15. The first painful lesson

The Japanese landed at Buna on July 21 1942. Despite air attacks by allied aircraft the Japanese had landed their task force, unchallenged on land, during that night. Allied observers posted along the coast had radioed this event to Port Moresby but received no response..

At Port Moresby, Major-General Morris was ordered to establish one battalion at Kokoda immediately. Lieutenant-Colonel Owen and his 39^th Battalion was ordered to leave by air for Kokoda on July 23 and assume command of all allied troops on the northern ramparts of the trail, including Templeton’s force, some Papuan infantry, planters and Patrol Officers. This force were named “Maroubra Force”!

Templeton had pushed two of his three platoons forward to ‘stage a delaying action’. His third platoon occupied Kokoda, guarding the airstrip there. The Japanese were easily able to push the Australians back, their numbers and their drill were far superior.

The Japanese jungle fighting tactics were to send a scout forward (expendable) and when fired upon they would follow up with a strong frontal attack in which quick casualties were the accepted norm. The speed in which they encircled and destroyed and enemy reflected their lightly equipped infantry, their excellent camouflage and, above all, their tremendous and almost silent deployment. To the inexperienced Australians, the enemy’s preoccupation with his continual frontal attack merely ensured that they would encircle and overrun any static defenders. The Japanese infantryman was the epitome of the jungle fighter; lightly equipped, even his food supplies were meagre – a ball of rice, some seaweed and , perhaps, some dried fish – enough to survive on for 24 hours, he travelled light, fast, was practised in most matters of jungle warfare and, most of all, he was prepared to lay down his life for his Emperor.

(with acknowledgement and thanks to "Trails of war")

In a series of engagements from Gorari to Kokoda the two platoons of B Company 39^th battalion were engaged in almost constant contact and withdrawal. It was during these forays that Templeton, while insisting on leading from the front, disappeared.

It later was learnt that Captain Templeton was captured, tortured and executed:

Kokichi Nishimura stands in front of his

house in Kazo, Saitama Prefecture

Japan Times - on-line

“…. Kokichi Nishimura, The Bone Man of Kokoda, ….(returned) to the site at Oivi Village where he stated he had buried Captain Templeton. ……….  Nishimura did not suddenly remember that he had buried Templeton 68 years previous, he had just assumed that Templeton’s remains had been recovered and re buried on the Australian’s advance. It was not until I returned to Japan that Templeton’s name came up in a conversation with Nishimura and he recounted the events to me. He was surprised that his remains had not been recovered.

Nishimura still clearly remembers the day he stumbled upon the bloated and rotting remains of Captain Templeton. Nishimura did not discover Templeton’s body until six days after Templeton’s execution. It is important to remember Nishimura arrived six days after the execution and was not a witness to the execution.

How could Nishimura remember the spot so clearly after 68 years? The event was clearly etched in his memory, the sight of the body, the smell and the waterfall that the body lay near. If you ever had a chance to meet Nishimura or read his book The Bone Man of Kokoda then you would understand he is a man of high honour and exceptionally intelligent, he has nothing to gain from assisting me. …”

(With appreciation to Wayne Weatherall at Kokoda Spirit Blog )

During a brief action at Oivi a concentration of Japanese firepower was assembled at the rear of the defenders who answered with grenades and rifle fire before a degree of panic broke out, abandoning the position the defenders had no hope of defending. Some pushed forward to their original front whilst others retreated to their rear and almost certain annihilation. If was the bush craft of a native policeman, Sanopa, serving with the Papuan Infantry battalion, that saved most of those moving forward and cut-off many heading for the rear where a strong enemy force lay in wait for them. Amongst the fierce actions fought that day there was much understandable confusion amongst the poorly trained and ill-equipped militiamen.

Kokoda Walkway - click to enlarge

Kokoda Walkway

With these events in train, Lieutenant-Colonel Owens decided  that the the Trail was easier to defend than Kokoda Village so he took the decision to fire the buildings and stores and to fall back to Deniki. To his latter amazement, on arrival at Deniki, he was told that the Japanese had still not occupied Kokoda. Owen thought he may still have time  to reinforce Kokoda by air, so, leaving a small force at Deniki he could hurry back to Kokoda. If his small force of around 80 men could hold Kokoda airstrip long enough reinforcements might land.


The second painful lesson was about to be learned in a desparate battle which bravery was defeated by overcaution.

14. The 30th Brigade in Port Moresby

The 30^th Brigade’s Battalions in Port Moresby:

While sweeping political and military events were occurring in the Middle East, Australia and the Philippines, the garrison at Port Moresby – mainly the 30^th’s Brigades 38^th, 49^th and 53^rd Battalions -  had primarily been involved in labouring duties rather than the training they so desperately needed. Unloading ships, building roads constructing defensive positions, digging trenches and stringing barbed wire whilst constantly losing the battle against malaria, dengue fever and dysentery.

In April 1942, Major-General Vasey wrote to subordinate army commanders requesting monthly reports concerning the combat efficiency of brigades in the army. He gave six guidelines for rating efficiency:

A.      Efficient and experienced for mobile offensive operations.

B.      Efficient as a formation for mobile offensive operations but not experienced.

C.     Individual brigades are efficient for mobile operations, but higher training has not been completed.

D.     Individual brigades are efficient in a static role. Additional brigade and higher training is required.

E.     Units have completed training. A considerable amount of brigade and higher training is required.

F.     Unit training is not yet complete.

Five weeks before the 30^th Brigade was committed to action on the Kokoda Trail its grading was given as ‘F’.The garrison at Port Moresby was thus given the lowest possible rating while being deployed in the most threatened area.

