The Failure of the Dardanelles Campaign and its Importance for New Zealand's Culture (eBook)

Essay from the year 2019 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Australia, New Zealand, grade: 1,3, Technical University of Braunschweig, language: English, abstract: This essay is mainly focussing on New Zealand's involvement in the battle against the Ottoman Empire, as well as the effects it had on the culture and national identity of New Zealanders.

In 1915, the First World War raged across Western Europe. When the war broke out in the prior year, the nations involved in the conflict on the Western Front believed in a rapid victory. The reality turned out to be quite different. Instead of achieving any success, British, Commonwealth, French, and Belgian troops were facing German troops in brutal trench warfare in France and Belgium. Throughout the entirety of this type of warfare, neither side made any significant or lasting progress.

Therefore, in 1915, British High Command came up with the plan of attacking the Ottoman Empire, Germany's ally in the east, and breaking through the Dardanelles strait to capture Constantinople. Alongside this, there was also the idea of aiding the Russian Empire by allowing supply shipments and thus possibly causing a relief on the Western Front. However, the Dardanelles campaign turned out to be one of the most fatal and costly military disasters throughout the history of the First World War.