Proposed Japanese invasion of Australia during World War II
In early 1942, elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) proposed an invasion of mainland Australia. This proposal was opposed by the Imperial Japanese Army and Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, who regarded it as being unfeasible, given Australia's geography and the strength of the Allied defences. Instead, the Japanese military adopted a strategy of isolating mainland Australia from the United States by advancing through the South Pacific. This offensive was abandoned following the Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway in May and June 1942, and all subsequent Japanese operations in the vicinity of Australia were undertaken to slow the advance of Allied forces.
This is all despite key battles, including the
Former Australian War Memorial principal historian Dr Peter Stanley states that the Japanese "army dismissed the idea as 'gibberish', knowing that troops sent further south would weaken Japan in China and in Manchuria against a Soviet threat. Not only did the Japanese army condemn the plan, but the Navy General Staff also deprecated it, unable to spare the million tonnes of shipping the invasion would have consumed."[2]
After the
Japanese proposals
Japan's success in the early months of the
The Japanese Army opposed the Navy's proposal as being impractical. The Army's focus was on defending the perimeter of Japan's conquests, and it believed that invading Australia would over-extend these defence lines. Moreover, the Army was not willing to release the large number of troops it calculated was needed for such an operation from the Kwantung Army in Manchuria as it both feared that the Soviet Union would enter the Pacific War and wanted to preserve an option for Japan to invade Siberia.[7]
We never had enough troops to [invade Australia]. We had already far out-stretched our
lines of communication. We did not have the armed strength or the supply facilities to mount such a terrific extension of our already over-strained and too thinly spread forces. We expected to occupy all New Guinea, to maintain Rabaulas a holding base, and to raid Northern Australia by air. But actual physical invasion—no, at no time.
In speeches before the
The Army's and the Navy's calculations of the number of troops needed to invade Australia differed greatly and formed a central area of discussion. In December 1941 the Navy calculated that a force of three divisions (between 45,000 and 60,000 men) would be sufficient to secure Australia's north-eastern and north-western coastal areas. In contrast, the Army calculated that a force of at least ten divisions (between 150,000 and 250,000 men) would be needed. The Army's planners estimated that transporting this force to Australia would require 1.5 to 2 million tons of shipping, which would have required delaying the return of requisitioned merchant shipping.[11] This invasion force would have been larger than the entire force used to conquer South-East Asia.[12] The Army also rejected the Navy's proposal of limiting an invasion of Australia to securing enclaves in the north of the country as being unrealistic given the likely Allied counter-offensives against these positions. Due to its experience in China the Army believed that any invasion of Australia would have to involve an attempt to conquer the entire Australian continent, something which was beyond Japan's abilities.[13]
The possibility of invading Australia was discussed by the Japanese Army and Navy on several occasions in February 1942. On 6 February the Navy Ministry formally proposed a plan in which
He said that after he had taken Singapore, he wanted to discuss with Tojo a plan for the invasion of Australia... Tojo turned down the plan, making the excuse of lengthened supply lines, which would be precarious and open to enemy attack...
The dispute between the Army and Navy was settled in late February with a decision to isolate rather than invade Australia. The Army continued to maintain its view that invading Australia was impractical, but agreed to extend Japan's strategic perimeter and cut Australia off from the US by invading Fiji, Samoa, and New Caledonia in the so-called Operation FS.[16] The question of whether to invade Australia was discussed by Imperial Headquarters for the last time on 27 February and in this meeting the Army stated that it believed that Australia was defended by a 600,000-strong military force. During a further meeting held on 4 March the Imperial Headquarters formally agreed to a "Fundamental Outline of Recommendations for Future War Leadership" which relegated the option of invading Australia as a "future option" only if all other plans went well. This plan was presented to the Emperor by Prime Minister Hideki Tōjō and in effect ended discussion of invading Australia.[17] The FS Operation was not implemented, however, due to Japan's defeats in the Battle of the Coral Sea and Battle of Midway and was cancelled on 11 July 1942.[18]
Subsequent Japanese operations in the South-West Pacific
As the option of invading Australia was rejected in February 1942 and was not revisited, the
The generals of the Army General Staff, and the Prime Minister of Japan, General Hideki Tojo, did not see a need to commit massive troop resources to the conquest of Australia, with the massive logistical problems that would produce. The generals were confident that Australia could be bullied into surrender to Japan by isolating it completely from the United States and by applying intense psychological pressure.
The dozens of subsequent
A small Japanese reconnaissance unit carried out a brief landing on the Australian mainland during January 1944. Matsu Kikan ("Pine Tree"), a joint army-navy intelligence unit, landed to assess reports that the Allies had begun to build major new bases on the northernmost coast of the
Australian fear of invasion
After the fall of Singapore, Prime Minister of Australia John Curtin compared its loss to the Battle of Dunkirk. The Battle of Britain occurred after Dunkirk; "the fall of Singapore opens the Battle for Australia", Curtin said, which threatened the Commonwealth, the United States, and the entire English-speaking world. Not knowing that Japan did not plan to invade Australia and in February 1942 could not successfully do so, the Australian government and people expected an invasion soon. The fear was greatest until June 1942. Curtin said on 16 February:[26]
The protection of this country is no longer that of a contribution to a world at war but the resistance to an enemy threatening to invade our own shore ... It is now work or fight as we have never worked or fought before ... On what we do now depends everything we may like to do when this bloody test has been survived.
