Gallipoli Campaign 1915: Why the Dardanelles Attack Failed

The Gallipoli campaign (also called the Dardanelles campaign) was an Allied attempt in 1915 to force the Dardanelles strait, capture Constantinople and knock the Ottoman Empire out of World War 1. It failed. After the fleet lost three battleships to mines on 18 March 1915, British, French, Australian and New Zealand troops landed on the Gallipoli peninsula on 25 April 1915, were pinned to a few narrow beachheads for eight and a half months, and were evacuated by 9 January 1916. Each side lost roughly 250,000 men killed, wounded or sick, and the Ottoman Empire stayed in the war until 1918.

This article is for readers who want a clear answer to what happened at Gallipoli, why the plan failed and what it still teaches anyone who plays a strategy game about 1914-1918.

Gallipoli in numbers

• Dates: naval attack 19 February - 18 March 1915; land campaign 25 April 1915 - 9 January 1916, about 259 days.
• The strait: the Dardanelles is roughly 61 km long and only about 1.2 km wide at its narrowest point.
• Naval attack of 18 March: 18 Allied battleships took part; 3 were sunk (Bouvet, Irresistible, Ocean) and 3 more were badly damaged, almost all by a line of 26 mines.
• Troops: about 490,000 Allied soldiers served on the peninsula over the whole campaign.
• Dead: roughly 44,000 Allied soldiers, including about 8,700 Australians and 2,800 New Zealanders, and at least 56,000 Ottoman soldiers (estimates vary by source).
• Evacuation: the Anzac and Suvla beachheads were emptied on 10-20 December 1915, and the last troops left Helles on the night of 8-9 January 1916.

Why the Allies attacked the Dardanelles

By the end of 1914 the Western Front was frozen in trenches (see our timeline of World War 1). Winston Churchill, then First Lord of the Admiralty, argued that a naval strike through the Dardanelles could break the deadlock in a different place. The plan had three goals: open a sea route to Russia, which was short of shells and cut off from its allies, take Constantinople, and force the Ottoman Empire to surrender.

On paper the idea was attractive. The Ottoman army was stretched across the Caucasus, Mesopotamia and Palestine (we describe those fronts in the Ottoman Empire in World War 1), and the Russian army on the Eastern Front badly needed relief. In practice the Allies underestimated the forts, the mines and the defenders, and they had no reserve ready if the fleet alone did not succeed.

The naval attack of 18 March 1915

The first phase was a bombardment by Allied battleships. On 18 March 18 ships entered the strait to silence the forts at the Narrows. Unknown to the Allied commanders, the Ottoman minelayer Nusret had laid a line of 26 mines parallel to the Asian shore only ten days earlier, in a bay where the ships turned.

Within hours the French battleship Bouvet sank with most of her crew, and the British Irresistible and Ocean struck mines and were lost. Admiral Sir John de Robeck broke off the attack. The forts had barely been damaged, and the Ottoman defenders had learned how thin the Allied plan was. The fleet never tried again, and the task passed to the army. The lessons about blockade and sea power are also central to the Battle of Jutland and the naval blockade.

The landings of 25 April 1915

General Sir Ian Hamilton commanded the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force. Because the fleet had failed, the troops were landed only after five weeks of delay, and this gave the Ottoman Fifth Army under the German general Otto Liman von Sanders time to dig in.

On 25 April the Allies landed at several points:

• Cape Helles: British troops, including the 29th Division, landed on five beaches at the tip of the peninsula. At V Beach the collier River Clyde ran aground and the men leaving her came under heavy fire.
• Anzac Cove: the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (Anzac) landed on the west coast, about 1.6 km north of the intended beach, below steep cliffs and ridges.
• Kum Kale: French troops made a diversionary landing on the Asian side.

At Anzac Cove the Ottoman 19th Division, led by Lieutenant Colonel Mustafa Kemal (the future Atatürk), counterattacked and held the high ground. Within days every beachhead was boxed in. Anzac Day, 25 April, is still commemorated in Australia and New Zealand.

