On April the 25th, 1915, men of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landed at Gallipoli. It was on that day the traditions of our fighting forces were born. These stories of their sons and daughters at war we proudly dedicate to the memory of Anzac. In the early days of the Roman Empire, Libya had been one of the granaries of Rome. Along its fertile coast, the Roman conquerors built their stately cities, but the Empire crumbled.
When Mussolini dreamed his dreams of a new Roman Empire, his eyes turned first to Libya. His cardboard legions drove out the weak Turkish administration and crushed the ill-armed Sinusi tribesmen with brutal cruelty. Over the still fertile... uplands and the dusty desert hemming them in, the flag of fascist Italy now flew. Italian colonists built their neat white towns beside the sea, notably the port of Tobruk, where lay the only good harbor on the North African coast.
between Alexandria in Egypt and distant Sfax. War meant disaster for the shoddy fascist empire. In January 1941, the 6th Australian Division stormed Tobruk and drove on towards Benghazi.
But it had to be diverted to the aid of hard-pressed Greece. Now the Germans intervened to save their ally. Rommel and his specially trained Africa Corps struck into Cyrenaica as far as the Egyptian border. Outnumbered and ill-equipped, the British Army had no choice but to withdraw.
Only Tobruk held out. General Wavell ordered that Tobruk must be held at all costs. For this desperate enterprise he chose the 9th Australian Division reinforced with the 18th Brigade of the 7th Division. It was a desperate enterprise. Nobody had thought about holding Tobruk.
Its only defences were now rusting barbed wire and a half-filled anti-tank ditch. How could these stem the victorious tide of enemy armour and guns? The feeble arc of defense stretched for 30 miles across a flat desert plain. It lay open to the onrush of the German panzers. But there was nothing else.
So the Australians manned the broken strongpoints, patrolled the rusty wire, and waited, not without misgiving, for the inevitable attack. As the long siege wore on, the old Italian perimeter was greatly strengthened and became known as the Red Line. Two miles behind it, the garrison constructed the Blue Line, a second defence system.
The Australians were supported by British tanks. By British guns. By British anti-tank guns. ...and by a British anti-aircraft brigade.
Indians were in the garrison of 24,000, two-thirds of which were Australian. Captured Italian guns were pressed into service. On April the 11th, 1941, the German-Italian army reaches Tobruk. Rommel at his desert headquarters expects no serious resistance.
He launches his invincible army straight at the gallant defenders. It is the beginning of a siege which is to last 242 days and rank with the great sieges of history. The thundering guns of the Royal Horse Artillery force the Panzers to a bewildered halt.
Rommel then plans a full-scale assault with German tanks and infantry. It is launched on the night of April the 13th. The Australian infantry coolly let the tanks pass through them, and then mow down the disconcerted German infantry who followed. Corporal Jack Edmondson, a farmer's son from Liverpool, although mortally wounded, destroyed a German post, saved the life of his platoon commander, Lieutenant Mackle, and won Australia's first Victoria Cross. In a grim Easter battle, Hitler's army suffers its first defeat.
The veterans of Poland and France, never before beaten, fly for their lives before the terrible Australian bairns. The myth of German invincibility dies in Tobruk. Rommel, amazed and furious, flies to the front to organize another assault under his personal command.
This time he will use not Germans, but Italians. On April the 16th, the Italians attack under the command of the Desert Fox himself. But it is a very half-hearted attack.
The Italians show little stomach for the fight. The South Australians of the 2nd 48th Battalion, led by a Sydney barrister, Colonel Victor Windier, make a brisk sortie. And the Italians wave white handkerchiefs and surrender in their hundreds.
It is time to use the full blitzkrieg tactics which have never failed in Europe and have smashed the armies of Poland, Norway, Belgium, Holland and France. On April the 30th, four German and Italian divisions, two of them armoured, are hurled against a low ridge held by three Australian battalions, Victorians and South Australians. The tanks, the Stukas attack.
Rommel drives forward in the wake of his panzers, confident that this time he cannot fail. Sirens screaming, the Stukas die. Warning, air attack.
And the gunners run to their guns. There are no fighter aircraft into Brook now, the enemy rules the sky unchallenged. In the front line, all the men can... The harbour is a target too. Brooke's only lifeline is by sea, and if this solitary link can be broken, the garrison is doomed.
