Dinkum Diggers

DINKUM DIGGERS:  An Australian Battalion at War

Dale Blair

Published by Melbourne University Press 2001

It used to be said:

If you believe the parsons, nothing is holy;

If you believe the doctors, nothing is healthy;

If you believe the soldiers, nothing is safe.

Reading Dale Blair’s book suggests that this should be added:

If you believe the revisionist historians, nothing is as it was originally written.

There is almost certainly truth in Blair’s suggestion that the ANZAC legend exaggerates the achievements of Australian soldiers, brushes some events under the carpet, and relies to a degree on the denigration of the achievements of others, particularly some English soldiers in World War I (and to a degree, Americans in World War II).  However, Blair is not content with revision or modification of the ANZAC legend, he must attempt to demolish it completely!

Blair focuses on two elements of the ANZAC legend:  claims for egalitarianism and a stated characteristic of initiative and resourcefulness.  With regard to the first, Blair seems to assume that, to exist, egalitarianism must be perfect.  He states at one point, when discussing those initially commissioned in the 1st Battalion:  ‘One would expect, in an egalitarian force, the distribution of commissions would be proportionate to the main religious denominations …’.  This has more of an echo of nineteen nineties ‘equality of outcomes’ political correctness than the reality of Australia in the early part of the Century, where a deep sectarian divide existed, and the opportunities for higher education were limited.  Those given greater opportunities in the AIF than they had in civilian life could well have seen the AIF as an egalitarian force, even if the outcomes were still less that perfectly proportionate.

Blair also rejects any suggestion that later commissioning from the ranks was more egalitarian, stating on page 56 that ‘In the AIF, a distinct “officer type” was unashamedly pursued …’.  However, only a paragraph above, he quotes a 1st Brigade report of 6 August 1916, which noted ‘40 new officers have been promoted from the ranks … though the new men are very good men few are of what used to be known as the officers type’.  This suggests that, even before the full impact of the Western Front casualty rate was felt, a wider (and presumably more egalitarian) range of candidates for commissioning was already being tapped.

In relation to initiative and resourcefulness, Blair uses a description of the ideal modern battle by Monash, dating from his 1920 book, to show how the infantry were part of a carefully orchestrated plan, which he considers left little room for individual initiative.  However, although Blair acknowledges in a number of places that the ideal battle plan was rarely achieved, he does not seem to accept that once the plan ceased to work perfectly, opportunities for individual initiative would probably arise.

Blair does not seem to accept that even strict adherence to orders could require some initiative.  So, he dismisses the advance after the ANZAC landing as simply following the order to ‘push on at all costs’.  Yet he seems to excuse the British performance at Suvla Bay, where presumably similar orders existed, but even British historians accept that energy and initiative seemed to be lacking.  Wherever possible, Blair seems to focus on the British performance at Cape Helles, rather than at Suvla Bay, giving a form of reverse discrimination to the alleged denigration of English soldiers in the ANZAC legend.

Later in the book, when discussing the advances of the ‘Hundred Days’ after August 1918, Blair acknowledges the achievements of the AIF, but again attempts to temper them by suggesting that the morale of the German Army was then in decline, or by comparison with British performance.  So, ‘peaceful penetration’ was against troops of low morale in neglected defences (but did not others on the Western Front also face similar German soldiers and defences?).  The raid at Chipilly Spur by two Australian sergeants and four other soldiers was against German soldiers whose attention was to their front, not the flank and rear, and the British battalion that was assisted was tired while the six Australians were fresh.  But he does not address why the Australian Corps should have been selected to participate in the 8 August attack if the hierarchy of the BEF did not have at least some belief that the Corps was superior to some others.

Other examples given in the book of supposed lack of initiative are not convincing.  Stopping the raid at Bayonet Trench when it was clearly a failure is surely an example of initiative (of the kind only likely to be taken by a confident and experienced force – surely a better example of lack of initiative was allowing the later waves to attack at the Nek, when the objective was clearly not achievable).  To state that ‘… bombing teams were simply doing their job …’ after describing an action that led to the award of a Victoria Cross is surely taking the concept of duty to an extreme!

Another failing of the book is the limited acknowledgement that an army can be expected to improve with training and experience.  To suggest that the ANZAC legend is exaggerated because the 1st Battalion was not ready to perform with distinction in its first action is surely stretching the evidence to breaking point, as it is to give weight to early patrol failures but then try to dismiss actions like that at Chipilly Spur as being only against a weakened enemy.  How does Blair think the enemy was weakened?

Finally, to use the limited numbers joining the Battalion Association (and the RSL), and the higher proportion of ex-officers and NCOs joining these organisations as evidence that the privates ‘… did not necessarily hold their … war experience in high esteem’ seems to ignore two realities:  after up to five years away, most ex-AIF members probably just wanted, in the modern vernacular, to ‘get a life’, while those with higher paying jobs (likely to include many ex-officers and NCOs) would have greater ability to put time into such associations.  Perhaps as a comparison, Dale Blair could investigate the level of active involvement of his ex-students in the Deakin University alumnus, and ponder?

One point of pedantry:  it was the 3rd Division, not the 4th, which was formed in Australia (page 102).

Overall, this is an unsatisfying book, not because of the lack of a story to be told, but because of the laboured attempt to tell more of a story than might be there.

JOHN DONOVAN.