I wish I could have been there.
The atmosphere must have been quite interesting at Anzac Cove (Ari Burnu) on Turkey's Gallipoli Peninsular this past Monday.

NZ's top military man, Chief of Defence Force Air Marshal Ferguson, told those gathered for the dawn service that the failed campaign was "a combination of extreme tragedy, gallantry, occasional inspired leadership at lower levels, gross incompetency at higher levels, and of endurance, cruelty and compassion."
He said all this and more - that it was "a folly of high command, joint warfare at its worst from the British side, a lack of focus, blunders and a squandering of life" - all in front of Prince Charles who sat there listening to it all.

At long last these things are being said out front. They have been thought in private for long enough.
It was not at all what I was taught in school, but it was certainly what I discerned when I took history a little more seriously and read for myself some time later on.
Neither are these notions gleaned from the 20/20 vision of hindsight.
That the colonials - the Aussies and the Kiwis - were considered dispensable canon fodder is a matter of attitude.
Likewise, the Turks were discounted as a serious fighting force, plus no topological map was considered necessary for planning such an invasion.
There were some real "know it alls" in the bunkers of Whitehall.

The Anzacs did die valiantly, but could their sacrfice have been not so much for freedom's sake as a pagan atonement for the sheer arrogance of those in office?

Yet by asserting such beliefs, I have no wish to upset my British friends.
They are not responsible for bad decisions of some men in power now 90 years ago.
No offence intended, and I hope that neither will offence be taken.
After all, Prince Charles was said to be "not concerned one bit", an interesting springboard itself for potentially treacherous thoughts.
I must not make the jump. The rocks below are surely encrusted with a seditious paranoia.

But the week has moved on and other matters will soon be barging in to take their turn for the mulling.
Apart from Scottish porridge, I shall continue to spare you from a knowledge of my breakfast menu.
That is, anyone who cares to read any of these words anyway…