Strike From the Sky: The History of Battlefield Air Attack, 1910-1945

3. The Palestine Campaign of 1918

3 The Palestine Campaign of 1918 Setting the Stage Since entering the war, the Ottoman Empire had found itself increasingly on the defensive; in the Middle East, this took the form of fighting on three fronts: against Russian forces in Armenia, against British and Commonwealth forces in Mesopotamia, and against British and Commonwealth forces driving eastward from Egypt. By the end of 1917, the latter forces, under the command of Gen. Sir Edmund H. H. Allenby, had seized control of Jerusalem. It was 1918, then, when Allenby planned a knockout blow aimed at the conquest of all Palestine. During fighting that year in what is now Israel and Jordan, aircraft of the Royal Air Force and the Australian Flying Corps were increasingly involved in ground-attack actions against Turkish and German troops. Allenby planned his offensive to begin on September 19, 1918, and in preparation for this offensive, even before the final date had been established, the airmen attached to his command stepped up the pace of their operations to assert control of the air (thus denying it to German reconnaissance aircraft that might have spotted preparations for the attackIand to bomb and harass German and Turkish forces. Ultimately this set the stage for the truly disastrous collapse of three Turkish armies, the Eighth (located west of the Jordan River, near Et Tire and Thl Keram, within ten miles of the Mediterranean coastI, the Seventh (located around Nablus, west of the Jordan and midway between the Jordan and Tul Keraml, and the Fourth (located east of the Jordan around Es Salt, midway between the Jordan and Ammanl. In July and August 1918, the Bristol Fighters of 1 Squadron, Australian Flying Corps, decimated German air strength over Palestine with a 29 30 STRIKE FROM THE SKY Palestine, 1918 o 30 I I Miles The First World War 31 series of air combats and attacks on airfields. Next, in company with squadrons of S.E. Sa's and D.H. 9 bombers (the latter a derivative of the workhorse D.H. 4) from the Royal Air Force, they turned their attention to wide-ranging attacks on Turkish and German positions ranging on both sides of the Jordan River, from Tul Keram in the west to Amman in the east, and from El Affule in the north to Allied lines in the south. Already during these missions, one geographical feature stood out as particularly important: the Wadi el Far'a, running southeast from Khurbet Ferweh above Balata down almost to Jisr ed Damieh on the Jordan River. It formed a natural bottleneck cutting off the Turkish Fourth Army east of the Jordan from the Seventh and the Eighth on the Jordan's west bank, and thus if the Fourth Army moved to assist the Seventh and Eighth once the Allenby offensive began, the Wadi el Far'a could prove a critical chokepoint. More likely, planners thought, the Allenby offensive would result in a massive retreat of Turkish forces east and north-toward Amman and Damascus. Accordingly, the Wadi el Far'a could prove equally as valuable a chokepoint for the entrapment of Turkish forces west of the Jordan. Two other routes were likewise worthy of being watched by air: the twisting rail and road line north from Nablus to El Affule via Arrabe and Jenin (which also offered the option of allowing Turkish troops to turn northeast at Jenin and make their way to Beisan, below Lake Tiberias), and the route from Nablus via Balata, and Khurbet Ferweh to Beisan. Allenby's cavalry planned to swing around the Turkish flank across the Plain of Esdraelon, seizing Jenin, El Affule, and Beisan; at the same time, east of the Jordan, what would now be termed a "special operations force" under the already legendary T. E. Lawrence would disrupt the enemy's rear north of Amman.3D Allenby's attack got underway in the early morning hours of September 19, and from the outset his air component played a critical role in the subsequent rout of Turkish forces. Initially, Australian aircraft bombed telephone exchanges at El Affule and Nablus to destroy communication among Turkish forces. (This had results far beyond expectations of the Allies, for as the struggle-generally termed the battle of Nablus, though some more grandiosely dubbed it the "battle of Armageddon"developed , the Fourth Army remained in bivouac around Es Salt until the late afternoon of the fourth day of...