In history, Gallipoli is pretty much textbook definition--maybe even the ANSI standard--of what happens when SNAFU devolves into FUBAR. (As if WWI didn't have enough of that.) To hear my Australian pal tell it, the mythos is that the British officers sipped their tea in safety whilst the regular soldiers were slaughtered in droves. Indeed, a distinct lack strategic leadership at the point of attack is documented. From John Julius Norwich's The Middle Sea (Doubleday: New York, 2006), pp. 580 - 581:
The Allied troops fought equally bravely, but their task was made harder by the extraordinary preference of Hamilton and his two subordinate generals, Aylmer Hunter-Weston and Sir William Birdwood--commanding the British and the Anzacs, respectively--to remain at sea throughout the vital first hours after the landing. Thus, when the signaling arrangements began to fail and there was an almost immediate breakdown of Allied communications, each individual unit was left to look after itsel, with no knowledge of what was happening on the next beach to its own.Add to this that some of the landing areas--most notably what's known on the history book maps as "Anzac Cove"--were unknown. And that the British had loaded down an already discombobulated supply effort with trucks for an area that had no roads and forgotten little niceties like landing craft. To be fair, the British could not have foreseen the extraordinary leadership and initiative of Ataturk. Nor could they have known that within months they would also be facing the worst blizzard in forty years.
When the Allied position became untenable enough to trump the egos of those championing the campaign, the prospects for evacuation were grim. Hamilton--not that his opinion should have been trusted--estimated that only one in two men would survive the withdrawal. Inclement weather and the expected difficulties of smuggling people, pack animals, artillery, transport and other equipment off to the rescue ships were compounded by the fact that Allied and Turkish trenches were in some places no further than ten yards apart. During the evacuation, those remaining had to give the impression of being a larger force than they actually were; otherwise, the would be overrun.
Yet the soldiers managed to maintain the subterfuge long enough make it work. Casualties and loss of life were almost nil, and--almost as important--the weapons magazines were blown up so that they could not fall into the hands of the enemy. It's probably the closest thing you'll get to a happy ending when war is involved. At least for the Allies.
What does this all have to do with business or software or even people in general? Nothing specifically, except to demonstrate that leadership does matter--but that leadership doesn't count for much without a strong command of the minutia at hand.
