The Adelaide River Stakes is the name given to the mass exodus of people prior to and following the Japanese air-raid in Darwin on 19th February, 1942. Thanks mainly to an ill-informed statement by a former Governor General, Paul Hasluck, that it is a story full of shame for our national persona, but it is a myth.
The truth is that with much closer examination it was anything but a shameful episode in our most serious year of peril. The propaganda disseminated by the government of the day was based on inadequate information, over-the-top censorship and a failure to take the population into its confidence. The faults lie with a succession of failed civilian and military administrations which, like the behaviour of most politicians, was a deliberate trail of cover-ups and refusal to admit fault.
This is a story that might seem to be long winded to focus on a single event in 1942 but in order to correct the imbalance that persists, even today, in the interests of completeness it is necessary to look back to the source of Japan’s belligerence in WW2. It is a long story that will appear in several episodes.
The genesis of this event began as far back as 1904. At that time Japan was at war with Russia. It coveted Russian territory sitting opposite Japan’s west coast. At the time Russia was a very vast country with no reliable land connection between Moscow and its far eastern provinces. Seaward connection was impossible for over 6 months of the year because the northern shores were ice-bound. The Russian fleet sailed from the Baltic Sea, around the Cape of Good Hope then on to Japanese waters. By that time the ships were fouled with barnacles and other marine growth that impeded their manoeuvrability. The fleet was wiped out by the Japanese navy in its home waters in 1905 and the war ended.
Japan, at that time had an impressive navy. When WW1 broke out it became one of the allies and achieved considerable success in pushing the German East Asiatic Squadron out of the Pacific. A Japanese cruiser was one of the escort vessels protecting the fleet taking the first Australian contingent to Egypt in 1915.
The Germans had a strong naval presence in the Pacific and Indian Oceans based at Tsingtao in northern China and had colonies in the Caroline Islands, Marshall Islands and The Marianas. It had also established radio stations at other Pacific Islands for controlling the East Asiatic fleet. The Japanese captured them all.
At the League of Nations conferences held following the end of WW1, The Western powers did not want Japan to become a dominant force in Asia as the colonial powers, predominantly Britain, France and Holland, did not want to risk losing their Asian colonies,. In the post-war division of spoils Japan was granted a mandate over these former German territories. That was a meagre return for the considerable contribution of the Japanese Navy when they were the ones that captured these territories in the first place.
The Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 and the London Naval Treaty of 1930 limited the strength of the Japanese Navy to 60% of that of the USA and Britain. Japan had requested 70%. Japanese foreign policy had been consistent throughout the start of the 20th century that there should be an Asian nation counted among the great powers of the world and nominated themselves as that nation. Nevertheless they signed the treaties and were rewarded by unlimited assistance from Britain in the design and construction of naval resources including the supply of plans and specifications.
The USA was not so generous.
During the 1930’s Japan conceived the idea of a Greater Asian Co-prosperity Sphere proposing that the Asian colonies of the European colonial powers and the USA should pass to Japan. This project was formally announced in 1940. The proposal was not greeted with any enthusiasm by the four colonial powers or Australia and New Zealand. Japan concluded that the League of Nations was a European club. She withdrew from the League and the two naval treaties and commenced a rapid construction program of warship and warplane building.
As the Japanese government became dominated by the military, there were substantial internal differences between the rival armed forces. The army decided that Russia was the logical enemy and planned accordingly. The navy considered the USA to be the logical enemy because of its powerful Pacific fleet so planning began with the army looking West and the navy looking East.
The naval strategy was based entirely on defence and fighting an attacker in home waters. Admiral Yamamato had been the Japanese Naval Attaché to Washington and was well informed, as he was impressed, by the industrial capacity of the USA. He recognised that Japan could not match US output in quantity so it concentrated on quality.
More speed, more arms and ability to fight in the stormy seas surrounding Japan.
The army was the first to move when it seized Manchuria in 1931 and set up a puppet government. Full scale war broke out in 1937. China’s area size and population was more than the Japanese army could hope to conquer so its aim was to overturn the Chiang Kai-Shek government and install another puppet government.
These military incursions alarmed the colonial powers and the USA which controlled The Philippines, Hawaii and several small Pacific islands. In January 1940 the USA cancelled its commercial treaty with Japan. In June it imposed sanctions on the export of aviation motor fuel and lubricants and No.1 heavy melting iron and steel scrap. It also increased support for China.
In retaliation, Japan signed a deal with Vichy France, a German ally, to station troops in French Indo-China, nowadays Vietnam. It did so in large quantity. In January, 1941 the Thais, seeing how easily Japan had pushed the French out of Vietnam, invaded and captured what us now Laos. Japan became a mediator between Thailand and Vichy France and expanded its deal to occupy northern French Indo-China. By July it had 120,000 troops stationed in what is now North Vietnam.
In a counter punch President Roosevelt froze all Japanese assets in July, closed the Panama Canal to Japanese shipping and extended the embargo by banning all supplies of oil to Japan. The USA had been Japan’s main source of petroleum products. Its alternative was to look to Borneo and the Dutch East Indies where there was abundant supply.
Soon after the embargo was imposed, American code breakers intercepted a cable from the Japanese Foreign Minister to his ambassador in America which said that “Commercial and economic relations between Japan and third countries led by England and the USA, are gradually becoming so horribly strained that we cannot endure it much longer. Consequently, our Empire, to save its very life, must take measures to secure the raw materials of the South Seas.”
In the 1930’s Japan had a group of clear headed military thinkers as good as anywhere in the world including Admirals Yamamato and Nagano (Chief of the Naval General Staff), both well aware of American industrial strength. They were ably supported by a group of younger officers led by Mitsuo Fuchida who eventually was to lead the attack on Pearl Harbour.
This group concluded that conventional naval strategy based on surface vessels had to be abandoned and replaced with aircraft launched from aircraft carriers. The division between army and navy increased when the army was intent on attacking Russia.
Yamamato was opposed to war because he believed that Japan could never defeat the USA in an extended war but the need for oil was paramount. Yamamato and Nagano disagreed on strategy. Nagano favoured a sudden conventional strike on the East Indies oil fields arguing that it would be all over before the US Pacific fleet could arrive on the scene. Yamamato favoured an air strike to put the US navy completely out of business.
Yamamato prevailed but was still opposed to war. He conceded that the only means of success was to mount a sudden knock-out blow against the US fleet at Pearl Harbour. Yamamato threatened to resign if his plan was not approved and on 3rd November, 1941 his plan was adopted and he was appointed to lead the carrier strike force for the raid on Pearl Harbour. The raid took place on 7th December, 1941. It was an obvious success in itself but failed to meet its objectives. Yamamato concluded that all they had done was to wake a sleeping giant and America entered WW2.
Simultaneously the army launched itself on the SE Asian mainland and secured the needed oil supplies.
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