Page 472 - Mastermind: The Truth of the British Deep State Revealed

This military success was particularly important because only four years

previously, the armies of the Balkan states, which were previously the Ottoman
Empire's, had heavily defeated the Empire. Indeed, had it not been for typhoid

fever and the cholera epidemic, the Bulgarian army would have occupied Is-
tanbul. Naturally, the Allied armies were confident that their success would

be quick and easy in Gallipoli. However, the Turkish army, by the valor of
her 250,000 martyrs, did not open the doors of Gallipoli. Military school stu-

dents from Istanbul volunteered to join the fight, willingly accepting the
prospect of martyrdom. Indeed, in the years 1915 and 1916, the Galatasaray

High School didn't have any graduates because each and every student had
been martyred in the battlefield. In 1917, there were only 5 students to grad-

uate. 50 students of the Istanbul High School had been martyred in just one
battle, which took place on May 19, 1915. Vefa High School and Çapa Teach-

ing School for Boys also didn't have any graduates during those same years.
Balıkesir High School and Balıkesir Teaching School for Boys had only 2

graduates from 1914 to 1918. Students in many schools in Thrace, after pre-
viously having their fathers martyred in the Balkan wars, didn't hesitate to vol-

unteer to fight in the Battle of Gallipoli and become martyrs themselves. Even
schools from distant cities such as Sivas, Trabzon, Konya, Erzurum and Kas-

tamonu lost their 1916-1917 graduates as honorable and noble martyrs of Gal-
lipoli. The effects of the loss of this educated generation would be severely felt

both during the Turkish War of Independence and the first years of the Re-
public. Yet, it had been the bravery and the blood of those martyred innocent

British and An-
zacs at the Gal-
lipoli peninsula.
These troops,
who dug
trenches to gain
a foothold on
shores, weren't
allowed to pass
through. (1915)

Mastermind: The Truth of the British Deep State Revealed