The breach with Turkey, so pregnant with evil destiny, did not attract much attention in England at the moment. All thoughts were then fixed upon the struggle of our thin and almost exhausted line to hold Ypres and check the enemy’s straining endeavour to command the Channel coast by occupying Dunkirk, Calais, and Boulogne. The Turk’s military reputation had fallen low in the Balkan War of 1912, and few realised how greatly his power had been re-established under Enver and the German military mission. Egypt was the only obvious point of danger, and the desert of Sinai appeared a sufficient protection against an unscientific and poverty-stricken foe; or, if the desert were penetrated, the Canal, though itself the point to be protected, was trusted to protect itself. On November 8, however, some troops from India seized Fao, at the mouth of the Tigris-Euphrates, and, with reinforcements, occupied Basrah on the 23rd, thus inaugurating that Mesopotamian expedition which, after terrible vicissitudes, reached Bagdad early in March 1917.
THE CAMPAIGN SUGGESTED
These measures, however, did not satisfy Mr. Churchill. At a meeting of the War Council on November 25, he returned to his idea of striking at the Gallipoli Peninsula, if only as a feint. Lord Kitchener considered the moment had not yet arrived, and regarded a suggestion to collect transport in Egypt for 40,000 men as unnecessary at present. In his own words, Mr. Churchill “put the project on one side, and thought no more of it for the time,” although horse-boats continued to be sent to Alexandria “in case the War Office should, at a later stage, wish to undertake a joint naval and military operation in the Eastern Mediterranean.”[8]
On January 2, 1915, a telegram from our Ambassador at Petrograd completely altered the situation. Russia, hard pressed in the Caucasus, called for a demonstration against the Turks in some other quarter. Certainly, at that moment, Russia had little margin of force. She was gasping from the effort to resist Hindenburg’s frontal attack upon Warsaw across the Bzura, and the contest had barely turned in her favour during Christmas week. In the Caucasus the situation had become serious, since Enver, by clever strategy, attempted to strike at Kars round the rear of a Russian army which then appeared to threaten an advance upon Erzeroum. On the day upon which the telegram was sent, the worst danger had already been averted, for in the neighbourhood of Sarikamish the Russians had destroyed Enver’s 9th Corps, and seriously defeated the 10th and 11th. But this fortunate and unexpected result was probably still unknown in Petrograd when our Ambassador telegraphed his appeal.
On the following day (January 3, 1915) an answer, drafted in the War Office, but sent through the Foreign Office, was returned, promising a demonstration against the Turks, but fearing that it would be unlikely to effect any serious withdrawal of Turkish troops in the Caucasus. Sir Edward Grey considered that “when our Ally appealed for assistance we were bound to do what we could.” But Lord Kitchener was far from hopeful. He informed Mr. Churchill that the only place where a demonstration might have some effect in stopping reinforcements going East would be the Dardanelles. But he thought we could not do much to help the Russians in the Caucasus; “we had no troops to land anywhere”; “we should not be ready for anything big for some months.”[9]
So, by January 3, we were bound to some sort of a demonstration in the Dardanelles, but Lord Kitchener regarded it as a mere feint in the hope of withholding or recalling Turkish troops from the Caucasus, and he evidently contemplated a purely or mainly naval demonstration which we could easily withdraw without landing troops, and without loss of prestige. In sending this answer to Petrograd, he does not appear to have consulted the War Council as a whole. His decision, though not very enthusiastic, was sufficient; for in the conduct of the war he dominated the War Council, as he dominated the country.
THE WAR COUNCIL
The War Council had taken the place of the old Committee of Imperial Defence (instituted in 1901, and reconstructed in 1904). The change was made towards the end of November 1914, but, except in one important particular, it was little more than a change in name. Like the old Committee, the Council were merely a Committee of the Cabinet, with naval and military experts added to give advice. The main difference was that the War Council, instead of laying its decisions before the Cabinet for approval or discussion, gave effect even to the most vital of them upon its own responsibility, and thus gathered into its own hands all deliberative and executive powers regarding military and naval movements. Sir Edward Grey, as Foreign Secretary, Mr. Lloyd George, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Lord Crewe, as Secretary for India, occasionally attended the meetings, and Mr. Balfour was invited to attend. But the real power remained with Mr. Asquith, the Prime Minister, Lord Kitchener, the Secretary for War, and Mr. Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty. In Mr. Asquith’s own words: “The daily conduct of the operations of the war was in the hands of the Ministers responsible for the Army and Navy in constant consultation with the Prime Minister.”[10]
LORD KITCHENER’S POWER
This inner trinity of Ministers was dominated, as we said, by Lord Kitchener’s massive personality. In his evidence before the Dardanelles Commission, Mr. Churchill thus described the effect of that remarkable man upon the other members: