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April 29, 2005
ANZAC Day and other Empire sacrifices ...
The Australians are rightly proud of their contribution to the defence of the democratic model we have today both in the First and Second World Wars and in all the subsequent conflicts. Ozguru, over at G'day Mate, stressed the sacrifice of the ANZAC troops at Gallipoli in that ill-fated campaign in WWI, but I think they must be almost unique in marking the sacrifices made by all the Colonial Citizenry in all the world in both wars and thereafter.
The South Africans lost several Divisions in Flanders (Visit the Menin Gate at Ypres to get some idea of the sacrifice they made!) and the Western Front along the Somme (Delville Wood's defence saw 200 men walk out after a four day stand in which 2000 South African troops went in!) and in East and South West Africa against German Forces led by charismatic and capable Generals, whilst themselves having to suffer under the leadership of British Generals too blinkered to see that a differnt kind of thinking was needed in the highly mobile war on the African fronts.
The Canadians, too, suffered heavily in WWI; the "temporary hospital they built at Orpington is still in use and is very extensive (which tells it's own tale!) and in the Dieppe Raid (among other "sortees"!) in WWII - a try out for the techniques that would follow at D-Day, and both the Australians and the South Africans took the brunt of fighting in the Western Desert, the Po Valley, and the push up through Italy. There were South Africans alongside the Australians in Burma and in the islands, and many more at sea and in the air with both their own airforces and the RAF. The South African First Infantry Division, together with 2 and 3 SAI, the little armour they had and the ancient biplanes their airforce was equipped with, chased the Italians out of Ethiopia and restored the Emperor Haille Selassi to his throne, having given him asylum until it could be achieved - something the anti-apartheid propagandists still don't like to acknowledge!
1 SAI then went on to be sent to relieve the Australians in Tobruk - without being given the ammunition they needed to hold off the Afrika Korps tanks! They still managed to hold out for almost three weeks, resorting to the most desperate of tactics to halt the German armour until eventually, out of ammunition, food, and water, they had no choice but to surrender. Their achievement is all but removed from the history taught today, and that is a pity because their stand, and the Australian's stand before them, helped give the breathing space that gave Montgomery the time to build up his forces for the Battle of El Alamein.
The rewriting of history by the revisionists of the 1960's onwards has done much to try to "airbrush" out the contribution made by these "Colonial" troops without whose voluntary presence the Empire would almost certainly have been overwhelmed. Ironically both the Gallipoli and the Tobruk "incidents" feature in an excellent work of fiction by the naval author Douglas Reeman. Entitled "HMS Saracen", the book is the story of a member of an unusual class of ship - the monitor - conceived as a vessel to support troops ashore or during landings from the sea with massive fire power in shallow waters. The ship in the book is based loosely on the last WWI pair built - HMS Terror and HMS Erebus, both armed with a pair of 15 inch guns and 16 4 inch mountings. The author has even drawn on the real lives of this pair to give meat to his story with the exploits of Erebus off Gallipoli and the sinking of Terror off Tobruk featured in the book.
We should never forget the contribution all the Colonial troops, seamen, and airmen made to the defence of our freedom in both World Wars, and in the subsequent conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, and everywhere else. We should remember them with honour - and in the words of Shakespeare, "think shame on all who decry their fame!"
At the going down of the sun
and in the morning
We will remember them.
Posted by The Gray Monk at April 29, 2005 10:07 AM