« Image of the Week: Davy's Death | Main | Sneak Peak »
May 02, 2005
Gallipoli
This April marked the 90th anniversary of the battle of Gallipoli...here's a thoughtful and fascinating note about that from a friend in Australia:
We have just celebrated ANZAC Day here in Aus and NZ. It is the celebration of the battle of Gallipoli, the Turkish peninsula, the dardinelles where in WW1 the allied forces including many thousands of Australian and New Zealand troops landed, and died, on the peninsula in the wrong place and badly organized by the English, including Winston Churchill.In Australian language 'it was a total stuffup by the poms.'Turkey has kept an area on the peninsula as a memorial to all of the dead. Bill Easton, my husband's father was a signalman at Gallipoli and survived.
The good thing is that, these days, thousands of backpackers, young aussies and nzers, turn up at Gallipoli in Turkey on April 25 to seewhere the incredible, but futile, sacrifice of those young soldiers took place.
During this terrible massacre the Turks and the ANZAC's met and struck a truce for a ceasefire while they buried the dead. Quite amazing but they also threw food into each other's trenches. It was when we ceased to be just convicts, or colonials, and realized we were as goodas them, 'the poms.
This year we were all interested in the different speeches by the Australian and NZ dignitaries. NZ, of course think for themselves, not in Iraq, rather unusual in these times. Our Australian Prime Minister, in bed with George Bush and Tony Blair, was very low key and diplomatic but the NZers were not. They were very candid in their speeches on the battle and disaster, alluding to the ineptitude of the English war council, prime minister and generals and praising the Turks for their courage and sacrifice defending their own land. The Turks were at the ceremony as well. How good was that?
Posted by rickbeyer at May 2, 2005 09:12 AM
Comments
Post a comment
Thanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)
(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)