- Real mistake, the failure to abandon the Dardanelles
enterprise in May -- The French attitude about Salonika --
General Sarrail -- French General Staff impressed with War Office
information concerning Macedonia -- Unsatisfactory situation at
the end of 1915 -- The Salonika business a blunder all through --
Eventual success does not alter this.

CHAPTER IX

OTHER SIDE-SHOWS........................................ 170

Three categories of side-shows -- The Jackson Committee -- The
Admiralty's attitude -- The Pacific, Duala, Tanga, Dar-es-Salaam,
Oceania, the Wireless Stations -- Kiao Chao -- The Shatt-el-Arab
-- Egypt -- Question whether the Australasian forces ought to
have been kept for the East -- The East African operations -- Our
lack of preparation for a campaign in this quarter -- Something
wrong -- My own visit to Tanga and Dar-es-Salaam in 1908 -- The
bad start of the campaign -- Question of utilizing South African
troops to restore the situation -- How this was managed --
Reasons why this was a justifiable side-show -- Mesopotamia --
The War Office ought to have interfered -- The question of an
advance on Baghdad by General Townshend suddenly referred to the
General Staff -- Our mistake -- The question of Egyptian defence
in the latter part of 1915 -- The Alexandretta project -- A later
Alexandretta project propounded by the War Cabinet in 1917 -- Its
absurdity -- The amateur strategist on the war-path -- The
Palestine campaign of 1918 carried out almost entirely by troops
not required on the Western Front, and therefore a legitimate
side-show -- The same principle to some extent holds good with
regard to the conquest of Mesopotamia -- The Downing Street
project to substitute Sir W. Robertson for Sir C. Monro, a
miss-fire.

CHAPTER X

THE MUNITIONS QUESTION.................................. 190

Mr. Asquith's Newcastle speech -- The mischief that it did -- The
time that must elapse before any great expansion in output of
munitions can begin to materialize -- The situation analogous to
that of a building -- The Ministry of Munitions was given and
took the credit for the expansion in output for the year
subsequent to its creation, which was in reality the work of the
War Office -- The Northcliffe Press stunt about shell shor