From the Dardanelles to Hormuz, why a ship is still a fool to fight a fort |
As another Anzac Day approaches, and warfare for a vital waterway is dominating global affairs, it is worth recalling that the Gallipoli land campaign of 1915 arose from a failed naval attempt to force the Dardanelles Straits and to create regime change and surrender on the Ottoman government in Constantinople.
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Instead that narrow strait was closed by sea mines and accurate heavy shore batteries supported by lighter mobile guns.
The dangerous Dardanelles
The risks to ships had long been recognised. In 1904 Royal Navy Admiral Sir John "Jackie" Fisher warned that forcing the Dardanelles would be "mighty hazardous".
Winston Churchill wrote in 1911 that such an operation was no longer possible. Yet by early 1915 he reversed his view, believing a naval breakthrough could change the war.
Beyond the strait lay the Black Sea and Russia. Opening a maritime supply route to the Tsar's failing armies seemed an attractive alternative to the deadlock on the Western Front. However, the logistical difficulties were immense, and the risks underestimated.
Fisher, recalled to duty in 1914 as First Sea Lord, resolutely opposed Churchill's plan, but his warnings were ignored amid rising irrational optimism.
A formidable force on paper
The British and French combined fleet was made up of older battleships, cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and improvised minesweepers - converted fishing trawlers crewed by civilians.
Their task was to clear minefields at night so the fleet could sail through the strait. But the trawlers were illuminated by searchlights and came under accurate gunfire from the shore.
Despite losses, crews persisted with great determination, though some mines once cut loose from their moorings became drifting hazards downstream.
The 26 mines that defeated a fleet
The decisive blow came from the Ottoman Navy minelayer Nusret, commanded by Captain Hakki Bey. On 8 March 1915, he laid 26 mines in Erenky Bay, along the path where Allied battleships routinely turned after they had bombarded fortresses.
On 18 March, the French battleship Bouvet struck a mine and sank within minutes, taking over 600 men with her. HMS Irresistible and HMS Ocean were also lost after hitting mines and coming under heavy fire. Over 800 Allied sailors died in a single day.
The modern battlecruiser HMS Inflexible was also badly damaged but survived.
The losses confirmed Fisher's warnings: mines and shore guns made the strait a deadly and complex barrier which could not be passed without heavy losses.
Compounding the problem, Allied ships were firing armour-piercing shells designed for naval combat at the forts. These often failed to explode on land targets.
High-explosive shells would have been far more effective, but too few were available to the big guns of the fleet.
As Admiral Nelson observed when faced with Copenhagen's guns, "a ship is a fool to fight a fort." The Dardanelles proved the point with brutal clarity.
With the naval plan failing, Allied leaders shifted to Plan B: an amphibious assault to capture the shore batteries from the land. British, French, Australian, and New Zealand forces landed on Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, and met entrenched and lethal resistance and became mired in deadlock.
The amphibious plan had seemed to planners to be simpler than forcing the strait, but it led to months of trench warfare, heavy casualties, and nine months later eventual evacuation.
What began as a naval operation became, through escalation, a costly disaster.
The Dardanelles campaign became a case study in failure for strategists.
It highlighted the effectiveness of mines as area-denial weapons and influenced amphibious planning in World War II.
Commanders thereafter understood the need to neutralise coastal defences which were protecting minefields before committing fleets in confined waters.
The Straits of Hormuz in 2026
Today, similar dynamics may be emerging again in the Straits of Hormuz.
Some modern mines sit on the seabed and detonate when they detect a ship's acoustic signature passing above. They are capable of breaking a vessel's back without ever touching it.
The last USS Tripoli struck a simple Iraqi moored contact mine during the Gulf War in the Northern Arabian Gulf and needed 20 hours of damage control to prevent it sinking.
Even older types of mine remain dangerous and difficult to counter, particularly in narrow and heavily trafficked waters.
In addition to mines, ships transiting Hormuz potentially face missiles, drones, and fast attack boats. The narrowness of the strait reduces warning time, making close quarters defence difficult even for well-equipped warships.
Escorting slow-moving tankers adds complexity because a single warship may only protect a handful of vessels, all vulnerable to concentrated attack. Small, fast boats remain a credible and persistent threat.
Despite the efforts to clear the area on the Iranian side of the strait by intensive bombing efforts to keep such a narrow chokepoint open against the current Iranian regime's determination to close it would be likely to incur losses in ships and lives.
The sinking or crippling of a major US Navy vessel with heavy loss of life would have unpredictable political consequences.
History suggests some maritime choke points, and their adjacent sea routes leading into them, overwhelmingly favour the defender. This was true of the Dardanelles.
In such cases, forcing a passage may become the least viable and most costly option open to a commander.
While history does not repeat exactly, its patterns often endure and are recognisable.
The Dardanelles showed how mines and short-range accurate artillery can defeat powerful fleets.
In 2026, the combination of mines, missiles, drones, and fast attack craft presents an even greater challenge. Nelson's warning still applies: a ship remains "a fool to fight a fort."
Fixed or mobile missile launchers firing missiles from the shore are a formidable threat to anything afloat. They were dangerous in the Falklands War in 1982 and in the Gulf War in 1990-91, and their speed, range and lethality have increased greatly in the last four decades
Underdog defenders have repeatedly shown that narrow waters can become deadly traps.
There is no reason to believe that this enduring reality of maritime warfare has changed in the 111 years since the first Anzac Day.
Desmond Woods OAM is a retired Lieutenant Commander RAN and Australian Naval Institute councillor.
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