http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/06/26/2286362.htm Battle for Australia gets day of recognition - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Dr Peter Stanley, director for historical research at the National Museum of Australia, has just written a book about Japan's supposed plans to invade Australia and he says there was, in fact, no real threat. "The Japanese had no plan to invade Australian in 1942," he said. "So there were battles of course fought across the islands to Australia's north but Japan's objective wasn't Australia, it was to conquer South-East Asia, which is what they did. Hmmm, did the Australians know that at the time? No they didn't. So, they fought and died thinking there was a genuine threat that they needed to counter. It's like saying that there shouldn't be a Battle of Britain Day because there was no realistic threat of Operation Sealion taking place!
He has been beating this to death for years. He believes the Japanese and their assertion (later) that they had no intentions to invade Australia. If they had not been met by the Task Force at Coral Sea, if they had been successful at Guadalcanal (nearly but not quite), if they had they been successful in taking Port Moresby (nearly but not quite) if, if, if, if,.................. IF, all these if's had gone Japan's way, I wonder whether they would have eyed Australia.........I am sure they would have!
He talks about the "Battle for Australia" being part of the revisionist movement to make us more patriotic yet he neglects to look at what the Australian people were thinking and feeling at the time. NB: I would have added comment but had a few news items to post so forgot!
Interestingly, I was on the tram on Monday afternoon and overheard two people, male and female, discussing how it was great that an official date had been set to commemorate the Battle for Australia. She was in her late 20s and he would have been in his mid-30s and both seemed to work for a government department involved in such things going by the way they were talking. Made for interesting listening as they too brought up the occasion being nationalistic and how it was hard to commemorate something that had no one date. Interestingly, I believe they mentioned Peter Stanley and commented how good a speaker he was even if they didn't seem to agree with what he said.
There are many orators who can make their content sound feasible and Peter Stanley does. He bases much of his "fact" on supposition. He, like most historians has the benefit of hindsight and has the right to form an opinion on any subject/topic however we do not have to agree. He also has been provided with the benefit of ESP that goes back 60 years into the minds of the Japanese Military leaders. There is no doubt in my mind that if the Japanese had not been defeated at Guadalcanal and to a much lesser degree suffered, their first land defeat at Milne Bay which in turn would have seen Port Moresby fall they would have thought themselves invincible. Once the lines of communications between Australia and the US were broken they would have invaded Tuvalu, Samoa, Fiji and Vanuatu. Let's be really clear here, while Guadalcanal raged the US navy had only one carrier (Hornet) in the South West Pacific from not long after the battle of Midway in June until mid October 1942, they also could not land bombers on Guadalcanal as they did not have the fuel to supply them and to top it off had less than 100 fighters to hold back the Japanese onslaught. From:U.S. Navy - A Brief History of Aircraft Carriers - USS Hornet (CV 8)
World War II vets honoured on Battle for Australia day - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
Is he sure or not? Looking at his wording, he does not seem to confident! I do adhere to my previous post! Australia would have been invaded.
