Voices from the Air

by Tony Hill

  Wilmot began to gather news of the campaign developing at the far end of the Kokoda Trail and it was not necessarily in line with the communiqués from GHQ. He sent a cable to the ABC challenging a GHQ report that the Japanese held the north of the Owen Stanley Ranges and the Australians the south. Chester was speaking to the New Guinea Force command in Moresby who had hotly denied the report – maintaining that, at that stage, the Japanese had only a narrow toehold on the coast and were still battling with the Australians for the village of Kokoda in the northern foothills leading into the mountains. Frank Dixon held back Chester’s report and passed it to the censor, who also passed it to GHQ, which then banned it. Wilmot’s role, according to GHQ, was ‘to send news and not comment on official and background information released from General Headquarters’.5 GHQ’s public representation of the Kokoda campaign was to be a source of fierce controversy with correspondents and the Australian command.

  An early report from Wilmot for the BBC emphasised the difficulty for any force intending to reach Port Moresby through the mountains. ‘Of course there’s no habitable area in the world that’s impassable to determined troops, but certainly the country between Kokoda and Moresby is not the kind of country through which a large force could fight its way.’6 He added, ‘that’s how it looks at present, anyway’. The battlefield in New Guinea not only challenged the training and tactics of the Australian forces, it also posed new challenges for reporting, different from any Wilmot had experienced in the Western Desert. The frontline here was on the other side of the Owen Stanley Range and the terrain in between was a seemingly insurmountable barrier for the heavy equipment of the recording unit.

  At present we are separated from the enemy by sea or mountains. In this island warfare it will seldom be possible for us to get near enough to the front to make actuality recordings or even interviews with troops who have done the fighting. It will seldom be possible for our observer to record his despatches.7

  The Withdrawal

  The mountainous terrain prevented Bill MacFarlane and the recording gear from accompanying Chester on the Kokoda Trail. On 19 August 1942 MacFarlane drove Wilmot, cinematographer Damien Parer and newspaper correspondent Osmar White to the foothills of the Owen Stanleys. From there, Wilmot, Parer and White set out on foot for the frontlines and to meet up with the troops of Maroubra Force. Wilmot’s reports from the Kokoda Trail were recorded after returning to Port Moresby.

  The first day out we climb the range behind Port Moresby in a truck and cover more ground in three hours than we’ll travel in the next three days on foot. Moresby’s dry and dusty but as soon as we start walking we come into thick wet forest which gets thicker and wetter the higher we climb. At the top of our first climb we can see the series of ridges that we’ve got to climb mounting up till they end in the 13,000 foot Mt Victoria with its head in the clouds.8

  Ahead lay days of walking, steep slippery gradients and hard climbing. ‘You could never get up this spur with a pack on your back if it weren’t for the stairs the engineers have cut. You curse the steps for their tiring monotony . . . and unconsciously you find yourself counting them . . . 1000 . . . 2000 . . . 2001 . . . 2002 . . . 2003 . . . I’ll go crazy if I count any more.’9

  Osmar White was both impressed and amused by Wilmot’s headlong approach to the daunting ascents and descents of the track and observed that the fat was disappearing from ‘chubby Wilmot before our eyes.’ Downhill, Wilmot took great strides that left the others trailing far behind. Going up the next hill they would catch up to the exhausted Wilmot who was now blowing hard and cursing. Wilmot’s all-or-nothing approach would have felled a lesser man. ‘He was the wrong build for this sort of work,’ wrote White, ‘but the right temperament. He was still grunting, cursing and whistling at the end of the day – and still travelling.’10

  Several days on, the party reached Eora Creek, just behind the frontline, where the wounded lay on stretchers on the ground and army doctors operated in a grass hut. Wilmot observed: ‘There are no refinements about war in the New Guinea mountains. It’s war which demands a degree of courage, endurance and sacrifice greater than has been demanded of any Australian troops in this war. These men have to fight the enemy and nature too, but in courage, endurance and sacrifice they’ve lacked nothing.’11

  Further on, Chester passed Australians of Maroubra Force returning from the front.

