'A subsidiary attack of the Somme Offensive, and launched on 23 July 1916, the Battle of Pozieres Ridge on the Albert-Bapaume road saw the Australians and British fight hard for an area that comprised a first rate observation post over the surrounding countryside, as well as the additional benefit of offering an alternative approach to the rear of the Thiepval defences.'
(Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/battles/pozieres.htm ).

It has been argued that the Battle of Messines was the most successful local operation of the war, certainly of the Western Front. Carried out by General Herbert Plumer's Second Army, it was launched on 7 June 1917 with the detonation of 19 underground mines underneath the German mines.

Passchendaele could be described as one of the most controversial battles of World War I. Difficulties arose through a dispute between the British generals and politicians, all of whom had a different idea on the strategy of war. The actual necessity or futility of the battle is still disputed to this day.

Officially named the Third Battle of Ypres, Passchendaele took place several kilometres north of the town of Ypres. The town, traditionally a centre of textile weaving was completely flattened as four years of battle raged nearby and in the town. Magnificent architecture from medieval times was destroyed by artillery including Cloth Hall built in 1214.

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The landing scheme was a simple one, in outline at least. The 3rd Brigade's 4000 men would land as a covering force to secure a beachhead for two Australasian divisions made up of six brigades. Those 4000 would go in two waves. The first, consisting of 1500 men, were to start from three battleships–Queen, Prince of Wales and London– then be distributed between twelve tows, each made up of a steamboat, a cutter (30 men), a lifeboat (28 men) and either a launch (98 men) or a pinnace (60 men).

The remaining 2500, the second wave, were to land from seven destroyers shortly afterwards. Those destroyers would wait near the island of Imbros and join the battleships, one and a half miles (about 2 km) from the mainland, at 4.15 a.m. The first wave was scheduled to land a few minutes earlier, and the destroyers would then sail in, full speed ahead, adding a number of lifeboats borrowed from transport vessels to the tows that had been used by the first wave. Once the whole 3rd Brigade was ashore, the rest of the 1st Division would arrive on transports, grouped in fours and coming in at regular intervals.

Such, at least, was the plan, and its first stage was negotiated without difficulty. Troops on the battleships were woken at 1 a.m., given a hot meal and a drink while the tows were being got ready, and by 1.30 a.m. were ready for mustering into companies. This operation was carried out with impressive efficiency: no one spoke; orders were given in whispers. The only sounds were shuffling boots and muttered curses as men slipped on the ladders leading down to the boats. But for many, the tension of that still night magnified the sounds.

Prior to the start of the Gallipoli campaign Anzac Cove did not exist. On 25 April 1915, as part of the overall Allied plan, the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (or Anzacs) were ordered to land on the Peninsula's Aegean coastline to seize the hill of Mal Tepe 5 miles inland and threaten the northern flank of the Kilid Bahr Plateau. The exact position of the landing remained vague with the military orders placing it between Gaba Tepe and Fisherman's Hut, a distance of roughly two and a half miles. The naval orders were somewhat more precise, pinning the southern flank of the landing one mile north of Gaba Tepe. Once the covering force of the 3rd Australian Brigade had landed and secured its position, the remainder of the 1st Australian Division followed by the New Zealand and Australian Division were then to push through towards Mal Tepe.

In the event the landing was very confused and set in train a sequence of events that were never to be overcome. Not only did the boats of the first wave contract into a much reduced line significantly to the north of the expected beach, they also became intermingled before the troops could disembark. As a result the men went ashore in considerable disarray. The second wave then followed in order, ironically compounding the original errors. Throughout the day the main body of the 1st Australian Division continued to land and move into this uncertain position. But, as Turkish pressure mounted, any residual coherence within the Anzac line was lost. Overnight, with the positions fragmented and many wounded on the beach, the question of re-embarkation was raised. But, after being rejected, the Anzacs were ordered to dig in which they did with consummate success.

