The New York herald., 1921-07-17


Berlin. July q. (
" OULD the allied fleet have forced the
Dardanelles and ended the war in
~ 1915?
Take ConsrantInople if it costs forty
ships" Winston Churchill is reputed to have
advised The attempt was made by and
abandoned after three ships had been lost
and three disabled on March IS, 1915 A
legend has sprung up that the Turkish forts
were virtually without ammunition and
the Straits might have been forced with one
more attack. And that the overconservative
Allies by fearing to risk a few battleships
involved themselves not only in the dire
Gallipoli expedition which their timidity ne
cessitated, but involved the world in the
immeasurable cost of three more years OF
fighting.
If this legend could be substantated IL
would make the decision to abandon the
naval attack on the Straits the most tragic
action in the war. 1t would render that
particular hour of conservatism the most
foolhardy prudence in the annals of the war.
But 1t cannot be substantiated, though
considerable light be thrown upon IL.
I have had access to the records of the
German navy dealing with these operations
and have some new and authoritative data
on the ornaments and ammunition i'm the
Turkish forts. furnished especially for this
present study by Admiral Peper, the Ger
man officer in charge of supplying the
Dardanelles defences. But while these facts
tempt one to believe in the almost certain
success of continued vigorous aggression by
the allied navies, the enigma of the Dar-
daneles remains unsolved and will probably
never be more than the topic of an incon-
elusive debate.
From one viewpoint the startling legend
can be substantiated The defence of the
Dardanelles an isolated military operation
supplies all evidence necessary to Justify the
strongest reproof of the allied command. For
the Turkish forts were not able to resist a
vigorous assault by sea. And Constantinople
lay beyond insecure before any modern and
determined attack
Had Constantinople fallen Bulgaria had
never joined the Germans Turkey as a
European Power would have ceased to exist
Precious Mesopotamia, the Mediterranean
coast and hinterland and islands could have
been exploited And, above all. Czarst Rus
sia could have been succored and the eastern
front saved. All told, one key of victory did
lie there in Constantinope and might have
been fetched by the Allies Fetched at
considerable price, to be sure, but what were
Churchill's forty ships weighed in the scales
against II and the three years more of war?
| myself remember having some of these
musings on March 10, 1915, | stood on
the parapet of masonry below the black and
moss-tnted tower of Tchanak Kale, and
looked from the narrows toward the great
bowl of water where the day before, the
allied fleet had crcled and stupendously
Numbered while the land trembled under
the storm of explosives. The enemy gave
no sign that morning, though the sun stood
clear above the smooth waters, and the
weather, / thought gave small reason for
ships or men to he idle Behind me the mas
sve walls of an ancient Turkish caste were
reduced to heap of dust covered stones
Scores of houses in the village had been
heaved up like geysers the day before with
the bursting of the ponderous naval shells
OF the Queen Elizabeth And my kit was
packed and I was ready to depart from
Tchanak for inland Anatolia when the allied
feet had finished its next assault. Word
had come from the German staff that a re-
treat would be made in case of need and that
the correspondents should hold themselves
rQady