The tragedy has been our repetitive unpreparedness and poorly conceived military analysis. Successive Govts have either left Aust's defence to the Poms, Yanks or the UN. Prefering short term economic expediency as an alternative..to the detriment of embattled sons and daughters. Priorities never included the Defence Forces.

Gallipoli diggers in the trenches at Lone Pine were decimated by Turkish artillery. Slouch hats were no protection to shell fragments or sharapnel. Simply not available. Darwin's air defence consisted of vintage aircraft that were bombed while neatly parked on the tarmac,even though there was ample warning but overlooked.The island of Crete surrendered to German paratroopers, which surprised and routed the Anzacs. No one expected the paras. The 6th Division fighting in the desert were recalled to Aust, and with no tropical gear or training, sent to the Jungles of Papua New Guinea. Malaria, tropical ulcers,humidity, food shortages, monsoons, accounted for 2/3 casualties, not the infamous Jap. The myths and fabrications emanating from Historians who glorify War and embellish campaigns to create heriocs and gallantry at the expense of down to Earth realism is to my mind, opportunistic, self-serving and utterly contemptable.

Modern classic: the AWM is Canberra is a National fiasco. Their web developers and email facilities are so archaic, much of their priceless material is obsolescent despite a $ 5 billion budget upgrade. When challenged about the accuracy of War time history of the Korean and Vietnam War, their curator declared all their Historians were Phd academics. Subsidised for years on bursaries and research grants. Umteen library staff, research tryst, typist pools etc, all paid contributors to compiling War history for these boffins who never saw service, yet write brillant accounts of campaigns from armchair perspetives. Not even Bollywood or Baz Luhrmann would risk liberties with the truth !

My Uncle, retired career Veteran who saw action, suffered gun-shot wounds, was accused of perverting the truth!!

It appears, if you're a reputable World acknowledged biographer, you are more entitled to be a credible witness then a battle scared, bravery decorated veteran on the scene. History gone askew.

C'est la guerre !!

Bravo! Telling it hard, jacinta! You must know that reference I cited 'The Monocled Mutineer'.

The sanitization and romanticization of the military and warfare are hardly ever challenged. Another absurdity: James Packer was made an official patron of the ADF's reserve forces recruitment. There was never any conceivable situation that he would have to undergo even peacetime training, let alone a deployment. Conscription or no, the oligarchs' brutal, self-serving and contemptuous strangle on the people ensure that people like Packer can bask in the flag-waving glory, but never risk a drop for it. Likewise the smug, pampered pundits who push every war their own families and bosses want - they never lead by example.

mil-observer “[John, please don't go near rougey's fish trap - like the steady empty lines to take up more space, the content is like aluminium chaff dropped against radar beams i.e., spurious distraction. It's just online trolling and the OTT arrogance stuff proves it yet again. Others too: please stay on track with serious respondents, for the sake of our discussion and the useful points and references elicited]”

Now that is better than Passys attempt at ad hominine but contains too much embedded pretentious elitism to be a real swing.

I suggest you try again and of course your attempt also lacks one important thing.

Passy claimed Capitalism owed something to the French revolution and I have clearly denounced that assertion.

Pretending this is some “serious debate”, elevated above consideration of my humble contributions, might bring a sense of smug satisfaction to your sad existence but remember-

What passes for “credibility” in those I challenge, diminishes every time they crawl back into their caves or ivory towers.

As to the matter Jacinta brings up, the “big bad capitalists”.

I would remind you all, the system of libertarian capitalism prevailed when Ronald Reagans “Starwars” strategy brought the corrupt Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to their knees and saw their complete collapse, noting how eager many of thiose former republics have been to sign-up to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, placing them squarely against the camp of their former “socialist masters”.

Whilst Jacinta may castigate the western democracies for their military investments, I would observe the USSR and every other quasi-socialist “workers paradise” has consistently devoted more of its Gross National Product to military spending than the capitalist countries.

