GALLIPOLI LANDING

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22469, 13 July 1936, Page 9

GALLIPOLI LANDING

OFFICER'S CRITICISM AUSTRALIANS BLAMED NON-USE OF HOWITZERS By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright (Received July 12, 5.5 p.m.) SYDNEY, July 12 Major-General Sir Charles Rosenthal, in the Gallipoli lecture yesterday, said: "Australia carries a grave responsibility for the failure at Gallipoli. I say that deliberately and without fear of contradiction. "If the howitzers had been landed to support the Anzacs on their first day on the peninsula the war might have been shortened by two or three years." Major-General Rosenthal served as an officer at the landing and explained that before the war he was in command of a special howitzer battery which had been formed in New South W ales. He urged the military Commander that these guns should be taken abroad with the troops. During his lecture, the officer said: "If, on the first morning at Gallipoli we had had the howitzers on the beach I am certain our infantry would have reached their objective, Gun Ridge, on the same morning." A message from Melbourne states that in commenting upon MajorGeneral Rosenthal's lecture, General Sir Talbot Hobbs, who was commander of the First Australian Division, said he entirely disagreed that the Gallipoli failure was Australia's responsibility. "To say that the absence of the j four guns Major-General Rosenthal I mentioned was the cause of our failure ! at the landing to my mind is absurd," ! said Sir Talbot. | "I think that if Major-General Rosenthal inspected the ground from Cape Ellis to Suvla Bay, he would realise that there were many more ridges beyond Gun Ridge and that the whole area was a vast natural fortress garrisoned by brave and resolute soldiers, led by efficient generals who knew the ground and were experts in defence." Australia did her best and all she was able to do."