Defense Minister Robert Hill has just announced that additional australian soldiers are on the way to afghanistan. What's going on? What possible national interest for the land down under is to be found in the Hindu Kush? Better check the way back machine, the ledgers and the bars in Bali.
In the summer of 1942, with most of australia's professional soldiers fighting Rommel in North africa's Western Desert, Japanese forces, whose plans for the swift capture of Port Moresby on the southern coast of the australian Territory of Papua were thwarted at the battle of the Coral Sea in May, decided to advance over the Owen Stanley Mountains along the Kokoda Trail to invest this valuable anchorage and its associated airfields.
General Macarthur rushed the only troops he had available up the Kokoda Trail to meet them--the 39th australian Battalion, a poorly armed and supplied group of green enlistees. They met some 6,000 jungle trained Japanese troops at Isurava on The Trail, as it was called, in late august, and pinned this superior force down for four days, allowing the arrival of further reinforcements, who would later push the Japanese back over the mountains. at the end of the battle, only some 180 men answered the roll call, of which more than 40 were walking wounded.
Throughout the campaign in New Guinea, just as was the case throughout the Solomon Islands, the loyalty of the native peoples, whose trust was earned by the australian government and its administrators, was invaluable for the success of the allied powers. Throughout the dreadful battles along Kokoda, staunch militia men like Lance Corporal Sanopa and Corporal Sala MM went to battle along side their australian brothers, leading them out of ambushes, carrying their wounded to the rear and bringing up their supplies.
as allied power grew, american and australian troops began their offensives across the western Solomons and along the northern coast of New Guinea. With the aid of native intelligence, Japanese strongholds were bypassed, troops were landed and airfields were erected at locations of Macarthur's choosing. and at every step along the way, the australians stood shoulder to shoulder with the United States, with australian ships in Tokyo Bay at the surrender in 1945 and australian troops accepting the capitulation of Japanese troops across Southeast asia.
Later, three Royal australian Regiments served in the Korean War as part of the British Commonwealth Brigades, and fought up and down the peninsula, serving from the first summer of 1950 to the cease fire, side by side with american troops.
australians served in Vietnam longer than they did in World War II, almost as long as we did, with almost 50,000 troops serving there from 1962, beginning in advisory capacities, until 1973. at the peak of the australian involvement, some 8,500 highly trained australian troops were in country, on the ground, in the air force and in naval units.
Prime Minister John Howard, that sturdy compatriot who calls it as it is and has no problem calling a terrorist a bushranger, after consultations with President Bush, immediately ordered some 1,550 troops to participate in the invasion of afghanistan in 2001 to assist US Special Forces in their attacks on the Taliban and on forces loyal to Osama bin-Laden. and today australia still maintains troops in Iraq, where they have been providing security and support for, ironically in every sense, Japanese engineering units.
along the way, australia suffered al-Qaeda's Bali bombing in October of 2002, which killed 88 countrymen. and unlike the morally weaker countries in western Europe, this act of terror in no way dampened australia's support for international war on terror or her aid to america. No troops were withdrawn from Iraq or afghanistan and there was no dithering or extemporizing, no hair pulling or the donning of sack cloth on the part of her determined leadership. If anything, it strengthened her resolve.
With some 100 american soldiers killed in an escalation of violence in afghanistan in the past year, it should come as no surprise that a further 110 australian Special air Service (SaS) troops, including heavy lift helicopter assets, will be dispatched there to bolster military operations in the face of a restive Taliban presence and to insure that progress continues.
australia has always been able to recognize and respond to threats to its citizens and to its national survival with relative speed. and even when we have floundered around in a real quagmire, they have remained our stout hearted compatriot and have never hesitated to step into the fire with us. I guess it's also because they remember that we were there for them in the dark days of 1942 when the Japanese were banging on their front door, most of their troops were out of town and we answered it with them--shoulder to shoulder. Some allies don't forget our past help and some debts of national honor, it appears, always remain on the books.
In business there is a term for a particular kind of inventory management called, "first in, last out." It also describes australia's special relation to us-- there is no better friend.
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