Hi Binoy,

A bit of a beat-up: Japan would not have had to actually invade Australia, that could have come much later, all in good time: if its Fleet had destroyed the US Fleet, that would have been it: Japan could then seize Port Moresby at its leisure, to secure its rear, and isolated Australia from US support.

Then it could have mopped up any Australian naval forces, occupied New Zealand and, when it had a spare moment from attacking what was left of the US naval forces around Midway, occupied the Australian east coast.

The feints used in bombing all of Australia's northern towns, from Port Hedland across to Charters Towers, would have drawn a sizable chunk of Australia's military forces north, to be isolated from the main areas of settlement by two thousand miles of desert, which the Japanese would never have been stupid enough to contemplate crossing. The east coast was always their target.

And if they had aimed to destroy the Hawkesbury River Bridge, up-stream from Broken Bay, instead of attacking Sydney Harbour, yes, Australia could have been taken out of the War: with almost all allied troops to the north of the Bridge in Queensland, and almost all of war production south of the Bridge, in Victoria and Sydney, we would have been easy meat.

Joe

I agree with LM that this is a fatuous beat up. The purpose of the Coral sea attack was precisely to Isolate Aus as was the attack on Darwin, and any invasion of Aus would have stretched Japans supply lines beyond sustainable limits. However, had the US lost the battle of the Coral sea and Midway, a later invasion a year or two later would have been entirely feasible.

I think Binoy is tilting at windmills.

Oh how insight you appear to be Binoy with the safety of 75 years distance.
all rather pathetic really.

At Darwin "30 aircraft were destroyed, 11 ships were sunk, and many civil and military facilities were also heavily damaged." The cruiser Sydney was sunk like the 2 British battleships without air-cover near Singapore due to incompetence. Singapore was handed over but they all lined up to salute Jap cars driving in . Kokoda was at the end of a Jap supply chain over razor back mountains. So probably an invasion was not needed , just set up camp in Port Moresby and bomb the port cities. Then the history is wrong but still right , USS Lexington and Yorktown saved the day.

The Japanese flew bombing raids over Townsville
At that time there was only one bridge across the Ross River in Townsville that would allow Australian military access to the north of the country along the east coast.

The Japanese in a bombing raid at night attempted to bomb that bridge
they missed by about a couple of 100ft.

My Dad who is now 86years knew where the big crater in the ground left by the bomb
was and I stood next to it as a young girl. Because it came down in what were open
Paddocks near the bridge. Also, the railway line north crossed the river beside the bridge at the same point, so no doubt they had hoped to take that out as well.

Was Australia supposed to let New Guinea fall to the Japanese? We had a friendly trading protective relationship with them at the time.

This article writer just didn't like Turnbull giving America any credit for
saving Australia from the Japs. But without American troops and superior
weapons a lot of which were based in Townsville. From which they flew out to
defend the Coral sea. We would have been helpless before the Japanese superior numbers. The Aussie soldiers were brave fighters, but they didn't have
anywhere near the numbers that the Japanese had. Nor were they that well equipped with weapons at the time.

Whatever the American reasons for coming to our defence, probably because of the
Attack on Pearl Harbour, and a few hours later the taking out of an airport base in Singapore, where they took out all the American planes on the ground.
Clever strategy by the Japanese. Nevertheless whatever the reasons, American did
put a stop to Japanese attacks on Australia when they fought the Japanese in the Coral Sea off north Eastern Australia.

If the Japs had won, rather than drawn in the Coral Sea, there was no need for Midway. Midway was only a Jap operation to draw the US carriers into battle, & wipe them out. It was only this slightly bloody nose that stopped the Japs from occupying Port Moresby, & from there northern Oz & our resources were just a logical step away.

As it was with Midway, only the lucky event of the US dive bombers getting lost, & bumping into the Jap carriers when the zeros were not in the air that saved the yanks, & our hides. Up until that moment most of the US aircraft had been knocked down, without inflicting even a scratch on the Japs.

