Australians in WW2

Scar,there's nothing wrong with pointing out errors.

"When the uneducated and ignorant scoff at these figures,"

Look at what you wrote. If that's not insulting and patronizing then I don't know what is. Especially since you don't know either men. Yes , I think it could be described as having a chip on your shoulder.

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It was my understanding that the Australian forces in North Africa were pulled out in order to meet the threat from the Japanese (against the wishes of the British). I don't know the full details, but I've got an uncle who was one of those redeployed from Africa to New Guinea. (I actually thought it was the 9th-but nobody quote me on that please)

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BTW, one fact I am certain of was that Australia had 1 in every 7 of it's citizens enlisted during WWII, which was the highest proportion of the population of any of the allied forces. Apparently people had a habit of getting drunk and then enlisting in a bout of patriotic fervour.

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Yes - I was brought up with the same belief - that Churchill said Australia was expendable - that our forcres should remain in Europe, and Australia re-taken after victory there.

Of course, there is no particular reason to believe Japan actually intended to invade Australia, as opposed to bombing us and suchlike, I believe.

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Quote:

It was my understanding that the Australian forces in North Africa were pulled out in order to meet the threat from the Japanese (against the wishes of the British). I don't know the full details, but I've got an uncle who was one of those redeployed from Africa to New Guinea. (I actually thought it was the 9th-but nobody quote me on that please)

This is correct. There were less than 5000 Australians taken prisoner in North Africa.

Quote:

BTW, one fact I am certain of was that Australia had 1 in every 7 of it's citizens enlisted during WWII, which was the highest proportion of the population of any of the allied forces. Apparently people had a habit of getting drunk and then enlisting in a bout of patriotic fervour.

The 1 in 7 figure is correct but that wasn't the highest proportion of the allies. The Kiwis had almost 1 in 5.

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Adrian wrote:

This is correct. There were less than 5000 Australians taken prisoner in North Africa.

But a hell of a lot of British. I watched an ABC program about this just a few weeks ago. One of the former Brit soldiers said it shamed them that the Australian soldiers held Tobruk, and then they lost it.

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I didn't know about the NZ force proportion though. That's one hell of a chunk of a population.

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Sure is.

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Scaramouche wrote:

Australians serving in Europe in WW2:
2/1st Battalion
2/2nd Battalion
2/3rd Battalion
2/4th Battalion
2/5th Battalion
2/6th Battalion
2/7th Battalion
2/8th Battalion
2/11th Battalion

This is only the infantry fighting as full battalions, and does not count the otehr services there. Nor does it include the many fighting directly under the command or allied forces. This information is also at the AWM website.

You list nine battalions here. How does that differ from saying that a division served in Europe? In an American division of that era, there were exactly nine battalions of infantry. That however, does not include the three artillery battalions in each American division, and it does not include the engineers, the support and supply, the medical corps . . . this does not refute what i wrote, that a single division served on the European Continent. Given that the Allied front line troops only reached about 750,000 in the ETO (although with literally millions of air force personnel, naval personnel and above all else, logistical and administrative support personnel). I can't understand why it seems such a point of pride to you to attempt to characterize the Australian participation on the ground in Europe as so significant. There was "glory" enough to go around in both North Africa and the southwest pacific. This is why i refer to a chip-on-the-shoulder attitude; it seems as though you feel that Australia is slighted if not made out to be a major player in Europe.

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New Zealand was in the war early, and stayed for the long-haul. They were a part of the force which tried to hold Greece against German invasion, and then fought in North Africa. Later, they joined the invasion of Italy. Their divison became a sort of "super" division, nearly twice the size of most dominion divisions, and eventualy highly mechanized. Given the size of their pre-war population, their contribution was significant. In comparison to all United Nations troops on the ground in Europe, the number was small.

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Scaramouche wrote:

Actually we had an Australia army at that time, and earlier. The Australian Army was established on 1st March 1901.

Take a moment to read what I actually wrote: "There was, I asserted, no such thing as an Australian "army" -- defined as a permanent or semi-permanent organizational unit composed of two or more corps and having a dedicated command structure -- during World War II.

"Army," unfortunately, is a term susceptible to two meanings: (1) the entire military establishment of a nation's land forces; and (2) the highest-level permanent or semi-permanent field unit in a nation's land forces (a problem, btw, that has no counterpart for maritime forces, where the distinction is between "navies" and "fleets"). Thus we can say that the U.S. Army (sense 1) trains its officers at West Point, and that the U.S. Fifth Army (sense 2) fought in Italy in World War II.

As I have consistently pointed out, there was no Australian army (sense 2) in World War II. There was an Australian army (sense 1), but then it's highly unlikely that Rommel (or anyone else) would say that he wished he had Australia's "military establishment." I will, therefore, charitably ascribe Scaramouche's error to a common misunderstanding rather than his demonstrated truculence.

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When Mac arrived in Australia there were around 300 000 Australian soldiers in Australia.

1.08 million Australians served during WW2. I think around 30 000 or so were captured and 40 000 killed. Hardly most.

Australian troops were no longer in Tobruk when it fell. Rommel had huge respect for the Australian troops and told Hitler that they were superior to the German soldiers he had. Remember, until Tobruk the German army had not failed. Armies had surrendered before them whenever tanks had broken through. The Australians did not do this and captured diaries show that the Germans were confused and scared that their Blitzkrieg no longer seemed to work.

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Let's all agree the Anzac forces were respected by their allies and their enemies and lay this thread to rest.

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Lol!!!!

And my gramma can whup your gramma!!!

(She COULD, you know! As a weelowan I ended up having to chase her on a horse and bring her back because she had become confused, and thought she was back on her sheep station, mustering cattle. She WAS mustering cattle, plying her stockwhip like a good 'un, on the craziest horse of the bunch, in her night dress, in 118 F heat - she was 84!!!)

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Since there is no possibility of stemming this Gallipoli-like Australian onslaught onto the shores of A2K, I suppose the next best thing is to encourage it. Consequently, I will do my small part to make sure that A2K remains at the top of any Google search results list, in the hopes that, by so doing, we will soon draw in the vast majority of the Australian population to become members of this site. So, without further ado:

Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war
Rommel quote Australian army world war

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Gallipoli-like? You luring us to our deaths, Joe?

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dlowan wrote:

Gallipoli-like? You luring us to our deaths, Joe?

Surely you're aware that the Australians were victorious in every military encounter in which they participated. As a matter of fact, I believe it was Mustafa Kemal (later known as Atatürk) who said: "give me two Australian divisions and I will conquer the world!"

Australians in WW2

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