Keith Jackson & Friends: PNG ATTITUDE

A rose for his grandfather’s grave

BY LAURA TRIESTE

EMOTION HAS spurred Andrew McDougall to take on the challenge of the Kokoda Track.

‘‘My grandfather fought in the war in New Guinea,’’ the Kellyville resident said. ‘‘He fought in the Middle East and then he went to Kokoda and was killed there. He was 25.’‘

Mr McDougall left for PNG with a group of ten friends and has spent eight days walking the track. His journey will finish with a dawn stand-to at Bomana tomorrow.

He is the first member of his family to visit the grave of his grandfather, Herbert Arthur Warne [pictured].

His grandmother, Esma Stuart, was very happy when she heard he would be making the trip. “She’s really proud and she’s given me a rose to put on the grave,” Mr McDougall said.

Source: Hills Shire Times, Sydney

Teacher on track for a testing Kokoda lesson

BY SARAH O'CONNOR

A NOBLE PARK teacher has overcome her hatred of camping, spiders and leeches – by walking the Kokoda Track with a group of Dandenong residents.

Jo Cucchiara [pictured with students], assistant principal at Noble Park Secondary College, wants to discover all she can about Australia's World War II campaign in Kokoda.

This includes writing a blog, taking photos and recording film footage of the trek. When she returns, Ms Cucciara will share the history of Kokoda with her students by incorporating it into the school's curriculum.

“There's room for improvement in terms of bringing Kokoda to the forefront of the Australian history curriculum,” Ms Cucchiara said.

She has been told to expect about 25 centimetres of rain each day on the Track. "We're going in the wet season because we want it to be the same as what the 39th Battalion went through," she said.

"I want to show the students the commitment and sacrifice and those values the soldiers had."

Ms Cucchiara said she was not known for her love of the outdoors. "I've never slept in a sleeping bag. I have a fear of leeches and spiders," she said.

But Ms Cucchiara has trained rigorously for up to 20 hours each week. She has already dealt with another anxiety, even before leaving the country. "I've already overcome my fear of needles - I think I've had about five already."

Source: Greater Dandenong Weekly, Melbourne

Jack was a driving force in the war effort

BY TIM WILLIAMS

JACK BOWMAN’S father owned a bus company, so the army thought the 19-year old would make a good driver.

He reported for training at Woodside on Christmas Day 1941 and, just days later, left Adelaide for PNG to spend two years trucking artillery and supplies around Port Moresby Harbour with the 13th Field Regiment.

The regiment’s guns were positioned about 15 km inland in preparation for a Japanese land invasion. “If they came ashore, we would have had to mow them down,” Mr Bowman says.

It never came to that after the victory of Allied forces in the Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1943, which played out before his eyes and was the only time he was truly frightened. “That was the turning point in the war as far as I’m concerned.”

Mr Bowman, now 87, says troops became blase about the endless Japanese air raids of 60 or 70 bombers swooping on the harbour each day. “When you’re there it doesn’t worry you. You’ve got plenty of mates around you.”

After the war Mr Bowman joined his father and brother driving for Bowman’s Bus Company taking over the business in 1950 and expanding it to a fleet of 44 buses.

He treasures Anzac Day for the annual reunion of the 13th Field Regiment. “Only about 50 of the 750 are left. A lot are from the Tea Tree Gully area and Norwood and so on. “You never forget their friendship.”

Source: Leader Messenger, Salisbury, South Australia

Nothing good comes from war, says veteran

BY ANNA PRYTZ

WORLD WAR II VETERAN Dick Goold [pictured] feels that talking about his harrowing posting to PNG is difficult but necessary.

Readying himself for tomorrow’s Anzac Day ceremonies, Mr Goold, 89, said he speaks about his devastating wartime experiences to ensure future generations are aware of war’s brutal reality.

“For a lot of the fellas, it’s very hard to talk about,” he said. “Some friends of mine were Rats of Tobruk and they can’t talk about it without getting emotional.

“But you do need people to know that nothing good comes from war. There have been so many of them over the years and nobody seems to have learned that yet.”