  Coming back is a line of troops who have just been relieved after a month’s hard fighting near Kokoda. They are tired, muddy and unshaven but they’ve done a grand job and earned their rest.

  There are wounded too. We’ve been passing them in ones and twos for several hours. They must be going through hell on this track. Specially those with leg wounds. Some have been hit in the foot and they can’t even get a boot on but they’re walking back over root and rock and through mud in bare feet, protected only by their bandages. Here’s a steep pinch and a wounded Digger’s trying to climb it. You need both hands and both feet, but he’s been hit in the arm and thigh. Two of his cobbers are helping him along. One goes ahead, hauling himself up by root and branch. The wounded Digger clings to the belt of the man in front with his sound hand, while his other cobber gets underneath and pushes him up. I say to this fellow that he ought to be a stretcher case, but he replies . . . ‘I can get along. There’s blokes here lots worse than me and if we don’t walk they’ll never get out.’

  But they are being got out . . . now and then we pass a stretcher case. The stretchers are only two saplings with a blanket between them and sewn up with lawyer vine. But they do. It’s hard enough to keep your feet with only a pack and a rifle on your back. It’s a miracle how they carry those stretchers. But they get through, even though it takes ten men all day to move one stretcher case back three or four miles. But the troops up forward are holding on giving them time to get all the wounded out.’12

  In his search for Brigade HQ, Chester could eventually go no further. ‘There’s heavy machine-gun fire from just over the ridge and every few seconds the valley rumbles with the crump of mortars. And the Brigade major says . . . “It’s no use your going forward Chester . . . we’re coming back.”’ In his script, And Our Troops Were Forced to Withdraw, Wilmot described the the camp that night.

  . . . all through the night a stumbling procession moves back in dribs and drabs along the track – occasional stretcher cases – ammunition parties – troops withdrawing . . . Dawn – and there’s machine gun fire from across the valley from where Frank was yesterday . . . enemy machine gun fire and still no word. Mid-morning . . . and up the track comes a Digger stripped of arms and webbing . . . he’s been travelling all night with the news that the companies are safe . . . they’ll be in this afternoon.

  Then another message . . . the Nips have hoisted their flag on the ridge where we were last night and a patrol reports they’re swarming over it in hundreds. ‘We’ll turn the fighters onto them,’ says the Brigade Major as he goes to the phone and dictates a signal asking for air support. We wait and wait . . . straining our ears for the drumming of engines. There’s not a cloud and the fighters’ll have an open go if they come soon . . . At last . . . we search the skies . . . but there’s only one plane . . . a reccy to see if the weather’s clear . . . and our hopes fall . . . by the time he can get back and the fighters can get here it’ll be clouded over. Slowly we see our hopes fade as the clouds come down and shield the enemy. Things are still going his way. He got in first . . . he has the numbers . . . and now he’s getting little breaks like this . . . but he’s still paying for every yard he advances . . . he’s still being fought all the way by men who hate withdrawing and refuse to admit defeat. Even though they’re being forced back they’re determined, cheerful and unconcerned. You can drive men like this back but you can’t conquer them. Nothings tests troops as much as a withdrawal . . . and they’re standing this test. But neither they nor you want any more talk about ‘glorious withdrawals’; that’s why I’ve tried to tell this story simpl
y as I saw it.13

  As the desperate fighting withdrawal by the Australians of Maroubra Force continued along the Kokoda Trail, Wilmot returned to Port Moresby to write his stories of Kokoda for the ABC. Wilmot told the New Guinea Force Command his view of the factors behind the withdrawal and wrote a report for the Australian commander in New Guinea, General Rowell. It was clear to Wilmot that the New Guinea Force had been let down by the most senior levels of Army command. His report concluded that the Japanese had outfought and outmanoeuvred the Australians largely because of their superior numbers, implying that GHQ, Land Headquarters and New Guinea Force HQ had underestimated the Japanese threat on the other side of the Owen Stanley Ranges. Wilmot later expanded on this in another document on the campaign.