The Japanese commenced bombing Port Moresby on the 3^rd February 1942. Natives fled and Coastal ship desertions were high. Three of the five Catalina flying boats were sunk by Japanese Zero attacks leaving those two and a lone Hudson bomber for air defence of the garrison. Eventually a long promised squadron of Kittyhawk fighters arrived. As the situation deteriorated in the South West Pacific Area during April it was decided to put a more positive emphasis on the defence of Port Moresby.

Squadron Leader Keith ‘Bluey’ Truscott steps out of the cockpit

of his Kittyhawk fighter as fellow pilots of 76 Squadron RAAF 

help to push it back into the dispersal bay. - [AWM 026648]

"

Brigadier Selwyn Porter was despatched to take command on 17^th April.

As the former commanding officer of the 2/31^st battalion in Syria, Porter bought with him a distinguished  Middle Eastern record and a youthful, driving personality to the garrison. The 2/31st Infantry Battalion had a battle honoured background. It was one of three formed in the United Kingdom on 27 June 1940 to create the 25th Infantry Brigade. The battalion’s personnel were drawn from throughout the Australian force that had arrived in Britain earlier in the month. It left Britain on 4 January 1941 and disembarked in Egypt on 9 March. Upon arrival, the 2/31st moved to Palestine for training where it was joined by a fourth rifle company. On 11 April, the 25th Brigade, now part of the 7th Australian Division, began to move to Egypt to bolster the defences along the Libyan frontier against an expected German attack and the 2/31st occupied positions at Mersa Matruh. In late May 1941, the 2/31st returned to Palestine to take part in the 25th Brigade’s first offensive operation - the invasion of Syria and Lebanon. The 2/31st’s first major engagement in eastern Lebanon was around Khirbe between 8 and 11 June. It was subsequently ordered to capture the town of Jezzine, which controlled one of the lateral routes to the coast. Jezzine fell to the 2/31st on 14 June but was heavily counter-attacked by the Vichy French on the 16th. The terrain around Jezzine was steep and rugged and the fighting exhausting; it was still in progress when the armistice was declared on 12 July. The 2/31st remained in Lebanon as part of the Allied garrison until 13 January 1942.

Selwyn Porter (left in service cap) and other

24th Brigade officers at Beaufort, Borneo

in August 1945

Upon arrival, Porter soon realised that he faced four critical problems:

1. The quality of defences were such that they were easily identified from the sea, far too dispersed, static and therefore restricted in mobility.

2. The garrison’s overall poor standard of leadership.

3. No real battle training had been implemented.

4. The brigade was poorly equipped with outdated equipment.

While not able to do much about the equipment problems, Porter injected young, trained and experienced officers from the 7^th Division as reinforcement officers to assist in leadership and training and used age and health issues of the older officers as an excuse to send those back to Australia. Unfortunately a few of the older officers escaped the net.

1. The 39^th Battalion:

Following Japan’s sudden entry into the Second World War, a new 39th was raised as part of the 30th Brigade to garrison Port Moresby. The 39th joined the 49th Infantry Battalion, already in Moresby, and the 53rd Infantry Battalion, which had been quickly formed in Sydney. The 39th arrived in Moresby at the start of January 1942, with little military training. The 39th was initially used for garrison duties and working parties. In June it was ordered to proceed up the Kokoda Trail to block any possible Japanese overland advance.

2. The 49^th Battalion:

A new 49^th Battalion was raised for “tropical service” in February 1941. The following month the battalion sailed to the islands as part of the convoy that took the 2/22nd Infantry Battalion to Rabual. Along the way the convoy stopped at Thursday Island and a group from the battalion, mainly from A Company, stayed to garrison the island. This group was initially called the 49th Battalion Details and in January 1942 became known as the Thursday Island Infantry Detachment. The rest of the battalion arrived in Port Moresby.

The battalion undertook little training in Moresby and mainly provided labour for working parties and unloaded ships’ stores. In 1941 the 39th and 53rd Battalions joined the 49th, forming the 30th Brigade. During this time the 49th’s morale was low and had reportedly the worst discipline in Moresby.

Japan entered the war at the end of the year and by the start of 1942 was rapidly advancing through south-east Asia and the Pacific. By March Japanese aircraft were attacking Moresby. The garrison at Moresby was strengthened to cope with the battles along the Kokoda Trail and at Milne Bay, yet there was little change to the 49th’s routine and their training remained basic. One veteran described the work as “digging holes”.

3. The 53^rd Battalion:

The 53rd Battalion was an infantry battalion of the Australian Army. Raised in 1916 for service during World War I the battalion served on the Western Front until the end of the war, before being briefly amalgamated with the 55th Battalion and then eventually disbanded in 1919. In 1921, the 53rd Battalion was re-raised and in 1927 adopted the title of the West Sydney Regiment, however, in 1937 they were once again amalgamated with the 55th, forming the 55th/53rd Battalion (New South Wales Rifle/West Sydney Regiment). In October 1941, during World War II, the two battalions were delinked and the 53rd was later deployed to New Guinea, where they took part in the Kokoda Track campaign. Poorly prepared and trained, and lacking up to date equipment, they did not perform well and were amalgamated with the 55th once more in October 1942, with whom they subsequently took part in further campaigns in New Guinea and Bougainville.

