They may now observe the rest those wars & battles on ANZAC Day, but the day itself originated as a commemoration of the battle of Gallipoli, in which a combined force of Australians and New Zealanders suffered enormous casualties fightint the Turks. ANZAC Day is set on the day the battle started (it lasted three months, I think).
Here is what a New Zealander I know from another site has to say about it: "The only upside of contemplating the debacle of British planning that was Gallipoli is that the ANZAC soldiers that went to that little hell-hole went as displaced Brits and came back as New Zealanders and Australians. For New Zealanders anyway, national identity began with what happened at Gallipoli although it took a few decades afterwards for the sentiment to fully mature."
If I had to go to war, I know I could ask for no better allied soldiers to fight beside than Australian and New Zealand troops. Their records in both World Wars are testaments of courage and military prowess.
Amen. I was in Sydney during ANZAC Day in 98. My huz and I also saw in 03, the War Museum in Canberra. Great tributes to these brave men.
My second favorite class in college was HIST 375-World War I. Our professor literally got choked up when talking about the ANZACS and how there are only a handful left; that was in '98, so there's even less now. The Lighthorsemen, which demonstrates Australain equestrian prowess, is an excellent film if anyone hasn't seen it.
All the British Commonwealth nations have a pretty good track record. I can't remember whether it's the Dutch or Belgians, but one group holds the Canadians in high regard as well.
Anyone who doesn't have the time to take a good course on WWI (wish I could have sat in on those lectures, Filius) should see the excellent Peter Weir film, Gallipoli.
We have a special mass for ANZAC day and after that we took the kids to march in the ANZAC day parade.
There were official flags from Australia, Britain and the U.S. there together with veterans from all of those countries marching with our own.
It was a wonderful tribute to those who gave so much for us and to what unites as all as peoples in a common cause.
God Bless
Thanks Mark,
It's good for our soldiers to be remembered from afar. So easy to forget, even here in Australia.
Yes Mark thank you also and here's a link to a good Anglican friend of mine - a WWII fighter ace whose funeral I attended yesterday. He has some interesting views on war.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/
World...5730832677.html
The irony, of course, is that in theoretical strategic terms the Gallipoli campaign was brilliant in its own way. If successful it would have busted open the Central powers, thereby weakening their ability to hold the Western Front that decimated a generation, and on the Eastern Front to bleed mother Russia into collapse and revolution.
But in the operational sense it was very naive. Political leaders and most military planners and senior officers just did not appreciate what the new generation of weapons could do nor the needed mix of weapons and tactics that could overcome defenses prepared with such weapons. It was felt that individual bravery and a stout heart would overcome all. Ironically they were almost right in the case of the ANZAC forces. The Royal Navy also came close to overcoming the Turkish forts, which would have substantially altered the tactical situation. But in war the difference between close and successful means everything.
And the other crucial conceptual and operational defect was that the urgency, scale, and coordination of the logistical effort required to successfully conduct a sea-borne invasion of this magnitude were simply not imagined. The bitter lessons of Gallipoli haunted a generation of British and Commonwealth military officers who were determined never to allow such issues to lead to failure of an invasion again. As a result, the British gradually but successfully convinced their American partners that the invasion of occupied France needed to be exceptionally well planned and logistically supported. It was.
I know that a lot is made of the outcome of the Gallipoli campaign leading to growing nationalism in New Zealand and Australia. This theme is quite powerful in some well-made movies. And I have no particular reason to question that it did. But it does seem to me that the growing self-confidence, habits of mind appropriate to new and unique lands, and the decline in direct immigration from Brittan would have been fairly powerful factors leading, or at least preparing the ground for, this direction in any event.
Fortunately, the old religious rivalries are not quite as intense, so that it's a bit easier to focus on our common heritage, our common challenges, and look forward to strengthening the ties that will help our common values prevail in the future.
Thank you for your kind thoughts about ANZAC Day. ANZAC Day is the closest thing we have to a religious day in neo pagan Australia these days.
My father lied about his age and volunteered to join the Air Force (RAAF) but was not accepted because his parents weren't of British stock - later in the war they took anyone - so he joined the army and was left with physical and emotional wounds which remained with him for the rest of his life. He never once went to an ANZAC Day parade, never spoke of the War and would not remain in the room if there was a war movie on TV.
