The Pacific Theatre was half of the second world war but has suffered from an over-focus on the history of the European theatre. As a result there are many myths and misconceptions relating to Japan's advance through South East Asia and the South Pacific.

Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor opened hostilities in the Pacific with Japan attempting a knock out blow against the US capital ships. There are two aspects to this, one it was well known by Australia that the attack was going to happen, and two, Japan invaded Malaya at the same time as they attacked Pearl Harbor.

An Australian Flight Officer, Bob Law-Smith from No.2 squadron Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) was flying Lockheed Hudson aircraft over the Timor Sea. He related to the Squadron's historian;

When we [No.2 sqn RAAF] arrived in Darwin [Northern Territory] from Laverton [Victoria] on the 6th of December [1941], the aircrew briefing informed us we were to move to action stations at our designated base at Koepang [Dutch Timor]. When we asked why, the answer was Japan was about to attack Pearl Harbor and war with Japan was imminent. It is now clear in retrospect, and especially in view of declassification of much formerly secret material, that from whatever sources our briefing statements were derived, the Australian Government was in no doubt that we should be in a state of war readiness after arriving at Koepang.

And Law-Smith from a speech he made in 1991;

While we were out on patrol we would be sent a signal that the Japanese were going to bomb Pearl Harbor - when the signal came through, if we found any Japanese ship we may bomb it. This is an interesting bit of history as this was several days before the Japanese did bomb Pearl Harbor - it is all in my log book. Now, I was the lowest form of life in the Air Force - any lower and I'd be out the bottom - so it wasn't a matter of very senior people being privileged to this information.

Since the US blockading of oil and raw materials, as well as freezing Japanese assets in America, went toward the Japanese decision to invade south rather than to continue their invasion and occupation of China, Law-Smith's recollections seem to point out that Roosevelt was very aware of the impending Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Despite this apparent duplicity by Roosevelt, his attempt to achieve and enforce peace through economic measures was a very Madisonian foreign policy.

In 1941, the capital ship was still seen as the dominant form of ocean superiority and power. Despite the Japanese using their aircraft carriers to such effect, many of their commanders, including Yamamoto still saw the carriers as the first phase in a sea battle that would lead to a Jutland like battle of the capital ships.

Malaya

On December 7th, Hawaii time, the Japanese Navy hit the American Naval base at Pearl Harbor, on December 8th Malayan time (thirty minutes before Pearl Harbor was bombed) the Japanese Army began their southern campaign by moving through Hong Kong, Malaya and the Phillipines.

As part of the Washington Treaty, Hong Kong was not able to be fortified, consequently only a small force of Scots, Canadian, English and Indian infantry existed there. Hong Kong was swollen with refugees and had limited water supply. Attacked by three Japanese infantry regiments, its fall was inevitable.

The Japanese invasion of Malaya began at Kota Bharu. The lynchpin of the British defence of Malaya was the island fortress of Singapore. Australia had practiced defence on the cheap through funding Singapore. It had managed to avoid having to create or maintain an independent Navy capable of challenging for ocean superiority and had instead made a force more suitable for slotting into the Royal Navy's (RN) structure.

It was well known in Australia, that if Britain was involved in a war in Europe, the RN would not be able to come to Australia's aid in the Pacific. The assets that the British did send out to Malaya, in the Prince of Wales and Repulse were promptly sunk when they were not defended by allied aircraft.

The Japanese invasion spread quickly north and west from Pantani and Singora [Thailand], exposing Burma and Siam to Japanese invasion and air power. Bennett's 8th Australian Division inflicted a defeat on the Japanese at Gemas while Indian and British reinforcements started arriving in Singapore; but it was in vain, by February 1942, Singapore was under siege.

Eighty five thousand allied troops protected a population of one million. Of the allied troops, seventeen battalions were Indian, eleven British, six Australian and two Malayan. On the 8th of February, sixteen Japanese battalions crossed the causeway. They were beaten back, but by their third attempt had established a presence in Singapore.

The Japanese Imperial Division attempted to cross but were held off by the 27th Australian Brigade. The Japanese troops continued to land, and with tank support quickly controlled the island. General Percival surrendered the garrison. With the battle for Malaya, the Japanese had taken one hundred and thirty thousand allied prisoners. From Malaya, Japan invaded Burma with the goal of reaching India.

The Phillipines

General Douglas MacArthur, the great egoist, commanded the US and Phillipino forces in the Phillipines. In US command circles, the defence of the Phillipines had been seen as an issue - the nearest naval force was 5,000 miles away in Hawaii, and the only maritime strike ability was the new B17 bomber. MacArthur wanted the Phillipines to have a central role in the American defence of the Pacific and consequently boasted of 200,000 Phillipino soldiers that he had at his command. These Phillipino forces largely existed on paper, as they were poorly equipped and trained.

Japan wanted the Phillipines as a spring board to invade the oil rich Northern Bornea, as well as to quickly remove the Phillipines as a base for American operations. With a tight timetable, the out-numbered Japanese General Homma had two months to achieve the occupation of the Phillipines. With the Japanese carriers striking Pearl Harbor, the Japanese air force flew from Formosa [Taiwan] in order to provide air superiority. It was from here that American aviation assets were destroyed on the ground. The remaining B17s flew to Australia.

The invasion was strongly resisted. The American and Phillipino infantry out-numbered the Japanese but were low on food and medical supplies. The also lacking air support. The Japanese had suffered 25% casualty rates against the defenders, and the Japanese infantry were also suffering from low supplies and exhaustion. Consequently, the Japanese advance slowed and the tired defenders were besieged in Bataan.

During this siege period, Japanese supplies were refreshed and the Japanese infantry reinforced. The defenders were surviving on less and less - food intake was starvation level. General Wainwright eventually surrendered. The Bataan death march mirrored the experience of the allied troops captured in Malaya. The depravities the Japanese inflicted upon Prisoners of War (POWs) were disgraceful.

MacArthur proved himself a poor leader, his tactics were flawed. He allowed his air force to be destroyed on the ground, he also dispersed his troops rather than concentrating his superior numbers against the Japanese. Unfortunately for the United States Marine Corps (USMC), Australian Army and American infantry, MacArthur was a skilled political general and managed to get control of all allied forces in the South Pacific. To this day, "Dugout Doug" is despised by the USMC and Australian Army.

Speed of Japanese Advance

One thing that is hard to conceptualise is the speed of the Japanese advance from Hong Kong to the Solomon Islands. The distance covered with the forces available is quite remarkable.

• Dec 7th 1941 (Hawaii time) Pearl Harbor bombed.
• Dec 8th 1941 (9.05 am Malayan time) Malaya invaded.
• Dec 8th 1941, Hong Kong invaded.
• Dec 10th 1941, Phillipines invaded.
• Dec 10th 1941, Prince of Wales and Repulse sunk.
• Dece 20th 1941, Japanese invade Borneo.
• Dec 25th 1941, Hong Kong surrenders.
• Jan 11th 1942, Japanese invade Celebes.
• Feb 8th 1942, Singapore invaded.
• Feb 15th 1942, Singapore surrenders.
• Feb 19th 1942, Darwin (Australia) bombed by Japanese carrier forces.
• Feb 20th 1942, Japanese invade Timor [Indonesia].
• Feb 28th 1942, Japanese invade Java [Indonesia].
• March 7th 1942, Japanese ground forces attack Rangoon (Burma).
• March 8th 1942, Japanese occupy Lae [Papua New Guinea]
• March 11th 1942, MacArthur leaves the Phillipines.
• March 12th 1942, Japanese invade Sumatra [Indonesia].
• April 1st 1942, Japanese invade Dutch New Guinea [Irian Jira]
• May 6th 1942, Phillipines surrenders.
• May 8th 1942, Battle of the Coral Sea.
• May 12th 1942, Japanese ground forces within miles of India's eastern border.