In the confusion of the initial landing, most of the first boats grounded along a narrow stretch of the shore between the small headlands of Ari Burnu and what became known as Hell Spit. Offering a slight degree of protection from Turkish observation and gunfire, this tiny inlet became the heart of the Australian and New Zealand line and was given the legendary name of Anzac Cove. Around it a claustrophobic, overlooked position grew up. The Anzacs were unable to break out, as their last concerted assault on 1-2 May clearly showed. But likewise the successive attempts made by the Turks to drive them into the sea, which culminated in the heavy attack of 19 May, were also all heavily defeated. From the start of June until the evacuation on 19 December, all actions were either diversionary or local, aimed simply at improving positions in the line. Even the giant move to the north begun on 6 August against Chunuk Bair and the height of the Sari Bair ridge in the end resulted in little improvement to the original Anzac position.

Life at Anzac was unique. The terrain was bewildering, formed both by natural gullies and deep, man-made tunnels and trenches. The Turks were at places almost within arm's reach, and access was possible only from the sea via a handful of vulnerable piers which were all subject to shellfire. The experience was fuelled by a heady mixture of futility, pride, self-reliance and degradation. Unpleasant, unsought, it bestowed on all those who survived it a badge of stamina and courage and helped to define the distinctive national characteristics of the new nations of Australia and New Zealand.

Somme 1916
'Comprising the main Allied attack on the Western Front during 1916, the Battle of the Somme is famous chiefly on account of the loss of 58,000 British troops (one third of them killed) on the first day of the battle, 1 July 1916, which to this day remains a one-day record. The attack was launched upon a 30 kilometre front, from north of the Somme river between Arras and Albert, and ran from 1 July until 18 November, at which point it was called off.'
(Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/battles/somme.htm ).

Bullecourt is perhaps the First World War battle that engendered the greatest distrust and contempt in Australian troops for their British commanders. Sandwiched between, and sometimes overshadowed by, two of the best-known Australian actions of the war - Pozi?s (July-August 1916) and Passchendaele (October 1917) - Bullecourt did not involve the level of casualties of these two, but it nevertheless resulted in huge losses for the Australian divisions involved.

Ypres 1917
'Meticulously planned, Third Ypres was launched on 31 July 1917 and continued until the fall of Passchendaele village on 6 November. The offensive resulted in gains for the Allies but was by no means the breakthrough Haig intended, and such gains as were made came at great cost in human terms.'
(Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/battles/ypres3.htm ).

The Battle of Amiens was one of the strongest blows against the German line during the Great War and came shortly after the Australian victory at Le Hamel. The attack began on 8 August 1918 and, for the first time, all five Australian divisions of the Australian Corps were used together. The Australian Commander, Lieutenant General Sir John Monash, was well aware of the significance of the occasion:

Tomorrow we are to take part in the greatest and most important battle that we have yet been in, for we are to assault the Hindenburg Line, the famous trench system which the Germans have boasted is impregnable.
- Diary entry, Captain Francis Fairweather, 28 September 1918.

The Hindenburg Line- the last and strongest of the German army's defence - consisted of three well-defended trench systems, established in 1917. Throughout September 1918, Australian forces had helped the British army to secure positions from which an attack on the Hindenburg Line could be launched. Planning began for a major attack at the end of the month. It was hoped that this attack would finally break the power of the German army.

The Capture of Tobruk
On January 22, 1941, British and Commonwealth forces capture the Italian occupied port city of Tobruk. The capture of this strategic point was not only significant in the protection of the Suez canal, but also marked the beginning of a rapid decline of an Italian presence in North Africa.

In the weeks leading up to 9 December 1941, lighters and barges laden with Australian troops slid silently from the battered waterfront of Tobruk. Not a man of them spoke as the ghostly flotilla manoeuvred to the sides of waiting warships.

They were Australian troops being evacuated from the Tobruk garrison. The Australian garrison had been relieved after a siege of more than 240 days during which the name of Tobruk had been written in glowing colours in the annals of Australian courage and determination.

For eight months, with a ring of steel, the gallant AIF had barred the advance of a hitherto all-conquering German Army.

In their fortress of dust and death, they had carried the fight to the German flank, defying the most intensive dive-bombing barrages in martial history.

News that the garrison had been relieved was received in Australia with joy, but it was joy tinged with disappointment that the heroic band was not to have the supreme reward of marching out to share the triumph of the Imperial troops in their second drive across Libya.