The August offensive and the stalemate

By summer the campaign had become trench warfare on a small strip of land, with heat, flies, dysentery and little shelter. Hamilton planned a final push for 6 August 1915. It had three parts:

• Lone Pine: an Australian diversionary attack on 6-10 August that became a bloody fight in covered Ottoman trenches.
• Chunuk Bair: New Zealand troops reached the summit on 8 August and held it for two days before an Ottoman counterattack led by Mustafa Kemal retook it.
• Suvla Bay: a new British landing on 6-7 August that was slow to move inland and lost the chance to seize the ridges.

After the failure of the August offensive, Hamilton was replaced by General Sir Charles Monro in October 1915. Bulgaria joined the Central Powers that month, which opened a rail route from Germany to the Ottoman Empire and made reinforcements for the Turks easier to send. Monro recommended evacuation, and Field Marshal Lord Kitchener agreed after visiting in November.

Why Gallipoli failed

Historians usually point to five causes:

• Poor intelligence and maps. The Allies did not know about the mine line, and the terrain at Anzac was far steeper than expected.
• Divided command. The navy and army worked in sequence rather than together, and the five-week pause gave the defenders time.
• Limited supplies. Shells and reserves were also needed on the Western Front, so Gallipoli was never fully resourced.
• Strong defenders. The Ottoman soldiers held the high ground and were led by determined officers.
• Disease and weather. Sickness caused huge losses in summer, and a blizzard in late November 1915 caused severe frostbite.

The one success of the campaign was the evacuation. About 83,000 men were taken off Anzac and Suvla in ten days in December 1915 with almost no losses, after fake rifles firing by water drips helped hide the withdrawal.

What Gallipoli means for strategy players

Gallipoli is the classic case of a landing without sea superiority and without a second wave ready to go. If you plan an amphibious attack in a strategy game, the same questions apply: who controls the water, how fast can reinforcements arrive and what happens if the first wave gets stuck? Our guide to naval warfare in Frontkrieg explains how fleets, landings and sea zones work, and the map of Europe in 1914 shows which coasts are worth fighting for.

Frontkrieg is a free real-time grand strategy game with no pay-to-win: 4,800 provinces, up to 500 players, 70 AI nations and a new match every day. Your decisions play out over days of real time, much like the long campaigns of 1915.

Frequently asked questions

How long did the Gallipoli campaign last?

The land campaign lasted from 25 April 1915 to 9 January 1916, about 259 days or eight and a half months. If you count the naval attack that began on 19 February 1915, it lasted almost eleven months.

Why did the Gallipoli campaign fail?

It failed because the fleet could not pass the mines and forts, the troops landed too late and in the wrong places, and the Ottoman defenders held the high ground. Poor maps, divided command, shortages and disease did the rest.

Who won the Battle of Gallipoli?

The Ottoman Empire won. It stopped the Allied advance, kept the Dardanelles closed and held Constantinople. The Allies evacuated by 9 January 1916 without achieving any of their aims.

How many soldiers died at Gallipoli?

Roughly 44,000 Allied soldiers and at least 56,000 Ottoman soldiers died, with about 250,000 casualties on each side when wounded and sick are included. Exact figures differ between sources.

Why is Gallipoli important?

It made Mustafa Kemal famous, shaped the national identity of Australia and New Zealand through Anzac Day, and kept Russia cut off from its allies, which weakened it before 1917. It also ended Churchill's career at the Admiralty for a time.

Conclusion

The Gallipoli campaign was a bold plan with the right goal and the wrong means. The strait stayed closed, the Ottoman Empire stayed in the war and about half a million Allied soldiers fought for nothing but a narrow strip of land. If you want to test your own plan for a landing or a blockade, start a match in Frontkrieg and read more history and strategy in our blog. For the full background, see the Gallipoli campaign on Wikipedia.