If the yanks had lost the carriers at Midway, we would have had Jap occupation forces in Oz, with nothing we or the Yanks could do about it at that time.

The Yanks not only did not use the Oz military to fight their war, but rejected the offer of using it. They left that idiot Blamey spilling unnecessary blood in useless mopping operations for nothing but his own ego.

Isn't it annoying when lefty kids try to insert their ideology into a history they don't understand or appreciate.

One other thing,
we can thank the American General for deciding to defend Australia in
the North. The politicians in the south, had decided to fall back and
only defend the land South of the Brisbane line as it was called.

My Old Dad talks about how people he knew abandoned their homes
in Townsville and headed south. But most people stayed because they had
no where to go. The American General however said he wasnt prepared to let the Japanese gain a base on Australia in the north and said
he thought it was better to fight them before they gained a foothold on Australian soil.

So the Brisbane line was abandoned.

My Father fought in the Pacific, as did many of his uncles and cousins, many of who never returned. I doubt if any of Binoy's did?

I believe Malcolm's revised colorfully expanded version? Is far closer to the verifiable and published facts than anti American Binoy's propagandized dismissal of the unrepayble blood sacrifice of American servicemen and material.

This was a no holds barred contest by them that took thousand of young American servicemen that threw in and risked the entire remaining American navy.

Sent motor plywood torpedo boats, one of which was commanded by one other than war hero, President Kennedy, against heavily armored dreadnought battleships, cruisers, destroyers and patrol boats, filled to the gunnels with Japanese marines. And without question saved our bacon!

Almost as inspiring as the handful of Aussie civilian soldiers, who fighting a strategic withdrawal rearguard action, shall live forever in the annals of history, myth and legend, as one of our finest moments, where the might of the previously undefeated and unstoppable Nipponese army, was finally halted, then forced to withdraw.

And yes, there's some truth in that time worn adage, the older we are the better we got?

Even so, least we forget!
Alan B.

"The Yanks not only did not use the Oz military to fight their war, but rejected the offer of using it."
Burma railway was gratefully accepted by the emperor and probably he would offer further mining and timber jobs in Japanese Australia. And wool .

Would the Japanese invade Australia?

As far as I know off there were at least two landings. One between Karumba & Burketown. They made it almost as far south as Julia Creek. The only survivor wrote a book after the War describing his experiences. He was dropped off from a Submarine with 102 Marines. He was here for three months & lost all his men & never saw who did it. When he was the last one left there were sign which way he should go & they took him back to where he was dropped off. He was the only survivor.

The second landing was at Cromarty between Townsville & Giru near Ayr. One of the men I worked with at the Railways was a Coast watcher, Mick Statham, during the War when he spotted the Japanese landing. He informed Military Headquarters in Townsville & they refused to believe him at first. He insisted so they sent a Negro Battalion down from Woodstock. Negro's weren't allowed into Townsville City Limits. A short Battle was fought & two Negros were killed & one wounded they killed one Japanese Marine & wounded two. The Japanese were rounded up & kept under military Guard in the cutting a Jezzine Barracks before being sent South by special train. My Father-in-Law was one of the Guards. All very Hush, hush at the time.

Some of my uncles left civilization during the War & lived on Cape Upstart. While I was growing up we would holiday over at Cape Upstart in the Huts. There were hundreds of Japanese Whisky & Saki Bottles laying all over the Beach. I asked the Uncles about them & they told me that the Japanese used Cape Upstart as a rewatering Base. They would come ashore & collect fresh water & have a BBQ on the Beach. They always had plenty of Alcohol & were happy to share it around. Alcohol was very hard to get during the War. They never interfered with my uncles. In fact, they said that the Japanese were always very polite.

Cont.

How many other places were visited? Lord only knows.