The reason why the capitalists might seem to spend more is because the economic system of productivity and wealth creation is better managed and ACHIEVES MORE, than the stagnant and feeble machinations of socialists and socialism (by any name and at any time)

jacinta,

Are you sure that your understanding of the Second World War is more accurate than that presented by the Australian War Museum?

jacinta wrote, "Successive Govts have either left Aust's defence to the Poms, Yanks or the UN. Prefering short term economic expediency as an alternative..to the detriment of embattled sons and daughters. Priorities never included the Defence Forces."

Not true in regard to the Second World War. This is completely debunked in Andrew Ross's "Armed and Ready - The Industrial Development and Defence of Australia 1900-1945" (1995).

In fact, between the two wars, Australia's Governments, both Conservative and Labour (whatever else can be critically said of them) , turned Australia into one of the most advanced industrialised countries in the world. Australia's economy was capable of sustaining a defence force that deterred the Japanese from invading in 1942. The Japanese Navy wanted to invade, but the Japanese Army vetoed this plan in March 1942.

Andrew Ross shows that the Japanese Army was probably right in its assessment of the situation. Australia's economy was almost self-sufficient and could have put into the field by June 1942, which is the earliest date before which Japan could possibly have launched an invasion, eight fully equipped Army divisions and an air force that was at least capable of denying them total air supremacy. (see also "The myth of the Howard Government's defence competence" at http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=6665&page=0)

Whilst Australian Governments appeared to be deliberately limiting the development of secondary industry to suit the needs of Britain's industrial exporters, Ross shows how this deceptive appearance was maintained in order to maintain trade arrangements which, for example, discriminated against Argentina, which in the 1930's produced a superior quality of frozen beef and lamb (Ross page 80).

This is also discussed in "Can Australia ever be self-reliant for national defence?" of 28 July 2007 at http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=860&page=0

Although no commensurate work has since challenged Andrew Ross's thesis, his work has curiously been ignored since then. As examples, the book is not listed in the bibliography of Peter Thompson's "Pacific Fury" nor "1942", both published this year.

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It's as if Australia's elites were happy to bury our past scientific and industrial achievements in order to turn our economy into the third world client economy that it has become.

jacinta wrote, "Malaria, tropical ulcers, humidity, food shortages, monsoons, accounted for 2/3 casualties, not the infamous Jap."

Australia's total war fatalities, whilst 39,000 too high according to one figure I could find, were still comparatively light when one considers the scale of that conflict and the fact that Australians fought in Europe, the Middle East and in the Pacific. Ross has shown that this was due largely to the excellent state of Australia's military technology.

Deaths due to disease and wounds were kept very low due to our excellent medical technology, although I can't cite the figures because I have lent my copy of "Armed and Ready" at the moment.

As for the Crete campaign, my understanding was that the German paratroopers were badly mauled at the start, but that the British inexplicably ordered a withdrawal when they could have defeated the invasion. Perhaps Antony Beevor's recent book may explain what happened there.

As for the Gallipoli campaign, whilst the Turks won and the whole campaign was morally dubious on many levels, and on all sides, including the side of the Turks who massacred the Armenians at the same time, it was a Pyrrhic victory for the Turks whose casualties significantly exceeded even the appalling losses of the French, British, Australian and New Zealand Forces.

Also, the line between a brilliant military victory and a terrible defeat is often a very fine one indeed. At several points in the campaign the allies could well have succeeded.

It's often all too easy to pronounce such campaigns as ill-conceived with the advantage of 20-20 hindsight.

Billie:

I agree with you...productivity IS a measure of output per worker.

You commented that New Zealand saw productivity decline when they removed farm subsidies and lowered social security payments. To me, this sounds like a rocky transition away from socialism. Russia seems to have had similar problems in this regard. Curiously, the Chinese are making their transition (thus far) with greater success.

You lament that Australian incomes under $25,000 are taxed at 50% while the notable wealthy pay no income tax at all. If so, perhaps government representatives could be persuaded by an angry electorate to change the tax code (one way or the other). In all democratic societies, the people should pay taxes according to some measure of fairness.

To me, your posts haven't been clear whether you believe that, as Passey has said, there will be war until we rid the world of capitalism, or whether you believe that capitalist societies tend to be more productive than socialist societies.

Lest there be any doubt, I have stated two beliefs. First, is that wars will occur, irrespective of governmental structure. Second, is that capitalism fosters greater productivity than does socialism.