The Battle of Greece – Australia’s Textbook Rear-Guard Action
Retreat doesn’t always mean defeat, sometimes it can be a victory to withdraw in good order and deny your enemy a total victory. This is was the outcome for the allied forces in Greece during April 1941, thanks in part to textbook rear-guard actions fought by Australian units, which allowed 50,732 men to escape the grasp of the advancing superior Axis force. But why were Australian units involved in Greece in the first place?
Escape from Greece – Podcast
ESCAPE FROM GREECE – PODCAST This podcast episode tells the story of Shanghai born John Robin Greaves, ‘Jack’, who emigrated to Australia in 1939 and volunteered for the Australian Imperial […]
First World War Centenary Prose Collection Vol. III – Audiobook
FIRST WORLD WAR CENTENARY PROSE COLLECTION VOL. III – AUDIOBOOK By Various. This collection of non-fiction and fiction pieces is the third volume commemorating the First World War. The majority […]
First World War Centenary Prose Collection Vol. II – Audiobook
FIRST WORLD WAR CENTENARY PROSE COLLECTION VOL. II – AUDIOBOOK By Various. This collection of non-fiction and fiction pieces is the second volume commemorating the First World War. The majority […]
First World War Centenary Prose Collection Vol. I – Audiobook
FIRST WORLD WAR CENTENARY PROSE COLLECTION VOL. I – AUDIOBOOK By Various This collection of non-fiction and fiction, with its companion poetry collection, commemorates the outbreak of the First World War […]
1917: our costliest year at war
1917: OUR COSTLIEST YEAR AT WAR A century ago, in early 1917, Australian troops had already seen heavy fighting, on Gallipoli in 1915 and even more on the Western Front […]
SIX of the best WORLD WAR II FILMS
SIX OF THE BEST WORLD WAR II FILMS World War II (1939-1945) was and remains the greatest conflict that humanity has ever seen both in scale and loss of life; […]
Walking with the Diggers
WALKING WITH THE DIGGERS The Centenary Commemoration of the Great War continues to unearth real treasures from our military history, none more mesmerising than this Exhibition of photographs taken by […]
The German naval threat in the Indo-Pacific 1914–15
Among the flood of centenary anniversaries and commemorations, one that slipped past without comment was the destruction of the German cruiser Konigsberg in East Africa on 11 July 1915. Although less well-known […]
The Benghazi Handicap and the Siege of Tobruk
The Benghazi handicap is the name Australian soldiers gave to their race to stay ahead of the German Afrika Korps in Libya, 1941. They won the race, but the reward was just to be besieged in the city of Tobruk for 241 days, the longest siege in British military history. In this article, we use the words of veterans themselves to describe these events, and how the Rats of Tobruk experienced the siege.
Warfare spurred on the welfare state in the 20th century – but it probably won’t in future
The link between warfare and welfare is counter-intuitive. One is about violence and destruction, the other about altruism, support and care. Even the term “welfare state” – at least in […]
The Holocaust
Warning: some of the following photos may be disturbing to readers. The event traditionally defined as the Holocaust — by which I mean the systematic extermination of European Jewry between 1941 […]
After Jutland: the North Sea operations of 18–19 August 1916
One of the Great War’s abiding myths is that the German High Sea Fleet never emerged again after the Battle of Jutland to face the Grand Fleet until the ignominious […]
Bismarck and the Origin of the German Empire – Audiobook
BISMARCK AND THE ORIGIN OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE – AUDIOBOOK By Sir Frederick Maurice Powicke (1879 – 1963) Despite its brevity, this Little Blue Book #142 by the Oxford historian, Sir […]
Four days in August: The Soviet Union’s final blow
Nearly 30 years have passed since the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991, and yet vivid memories of the once-mighty empire remain steadfast in our collective memory. By […]
Sardines for breakfast, hypothermia rescues: the story of the cash-strapped, post-pandemic 1920 Olympics
Since the global pandemic began, debate has raged over whether Tokyo should go ahead with the Olympic Games, now set to open on July 23. The same heated debates were […]
ROME’S AUGUSTUS AND THE ALLURE OF THE STRONGMAN
ROME’S AUGUSTUS AND THE ALLURE OF THE STRONGMAN The Roman emperor Augustus is held up by some as a statesman who brought peace, and as a potential model for the […]
Caste: A Divisive Structure in the United States, India, and Nazi Germany
In her new book, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, Isabel Wilkerson writes that the ways in which we are divided today are “like the wind, powerful enough to knock […]
The Cold War Ignites: The Berlin Blockade and Airlift
Once the centre of Nazi ideology and power, the German capital of Berlin was extremely important not only in the Allies quest to defeat Hitler, but in the rebuilding of […]
Constructing Oppression: The Berlin Wall and the Literal Iron Curtain
60 years after its initial construction, the memory of the Berlin Wall remains a potent symbol of the Cold War. Of all of history’s global conflicts, perhaps none has been […]
Who will have us? Jewish Refugees before WW2
The plight of Jewish refugees after the outbreak of World War II in 1939 is well documented. Hundreds of thousands of people fled Nazi persecution and hoped to find a […]
Remembering Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg
REMEMBERING SACHSENHAUSEN-ORANIENBURG By Rachel Horne. 35 kilometres north of Berlin, you will find the Nazi concentration camp of Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg. Some particularly well-known figures were imprisoned here, including the Prime Ministers […]
Deceptive Ineptitude: German Spies in WW2 Britain
DECEPTIVE INEPTITUDE: GERMAN SPIES IN WW2 BRITAIN Operation Lena, the German espionage operation in Britain, turned out to be one of the least successful spy missions of World War 2. […]
The Somme: The German perspective
By Dr Robert T. Foley. How do Germans view the Battle of The Somme? This article explores reactions to the most famous battle of the First World War. Shortly after […]