A supply ship is mortally hit. As she begins to sink, her crew leap for their lives. A furious barrage is flung up from everything that can be fired. And the attackers pay a price. But the German pilots are brave men and press home their attacks through a storm of fire regardless of losses.
Their job now is to blast a path in true Blitzkrieg style. for the German and Italian tanks. The bombers concentrate on the guns. which the panzers have learned to fear.
General Morshead, commander of the Tobruk garrison, issues an order. There'll be no Dunkirk here, no surrender, no retreat. And now the Australians await the onslaught.
Enemy tanks and machine gunners break into their forward positions, but a counterattack by Colonel Windio's South Australians checks. the enemy thrust. Fierce fire from German guns and tanks stops a gallant counterattack by men of the 18th Brigade of the 7th Division. So ends the last major battle for Tobruk.
Rommel has broken into the perimeter on a front of nearly three miles to a depth of less than two. In Hill 209 he has gained a useful observation point, but the salient has cost him 1,700 casualties. Rommel, in fact, has shot his boat. His troops, who had expected an easy victory, are weary and disheartened. Tobruk is the first defeat they have ever suffered, and its taste is bitter.
The men of Tobruk settle down to the long, grim test of endurance. Lord Haw Haw, the British traitor broadcasting from Berlin, gives them a name whose glory is to ring round the world. The Rats of Tobruk. He says they are self-supporting prisoners caught like rats in a trap. To the Germans, it feels more like having a tiger by the tail.
The Australians quickly become masters of no man's land. Their besiegers are given no rest and are forced onto the defensive. Almost every night Australian and Indian patrols go out observing, listening, reconnoitering. And when a likely quarry is detected, it is attacked and prisoners taken. Nerve-wracked Germans and Italians never know when death will strike out of the darkness.
The rats of Tobruk bite hard. The garrison too has to be constantly on the alert, but the enemy never risks another attack. Without the heroic efforts of the navy to keep Tobruk's back door open, the garrison could not survive.
Every tin of bully beef, every round of ammunition has to be brought in by sea. Rommel turns on the full weight of his air force to prevent these gallant ships reaching Tobruk. 34 warships and merchantmen are sunk and 33 damaged.
Bom Ali, their crews call the sea lane to Tobruk. But with cool and dauntless courage they keep Tobruk's lifeline open. The heaviest burden is borne by the renowned Australian scrap iron flotilla.
The destroyers HMAS Stuart, Vampire, Vendetta, Voyager and Waterhead. No less than 34,000 tons of stores reach the beleaguered garrison. Australian and British warships and merchantmen run a regular ferry service along the deadly coast from Alexandria to Tobruk. The spud run, they call it, with grim irony.
And somehow the vital supplies get through. There is no rest from the stupids. The desert is flat and artillery observers have to use man-made towers. A target has been spotted. The British guns are mad.
And so are the guns of the famous Australian Bush artillery. Captured Italian guns manned by volunteer crews of cooks, batmen and drivers. For the men of the garrison, life is hard. In blazing heat and under incessant air and artillery bombardment, they have to live underground in caves and dugouts.
Water is scarce, brackish and severely rationed. Dust sifts everywhere. Desert fleas make life miserable.
and there are the flies. If you want to do your laundry you use sea water. The sick rate is surprisingly low but lack of vitamins brings desert sores.
Vitamin C pills and salt tablets have to be taken daily. Throughout the siege, it is the pride of a little group of soldier journalists that the Tobruk truth, otherwise the dinkum oil, always appears. It is distributed to every unit.
Bombs and shells are no respecters of Christian churches, or of Muslim mosques, or of Jewish synagogues, but many men in their hour of trial draw strength from their faith. The garrison can never relax its vigilance. The only amenity to Brook has to offer is an occasional swim and it's duck or run when the Stukas come.
A beach patrol of a different kind from the ones we know in peacetime at Bondi or Cottesley. The Eighth Army gets a new commander. General Auchinleck replaces General Waver.
But that does not mean much to the tired men who man the battered defenses of Tobruk. One day is much like another and begins with a hasty breakfast underground. There are 24,000 mouths to feed and a field bakery knows no union hours. Fresh bread helps to ease a monotonous diet of bully beef and M&V stew.
The Rajputs make their own chapatis. Washing up is a miserable chore, but at least for most of us it is not interrupted by an airing. Morselessly, unceasingly, the air attacks go on. By June the gunners have engaged 1,500 enemy aircraft. Every day sees its artillery duels as Rommel vainly tries to break the spirit of the rats of Tobruk.
