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- 18 June 2002
World War II Papua New Guinea Campaign War Memorials
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Page: 3218
The Hon. CHARLIE LYNN [9.19 p.m.]: I congratulate the Federal Government and the Minister for Veteran Affairs on the recent announcement that this year they will allocate $1.5 million for three new war memorials: on the Kokoda track, Milne Bay and at Popondetta. These memorials will mark the 60th anniversary of the Papua New Guinea campaigns during World War II. I have studied Isurava closely over the past few years because for the first eight or nine years that I went to Papua New Guinea I was always told that the location of the Isurava battle site was near the village of Isurava. But that did not make sense because what I had read and the ground of the village did not coincide. In 1997 I took a global positioning system with me and I was able to locate the original battle site. Since then we have taken veterans there for a final parade and this year the Government is going to honour that battle site with the construction of what I believe is a fine memorial. It is long overdue because Isurava, as I have pointed out in the House before, is our Alamo. Unfortunately, Australians know more about the Alamo than they know about Isurava. But it was in Isurava on 29 August 1942 that Private Bruce Kingsbury of the 2/14th Battalion won the first Victoria Cross to be awarded on Australian territory.
The average age of the young Australians at the battle of Isurava was 18½ years. They faced an overwhelming force that outnumbered them by 6:1. But they knew they were all that stood between the advancing Japanese army and their families back in Australia. They fought fearlessly and ferociously in defence of Australian territory. We should look at the memorial at Isurava as the first step in our long overdue honouring of the diggers who served in Papua New Guinea during World War II.
The battle of Milne Bay in late August 1942 happened at the same time as the battle of Isurava because it was part of a two-pronged attack: a seaborne landing at Milne Bay and an advance along the Kokoda Track through Isurava. The attacks at both Isurava and Milne Bay were co-ordinated to start on 26 August 1942. It was at the battle of Milne Bay where the Allied defenders, which included 4,500 Australian infantrymen, supported by Royal Australian Air Force Kittyhawk fighters, drove off the enemy forces, thereby inflicting the first military defeat of the war against a Japanese amphibious force. It was also the site where another Australian, Corporal John French of the 2/9th Battalion, won the Victoria Cross. Popondetta was the staging area for the Australian offensive against the Japanese positions in the northern beachheads of Buna, Gona and Sanananda, the scene of one of the fiercest battles in Papua New Guinea.
I have often been critical of successive Federal governments since World War II because of their neglect of our history in Papua New Guinea. I believe our approach has been wrong in that we have built structures there that have created false expectations among the locals that something would eventually happen as some sort of legacy, but when we have withdrawn nothing has happened and the structures have fallen into decay. I believe we need to establish what I call a self-sustaining eco-adventure trekking industry and give ownership of the industry to the local people. They own the land that is very sacred to our military heritage. If they are given ownership of the industry they will protect the area and provide for the safety of the young Australians who very soon will discover the challenge of places such as the Kokoda Track, as they have with Gallipoli. We have a national responsibility to make sure that they can visit the areas safely. When they go it should be both an educative and a commemorative experience, and it should provide to Papua New Guinea a form of ongoing income and economic development that will allow people along the track to become self-sufficient. I have been critical in the past but tonight I compliment the Minister for Veterans' Affairs and the Federal Government on the allocation of $1.5 million as a first step in this process.
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