The soil of Tobruk must be forever Australian. Australians, backed by British artillery and tanks, captured the fortress in the first Allied drive through Cyrenaica (Libya), and Australian troops, again backed by British artillery, held it against as great odds as have been faced by any garrison in history. The very dust of its bomb-poked perimeter is hallowed with Australian blood, and Australian dead lie in its windswept cemetery.

The story of the Tobruk garrison begins in April 1941 when the Germans, striking with unexpected speed and mechanised strength, thrust the Imperial Forces back from Benghazi and across the Cyrenaican plains to the Egyptian frontier.

Cut off from their main forces, the AIF fell back on Tobruk, retired behind its strongly fortified perimeter and established the ring of fire and steel on which successive waves of German shock troops were shattered.

A big white town, with a peacetime population of about 5,000 people, Tobruk lies at the end of a bay about one mile wide and two miles long. It was planned and built as a garrison town, for there can be no other reason for its existence in arid, treeless country supporting only a few camels, goats, and gazelles. Through the town runs the single bitumen road that crosses Cyrenaica.

The ring of strong-posts which the Italians built around Tobruk is about 26 miles (45 kilometres) long. Each flank rests on the sea, and for three or four miles (five to seven kilometres) from the coast the posts defending the flanks are on the inner side of bare, precipitous waddies. Each strong-post is a labyrinth of concrete-sided trenches and there are concrete emplacements for anti-tank guns and machine-guns within the posts.

This, then, was the fortress town to which the AIF was to cling through the heat in blinding sandstorms of a North African summer - a poisonous thorn in the flank of the enemy.


The strategy of Major General L J Morshead, of the Tobruk garrison, was simply this: to hold the town at all costs, and, by offensive forays, to force the enemy to divert greatly superior forces to hold a dangerous threat and thus weaken his drive against Egypt.

It was in the heat and dust of Tobruk that Australian tenacity and courage achieved its supreme expression. Air raids which had gone into the thousands before unofficial statisticians lost count had no more effect on members of the garrison than the enemy's artillery, strafing and attacks by tanks

The siege was only a couple of months old when the renegade Lord Haw Haw, broadcasting from Berlin, said they were "caught like rats in a trap" and applied it to the garrison because most of its men could find shelter only underground while the bombers were overhead. Our men accepted the title with relish. To one another, they were "the rats." To the Axis they were rats with razor-sharp teeth. They became "The Rats of Tobruk"

In the first phases of the siege the Australian garrison, concerned primarily with testing its strength, concentrated on defence. But as the troops proved their ability to repel thrust upon thrust by Germans and Italians, defence gave way to fierce aggression as the world's most daring patrol fighters went into action each night.

Tobruk patrols were of two types - fighting and reconnaissance. The job of the reconnaissance patrol was to gather information and, if possible, to secure prisoners for identification. Its members used all their bushcraft to avoid being discovered. Like stealthy shadows, they saw without being seen. But the fighting patrol went out to fight. Its aim was to do as much damage and to kill as many of the enemy as possible. Its members would creep up on an enemy post, surround it and then, at a given signal, rush in with the bayonet and kill-soundlessly A few brief minutes of bloody, sinew-straining work and the foray would be over, with not a shot fired.

So persistent and so deadly were the Australian night patrols that the enemy, living in the perpetual shadow of silent, stealthy death, was soon reduced to a state of almost panicky nervousness. On the slightest provocation, and often on no provocation at all, he would put down artillery and mortar barrages.

Two typical examples of AIF offensive patrols are quoted. In the first, the raiders crawled in single file for two miles through a minefield to attack an observation post, the position of which had been revealed by reconnaissance patrols on the previous day.

Throughout the siege the AIF garrison operated with a perfect team work that ran from the front-line soldier, back through his immediate headquarters to the artillery, back to the higher formations, to the supply and ordnance workshops, and to the hospitals. In the entire garrison there was not one idle mouth to be fed.

And throughout the eight bitter months of heat and dust and blood and flies, the garrison retained those high spirits that are the hallmark of high courage. If Lord Haw thought he could goad the Australians with his bitter tilt at the "Rats of Tobruk" he committed the grossest of his many misjudgments.

