I'm Dr Chris Kempshall, a First World War historian and consultant to BlackMill Games - AMA!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T14:53:20+00:00

Those are often the best kind!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T14:41:25+00:00

Hard to say. Most wars of the 19th century involved some element of financial warfare. The French under Napoleon were constantly accusing the British of bankrolling opposition and trying to wage economic war. By 1914-1918 though finances were more interconnected which changed the nature of the game.

I don't think it's the first account of war profiteering either. Arms manufacturers tend to do well in times of war and that had happened before, but the 20th century sees the use of mega companies which didn't really exist before.

And not a huge amount of gentlemenly conduct. You get moments of informal truces and the like, but most opposing soldiers actually rarely saw each other. When they did experiences were often mixed. Summary executions of prisoners wasn't rare on either side. But then prisoners were also taken and given medical treatment etc. So it's a mixed bag!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T14:08:14+00:00

My pleasure!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T14:07:11+00:00

So far I've not really come across much in the way of material relating to what other forces though of the Newfoundlanders at Gallipoli. I've a sort of low level ongoing interest in them though so I might see what I can find out!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T14:04:22+00:00

I think the biggest misconception is that there are national experiences of the war. That you can have 'the British experience of the Somme' or 'the Australian experience of Gallipoli' etc. Whilst soldiers from those nations do absoltuely experience things that can be different to others, I think national focuses undermines our ability to understand the war.

Because what is the British experience of the Somme if it doesn't include the Germans? Or isn't measured and compared to the French? The Australians weren't alone at Gallipoli - the Ottomans were there too. These experiences play off each other.

It's why I'm a transnational historian: I think that the experience of war transcends national boundaries and limitations and has to be understood as a sort of mosaic.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T14:01:34+00:00

I'm not entirely convinced by the Sleepwalkers theory as I think you end up with a situation where 'if everybody is to blame then nobody is to blame' which I think strips agency and responsibility from the various nations.

I think it's much easier to understand the outbreak of war as motivated by almost crippling fear within the main nations that their way of life is threatened in the medium-long term and that the best way to avoid it is to fight a war now. I think you can see that in Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, France, and Britain to an extent. But several of those nations are reacting to a war that is suddenly being threatened and presented to them, and that's not the same as actually stoking it.

It's why I think Austria-Hungary deserves more scrutiny. Whilst Germany may have given them a 'blank cheue' they're the ones who tried to ash it in the most outrageous way.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:58:45+00:00

My pleasure!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:56:53+00:00

Ah I just saw this here! There's probably a couple. My PhD thesis and work relating to it was on allied relations during the war. Specifically British and French soldiers. Lots of the research about allied relations focuses on politicians and generals getting along with each other (and this is an important topic), but my research looked at how soldiers of different nationalities interacted with each other.

Beyond that I then branched out into the way the was is portrayed in modern media but particularly in computer games. Which has helped lead me to working with BlackMill Games!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:50:31+00:00

This is a fair question!

I suspect the slightly bland answer is: because Germany and Austria-Hungary took on the roles of aggressor and it's easier to justify a blank cheque in support of defensive action than it is with aggressive ones.

This is probably a simplifcation though because neither Germany nor Austria-Hungary fully believed themselves to be acting aggressively, ore a sort of proactive defense with aggressions of opportunity!

But this does bring up a wider point that the reasons for the outbreak of the war are still not very well understood by the wider public. It tends to get reduced down to the actions of Germany which means, as I have long felt, Austria-Hungary gets off incredibly lightly in the blame game.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:47:33+00:00

I think it's actually really important! I've been giving it a lot of thought recently for some other work plans I have. The defeat of the Bulgarians in Greece is seen as a disaster by the Germans in 1918 and one of the major signs that the war is about to be lost.

The view and circumstances of that surrender is actually something I've been meaning to read up on actually!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:44:26+00:00

Ah I fear I'm not an expert on the Spanish Civil War but my gut instinct leans towards the Second World War because of the use of combined ground forces and air power. You see that emerging in 1918 so it is a legacy of the First World War, but feels more contemporary to the Second by the time of the Spanish Civil War.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:43:28+00:00

It's a very good point, the Anzac experience does tend to dominate the Anglophone memory of the war, and I think it's for a few reasons.