On 21 June 1942 36 AIF officers from the 7^th Division had been posted to the 30^th Brigade – 16 to the 39^th Battalion, 8 to the 53^rd Battalion and 12 to the 49^th battalion. Eight Lieutenants went straight to platoon level, where, in particular, basic training is successfully implemented under a capable officer commanding a company. These officers and the young, enthusiastic militia officers that had been retained performed magnificently under pressure of having little time.

Thus the 39^th Battalion, manned by volunteers for tropical service and led in June 1942 by a very capable bunch of battle-experienced AIF and young and enthusiastic militia officers was a battalion in change. Not so the 53^rd Battalion, as the majority of the militia company commanders were over 40 years of age and while some were proficient a number of company commanders were slow in reacting to orders or unable to do so.

Back in Australia MacArthur had been ordered by the Chief of Staff in America to take Rabaul. He ordered a small party of mixed American and Australian officer to the North Coast of Papua to find a suitable site for an airfield from which he might carry the war forward. An area north-east of Dobodura was considered suitable.

As a consequence of such thinking, Blamey instructed Major-General Morris on the 29^th of June to “… secure Kokoda!...”. Brigadier Porter was ordered to send a rifle company over the Kokoda Trail to fulfil this order.  Captain Sam Templeton was ordered to march his company over the Kokoda Trail and meet the lugger Gili Gili at Buna.

Captain Sam Templeton V50190

Templeton was an older officer – in his 50’s – and referred to as “Uncle Sam” by his mostly adolescent soldiers. He had been refused service with the AIF because of his flat feet and age.

“He had fought in the Irish rebellion and the First World War and this was to be his last fling. He set an example to the whole company in other words. I think he realise that we were a lot of young blokes …. A man that you couldn’t get to know very well, but he always said that if he went into action against the Japs, he wouldn’t come back and that’s exactly what happened, he told me that.”

(Lieutenant A.J. “Judy” Garland, Platoon Commander.)

It was extraordinary to contemplate that the first Australian contact in PNG against the best jungle fighters in the world at that time, was to be undertaken by a company of raw young militiamen , graded fighting proficiency “F” and led by a commander who was over 50 and had flat feet. Yet Templeton was to prove an inspiration to his young soldiers and create a name legacy that survives on the Kokada Trail until this very day!

13. Climbing "The Golden Stairs"

The ‘Golden Stairs’ rise towards Imita Ridge

on the Kokoda Track, photographed in

October 1942. [AWM 26837]

Peter Brune, in "A bastard of a place" (Allen and Unwin, 2003) wrote:

"In 1942, take the best of the youth of Australia and take them at their physical peak, burden them with equipment weighing anywhere between 50 and 70 pounds (22 to 31kg). Dress them in a khaki uniform designed for the desert, not the jungle,pose them to a claustrophobic environment that will test their alert minds; and send them across terrain that will exhaust the fittest of them. Feed them so sparingly that they will lose two or three stone in weight (13 to 19kg) over a period of six to eight weeks; expose them to humid sweating days and cold wet nights, blessed only with half a blanket or a groundsheet; put them in a weapon pit full of water; isolate them, by creating a situation where they can only be re-supplied by air or overtaxed Papuan carriers, and never to a degree where they can gain sufficient strength to perform at their optimum level.

These young soldiers are not naive; they know that the further they struggle forward, the further they slip away from their supplies - bullets and tucker -  and in everyman's mind the daunting thought of a wound. Will there be enough stretchers, enough carrier, to take them out, and critically, if they cannot crawl out or stagger out the price of falling into the enemies hands."

The Kokoda Track [DVA]

Prior to the outbreak of the war in PNG travellers had two ways to move from Port Moresby to the north coast across the Owen Stanley Range - fly over it or sail around it. There were no roads. The Papuans had their own trails, including the hazardous one over the Owen Stanley Range. A primitive foot track, at most three or four feet wide (about a metre wide), restricting movement in most places to single file and only scant knowledge of this track had reached the outside world through occasional reports of patrol officers, planters, miners or missionaries.

The "Golden Stairs" consisted of several thousand pieces of wood shoved into the ascent and held in place by wooden pegs. Filthy, putrid, mud constituted the rest of the 'step'. At some points the exposed roots of trees formed the 'steps', thus making them irregular. The stairs became permanently soaked and sodden because of the daily rains that saturated the jungle. Men fell, banged knees, shins and ankles on the exposed steeps, gave vent to their anger and struggle agonisingly to their feet; and orderly progress became impossible as long strings of exhausted climbers backed up down the track waiting for a chance to move forward.

Lieutenant Hugh Dalby, 39th Battalion:

"They were so steep . . . we soon had it worked out that instead trying to walk over the mountain range in sections as we started off doing, and nearly killed ourselves, the next day we set off at intervals . . . so you might be five minutes getting rid of your men. But instead of getting to the next staging place at five o'clock at night when t was dark, you'd get there at two o'clock in the afternoon 'cos you wern't hampered by this stop, start, stop, start routine."

