Dennis Jensen (Tangney, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Anzac story is the glue of our nation. A belief in mateship and rugged resourcefulness built this nation. At the 100-year mark, it is important to reflect upon the importance of that time and event then and now.

For Australia, as for many nations, the First World War remains the most costly conflict in terms of deaths and casualties. From a population of fewer than five million, 416,809 men enlisted, of which over 60,000 were killed and 156,000 were wounded, gassed or taken prisoner. The outbreak of war was greeted in Australia, as in many other places, with great enthusiasm. In response to the overwhelming number of volunteers, the authorities set exacting physical standards for recruits. Yet, most of the men accepted into the army in August 1914 were sent first to Egypt, not Europe, to meet the threat which a newly belligerent Ottoman Empire—now Turkey—posed to British interests in the Middle East and the Suez Canal.

The Australians landed at what has become known as Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915 and established a tenuous foothold on the steep slopes above the beach. During the early days of the campaign, the allies tried to break through Turkish lines, while the Turks tried to drive the allied troops off the peninsula. Attempts on both sides ended in failure and the ensuing stalemate continued for the remainder of 1915. As a result, the Turks were unable to inflict more than a very few casualties on the retreating forces.

In modern parlance, Gallipoli was a game changer. It changed the attitudes of the young men fighting and those at home. It consolidated a belief in the idea of a separate Australian identity. It showed how victory can be pyrrhic, and retreat a success. It demonstrated the changed and complex reality of war—quagmire, morale and operational factors were now in the minds of the millions. Every club, community and country, for it to be successful and enduring, needs a unifying foundational narrative, and 25 April 1915 marks a pivotal moment in Australian history. The Australian troops who stormed ashore as part of the allied landing force on the morning of 25 April were the newly-minted Anzacs, formed in Egypt only a few months before.

About 420,000 Australians enlisted for service in the war; almost 40 per cent of the eligible male population. This was the first time Australians had been exposed to the bloody horrors of 20th century trench warfare, and our young nation recoiled. Despite the savage introduction, something precious was salvaged from disaster. Gallipoli showed us what they were made of—and it is something to be proud of. It was because of the way in which the Australians performed, not their strategic achievements, that the Anzac legend was born. The Anzac Gallipoli legend says to us that such is our love of country and upright decency that we would literally go to the ends of the earth to defend our view of what is right and our way of life.

In Gallipoli the legacy of the campaign is clear. The landscape still bears the marks of trenches and artillery bombardments and there are 44 separate war cemeteries. The cemeteries honour the dead of all those nations that fought in Gallipoli but, due to the nature of the fighting and the complexity of recovering bodies during the campaign, the vast majority of soldiers who died have no known grave. While this ill-fated battle became a touchstone of Australian and New Zealand nationhood the British chose to forget the 'disgraceful disaster'. The war changed more than the hands that write history, but reality never does. And while it is right that we remember the valour and bravery of our Anzacs always, it is also right that we remember the context that drove them into war on foreign shores. Every little nation in the family of the British Empire sent its sons to help the then motherland. Our nation was no different. We were and are a part of a family of free countries. The war was about family—families suffering in sacrifice.

Although he never served in the Australian forces, I would like to honour my maternal grandfather, Bernard Bailey, who fought on the Western Front in World War I—one of the Allies. The attitude of service then was very strong. My grandfather was a bombardier in charge of a howitzer. In those days they had no hearing protection—so he went deaf in one ear as a result of the continual noise. He was medically released from service due to injuries that he sustained during the war. I recall watching him shave in the morning. He was wearing a singlet. He had a huge chunk out of his arm, and I asked him about it. A piece of shrapnel had gone through his arm. It is interesting some of the things they did in those days. Of course, they did not have skin grafts the. He told me what they did to try to prevent infection. They used the skin from hard boiled eggs to form a protective layer to prevent infection.

My grandfather was an interesting character. He was one of the early motorcyclists in the world. He was checking out a nurse when he was on a motorcycle and he crashed. The nurse he was checking out ended up being my grandmother. I was talking about the whole issue of service and the attitudes that people had then. My grandfather was not a large man. He was only five foot six inches tall. My uncle, during World War II, was not particularly interested in serving. My grandfather was really ashamed of this. So imagine this: here was a man who was around 50. At that stage he was blind in one eye because of a lazy eye and he was deaf in one ear. And he had a big chunk out of his arm due to war injuries. And he went to try and enlist! Of course, they did not accept him, but it had the desired effect: my uncle did then enlist. However, my uncle, different from my grandfather, never spoke about his experience in World War II in North Africa.

I really regret the fact that my grandfather died when I was only 14 years old. I would have liked to have him around a lot longer. The stories that he told were quite chilling but also very memorable. For example, he told stories of the trenches—and I imagine the same thing would have happened in Gallipoli. He said the rat infestation in the trenches was terrible and they used to have competitions to see who could kill the most rats. That was one of the ways the comraderie built up in awful circumstances. It makes me think back to those men on the Gallipoli shore and the terrible conditions they had. There was a great probability of them dying of injuries the majority of which today would not be a death sentence but were then because of inadequate drugs and inadequate medical treatment. The courage of those men in facing that persistent and consistent danger day after day beggars belief. In a lot of battles since, there is what is called manoeuvre warfare: you have a battle but, after that, things do not move; you have large periods where essentially nothing happens. But at Gallipoli and on the Western front it was just day after day after day. So I salute all of those Anzacs who served not only at Gallipoli but throughout World War I. I thank them for their sacrifice and the soul they brought to this nation called Australia.

See this speech in context