Yanks Down Under 1941 45

Includes accounts and discussion of relationships between negro G.I.s and Aborigines, other G.I.s and Aborigines.

They came in hundreds of thousands--soldiers, sailors, pilots, marines, nurses, merchant seamen. Young Americans were everywhere in Australia when down under became the rallying ground for the fight against the Japanese. The impact they made--sometimes violent, often emotional, frequently funny, --was felt for years afterward in both predictable and unexpected ways. This book tells the story of that friendly invasion for the first time. Using interviews, letters, diaries, and other materials gathered during the authors' extensive travels throughout the United States and Australia, this book vividly illustrates how the Yanks and the Aussies, in and out of uniform, responded to each other. It shows how the American invasion affected the Australian identity and laid the groundwork for a new association between the two countries. About the Authors: Daniel Potts, now an Australian citizen and Associate Professor of History at Monash University in Melbourne, was born in the U.S. Annette Potts, his wife and a native Australian, has collaborated with him on several previous books about Australian-American relations.

Over 120,000 American troops were stationed in Australia during the Second World War. Hundreds of thousands more passed through the country between 1941 and 1945. Because of Japan’s conquest of the Philippines in 1942, Australia was transformed into the principle base for the United States Army in the Southwest Pacific. This American occupation of an allied country resulted in several areas of tension between friends. The examination of these “fault lines,” which have, for the most part, received little attention from historians, is the purpose of this book. Jurisdictional and policing disputes and problems between Australian workers and American authorities are examined. American personnel committed thousands of crimes during the occupation, many of which were notorious. How Australians reacted to these crimes and how the American military sought to limit their negative effect on wartime relations is a major focus of this book. How the US military tried to protect GIs from prosecution by spiriting them out of Australia is also explored. Other areas of tension such as race and gender relations, which have been looked at by other historians, are examined in a new light; this book provides novel insights and challenges the existing historiography with regard to relations between black Americans and Australian civilians. How leaders on both sides, in particular Douglas MacArthur and John Curtin, managed crises and relations between civilians and GIs are studied. Sexual relations, an area of particular concern for authorities, were directed towards short-term flings and prostitution. In contrast, authorities did all they could to discourage long-term relations (i.e., marriage). Authorities obsessed over interracial sexual relations and doubled efforts to discourage them. Conflicts between American personnel and Australian civilians during the occupation did not threaten the alliance against Japan. Nevertheless, there were myriad problems between allies that led to friction and ill-will. These problems demanded management from above.

Fazio examines the significance of the US-Australian Korean engagement, 1947–53, in the evolution of the relationship between the two nations in the formative years of the Cold War. In the aftermath of World War Two, divergent American and Australian strategic and security interests converged and then aligned on the Korean peninsula. Fazio argues that the interactions between key US and Australian officials throughout their Korean engagement were crucial to shaping the nature of the evolving relationship and the making of the alliance between the two nations. The diplomacy of Percy Spender, John Foster Dulles, and James Plimsoll was particularly crucial. He demonstrates that the American evaluation of the geo-strategic significance of Korea was a significant factor in the making of the ANZUS alliance and events in Korea remained central to the evolving US-Australian relationship. Their Korean engagement showed the US and Australia had similar and overlapping, rather than identical interests, and that their relationship was much more nuanced and problematic than commonly perceived. Fazio challenges the Australian mythology on the origins of the ANZUS Treaty and presents a cautionary insight into the limits of Australia’s capacity to influence US policy to benefit its interests. An insightful read for diplomatic historians, providing greater depth to understanding the broader historical context of the trajectory of the US-Australian relationship and alliance since the beginning of the Cold War.

Part biography, part transnational history, this study details the life and career of Percy Spender, one of Australia's most prominent twentieth-century political figures.

With more than 1,700 cross-referenced entries covering every aspect of World War II, the events and developments of the era, and myriad related subjects as well as a documents volume, this is the most comprehensive reference work available on the war. This encyclopedia represents a single source of authoritative information on World War II that provides accessible coverage of the causes, course, and consequences of the war. Its introductory overview essays and cross-referenced A–Z entries explain how various sources of friction culminated in a second worldwide conflict, document the events of the war and why individual battles were won and lost, and identify numerous ways the war has permanently changed the world. The coverage addresses the individuals, campaigns, battles, key weapons systems, strategic decisions, and technological developments of the conflict, as well as the diplomatic, economic, and cultural aspects of World War II. The five-volume set provides comprehensive information that gives readers insight into the reasons for the war's direction and outcome. Readers will understand the motivations behind Japan's decision to attack the United States, appreciate how the concentration of German military resources on the Eastern Front affected the war's outcome, understand the major strategic decisions of the war and the factors behind them, grasp how the Second Sino-Japanese War contributed to the start of World War II, and see the direct impact of new military technology on the outcomes of the battles during the conflict. The lengthy documents volume represents a valuable repository of additional information for student research.

"This book is of interest to any scholar of World War II, particularly those focused on bridging culture and war. Highly readable, this text is suitable for undergraduate and popular audiences as well. Many should find its analysis to be a refreshing take on the well-trodden field of World War II histories." — Journal of Military History December 1942 saw the bloodiest Christmas in the history of mankind. From the islands in the Pacific to the China front, from the trenches in Russia to the battle lines in North Africa, in the skies over Europe and in the depths of the Atlantic, men were killing each other in greater numbers than ever before. The Holocaust continued, and innocent civilians were murdered by the thousands throughout the evil Nazi empire, even as the perpetrators celebrated the birth of Christ. Millions stationed in far-off lands amid the greatest conflict in human history feared this was their last Christmas in freedom, or their last Christmas alive. At the same time as the slaughter continued unabated, throughout the world there were random acts of kindness, born out of an instinctive feeling of the essential brotherhood of man. These gestures also straddled religious barriers and sometimes included those of non-Christian faiths. Even some Japanese, otherwise embarked on a self-declared crusade against the West, relented for a few precious hours in acknowledgment of the holiday. At the same time, Christmas 1942 saw the injunction of ‘good will to man’ distorted in ugly and callous ways. At Auschwitz, SS guards played cruel games with their prisoners. In Berlin, the German heart of darkness, Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels spent time with his family while still buried in feverish fantasies about the Jewish world conspiracy. Christmas 1942 saw the entire range of man’s conduct towards his fellow man, reflecting the extremes of behavior, good and bad, that World War II gave rise to. The way the holiday was marked around the world tells a deeper and more universal story of the human condition in extraordinary times.

Thousands of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people served their country during World War II and this book focuses on the experiences of six of those soldiers.

This is a fascinating new account of how diplomacy and politics gave way to military strategy and warfare in the Pacific. Presenting previously unpublished documents this book freshly examines the key events in the fight for the Pacific.

The 4 volumes in this set, originally published between 1980 and 1983, bring to light and focus on the conflict between Japan and Australia and Japan and the USA. Timothy Hall’s volumes, richly illustrated with black & white photographs, used highly contentious documents as their sources and give fascinating insights into a period of Australian history which is sometimes less than gloious. John J. Sbrega’s tour de force is not only one of the most extensive annotated bibliographies on the USA and Japan in World War 2 ever published, but it also provides invaluable information on lesser known but no less important aspects of the conflict.