Whether the overburdened soldiers travelled up or down, he experienced the unending aching of strained knees and a suffering back never designed to carry a heavy load over the Owen Stanley Range. After his last sporadic bursts, of desperate joint-wrenching, lung-bursting scaling of the "Golden Stairs", many a sweat-sodden campaigner reached Ioribaiwa utterly worn out, disoriented and huddled in the chill of the night nearly 3,000 feet above sea level , completely exhausted, unable to fight and only seeking to rest and recuperate for the next day of trekking the trail.

When the Japanese first landed in Papua there was much talk of "the Kokoda Pass". But there was no pass—merely a lowering of the mountain silhouette where the valley of Eora Creek cut down into the Yodd a Valley south of Kokoda . From Kokoda the track slipped easily down towards the sea for three full days of hot marching . First it passed over undulations fringed by rough foothills and covered with thick bush. It forded many streams, passed through the villages of Oivi and Gorari, went on down to the Kumusi River which, deep and wide and swift, flowed northward and then turned sharply east to reach the sea between Gona and Cape Ward Hunt.

This was the country of the fierce Orokaivas, unsmiling men with spare, hard, black bodies and smouldering eyes . They were still greatly feared by all their neighbours although it was many years since Europeans first came and forced peace upon them. They suffered at the hands of the Yodda Valley gold-seekers at the end of the nineteenth century and the severity of the magistrate Monckton at the beginning of the new century, and it was said that they had not forgiven either occasion. Their kinsmen, the coastal Orokaivas farther on, were of the same type. The track crossed the Kumusi by a bridge suspended from steel cables. The place of crossing came thus to be known as Wairopi (the "pidgin" rendering of "wire rope"). A little farther on, in the vicinity of Awala, began a network of tracks which passed over tropical lowlands through or past Sangara Mission and Popondetta into spreading swamps and thus reached the coast on which were the two little settlements of Buna and Gona—the former the administrative headquarters of the district, the latter a long-established Church of England mission. Up to July 1942 Australian military interest in this lonely coast and the even lonelier track which linked it with Port Moresby was of slow growth.

On 2nd February Major-General Rowell, then Deputy Chief of the General Staff, had signalled Major-General Morris:

Japanese in all operations have shown inclination to land some distance from ultimate objective rather than make a direct assault. This probably because of need to gain air bases as well as desire to catch defence facing wrong way. You will probably have already considered possibility of landing New Guinea mainland and advance across mountains but think it advisable to warn you of this enemy course.

Morris, with a difficult administrative situation on his hands, only meagre and ill-trained forces at his disposal and more likely military possibilities pressing him, that month sent a platoon (Lieutenant Jesser) of the Papuan Infantry Battalion to patrol the coast from Buna to the Waria River, the mouth of which was about half-way between Buna and Salamaua, and watch for signs of a Japanese approach.
 
On 10th March a Japanese float-plane swept over Buna about 11 a.m., bombed and machine-gunned two small mission vessels there, then settled on the water . However, it was promptly engaged with rifle fire by Lieutenant Champion,' the former Assistant Resident Magistrate, and the small group with him, who were staffing the Administration and wireless station on the shore, and it quickly took the air again. At the end of March the Combined Operations Intelligence Centre, in an assessment of the likelihood of Japanese moves to occupy the Wau-Bulolo area after the seizure of Lae and Salamaua, had suggested the possibility of a landing at Buna with a view to an overland advance on Port Moresby.
 
But little serious consideration seems to have been given to this suggestion.
 
The Japanese expedition against Port Moresby, turned back by the Allied naval forces in the Coral Sea, had underlined the need to reinforce the troops and air squadrons in New Guinea.

Japanese Attack Plan

Initial movements (Battle of the Coral Sea)

On 14th May MacArthur wrote to Blarney that he had decided to establish airfields on the south-east coast of Papua for use against Lae, Salamaua and Rabaul, that there appeared to be suitable sites between Abau and Samarai, and he wished to know whether Blarney had troops to protect these bases. Blarney had already ordered the 14th Brigade to Port Moresby and it embarked at Townsville on the 15th. He replied, on the 16th, that he could provide the troops, and MacArthur, on the 20th, authorised the construction of an airstrip in the Abau-Mullins Harbour area . At the same time he ordered that the air force bring its squadrons at Moresby up to full strength and that American anti-aircraft troops be sent from Brisbane to the forward airfields at Townsville, Horn Island, Mareeba, Cooktown and Coen.
 

The 14th Brigade, with only about five months of continuous training behind it (although most of the individual men had had more than that), was thus the first substantial infantry reinforcement to reach Moresby since General Sturdee had sent two battalions there, making a total of three, on 3rd January, four months before the Coral Sea battle. When the inexperienced 14th Brigade was sent forward there were, in eastern Australia , three brigades of hardened veterans—the 18th, 21st and 25th—but unwisely none of those were chosen.

12. The Commanders

1. The Japanese Commander

General Tomitarō Horii

Tomitarō Horii, November 7, 1890 – November 23, 1942) was a major-general in the Imperial Japanese Army during World War II. He was an experienced infantry commander having served with distinction in the Second Sino-Japanese War. Born in Hyōgo Prefecture, Horii became an infantry officer following his graduation from the 23rd class of the Imperial Japanese Army Academy in 1911. He was later assigned to the headquarters of the Shangai Expeditionary Army during the January 28 Incident from January 28-March 4, 1932.