Former Head of the Centre for Historical Research at the National Museum of Australia Dr Peter Stanley has been critical of the oft-repeated, widespread myth that Japan intended to invade Australia, commenting "the invasion myth helps justify the parochial view Australians took of their war effort."[2]
In fiction
The 1984 alternate history novel The Bush Soldiers by John Hooker depicts a successful Japanese invasion of Australia and the last-ditch resistance effort made by a handful of Australian and British troops.[27]
In John Birmingham's 2004 alternative history novel Designated Targets, Imperial Japan launches an invasion of northern Australia.
The 2001 alternate history essay collection Rising Sun Victorious edited by Peter G. Tsouras has a chapter Samurai Down Under by John H. Gill that posits a briefly-successful Japanese invasion of the Queensland coast at Cape York, Cairns and Townsville.[28]
See also
- Axis victory in World War II
- Battle for Australia
- Brisbane Line
- Battle of Christmas Island
- Cocos Islands during World War II
- Kantokuen
- Operation Mo
Notes
- ^ Stanley (2002), pg 3.
- ^ a b "Japanese invasion a myth: historian". The Age. 1 June 2002. Retrieved 12 March 2019.
- ^ Geoffrey Bolton, The Oxford History of Australia: Volume 5: 1942–1995. The Middle Way (2005) pp 7–10, 15
- ISBN 9780521644839.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 162–163.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 168.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 163.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 172.
- ^ Gill (1957), pg 643.
- ^ Ken'ichi and Kratoska (2003), pg 54–55.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 163–165.
- ^ Hattori (1949), pg 1.
- ^ Bullard (2007), pg 78.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 165–166.
- ^ Potter (1969).
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 167.
- ^ a b Frei (1991), pg 171.
- ^ Frei (1991), pg 171–173.
- ^ Stanley (2008), pg 108.
- ^ Stanley (2008), pg 178–180.
- ^ Stanley (2008), pg 182–185.
- ^ Daphne Choules Edinger, 1995, "Exploring the Kimberley Coast" and; Cathie Clement, 1995, "World War II and the Kimberley" (The Kimberley Society).
- ^ Frei (1991), p. 173.
- ^ Frei (1991), pp. 173–4.
- ^ Matchett (2008).
- ^ Hasluck, Paul (1970). The Government and the People 1942–1945. Australia in the War of 1939–1945. Series 4 – Civil. Canberra: Australian War Memorial. pp. 70–73. 6429367X.
- ISBN 0670197513.
- ISBN 0739416987.
References
- Bullard, Steven (translator) (2007). Japanese army operations in the South Pacific Area New Britain and Papua campaigns, 1942–43. Canberra: Australian War Memorial. )
- Frei, Henry P. (1991). Japan's Southward Advance and Australia. From the Sixteenth Century to World War II. Melbourne: Melbourne University Press. ISBN 0-522-84392-1.
- Gill, G. Hermon (1957). "Chapter 17 – Prelude to Victory". Volume I – Royal Australian Navy, 1939–1942. Australia in the War of 1939–1945. Canberra: Australian War Memorial. Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 August 2006. Retrieved 6 November 2006.
- Hattori, Takushiro (1980) [1949]. "Statement Concerning Reasons for Opposition to Plan for Invasion of Australia". In Donald S. Detwiler (ed.). War in Asia and the Pacific. Volume 7. The Southern Area (Part II). New York: Garland Publishing. ISBN 0-8240-3291-8.
- ISSN 0729-2473.
- Goto, Ken'ichi; Paul H. Kratoska (2003). Tensions of empire: Japan and Southeast Asia in the colonial and postcolonial world. Research in international studies Ohio University research in international studies. Volume 108. Singapore: NUS Press. ISBN 978-9971-69-281-0.
- Matchett, Stephen (30 July 2008). "Get over it, we weren't at the heart of World War II". The Australian. Retrieved 27 May 2010.
- Stanley, Peter (2002). "He's (not) Coming South": the invasion that wasn't" (PDF). Conference Papers. Remembering 1942. Archived from the original (PDF) on 26 September 2007. Retrieved 5 October 2007.
- Stanley, Peter (2008). Invading Australia. Japan and the Battle for Australia, 1942. Melbourne: Penguin Group (Australia). ISBN 978-0-670-02925-9.
- "Japanese Operations in the Southwest Pacific Area, Volume II – Part I". Reports of General MacArthur. United States Army Center of Military History. 1994. Archived from the original on 8 February 2009. Retrieved 8 July 2010.
Further reading
- Arnold, Anthony (2013). A Slim Barrier: The Defence of Mainland Australia 1939-1945. PhD Thesis (Thesis). University of New South Wales. hdl:1959.4/53041.
- Brown, Gary; Anderson, David (29 April 1992). "Invasion 1942? Australia and the Japanese Threat" (PDF). Issues Brief. Canberra: Department of the Parliamentary Library. ISSN 1037-2938.
- Stanley, Peter (2007). "What is the Battle for Australia?" (PDF). Australian Army Journal. 4 (2). Canberra, Australian Capital Territory: Land Warfare Studies Centre. ISSN 1448-2843. Archived from the original(PDF) on 23 January 2018. Retrieved 1 July 2017.