ANZAC Day Dawn Service Speech in Lae
25 April 2007, War Cemetery, Lae, PNG
Tim Paterson, First Secretary, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
This year marks the 92nd Anniversary of the ANZAC landing on the Gallipoli Peninsula. It was on the beaches and cliff faces of the Turkish shoreline that Australian and New Zealand troops fought side by side for the first time. Together, as part of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corp – or ANZAC – they saw sustained action over the 8 months of the Dardanelles campaign.
Militarily, the Gallipoli Campaign was a failure, and one that exacted an enormous human cost: Australian and New Zealand casualties were heavy and conditions were appalling. But out of that tragedy grew what has come to be known as the ANZAC legend – characterized by courage, tenacity, initiative, determination and the spirit of heroism.
The ANZAC legend has become part of the national ethos of Australia and New Zealand. We see it in the spirit of unity, freedom, enterprise and equality that continues to define our nations. Similarly, we see it in the qualities of comradeship, self-sacrifice and good humour that define us as peoples.
In the Australian tradition, ANZAC Day is not a time for glorification but for sombre reflection. The sight of so many graves reminds us of the terrible cost of war. And of course, the tragedy of so many young lives lost did not end here – the pain of their loss lived on in the hearts of all those who were robbed of a son, a husband, a father, a brother, a friend. While the resort to armed conflict is sadly sometimes unavoidable, ANZAC Day is a time for all of us to remind ourselves of the preciousness of peace.
While the ANZAC legend was born on the shores of a country far from our own, it faced one of its sternest ever tests much closer to home, here in Papua New Guinea during the dark days of World War Two, in places that have now become part of our shared history - Kokoda, Milne Bay, Buna, Gona and Bougainville, to name a few.
ANZAC Day provides us with a reminder of the close and enduring links between Australia and Papua New Guinea. We must never forget the bravery of those Papua New Guineans who, at great risk to themselves, supported us during our hour of need in the bitter campaigns of World War Two. Many Australian servicemen owed their lives to the selfless courage of these people.
As we reflect on the sacrifices of the past, let us not forget that the ANZAC spirit lives on in the work of those servicemen and women currently involved in operations overseas. We have personnel operating with counterparts from PNG and France in Solomon Islands as part of RAMSI and tsunami relief operations and with American, British and Dutch soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. Let us also take time to reflect on the families and communities who have loved ones deployed on operations.
Above all else ANZAC Day is an occasion for us to reflect on how the peace and freedoms we all enjoy were won. As we look around us it is difficult not to feel weighed down by the magnitude of the sacrifice that those who lie here made. But despair must not be our tribute to them. Rather, as we consider the enormity of their sacrifice, let us remember that their true and lasting legacy is the freedoms that we continue to enjoy to this day.
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