Turkey on Friday hosts world leaders to mark the 100th anniversary of the start of the Battle of Gallipoli, nine months of remorseless slaughter that achieved nothing on the ground but helped forge national identity in societies up to the present day.
The Turkish authorities are hoping to send a message of peace in the two-day commemorations of the World War I battle but also emphasise its patriotic importance ahead of the country's June 7 legislative election.
Allied forces including Australian, British and New Zealand troops fought against the German-backed Ottoman army in what ended as one of the worst Allied retreats of the war.
But a dark shadow is cast by the 100th anniversary, also on April 24, for the start of the campaign of mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.
The Armenian authorities, which regard the massacres as genocide, have bitterly accused Turkey of bringing forward the Gallipoli ceremonies by one day from April 25 to hide an unwelcome passage in its history.
- 'Peace and brotherhood' -
Leaders including Prime Minister Tony Abbott of Australia and the heir to the British throne Prince Charles will join Turkish officials in paying tribute to the tens of thousands who died on both sides in the battle.
"The sons of nations who fought each other on opposing sides 100 years ago will gather under the same roof to convey the message of peace and brotherhood to the world," said President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
In a nationalist-tinged video released by the presidency ahead of the anniversary, Erdogan recites a poem by Turkish poet Arif Nihat Asya as Ottoman troops are shown praying before battle.
A series of ceremonies will be held on Friday April 24 at the cemeteries on the peninsula, with Australia and New Zealand holding the traditional Anzac Day dawn service on April 25.
The ground battle began on April 25, 1915 when the Allied troops landed on the Gallipoli peninsula, the strip of land on the north side of the Dardanelles Straits in the hope of blasting through Thrace to take Constantinople and knock the Ottoman Empire out of the war.
The land campaign was ordered after Ottoman forces in March prevented Allied naval ships from entering the Dardanelles.
After nine months of senseless carnage in which many were killed by disease as well as fighting, the last Allied troops were evacuated in January 1916 after what is usually seen as a failed campaign and cost Winston Churchill his job as first lord of the admiralty.
During the fighting, there were stories of the opposing sides exchanging foodstuffs and of the mutual respect between the "Mehmetcik" (Little Mehmets, the Turkish soldiers) and the "Tommies" on the Allied side.
- Birth of modern Turkey -
The Ottoman Empire, already on its last legs, would lose World War I along with its imperial German allies.
But the Battle of Gallipoli has come to be regarded as a triumph of Turkish resistance which prevented occupation and sowed the seeds for the foundation of modern Turkey in 1923.
"Stop traveller! Unbeknown to you, this ground you come and tread on is where an epoch lies," read the words etched into the hillside seen by any modern day visitor to the Dardanelles Straits.
A key commander under German General Otto Liman von Sanders was a lieutenant colonel named Mustafa Kemal, who as Ataturk would found the modern Turkish state and remains the country's national icon to this day.
Mustafa Kemal deployed the 57th regiment to thwart the initial attack, famously telling them: "I assume there is no-one among us who would not rather die than to repeat the shameful history of the Balkan Wars." The regiment was almost completely wiped out.
For the young nations of Australia and New Zealand, the sacrifices of their troops in a conflict many thousands of miles from home was of huge importance in building their own national consciousness.
The battlefield sites of Gallipoli have for years been a traditional rite of passage for hundreds of thousands of young Aussies and Kiwis reconnecting with their nations' roots.
Among those who sought to expose the incompetence of some of the Allied commanders was a Australian war correspondent named Keith Murdoch, father of press baron Rupert Murdoch.
Films released ahead of the anniversary included the Turkish blockbuster "Son Mektup" ("The Last Letter") which aims to instill a patriotic fervour and Australian-Turkish production "The Water Diviner" starring Russell Crowe and big Turkish stars which preaches reconciliation.
Turkey on Friday hosts world leaders to mark the 100th anniversary of the start of the Battle of Gallipoli, nine months of remorseless slaughter that achieved nothing on the ground but helped forge national identity in societies up to the present day.
The Turkish authorities are hoping to send a message of peace in the two-day commemorations of the World War I battle but also emphasise its patriotic importance ahead of the country’s June 7 legislative election.
Allied forces including Australian, British and New Zealand troops fought against the German-backed Ottoman army in what ended as one of the worst Allied retreats of the war.
But a dark shadow is cast by the 100th anniversary, also on April 24, for the start of the campaign of mass killings of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire.
The Armenian authorities, which regard the massacres as genocide, have bitterly accused Turkey of bringing forward the Gallipoli ceremonies by one day from April 25 to hide an unwelcome passage in its history.
– ‘Peace and brotherhood’ –
Leaders including Prime Minister Tony Abbott of Australia and the heir to the British throne Prince Charles will join Turkish officials in paying tribute to the tens of thousands who died on both sides in the battle.
“The sons of nations who fought each other on opposing sides 100 years ago will gather under the same roof to convey the message of peace and brotherhood to the world,” said President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
In a nationalist-tinged video released by the presidency ahead of the anniversary, Erdogan recites a poem by Turkish poet Arif Nihat Asya as Ottoman troops are shown praying before battle.
A series of ceremonies will be held on Friday April 24 at the cemeteries on the peninsula, with Australia and New Zealand holding the traditional Anzac Day dawn service on April 25.
The ground battle began on April 25, 1915 when the Allied troops landed on the Gallipoli peninsula, the strip of land on the north side of the Dardanelles Straits in the hope of blasting through Thrace to take Constantinople and knock the Ottoman Empire out of the war.
The land campaign was ordered after Ottoman forces in March prevented Allied naval ships from entering the Dardanelles.
After nine months of senseless carnage in which many were killed by disease as well as fighting, the last Allied troops were evacuated in January 1916 after what is usually seen as a failed campaign and cost Winston Churchill his job as first lord of the admiralty.
During the fighting, there were stories of the opposing sides exchanging foodstuffs and of the mutual respect between the “Mehmetcik” (Little Mehmets, the Turkish soldiers) and the “Tommies” on the Allied side.
– Birth of modern Turkey –
The Ottoman Empire, already on its last legs, would lose World War I along with its imperial German allies.
But the Battle of Gallipoli has come to be regarded as a triumph of Turkish resistance which prevented occupation and sowed the seeds for the foundation of modern Turkey in 1923.
“Stop traveller! Unbeknown to you, this ground you come and tread on is where an epoch lies,” read the words etched into the hillside seen by any modern day visitor to the Dardanelles Straits.
A key commander under German General Otto Liman von Sanders was a lieutenant colonel named Mustafa Kemal, who as Ataturk would found the modern Turkish state and remains the country’s national icon to this day.
Mustafa Kemal deployed the 57th regiment to thwart the initial attack, famously telling them: “I assume there is no-one among us who would not rather die than to repeat the shameful history of the Balkan Wars.” The regiment was almost completely wiped out.
For the young nations of Australia and New Zealand, the sacrifices of their troops in a conflict many thousands of miles from home was of huge importance in building their own national consciousness.
The battlefield sites of Gallipoli have for years been a traditional rite of passage for hundreds of thousands of young Aussies and Kiwis reconnecting with their nations’ roots.
Among those who sought to expose the incompetence of some of the Allied commanders was a Australian war correspondent named Keith Murdoch, father of press baron Rupert Murdoch.
Films released ahead of the anniversary included the Turkish blockbuster “Son Mektup” (“The Last Letter”) which aims to instill a patriotic fervour and Australian-Turkish production “The Water Diviner” starring Russell Crowe and big Turkish stars which preaches reconciliation.
