Major Vine:

The 19^th Century poet Tennyson wrote: ’Theirs is not to reason why, theirs is but to do and die’.

When the call for volunteers went out a nation answered.

The nation was new and the nation was bold.

The people were toughened by the unforgiving land and forged in a bond of nationality.

The threat was not to them directly and indeed the call came from a land far away.

A land many had left and almost forgotten.

The young men of Australia answered the call in droves.

Young men who were sons, brothers, fathers and friends rallied to meet the national need.

Many travelled vast distances just to be considered.

Some lied about their age and managed to join aged just 15 years old.

All left behind their family, their friends and everything that meant anything to them.

They had no confirmed understanding of what lay ahead of them.

They knew not of the pain, the suffering, the loss and the sacrifice that was to come.

What they did know was duty, service, honor and, through their very being, mateship.

They were backed by a society and guided by politics that saw men as men, defenders of the weak and repellent of the tyranny that was in play.

And they came and they came.

So many came that the tests for entry had to be made more stringent.

The recruiting stations filled and the King’s shilling was taken.

Then it was to the boats and then it was to war.

And so, after a time at sea, a landing and more training it began.

The guns fired, the bullets flew and the gas wafted across fields and beaches and cliffs across the world.

And men died and died and died.

They died in their 100s their 1000s and their 10s of 1000s.

The sacrifice for freedom was required and the bill was paid in full.

Unknowingly 1000s of miles away, wives became widows, children became fatherless and parents lost their sons.

And a victorious nation mourned it’s loss.

From a population of fewer than 5 million, over 416,000 men enlisted, of which over 60,000 were killed and 156,000 wounded, gassed or taken prisoner.

Australia suffered the greatest loss, per capita, of any country involved in the Great War.

This was supposed to have been the war that ended wars. It did not.

The heralded threat of aggressors through the 20^th Century came from many theatres around the world.

Each instance presented a requirement for Australian service men and women to act as the extension of politics and meet the need.

And each time the need was met.

The call still goes out for citizens to join and the call is answered.

But it is answered now with the full knowledge of what lies ahead.

Through the media we as Australians are made aware of the dangers of life in the ADF.

We know within hours when one of our own has fallen in the line of duty.

Soon after we are informed of how they fell and then we are told their name.

And it is current and it is accurate and it is real.

Regardless, the young men and women answer the call to represent Australia in the fight against oppression, tyranny and evil.

To give hope to those without hope and to help those who cannot help themselves.

And there is no doubt they will continue to do so.

There has always been and will always remain the cost of those who die or are wounded.

There will ever be tears in the eyes of those whose loved ones pay the ultimate price or return a different person.

There has never been a war without sacrifice or loss.

The 3^rd Battalion the Royal Australian Regiment has conducted such service form Sydney for over two decades.

On the 9^th of December we will lower the flag for the last time and move to Townsville to continue our work.

Regardless of where we are in Australia or indeed the world we will honor those who left a legacy for all of us.

We will mourn the dead as that is all we can do.

And we will remember them. Lest we forget.

Major Matthew Vine
Second-in-Command
3rd Battalion
The Royal Australian Regiment

11-11-2011

She is now investigating claims made by Wayne Wetherall, owner of Kokoda Spirit and Sandakan Spirit. She has recently filed this report:

‘In 2010, Wayne Wetherall, an Australian tour operator, undertook a trek along the 1945 POW death march track in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo, with TYK Adventure Tours, a small company owned by a local man Tham Yau Kong. After recording the route on a GPS, Wetherall announced that he intended to conduct his own treks. In order to promote and attract business he then registered, as his internet domain name, a name that was identical (apart from a hyphen) to that used by TYK since 2005. He also downloaded, without permission, historical material copyrighted exclusively to me, onto his own website.

‘His next move was to make statements on his website, and in the Australian media, that people walking along the death march track since 2006, when it was opened up by Tham Yau Kong and myself, had all been following an incorrect route. The correct path, he claimed, passed through the village of Miruru, in the Liwagu valley. His ‘proof’ was a map that appeared in a self-published book in 1999.

‘The route shown on this map has no basis in fact.

‘In 1945, POWs marching from Sandakan to Ranau followed a jungle trail, the majority of which was cut by local headmen. Believing that the track they were cutting was for use by the Japanese, the headmen had deliberately routed the track away from all habitation until it reached Paginatan, 26 miles from Ranau. Keeping well clear of the Liwagu-Labuk river system with its numerous small kampongs (villages), the track crossed the Telupid and Tapaang Rivers, before following the southern banks of the Taviu River until Lolosing, where it ascended to the summit of what we now call Taviu Hill.

‘At the end of 1945, Australian army teams walked the death march track three times, searching for the remains of dead POWs. Two teams moved from east to west. The other, travelling in the opposite direction, was led by survivor Bill Sticpewich who had also walked the track as a POW. Diaries were kept, reports compiled and the location of each body found was meticulously noted. Local people, to whom a bounty was paid for located remains, were keen to help. The teams also carefully mapped and recorded the route in great detail, including the distance between each river crossed, especially in the Taviu valley, which was uncharted and unexplored territory.

‘The word ‘Miruru’ appears nowhere on any Australian archival record, and the village by that name is not marked on any recovery or investigation map. ‘Miruru’ does, however, appear on a few Japanese ‘place of death’ records. While some Japanese records are very accurate and can be relied upon, less diligent recorders were often extremely inexact. They not only used broad-based ‘locality’ names to describe a place of death, they also ‘re-named’ existing geographical features, including Taviu Hill and a tributary of the Taviu River, both of which they called ‘Miruru’ – a word that means ‘parallel‘.

‘The incorrect map published in 1999 has been drawn by the author on the flawed assumption that ‘Miruru’ refers to the village in the Liwagu Valley of the same name.

‘The Sabah Society, in turn, gave this 1999 map in good faith to Tham Yau Kong, whose task was to assist with the Society’s commemorative march from Sandakan to Ranau in August 2005. It was not until the walk had concluded that Tham learned from me of the existence of the archival maps, which showed clearly that the original route had not passed anywhere near Miruru village.

‘A map of the route, charted in 1945 and taken from archival sources, is in the Commemorative Pavilion at the Sandakan Memorial Park, where it has been on public display for the last 12 years. A similar map has also been displayed at Kundasang War Memorial Gardens since 2006. The most superficial search of Australian archives, or a visit to either of these establishments in Sabah by anyone interested in the Sandakan story, would have revealed the fallacy of the assumption that the route passed through Miruru village, an assumption that has led directly to the current situation.

‘Wayne Wetherall, now aware that there is a problem, continues to use the faulty 1999 map, as well as the Sabah Society map based upon it, as ‘proof’ of his claim that the death march passed through Miruru. Indeed, far from retracting or moderating his claims, he has recently tried to add further weight to the validity of his so-called route by claiming in the media that the headman of Miruru is ‘adamant’ that the death march passed by the village.