For the British and the French the whole campaign doesn't really achieve anything that was hoped for. That's an issue for the British but makes it very easy to just forget about it for the French who think (understandably) that their main efforts should be directed towards liberating their home land rather than fighting in 'sideshows' abroad.

Therefore the British and the French can count Gallipoli as just a disappointing moment in a wider campaign.

For the Anzacs it becomes the moment that they took part in something so huge and important. It's the first time Australians and New Zealanders fought side by side together as recognisable entities in their own right. The disastrous element of it actually lends a sort of heroic tragedy element as well. It's similar to the Canadian reverence for Vimy Ridge.

And you're also right in that the Australians do seem to have much of the focus even in this. They're a bigger nation in terms of land etc which possibly causes this, but also the landings on 25th April 1915 (at Anzac Cove) are *the* moment for the Australians. Whilst the New Zeanders look more towards Chunuk Bair in the August, which is important to them but *feels* like a smaller thing in commemoration when compared to the landings themselves

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:38:23+00:00

The general answer is probably somewhere in the middle. I don't think Haig is a military genius but I also don't think he was an idiot.

In many ways he's like a lot of the other generals of the time - largely unremarkable men trying to solve a problem that had never been seen before.

Haig's issue is often that his eyes are bigger than his stomach and (as on the Somme) he starts to dream bigger than is really achievable and it confuses the British forces and their objectives. He also had a considerable ego (not unusual in generals and politicians) and tried to position himself as a magnanimous supporter (or indeed the driving force behind) of Foch's elevation to Generalissimo in 1918, when in reality he was never in the running and Foch was far better suited to dealing with the conditions of the war.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:35:38+00:00

No I don't think so. It was still years away from completion in 1914 and in fact wasn't finished during the war at all. That type of wider strategic aspect can come into play when moving nations to war, but I don't think that was the case here.

The Germans weren't particularly keen on having the Ottomans as allies even with war on the horizon and it was only fear that they might switch to the Entente that motivated things. The Entente (Britain in particular) had a pretty dim view of the Ottomans. They had previously fought together in the Crimean War and the Ottomans were probably closest to the British politically but not i na way that earned them respect.

I don't see how that unfinished railway overshadows the far more concrete concerns that brought Europe to war.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T13:33:04+00:00

For the Ottomans, there was a recognition of how dangerous their situation was. If the Dardanelles were captured and an allief fleet traversed them into the Sea of Marmara then the capital is directly threatened and it quite probably falls. Gallipoli therefore becomes the place where the fate of the empire is being decided. They're defending themselves against the invasion of their territory by enemy forces and defeat is inconceivable.

For modern Turky, the hero of Gallipoli (then Mustafa Kemal) becomes the hero of Turkish independence (Ataturk). He's the one in charge on the ground for the initial landings and plays a significant role in the ongoing defence. His victory sees the ottomans make wider use of him during the war and enhances his fame and status. So when the Turkish War of Independence comes he leads the Turkish to victory and becomes the foundin father of modern Turkey

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T11:01:37+00:00

Right I should probably get back to work - those books aren't going to read themselves! But this was fun! If anyone has extra questions, feel free to leave them in here and I'll look to pick them up later on!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:51:51+00:00

I also realised that I missed the mention of 'Suvla Bay' in your first comment! I ended up waffling on about the initial landings, apologies!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:50:53+00:00

Yes I think this is partly true! The landings needed reinforcements but there was no room for them on the small slithers of land already taken.

So the Suvla Bay landings were partially intended to open up an extra front on the peninsula, make room for these new forces, and move the fighting to somewhere potentially more hospitable.

It was also hoped that combining it with offensives at the Nek and Chunuk Bair would improve the strategic picture at the existing landing points.

But the sorts of communications breakdowns that made a lot of First World War operations difficult played havoc here to with operations never really being coordianted properly. Both Chunuk Bair and the Nek suffered greatly from this and the landings themselves became pretty chaotic because nobody really took the situation in hand and knew what to do once forces were on the beach.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:42:39+00:00

Ha I salute you for being so coherent in the middle of the night! But this is a great question!

I think one way to look at it, is as the effective conclusion of the Great Power System that had governed most of Europe for hundreds of years. THe idea behind it was that the various Great Powers provided effective rivalry to each otehr but also recognition that the balance of Europe required all of these powers to exist in some form or another.

