Item 01: Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett diary, 1915-1917 - Page 32
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[Page 32]
in doing so, but of course not in the manner in which I wished. It is obvious to me that unless we succeed in getting the Peninsular in the first two or three weeks, that our chance has gone forever, because it would be impossible to spare sufficient reinforcements from the Western Front to turn what was meant to be a secondary operation, into a great major operation of war. However, the spirit of all ranks seemed excellent, the Australians and New Zealanders were especially keen, on seeing active service for the first time, after their long months of preparation. This of course is the greatest enterprise of its nature ever undertaken in the history of any nation, and in spite of those careful preparations, I mistrusted our Staff work as I knew that the best brains of the Army were in France, and that even there, it had broken down time and time again. The cooperation between our Army and our Navy has seldom been happy in the past, and I felt that here we might see another example of jealousies and conflicting interests fraught with momentous consequences.
Other factors which it seemed to me would tell against us, would be the peculiarly heterogenuous character of the Expedition, involving as it did troops drawn from almost every nation fighting on the side of the Allies, and from almost every climate, from the North to the South Poles. I knew that there was likely to be friction between the French and ourselves as the former had always regarded the landing in the nature of a forlorn hope and it did not auger well for our success that they had appointed a General D'Amade, who had already been twice stellenboshed on the Western Front. He was supposed, however, to be a great friend of the English, having been the French Military Attache witn our