Gallipoli

A series of intricate trenches were dug by the Anzacs hoping to capture the highest point of the peninsula, Chunuk Bair. Not even 8 meters away are trenches dug by Turkish soldiers hoping to protect Chunuk Bair. The trenches were dug so close to make camaraderie and killing easier.

Wars are fought not between people. People fighting are just pawns in the game controlled by a few figures and constructed ideologies that cause pawns to follow orders and shoot friends (as the Turks and Anzacs were). They sang together, shared food and cigarettes, and even helped bury each other’s dead. But, when orders came to shoot, they did. Strange. Thousands died. 500,000. The numbers don’t even include the injured or those taken away to be hospitalized. 86,000 Turks died in 8 months for their homeland and the other side in vain?

Both the Turks and Australians use Gallipoli as a marker of their countries’ formation. It was as the tour guide said, “the last gentlemen’s war”.

It was also here at Gallipoli that Mustafa Kemal “Ataturk” became a known and respected figure in Turkist nationalist history.