(Note: on the midnight of January 28th, Japanese carier aircraft bombed Shanghai in the first major aircraft carrier action in the Far East. Three thousand Japanese troops proceeded to attack various targets, such as the northern train station, around the city and began an invasion of the de facto Japanese settlement in Hongkew and other areas north of Suzhou Creek. In what was a surprising about-face for many, the 19th Route Army, who many had expected to leave after having been paid, stayed to put up a fierce resistance.

Though the opening battles of the conflict took place in the Hongkew district of the International Settlement, this soon spread outwards to much of Chinese-controlled Shanghai. The majority of the Concessions remained untouched by the conflict, and it was often the case that those in the Shanghai International Settlement would watch the war from the banks of Suzhou Creek, and could even visit the battle lines by virtue of their extraterritoriality. Being a metropolitan city with many foreign interests invested in it, other countries, such as the United States, Great Britain, and France attempted to negotiate a ceasefire between Japan and China. However, Japan refused, instead continuing to mobilize troops in the region. On February 12, American, British, and French representatives brokered a half-day cease fire for humanitarian relief to civilians caught in the crossfire. On 30 January, Chiang Kai-shek decided to temporarily relocate the capital from Nanjing to Luoyang as an emergency measure, since Nanjing's proximity to Shanghai could make it a target. On February 12, the Japanese issued another ultimatum, demanding that the Chinese Army retreat twenty kilometers from the border of Shanghai Concessions, a demand promptly refused by the Chinese forces. This only intensified fighting in Hongkew. The Japanese were still not able to take the city by the middle of February, and the number of Japanese troops was increased to nearly ninety thousand with the arrival of the 9th infantry Divisdion and the IJA 24th Mixed Brigade, supported by eighty warships and three hundred airplanes.)

From 1935-1937, he was attached to the IJA 12th Infantry Regiment, and became commander of the IJA 78th Infantry Regiment in 1938, after his promotion to colonel the previous year. Horii was appointed commander of the IJA 55th Division (part of the South East Force) in 1941.

During the New Guinea campaign, Horii and his South Seas detachment were assigned to the invasion of Port Moresby, but were turned back by Allied forces during the Battle of the Coral Sea. As a result, after landing in the Buna-Garara area in July 1942, Horii led a column of 8,500 men of the IJA 144th Regiment overland on the Kokoda Trail over the treacherous Owen Stanley mountain range in an attempt to capture Port Moresby. After heavy fighting against a small Australian Army and Militia Force, however, the Japanese were delayed and defeated, and Horii was forced to withdraw with his surviving soldiers in the Kokoda Track campaign  from September 1942.

Horii drowned while crossing the Kumusi River when his raft capsized in November 1942.

2. The Australian Commander

Field Marshal Sir Thomas Albert Blamey GBE, KCB, CMG, DSO, ED

Field Marshal Sir Thomas Albert Blamey GBE, KCB, CMG, DSO, ED (24 January 1884 – 27 May 1951) was an Australian General of the Second World War and the first, and to date only, Australian to attain the rank of Field Marshal. Blamey served in the First Australian Imperial Force (AIF) in the First World War. In mid-1914 Blamey had been in Britain on the staff of the Wessex Division. In November he sailed for Egypt, along with Harry Chauvel, to join the Australian contingent and became intelligence officer on the staff of the Australian 1st Division for the Battle of Gallipoli. During the landing at Anzac Cove, Blamey was sent to evaluate the need for reinforcements by Colonel M'Cay's 2nd Brigade on 400 Plateau. He confirmed that they were in such need, and the reinforcements were sent.

On the night of 13 May 1915, Blamey, in his capacity as intelligence officer, led a patrol consisting of himself, Sergeant J.H. Will and Bombardier A.A. Orchard, behind the Turkish lines in an effort to locate the Olive Grove guns that had been harassing the beach. Near Pine Ridge, an enemy party of eight Turks approached and one of them went to bayonet Orchard, so Blamey shot him with his revolver. In the action that followed, six Turks were killed. Blamey withdrew his patrol back to the Australian lines without locating the guns. Later, examination of the fuse setting on a dud round revealed that the guns were much further to the south than had been realised.

Blamey was always interested in technical innovation. He was instrumental in the adoption of the periscope rifle at Gallipoli, an instrument which he saw during an inspection of the front line. He arranged for the inventor, Lance Corporal W.C.B. Beech, to be seconded to division headquarters to develop the idea. Within a few days, the design was perfected and periscope rifles began to be used throughout the Australian trenches.

When the Chief of General Staff (CGS), Lieutenant General Sir Cyril Brudenell White, retired in 1923, Blamey was expected to succeed him as CGS as he had as chief of staff of the Australian Corps in France. However there were objections from more senior officers, so the Inspector General, Lieutenant General Sir Harry Chauvel, was made CGS as well, and Blamey was given the new post of Second CGS, in which he performed most of the duties of CGS.On 1 September 1925, Blamey transferred from the Permanent Military Forces to the Militia, and on 1 May 1926 he took command of the 10th Infantry Brigade, part of the 3rd Division. Blamey took command of the division on 23 March 1931 and was promoted to major-general, one of only four militia officers promoted to this rank between 1929 and 1939. In 1937 he was transferred to the unattached list.