With the Japanese in the Solomon Islands and controlling the northern coast of New Guinea, it fell to the USMC to defend the Solomons while the Australian Army defended the south coast of New Guinea. This was to be the stalemate between the allied and Japanese forces until Japan broke its back on Guadalcanal.

Control of the Seas

The allies were fortunate to have a daring commander such as Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz. His faith in his carriers and his men to beat their Japanese opposites saved Australia from having its sea lines of communication (SLOC) being cut off from the US.

The Japanese and Yamamoto, for all their innovative use of their carriers, still believed in the capital ship as striking the knockout blow. This thinking was shown at Midway, where the Japanese fleet sailed with the carriers as bait, rather than the carriers being their main strike force.

Midway became a naval battle decided by carrier aircraft where even small numbers of aircraft proved the carrier itself to be vulnerable. Thirty three dive bombers laid waste to the Japanese carriers Kaga , Akagi and Soryu . Forty-six bombers from the Hiryu struck the USS Yorktown soon after which sank two days later. The Hiryu was discovered by American bomber aircraft and also sunk.

From this point on, America had the advantage in blue water superiority. Japan was unable to replace its lost carriers, nor was it able to replace the loss of its skilled naval pilots. American industry began supplying the US Navy (USN) with increasing numbers of aircraft carriers - reaching the remarkable output of nearly three a month . As an example, Admiral Halsey's force in 1941 comprised four carriers. For the invasion of the Gilbert Islands in November 1943, under Admiral Spruance, totalled nineteen carriers. This remarkable industrial output was to be the basis for post-war American hegemony.

Nimitz's command of American naval forces, and in particular his aggressive use of the small complement of American aircraft carriers was the turning point in the Pacific Theatre. Nimitz stands out by far as the best commander in the Pacific Theatre, and in my opinion, the best commander of all nations and all forces in World War II.

Breaking the Back of the Japanese, Part 1: Milne Bay

The Coral Sea battle had deflected a Japanese invasion fleet from landing at Port Moresby where an Australian garrison defended the Papua New Guinean city. With the Japanese Army still requiring control of the southern coast of New Guinea for their aircraft to range over northern Australia, the Coral Sea, the Solomons, Fiji and New Caledonia - they decided to hop their way under New Guinea by under-taking assaults at strategic points. The first hop was the the airfield and port at Milne Bay.

Milne Bay as defended by an Australian garrison, along with three RAAF squadrons. The Japanese landed at Milne Bay on the 25th of August, 1942 and began fighting their way toward the airfield. The coastal strip was hemmed in by water and mountains, thinning the passable land to two hundred metres wide at points. The Japanese troops, supported by tanks fought their way to the edge of the airfield, so close that the Australian fighter aircraft would begin firing their guns before they had their landing gear up.

The Australian troops beat the Japanese invasion force back into the sea by the 6th of September. This was the first time a Japanese invasion force had been defeated.

Breaking the Back of the Japanese, Part 2: Kokoda

With the naval defeat at Coral Sea, the Japanese Army also launched an overland offensive across the Owen-Stanley Ranges to Port Moresby. Initially Australian militia units and Papuan infantry faced the Japanese forces, which had reached Kokoda by July 29th, 1942, but these units were reinforced by the Australian 7th Division. The 7th Division had been returned from North Africa.

On the Kokoda Track, fighting between the Australians and Japanese was murderous and bloody. The Australian militia's were outnumbered by five to one, and the soldiers of both sides were suffering from lack of supplies and illness such as dysentry. MacArthur, believing the Rowell's campaign of defend and retreat, wanted Rowell replaced. Blamey did so. MacArthur did not see that it was bleeding the Japanese of manpower and over-extending their supply lines.

Generals were largely irrelevant in the inhospitable environment of the Papuan jungle and the daily hand to hand combat. The Japanese despaired, as they were had lost nearly a third of their force, were short on supplies and saw no sight of reinforcements with the USMC defence of Guadalcanal. Horii had got within 32 kilometres of Port Moresby before retreating. By November, 1942, the Australian Army had retaken Kakoda.

By January 22nd, 1943 Australian and American forces had cleared the Japanese from New Guinea. David Smurthwaite described the Australian and American operations in New Guinea;

For the first time in World War II a Japanese land operation had been defeated, even though the Allied forces had been outnumbered for much of the campaign. Throughout, Australian and American aircraft had played a vital part in supporting front-line units, droppign everything from food and ammunition - missions decribed as 'biscuit bombers' by the troops - to bridging equipment. This use of air power to provide the logistic support for an overland advance in difficult terrain was to become a particular strength of Allied warfare in the Far East and Pacific theatres. Australian techniques of jungle warfare and tactical leadership, developed during the fighting in Papua, were to be adopted with success by British forces in their campaign in Burma.

Despite these positives, the Australian position in Kokoda would have been even more tenuous if it was not for the American campaign in the Solomon Islands at Guadalcanal.

Breaking the Back of the Japanese, Part 3: Guadalcanal

On the 7th of August, 1942; the 1st Marine Division landed at Guadalcanal and Tulagi in the Solomon Islands. The American forces had decided to buttress the lines of communication through Fiji and New Caledonia by defending the Solomons. Originally an invasion to displace two thousand Japanese infantry and workers which were building an airfield, it quickly became a defence as the Japanese threw their full might against the American defenders.

Japanese aircraft attacked constantly from Rabaul, the long flight time travelling over many Australian coast-watchers who would notify the US fighter aircraft at Henderson Airfield of the incoming raids. The initial naval battles were damaging to the allies, Mikawa led a Japanese naval force past Savo Island where they blew the Australian cruiser HMAS Canberra out of the water and damaged the USS Chicago .

Their surprise was complete, one survivor of the Canberra recollected seeing star shells bursting in the air and saying, "What are the yanks doing now?". He was blown off the ship by the torpeda and shell strikes on the Canberra. Mikawa's force on its path out also sunk the US cruiser Quincy , Astoria and Vincennes . The allies were fortunate, the Marine transports were undefended just south of Savo.

On the 18th of August, the Japanese Army landed troops Taivu. As the island became a meat-grinder, the 43rd US Division was deployed to Guadalcanal from New Zealand while the Japanese stripped troops, aircraft and ships from China, Indonesia and the Phillipines to throw at the US forces on Guadalcanal.

Continued Japanese naval operations began to have success against the USN, the aircraft carrier USS Saratoga was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine in August and forced to limp back home for repairs. Shortly after the Wasp was struck by a torpedo and sank. This left the USN with only one carrier to defend the Marine operations at Guadalcanal.

Fortunately, the carriers were not the total air assets available, Henderson Airfield and it's "Cactus Air Force" had been able to provide air support and air cover to American forces, and eventually establish air superiority in the surrounding area. The airfield survived bombing from the air as well as the bombardment from naval guns.

By the end of November, 1942; there were over twenty thousand Japanese troops on Guadalcanal who were on the verge of starvation. American domination of the ocean and skies had become strong enough that supplies to the Japanese troops were not getting through. Approximately thirteen thousand Japanese troops were withdrawn from Guadalcanal by February 7th, 1943. The battle had been won, and Japan's back had been broken.

