The Daily News. MONDAY, MARCH 12, 1917. THE DARDANELLES REPORT.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 March 1917, Page 4

The Daily News. MONDAY, MARCH 12, 1917. THE DARDANELLES REPORT.

Although the cabled report of the Dardanelles Inquiry Commission will command attention, it is matter of extreme regret that it should have been published till after the close of the war. Such a humiliating record of ineptitude and administrative chaos should not have been given to the world at the most critical period of the war. It is safe to assume there was not a single person of average intelligence and unbiased mind, either in Britain or in any other part of the Empire, who was not perfectly well aware that gross bungling and probably culpable negligence had characterised the initiation and conduct of the Dardanelles campaign. Not an atom of good could be done by making the report public at the present time, but a vast- deal eu harm must ensue. Apart from the intense satisfaction, possibly mingled with sneering pity, that it will evoke from our enemies, the laying bare of the "go as you please" methods which were in vogue among the members of the British Cabinet, the War Council, and the experts on naval and military strategy, will only add fuel to fires of a political nature. A more damning indictment could'hardly have been framed, although efforts to gloss over glaring blunders have been painfully and unsuccessfully made. Historians of the war are not so likely to blame the men chiefly concerned as the system under which such a costly fiasco became possible. If we probe for the real cause of this ill-starred expedition it will be found in politics—the bane of all English military operations—and the first result of the publication of the report is an outbreak of bitter party feeling. Yet, after all, it is not the British who should feel deeply aggrieved, mortified, and ashamed of the death trap for the Empire's valiant sons. Rather is it Australia and New Zealand who might have been expected to make a welljustified outcry, for it was the flower of their manhood who bled and died for a forlorn hope, made so by the gross,callousness of the British Cabinet, and the inexplicable silence of the military and naval experts at a time when their vigorous protests could have commanded the attention they deserved. Why were they mutely acquiescent in decisions they knew to bo rash and practically tending to disaster? That was the main question the Commission had to investigate as a preliminary to what' followed, . but their report is vague and unsatisfactory. It is quite conceivable the Commissioners had a premonition their report would be published, for they knew —as did the public generally—that political partymongers were eagerly waiting to make capital out of the disastrous expedition, and this may have operated to tone down the blame so that as little harm as possible could be done. There is, however, no difficulty in reading between the lines of the report, and obtaining a fairly good insight into the whole business, without unduly reading into it facts and conclusions -...it aw unjustifiable The pity of it is that the one dominant voice is no\ for eve) stilled. Lord Kitchener '! have thrown much light on the si...jcct hat not death Temoved him from his higl position, and it is because he is dead wt must be very chary in accepting state inents which would cause us to lesser our faith in his military geuiun and tac tical skill. Apparently the fatal plungi Ibad heen decided upon at a time whei lie was unable to supply a hind fore!

to co-opera to with the fleet, and lie is said to have caught at the idea of a naval operation alone, the futility of which does not appear to have been brought to his attention till the mischief was done, and then it was that the Auzacs were despatched on that forlorn hope from which so many failed to return. Neither Australia nor New Zealand pressed for this report to be made public. Their loyalty is to the cause the .Motherland is championing, and not to political party leaders. They have suilV-red in silence and with courage. It is not unreasonable to assume that they will greatly regret the unpardonable indiscretion in publishing the report at the present juncture. The ugly skeleton should have remained in the cupboard till after the war. We do nol propose to discuss the report at present, tiie revelations being of a character that must make all patriots burn with slmim and give our enemies full scope for their contemptuous gibes. It was, humiliating enough to have to withdraw from the Peninsula without having the salt rubbed into the wound. The wonder is that in spite of all the ineptitude of the British authorities we are winning the war, thanks to the whole-hearted enthusiasm of the manhood of the Empire, and it is to that we must confidently look to achieve the final triumph. The faults and follies of the past are gone beyond recall, and we are still justified in believing that the lessons they convey have been taken to heart. It is the present and the future that demand our attention. Time enough after the war to review the faults of those who, while meaning well, were personally lacking in the tactical and strategical skill that was at their service and should have been utilised to the utmost —not to carryout their views, but to advise and warn, freely and frankly.