‘Tham Yau Kong interviewed villagers in 2005, and established that no white men had been in the Liwagu valley during WW2. In May this year, after the spurious claims regarding the route first emerged, I re-interviewed a key witness on the subject. After stating categorically that the death march route did not go near Miruru, he accompanied me to Taviu Hill to confirm the exact path of the POW route. This expedition was video-recorded. He has since re-confirmed the route to senior members of the Sabah Forestry Department.

‘In August this year I visited Miruru to interview the present-day headman, and his father, who had been employed by the Japanese as a courier to deliver messages along the track. Their independent interviews, and that of another witness in nearby Mangkadai village, who gave the same information, were also video-recorded. All three informants were adamant that the death march track had never passed anywhere near their villages, old or new, but had followed the Taviu River – the same information previously given to Tham and myself by other local people who had worked for, or been in contact with, the Japanese.

‘The older man at Miruru revealed that, although there had been white soldiers in the village during the Indonesian Confrontation in the 1960s, the only white man who had been in the village in WW2 was a POW whom he had ‘rescued’ from the track near Kuporon and then passed to the headman at Telupid. I knew of this incident, as a report to this effect is in Australian archives. The man further demonstrated his intimate knowledge of the death march route by naming the rivers appearing on the archival map as rivers that needed to be crossed, and confirmed the location of the Japanese camp site at Lolosing (also marked on the map and which I have visited), the correct route up Taviu Hill (also previously checked out by TYK, my husband and myself) and that, from the summit, the track went directly down to Tampias.

‘He stated that there was definitely no diversion into Miruru, and seemed astounded that anyone could possibly think that the death march passed by the village, saying ‘other side, other side’ and pointing in the direction of the Taviu Valley. He also stated that, apart from small hunting trails known only to the villagers, no connecting paths linked the Liwagu Valley to the Taviu Valley during WW2.

‘His son, the present headman, categorically denied that he has ever met or spoken to ‘the Australian tour operator‘, whom he heard was in the village recently. Indeed, he stated that he refused a request for an interview. He is therefore understandably angry and upset that his good name and reputation as a man of standing in the community have been used and exploited to give credence to such bogus claims.

‘Wetherall’s further claim that his route through Miruru village has the backing of Sabah Tourism is untrue. When asked about the veracity of this statement, Sabah Tourism stated that it is ‘no expert on the technicality of the Death March Track and Route and therefore will refrain comments on the subject’.

‘The route of the death march has never been a secret. Anyone with a copy of the archival map who has intimate knowledge of the river systems can retrace the route, which is what Tham Yau Kong did in late 2005. The path currently followed by TYK trekking groups is as close as possible to the original track, keeping in mind environmental, land ownership and other considerations.

‘This is especially true for the climb up Taviu Hill.

This section of the track is now the subject of a new claim by Wetherall, who states that it had been ‘lost’ and that he has recently ‘discovered‘ it. He further claims that he is the first white person to enter the area since the end of the war. He is wrong on all counts.

‘This sector has never been ‘lost’. Identified and assessed by the TYK team, my husband and myself, it was featured on the TYK website in early 2009, and listed as a possible short trek for individuals. However it was not offered to general trekking groups as it passes through highly protected Class 1 forest, which cannot be disturbed in any way or entered without permission from the Forestry Department.

‘As this area is also very prone to flash floods, and there is a seven-hour ‘no escape’ trek to reach the summit requiring a high level of fitness, until 2011 it was considered unwise to attempt to use it. TYK parties always ascend Taviu Hill by a parallel route that is safer, and less environmentally intrusive, while still giving trekkers an insight into the hardships faced by the POWs.

‘However, on 21 August this year, with the necessary permission obtained, weather conditions dry, and a trekking group that was superbly fit and very environmentally aware, the TYK team guided a group of British soldiers, who were covering the entire distance from Sandakan to Ranau, up the Lolosing route.

‘The intention to use this route was announced on 12 August. On 22 August, the day on which the Daily Express reported that the soldiers had completed the climb the previous day, media in Australia and Malaysia reported that an Australian tour operator, Wayne Wetherall, had ‘found’ the ‘lost’ Lolosing route on 13 August.

‘To support his assertion, ‘breaking news’ was posted on his website, along with several photos. These images depict the route he claims to have ‘found’ by ‘slashing’ his way through what is Class 1 protected forest, on an expedition that he alleges had ‘the support’ of Sabah Forestry, which Forestry officials totally refute. It appears, from the photographs, that this ‘lost’ route is an old, overgrown logging track, leading to an oil palm plantation along the Taviu River.

‘It is worth noting that on 15 August, two days after his alleged discovery, this same operator tried unsuccessfully to attach himself to the British team in order to climb Lolosing – the route he claimed, on 22 August, to have ‘found‘ on the 13th. I suspect that the sole reason for his eagerness to join the UK military group on this particular sector was to find out where to go.

‘The various claims regarding the death march route have certainly generated publicity for this man and his company. Not one claim, however, is supported by historical fact.

‘In summary:

‘1) The historical facts surrounding the Sandakan Death Marches have been available to the wider public since the 1998 publication of my book ‘Sandakan a Conspiracy of Silence‘, a work that took six years to research and complete.

‘2) The map of the Death March route, as documented by the army recovery teams in 1945, has been on public display at the Sandakan Memorial Park since 1999, and at Kundasang War Memorial since 2006.

‘3) The claim that the death march track passed through old, or new, Miruru village is not correct.

‘4) The claim that a section of the track has been ‘lost’ is also incorrect. For environmental and safety reasons a parallel track is used for trekking parties.

‘I stress that I have no financial or commercial interest in any business, either in Sabah or Australia, which derives income or any other benefit from treks or tours in Sabah. My interest in this particular matter is simply to ensure that the history of this tragic and unfortunate chapter in Australian history is correctly and faithfully recorded for posterity.

Lynette Silver
Historian’

Wetherall has previously been exposed for falsly claiming that he had solved the mystery of Captain Sam Templeton’s disappearance at the beginning of the Kokoda campaign.  This, and other claims were exposed in http://blog.kokodatreks.com/2011/04/08/kokoda-spirit-an-oxymoron

. The Kokoda Trail campaign has never been properly analysed from the viewpoint of  ground and tactics.

. There was never any ill-feeling by Allen towards Blamey.  Blamey’s ADC told me  that Blamey visited Allen in Darwin as soon as he could and they spent until dawn yarning in a convivial way.

.  Rowell was the first of the war’s senior officers to come out to present himself in the best possible light.  Blamey declined to write his memoirs for the noble reason that the war was over and he had no wish to damage any of those who fought.

There are three types of military historians: journalist historians, who show little respect for the facts in order to tell a good story; academic historians, who have the time and facilities to unearth new and valuable information, but mainly at the political and strategic levels; and soldier historians, who are the only ones one can trust at the tactical level, for they have been taught to understand the key factor – ground.  Peter Pedersen of the Australian War Memorial is one I have always admired for the latter quality, and now we have Rowan Tracey, who I hope goes on to write further.

Major-General G. L. Maitland AO OBE FRD ED (Retd)
North Turramurra
2 July 2010

Rowan Tracey’s article can be read at:  http://blog.kokodatreks.com/2010/07/21/conflict-in-command-during-the-kokoda-campaign-of-1942-did-general-blamey-deserve-the-blame-2/

The last time I saw Stan was on the 20th of September; and he was, as usual, hungry for news about the Camp and Power House; his eyes always lit up just at the mention.
 
