A. WORLD WAR 1

When Britain declared war on Germany on 4 August 1914 (World War 1), Australia as a �member� of the British Empire was automatically at war too. The response by the Australian government was immediate � by the end of October, the First Australian Imperial Force (AIF) of 20,000 volunteers had been dispatched to Europe via Egypt.

(i) The Battle of Gallipoli, and the legend of the ANZACs. Winston Churchill (then First Lord of the Admiralty of England) conceived a plan that was intended to relieve Turkish pressure on Russia�s troops by forcing an entrance to the Black Sea. He wished to take the Dardanelles, and ordered the waiting Australian, New Zealand, French, British, Indian and Gurkha divisions to attack from the sea.

The Turks, who had been warned of these intentions, were entrenched in fortified positions along the ridges of the Gallipoli Peninsula. Their commanders, Mustafa Kamel and the German Liman von Sanders were able to direct their fire upon the exposed beaches below � like a unsuccessful precursor to Omaha Beach in World War 2. From 25 April 1915, when they landed, until 20 December when they withdrew, the British and Allied forces were pinned to the near vertical cliffs and narrow coves. There was horrendous carnage and epic heroism upon the ridges and beaches of Cape Hellas, Lone Pine and Suvla Bay � names which will remain forever etched on Australian war memorials.

The defeat at Gallipoli spawned the legend of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC). Australia and New Zealand would forever remember their troops at Gallipoli. Each year, ANZAC day is a public holiday with memorial services to remember the soldiers who gave their lives. A poet laurete John Masefield wrote� �They were �the finest body of young men ever brought together in modern times. For physical beauty and nobility of bearing they surpassed any men I have ever seen; they walked and looked like kings in old poems.� The 1980s movie �Gallipolli�, starring a young Mel Gibson recounted the story of the ANZACs. Out of that baptism by mud, shrapnel and gallantry arose Australia�s first coherent sense of nationhood and identity.

(ii) Heavy casualties for a young nation. In World War 1, of the 330,000 Australians who had fought, 226,000 (68.5 percent) were casualties � a greater percentage by far than had been suffered by any other country among the Allies. If nationhood was being born, the nation itself was being cut down in the war fields of World War 1. [see panorama inside Hall of Valour, Australia War Memorial, Canberra]

B. WORLD WAR 2

When England again went to war against Germany in September 1939, Australia once more automatically entered the conflict. (d�j� vu ?) A Second Australian Imperial Force was raised and dispatched to the Middle East. While Australian air, land and sea forces fought in Britain, the Mediterranean, North Africa, Greece and the Middle East � Japan was mounting its war campaign in Asia, especially South-East Asia i.e. near Australia�s own backyard. Australian forces were hence sent to Malaya (now Malaysia), the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), Darwin (i.e. Australia�s northern tip) and Rabaul (New Guinea) to stem the Japanese tide. [see panorama of World War 2 warplanes inside Australia War Memorial, Canberra]

(i) Australia's Big Fear, and realization. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour finally confirmed Australia�s big fear: to be isolated and white in an Asia at war. When Singapore fell to the Japanese on 15 February 1942, 15,000 of the 130,000 captured troops were Australian. The country was faced with the fact that a distant and beleaguered Britain could be no real assistance against an imminent Japanese invasion. Japanese planes bombed Darwin on 19 Feb and Broome on 3 March 1942. Australia faced the very real threat of invasion by Japanese troops! The Australian war cabinet then outraged Churchill by diverting the 7th Australian Division from the defence of Burma to the New Guinea and Pacific regions.

If it is true that the Australian nation was born at Gallipoli, it is no less true that with the fall of Singapore � Australia finally came of age.

(ii) The bloody battle along the Kokoda Trail. The tide against the Japanese began to turn in May 1942 when a combined American and Australian fleet checked the Japanese forces at the Battle of the Coral Sea. The American victory at the Battle of Midway in June assured Allied control of the Pacific, but in New Guinea (then part of Australia), Japanese foot soldiers were closing in on Australia�s main base at Port Moresby. Then in August, a scratch force of Australians stopped the Japanese in a week of savage, hand-to-hand jugle fighting. The Japanese continued to advance along a sodden, malaria infested mountain track in New Guinea;s Owen Stanley Ranges. This was the Kokoda Trail. It was the scene of months of bloody guerilla combat by the Australian 25th Brigade supported by the Papuan resistance (sometimes known as the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels). In September the Japanese were only 52 km (32 miles) from Port Moresby, but by November they had been pushed back by the troops to the northeast coast. As the threat of invasion receded, so another Australian male archetype � the Jungle Soldier, joined the Bushman, the Digger and the Lifesaver in the line-up of Aussie myths.

(iii) The end of World War 2. When World War 2 ended , the Australian Prime Minister John Curtin during the war did not live to see its end as he died 2 months before the announcement. The new PM, Ben Chiefly announced the end of the war on 15 August 1945. In Melbourne, more than 200,000 people attended a thanksgiving service at the [Shrine of Remembrance]. Yet, another �war to end all wars� was over.