  The recent success indicates that if the troops sent to the Owen Stanley Range in August had been properly trained, acclimatised and equipped and if they had had adequate air support, the withdrawal and the consequent considerable losses of valuable personnel need never have taken place.14

  Wilmot saw no lack in the bravery and endurance of the troops, and his report for the New Guinea Force commander was well received by General Rowell and senior commanders but the Australian commander-in-chief, General Blamey, ordered all copies recalled from circulation. Blamey also blocked several of Wilmot’s initial scripts on the Kokoda campaign, including And Our Troops Were Forced to Withdraw. Wilmot was advised to submit scripts that, among other things, did not ‘refer to anything that might tend to lower the confidence of our troops in their weapons, equipment, supply organisation etc’, and that contained ‘no implied criticism of military direction or training methods that would tend to lower the confidence of our troops in their commands with consequent impairment of our morale’.15

  While Blamey apparently acted in response to the criticism implied in Wilmot’s analysis, delays and cuts to Wilmot’s scripts imposed by GHQ also reflected the different views between New Guinea Force in Moresby and GHQ in Brisbane.

  The material which is being cut at GHQ is always authoritative and the line I have been taking in criticism has been adopted after consultation with senior officers here. General Rowell has been granting me a private interview at least twice a week, so that I have the full background. In view of this it is unfortunate that so little is getting through from here and that the News Service is forced to rely on despatches from GHQ which have frequently been inaccurate enough to warrant New Guinea Force protesting to GHQ about the ABC broadcasts.16

  The control from the top was increasingly tight and the ABC correspondent at GHQ, Haydon Lennard, remarked: ‘It seems to me that General MacArthur has decided to force more and more releases from his own headquarters and to restrict the activities of correspondents not directly under his control.’17

  MacArthur’s GHQ spokesman, Colonel Diller, consistently downplayed the size of the Japanese force and the nature of the task in the Kokoda campaign and, according to Wilmot, it was only pressure from the Australian HQ that eventually resulted in more accurate communiqués.

  However, Wilmot’s experience in the Middle East and now in New Guinea had convinced him that General Blamey did not have the confidence of many of his senior commanders, or the troops. While in the Middle East, Wilmot had also begun looking into rumours that the Army was being grossly overcharged in a contract to supply movies for the troops, and that Blamey had corruptly benefited from the deal. In late September, Wilmot returned to Australia, where he met the prime minister and made known his concerns over the conduct of the New Guinea campaign, and Blamey’s suppression of criticism.18

  Wilmot returned to Port Moresby but the Kokoda campaign would be the end of his time as an ABC war correspondent. Things came to a head at Blamey’s headquarters in Moresby on Sunday 1 November, when Blamey sent for Wilmot. Among those present in the room was George Fenton, of Army Public Relations, Wilmot’s friend from the Middle East. Wilmot detailed the conversation in a later confidential report to the ABC. According to Wilmot’s account, Blamey accused Wilmot of raising allegations about him during a conversation in a Melbourne restaurant.

  It was reported to me then that you had alleged that there had been improper dealings by me in the case of a motion picture contract in the Middle East and that I had benefited financially from these dealings. You also alleged that I had improperly interfered in stopping the court-martial of an officer.

  Blamey had then sent a mutual friend to talk to Wilmot about the allegations and ‘to assure you that these allegations were unfounded’. Blamey said the mutual friend had reported back that ‘you accepted my assurance and would not repeat these allegations’.

  Wilmot did not recall the supposed restaurant incident, and had a different recollection of the conversation with the mutual friend. He also told Blamey that he had no recollection of later talking about the conversation with three other people, as charged by Blamey. Wilmot’s report of the meeting concluded:

  General Blamey: Will you say that you did not discuss this matter with anyone?

  Chester Wilmot: No, I cannot say that.

  General Blamey: Well, that is all. You have endeavoured to undermine my authority as C-in-C. That is a serious matter. We should give thousands of pounds to have someone in your position in Japan trying to undermine the C-in-C there. Your accreditation to Allied Land Forces is forthwith cancelled. You will return to Australia at once. Fenton, will you please make the necessary arrangements. Good morning.19

  In his report to the ABC, Wilmot condemned what he called Blamey’s tactics of ‘surprise – stampede and guillotine’ and the fact that he had no chance to hear the details of what he was alleged to have said and to adequately consider a response.