He was very proud to show me the draft of his biography by Bill James; which features on the top half of the cover the photograph that you have on the ‘Order of Service’ sheet.
And on the bottom half – a photograph of Stan charging up the Rugby field, ball under his arm, wearing the Power House Colors that were so dear to him.
 
Lord Somers Camp was life changing experience for Stan that he never forgot  – and it instilled in him the values by which he lived his life of commitment, courage, humanity and humility.
 
Stan was a natural born athlete and by the time he first went to Camp in 1933 he was a strapping young man standing almost 6ft 2 in (187 cm) tall;  weighing 13 ½  stone (85 kg.) of solid muscle. 
 
He was a successful sportsman in many areas; representing Victoria at the javelin; he also played tennis, cricket and Australian Rules, he was a strong swimmer and a gymnast.
He tried out for St.Kilda VFL Australian Rules team but after a game of Rugby with the St.Kilda Rugby Club he decided that was the game for him.
 
Stan’s introduction to Lord Somers Camp is quite a story on its own!!
 
He had attended some weekend camps in 1933 and at the Easter Camp that year, a bee’s nest was being smoked out of the pulpit of the Bush Chapel  as  Stan was strolling down to be beach.
 
The scantily-clad Stan was stung in a rather delicate spot around the groin area which he always politely referred to as his “John Thomas”.
Stan attended first aid and ice packs were applied but after three days it was decided that the sting had to be lanced.
 
It was at that time; that Doc McAdam, with the surgical instrument delicately poised, formally invited Stan to become a member of Lord Somers Camp; on the condition, of course, that he would play Rugby for Power House.

Stan remarked that; under the circumstances he had little choice and so his involvement with Lord Somers Camp and Power House Rugby Club was sealed.
 
Stan soon became prominent with Power House and Victorian Rugby; in 1934, he was appointed Captain of the Power House 1st grade team and not long after Butch returned to Melbourne to join Lord Somers Camp and play Rugby.
 
This was the Golden Age for Power House Rugby and Victorian Rugby.

In 1937, the powerful Springboks toured Australia and played against the Victoria State team which included six Power House members as well as Weary Dunlop from the Melbourne Rugby Club.
 
Initially the Victorian team was overawed by the strength and size of the visitors. Weary, was a key player in the team due to his size, and Stan felt that he hadn’t been pulling his weight in the 1st half of the game. So, at the beginning of the 2nd half, Stan biffed Weary who thinking that a Springbok had hit him; lifted his effort and the home team outscored the visitors in the second half, eventually losing 45 – 11
 
Stan played well enough to be selected to play for the Australian XV against the Springboks in Brisbane the following week-end.

They lost dismally to the Springboks 36 – 3;
 
After the game a Sydney Morning Herald sports reporter and former Wallaby, Syd King, took Stan aside and told him that if he wanted to cement his place in the Wallabies as a second-row or flanker, he would have to put on 10 kilos extra.
 
He took the advice and in 1938 Power House captained by Stan, defeated the New South Wales ‘A’ Team on the Manly Oval and won the ‘A’ Grade Premiership in Melbourne just five years after the Club’s foundation.
 
Doc’s recruitment of Stan had proved to be very wise!!
 
When the 1939 Wallabies team to tour England was announced, three Victorians,  Stan, Andy Barr and Max Carpenter; all men from Power House Rugby Club, were selected symbolizing the pinnacle of achievement by Power House as few Victorians have since played Rugby for Australia.
 
As you know, the touring team arrived in England on the 3rd of September; the day war was declared between England and Germany and no games were played.
 
Over-shadowing Australia in the late 30’s was the threat of war in Europe,
 
Doc MacAdam was acutely aware that Australia should be prepared for such an event and, in spite of resistance, Lord Somers Camp established ‘C’ Company of the 14th Battalion as a training unit in 1937;
 
Within weeks 250 members of Camp had joined up with Phil Rhoden as second in command; Stan and Butch were lowly privates.
 
It was a result of this that Phil Rhoden, Stan, Butch and many other Power House men enlisted with the 2nd 14th when war broke out.

This exploitation of local carriers would not have been allowed in 1942 and it should not be allowed today.

The PNG Kokoda Track Authority has established a Rangers Station at the start of the trail at Owers Corner but it seems to be all tiger and no teeth as evidenced by a Post Trek Report from one of our Adventure Kokoda trek leaders:

‘We departed Owers Corner the same time as (an Australian) Group of four trekkers and seven carriers.

‘I observed their packs being weighed- the heaviest being over 31kg and the lightest was 28kg.

‘On being told by the ranger that their packs were overweight the head guide informed the ranger that they were happy to carry the packs and that was the end of the matter.

‘On day 2 coming down Imita Ridge one of the (Australian group) carriers blew his knee out and could not continue. The trekkers were travelling well ahead of their carriers who could not keep up with them and consequentially there was no one to treat him. I examined his knee and he appeared to have knee ligament damage and also a torn muscle in his thigh. I left him at Va Ule creek but saw no way he could continue to trek with his pack weight’.

The overloading of local Kokoda porters is related to cost-cutting by rogue trek operators. These operators regard the PNG Kokoda Track Authority as a toothless tiger and they know they can flaunt their Code of Conduct and Licensing Agreement with impunity.

According to the KTA website www.kokodatrackauthority.org there are now 47 licensed trek operators on the Kokoda Trail. They are competing in a market that has declined by 54 per cent over the past year. The most effective way for rogue operators to cut costs is to cut the number of porters for their groups. Local porters are easily exploited in this regard as they there are now fewer opportunities to get work. That is why they advise the Rangers that they are happy to carry the extra weight.

Another major cost in conducting treks is the charter of an aircraft to drop food for the second half of a trek at Efogi village. Feedback indicates that only a couple of trek operators continue with this practice due to increasing charter costs.

If the KTA is genuine in protecting the physical welfare of local porters from exploitation by rogue operators they should address this problem without delay.

The solution is simple. Our experience is that it takes three PNG guides/group and personal carriers to support one Australian trekker. This is based on the following assumptions:

1. The trek operator will comply with the KTA Code of Conduct and limit the maximum weight to be carried by each Carrier to 20 kg.
2. The trek operator has organised a charter flight to deliver supplies for the last half of the trek to Efogi village.
3. Trekkers engage a Personal Carrier – the ratio can be reduced slightly for those trekkers who carry their own backpack.

If the trek operator cannot produce a receipt for a charter aircraft to deliver additional food to Efogi village at the half-way point then the ratio of porters to Australian trekkers in the group should be 5:1. All the Ranger has to do then is count the number of Australian trekkers in a group, count the number of PNG guides and carriers supporting them and multiply by 3  if they can produce a receipt for a charter aircraft, or 5 if they can’t.

This obviously means that rogue trek operators will have to charge more for their treks but it will also mean that more PNG guides and carriers will be employed and it will decrease the risk of physical injury caused by overweight backpacks.