After enlisting in the Royal Australian Air Force as a mechanic, Mr Goold said he was posted to Port Moresby when he was 19. He remembers vividly the rough and unhygienic living conditions, constant bombings, fear and uncertainty as well as the mateship of fellow troops.

“It stays with you, that,” Mr Goold said. “I was there about nine months and that was more than enough for me. Some of those things you never forget.”

A member of Templestowe RSL since 1962, Mr Goold has been prominent in the club’s Anzac Day services. I’m always there and I do the raising of the flag,” Mr Goold said. “It’s good to keep the spirit going.”

Source: Manningham Leader, Melbourne

Kokoda memorial walk on the Gold Coast

BY MATTHEW KILLORAN

SUPPORTED BY A walking frame, Kokoda veteran Jim Stillman, 90, had pride in his eyes as he watched dozens of people march past in memory of an Australian legend.

Mr Stillman, who served in the 39th Battalion at Kokoda, was the guest at Rotary Kokoda Memorial Walk on Queensland’s Gold Coast on Sunday.

He said he was sad that, for the first time, he was the only veteran of the Kokoda campaign at the memorial walk, but was encouraged by the number of young people taking part in the event.

''It's getting very good, it's getting better every year,'' said Mr Stillman.

''I think it's quite good the Gold Coast has several different events which honour the Kokoda legend and veterans,'' said Geoff Stillman, Jim's son, who walked the full 26 km.

Event organiser George Friend said more than 100 people participated in the memorial walk, raising more than $4,000.

The money will go to the Kokoda Memorial Hospital, Legacy and the Premier's Disaster Relief Appeal.

The Kokoda Memorial Walk is held each year on the Sunday before Anzac Day.

Photo: Gold Coast-Tweed Pipes and Drums on the Kokoda memorial walk

Source: Gold Coast Bulletin

Kokoda trekking season opens for 2011

PNG TOURISM officially launched the 2011 Kokoda trekking season last week at The Mint in Sydney.

Guests were captivated by Bill James, Director of the Lost Battlefield Trust and writer of Field Guide to the Kokoda Track, as he shared his knowledge of the area and reconfirmed the discovery of the lost battlefield where a body has been found and is believed to be one of the five Australians unrecovered.

It is anticipated that they will begin opening parts of the lost battlefield over the next 12 months, allowing visitors to experience first-hand what it was like 68 years ago. Weapon pits, war debris, expended ordinance, machine guns, helmets and much more are still on the ground as it was when the Australians attacked this region.

Major improvements have been undertaken and further scheduled upgrades include a new airport and infrastructure, a joint initiative between the Australian and PNG governments to protect and encourage tourism.

Rod Hillman Chief Executive of the Kokoda Track Authority, advised that emergency medicine doctors are doing research into hydration to ensure safety for visitors.

Porters and guides are being trained in basic first aid and wilderness first aid so they can support travellers and help educate local villagers.

Research has shown that word of mouth is the means to the increase of trekkers visiting PNG. Over 17,000 Australians visit each year.

“Trekkers are having good experiences and this translates directly to increased bookings,” said Vera Huntink sales and marketing manager for PNG Tourism in Australia and New Zealand.

“Over the last two years significant work has gone into raising standards along the track, encouraging community engagement and giving back to communities.

Track discovery may be Australian digger

BY CAROLINE MARCUS

RESEARCHERS SURVEYING a lost battlefield on the famed Kokoda Track may have found the body of a missing Australian Digger after uncovering a buried boot [pictured].

The brown left boot, corresponding to footwear worn by Australian soldiers, was discovered with human remains during an archaeological survey at the site of the last Kokoda battle of 1942, which remained hidden until it was found last year.

Known as the Lost Battlefield, the jungle terrain at Eora Creek, near Alola in PNG, was where Australian soldiers of the 16th Brigade, 2nd AIF, engaged elements of the Japanese army's 144th Infantry Regiment in late November 1942.

Over eight days, 79 Australians and about 69 Japanese were killed. The bodies of five Australians are still missing.

During the survey, two sets of human remains were discovered as well as one and two-man gun pits corresponding to Japanese defensive positions. Although the nationality of the dead is yet to be confirmed, the team believes one body could be that of an Australian because of the boot and other items found.