On 13 October 1939, Blamey was promoted lieutenant-general and appointed to command the 6^th division, the first formation of the newSecond Australian Imperial Force. Generals John Lavarack and Gordon bennett also were considered for the post, and had their supporters, but Blamey was the preferred choice of Prime Minister Robert Menzies. Menzies limited Blamey's choice of commanders by insisting that they be selected from the Militia rather than the Permanaent Military Forces.

Blamey travelled to the Middle-East with the 2nd AIF as its commander. He occasionally clashed with the British Commanders-in-Chief Middle East, General Archibald Wavell and his successor, General Claude Auchinleck, over the employment of Australian forces. He refused to allow his troops to perform police duties in Palestine, and insisted that they remain together as cohesive units, and no Australian forces were to be deployed or engaged without the prior consent of the Australian government. The government strengthened his hand by promoting him to full general, and Blamey was appointed Deputy Commander-in-Chief Middle East

However, Blamey was not inflexible and permitted Australian units to be detached when there was a genuine military need. Because the situation in the Middle East tended to lurch from crisis to crisis, this resulted in his troops becoming widely scattered at times. Blamey has been criticised for allowing Australian troops to be sent on a dangerous mission to Greece after he had been told that Menzies had approved and Menzies had been informed that Blamey had approved. Blamey was under no illusions about the odds of success and immediately prepared plans for an evacuation. Blamey's foresight and determination saved many of his men but he lost credibility when he chose his son to fill the one remaining seat on the aircraft carrying him out of Greece. He was Mentioned in Despatches, and awarded the Greek Military Cross, First Class.

In the Syrian campaign (against the Vichy French), Blamey took decisive action to resolve the command difficulties caused by General Henry Maitland Wilson's attempt to direct the fighting from the King David Hotel in Jerusalem by interposing Lieutenant-General John Lavarack's I Corps headquarters.

Later Blamey forced another showdown with Auchinleck over his insistence that the Australian 9th Division be withdrawn from Tobruk, allowing his command to be concentrated in Syria. Blamey was supported by Prime Minister John Curtin and Auchinleck was forced to back down. For his campaigns in the Middle East, he was created a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) on 1 January 1942.

In 1942, Blamey was recalled to Australia to become the Commander-in-Chief Australian Military Forces (AMF), and then Commander of Allied Land Forces as well. Some of Blamey's most controversial actions concern the period after the Japanese declared war, and United States General Douglas MacArthur retreated to Australia.

11. War comes to Papua New Guinea.

Before the war there was no real Australian interest in PNG. There was a lack of economic endeavour and consequent poor financial gain caused by a paucity of funding and protective legislation.Then there was the ruggedness of the land itself. There was a deep cultural ignorance and unawareness of PNG’s strategic significance.Australian policy and Australians were looking elsewhere!

Photograph from a Japanese plane of Battle Ship Row at the beginning of the attack.

Then the Japanese attacked the American Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbour on 7-8 December 1941, followed by the loss of HMS Prince of Wales  and HMS Repulse two days later. Hong Kong fell and then the Japanese attacked Rabaul on 23 January 1942.

Map of Japanese landings at Corregidor

Ambon was attacked a week later and on 31 December the Commonwealth Forces withdrew from the Malayan peninsula into the bastion of Fortress Singapore. The nightmare continued with the fall of Singapore on 15 February 1942. With Singapore gone little stood between the Japanese and the shores of Australia.

War correspondent Robert Sherrod, of Time Magazine,

in front of the remains of the Darwin Post Office, June 1942.

The first air raid on Port Moresby on3 February was like a bucket of cold water being tossed over the Australian public but on 19 February when the Japanese struck at mainland Australia through the air raids on Darwin, Australia’s northern-most city and the Japanese landing on Timor sent shockwaves through the nation.

The 2nd AIF's main strength consisted of five divisions: the 6th, 7^th, 8^th and 9th, and the 1^st Armoured Division. Divisions numbered 1st to 5th were Militia divisions, as were the 10th through 12th and the 2nd and 3rd Armoured Divisions. Units of the Second AIF prefixed their numbers with a '2/' (pronounced 'second') to distinguish themselves from Militia units. Where such a unit did not exist in the First AIF or the Militia, the '2/' was not initially used, but later it was generally adopted as identifying a unit of the Second AIF.

The 6^th, 7^th and 8^th Divisions were in the Middle East. The 7th Division, under Major General Arthur Allen and other Australian units formed the body of the Allied invasion of Lebanon and Syria in 1941. The division's 18th Infantry Brigade fought at Tobruk. Following the outbreak of war in the Pacific, elements of the 7th Division were sent to the Dutch East Indies, reinforcing a few 8th division units. The bulk of the 7th Division was deployed in support of Militia battalions engaged in a rearguard action on the Kokoda Track Campaign in New Guinea.

In the second half of 1941 the Australian government and the Australian Army had began to consider how best to strengthen the nation’s home defences and to provide the home army with more experienced commanders. To this end it began to withdraw some of its more experienced officers from the Divisions fighting the Germans in the Middle East. Three of those were commanders promoted on high merit: Brigadiers Rowell, Vasey and Clowes. On January 3 1942 the British wanted two of the AIF Divisions in the Middle East shifted to the Far East. The 6^th and 7^th Divisions were chosen. The Japanese rapid subjugation of their destination points soon changed that. What followed was a confrontation between British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and the Australian Prime Minister John Curtin. Curtin won the confrontation and the convoy carrying the 7^th Division, one to shoulder the burden of the PNG Campaign, arrived back in Australia during march 1942.

