World War 1
recreate and learn about world war 1
Recreating War
Sunday, Jun 9, 2013, 12:00 PM
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Causes of world war 1
The Australian involvement of WW1
Most of the men accepted into the army in August 1914 were sent first to Egypt, not Europe, to meet the threat Turkey posed to British interests in the Middle East and the Suez Canal. After four and a half months of training near Cairo, the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) departed by ship for the Gallipoli peninsula. The ANZACs landed at what became known as ANZAC Cove on 25 April 1915 and established a foothold on the steep slopes above the beach. During the early days of the campaign, the allies tried to break through Turkish lines, while the Turks tried to drive the allied troops off the peninsula. Attempts on both sides ended in failure and the ensuing stalemate continued for the remainder of 1915. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, revered in Turkey as the saviour of the Battle of Gallipoli and as the father of the country that he helped form after the war, wrote in 1934 a tribute to the ANZACs:
"Those heroes who shed their blood and lost their lives… you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours. You, the mothers who sent their sons from far away countries, wipe away your tears. Your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land, they have become our sons as well."
Following Gallipoli, Australian forces fought campaigns on the Western Front and in the Middle East. When the AIF divisions arrived in France, the war on the Western Front had long settled into a stalemate, with the opposing armies facing each other from trench systems that extended across Belgium and north-east France, from the English Channel to the Swiss border.