Oil

The Japanese had invaded south in order to control the oil assets in Java. The Dutch businessmen, partly in disbelief in the Japanese advance, and partly because they thought the allies would quickly recapture their oil fields and refineries, did not bother to sabotage them. Consequently the Japanese captured much of the oil industry intact.

After New Guinea and Guadalcanal, the American forces leveraged their naval power into an island hopping operation which was to cut the Japanese in two. The number of aircraft carriers the Americans had at their disposal meant that they did not need airfields to support their operations. This was shown at Kwajelein when extreme force was brought to bear and Nimitz found himself six weeks ahead of their timetable. David Smuthwaite comments;

An irresistible form of warfare had come to the Pacific; the fast carrier task force and the all arms amphibious assault, supported by the most powerful industrial base in the world.

With the success of these operations, Japanese troops were bypassed, thirty seven thousand in Bouganville alone. As the American forces hopped their way to the Marianas. The Japanese Navy was cut off from Japan as it stayed in Java and Sumatra where the oil was. If the Japanese Navy had of sailed for Japan, they would quickly have run dry.

During the Battle of the Phillipines, Japanese naval assets sailed from Sumatra as well as Japan to face the US forces. The carrier battle that ensued was to be known as the "Marianas Turkey Shoot" as US Naval aircraft downed two hundred and forty aircraft for the loss of nineteen. American air and naval superiority was complete.

China and the Invasion of Australia

Japan's plan for South East Asia was to create a Greater East Asian Co-prosperity Sphere, which would extend from China, through Korea, Thailand, Burma, Indonesia and New Guinea to New Caledonia. Including in this economic and political grouping of Japanese hegemony were Australia and New Zealand, as both these countries had the raw materials and commodities that the Japanese needed to maintain its economy.

In the 1920's Japan had expanded her influence into Korea,by the mid-1930's in the Army acting independently of the Japanese Government, the Army set about the invasion and occupation of Manchuria. This was resisted in the south by the nationalists [Kai-shek in Szechwan] and in the west by the communists [Mao].

China and Korea detained the bulk of the Japanese Army's division for garrison and occupation duties. In 1941, of the fifty one divisions of the Japanese Army, only eleven were available for the attacks on Malaya and the Phillipines. Until the end of the war, China, Korea and defending from Soviet expansionism continued to consume the bulk of Japan's infantry.

This is why Australia was never credibly threatened. Even if the US aircraft carriers had been sunk in 1942, and New Caledonia had been successfully invaded cutting Australia off from the US, Australia would not have been able to be invaded. Australian troops numbered too high, even if Australian aviation assets were small, and Australian naval assets were non-existent. For Japan to attack and hold the eastern freeboard would have taken at least ten divisions, more than they had available.

Menzies and Curtin

Recently Australian historians rated John Curtin and Robert Menzies, Australia's two wartime Prime Ministers between 1939 and 1945, as the best Australian Prime Ministers . From the article;

But the two who have been judged Australia's greatest modern leaders have at least one thing in common. In both cases, as Geoffrey Blainey puts it, their period of power seemed to be over well before it actually began. "They both faced great adversity."

In my opinion they were the two worst Australia has had. They were both stunning examples of the Australian "waitocracy". Joe Scullin has a greater claim than Curtin or Menzies, his battle against the Colonial Office and King of England to establish the precedent of an Australian Governor General was more worthy than those two hacks, with their bungled and cringing efforts in World War II.

Richard Williams was the best leader Australia had in World War II, his role should have been central as head of the Air Force, except Robert Menzies replaced him before the war, with a retired British hack, Charles Burnett, that the Royal Air Force and Royal Australian Air Force did not want. With Williams' sacking by Menzies, all three Australian Chiefs of Staff were member of the UK forces, rather than Australian forces. William's wrote;

Gavin Long in an unofficial war history volume To Benghazi refers to this and says, 'A British soldier (or admiral or air vice marshal) was considered [by the government] likely to possess virtues an Australian could not acquire'. I [Williams] recall discussing this subject some years earlier with General Sir Brudenall White when he was Chief of General Staff and he expressed the view that 'It is better to have Australian troops commanded by an Australian with a second-class brain than by an Englishman, even if he has a first-class brain.' and the United Kingdom was not in the habit of sending its first-class brains for temporary duty with the Dominion forces.

Williams was a firm believer through his leadership experiences in World War I, that Australian solutions to Australian problems were superior. It was Williams who saw in the 1920s that Australia would be most vulnerable in a two front war if it did not have an indigenous aerospace industry. He established the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation which was the basis for the "panic fighter" Boomerang to be quickly produced in 1942.

Just When They Needed Us The Most

In 1940, Britain had lost a great deal of men and material in the French campaign. The Canadian troops were committed to the defence of Britain, and there was no real force to face the Italians who were expanding through North Africa and the Middle East. The only country with the troops and equipment to allow the allies to open a second front was Australia.

The North African and Syrian campaigns against the Italians, Vichy French and Germans could not have been maintained without Australian troops. This was probably the theatre where Australia made the greatest difference in World War II. This was an advantage that Menzies should have pressed home with Churchill. Unfortunately Churchill saw the Australian political and military leaders as colonials. His view that Dominions did what they were told.

The Anglophile Menzies who believed Australian interests were shared by Britain, offered no suitable defence. When Australia was the most necessary he should have been screwing the British for aircraft in what was becoming an inevitable showdown between Australia and Japan. Instead Menzies allowed Australian airmen to be traded away to England with the Empire Air Training Scheme (EATS). He also willingly handed over sovereignty of Australian assets to British interests. Churchill abused Menzies and Blamey by lying to them about an Australian deployment to Greece and Crete, but even so, Menzies was out of his league and failed Australia.

This is when Curtin took over. One of his first moves was to make the statement;

Without any inhibitions of any kind, I make it clear that Australia looks to America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United Kingdom

While this is often remarked as Curtin's strength and his subsequent tussles with Churchill over Australian troops being detained in Ceylon [Sri Lanka] to be deployed in Burma by the British, rather than in PNG to defend Australia, it really just swaps America for Britain. Curtin handed over sovereignty of Australian forces to MacArthur, who viewed Australia with the same colonial contempt that Churchill had.

In 1942, the United States could not defend New Guinea without Australian troops. The first allied land victory was handed to Curtin and MacArthur by the Australian Army but no political capital was made of it. When Churchill demanded Montgomery deliver him a victory, he was handed El Alamein to use as a political club against America and Russia. When Rowell handed Curtin Kokoda and Milne Bay, Curtin allowed MacArthur to replace Rowell and replace him with Blamey.

Once again Williams is an insider that viewed much of this ineptness and political cringe first hand;

Australia was still [1944] sending large numbers of air crew trainees through the United States for service with the Royal Air Force and they had often been held up on the east coast, sometimes for several weeks, waiting for ships to cross the Atlantic. Numbers were also building up at the personnel reception depot in England and sometimes months passed before aircrew reached a Service squadron - some never did.

Whilst this was going on Churchill was drawing attention to mounting losses of British shipping. At the same time newly formed squadrons of the US Army Air Corps were being sent to the South-West Pacific area and I could not get the aircraft that Australia was asking for.

