At the outbreak of World War I, the British Indian Army had a severe shortage of wireless equipment and trained operators.

On 27 December 1915, the Australian government received a request for a troop of wireless signallers (approximately 50 soldiers) to be sent to Mesopotamia.

[1] On 25 April 1916, the first of the Australian wireless stations set off from Basra on a 140 miles (230 km) march north with the British 15th Indian Division.

[3][4] Two of the Australian stations were charged with intercepting all enemy wireless communications, while a cipher expert, Captain Clauson of the Somerset Light Infantry decoded the messages and passed them onto Intelligence Branch.

The mobile Anzac stations allowed the commander of the British forces, General Frederick Stanley Maude, direct control over columns of cavalry out on operations.

[7] The British offensive began on the night of 13 December with a short thrust across the desert to the Shatt al-Hayy, a channel connecting the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers.

During this period, the wireless stations supported the cavalry, who conducted raids, screened artillery movements and tried to outflank the Suwaikiya marshes, a wide flanking maneuver which failed due to torrential rains.

The cavalry entered Aziziyeh, 100 kilometres (62 mi) north of Kut on 29 February, where it was forced to break off the pursuit for a week while it waited for supplies.