ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts covered in the preceding chapters of this book. The author's narrative mainly concentrated on the wearing down of the enemy. The operations in Mesopotamia served two purposes, the safeguarding of India and the destruction of the Turk. The first objective, even if the second had not been incidental to it, must be regarded as the more vital of the two. In the perspective of history the issues will not be confused, but it is doubtful if it is even now realised that the Mesopotamian Expedition was, in its inception, one of the few brilliant strategical strokes of the war, and that it was our promptness in occupying Basra that dissipated the Hun’s dream of domination in the East. The end was sudden and dramatic. Those who left Mesopotamia in the summer of 1918 only missed one week’s fighting.