I suggested, therefore, to the Combined Chiefs of Staff that if the aircraft now going to new United States squadrons in the South-West Pacific were given to Australia, we could man them, and reduce the demand for shipping for the transfer of Australians first across the Pacific and then across the Atlantic and for Americans to the South-West Pacific. Further I suggested that Australians would be more interested in fighting in the Pacific, involving the defence of Australia, than elsewhere - not to mention their greater interest than other nationals in that defence.

There was at first some hesitation about accepting this proposal but finally General Marshall (US Army Chief of Staff) said that he would agree to this if both General MacArthur and Mr Curtin agreed - he would ask them. I did not expect for one moment that MacArthur would agree to this suggestion even if those above him did; it was not likely that he would wish to employ other than United States forces to return to the Phillipines as he said he would do, but I was surprised when, at the next meeting of the Combined Chiefs of Staff, General Marshall told me that Mr Curtin had also opposed the suggestion on the grounds that he did not want anything done that would make it appear to the Australian people that American aid was being reduced.

That, I thought, said little for the intelligence of the Australian people in 1944, or was it the Government who were the most fearful? And so Australia continued to send aircrew across America to England, while the Americans came down to the South-West Pacific.

Menzies and Curtin were one and the same, both deserved censure for their unenlightened management of Australian forces, and the manner with which they uncritically turned over the sovereignty of Australia's forces to Churchill and MacArthur. Neither used Australian achievement in battle to further the country's needs or fortunes. They were both failures as wartime Prime Ministers.

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Separation of powers is an important principle, it stops an individual, or a small group of individuals acting as judge, jury and executioner. Strong separation of power promotes a nation of laws, rather than a nation of men and protects against arbitrary government. I was surprised to read of Frank Browne in Michael Fullilove's collection of speeches. Browne was accused, sentenced and gaoled by the Australian Federal Legislature.

Frank Browne

During the mid-fifties Browne ran the free weekly newspaper, Bankstown Observer . He was also known for printing and distributing a pamphlet called Things I Hear which Fullilove described as muckraking in Drudge Report style. In May 1955 Browne wrote an article titled, "MHR and Immigration Racket". Browne alleged that the member for Reid, Charles Morgan had engaged in immigration racketeering. Morgan claimed that the newspaper article should be referred to the House of Representatives Standing Committee of Privileges for investigation. This committee investigated Morgan's claims, and decided that a breach of privilege had occurred and that Browne, along with the newspaper's owner Raymond Fitzpatrick, should be required to appear infront of the committee.

The House of Representatives heard the charges against Browne and Fitzpatrick and on a motion from Robert Menzies, the house voted that the two men serve ninety days in gaol each. This is the only time that Federal parliament has gaoled an Australian citizen. Though DIMIA has been skating around this recently, if Australian citizens caught in the indefinite detention debacle can be called gaoling. Browne protested his handling at the hands of parliament;

It is considered the right of every Australian citizen charged with an offence that he, first must be charged; and secondly; he must have legal representation. That is denied to me even here. He must have the case against him proved, and he need not answer incriminating questions. There there is the fact that he must have the right to cross-examine his accuser. And lastly, he must have the right to appeal. There is also another inherent right which is always observed in every court in this Commonwealth, and every court where there is any reasonable conception of justice - that he shall present his case in an atmosphere which shall not have had the effect of prejudging him.

Browne continued with a warning to Parliament;

I say that, if this Parliament establishes a precedent and takes the right of punishment into its own hands, the rights that have been fought for since 1215, and even before, are seriously endangered. The right of free speech is endangered. You talk about intimidation, sir. You visit exemplary punishment and what happens? There will not be a journalist in the land, not a newspaper proprietor in the land, who will feel free ...

The High Court backed the legislature using Section 49 of the Constitution. From the case ;

Constitution. The Constitution in s. 49 provides : - "The powers, privileges, and immunities of the Senate and of the House of Representatives, and of the members and the committees of each House, shall be such as are declared by the Parliament, and until declared shall be those of the Commons House of Parliament of the United Kingdom, and of its members and committees, at the establishment of the Commonwealth."

The case goes on to define privilege, contempt and the power of the House of Commons and its relation to the House of Representatives through Privy Council cases.

For s. 49 says that, until the powers, privileges and immunities of the House are declared by Act of Parliament, the powers, privileges and immunities of the House shall be those of the Commons House of Parliament of the United Kingdom at the establishment of the Commonwealth.

The language is such as to be apt to transfer to the House the full powers, privileges and immunities of the House of Commons. As Lord Cairns has said, an essential ingredient, not a mere accident, in those powers, is the protection from the examination of the conclusion of the House expressed by the warrant.

So the legal argument was, the House of Common can do it, and since there is no Australian federal act saying parliament cannot do it, federal parliament were not committing an illegal act. But what of the doctrine of separation of powers?

Then it was argued that this is a constitution which adopts the theory of the separation of powers and places the judicial power exclusively in the judicature as established under the Constitution, the executive power in the executive, and restricts the legislature to legislative powers. It is said that the power exercised by resolving upon the imprisonment of two men and issuing a warrant to carry it into effect belonged to the judicial power and ought therefore not to be conceded under the words of s. 49 to either House of the Parliament.

It is correct that the Constitution is based in its structure upon the separation of powers. It is true that the judicial power of the Commonwealth is reposed exclusively in the courts contemplated by Chap. III.

It is further correct that it is a general principle of construction that the legislative powers should not be interpreted as allowing of the creation of judicial powers or authorities in any body except the courts which are described by Chap. III of the Constitution. Accordingly, it is argued that a strong presumption exists against construing s. 49 in a sense which would enable the particular power we have before us to be exercised by the Senate or the House of Representatives.

It was pointed out that in the case of the Inter-State Commission s. 101 had received a construction which made it impossible to invest the Inter-State Commission with the character of a court and confide to it judicial functions, because it was not a body which fell within Chap. III. That was relied upon as an instance or example of the kind of construction or interpretation which we were urged to adopt in the case of s. 49.

The High Court chose an explicit reading of Section 49, which enabled the House of Representatives to adopt all the powers of the much older, and informal British House of Commons. The constitutional ineptitude of the "Bearded Men" strikes again. The judge writes;

Accordingly, all the arguments which have been advanced for giving to the words of s. 49 a modified meaning, and the particular argument for treating them as not operating, fail. We are therefore in a position of having before us a resolution of the House and two warrants which conclusively show that a breach of privilege has been committed and the two persons who seek release are properly held by the person to whom these proceedings are addressed, Mr. Edward Richards.

It follows that the applications for the writs of habeas corpus should be refused and we accordingly refuse them.

ORDER. Applications refused.

Australia's parliamentary system has weak separation of powers anyway, but in the Browne and Fitzgerald incident it wielded absolute power. The legislature made itself King.

More Information

• national Archives of Australia: Fact Sheet 204

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has a wonderful collection of historical documents all trapped in pulped wood and not digitally indexed or searchable.

Documents pertaining to the Columbo Plan, Malaysia, Trade Agreements, Indonesia Independence, etc, etc; all tied up into $50 and $60 paperbacks and hard covers.

Some documents are digital . For instance, UK's Secretary of State M. McDonald to Joe Lyons on January 1939;

Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs [2] has received a large number of reports from various reliable sources which throw a most disquieting light on Hitler's [3] mood and intentions. According to these reports Hitler is bitterly resentful at the Munich Agreement which baulked him of a localised war against Czechoslovakia, and demonstrated the will to peace of the German masses in opposition to the war mongering of the Nazi Party. He feels personally humiliated by this demonstration. He regards Great Britain as primarily responsible for this humiliation and his rage is therefore directed principally against this country which he holds to be the chief obstacle now to the fulfilment of his further ambitions.

