a toast to those strange people from Down Under

[winterbadger]

Here's to the men (and now women) from Australia and New Zealand who have fought and far too often died for King, Country, and for those who live far from their Antipodean homes.

If you're not familiar with ANZAC Day, there are a good many references, starting with this Wikipedia article.

Someone from Australia commented on one list I read:

Observations - there are no WWI diggers left - I knew that, but I was still looking for them, and oddly they were still there if you knew where to look - in the corner of the crowd was an old lady wearing her father's medals...and down the front was a little girl who would never
have known her great-great (?) grandfather, but she certainly knew what he did.

The MC for the local service is a rat of Tobruk, and his dad was at Villiers-Brettonoux 90 years ago today (see here for a very
jingoistic version of the story).

The ranks of the WWII chaps are thinning, and even the Vietnam diggers suddenly look old.

But, unlike 5 years ago, there are now a lot of young diggers, men and women, wearing campaign medals for Timor, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Looks like Anzac Day is in good health.

Lest we forget.

Australia and New Zealand have never stinted in offering support to their allies. I wish that sometimes the causes they fought in could have been better, but the sacrifices were always as great.

Comments

[ticktockmary.livejournal.com]

Last year I was in Istanbul just before Anzac day, and so thousands of Aussies and New Zelanders came through on their way out for the commemoration.

Man those people can party. All really nice folks, it was fun meeting them.

[winterbadger]

I think it's a fine thing that the Turks have an ANZAC Memorial of their own. I'm a sappy bastard, and I can't help but weep at the words of Kemal Ataturk engraved there:

"Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives, you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side, here in this country of ours. You, the mothers, who sent their sons from far away countries, wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land, they have become our sons as well."

[ticktockmary.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's positively poetic. Thanks for posting it, I had not seen it.

[gr-c17.livejournal.com]

I meet many vet's when they came to DC for the commemoration of the Korean War Memorial. They all had their slouch hats, and were very fun.

[shy-kat.livejournal.com]

And for those of us here in Italy, it's happy Italian Liberation Day!

[winterbadger]

Then a happy liberation day to you and all the Eyeties. :-) I'll use my bersaglieri icon in their honour!

[wcg.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the reminder.

Do you know the connection between the Gallipoli campaign and the Marine Corps' interest in amphibious warfare?

[winterbadger]

No, I don't! I hope that anyone interested in amphibious warfare was motivated by Gallipoli to learn how to do it RIGHT. :-(

[wcg.livejournal.com]

That's exactly what happened. Marine Major General John A. LeJeune was in France, serving as Commanding General of a division composed of Army and Marine units under Black Jack Pershing. Pershing and LeJeune followed the Gallipoli campaign very closely, and Pershing urged LeJeune to do all he could to focus the Marine Corps on developing techniques for amphibious warfare because Pershing was convinced the Army wouldn't do so. When LeJeune became Commandant of the Marine Corps he suspended all other activities at Marine Corps Schools at Quantico, and had every officer there focus on developing amphibious warfare tactics, methods, techniques, and doctrine. The resulting field manual became The field manual for amphibious warfare for both the Army and Marine Corps in WW II. (And the paper Earl Ellis wrote, Advanced Base Force Operations in Micronesia, became War Plan Orange.)

So yeah, the American amphibious successes in WW II were a direct result of the hard won lessons of the ANZACs in WW I.