Australian trekkers who do not wish to be party to the shameless exploitation of local PNG Guides and Carriers should ask two simple questions of the trek operator they choose:

1. Have they arranged a charter aircraft for a food resupply at the half-way point?
2. Do they have a ratio of three PNG guides/group and personal carriers for each Australian trekker – or five if there is no pre-arranged half-way drop?

Those who choose to trek with an operator who knowingly overloads their guides and carriers become partners in a shameless act of exploitation which is a poor reflection on the Kokoda spirit.

The proclamation was the result of a proposal submitted by Charlie Lynn of Adventure Kokoda.  Charlie made the following speech to the NSW Parliament on 2 May 2006:

KOKODA COMMEMORATION DAY

The Hon. CHARLIE LYNN [6.50 p.m.]: Last week, on the occasion of my forty-first crossing of the Kokoda Track in Papua New Guinea, I was privileged to present the Prime Minister, Sir Michael Somare, with a strategic plan for the proclamation of the Kokoda Trail as a national memorial park. The objective of the plan is to develop a sustainable eco-trekking industry for the Koiari and Orokaiva people who live along it. These people are custodians of land sacred to our Australian heritage and they will protect and care for the various battle sites if we provide them with an incentive to do so.

The plan came about when the former Minister for Veterans Affairs, Bruce Scott, advised me that the Government had no master plan for the development of the Kokoda Track. His successor, Danna Vale, advised me that if I were to devise such a plan she would present it to the Government for implementation. We then established a Kokoda Track Foundation, which raised the finances to complete the plan. We worked in partnership with the Worldwide Fund for Nature, the University of Technology, Sydney and Templeton Galt.

We engaged Colonel David Knaggs to facilitate the process. That involved workshops in Sydney, Efogi Village, Kokoda Village and Port Moresby, and included Koiari and Orokavia clan leaders and landowners, local, provincial and national government bodies, and other stakeholders such as the RSL, Rotary, the Kokoda Track Authority and the Papua New Guinea National Cultural Commission. Sir Michael was generous in his response to the plan and we hope to work in partnership with his Government in its implementation. We intend to present the plan to the current Minister for Veterans Affairs, the Hon. Bruce Billson, in Canberra on 15 June.

Kokoda, like Gallipoli, has had a slow awakening. While the story of Anzac was well known to all Australians as a result of our annual commemoration of Anzac Day, it was not until Peter Weir’s epic film Gallipoli around 30 years ago that the peninsular developed into a pilgrimage for young Australians. This led to an increasing interest in other Australian battles on the Western Front, where our Anzacs, under the inspiring and visionary leadership of General Sir John Monash—arguably the greatest Australian of all time—were instrumental in the defeat of Germany. So it is with Kokoda.

Recent documentaries and books on the Kokoda campaign have led to an awakening of the importance of the battles along the track during the period from 8 August to 16 November 1942. This interest is also evident in the increasing number of Australians trekking across the track. Last month some 600 Australians aged between 10 and 70 trekked across it. The impact of the experience on those who trekked it is profound. They feel betrayed that they were never taught anything about it; They feel ashamed that we have ignored our Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels by never issuing them with a medal, and are disappointed at the neglect of significant battle sites.

Notwithstanding these disappointments, they feel proud that they have walked in the footsteps of the brave and have conquered some of their own adversities along the way. They also feel proud that they have shared the experience with their fellow Australians and have re-established a strong relationship with our PNG cousins. There is no doubt that Kokoda is stirring the emotions of our current generation just as Gallipoli did to a previous generation.

Therefore I believe we should take the next step and consider the proclamation of a Kokoda Day of Commemoration on our national calendar. It should not be a holiday but a day when services are held in our schools and communities. I believe 3 November should be proclaimed as Kokoda Day. I acknowledge that the Kokoda campaign began with the first contact between 39 Militia Battalion and the Japanese forces forward of Kokoda on 24 July 1942 and ended with the crossing of the Kumusi River in pursuit of the retreating Japanese on 16 November 1942.

The battle across the track began with the Japanese attack on the Kokoda Plateau on 27 July 1942 and ended when the Australians re-entered Kokoda on 2 November and raised the Australian flag in the village on 3 November. I believe that the raising of the flag symbolised our victory against all the odds, a victory attributed to the success of our naval forces in the battles of the Coral Sea and Midway and our airforce in its continual bombing sorties against Rabaul and Japanese naval and amphibious forces. Kokoda is symbolic of all these victories.

In 2002 I supported a proposal for a Battle of Australia Day and argued that Kokoda was too narrowly focused. Since then I have completed many more crossings of the track and have had access to much more research material, which has caused me to change the view I expressed at that time. Kokoda is the only time in our history where Australian territory was invaded by a fanatical and powerful enemy force. Our diggers were outnumbered, outgunned and out-trained but they contested every inch of the track back to the last line of defence, where they rallied and forced the invading Japanese forces back, and re-entered the village of Kokoda on 2 November. No Kiwis, British or Yanks were involved—it was purely an Australian operation.

Kokoda is symbolic of the fighting qualities evident among our soldiers, sailors, airmen and servicewomen in all of our campaigns in the south-west Pacific area. The anniversary of the raising of the Australian flag at Kokoda on 3 November 1942 would, I believe, be the most appropriate day to commemorate Kokoda Day. Therefore I call on the Federal Government to proclaim 3 November as Kokoda Day and include it as a national day of commemoration.

Charlie Lynn then submitted the following proposal for Kokoda Day to be proclaimed to the Prime Minister of PNG, The Rt Hon., The Grand Chief, Sir Michael Somare:

Executive Summary

Australia was unprepared for the war in the Pacific in 1942. Our faith in ‘great and powerful friends’ coming to our aid in the event of Japan entering the war was shattered with the sinking of HMAS Prince of Wales and HMAS Repulse near Singapore on 10 December 1941 and the secret deal struck by UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill and American President Franklin Roosevelt for American aid to be directed to the European theatre of operations at the expense of the South West Pacific.

The defence of Australia and its mandated territory of New Guinea was dependent on untrained militia forces and a small band of New Guinea Rifles as our experienced AIF units were returning from Europe to meet the new threat.

Resources were so scarce in New Guinea that young males were forcibly recruited to support the war effort. Many of these men from remote mountain villagers had no idea of the war and were conscripted against their will. They were told that men from Japan were the enemy. For many of these men other villagers living in remote tribal lands were also considered ‘enemy’. One can only imagine the fear and uncertainty they felt as they were forcibly marched away from their families and clans.

They were designated as Carriers but were to become known as ‘fuzzy-wuzzy angels’ because of their selfless sacrifice in assisting wounded and sick diggers during the various campaigns.

They carried vital war supplies on their bare shoulders in endless lines over hostile and inhospitable terrain. Modern day trekkers are in awe of their efforts. Without this vital link in the chain of our war effort Japan would have been successful in the conquest of New Guinea.

Today, 67 years after the Pacific War, they are the only link in the chain not to have received any official recognition. Many claim they were not properly paid. None were ever issued with a medal. No day has been set aside to commemorate their service or sacrifice.

It is difficult to understand why successive Australian governments have ignored this important omission.