They shall grow not old. As we that are left grow old
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
For the complete ode see http://www.ausvets.powerup.com.a...u/
tradition.htm
Sharon, it's actually "nor shall the years contemn" -- the T is in the original, it's not just Alexander Downer's pronunciation. It means "to treat with contempt".
Some years ago, I helped host a delegation of officials from The Philippines who were visiting Australia to learn our magic secrets for reducing bribery and corruption in public life. (Unfortunately, Step No #1 -- href="http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&
rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-40%2CGGLG%3Aen&
q=Treisman++%E2%80%9CThe+Causes+of+Corruption%
3A+A+Cross-National+Study%22&meta=">"be a Protestant country" -- is not on the Filipino agenda, although they did make a partial move in this direction by electing Fidel Ramos, an Evangelical, as President...). Anyway, our week-long seminar was broken by Anzac Day holiday in mid-week (the 25 April date is sacrosanct). When we resumed, several of our guests were shaking their heads and saying "We always thought you Australians were ultra-secular! But the devotion put into Anzac Day is like saints' days in The Philippines." The power of civic religion, I guess.
Sharon, it's actually "nor shall the years contemn" -- the T is in the original, it's not just Alexander Downer's pronunciation. It means "to treat with contempt".
Some years ago, I helped host a delegation of officials from The Philippines who were visiting Australia to learn our magic secrets for reducing bribery and corruption in public life. (Unfortunately, Step No #1 -- href="http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&
rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-40%2CGGLG%3Aen&
q=Treisman++%E2%80%9CThe+Causes+of+Corruption%
3A+A+Cross-National+Study%22&meta=">"be a Protestant country" -- is not on the Filipino agenda, although they did make a partial move in this direction by electing Fidel Ramos, an Evangelical, as President...). Anyway, our week-long seminar was broken by Anzac Day holiday in mid-week (the 25 April date is sacrosanct). When we resumed, several of our guests were shaking their heads and saying "We always thought you Australians were ultra-secular! But the devotion put into Anzac Day is like saints' days in The Philippines." The power of civic religion, I guess.
Tom, the excerpt I posted was cut and pasted from the website so maybe you should contact the Aus Vets site and tell them they have it wrong.
"Contemn" as a verb doesn't survive anywhere else in English that I know of, so it's a common mistake. However, reading the sentence as "treat with contempt" does make [even] more sense than if you read it as "condemn (as guilty).
Thank you Mark, and thank you all for your kind remarks about the ANZACS.
Sean is correct about the origing of Anzac Day, but for many years it has come to embrace all the theatres of war in which the Anzacs have served.
So Gallipoli was a defining time in the history of both countries - althought the Aussies served under their own officers, while the NZers were included as a British contingent serving under British officers in WW1 - and if you saw the movie "Breaker Morant", you'll understand why.
Gallipoli is particularly poingant for me - my maternal grandfather, Donald Vincent Piper served on Gallopoli, going in a private and coming off a 1st.Lieutenant. He suffered shrapnell wounds and did not serve in France.
My great uncle Eustace Nicholson (Maternal side of family again) also served on Gallipoli, and then served in France - by then a Sergeant Major, and before coming home married a Parisienne and brought her back to NZ. Aunt Jeanne never saw her homeland again.
Also, dad's oldest brother George Beckett served in the trenches in France, and was repatriated in early 1918 after being gassed in the trenches. Uncle George was a real character - still quite ill, and with only one lung working, it only took him three days from being in the convalescent home near Auckland, to cultivate an affair with the hospital matron. Despite having only one lung, he played rugby football for the Kaharoa Rugby Club in Rotorua until 1926, and died at the ripe old age of 95.
And of course, there's my Dad who served in Italy during WW2 along with 2 of his cousins, and his brother in law who was a navigator in a Lancaster, and another bro-in-law who served in the RNZNavy.
Two cousins served in Korea. 2 friends served in the Malaysia/Indonesia confrontation of 1959 - 1963?.Several friends served in Vietnam. In my younger days, one of dad's friends served in the RNZAF - Tommie Austin - flying Hurricanes and Spitfires in England - like 'Another Steve's' link - they probably new each other. Another flew Corsairs in the Pacific, and yet another neighbour flew TBF Grumman Avengers also in the Pacific.