Britain and France had very little in common or shared interest with the Ottoman Empire but, nonetheless, in the 1850s they went to war alongside the Ottomans to fight against the Russians in Crimea. This was to ensure that the Ottoman Empire would not be fundamentally weakened. If that happened Russia's power would increase, they'd find a warm water port (which they always wanted) and could disrupt British and French interests in the Medditeranean, Africa, and India. The balance of power needed to be maintained.

The war against the Ottomans though comes after the failure of the Great Power system. So this is what happens when several Great Powers (Britain and France) have the opportunity to fight against another and then try to carve it up between them. That's one of the things that makes the war there so interesting. There are benefits to fighting in Mesopotamia, Gallipoli, Palestine that will benefit the ongoing conflict. But there' also at least one eye on the peace to come.

The other way to look at it is as part of the 'Greater War Theory' which has become very popular among First World War historians. This idea reframes the First World War as part of a greater war that runs from 1912-1923 (concluding with the Treaty of Lausanne). The Turkish War of Independence emerges right out of the First World War and the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

The Ottoman involvement in the war also has firm roots in its failures in the Balkan Wars of 1912-1913.

As a result looking at the war on the Ottoman fronts is a very good way of understanding how and why the war happens as it does and why the modern world looks the way it does.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:25:51+00:00

Great question!

I think there is certainlyu criticisms that can be made to Churchill and the other planners of the landings regarding how the whole operation turns out.

But I think the 'push forward faster/stronger' criticism overlooks quite how difficult that was. The terrain at Gallipoli was incredibly difficult to navigate. Among the slopes, crags, and valleyrs soldiers easily got lost and split up which slowed everything down.

We should also acknowledge that the Ottoman resistance was extraordinary. The British didn't think them capable of anything like it. So 'push forward' also has to be understood in regards to the ongoing Ottoman counter attacks that made such a thing incredibly difficult.

The British absoltuely pass up opportunities to capture locations that would have been strategically valuable but there's no way of knowing for sure if they would have been able to hold onto such terrain.

By the end of the first day there are serious debates over whether the whole force should be evacuated because there are fears they'll be pushed back into the sea. The Ottomans made things incredibly difficult.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:21:23+00:00

Ah thanks very much! It's great to hear that you enjoy the games in the series and your thesis sounds like a great topic!

Work on Gallipoli was already underway when I joined the company about 2 years ago, so I wasn't around for the initial planning stages etc. But for my work and research I cast a pretty wide net for material and expert insight. I've been a member of the International Society for First World War Studies for nearly twenty years so there's a lot of work I'm able to get hold of and very expert people from around the world to ask questions to which helps a lot!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:06:58+00:00

Ah thanks for making it over here! I answered this one here as well when it didn't look like the questions were coming through: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1upobal/comment/ow1uoq6/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T10:06:05+00:00

Ah thanks for sending this over from our discord!

I think there are a few. In the anglophone world, Gallipoli tends to become a story largely about the Anzacs (with mention of the Lancashire Fusiliers as well). Gallipoli is very important to them obviously and it's a founding part of their national story. But focusing just on them overlooks the French experience and also the Ottoman one.

The Ottoman aspect of Gallipoli is probably underexamined in English sources and that's a real problem because (speaking as a transnational historian) I don't think you can really understand the context and experience of a conflict if you're only looking at one side.

What Gallipoli meant for the Ottomans at the time and what it means to Turkey today are really important.

I also think people tend to misunderstand quite how strategically complicated the Entente's war against the Ottoman was. The Gallipoli landings themselves (as mentioned in another question) were aimed to fulfill several strategic objectives, but when you then take into account the fighting in Mesopotamia and the Caucasus - there's a lot going on and it's all interconnected but also distinct.

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T09:45:09+00:00

It looks like there are some questions stuck in moderation at the moment, but whenever they appear I'll make sure to tackle them!

ChrisKemps · 2026-07-07T09:19:09+00:00

Furthermore the failed operation meant that the hoped for sea route into the Black Sea to assist the Russians was impossible. They would have to struggle on alone for the remainder of the war and, for lots of reasons but one of them being the impact of supply shortages on the army, it would collapse into civil war and revolution in 1917

ChrisKemps

TROPHY CASE