The Department of External Affairs to Ballard in 1946. Some of the other ones in that period have a detailed look at the party politics in Indonesia at the time.

You can inform Sjahrir that our reading of the Cheribon agreement appears to preclude us at this stage of the negotiations from formally accrediting a consular or diplomatic representative to his Government. You should assure him however that we wish to establish close links with the Indonesian Government and ask for his general comment on the situation. What we have in mind is that you should be, for all practical purposes and for the time being, the Australian representative with the Indonesian Republic.

4. In the absence of any Indonesian commentary on the Cheribon agreement, we are inclined to attach some weight to the view that the agreement would facilitate the emergence, as a self-governing state in international law, of the United States of Indonesia rather than the Republic of Indonesia.

Cablegram from Percy Spender to Robert Menzies during the ANZUS negotiations;

Thank you for your telegram 3411.[1] While I fully appreciate the reasons for your view that we should not do anything which might tend to narrow the field of discussion between the United Kingdom and United States, further information which I have just received makes me feel that there is some danger of American misapprehension of the Australian attitude if our views become known to the United States only through the United Kingdom, even though the United Kingdom may be putting forward views which in some general strategic sense are those of the Commonwealth as a whole.

Menzies to Fadden;

Also tell Percy Spender that the Pacific Pact is not at present on the map because the Americans are uneasy about the stability of most Asiatic countries. We do not need a pact with America. They are already overwhelmingly friendly to us.

The Pacific Pact was Percy Spender's idea to make a treaty that ensured a permanent US presence in the Pacific. It was also to try and create a counter-weight to NATO influence which was being put together at the time.

Menzies was cold to it at first, as was the US and UK, but when John Foster Dulles arrived in Australia after the outbreak of the Korean War, the initial impetus of the Pacific Pact was to become ANZUS.

Hopefully DFAT will continue the digitisation of our foreign policy history so it is readily accessible and searchable.

cam

Georgiou desperately needs his own website where he can post his speeches and thoughts. His speech to the Murray Hill Society at Adelaide University is significant for a couple of reasons; from a policy perspective because he points out that citizenship test is bad policy and has no empirical grounding. He is also another voice concerned about the increasing control of executive (and party) discipline on legislative independence.

TheAustralian has reproduced the speech in full. To their credit they have a history of performing this service. I am reproducing it here as well so that it is not lost to Georgiou's lack of a website and mainstream newspaper websites having a speedy news cycle.

A couple of things to note. Judith Brett's interpretation of the schism between Watson's Labor and Deakin's and Cook's liberalism is now the accepted narrative. I agree with it too - that article being a discussion of Brett's thesis.

Like others he laments the increasing whip of the party room. Georgiou notes that under Menzies Senators crossed the floor 5% of the time, under Holt 11%, Gorton 7%, Fraser 6% and in the last two years 2.2% of the time. There is also a great deal of romanticism for Menzies which I don't think is justified either.

The policy significance of this speech is in Georgiou pointing out that the 'citizenship test' has no empirical value and is trying to solve a problem that does not exist. In other words it is pure politics, most likely electoral in target, and not good policy or legislation. Andrew Bartlett has asked similar questions as to the lack of empiricism in the testing policy.

This is Petro Georgiou's speech to to the Murray Hill Society at Adelaide Uni.

It is a privilege to be invited here this afternoon to deliver the inaugural Murray Hill lecture.

I would like to take this opportunity to canvass some thoughts about Liberal Party tradition, not least because Murray Hill exemplified one of its vital streams.

Hill was a strong believer in tolerance and personal liberty and in his political career acted to further those commitments.

In 1972, whilst Hill was a member of the Liberal and Country League, he introduced a private Member's bill in the South Australian parliament to decriminalise homosexuality in South Australia.

Speaking from personal experience, private Members' bills can be difficult creatures.

An amended version of Murray Hill's bill passed the South Australian parliament in 1972 providing for the first time in Australia that homosexual acts in private were made "if not exactly legal no longer entirely illegal."

It was a significant achievement for Murray Hill.

The pursuit of convictions, a strong commitment to tolerance and individual liberty places Hill firmly in the mould of the liberal tradition.

Hill was also a bearer of that tradition in the fundamental sense - he transmitted it by personal example in his public life and also to his offspring and through them to others.

After a quarter of a century as a Senator, Murray Hill's son, Senator Robert Hill, said in his valedictory speech that he had always leant to the liberal side of the Party:

"Maybe because my parents, while personally conservative were always tolerant of the choices of others."

Robert Hill's tentativeness about the sources of his commitment is characteristic of the frequent uncertainty surrounding the origins of traditions. But he does underscore tradition's importance to political parties.

Politicians and political parties are moulded by the inheritance of the past.

Traditions influence behaviour even if their force is not always recognised.

The images projected by history influence why people join one party rather than another. Political parties draw strength and direction from their past. Traditions influence how they behave and evaluate actions and their outcomes, what appropriate values are, how to judge achievements, failures and lost opportunities.

For those who doubt the power of tradition in a rationalist age consider briefly the Liberal party room at its simplest and most passionate.

New members uninformed about the rules of the tribe receive a rude lesson in the power of tradition if they sit in a seat that is "owned" by someone else.

There are no written rules for the conduct of the federal Liberal parliamentary party room.

Are there votes in the party room?

Does the party room have to agree to the introduction of private Members' bills?

Must the party room be advised if someone is going to cross the floor?

What do you do to have a leadership spill?

The answer to these and other basic questions is not always clear. Fundamentally, however, in the party room we do things the way we do them because we have always done them that way.

Traditions are powerful but they are not immutable.

Some of them are immensely beneficial. Others are not - Winston Churchill's dismissal of the traditions of the royal navy as "rum sodomy and the lash" springs to mind.

Yet I believe we need to try to understand our traditions in all their strengths and weaknesses.

We need to expound and defend the best of them. And we need to appreciate that what a tradition is can be highly contestable, and whether a tradition is good or bad can divide judgements.

In orienting ourselves we need to recognise the fate of some of the things that once appeared to be part of our political inheritance.

The white Australia handed down from Deakin through to Menzies - a legacy shared with the Labor Party - has been demolished by the hand of the Liberal Party.

The great public enterprises of which Menzies was so proud, have essentially been sold off. First of all by the Labor Party, and then by the coalition.

The social justice constantly proclaimed by Menzies as one of the Party's cornerstones has been forgotten by many members of the Liberal Party, and has been reviled by others.

Our traditions of civil liberty have been curtailed, and in some cases overturned, in pursuit of a war on terrorism.

In the recent past we lauded the liberal tradition as responsible for one of the world's most generous and compassionate responses to Vietnamese refugees arriving on our shores.

Today some still demand the utilization of every artifice to deny refugees arriving on the Australian mainland the protection of Australian law.

Traditions are not immutable. They are sometimes good and sometimes bad. The bad traditions do not necessarily submerge or sink under their own weight, and the good traditions do not defend themselves.

In the first decade of the twenty-first century the Liberal Party has to address its traditions, justify and defend them or dismiss them. What we should not do however, is to slide by them.

Today I would like to talk about a trinity of traditions which lie at the heart of our Party and I consider worth defending.

The first is the tradition of members of the federal parliamentary Liberal Party exercising their conscience on matters of principle.