Considering the number of attacks on the East Coast, Newcastle, Sydney, the Hospital ship of Frazier Island. I'd say there were intentions of making a landing somewhere on Australian soil. The Gulf would have been a bad choice as it's either parched as old leather or a meter deep in mud. the East Coast of Queens would be a bad choice as there are only a few places on the Reef that you can access open sea. The rest of the North is deserted.

The Army had an Exercise across the Top End in the 80's. Ever seen the Photo of the Python caught on the electric Fence, Taken by a lad in 2 RAR on the QLD/NT border. They said when they got back that if anyone invaded across there the best thing to do was withdraw a bit at a time & stretch their Supply lines until they gave up or died of hunger & thirst.

After the war it was known that the Coral Sea battle stopped the
invasion of New Guinea. During the war there would have been almost no
one who would have known the truth as it was Ultra.
What was assumed during the war was that Japan might well invade
Australia. Ever heard of the Brisbane line ?
It was never a given because many people assumed that the country is
so vast that the Japanese would have been overstretched.

Probably what was a concern was if a peace was made with a victorious
Japan, we would have had an occupation.
From what I read about the Japanese wartime planning was that Australia
was too big and would take too many troops to occupy. There was a big
argument about an invasion and some Naval planners wanted to invade
but the army did not have the troops to do the job.

Thanks JayB & Bazz,

Fascinating ! We came close, didn't we ? When I was a kid, I found a tobacco tin of my dad's with Japanese money in it, printed in English, ready for distribution once they had invaded. Probably everybody had that sort of thing then.

The first Japanese prisoner captured on Australian soil was bailed up by an Aboriginal bloke on Melville Island. I think he was an airman shot down while bombing the Missions there.

If the Japs had invaded, they might have occupied Broome, and then Port Hedland (they bombed both towns) - that way they could have menaced all shipping coming across the Indian Ocean, and isolated Perth. Again, they wouldn't have tried to invade the rest of Australia from there - two thousand miles of desert ? Hardly.

We forget too that German ships were off the western and southern coasts, sinking ships even just outside Port Phillip heads.

Thanks again,

Joe

Interesting times . The US owned Philippines and George VI owned most of the rest including Gibraltar , Malta and Cyprus against the German invasions. He also owned the old German empire because they don't speak English ( but neither do Australians or Yanks ).

This article has little to do with History... the writer is merely expressing his beliefs... anti American beliefs.

Incidentally , As I come from an old Rabaul family , whom were evacuated from , chased out or killed by the Japanese.. I would be surprised if there was even One (1) active Sailor in Rabaul pre-war....... not quote 'the naval base of Rabaul'

There was one Australian Battalion ,some NGVR Soldiers and an RAAF Squadron.... that's it....

I agree with the author's hypothesis.

The real story of the Pacific War is that the Japanese lost it right at the start, when they botched the attack on Pearl Harbor by missing the US carriers, which of course weren't there. Their operations in New Guinea and further east were necessary to shore up their eastern flank in Southeast Asia. Darwin was bombed (to great effect given the panic than then ensued) but other raids - including the high profile midget submarine attack in Sydney Harbour and the shelling of Sydney's eastern suburbs from a submarine off the coast - were pinpricks.

Coral Sea prevented further effective Japanese land operations in Papua and New Guinea and isolated Japanese forces in Guadalcanal. It also showed Tokyo clearly where the limits of his military projection lay.

True, if Coral Sea had gone the other way, then Australia itself would possibly have faced more effective enemy action, including, possibly, landings by raiding forces (think Dieppe as an example). The frenzy over full-scale invasion was useful - as the author of the piece notes - as an Australian home front propaganda tool. Militarily, for the Japanese, it was a no-brainer. If troops had been withdrawn from China to contribute to the forces that would have been needed to invade Australia, the Russians despite their supply and manpower problems in the European war might have entered the Pacific War rather earlier than they did, in August 1945. The Japanese would have lost the war earlier. But like many things, that didn't happen.

