Page 74 - Wish Stream Year of 2018

was expected. Before we played, however, we still had one more point on our tour to visit: the Australian War Memorial and Museum. This was a very humbling experience that provided the grounding of why we were touring Australia. This memorial is dedicated to all members who died or participated in those wars involving the Commonwealth of Australia. The building itself was impressive, with a very peaceful and reflec- tive space above ground, with a huge detailed museum situated beneath.
Our final game commenced that afternoon, with the crowd well established in the stadium. Mim- icking the aggression our PTIs have pulled from us on the Obstacle courses in Camberley, the RMAS team gave 100% from the start and a full high tempo game commenced. The pace was relentless, and with the 25°C heat, substitutions came thick and fast. A game of constant attacks and counter attacks had the crowd enthralled, which was complemented beautifully by the com- mentary of WO1 (CRSM) Ridgeway-Buckley WG.
72 SANDHURST
Exercise KOOKABURRA CADET – ANZAC Day
OCdt Jalili
On 25th April 1915 the first troops of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) landed just south of Ari Burnu, in
an unremarkable cove overlooking the Aegean Sea. Their mission, as part of a wider Allied amphibious operation comprising of British, French and other forces, was to secure the Dardanelles and march to the Ottoman capital of Constantinople. The invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsular was off to a bad start; undetected currents and navigational error had driven the ANZAC force one mile north of the intended land- ing beach at Gaba Tepe. Unlike the open objec- tive to the South, Ari Burnu (formally renamed ‘ANZAC Cove’ by the Turkish Government in 1985) was difficult going, and the ANZACs were immediately faced with steep cliffs up to 90m in height. Despite being garrisoned by only two Ottoman companies, this small defending force nonetheless inflicted grave casualties on the ANZACs from their dominant position on the
high ground surrounding the cove. Taking hold of gorse bushes in the cliff-face and forcing bayo- nets between rocks as handholds, the ANZACs fought fiercely up the headland and eventually overran the Ottoman troops defending its sum- mit. Beyond the beach, further cliffs and shrubs presented a formidable barrier, and small groups of ANZACs, who successfully penetrated further inland, were soon cut off, surrounded, and killed. Unable to make the decisive drive into the Penin- sular, the ANZACs soon fell victim to the Turkish counter-attacking forces. Under the command of Mustafa Kemal (later named ‘Atatürk’, founder of the Republic of Turkey and its first President), the Turkish counter-attack halted the ANZAC advance. What followed were eight months of stalemate, marked by continuous close-range fighting and heavy shelling. By the time the ANZACs withdrew to Egypt in January 1916, an estimated 115,000 British and dominion troops were killed or wounded. Of these 28,150 casu-