Case study: The Australians.

With the outbreak of war Australia found itself willingly at war for the empire. Australian leaders were not consulted, but demonstrated their unqualified loyalty. Their prime minister declared that Australia would support Britain to 'the last man and the last shilling'.

The name of the volunteer force formed in September 1914 was the Australian Imperial Force (AIF). Its first members sailed for the war in November 1914. They had enlisted with mixed motives: to serve King and Empire, to have an adventure, to see the world, to do the right thing. One man in five had been born in Britain - many enlisted in the hope of a trip home before active service.

The AIF first went to Egypt (the Dardanelles). On arrival many of its members were struck by the contrast between themselves and the British soldiers they met. Though most Australians were city-men, they had been raised in one of the world's most prosperous and progressive democracies. They towered above the shorter Lancashire territorials they called the 'Chooms'. For the rest of the war Australians would measure themselves against the British Army. As they became more and more aware of their own strengths they grew more and more disillusioned with Britain.

Differences emerged immediately. British troops stuck rigidly to military custom, especially saluting. Australian volunteers tended to salute only those superiors they respected personally. This is seen in a cartoon of 1917: "Why do you not salute?" a British colonel demands of a slouching Australian private. "To tell you the truth, digger", he replies, "we've cut it right out". British insistence on saluting prompted Australian resistance and generated friction throughout the war.
During the Gallipoli landings the Australians (with the New Zealanders) quickly developed as soldiers. Though new to war they soon gained a toughness and skill which they felt contrasted with what an Australian school teacher called the 'inefficient, incapable, and badly led' British troops. They had expected to learn from the British, but on Gallipoli they looked down on them as amateurs.

The AIF divisions fought on the Somme in 1916, losing as many casualties in eight weeks as had been lost on Gallipoli in eight months. In 1917 they attacked at Messines and in the battles of Passchendaele (Ypres). In 1918 they helped to both stop the German March offensive and lead the advance to final victory.

However, we must not read too much into the way the troops condemned the British war machine. Many, perhaps most, remained proud of the dual loyalties to Australia and to the Empire. 'This war', an Australian schoolteacher wrote from Gallipoli, 'has made me intensely British and absolutely Australian'. Although nationalism was growing it was not until after the Second World war that Australians' faith in Britain really cracked and they developed pride as a nation independent of Britain.

 

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