On the other point - Australia as a traditional source of imperial levies for powerful empires, first the British and then the Americans - I also have to agree with the author. The first half of the 20th century was not the time for truly independent military and foreign policies - on population alone, leaving aside other issues. But it is time now, and Australia should take a far more independent defence position.

Scribe: The first half of the 20th century was not the time for truly independent military and foreign policies - on population alone, leaving aside other issues. But it is time now, and Australia should take a far more independent defence position.

You are right, of course, but I feel it's still too early in our history to take a fully independent stand. At a population of 25 million & a Total Military force of about 65 thousand, (Not sure of the latest figures) Australia couldn't defend it's self against Indonesia, if they decided to take North Western Australia. There was talk, many years ago, that this part of Australia belonged to them.

Morsby's occupation would have effectively cut Australia off from the Indian Ocean. All shipping would have had to go the long way around. Cape York would have been occupied, cutting off any traffic through the Torres Straights & then Darwin would have been easily occupied. That's about as far as they would have needed to go to protect their Oil interest in South East Asia.

After Coral Sea , Fletcher the US commander sailed to Pearl Harbor without telling the Aust commander went off to Darwin . Next day the Yanks thanked the Aust .

"Having already committed a battalion to Malaysia to support resistance to the Konfrontasi policy of Indonesia’s Sukarno government, the logical next step for Menzies was to look to Vietnam. He did this with the support of his Cold War warrior and minister for external affairs, Paul Hasluck. They decided to send an Australian battalion to South Vietnam, partly to ensure continued American interest in the region.

A series of negotiations took place between Australian, American and Vietnamese representatives to secure acceptance of the Australian troops. The South Vietnamese government and the American ambassador in Saigon, Maxwell Taylor, were initially reluctant to receive more foreign troops. It seemed that the necessary South Vietnamese invitation wasn’t going to be forthcoming.

Fortunately for Menzies, the South Vietnamese government was persuaded to accept the Australian offer. A formal request was given just before Menzies made his speech in Parliament.
By this time it was late evening on Thursday, April 29. The Labor opposition leader, Arthur Calwell, and his deputy, Gough Whitlam, had already left Canberra for their home electorates. As many members of both sides had departed Canberra, Menzies made his announcement to a near-empty House of Representatives."
_ N Ferns , Monash Uni.

Does Commander in Chief Donald J Trump need the arstralians?

Scribe,
Ever since Tasman the quickest way to/from the Indian ocean
has been across the Bight. It still is. Control of Torres Strait would
have compromised Darwin but it would have been better supplied by road
and air anyway.
What has not been taken into account in this discussion is that at that
time there was a large US army in Australia.

No, the Japanese army knew that an invasion of Australia would have
tied them up in a very difficult campaign with long support lines
and they may have taken note of the problems facing the German army
in Russia with it rapidly expanding front line length.
They would always have had an exposed end on any front.

Bazz,

The Japanese had a plan to cripple American forces so they would have an unopposed. path through the Islands north of Australia. They had good information about Australia and Australia's small population and lack of many numbers of men
and weapons back then.

There plan was to cripple the American navy by a surprise attack on Pearl Harbour.
A few hours later they flew back to Singapore and wiped out the American planes on
The ground at the air base the Americans had there.

There were no fighting men here at the time, they were all over helping Britain fight
the Germans. When the Japs began to attack, the Australian prime minster bought
our troops home to fight the Japanese. Churchill didn't want the Australian troops to come home and he couldn't help us because Britain was under intense attack by the Germans. He said let Australia fall and we'll get it back later. Australia's prime minister
didn't agree and bought the troops home.

The Japs knew Britain couldn't help us, and that their army far outnumbered Australia's.
They also thought their plan to decimate the American forces in surprise attacks would
disable America.