The second is the Liberal Party's tradition of respecting its heritage of liberal philosophy.

And the third is the tradition of recognising social complexity and respecting institutions that work. My particular focus here is to examine the current discussion paper on citizenship.

The Liberal Party's traditions may have changed over the decades.

But enduring has been the right of members of the Liberal parliamentary party to differ from the majority of their colleagues on matters of principle and conscience. This of course extends to the expression of a different view on the floor of the parliament.

Indeed, the right to individual judgement was a primary rationale in the emergence of the Party.

When the Deakinites fused with the free trade conservatives to form the first precursor of the modern Liberal Party, a motivation was the rejection of Labor's demand that parliamentarians subordinate their individual judgement to the dictates of the caucus majority.

As Alfred Deakin put it

In Labor there is not a natural and real, but a narrow mechanical compulsory uniformity enforced by constant knee drill in caucus. They all stand alike and apart. The Liberal Party stands in broad unity, but individualities remain. In this government and in this Party no man has parted with his individual judgement or his responsibility to his constituents. We enjoy a proud sense of free union as free men in a free party.

This is not just a matter of a distant past. It has always been intrinsic to the Liberal Party's commitment to the responsible individual.

The individuals that comprise the Liberal Party today value unity, but they do not believe that parliamentarians should be clones.

The liberal commitment to the centrality of the individual's reason and responsibility distinguishes us from Labor's collectivism.

Labor still demands that its parliamentary members sign and adhere of to a pledge, "to vote as a majority of the parliamentary party may decide at a duly constituted caucus meeting"

Unlike Labor we recognise and respect that members of parliament can responsibly deviate from their party on the floor of the parliament.

The liberal tradition of respecting the principles of the individual has endured from Deakin through to Menzies, and to the present day.

The late Don Chipp described Menzies' embrace of the tradition.

In 1961 Don Chipp's principles prevented him from supporting a government bill that included provisions for capital punishment.

Chipp recalled that with the government only holding a majority of one seat, he went to see Menzies to explain that his conscience would prevent him from voting with the government.

"I couldn't possibly vote for the clause on capital punishment", said Chipp. "I was in a hell of a dilemma. I went to Menzies...in absolute terror I told him I could not vote for the bill expecting him to tear me to shreds, because his reputation as a sort of tyrant had preceded him.

On the contrary, he put his hand on my shoulder and said, "My boy, thank God we've got people with courage like you in the Party ...you vote as you please."

Menzies apparent equanimity was very impressive. But then Menzies was in many ways unique as the founder of the modern Liberal Party in his appreciation of the need to continually defend the traditions which in turn defined the Liberal Party.

The tradition has endured long after Menzies' departure. Even in the midst of a tortured reappraisal following the 1983 loss of government, the Liberal Party reaffirmed that:

The Party's belief in the importance of individual conscience means that it accepts that there are occasions when a Liberal member of parliament may vote against his colleagues without incurring sanctions from the Party (or expulsion as in the Labor Party).

Expressing traditions in documents is important. But their vitality is reaffirmed in the party members' actions. The voting recorded in Hansard demonstrates that the tradition remains alive.

During the Menzies government, Members and Senators crossed the floor on 5 per cent of divisions.

Under Holt it was 11per cent; Under Gorton it was 7per cent, and under Fraser 6 per cent.

In the 41st Parliament, which has so far run from 16 November 2004 to 14 September 2006, government Members or Senators crossed the floor in 2.2 per cent of divisions.

16 Members of the coalition still in parliament at the beginning of this year had crossed the floor between 1 and ten times. A majority of those who crossed the floor became ministers, and 5 of them cabinet ministers.

Robert Hill was one of the most frequent floor-crossers with 10 occasions to his name.

As Robert was leaving the Senate, he reaffirmed the tradition, saying

For the Liberal Party, with its emphasis on an individual's freedoms rather than collective responsibility, the right to be guided by conscience remains vital. I (Hill) am proof that you can take a different view on certain issues and still succeed - although I would not encourage it too often.

Hill thinks ten times is not too often. In the future no doubt some political scientists will use regression analysis to test this.

Of course they will have to consider the parliamentary record of Senator Reg Wright.

Senator Wright was a delegate to the 1944 Canberra conference called by Menzies to form the Liberal Party. He sat in the parliament from 1949 to 1978, became a minister in the Gorton and McMahon governments, and he crossed the floor 150 times.

Wright was called a rebel by some. His response was illustrative of the very tradition that we are exploring.

To call me a rebel shows a pur-blind lack of understanding of what the parliament stands for...it demand(s) of each man that he exercises individual judgement...anybody worth his salt as a Liberal would never surrender his vote.

Only a few days ago, Wright's legacy was brought home to both me and my colleagues, Judi Moylan and Russell Broadbent.

Having recently crossed the floor on a matter of principle, we received an email from Janet Upcher, the daughter of the late Senator Wright.

The email in part read:

My late father Reg Wright crossed the floor numerous times on matters of principle, and as a young girl, I saw the struggle he underwent to maintain his conscience - for that he has my eternal admiration.

Whether it has been Robert Hill, Reg Wright, or any of the numerous members of the parliamentary Liberal Party, crossing the floor is a step that is taken with a great deal of gravity. And it also remains one of the strongest and most enduring traditions of the Party.

Recently a number of Liberal Members and Senators either declared their intention to cross the floor, or voted against the government on a bill to excise the Australian mainland and Tasmania from the Migration Act.

In accordance with tradition the MPs concerned advised both the Prime Minister and the party room of their intentions and the reason for their actions.

However, their actions were met with public attacks from some parliamentary colleagues.

The liberal tradition of voting according to principle was denounced by Liberal parliamentary party members as the acts of "heretics and anarchists".

"Unprincipled", "ridiculous" and "indefensible" railed one Liberal. "Flying in the face of democracy," declared another. Another Member had presaged this by calling the pursuit of a private Member's bill "political terrorism".

I do not believe these responses reflect the view of the entire Liberal parliamentary party, or the Party at large.

The essence of the tradition was best reflected intellectually by Peter Costello who, whilst not agreeing with those crossing the floor, said:

We are a party that believes in a strong nation. We are also the party of conscience. Where members of our party have deeply held positions, genuinely held and argued and defended, we respect their right to differ from our party. This is, after all, the Liberal Party.

It was similarly exemplified affectionately by Warren Entsch, who after the vote hugged Judi Moylan. Warren said: "I had different views of the issue but I'm proud of what she did...as a Liberal, I think that it is important to stick to our principles."

The danger that we need to appreciate, of course, is that even the most embedded of our traditions can be eroded. And that the challenge to those values and traditions can come from within our party as surely as it can from without.

Attacking and denigrating parliamentarians who differ from their party on principle is antithetical to the values of the Liberal Party.

The ethos of the Party is that those who cross the floor on a matter of principle are entitled and free to do so. They are entitled not only to freedom from sanction, but also to respect for their principles and beliefs.

I believe that this tradition of respect for individual principle is functional for good government.

The resolution of issues in the party room is fundamental to our system. Everyone sacrifices to achieve a consensus. On the overwhelming majority of issues, people do give way on the whole or part of their perspective in the interests of achieving common ground.

But where there are deep and genuine differences of principle that cannot be reconciled, responsible government, accountability and parliamentary democracy dictate that individual Members have the freedom to take the final step to manifest their position.

I also believe that this is a tradition Australians want to see upheld.