The Lost Battlefield Trust, which commissioned the survey, yesterday released a report into the findings. The trust's chairman, David Moffatt, said the findings were of national significance and it was "incredibly humbling" to have the opportunity to identify and recover a soldier almost 70 years after the battle.

"It is not confirmed that it is Australian but the weight of evidence suggests it is," Mr Moffatt said yesterday. "It would be wonderful to recover a Digger."

Defence Department staff will travel to the site to confirm the nationality of the soldier, and may use DNA testing. If Australian, he will be reburied at the Bomana War Cemetery.

Source: Brisbane Sunday Mail

Kokoda track is Australia’s major shrine

BY JEFF KENNETT

AS WE APPROACH Anzac Day on 25April, the country starts to focus again on the theatres of war that have taken young Australian men and women overseas to be involved in conflicts that have ensured Australia's independence.

In World War II, for the first time, Australia experienced an opposing force in and around our own territory.

The biggest threat to Australia was undoubtedly the Japanese landing in PNG - at that time Australian territory - and their attempt to secure PNG as a base from which to continue their advance south.

The Kokoda Track was crucial to the Japanese advance. Up to 13,000 Japanese army and naval personnel were deployed in a campaign that was to last only six months, concluding in the defeat of the Japanese in the third week of January 1943, when they were driven from the same beaches from which they launched their campaign only months earlier.

But during those six months, one of the most heroic battles was staged by a grossly outnumbered, and in the main untrained, Australian force, in the most difficult terrain and weather conditions imaginable.

As much as we remember Gallipoli, it is perhaps the Kokoda campaign that has been the most defining military conflict involving Australian troops, given the grave potential threat to mainland Australia.

Since that terrible conflict, PNG gained its independence from Australia on 16 September 1975. Australia continues to be a major benefactor to its development. But the country is young, and the contrasts are extreme between the wealth of a few and the poverty of many. Sadly, corruption is rife and crime, particularly in Port Moresby, is frightening.

On the other hand the mineral wealth within PNG has in part been identified and is now starting to be extracted. It will bring enormous wealth and potential to the country, if the corruption that exists at the highest levels does not kill the golden goose.

You really get the feeling that PNG is at the crossroads and unless careful might degenerate into the worst of Third World countries. They need to recognise their shortcomings and introduce reforms themselves and/or seek help from those with experiences and skills they do not possess.

But to me the real wonderment of PNG still remains the Kokoda Track.

Source: Extracts from a story in the Melbourne Herald-Sun.   Jeff Kennett is a former premier of Victoria.   Spotter: Peter Kranz

Kokoda Track Foundation expands presence

BY PATRICK LINDSAY

WE WERE DEEPLY disappointed at recent ill-informed remarks made by ‘Disappointed Track Dweller’ in the Post-Courier about the use of the Kokoda Track Foundation’s funds and our decision to expand our programs to benefit the wider PNG community.

We normally don’t respond to people who do not give their name with their comments but these anonymous claims are so misguided we must set the record straight.

First, the writer has confused the Kokoda Track Foundation with the Kokoda Track Authority.

The Kokoda Track Foundation is an Australian-based not-for-profit organisation that has been helping communities along the Kokoda Track since 2003. All funding for our projects comes from donations raised entirely from the Australian public: individuals, corporations, trek operators, and philanthropists who all want to lend a hand to our nearest neighbour. We don’t receive any funds from trekking fees.

On the other hand, the Kokoda Track Authority is a PNG local government Special Purpose Authority, charged with administering trekking operations along the Track. Its funding comes from fees paid by trekkers.

Second, the writer has failed to do his homework.

This year our Foundation will have 300 students on scholarships, all of whom come from families from the Kokoda Track catchment area. We award these primary, secondary and tertiary scholarships on the basis of the following strict selection criteria: (1) academic merit; (2) gender equality; (3) family need; and (4) residence in the Koiari/Orokaiva catchment area.

The Foundation also supports 35 elementary, primary, and secondary schools with textbooks, library books and stationary. We are currently delivering classroom furniture to many of these schools, as well as hospital beds to aid posts, health centres and hospitals. We fund teacher and health worker training, provide medicines to aid posts and hospitals and we underwrote the Northern Province Seed Restoration Program in response to Cyclone Guba. All of these schools and activities are in the Kokoda catchment area.