The recent upsurge in interest in the Kokoda campaign by Australian trekkers indicates there is a strong desire for our wartime links with Papua New Guinea to be recognised. This can be achieved by providing them with an incentive to visit, or revisit the country.

The proclamation of a ‘Kokoda Day’ dedicated to the wartime carriers would provide this incentive.

This paper recommends that November 3rd be officially proclaimed as a day of commemoration for the carriers. This is the day the Australian flag was raised at Kokoda – a ceremony that would never have been possible without the support of the New Guinea Wartime Carriers.

Objective

To seek the support of the National Government of Papua New Guinea to proclaim 3rd November as ‘Kokoda Day’ to commemorate the service of the wartime carriers.

Background

The PNG Carriers who supported Australian troops during the Pacific have never been properly recognized. Some were never paid and none ever received a medal for their service.

According to our official history of the war in the Pacific by Dudley McCarthy (Australia in the War 1939-1945, p116) the Australian New Guinea Army Unit (ANGAU) was authorised by the Australian government to provide for:

‘the conscription of whatever native labour might be required by the Services..’

Rates of pay were to be determined and the Senior Military Officer or District Officer was empowered:

‘to have the natives so employed to enter into a contract with the Australian Government.’

It has been estimated that some 10,000 PNG nationals served as Carriers in support of the Australians during the Kokoda campaign in 1942.

A further 42,000 are estimated to have been indentured to support Australian troops in the Milne Bay and the Buna/Gona campaigns. They were paid 10 shillings per month.

According to wartime journalist, Osmar White :

‘ANGAU contrived a maximum mobilization and use of native labour. At the critical period, its method of conscription was even more arbitrary than German recruiting in the early days. In some villages every able-bodied male over the approximate age of sixteen years was rounded up, transported to the clearing centres, and thence drafted to whatever type of work had priority in the immediate emergency. Brutal disciplinary measures had often to be taken in the field; but when the first and worst crises of invasion were surmounted, ANGAU did what ti could to conserve the life and health of its native levies and to maintain the viability of native communities depleted of 40 or 50 per cent of their able-bodied men. Under military rule, the labourers’ health was more carefully considered and their diet in general better than under private employers before the war. ANGAU was fully aware of the value of native labour and co-operation to the Allied effort.

What is not understood by many is that male villagers indentured for work as Carriers faced two potential enemies – the invading Japanese and traditional clans whose customary land was foreign to them.

During the period 1944 to 1957 approximately 2 million pounds was paid by the Australian Government in compensation for property damage to PNG nationals by the Australian Government. In 1975 PNG gained independence and the PNG Government assumed all legal obligations for compensation of its veteran community.

Unfortunately the PNG Carriers were excluded from benefits under legislation for compensation of PNG nationals who served in the Defence Force. In 1980 they were also deemed to be ineligible for the PNG War Gratuity Scheme for ex-Servicemen.

In 1981 the Australian Government paid $3.25 million to the PNG Government under the Defence (PNG) Retirement Act as a final payment for compensation for Carriers. In 1986 the PNG Government introduced payments of PNGK1,000 for each surviving Carrier. The payments ceased in 1989 and many Carriers claim to have not received any money.

During the 50th anniversary of the Kokoda campaign the issue of payment and compensation for many of the Carriers who claim they were never paid was raised with the Keating Government.

On 21 April 1992 The Australian newspaper reported that returned servicemen in PNG had called on the Australian Government to pay hundreds of local war veterans who helped Australian troops during the Kokoda campaign. According to the report:

“The President of the PNG Returned Services League, Mr Wally Lussick, said Australia had sent about $3.5 million to PNG to help compensate local war veterans in the early 1980s, but much of the money had gone to the wrong people and a large group of carriers missed out.

“Mr Lussick said much of the money went to those press-ganged into being carriers for the Japanese and many people who took no part in the war received payments.

“The visit to PNG later this week by the Prime Minister, Mr Keating, for Anzac Day services to mark the 50th anniversary of the Kokoda battles would provide a good opportunity for Australia to make a commitment to the surviving carriers, he said.”

In the PNG Post-Courier of 24 April 1992, the Prime Minister of PNG, Sir Rabbie Namaliu called on Australia ‘to help compensate WW2 carriers and stretcher bearers”. He raised the issue with Prime Minister Paul Keating at the time. According to the Post-Courier:

“Most of the carriers and ex-servicemen received compensation payments from Australia in the mid-1980s, but many legitimate veterans from the Southern Kokoda Trail near Port Moresby, missed out.

“PNG authorities estimate up to 200 surviving carriers are still waiting for some kind of payment from Australia for their wartime labour and service.

“Mr Namaliu said the Government was considering making an approach to Australia to identify and pay those carriers who have gone unrewarded for half a century.”

On 5 May 1992 the Bulletin with Newsweek reported:

“Keating says compensation cases will be dealt with on their merits and all worthy claims examined; but no concrete sum for individuals has been discussed. The difficulty of maintaining a list of the original carriers is underlined by how few speak English. Family members of dead carriers are calling for posthumous compensation – after all, they took part in a battle that Keating described this week “as more important to Australians than any other battlefield in Europe or Africa.”

Whilst Prime Minister Keating was genuine in his desire to resolve the issue it is clear that his bureaucracy put it in the ‘too hard basket’ at the time.

The argument that ‘it would be inappropriate for the Australian Government to consider taking any further action on this matter in the absence of a detailed proposal from the Papua New Guinea Government’ was a cop-out.

The increasing numbers of Australians trekking Kokoda and reconnecting with the ‘sons of the fuzzy-wuzzy angels’ will be enthusiastic supporters of a day dedicated to their memory.

Kokoda Awakening

Kokoda is experiencing a slow awakening as evidenced by the following numbers of Australians now trekking across the track:

1. 2001: 76
2. 2002: 365
3. 2003: 1074
4. 2004: 1584
5. 2005: 2374
6. 2006: 3750
7. 2007: 5146
8. 2008: 5621

Amongst the trekkers in the above figures have been Federal and State politicians, prominent media personalities, successful business people and a number of private schools.

Remembrance Day – Papua New Guinea

Remembrance Day commemorates Papua New Guinean servicemen who sacrificed their lives in World War 11 and Bougainville. It occurs on 23 July which commemorates the day in 1942 when the Papuan Infantry Battalion first fought against Japanese soldiers near the Kumusi River in Oro Province. Remembrance Day is a public holiday.
In 2008 Governor-General Paulias Matane paid tribute to these soldiers and added:
“Also we must remember those who provided intelligence reports, coastwatchers and the fuzzy wuzzy angels. All these fallen heroes contributed in a significant way to the strategic defence of our land then and today.”

Kokoda Day

Whilst Remembrance Day commemorates the service of Papua New Guinean servicemen who served, and those who sacrificed their lives in action during the Pacific War and the Bougainville crisis, Kokoda Day would be dedicated to the service of the Wartime Carriers.
Kokoda Day would not be a national holiday. It would be a day of commemoration which could include:

• a morning service in schools (thus providing an opportunity to educate Papua New Guinean students on the achievements and sacrifices of their grandfathers);
• a flag raising re-enactment at Kokoda; and
• a service at Remembrance Park in Port Moresby.