The Japanese underestimated the big armament factories already up and running, in America because they were selling Arms to the British and,allied forces and making heaps of money. That's how the Rockerfellas became filthy rich.

The Americans could turn out new weaponary very quickly and efficiently. In fact this industry was providing new jobs and prosperity after the bleak years of the depression.
Suddenly Americans had jobs again in these weapons factory's and the money was pouring in as they provided the much needed weaponary to Britain and its allies.
America didn't have to mobilize and arm, they were already highly mobilised and armed,
although not yet in the war physically.
So Japan's attack on their ships and planes didn't slow America down like Japan thought it would. Existing American factories turned out new planes and ships again very rapidly. This is what bought the Japanese,plan undone. Their plan to disable America never succeeded.

Chereful said;
A few hours later they flew back to Singapore and wiped out the
American planes on The ground at the air base the Americans had there.
Well I doubt that. Their carrier planes would not have anything like
that range.
I had never heard that the US had a base in Malaya pre Dec 1941.

Another not realised point is that the Japanese attacked Malaya before
Peal Harbour by a couple of hours. Because of the time zones everyone
thought Pearl Harbour was attacked first.

Hi Bazz,

Yeah, the Japanese occupied Indo-China in 1940 in league with the Vichy regime in France; and from there put pressure on the Thai Regent Pibul Songgram who allowed them to move their military into Thailand and set up bases. From there, they could attack Malaya and Burma with ease. And from there, the Dutch East Indies, and then northern Australia. So Australia was being assaulted from both the north-west and the north-east.

Joe

Bazz, " Japanese attacked Malaya before Pearl Harbour by a couple of hours. Because of the time zones everyone thought Pearl Harbour was attacked first"

The British Admiralty would definitely have endeavoured to get Churchill's immediate attention on that, irrespective of his engagements or preoccupied status at the time.

It raises many questions. But I guess that some secrets always stay that way. Sometimes a simple explanation though, such as the human errors in thinking. It may not have even registered, or have been interpreted differently.

Well yes Leoj there is 18 hours difference between Singapore & Hawaii.
so by date the attack was the next day in Singapore.
I guess it was a synchronised attack.

I've been looking for the Book by the Japanese Marine Lt. No Luck so far. I remember the story from the Mid-day show with Kerry Ann Kennelly interview.

Bazz,

Have you come across this report?

http://www.dawn.com/news/820634

Interesting link leoj. I have known for many many years that Malaya
was attacked first by a small amount if time.

The Ambush
The first real contact between Australian and Japanese troops was during the evening of 14-15 January 1942 at a wooden bridge west of Gemas in Malaya.
The Australians mounted a successful ambush at the bridge before withdrawing to link up with their main force for the larger battle at Gemas. By the afternoon of the next day, the Australian were pushed back. The 2/30th Battalion had lost 81 men killed, wounded or missing and there were an estimated 1,000 casualties to the 5th Japanese Division.

I've been there. We used to stop there on the way to Kulang to go Skydiving. There is a large Planck on the Bridge describing the Battle in great detail. It's about 1.5 x 1 meters in Bronze. I've also camped at the Japanese Invasion site in Kelantan & seen the wrecked bunkers. Around the same place I ran into the Orang Aslie, Native Australasian people. Very interesting. Then we used to stop off at the Old Colonial Office, which is a Hotel/Restaurant with rooms. They did a very nice Morning Tea in the Old Colonial Style.

It's pretty well established that the Japanese had no immediate plans to invade Australia during the early months of the Pacific war.

Which is not to say that Australia had no plans to defend itself so far as it could.

Australia's gold reserves were locked up in the Broken Hill jail, on the theory that if the Japanese managed to fight through and capture it (a very long shot), there was no way they would get it back to the coast. Australian troops who later fought at Milne Bay trained at Currimundi Lake on the Sunshine Coast, before being put onto trains and taken to Townsville for embarkation to PNG. There are still street signs (next to the Currimundi Primary School) warning that unexploded ordnance may be found in the area, which is still mostly an undeveloped paddock.