Most of the 8th Division' was sent to Malaya to strengthen the garrison prior to war with Japan, while the remaining battalions were deployed in the Dutch East Indies and New Guinea. Consequently, most of the division was lost at the Fall of Singapore in February 1942, where the division lost 1,789 killed and 1,306 wounded; another 15,395 were captured. The divisional commander, Major General Henry Gordon Bennett created an enduring controversy by escaping.

On 18 March 1942 General Douglas MacArthur arrived in Australia from his post in the Philippines (rapidly falling to the Japanese invaders) on the orders of president Roosevelt. On that date it was announced that he had been appointed  Supreme Allied Commander, South West Pacific Area. MacArthur had only 2 Divisions of raw, poorly led young conscript American troops in Australia whose build-up would not be completed until May. Australia had the recently returned and battle-hardened 7^th Division and a Brigade of the Sixth Division in addition to five poorly trained Divisions of militia. It was the Australians who were to provide the ‘blood’ for MacArthur’s South West Pacific defence.

General Blamey arrived back in Australia on 23 March to learn that he had been appointed Commander-in-Chief of all Australian Military Forces. Not without some degree of friction as Major General Herring, Brigadier Steel and Major-General Vasey called on the Defence Minister, Frank Forde, with the aim of ‘dethroning’ Blamey through his enforced retirement. Rowell refused to join this group. Blamey survived but lost out to MacArthur who Prime Minister Curtin appointed as his chief military adviser. Blamey had to learn from the Australian government what Curtin and MacArthur had decided as the best course of action in processing the war. Blamey did have one victory. He accepted General Sturde’s restructuring recommendations for the Australian army. The state-based command system was disbanded.. The army was divided into the First Army, responsible for the defence of New South Wales and Queensland: the Second Army, responsible for the defence of Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania: the 3^rd Corps to defend Western Australia: North Territory Force: the forces in PNG and the Land Headquarters Units. There was a concomitant shake-up of the general officer staffing.

Senior Allied commanders in New Guinea in October 1942.

 Left to right: Mr Frank Forde (Australian Minister for the Army);

MacArthur; General Sir Thomas Blamey, Allied Land Forces;

Lieutenant General George C. Kenney, Allied Air Forces;

 Lieutenant General Edmund Herring, New Guinea Force;

Brigadier General Kenneth Walker, V Bomber Command

In April 1942 the Japanese Imperial Headquarters now ordered the capture of Port Moresby, Fiji, Samoa and New Caledonia as a jumping off point to the invasion and capture of Australia and that to become a base to strike at the United States. Port Moresby was identified as the first objective but on May 1 the American Navy played its tactical trump card. By deploying their carriers USS Lexington and Yorktown into the Coral Sea the Americans were able to intercept the Japanese invasion fleet bound for Port Moresby. While the Americans lost more shipping and ordinance than the Japanese the telling difference was that the invasion fleet was turned back and Port Moresby gained a critical reprieve.

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10. Papua New Guinea – pre-World War II.

Papua New Guinea (PNG) lies 150 miles (240klms) from mainland Australia. It is positioned just south of the Equator with its main island constituting four fifths of its land mass and the remainder made up of hundreds of coastal islands of varying size. The main island is dominated by an extremely rugged east-west central mountain spine with peaks at times over 13,000 feet (about 4,000 metres). This dominant feature is cut by numerous rushing rivers and creeks which, along with volcanic action, have produced areas of soil-rich inland and and coastal lowland fields. The vegetation in the highlands is dominated by thick tropical rain forest, jungle and man-made grasslands.The latter are the by-product of centuries of burning, clearing and planting and the resultant regrowth of vegetation. Along many parts of the coastline the landscape is dominated by many grasslands and swamps. From the air the terrain is viewed as an impressive, rugged impenetrable and inhospitable region.

The climate of PNG is hot and humid and dominated by high rainfall all year long.”The Wet Season” is usually between October and May and, apart from Port Moresby which is in a rain shadow, the rainfall is very high – it rains every day, without warning and falls in torrential downpours. The temperature and humidity is high during the day but can plunge during the nights, while the coastal lowlands remain hot and humid all year round.

Prior to the onset of WWII there were at least seven hundred different languages which demonstrated the isolation and diversity of its inhabitants – a direct consequence of the nature of its geography. In hundreds of isolated little parts of the the country small clans or tribes existed and were based on ‘kinship through marriage, blood lines or adoption’. To use the term “village” is misleading in the PNG context: such groups lived in a small group as three or four families, while others might be part of a hundred or more family groups. All clans had access to their own lands on which subsistence crops were grown: taro, yam, sago, sweet potato, bananas and various leaves of different vegetables. Meat was procured by hunting or catching marsupials, reptiles, fish and pigs. The land was used through and almost ageless cycle – let it dry, burn, plant, reap and move on within the boundaries of your land, allowing the used soil to rest and repeat the cycle.

Huli Wigman from the Southern Highlands

In the highlands there were no roads, hardly any trails and mostly rough hewn tracks known by the locals.