  The basic reason for the conflict is a difference of opinion on a matter of principle. I have always stood up for the right of correspondents to make informed criticism of military affairs and general administrative matters affecting the troops. To me and other correspondents General Blamey has insisted that there shall be no such criticism.20

  Blamey had, somewhat controversially, sacked General Rowell as New Guinea Force commander, and Wilmot believed that his friendship with Rowell also made him suspect in Blamey’s eyes.

  Wilmot concluded that ‘the basic freedom of correspondents in General Blamey’s command is at stake. If this is unchallenged he has succeeded in placing himself above criticism.’ Despite this, Blamey won the battle with Wilmot, who could no longer report as a war correspondent in the South West Pacific Area and returned to Australia.

  The month before, in October, the Japanese advance along the Kokoda Trail had been halted at Imita Ridge, only a few kilometres from the road leading to Port Moresby. The Japanese were exhausted and had run out of supplies, and the fighting would now turn against them. At this stage Wilmot had not yet returned from Australia for his confrontation with Blamey in Moresby, and Chester’s colleague Dudley Leggett headed into the mountains with the Australian soldiers who were pursuing the retreating Japanese troops back through the Owen Stanleys.

  The Trail Back

  After just a few hours of walking on the punishing track, Leggett’s knees were aching and quivering from the ‘jar and strain’ of maintaining his balance, descending and climbing the steep ridges. On the second day he fell ill with dysentery, but after an overnight rest he forced himself on and caught up with his companions. Dudley Leggett was very fit – only a few years earlier he had competed in decathlons and pentathlons and at the Australian Athletics Championships, and in his rugby playing days, the Courier Mail had described him as a ‘splendid physical type’.21 But his fitness was now being severely tested by the Kokoda Trail; and for the Australian soldiers, pushing forward through the mountains ahead of him, conditions were even more serious. Dysentery and physical and mental exhaustion wasted the soldiers of the 25th Brigade who were hounding the Japanese back through the mountains.22 The bodies of Japanese left behind in the speed of their retreat were found at various points along the track – so too
the bodies of Australians at places like Brigade Hill, where they had died in the fighting of the Japanese advance only a month earlier . . . and some others which bore witness to Japanese atrocities, bodies bayonetted and mutilated. Leggett’s reports did not describe the full grim reality found along the track and many of the bodies seem to have been already buried by the time he passed.

  From Ioribaiwa to Kokoda the trail is one of bloodshed and anguish imprinted on the memory of our troops. One can follow the struggle of the last three months by decaying equipment and the graves of the fallen. Rusting shallow Australian steel helmets, the high crowned basinlike Japanese helmet, rotting tunics, stray boots, Japanese two-toed rubber shoes, Jap rifles, Australian rifles, pieces of machine guns, grenades, live ammunition, empty shell and cartridge cases, the brass metal strips of the Jap 310 Woodpecker or Hotchkiss type machine gun. The graves of Australians are identified by a rough wooden cross bearing name, number and unit or the simple epithet, ‘an unknown soldier’. Japanese graves are marked by a piece of planed sapling, inscribed in Japanese characters, either driven into the ground at the head of the mound of earth or lying along it.23

  Leggett arrived at Myola, high up on the watershed of the Owen Stanleys and a location for supply drops from Allied ‘biscuit bombers’.

  Everyone who has written about the conditions here feels impotent to do it adequately. The mud on the Myola track defies imagination. We walked through clutching mud as near as nothing to our knees and then slush and slime to the top of our boots . . . But at Myola we saw the sun. There are two huge shallow basins of marsh and dry ground covered with coarse grass.24

  Myola and the dry lake beds covered in Kunai grass had been a supply base and were now also a hospital and command centre. The Australians had caught up with the Japanese and from Myola they moved on to attack the enemy at Templeton’s Crossing.