Why 3 November?

The Kokoda campaign began with a full scale attack on the Australian 39th Militia Battalion on 29 July 1942. The campaign lasted three months as the Australians were pushed back to last line of defence on Imita Ridge. The Australians rallied at this point and pushed the Japanese back across the track. Kokoda was recaptured on 2nd November 1942 and the Australian flag was raised at a service the following day.

The flag raising ceremony symbolised the turning of the tide in the Pacific War. It also symbolises the service and sacrifice made by Carriers in all campaigns throughout PNG.

This victory would not have been possible without the vital support of the PNG Carriers across the track. In addition to their contribution to the war effort hundreds of Australian soldiers owe their lives to the selfless sacrifice of the Carriers who guided and carried them to safety over inhospitable jungle terrain in the most adverse of circumstances.

Tourism Benefits for Kokoda (Oro Province)

The proclamation of Kokoda Day would provide an incentive for Australians to travel to Papua New Guinea for the commemoration services.

Following is a monthly summary of Australians trekking Kokoda in 2007:

1. January: 4
2. February: 10
3. March: 57
4. April: 909
5. May: 254
6. June: 658
7. July: 959
8. August: 938
9. September: 735
10. October: 494
11. November: 78
12. December: 50

The proclamation would effectively extend the trekking season into November by providing an incentive for Australians to visit PNG. There are many Australians who are not physically able to trek Kokoda however they would visit the village if there was a strong reason for them to do so.

Commemorative activities would not be limited to a single day in Kokoda. It could include short treks up to the Isurava Memorial, across to Abuari and down the Eastern side of the range which was defended by the 53rd Militia Battalion. It would also provide them with an opportunity to extend their stay and visit the beachheads at Buna and Gona thus bringing increased tourism benefits to this region.

In addition to the re-enactment of the raising of the flag Kokoda Day would provide an opportunity for local clans to showcase their Orokaiva culture with sing-sings, traditional dances, markets and craft displays.

In Port Moresby a service could be held at Remembrane Park in the morning and a beating of the retreat at Bomana War Cemetery in the evening.

Diggers Tributes to PNG Wartime Carriers

In a report on the medical aspects of the fighting withdrawal in the face of overwhelming Japanese forces after the Battle for Isurava was lost, Colonel Kingsley Norris, Assistant Director Medical Services with the 7th Division praised the work of the Australian medics. No living casualty, claimed Norris, was abandoned to the enemy and overall 750 wounded and sick were shepherded down the track to safety. Norris was also full of praise for the ‘walking wounded’. They had, in Norris’ words, to be treated with ‘absolute ruthlessness’ and not provided with stretchers:

‘Those alone who were quite unable to struggle or stagger along were carried. There was practically never a complaint nor any resentment … One casualty with a two inch gap in a fractured patella, splintered by a banana leaf, walked for six days …’

Captain ‘Blue Steward, Regimental Officer, 2/16th Battalion:

“… they never forgot their patients, carrying them as gently as they could, avoiding the jolts and jars of the many ups and downs. The last stretcher was carried out by the Regimental Aid Post boys, two volunteers, Padre Fred and myself. Till then we never knew the effort needed, nor fully appreciated the work the carriers were doing. Their bare, splayed feet gave them a better grip than our cleated boots could claim on the slippery rocks and mud.

“Some of the bearers disliked the tight, flat canvas surfaces of the regulation army stretchers, off which a man might slide or be tipped. They felt safer with the deeper beds of their own bush made stretchers – two blankets doubled round two long poles cut from the jungle. Each time we watched them hoist the stretchers from the ground to their shoulders for another stint, we saw their strong leg, arm and back muscles rippling under their glossy black skins. Manly and dignified, they felt proud of their responsibility to the wounded, and rarely faltered. When they laid their charges down for the night they sought level ground on which to build a rough shelter of light poses and leaves. With four men each side of a stretcher, they took it in turns to sleep and to watch, giving each wounded man whatever food, drink or comfort there might be.

Laurie Howson, 39th Battalion:

“The days go on. You are trying to survive, shirt torn, arse out of your pants, whiskers a mile long, hungry and a continuous line of stretchers with wounded carried by ‘Fuzzy-Wuzzies’ doing a marvellous job. Some days you carry your boots because there’s no skin on your feet. But when I look around at some of the others – hell! They look crook! Then I have seen the time when you dig a number of holes in the ground and bury your dead. Nothing would be said, but you think ‘maybe it will be my turn next.”

Conclusion

The Australian army would have been defeated in the Kokoda campaign if they had not received vital logistic support from the New Guinea Wartime Carriers. Hundreds would have died of their wounds and tropical illnesses if they had not been carried off the track.

These wartime Carriers have never been officially recognised. The Australian government specifically excluded them from benefits under legislation for compensation of PNG nationals who served in the Defence Force. In 1980 they were also deemed to be ineligible for the PNG War Gratuity Scheme for ex-Servicemen.

The service of the wartime carriers and the sacrifices they made towards the allied victories in Papua New Guinea should be honoured and enshrined in a special day dedicated to their memory.

The most appropriate day is November 3 as the Australian flag would never have been raised on the Kokoda plateau if it had not been for their service.

Recommendation

‘Kokoda Day’ be proclaimed on 3rd November each year to commemorate the service and sacrifice of the New Guinea Wartime Carriers.

Major Charlie Lynn MLC

It was evident that the Kokoda Trail had been ignored by successive Australian Governments since the end of the Pacific War in 1945.

In 1992 I wrote a paper calling for the PNG Government to recognise the benefit of developing Kokoda as an adventure destination:

‘In the short term PNG should focus its tourist development on its natural assets – the country and its people. And it should develop policies to cater for the niche adventure market.

‘The Kokoda Trail is an ideal model. The trail has a special aura because of its significance in the war. The rugged beauty of the Owen Stanley Range and the nature and disposition of the villagers along the trail are unique attractions to the adventure tourist.

‘Tourism along the trail will create social and economic benefits for the villagers. Local guides will be employed, food will be procured, accommodation will be used, and artefacts will be purchased.

‘The 50th anniversary of the campaign across the Owen Stanley Range is a unique opportunity to refocus international attention to the challenge, the rigours, and the people of the Kokoda Trail. It provides an opportunity for the government of PNG to establish a model for adventure tourism which would otherwise take many years to establish’.

In 1994 I submitted a paper calling on our Federal government to seek to proclaim the Kokoda Trail as a National Memorial Park:

‘Any plan that is developed should consider the fact that PNG does not have a welfare system and the Koiari and Orokaiva people who live along the track operate a subsistence economy. They are also the custodians of the land on which the battles that saved Australia were fought.

‘If we develop our long term plan around providing a regular source of income for them we can be assured that they will protect and honour the battlesite we restore, the educational memorials we build and the village museums we assist with.

‘The objective of the master plan should therefore be to develop a self-sustaining eco-adventure trekking industry for the Koiari and Orokaiva people who live along the Kokoda Trail.’

