EAST OF JORDAN
Before Haifa fell our troops were moving swiftly east of Jordan. A Division of Indian and Yeomanry cavalry crossed the Jordan about Beisan and rode eastward. Simultaneously, the Anzac Mounted Division forded and swam the river further to the south, and moved on Es Salt and Amman. The Australians and New Zealanders were familiar with the country. This was their third expedition to the Plateau of Moab and the heights of Gilead. They knew every goat-walk on the steep mountain side. This time they had come to stay; the Fourth Turkish Army on the East was to share the fate of the 7th and 8th Armies on Samaria. The tactics employed on both sides of the river were broadly similar. General Allenby depended for success upon the speed and stamina of his horses. Before the operations commenced, the Turk held a defensive position which was roughly an extension of his line west of the Jordan. He was strong in the foothills of Gilead; on the mountain he had his base at Es Salt, and at Amman he had a substantial force guarding a vital series of tunnels and viaducts on his Hedjaz railway. Beyond the railway the Eastern Palestine Range flattens out on the wide desert, which extends right across to the Euphrates. On the fringe of the desert was the Army of the Sherif of Mecca, a picturesque, galloping, thrusting, well-armed force. The Arabs harassed the Turk by day and night, repeatedly dashing in and cutting his railway and telegraph communications with Damascus. When attacked, they would fade away into the wide desert and leave the slow-footed Turk in the air. While the Anzacs marched upon Es Salt and Amman, the Arabs made a detour in the desert, appeared on the flank of the enemy north of Deraa, and cut the railway where the Hedjaz line junctions with the line which supplied the Turks west of the Jordan.