Australians expect discipline of their parliamentarians.

They do not particularly care for infighting or personal aggrandisement.

But equally, they want those whom they elect to stand up when they believe it is right to do so.

This brings me to the second great tradition of the Liberal Party which is worth defending - the respect for both the liberal and conservative strands of the Liberal Party.

Let us look briefly at the character of Menzies' liberalism. Consider the naming of the Liberal Party.

Menzies stated that "we took the name `Liberal' because we were determined to be a progressive party, willing to make experiments, in no way reactionary, but believing in the individual, his rights and his enterprise."

Paul Hasluck, an acute observer of men and affairs, believed that:

...although a traditionalist, Menzies was not a conservative in any doctrinal sense.

I do not know what part he had in choosing the name "Liberal" for the new party he formed but the name would certainly fit his political creed. His political thinking was in accord with the liberalism of Alfred Deakin...

Menzies' brand of liberalism was a particularly Australian one. It was not an import from conservative parties abroad, but rather a far more progressive and tolerant brand of liberalism reflecting the values of the Australian community.

I have outlined elsewhere my belief that Menzies' legacy has been distorted by some who have attacked the concept of social justice he constantly advanced.

The strength and pride of his commitment and his sense of achievement is reflected in this declaration, towards the end of his prime ministership:

We have greatly aided social justice, we have shown that industrial progress is not to be based on the poverty or despair of those who cannot compete. After fourteen consecutive years ...we can point to ...achievements in industrial justice and peace, in social services, in a growingly successful attack upon poverty in widely distributed rising standards of housing and living generally that can be matched by very few counties in the world.

Menzies' philosophical legacy was that Australian liberalism is a broad church. Within that church are two fundamental arches. Under one arch reside the market, free enterprise, opportunity and incentive.

Under the other arch shelter stability, security, social justice and equity. The cornerstone of the arches is the state. The state supports a free market society at the same time as it upholds its obligation to the weak, the sick and the unfortunate.

From another vantage point, I think John Howard is right that Menzies' legacy embraced the respect for the dualism of the liberal tradition. As he put it in his 1996 Menzies lecture "Menzies knew the importance for Australian liberalism to draw on the classical liberal as well as the conservative political tradition... that encompassed both Edmund Burke and John Stuart Mill."

The philosophical strength of the Liberal Party lies in the coming together of both of those streams. A respect for the duality of streams is entrenched in the Party's ethos.

Indeed, as Peter Costello has said, "The Liberal Party is at its strongest when these two strands intertwine. Each complements the other and gives it greater strength."

To retain a philosophical balance in modern political parties takes constant reflection and appraisal. Indeed, there are inevitable tensions in all political organisations.

In the modern Liberal Party, conservative and liberal streams can and often do coexist in the same individual.

Indeed it is common for people to take the conservative side of one issue and the liberal side of another.

Equally however, there are those who are more consistently on one side or the other.

In this sense, I believe it is true to say that currently the liberals or moderates are not the overwhelming majority. Indeed Laurie Oakes, in an image that resonates, likens the liberals in the Party to an endangered species, the orange-bellied parrot.

Ultimately traditions are carried and conveyed by individuals, and if too many liberals flew into the political turbines it would weaken the continuation of the liberal tradition.

I believe that we need to be sensitive to this and to such manifestations as attacks on those who represent the liberal persuasion in the Party. I have already outlined public attacks on those who crossed the floor on the immigration bill. And we have observed renewed efforts to unseat Members of parliament because they represent the liberal stream of thought.

We have seen such intrusions into seats such as Pearce directed against Judi Moylan.

In NSW, some seem determined that the broad church would be better off if there were no liberals in the pews. Marise Payne bears the brunt of such targeting because of her positions on refugees, abortion and civil liberties.

It would be a tragedy for the Liberal Party and the parliament if a classic Millsian liberal who makes the enormous contribution that Senator Payne does is driven from our Party.

Ladies and gentleman, there is no broad church in the abstract.

There is only a broad church in the rich tapestry and duality of those that form our parliamentary party.

Their diversity of thought and the dual philosophical streams are what embody the notion of a broad church.

No one individual, and no one tendency, represent the diversity of the Party as a whole. I believe that the Liberal Party as a whole is committed to its tradition of respect for its philosophical duality. The reality is that, if a minority succeeds in attacking those who represent the liberal strand, the loser will be the Party that we have inherited.

I now turn to a third aspect of the liberal tradition, the balance between change and continuity. Sir Robert Menzies saw the Liberal Party as a progressive party, not averse to experiment; as a party that believes in state action to secure economic and social advancement and that embraces sensible parts of the Burkean understanding of society. One of these insights is that when you are dealing with social arrangements that have proved that they work, governments need to proceed with great care. There is a substantial burden of proof required to establish whether something needs to be changed, and that the changes proposed will achieve the desired outcome.

It is through this Burkean prism of the need to respect the complexity of social patterns, particularly successful ones, that I would like to contribute to the current debate about citizenship. In crude terms, what is broke and what needs fixing.

Let us look at our record. Since 1945, Australians have accepted 6 million migrants, an average of 1 million a decade. We have overcome our concerns about migrants coming from places other than the British Isles. We then overturned the white Australia policy which was for so long considered by both major political parties as essential to social harmony and cohesion. Today 28.2 per cent of our population was born overseas. Since 1949, 3.5 million Australians have become citizens by naturalisation.

By any standard, we are an exemplar of unity and respect for our multicultural diversity. We have, with remarkable success, brought together peoples of diverse nations, religions and cultures. Migrants to Australia have worked hard and committed themselves to this country. Through their efforts and initiative, and that of their children, and increasingly their grandchildren, they have profoundly enriched the Australian nation, of which they are an intrinsic part economically, socially, culturally and linguistically.

Until a few weeks ago, this was an article of faith on the part of every politician. Now we are told we need to make significant policy changes to address weaknesses in our citizenship laws.

What are the societal malfunctions that justify these changes?

I have looked closely at the federal government's discussion paper, Australian Citizenship: much more than just a ceremony, and, in what has been said and written in connection with the proposed tests, I can find no detailed, robust analysis of a problem, and no evidence of how the new measures would resolve a problem that has not been demonstrated.

There is no equivalent of the Galbally report, which thirty years ago provided a rigorous philosophical and evidential basis for the Fraser government's adoption of the policy of multiculturalism.

I have no doubt that more can and should be done to encourage immigrants to integrate effectively into the Australian community. But in order to do so sensibly, I would like to know pretty precisely what is the scale and nature of the issue. For example, how do we define integration and assess whether it is occurring? Who is not integrating and why is that so - are there attitudinal or language barriers or do they suffer from discriminatory barriers?

I am all in favour of encouraging non-English speaking immigrants to learn English - acceptance of English as the national language and promoting its acquisition have always been central tenets of multiculturalism. Where is the evidence showing who does not learn adequate English and the reasons for that? Do immigrants not want to learn or are they stymied by the lack of availability of classes or are they fully occupied in meeting other demands, such as employment and family responsibilities?

Instead, we are told that changes to the Citizenship Act are needed because the present system showers citizenship around like confetti - throwing citizenship at people who do not value it, in part, because it is so easy to get.

Such assertions are nowhere supported.

The discussion paper tells us that testing will "assist social cohesion and successful integration into the community". The implication is that this is not happening now. Yet there is no evidence provided for this - no research to support it.