It was difficult to progress the idea as the responsibility for such a plan did not fit neatly into a single Ministerial portfolio. I was advised by the Minister for Veterans Affairs that the government did not have a master plan for the development of the Kokoda track. With the concurrence of the Minister I volunteered to develop one.

I enlisted the support of Kelvin Templeton of Templeton-Galt who later engaged Dr Stephen Wearing of the University of Technology Sydney and Mr Paul Chatterton of the World Wide Fund for Nature in PNG to conduct workshops in Sydney, Port Moresby, Efogi village and Kokoda.

In 2003 my company, Adventure Kokoda Pty Limited, funded the establishment of the Kokoda Track Foundation to raise funds for the strategic plan and to develop shorter term educational, health and sporting initiatives for the Koiari and Orokaiva people along the track.

We then engaged Colonel David Knaggs of Davendish Consulting to facilitate workshops and write the plan.

I am indebted to the Directors of the Foundation, namely Kelvin Templeton, Yahoo Serious, Peter Thomas, Patrick Lindsay, Paul Croll, Genevieve Nelson, Dr Michael Cooper, Andrew Schauble, Brett Kirk, Gillian Marks, Sue Hoopman and Tony Stewart who were generous with their time and expertise. We were ably supported by our Secretary, Natalie Shymko; our Treasurer, Tiffany Couch; our Solicitor, David Frecker and our Auditor, John Flynn who provided their services in an honorary capacity.

I am also indebted to the Chief Executive Officer of the PNG Kokoda Track Authority, Mr. Warren Bartlett and his Board Members; representatives of the PNG National Government, Central and Oro Provincial Governments; Koiari and Kokoda Local Level Government authorities; and the clan leaders, landowners and other stakeholders along the track who hosted and participated in our workshops in PNG.

I wish to thank the RSL and Services Clubs Association, the Victorian Branch of the RSL, Johnson and Johnson, Templeton-Galt, WWF, the University of Technology Sydney and Adventure Kokoda for their corporate support. I also wish to thank the numerous individual donors who have ensured that village students will now have a better chance of obtaining a proper education and that villagers along the track will benefit from some of the medical supplies and sporting equipment we have delivered to them.

This is the first step in the process of having the Kokoda Trail proclaimed as a National Memorial Park and achieving a World Heritage Listing. I commend it to the Australian and PNG governments and urge them to use it as a reference document in the development of Kokoda and other significant Pacific War battlesite as the basis of a sustainable eco-tourism industry for PNG.

You can view the Strategic Plan we developed at http://www.kokodatreks.com/docs/StrategicPlanfortheKokodaTrailwithAttachments_000.pdf

Lest we forget,

Charlie Lynn

The Overseas Memorials Search website allows viewers to access details and photographs of over 110 official and privately constructed overseas memorials honouring Australian service.

Minister for Veterans’ Affairs, Alan Griffin said the website would make planning a visit to an overseas memorial easier for Australians.

New resource for overseas memorials

“Australians have served in locations throughout the world – not only protecting our nation, but helping to protect our neighbours and allies,” Mr Griffin said.

“Official memorials have been established by the Australian Government or the Commonwealth in many of these locations, and local communities have also erected special memorials and monuments.

“I encourage all Australians to consider visiting an overseas memorial as part of future travel plans, or as part of research into our wartime history.”

He said the new database provided travellers with details about memorials on the Kokoda Track, a memorial plinth at Subic Bay in the Philippines and a memorial stone in Elands River in South Africa.

“The database will continue to grow as more data is collected, and I invite people with information about the location or details of overseas memorials to contact my Department,” Mr Griffin said.

“The stories behind each memorial are unique and provide a powerful reminder of the courage of Australians who served and died overseas.”

He said an example of one tribute to Australian soldiers was in the Danish town of Stadil, where locals had built a wooden cross to commemorate the crew of the Lancaster bomber EE138, which was shot down by a Luftwaffe night fighter in 1943.

The crew of eight men, four of whom were Australian, managed to steer the Lancaster away from the village before it crashed, but died for their efforts.

The new website was available at http://memorials.dva.gov.au

SIX days into walking Kokoda Olivia Pratley had had enough.

Physically she was being worked harder than ever before.

Mentally and emotionally, she was struggling being away from her beloved family in a foreign country amidst some of the most remote – and technologically isolated – terrain on earth.

“I was really questioning why I was there. I was physically stuffed and crying almost every day,” she said.

“Then on day seven John, our guide, came up to me and handed me Clarrie Meredith’s dog tags.

“We’d met Clarrie (a WWII vet) before we flew out from Sydney and John said to me he had promised to give the tags to someone on the walk who was trying hard, but wasn’t quite doing their best.

“He told me he wanted me to make the top of the next ridge without stopping once and I did. When I got to the top I handed the tags back to John.”

It instilled the confidence Olivia needed to complete the gruelling 120km journey and made her re-evaluate exactly why she was doing the walk.

The 17-year-old Melville High student had been chosen to participate in the trek as part of a Clubs NSW initiative.

Young people between the ages of 16 and 22 are given the opportunity to walk in the footsteps of the many brave souls who fought and perished along the track during the Second World War.

Olivia, whose great grandfather and great uncle both served along Kokoda, said before she left that she expected the experience to be life changing.

Upon returning home she was certain it had.

“John had a saying. You don’t go to Gallipoli for a swim and you don’t go to Kokoda for a walk, there’s far more to it than that,” she said.

“It wasn’t until I got home I realised this is a major achievement. I never thought by age 17 I’d be completing the Kokoda track.”

After touching down in Port Moresby, Olivia and the 21 other trekkers were driven to a small regional airport before flying in to Kokoda.

They had originally intended to bus in following the tragic plane accident which claimed the lives of several Australians earlier this year, but civil unrest in the area meant they had to fly in instead.

Upon landing at Kokoda airfield the group was met by around 250 Papuans, all clamouring for a position as a porter or guide on the trek.

Tour company Adventure Kokoda employs about 250 Papuans as guides and porters on a rotating roster.

The first day of the trek would prove the easiest, with a short walk across flat, open terrain to a small village just out of Kokoda where the group spent its first night.

“Really the first day was about getting used to the humidity and acclimatising,” Olivia said.

Day two was the start of the gruelling climbs Kokoda is best known for, which do not abate until the trekkers complete their journey at Ower’s Corner 10 days later.

Every morning began with a Cooee call at 5.30am and trekkers were required to be on the road no later than 7.30am.

“Each day we’d have two trek leaders who would basically eat last and make sure everyone was up and ready,” Olivia said.

“Part of your job was motivating people to keep going, while at the same time each day you’re pushing your boundaries further and further.

“I challenged myself to a level I’d never before reached.”

A stop at the Isurava Pillars memorial midway through the track was a particularly poignant moment for Olivia.

The four pillars, in a clearing overlooking a magnificent forested valley, symbolise the values of courage, mateship, endurance and sacrifice.

Each of the trekkers was asked to stand beside the pillar they felt best embodied them.

“I stood next to courage, because it takes courage to start anything,” Olivia said.

