ANZAC's Dirty Dozen 12 Myths of Australian Military History

by Stockings, Craig

• ISBN13: 9781742232881
• ISBN10: 1742232884
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-05-01
• Publisher: University of New South Wales Press

Summary

Australian military history is a landscape of legends, yet across the breadth of military heritage, accuracy and objectivity are often shunted aside so that tales bent on commemoration, veneration, and the idealization of Australian virtues can thrive. In this book, a team of renowned historians revisit the battles to expose a host of stubborn fantasies and fabrications that obscure the real story. Confrontational and clear-eyed, it goes beyond the indulgent, politicized, and emotionally charged rhetoric of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC)that sacrosanct idea in the Australian national psycheto find out exactly what it means to be Australian at war and proud of it.

Author Biography

Craig Stockings is a senior lecturer in history with the University of New South Wales at the Australian Defense Force Academy. He is the author of Bardia: Myth, Reality and the Heirs of ANZAC; The Torch and the Sword; and Zombie Myths of Australia Military History.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. vii
Contributors	p. viii
Introduction: Myths and Australian Military History	p. 1
Australian military history doesn't begin on Gallipoli	p. 11
The 'superior', all-volunteer AIF	p. 35
What about New Zealand? The problematic history of the Anzac connection	p. 51
Other people's wars	p. 73
'They also served': Exaggerating women's role in Australia's wars	p. 100
The nonsense of universal Australian 'fair play' in war	p. 112
The unnecessary waste: Australians in the late Pacific campaigns	p. 138
Lost at sea: Missing out on Australia's naval history	p. 165
'Landmark' battles and the myths of Vietnam	p. 186
The myth that Australia 'punches above its weight'	p. 210
Critical reflections on the Australia-US alliance	p. 235
Monumental mistake: Is war the most important thing in Australian history?	p. 260
Epilogue	p. 287
Notes	p. 293
Index	p. 323
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