We are told that people take out citizenship because it is easy. It is easy we are told because there is no "formal test" of English or suitability or commitment to our country. A hearsay anecdote is related about people leaving a citizenship ceremony before the singing of the national anthem. This, we are told, "suggests that there are many people who are taking out citizenship who may see it as no more than a passport."

The discussion paper proposes "formal", more difficult and more protracted tests before people become citizens. These will, the paper asserts, provide a strong incentive for people to learn English.

A number of underlying premises in the discussion paper are problematic. I will address three.

The first of these is that people take up citizenship without commitment because the requirements for English proficiency are so low. Yet it is those people most proficient in English who are the ones least likely to take out citizenship. The reality is that take up rates of citizenship are lowest amongst those who are English speakers - immigrants from the UK the USA and New Zealand.

The second underlying premise is that there are no existing tests, and no signatures of commitment. I have seen a recent poll that a significant proportion of Australians are in favour of the introduction of a formal citizenship test. The fact is that tests have long been in place.

I am not going to play a semantic game about when a test is formal or informal. What I can say is that following the requirements of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948, people are currently assessed on the following: basic English language knowledge; understanding the nature of the application and its meaning; and an adequate knowledge of the responsibilities and privileges of Australian citizenship.

This assessment is made during a compulsory, formal interview. Additionally, those seeking Australian citizenship are required to formally commit to citizenship by signing a declaration as part of the application. At the citizenship ceremony candidates are required to affirm their commitment to Australia in the words of the Australian citizenship pledge, and I quote:

From this time forward, (under God,) I pledge my loyalty to Australia and its people whose democratic beliefs I share, whose rights and liberties I respect, and whose laws I will uphold and obey.

The third premise is that somehow we have fallen behind other countries in the stringency of our requirements. The countries that we are falling behind are cited as the US, the UK, Canada and the Netherlands. Look at their record of harmony. Australia's record is second to none in multicultural harmony and integration. We are uniquely successful. Why should we emulate countries with a less distinguished record?

The discussion paper has had one unintended, and I believe beneficial effect. It has made many Australians reflect on the challenges that faced their parents and grandparents. For my part, my mother and father were among the many people who became Australians despite only limited fluency in English. My father was desperate to speak English properly - and thought he did - but he really didn't, because he worked two jobs for most of his life.

A recent letter published in The Age reflects the experience and the sentiment of hundreds of thousands of migrants to this country. Speaking of the Greek community, the author writes:

...older migrants were not subjected to an English-language test and, in many instances, they never did master the language of their new country. Finding work, establishing a home and family and ensuring a secure future for their children took all their energy and resolve. They did not underestimate the importance of developing knowledge of English and there was a sense of regret and sometimes despair that they needed to rely on others to ease their way in an English-speaking environment....

Reflecting on her personal experience she continues:

...My Greek migrant parents, relatives and friends who made it possible for me to develop into a tertiary-educated bilingual Australian, who nurtured me in my youth, set an example, and gave me a sense of responsibility towards others, were in many cases illiterate in English. They were, however, model Australian citizens and their loyalty to this country was rock-solid. Their own Greek-speaking community helped them adjust to their new country. (Nina Mills, Blairgowrie.)

Throughout our history, very many people have become citizens despite having little fluency in English.

But that did not prevent them from making substantial contributions to our society - people who worked hard in jobs that many English-speakers were loathe to take; people who obeyed the law, were good parents and fine neighbours.

Aren't such personal qualities the essence of good citizenship?

How can it be in the national interest to impose new barriers to citizenship, barriers which would have prevented its acquisition by so many who have demonstrably proven to be model citizens?

Ladies and gentlemen, the liberal tradition has facilitated the success of one of the most successful migration processes in modern history. That has been made possible because the Liberal Party was progressive and committed to nation building. There are no doubt many reasons why it has been a success. I believe it has something to do with the Australian character that is fundamentally tolerant and accepting of people trying to make a go of it, especially when they come to know them as individuals. I believe it is partly because of the openness of Australian society. I believe it is partly because of the policy of multiculturalism that embraces diversity as a value within a commitment to Australia. And I believe that it is due to the fact that we have sought to accept as Australian citizens those who made a real commitment to Australia, even if they spoke only basic English and probably couldn't answer many multiple choice questions about Australia.

But beyond this, as a liberal I am enough of a Burkean to know that recipes for social cohesion and commitment are complex and if the mix has succeeded, we need to have imperative, overriding reasons to change it. In my view, the discussion paper in no way demonstrates the need to change our longstanding processes, and the proposed new approach potentially undermines our unquestionable success.

Gary Sauer-Thompson comments on the recently aired docudrama on John Curtin. In popular history Curtin and Menzies are often rated as Australia's two greatest Prime Ministers; Curtin because of his stand in WWII and Menzies for his longevity. In my opinion, they were two of Australia's worst.

Both Menzies and Curtin were Prime Ministers in WWII and faced the early onslaughts on allied military effectiveness by the Germans and Japanese. Menzies, followed the policy of the "Great and Powerful Friends" [GAPF] which had been in place since 1919 with Billy Hughes at Versailles.

This policy has been bipartisan since that time, and other than a small period where it was challenged by the international liberalism of Doc Evatt, and later the Engagement Doctrine of Gareth Evans, it has dominated Australian foreign policy making.

Menzies actually removed Australia's most effective commander, Richard Williams, just prior to WWII when a not so flattering review of the Royal Australian Air Force [RAAF] was done and became a political liability for Menzies. Williams faced the chopping block and was replaced with a retired Royal Air Force [RAF] hack from England.

Australian air force policy became British policy and totally lost its indigenous and independent strain that it had under Williams. I consider this Menzies biggest mistake in his first period as Prime Minister. Because of this Australia got the Empire Air Training Scheme which handed over sovereignty of Australian airmen to the RAAF. This is something that the Australian Flying Corps [AFC] did not allow in WWI under the Prime Ministership of Billy Hughes.

Menzies also faced Winston Churchill who saw Australians as inferior to British leadership and consequently a subservient dominion - not a sovereign force. Churchill, however, was aware that Menzies and Blamey were aware of domestic national politics, and consequently, Churchill and his High Staff lied to Menzies and Blamey over the Greece campaign.

The fall out from this was the future Australian civil and military leaders did not trust Churchill's word. Part of Curtin digging his heels in with Churchill over the Australian Divisions coming back to Australia were because of Churchill's duplicity during the Greek campaign. Even so the Divisions stayed in Sri Lanka for a time until the Burmese front settled down, so it wasn't a complete victory for Curtin.

Despite Menzies losing the confidence of parliament and the government changing to one led by Curtin - the foreign and military policies are exactly the same with Menzies and Curtin. The speech that Curtin made in December 1941 is seen as some watershed in Australian policy - but it isn't. His words:

Australia looks to America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United Kingdom.

The policy toward America is exactly the same as it was to the UK previously. Prior to that point the protectorship of Australia came through Royal Navy [RN] dominance, Curtin is just replacing the RN with the United States Navy [USN]. It is the same policy and speaks of the lack of imagination in Australian foreign policy which continues to this day. In addition, where Menzies had a dominion-style relationship with Churchill, Curtin swapped that for exactly the same with MacArthur - two of the worst people in history to be submissive too.

Menzies and Curtin were both out of their depth and it showed in Australian WWII military leadership. It was nothing like it was in WWI. No Monash rose from WWII, and the one most able to be the next Monash, Richard Williams, was removed for political reasons just prior to the war.