The men were proud of the title and some of them now treasure an unofficial medal, bearing the stamp of a rodent rampant, which was unofficially struck to commemorate the defence of Tobruk.

That medal was fashioned from aluminium taken from the fuselage of a German bomber brought down by the anti-aircraft fire of the sharpest-teethed rats in history. Below right is a newer commemorative medal issued by the Association in 1977.

And so, after months of indomitable fighting, the "Verdun of the Desert" was relieved and the British Navy's perfectly executed evacuation manoeuvre wrote the final chapter of an epic that must always rank among the finest achievements of Imperial arms.

Of the 50,662 troops embarked from Greece, about 30,000 were landed in Crete, without most of their vehicles and heavy weapons. On 30 April, General Freyberg was given command of all the forces on the island with orders to defend it against a probable attack by German airborne troops.

Retimo is a town on the north coast of the island of Crete, located between the island's major population centres of Canea in the west, and Heraklion in the centre of the north coast. In May 1941 it was strategically important because of the recently-constructed airstrip about 8km east of town.

In preparation for an expected German airborne attack, the 4th and 5th Greek Regiments and the 2/1st and 2/11th Australian Battalions, supported by elements from Australian artillery, medical, engineer and signals units took up defensive positions in the hills south of the airstrip. The defence of Retimo itself was the responsibility of a battalion strength unit of Cretan police. Lieutenant Colonel Ian Campbell, commander of the 2/1st Battalion, was appointed overall commander of Retimo Force.

On the morning of May 20, the invasion of Crete began with German paratroops landings in the west of the island. At around 4.30pm it was Retimo's turn. The invading force was made up of two battalions of the 2nd Parachute Rifle Regiment, with detachments from divisional support units. The Germans, expecting minimal opposition, planned to take the airstrip first and then march west to the town. They received a very severe shock.

The German landing was disorganised, and strong resistance inflicted many casualties, but the invaders were initially successful. One battalion-strength group of paratroops landed on and around the hill occupied by 2/1st Battalion that dominated the airstrip. They captured the hill but were forced off it the next day with heavy losses and fell back to defensive positions around an olive oil factory at Stavromenos, east of Retimo. From 21 to 26 May, the 2/1st Battalion attacked this group of Germans, eventually capturing the factory and forcing the few unwounded survivors to flee toward Heraklion.

Another battalion-strength group of paratroops made a very dispersed landing to the west of the airstrip. Some landed on top of the 2/11th Battalion, others on the coastal plain between the airstrip and the town. Those not killed or captured in the landing fell back toward Retimo. They reached its outskirts but, blocked by the Cretan police, took up defensive positions on a ridge that ran from the mountains to the sea.
From 22 to 28 May, the 2/11th Battalion launched several attacks on these positions, but, hampered by poor coordination with the Greek units, made little progress. They made a final attempt on 28 May but the inadequately trained Greeks opened fire early, warning the Germans of the Australians' approach. The attack was driven off. By this time Retimo Force had almost exhausted its food and ammunition. Communication with other Allied forces fighting on the island had broken down on 27 May, leaving Campbell with little idea of how they were faring.

On 29 May the Greeks abandoned their positions and the Australians reduced the size of their perimeter. The next morning vehicle engines could be heard in the distance. A few optimists among Retimo Force assumed that they were about to be relieved but the appearance of German light tanks soon persuaded them otherwise.

Campbell realised that further resistance would only inflict unnecessary casualties and he ordered his men to surrender. Major Sandover, leading the 2/11th Battalion, offered his men the choice of surrender or escape. Many took the latter option and evaded capture for several months, living in the mountains with assistance from the local population, despite the fact that locals helping Allied soldiers risked death if discovered. Between June and September 1941, approximately 600 Allied soldiers were able to escape the island of Crete. Almost one in ten of those escaping were from the 2/11th Battalion.

