The exact truth of the conditions in India and Egypt will possibly never be known, so rigorous were the operations of the censorship set up by the British War Office. One thing is certain, however: in both countries political conditions were serious before the war and they could not, by any stretch of optimism, be conceived as improving with the coming of a great struggle aimed at the only remaining independent Mohammedan power.
For many months previous to August, 1914, the Indian office in London had been apprehensive of rebellion in India. In Egypt the circumstance that at the beginning of the war the British authorities announced that they would make no use of the native Egyptian army speaks for itself. It was believed in Constantinople and in Berlin that both Egypt and India were ripe for a terrible revolt against the rule of the British Raj: the uprisings of millions of fanatical natives that would forever sweep British control from these two key places to the trade of the world and would institute a Turkish suzerainty, backed and controlled by Berlin. This was thought all the more likely as thousands of the British regular troops had been withdrawn from India and Egypt for service in France, being replaced by raw levies from England and the Colonies.
These, then, were the major considerations that prompted the early offensive against Egypt. It was based upon sound political and military strategy. Just how near it came to complete success, just how much additional worry and effort it added to the burden of Great Britain and France, only a complete revelation of the progress of events in all fields will tell.
In the attack upon the canal the Turks operated primarily from their base at Damascus. As preparations progressed the troops that were to take part in the actual advance were concentrated between Jerusalem and Akabah. Under command of Djemel Pasha, Turkish Minister of Marine, there were gathered some 50,000 troops consisting mostly of first line troops of the best quality, reenforced by about 10,000 more or less irregular Arab Bedouins.
During November and early December, 1914, the force was moved forward by slow and methodical stages, until by December 15 it was awaiting orders to advance, encamped on the confines of the great desert that separated it from its objective.
Here it is well that the reader should have a good idea of the difficulties of the task the Turkish higher command had imposed upon Djemel Pasha and his troops.
The two chief difficulties to be met by the invaders of the Sinai were lack of transport facilities and lack of water. Three routes were possible for the Turkish army, all artificial obstacles being for the moment ignored; two by land, across the Sinai desert, and the third by sea, across the Mediterranean. The latter, however, must be ruled out because the seas were controlled by the Anglo-French fleet. For the same reason, the northern land route had many disadvantages, because it could be commanded for a part of its length by warships. However, it is instructive to examine it in detail.
The whole region crossed by the sea road is desert of the most difficult and forbidding character. By this road all the great invasions—the Roman, Egyptian, Assyrian, Greek, and French—have been made. The road enters the desert at El Arish and from there to El Kantara on the Suez Canal, the probable point of attack of an army moving by this route, is 100 miles. Over this whole distance there are only three places, once an army has left El Arish, where water can be had. The first is a matter of a day's march, at El Maza, thirty mile away; the second is at Bir-El-Abd, another day's march; and the third at Katieh, within striking distance of the canal. Without the construction of a special railway the transport of a force large enough to efficiently control the canal by this route seems to be out of the question.
The southern route, known as the Hadj, or Pilgrim's Road, running from Akaba to Suez, besides being longer is even worse off in the matter of water. This was the traditional path of pilgrims traveling from Egypt to Mecca, and still is much in use for that purpose.
Something like 150 miles separate Akaba and Suez, yet only two watering places are to be found in the whole distance. The first is three days' march from the former place, at a point called Nakhl, where modern cisterns had been built and an adequate supply of water for a large force probably was obtainable. The next watering place is another three days' march, at Ayun Mousa, or Well of Moses, within a short distance of the canal.