There are not the words in Koiari to ask about Kokoda’s spirit. That is an Australian construct, and a reasonably modern one: the sort that made Paul Keating bend down and kiss the earth at Kokoda in 1992, that wrote the word ”mateship” on the memorial built there a decade later, and sends almost 6000 Australians down the track each year.

After six days on the track I sit in front of one of the last Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels, Ovuru Ndiki, and attempt to ask the question anyway; to understand why it is everyone but the Australians must be paid to walk what was, 100 years ago, a simple mail route. Why four years ago we started doing it in such numbers, at such cost, to such risk.

”It’s something to remark on what happened,” Ndiki tries to explain the idea of spirituality, 105 years closing in around his eyes and emptying his mouth of teeth. ”There is some of us left behind. Walking the track, you can pick up pieces of that.”

In the past decade, the number of people picking up those pieces has increased 74 times. It is now Papua New Guinea’s most popular land-based attraction – a band of wealth in the jungle, worth as much as $50 million a year, supported entirely by Australians.

Sports teams come here to bond. Kevin Rudd and Joe Hockey made it one of the first legs of 2007′s Sunrise election. Bags at the airport must now be X-rayed for souvenired grenades. Where two years ago there were five trekking companies, now there are 30. ”If you can get yourself a business card, you can take people up the track,” says John Nalder, who guides me through the 133 kilometres. ”It’s really exploded since 2005.”

At night, you can hear the sound of sobbing coming from tents. The track is, without question, the most difficult thing I have done. The climbs are ceaseless and painfully steep. At one point, doubled over with food poisoning that will last six days, I black out from vomiting.

”Amazing” is the most common description of the trek. Then gruelling. In 10 days, I lose 13 kilograms. ”Everything is a search for something, a search for identity, for who they are,” Nalder says. ”Australians have had a cringe about who they are, and that’s changing. I do get people who want to brandish the flag, but it’s a love thing, it’s a patriotic thing. It’s not the redneck, white supremacist one.”

The track itself is almost an extension of Australia. It was, until 1975, part of an Australian territory. Even now, villagers along the track wear jerseys from the National Rugby League. There is a discarded Vegemite jar on the climb out of Isurava and dull triplets of ”Aussies” and ”Ois” ring through the Owen Stanley Ranges.

Many more Japanese soldiers died here than the 625 Australians killed. But Japanese almost never walk Kokoda. Those that come are usually flown in and out by helicopter. They are there not to experience some national myth but to farewell ancestors. Of the two Japanese memorials on the track, one has had the muzzle of its gun set into the ground – a mark of submission lobbied for by the RSL. The other has been destroyed by trekkers.

”We get so much exposure to American culture that’s so strong and so steeped in history. Perhaps we’re trying to get on to some of that,” says Andrew Skehan, a 30-year-old history teacher who won a 2GB competition to walk the track. ”The new national curriculum – Australian history is the first thing on there. Perhaps Australia’s push towards a place on the international stage makes us see we have to define ourselves so we can say we stand for something.” For the most part, however, trekkers struggle to explain why they have come; what made them spend up to $6000 on a journey through heat, mud and steep climbs, with heavy packs and sickness. For those without relatives who fought in the 1942 campaign, there is vague mention of achievement. A walk that would buy them a beer back home, with something about national history on the side.

But the words of Nathaniel Ryan, a 17-year-old preparing to join either the police or the army, are more common: ”Mate, I’m just concentrating on where to put my feet.”

The place of Kokoda in Australia’s psyche is a vestige of Keating’s cosmopolitan prime ministership. This was his region. In 1995, wearing a hornbill headdress, he was inducted as an Orokaivan chief in Kokoda. But it was only after a decade of John Howard’s narrowed patriotism that Australians started walking the track in any great numbers – and the story of Australians defending Australia really set in. A book from Peter FitzSimons helped, too.

Three years before Keating’s chiefly induction, he and his entourage flew three RAAF Caribou transport planes to the Kokoda airstrip. It is a cleared piece of jungle, below the razorback country where the fighting took place, with a palm oil plantation on one side and grassland on the other.

At the expense of Gallipoli, he described this earth as the essence of Australia’s nationhood. Standing a day’s walk from that spot, on the hillside where the monument Keating wanted was finally built, two girls start crying. My trek leader cries also. A 17-year-old youth announces he will join the army.

”There can be no deeper spiritual basis for the meaning of the Australian nation than the blood that was spilled on this very knoll, this very plateau, in defence of Australia,” Keating said here the year that youth was born. ”This was the place where I believe the depth and soul of the Australian nation was confirmed … The lesson of this place is that those young men believed in Australia and we need to give Australians – all Australians, particularly young Australians – an Australia to believe in.”

By 2004, as Howard began in earnest his flag-pole assault on Australia’s ”values neutral” schools, the Kokoda walking had already begun. Records, which only start in 2001, show 76 trekkers in a year. By 2005, that number had grown to 2374 and has continued to almost double each year since.

That there are both a 96-kilometre tourist track and the 133-kilometre wartime version says a lot about what Kokoda has become. ”I was moved, more so than I expected to be,” says Bec Walsh, a 21-year-old medical science student, part-way down the track. ”It’s hard not to be affected.” Walsh is there as part of an RSL program to educate young leaders. It is the same program that was used, more or less, for the national rehabilitation of Ali Ammar after he desecrated the Australian flag in the Cronulla Riots reprisals. ClubsNSW also fund a group.

”I don’t know if I feel more Australian,” says Clair Edwards, who was chosen to walk the track because her grandfather fought there. ”But I feel more deeply in touch with my heritage. I have this deep attachment, it’s not just knowledge; now, it’s emotional. I know my country on a more personal level.”

The people walking the track have changed in the past two or so years. There are fewer trophy trekkers, fewer people walking simply to say they did it. They are now more likely to be middle-aged than young adventurers – men with to-do lists, who carry pictures of fathers who fought on the track. But while their fathers had an average age of 18 when they fought here, these men have an average age of 50. ”My dad told the larrikin story, the fun stories,” says Martin Stuart, a 48-year-old engineer whose father was in the 39th Battalion. ”But I’m here to find out the rest, to piece it together.”

A day earlier, a trekker in Mr Stuart’s group died after less than two hours on the track. Four others have died in the past 12 months.

They are joined by the 13 who died on a Twin Otter flying to Kokoda to begin the trek in August. The deaths are, in some ways, understandable – the trekkers are older, there are more of them, unscrupulous providers are walking without satellite phones or medical supplies – but the effects on the market are unknown. Some suggest the deaths make the myth more real, that memorials to modern dead have been seen up and down the track for years.

”It’s not helpful,” the chief executive of the Kokoda Track Authority, Rod Hillman, says. ”It’s difficult to move forward until we find the cause of death. The newspaper here is reporting [the most recent death] as an aneurysm. That could happen watching TV. But the growth’s been quite exponential. I think it’s unlikely to get that growth again.”

Erik Jensen trekked with the Kokoda Youth Challenge – a leadership program for young people developed by Adventure Kokoda and supported by the RSL Services Clubs Associaition and Clubs NSW.  Eriks’s trek was led by John Nalder and Jo Roberts of Adventure Kokoda.