TURKS' FLIGHT FROM LULE BURGAS.

Colonist, Volume LIV, Issue 13567, 7 November 1912, Page 5

TURKS' FLIGHT FROM LULE BURGAS.

THE WEAK LEFT TO DIE,

IF CHATALDJA FAILS

BLACK OUTLOOK AT CONSTANTS NOPLK.

TURKEY'S UNPREPAREDNESS

DECEPTION OF THE WORLD

SCATHING CONDEMNATION OF THE GENERAL STAFF.

(Received Nov 6, 10.50 p.m.)

London, Nov 6

Mr Martin Donohoe, tho "Daily Telegraph's' ' correspondent, describing the retreat after tho battle of Lulo Burgas, says the strongest speedily got to the front, whilo tho weak, sick, and wounded struggled painfully behind. Thousands of wounded made pathetic efforts to keep up with their comrades, but many fell by tho roadside or crawled off the- track and died. For three days "all wero without food, and every stream was turned into a mud puddle in the fearful struggle to quench tho thirst.

The Turks at the commencement of the campaign were 2000 officers short, and tho loss of officers during the battle was enormous. Hence the impossibility of maintaining a semblance of order during the retreat. >

Looking back from the rising ground at Chorlu an extraordinary sight was presented. Fifty thousand stragglers dotted tho plain, men, horses, guns, and ox waggons all converging on two roads leading to Chorlu, and bont on reaching it before nightfall.

If tho routed army fails at ChataMja it will fall back on Constantinople, and tho starving hordes are bound to begin looting. The city's forces are incapable of preserving order.

Tho military authorities at Constantinople throughout the campaign havo deliberately deceived the outside world, hoping that the bravery of tho Turks would pull them through* at the eleventh hour. Tho army was defeated through sheer starvation rather than any other

factor

The Turkish army has no general staff capable of running a country circus. The greatest battle of modern times was fought without the smallest preparation for the succour of the wounded, and the few surgeons lacked every necessary. The artillery had but a few hours' supply of ammunition, while whole battalions and brigades wero composed of ignorant Anatolian peasants, thousands of whom had never handled a rifle. TJho correspondent did not see a Turkish machine gun in action.

The Bulgarians' artillery was matchless, and the ammunition supply was a masterpiece of organisation. The machine gun fire was deadly.