For failure to take Tobruk has upset the German commander's plans for a drive into Egypt. Rommel dare not weaken the investing forces for fear the indomitable garrison breaks out and attacks his lines of communication. German-Italian advance bogs down on the frontier of Egypt. The hard-pressed 8th Army is given time to regroup and rearm. The rats of Tobruk have saved Egypt.
But now the Australian government... begins pressing for the relief of their troops. The British agree reluctantly because the relief by sea of 15,000 troops and their replacement is an appallingly hazardous project.
It is decided to replace the 18th Brigade of the 7th Division by a Polish brigade. In August, the gamble comes off. The 18th are successfully evacuated.
In September and October, their comrades of the 9th Division follow them out of Tobruk. All but one battalion, the second 13, were destined to see the siege out. For the ships which are to take them off never get through. And now the 8th Army has used the respite gained by the gallant defence of Tobruk to gather its strength for a decisive counter-stroke. Bombers and fighters set out to clear the skies.
On November the 18th, 1941, British, New Zealand, South African and Indian troops of the 8th Army strike back to Cyrenaica. Their objectives? To link up with the Tobruk garrison and drive the Axis forces out of Cyrenaica. While they moved up to Merse-Metru, the Tobruk garrison itself was to play its part.
The plan was to break out from the perimeter and join up with the 8th Army at Edduda. The only Australians now left in Tobruk are Colonel Bull Burroughs, 2nd 13th Battalion from New South Wales. The defenders of Tobruk have been set a daunting task.
Between them and Ed Duda is a series of strongly held positions known as Jill, Walter, Jack and Freddy. They are held by Rommel's crack troops. Minefields are thick on the ground and the enemy has... heavy guns to support its infantry.
At dawn on November the 21st, the garrison break out of their eastern perimeter. There is desperate fighting and they suffer heavy casualties. By nightfall, they have gained some five miles.
German prisoners are taken. A wounded German is led in by his comrades. There are Italian prisoners too.
In bitter fighting, one after another, Jill, Walter, Jack, and Freddy are stormed. The key ridge of Ed Duda has still to be taken. The small force of tanks from Tobruk has been badly mauled by the German guns, and they are pulled back for maintenance.
Until they are ready for action again, the infantry can make little impression on the enemy's strong points. The armorers work with a will. Tracks have to be repaired.
There, guns clean. The tanks are ready. November the 25th, the Tobruk garrison commander, now the British General Scobie, is told that the New Zealanders will try to link up next day, and that by then, Ed Duda must be taken. ...rushed up from Tobruk and jumped from their lorries to join the fight. Machine guns and mortars give covering fire.
Men of the Essex Regiment crawl forward to the start line for the final assault on the Ed Duda Ridge. With the permits fixed, they advance steadily into a hell of shell fire. Head due to restore.
And on November the 27th, New Zealanders of the 8th Army meet them on the crest. But although a corridor has been precariously established, Tobruk cannot yet count itself relieved. On November the 29th, it looks as if the western wall of the corridor will cave in, and the garrison will be driven back to Tobruk. Now the Australians have their final hour of glory in the siege of Tobruk.
General Scobie's only fresh troops are the 2nd 13th Battalion to Brooke's oldest inhabitants. They are hurried forward in order to re-establish the position on Ed Doola. Charge!
Yelling, the Australians are coming, they race forward against odds of more than 4 to 1. The Germans waver and break. The Australians charge past enemy dead and burning vehicles. The advance continues. and the key ridge of Eduda is firmly held once more. But although the men of Tobruk cling to their positions, the German armour sweeps the Eighth Army away again and Tobruk is once more surrounded.
Desperate tank battles rage over the ridges round Tobruk, but gradually the Eighth Army regains the initiative. The Australians have been withdrawn from Ed Duda after two days of heavy fighting. The men of the Border Regiment who relieve them strengthen their positions and await the outcome of the tank battles which will decide to Brooke's fate.
Stretcher bearers collect the wounded and bring them in. The Eighth Army rolls forward, the panzers beaten at last and in full retreat. On December the 10th, the long siege ends. The Rats of Tobruk, the men who wrote an imperishable chapter... in Australia's history at the grievous cost of 3,200 casualties.
Poles, Australians, Indians and British linked in the comradeship of a glorious achievement. leader General Morshead is honored with a knighthood. Tobruk, a name written in the desert sand which will endure forever.