History

• Australia's loyalty to Britain

  • Australia immediately declared support towards Britain declaring war against Germany
  • Australia had cultural and historical ties with Britain → felt like they had a duty to assist Britain
  • Also wanted to help stop the political fascist threat
• Japanese aggression in Asia-Pacific


  Became a threat to Australia after Singapore was defeated in February 1942
• Australian Government's response


  Recalled troops from the Mediterranean to defend the country
• Role of Australian women in World War 2

  • Involved in every type of war and conflict, especially as nurses
  • Witnessed first-hand and the daily brutality of war
  • Dealt with the sick, wounded and DEAD
• Roles of Australian women in World War 2


  • Served in Australia in war zones across the world and in hospital ships and transports
• The Australian nursing service was established to send nurses to the Boer war


  1898
• By World War Il, the Australian nursing service had grown into the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS), and 3477 nurses were sent overseas to war - 71 were killed in action
• Service options opened up for women in 1941

  • Army services
  • The royal Australian women army corps
  • the women's auxiliary Australian air force
  • the Women Royal Australian air force
• Australian troops' treatment of prisoners

  Reluctant to take prisoners, they often killed them instead of taking them
• The death rate of allied troops in japanese war camps was 27%
• Prisoner of war experience


  • One prisoner became a prisoner of war after the fall of singapore (Charles Richards)
  • He treated men at the thai-burma railway
  • Richard sealed all his diary entries, hid them in a bottle and buried them underground
• Japanese Imperial Headquarters' aim

  Capture Port Moresby, the capital of Papua New Guinea → use it as a base to attack Australia
• Plan was changed by 'Battle of Coral Sea' (May 1942) and 'Battle of Midway' (June 1942)
• Those already employed in essential war industries were expected to stay there and the government directed other people to work in such industries
• Source 3 reveals that woman's job was to clothe the men who work and fight
• 1939-43 women's participation in the workforce increased by 31%
• Some woman took on "men's" jobs
• Australian women played a more important role in WW2 than they did in 1 and they took on non-combatant roles in 3 branches of the military service
• Australian women were asked to sign up to the military and do some things the men were asked to do
• The bombing of Darwin and Northern Australia in 1942 - 43


  Japanese aircraft conducted aerial attacks on the mainland northern Australia
• 2 months after the attack on pearl harbour, many Australians feared that the Japanese were about to invade
• The Japanese launched their bombs on the harbour and over the next 22 months, they launched bombing raids around North Aus
• Japan


  Highly militarised ally of Nazi Germany
• It was agreed that when the Germans won the war, Japan would enjoy control of the southern hemisphere, and Germany of the northern hemisphere
• Imperial Japan began its world war earlier, in 1937, with its savage attack on China, including the devastation of Nanjing
• USA imposed an oil embargo on Japan, threatening its ongoing military campaign
• Japan responded by anticipating an American declaration of war, and launched a surprise attack on the US base of Pearl Harbour (7 December 1941)
• The US blockade on oil to Japan – of which 80% came from America – threatened to stop Japan's headlong rush to regional domination
• The British were concerned that Japan would capture its rich colonial holdings in Malaya and India
• The Australians felt reassured that the Japanese could never get past the mighty British fortress of Singapore, whose battery of guns could decimate any fleet attacking by sea
• It was therefore a massive shock when news arrived that the Japanese had captured Singapore (1942): this was as traumatic as 9/11 in our own time
• Singapore only had guns facing out to sea, on the assumption that no invading force could make its way down the steep Malay peninsula behind the fortress
• The Japanese exploited this assumption, training its army to descend the steep terrain, often with a single Japanese soldier carrying just one part of a gun, or wheeling a gun barrel on a bicycle
• In the brief battle, some 80,000 Allied troops were captured, including some 15,000 Australians
• Many were executed; others were held under inhuman conditions in the notorious Changi Prison
• The capture of Singapore unleashed a flood of Japanese attacks
• They captured Burma (modern Myanmar), then invaded the Philippines (1942) forcing out the Americans
• The Japanese then landed in northern New Guinea (February 1942)
• India and Ceylon were also under threat
• Japan now implemented detailed war plans to invade the Asia-Pacific region