Pre-The Great War PNG was divided into three European “Protectorates”. After the war the British dependency was ceded to Australia and Australia seized the German territory on the Eastern mainland and New Britain and the islands from the Admiralties to Bouganville. Australia established a civil administration in 1920 over the areas it claimed at the Versailles Peace Conference. The period of Papuan history from 1906 to WWII was dominated by Lieutenant Governor Sir Hubert Murray. Murray was born into an Irish-catholic family in Sydney, was an oxford law graduate. When Australia took over Papua in 1906 a Royal Commission was established to determine the best way to administer the territory. The two key issues facing the Commission were how best to deal with land tenure and how to utilise the indigenous people as a cheap labour supply.

Murray chose to allow whites to lease land for the purpose of mining or plantation production. Murray presided over a system whereby local natives signed on as indentured labourers for a period – usually eighteen months. The early period of Murray’s administration were marked by what he called ‘the oil stain’ policy. He deployed small patrols to pierce and pacify the interior with the use of weapons only permissible in self-defence. An outpost or station was like a small drop of oil on water, it spread. By adding other drops in other localities the ‘oil stain’ spread until its edges merged with the adjoining outpost so that patrol officers were in reasonably frequent contact with each other over the length and breadth of the territory. It was a process not unlike that employed by the North-West Mounted Police in Canada during Canada’s formative years.

A Patrol Officer ("Kiap") checking a native canoe. 

New Guinea, 1948.

(Photographer: James (Jim) Fitzpatrick. NAA: A1200, L9830)

Hewa patrol leaving camp on a kunai plain. (Photographer: Tom Webster)

Murray died barely two years before the Pacific War came to Papua with a rapidity of defeat and brutality that was to shock the western world and its associated notions of white supremacy. For the white planter, miner, district magistrate or patrol officer – and sometimes missionary – their local knowledge of the terrain and the indigenous people was to prove invaluable. Together with the natives, these white adventurers were to become an intriguing substitute for the modern infrastructure of war.

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9. The Declaration of war and military preparedness.

German expansionism threatened the security of Europe and Japan’s ambitions for a wider empire (especially in regions rich in primary products the Japanese were finding increasingly harder to obtain as trade embargoes tightened as a result of their incursions into China) during the 1930’s resulted in successive Australian governments placing faith in their military, alliances with the ‘Mother Country’ and trust in the British diplomacy of appeasement. This despite many warnings of impending disaster.

Japanese troops enter Mukden,

The Mukden Incident, also known

as the Manchurian Incident

Most Australians believed any future forces committed to a European theatre of conflict would be recovered, in time, and they had trust in the impregnability of the security screen of Fortress Singapore. The Japanese military, through their actions in China, particularly Nanking, gave evidence of their ruthless  and merciless intentions and actions.

On the 3^rd September 1939, Prime Minister Robert Menzies, announced that as a result of Britain being at war with Germany …”as a result, Australia is also at war.” We were at war with Nazi Germany.

War is declared against Nazi Germany

Like the situation of The Great War, Australia had two types of armies. The first was the longstanding volunteer army. The second was the militia army which was considered inferior as it was raised out of need for an ‘economical army’, given initial training, weekly or second weekly sessions and an annual two week camp. The Australian army at the declaration of war was a threadbare defensive force and hardly capable of any overseas service or offensive action at home. Conscription was considered abhorrent by the majority of Australian electors and during The Great War two referendums on the conscription issue were defeated. The government of the day decided to raise a Second Australian Imperial Force (2^nd AIF) as a political expedient to avoid the conscription issue and a decision which was to bedevil the Army until the end of the war with the Army divided into what was, in effect, two armies.

2nd AIF Recruiting Poster

Many of the initial volunteers for the 2^nd AIF were no doubt driven by a sense of duty to the British Empire and also by their belief that it was their duty as an Australian. There was the added attraction of travel and adventure as a large overseas force and also to emulate the deeds of their predecessors of the 1^st AIF – those fathers and uncles or other contacts who were living, breathing examples of a proud history of honour and service to king and country. There is just as much evidence, however, that many joined for less romantic ideals. One Labor politician described them as ‘economic conscripts’ when describing the initial recruits. These were men, unemployed, being offered ‘Five bob a day (5 shillings), food and lodgings instead of the dole’ which was then eight shillings and sixpence a week. There were also many who joined the AIF and took a paycut to do so!

Members of the Australian 56th Battalion (militia)

standing at ease at a training camp.

Just as there were many reasons for joining there were also many reason for not doing so. Bitterness and frustration born of despair in the great Depression caused as many not to join as it did those who did join. There was also a belief that an Australian army was for the defence of Australia and not some foreign nation, no more European bloodbaths of young Australians in futile battles. Still many others were in ‘reserved occupations’, skilled and valued workers who would deplete the national workforce if released to join up. There was a division between the AIF and the militia with the former frequently referring to the militia as ‘Chocos’, or, ‘chocolate soldiers’ who would melt if ever facing real action. There was also the fact that the conscription law of service meant that the militia could only fight on Australian soil, something the men of the AIF resolutely believed would never happen. Thus the other term for the militia ‘”Koalas” – a protected species and not for exporting or shooting at. At the same time the militia saw the AIF as arrogant and the cynical referred to them as ‘five-bob-a-day murderers’, or ‘five-bob-a-day tourists’.

It would take the Papuan Campaign to draw a divided army together.

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