And so on it goes, and yet we do not learn....BUT...
Let us never forget.
"Despite having only one lung, he played rugby football for the Kaharoa Rugby Club in Rotorua until 1926, and died at the ripe old age of 95."
Don, he sounds like my great uncle Bill Barry, a Newfie and a boxer who enlisted in the British Army in 1939 because, in his phrase, "Someone had to show the Limies how to fight!"
Even Speaking from a HQ puke standpoint, the Aussies and Kiwis rock.
There is *nobody* better to go to war with.
The Australian and New Zealand embassies put on an outstanding series of events Tuesday.
BTW - Sean
The Gallipoli campaign lasted nine months
Ed the Roman, "go to war with" is a deeply ambivalent phrase in English...
"Australians went to war with Japan in the Pacific in 1941."
"Australians went to war with America in Iraq in 2003."
Tom R.
It depends on whether he expected victory or defeat 
So Kiwi's is a nuclear powered U.S. Navy ship or boat able to visit your country now or is it still off limits?
The Yanks can just say to the NZ Munustry uv Diffince "Hell yeah, we can assure y'all that there orr no 'Nick Lear Muscles' abooorrrd the USS Dan Quayle", and caim the Doctrine of Mental Reservation.
inhocsig.
Unfortunately the policy still stands. Remember it was introduced in 1983?? by the left Labour Govt. when the ANZUS Alliance was scuttled (by the US) and our non-thinking lefties claimed foul, because the blame then was put by them on the US (go figure).
Even though in recent years the US have stated categorically that all their vessells in this area are non-nuke - powered or armed, the Labourites still won't accede.
Now, there is much talk of getting Nuclear power plants here, as Hydro and fossill fuel fired plants are becoming costly and inneffient, and are a greater environmental degrader than what is now technologically clean nuclear power.
Time will tell.
However, much was made in our recent election of the words of the National Party leader, "If National wins the election, the policy will be gone by lunchtime". So its fully a political issue.
Well, let's be honest here. We like the Kiwis and all. But in terms of their own national defense, right now they are on their own - by their own choice.
NZ has been dropped from military exchanges with the US. Big deal, you say? Well, actually, yes. The new weapons, communication equipment, organization, and battle-proven tactics of the US are the standard in almost the entire spectrum of defense and war-fighting - from urban terrorist war to high tech air supremacy duels. The US is sharing key aspects of these assets with actual allies, such as the folks from Oz. The New Zealand government decided it did not wish to be an ally. OK the US said.
Which is all fine, if there is no actual threat to New Zealand or its vital interests. But it does not appear that the violent radical Islamists have yet recognized a specific New Zealand exception in their various attacks, campaigns, and plans.
Now, a couple of years ago it appears that some adults in the New Zealand body politic decided that the US actually would allow NZ to go under if the political leadership there insisted, no matter how much our citizens like each other. And a plausible scenario of Islamic subversion/co-option of Pacific island states working its way toward Mt. Cook cannot be dismissed out of hand. Sort of the thing that makes it handy to have an Uncle Sam around, even if you have to keep reminding him that you are morally superior to him.
So a new understanding was reached, at least. NZ will do, and even now is starting to do, some heavy lifting in the foreign policy, foreign aid, and military realm in the South Pacific. NZ and Uncle Sam stay coordinated in the neighborhood. We're both assessing how it’s going. If more adults take up positions as NZ public officials, well, we'll both see what else we might do.
Being in the bountiful, green, and pleasant land of New Zealand can induce a kind of ecotopian confusion among some. And now that substantial portions of the elites have jettisoned the formerly normative role of a generally mainstream Christianity and backfilled it with a hollow enjoy-the-good-life orthodoxy, a lot of Kiwis are a bit disoriented. Maybe they will snap out of it before they either just give up and die out, or get swamped. Maybe. It really is up to them, and the US will just take its guidance accordingly. We’re liable to be busy ourselves for a while.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and prophesy that Glenn’s exposition of Judayo-Christian Just War doctrine will soon provoke a proportionate response from one Chris Sullivan… But then I’ve got the time-zone advantage on this.
Glenn.
"......but in terms of their national defence they are on their own."