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Sixty years ago in September Australian forces began a series of great offensives in and around New Guinea. Over the following six months the Japanese Eighteenth Army was overwhelmed, its units scattered when they were not eliminated. The battles took the Japanese base of Lae, cleared the Huon Peninsula and the Markham–Ramu Valley and liberated the people of those regions from Japanese occupation. The offensives gave Douglas MacArthur's forces of the south-west Pacific a firm base from which to launch a further offensive, which from April 1944 took his forces bounding along New Guinea's northern coast all the way to the shores of the Philippines, his real objective.

Australia's involvement in the long battle for the Kokoda Trail began on 21 July when the Japanese landed in Papua. A partial resolution of the conflict was not to come until November. The Japanese were finally driven out of Papua in January 1943.

The small Allied air force could do little against greatly superior Japanese air power. Allied naval strength in the area consisted of only 9 cruisers, 23 destroyers, and 36 submarines. Nevertheless, though no match for the vastly superior Japanese Fleet, the Allied warships attacked repeatedly. In the early dark hours of January 24, 4 Allied destroyers attacked a large convoy off Balikpapan, Borneo. In this, the Battle of Makassar Strait, the destroyers escaped unharmed after sinking 4 Japanese transports and a patrol ship and damaging other vessels. Subsequent engagements - the Battle of Lombok Strait (February 18-19) and the Battle of the Java Sea (February 27) were not as successful for the Allies. In the latter losses from Japanese air and naval attacks were so severe that the surviving Allied warships were withdrawn from the Java Sea to Tjilatjap (Chilachap) on the south coast of Java. On February 28, 2 Allied cruisers, the Houston and the Perth, which were attempting to escape southward through Soenda (now Sunda) Strait, suddenly ran into a huge Japanese invasion armada in the process of assaulting Batavia (now Djakarta). The cruisers were destroyed, but only after sinking 3 loaded Japanese transports.

05 July 1941 - 12 July 1941
The battle of Damour was the final major operation of the Australian campaign in Syria and Lebanon. Damour is a large town on the Lebanon coast of approximately 30 kilometres south of Beirut, which in 1941 was the French administrative capital. The Wadi Damour, with the Damour River in its bed, was a further three kilometres to the south of the town. It was the last major natural obstacle that had to be crossed prior to reaching Beirut. Having already captured the heights overlooking Damour on the south bank of the wadi, the plan developed by Major General Arthur "Tubby" Allen, commanding the 7th Australian Division, involved encircling the French positions at Damour. The operation began on the night of 5 July 1941 with troops of the 21st Brigade moving into position to cross the Damour River in two places. They attacked French positions on the northern side early on 6 July - the 2/16th Battalion at El Atiqa, the 2/27th at El Boum. By nightfall both positions were in Australian hands. In the early hours of 7 July the 2/3rd and 2/5th Battalions, and two companies of the 2/14th then moved northwards through El Boum, outflanking Damour to the east. At Daraya, the 2/14th companies swung west to advance on Damour from the east, while the 2/3rd and 2/5th Battalions continued north to cut the road to Beirut north of the town, which they accomplished on 8 July. In the south, the 2/2nd Pioneer Battalion and elements of the 6th Divisional Cavalry Regiment were advancing along the axis of the coastal road. By 2 am on 9 July the Pioneers were advancing into the southern outskirts of the town, and at 4 am a patrol from the cavalry were able to drive right through; the French had withdrawn. The Australians immediately began pushing along the coastal road towards Beirut. The Vichy French commander, General Henri Dentz, had sought an armistice on 8 July and at one minute past midnight on 12 July a cease fire came into effect, ending the campaign.

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'Considered one of the 'hottest' spots of the Western Front, and certainly in the Ypres Salient, the Menin Road was the scene of frequent artillery fire directed by German forces against the predominantly British presence in the Salient, most notably during the First and Third Battles of Ypres (1914 and 1917 respectively).'
(Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/atoz/meninroad.htm ).

'The Battle of Sari Bair (also known as the Battle of the Nek), launched on 6 August 1915, was timed to coincide with a further major Allied landing of troop reinforcements at Suvla Bay on the Aegean coastline north of Anzac Cove. The battle formed part of Allied Mediterranean Commander-in-Chief Sir Ian Hamilton's three-plank Suvla Offensive.'
(Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/battles/saribair.htm ).