Back in the mid-70s I wrote an honours thesis on the administration of Charles Abbott, a former Country Party politician who was the administrator of the Northern Territory from 1936 to 1946. Judging from the papers I accessed at that time, I was one of the first to have researched that period. One document I saw related to a meeting of the joint chiefs of staff. When one of them asked if Singapore was likely to fall, the Navy COS replied that it would not, "because the Admiralty told us so."

The other often forgotten fact is that when (mainly) Australian troops defeated the Japanese at Milne Bay in August-September 1942 it was the first time that the Japanese Imperial Army had been defeated on land.

The intention of the Japanese seemed to be to capture the three airstrips at the western end of Milne Bay. Operating from there, Japanese aircraft could easily have caused major damage to Port Moresby, Darwin, Broome, Cairns and Townsville. While such attacks did not represent an intention to occupy the Australian mainland, they would certainly have tied up a large part of Australia's modest defence forces.

Hi Calwest,

Just out of interest, did you find much from the period when Abbott was NT Administrator about Aboriginal (or more specifically, if indelicately, half-caste) children and the reasons why they were evacuated south after Darwin was bombed ? And any other directives about 'taking children away' ? Isn't it fascinating (but very disappointing too) that precious records are so rarely examined ?

In 1992, fifty years after Sydney Harbour was attacked, I rang my mum up to remind her. She started to laugh and explained that my father worked on the munitions train to Brisbane and was due to go up that night. She said he went white as a sheet; she made his lunch like it was the last meal of a condemned man. Of course he knew about the Hawkesbury River Bridge, the only rail (and main road) link between south and north Australia.

The unexpected twists of history :)

Cheers,

Joe

Hi Joe,

Yes, I did see documents relating to the passengers on the trains that took people south prior to 19 February 1942. The passenger lists identified ethnic origin for each passenger and marked "HC" against half-castes. I was surprised (c. 1977), but accepted the 1940s were different days with different norms.

I don't recall anything about children being "taken away" (removed from their families). Relatively few civilians left in Darwin, apart from the Post Master and his female staff, all of whom were killed when a bomb hit the post office.

As for the original documents...!!

One of the most powerful bodies in Darwin at the time was the North Australian Workers' Union. They effectively controlled the wharf and could shut down supplies from the south. The railway went south, but only to Adelaide River, I think.

The NAWU still existed in 1976-77. I phoned them and asked if they had any records from the period (1936-46). The NAWU bloke said they had had records from that period, "...but they were all blown away by Cyclone Tracey." The ANU, which had a Northern Australia Research Unit, had not found, copied or archived those documents, which would have been essential to understanding Abbott's period as Administrator, because he was in conflict with the union from very early in his term there.

The Lowe Royal Commission directed at Abbott most of the blame for the civil disorder in Darwin. The relevant minister (in the Curtin government) advised Curtin to ignore it, which he did.

One month later, Major General David Blake, the senior Army officer (and senior defence officer in the NT) and who had a strong record from WW1, was transferred from Darwin line of command to Alice Springs line of command and a month later to the unattached list. I guess the Army had a view about who was responsible for the disorder, since it involved mostly military personnel.

After the war both Blake and Abbott were members of the Naval and Military Club in Sydney. Interesting conversations over a glass of port, no doubt.

Hi Calwest,

Fascinating ! I suppose Blake would have been at least partly responsible for sealing the Stuart Highway, using enemy-alien labour, including Jews who happened not to have taken out citizenship, even though of course they would have been refugees from Nazi-controlled Europe. Did they extend the railway down to Pine Creek during the War ?

The unions don't have a very good record of supporting the War effort up that way, hence so many ships in Darwin harbour waiting to be unloaded, hence so many bombed by the Japs and sunk needlessly. One more disgraceful period in our history.

Thanks, mate.

Joe