Not so.With the breakup of the ANZUS alliance, NZ and Oz maintained full co-operation militarily. Frequent joint exercises are held, both here and in Oz - in naval and in the air, except since the Labourites scuttled our Air Force Strike wing, all our combat pilots are now flying for RAAF, RAF and USAF - bad bad decision, and the majority of kiwis were annoyed by it, given the long history of the RNZAF . And the US military know and co-operate, but because the political/diplomatic situation exists, its a sort of wink and a nod basis.
It may be of interest to you to find out where the NZ military has been operating:
Solomon Islands - Army & police have been there for some years, with the Aussies.
Iraq. NZ Army engineers had a detachment operating with the Brits, rebuilding schools, water plants and other infrascruture.
Afghanistan. Ever since the conflict started, NZ Army units of SAS have been there, mainly around where the Taliban blew up those Budhist statues.
East Timor - with the Aussies.
Bougainville- ditto.
Sierra Leone UN mission.
Bosnia & Herzegovinia.
Croatia and Kosovowith UN.
Sinai multinational force of observers,& Middle East UN truce supervision in Israel, Lebanon, Syria & Egypt.
Also mine clearing etc in Cambodia and Mozambique
All this is done with th approving nod of the US, even tho US and Oz have criticised NZ (mainly under the Labour adminisration) for not contributing enough, which again, most kiwis concur with.
I guess a lot of things go on under the covers, that many up your neck of the woods would not hear about - but NZ is a major contributor - along with the Aussies, to maintaing stability in the Pacific region, including SE Asia.
I think you will find that most kiwis are pretty aware of whats going on - but as always, the news media focuses on the lefty / greenie faction to get its news, in the same way that the media portray the US as a big bully. But the majority of kiwis are not fooled.
Regards
Dear Don(Kiwi),
I was aware of all but two of the specifics you cite, and I did sketch the general scheme of the rather complicated little arrangement that has been arrived at for your part of the world and NZ in the larger world scene.
But the point is - why a complicated arrangement at all? And especially, why given past Kiwi history, specifically military history. (BTW the NZ assault on Monte Casino against the toughest German paratroopers in the toughest defensive positions ranks among the top feats of arms ever in my view).
Well, the reason is that the NZ political leadership includes a substantial element that declared the arrival of the millennium, perhaps prematurely. But more than that they identified the existence of US military might as one of the principal explanation for the increasingly obvious sluggish pace of the unfolding of millennium-like developments. Sorry they saw it that way, but apparently they did.
As I said also, our peoples like each other -good. But peoples get to choose who their allies are - and that's good too. The NZ leadership (and I have now reason to doubt that it didn’t exactly correspond with broad popular feeling) made its choice and the US respects it.
The land of Oz has perhaps more of a neighbor's interest in New Zed and is willing to play some games concerning uniforms, cockpits, and paystubs, etc. They must figure that it will be less trouble that way in the end. It's their call.
But I think it's important for Kiwis to understand that their relationship with the US, even if it were to progress under the new system of mutual respect and coordination in international engagement with the US, is probably going to remain one notch short of our first rank allies. Same thing with Canada - situation there is on the mend too, but the trust just ain't at the same level any more. We fully understand that that's good news to some. But however you look at it, it's just a fact of life that we will all live with for a while.
Maybe if we work and sacrifice through a few more tough scrapes like we have in the past, based on the enduring values we really share, we will find ourselves back as formal, and full, allies. I guess we will see, and if I had to guess it will be when the going is really tough.
P.S. Hey, if you take your boat out of Prince William Sound or Homer and head azimuth about 210, New Zealand is the next landfall. So we’re neighbors, even if distant ones.
Change:
(and I have NOW reason to doubt that it didn’t exactly correspond with broad popular feeling)
TO
(and I have NO reason to doubt that it didn’t exactly correspond with broad popular feeling)
BTW - Sean
The Gallipoli campaign lasted nine months
Thanks for clarifying, Don(kiwi), and sorry to get it wrong. I cannot imagine, nor do I want to try, such an unbelievable slaughter lasing for nine whole months.
Oh, and I saw Breaker Morant years ago and I perfectly understand why Aussies would have insisted on serving under their own commanders.
Don & Glenn,
Thanks for your discussion/update.
Will pray to John Paul Pershing II for a favourable outcome.
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