Late last year our Foundation won a grant from The Trust Company, a leading Australian trustee company administering the estate of the late Fred P. Archer, that allowed us to establish the Archer Leadership Scholars Program, our first program available to students throughout PNG.

Under the scholarships, each year six outstanding students in their final year of tertiary studies will receive a year-long program of intensive leadership and mentoring activities in PNG and Australia. The program aims to develop leadership skills and abilities through mentoring, community development placements, work experience, tuition and boarding support, resource support, and an exchange program to Australia.

Fred Archer was an Australian who spent 54 years in PNG, a planter, businessman, WWII Coast Watcher and philanthropist. It was his dream to help PNG find its next generation of leaders. Our Foundation has always shared this goal.

As our Foundation grows, we look to expand our programs throughout the Track catchment area and to other needy communities across the country so we can make real differences in the lives of Papua New Guineans.

Patrick Lindsay is Chairman of the Kokoda Track Foundation

The Kokoda Track Foundation welcomes enquiries about any of its programs in education, health, community development, and microbusiness in PNG. Please contact the Foundation’s executive director, Dr Genevieve Nelson on +61 2 9252 2992 or gen.nelson@kokodatrackfoundation.org

Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels honoured at Kokoda

THE SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTION of the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels during World War II was acknowledged at a medallion ceremony in Kokoda yesterday.

Australia’s High Commissioner to PNG, Ian Kemish, presented commemorative medallions to six recipients.

In a statement, Veterans’ Affairs Minister, Warren Snowdon, said Australians will be forever indebted to the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels.

“They provided invaluable assistance to Australians during the Second World War — carrying supplies, contributing to the building of bases, airfields and other wartime infrastructure and, most notably, evacuating the sick and wounded through some of the most hostile terrain ever encountered in modern warfare,” Mr Snowdon said.

Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels Day was established in 2009 and Mr Snowdon said this year’s inaugural ceremony provided an opportunity to mark the involvement of a special group of people who continue to be respected and honoured.

The medallion ceremony was held on 3 November, the day on which the Australian flag was raised above a reoccupied Kokoda village after months of fighting along the Kokoda Track.

The Kokoda campaign began when Australians of the 39th Militia Battalion and members of the Papuan Infantry Battalion encountered Japanese troops near Awala on 23 July 1942. For the next three months the Australians conducted a fighting withdrawal to their last line of defence on Imita Ridge near Port Moresby.

At this point the Australians, now bolstered with reinforcements, rallied and after a number of fierce engagements they were able to push the Japanese back along the track.

The commemorative medallion was announced in April last year and features the famous image of a blinded and barefoot Private George Whittington being helped by Raphael Oimbari. The photograph was taken on Christmas Day 1942 near Buna on the PNG north coast.

Medallions are available to surviving Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels and the widows of Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels, and the Australian Government is still seeking to ensure all surviving Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels are honoured.

Ex-Kiap and war historian Ross Wilkinson writes: “It is good that, whilst we tend to associate "the fuzzy wuzzies" with Kokoda, this appears to be recognising the help of the population in a broader sense.

“The PNG people provided far more wide-ranging assistance to allied troops in PNG during the war. Villagers recruited by ANGAU received remuneration for their assistance and a small number of the population received individual honours or recognition of a tangible kind. 

“But many assisted in a totally voluntary way, whether it was guiding lost soldiers and airmen back to their own lines or guiding Coastwatchers to new locations from which to carry out activities.

"Most of the people we readily identify as 'fuzzy wuzzies' were contracted workers through ANGAU.  The ones who deserve recognition were those like the villagers of New Britain who assisted the remnants of Lark Force escape along the coast to be rescued.  They didn't get paid for that.  I am presuming that the mention of Rabaul in the statement recognises this aspect of activities in the region.

"There were villagers in the Owen Stanleys who guided the downed airmen back to allied lines.  There were many executed by the Japanese when caught doing these things.  There were labourers in Port Moresby on the wharves subject to regular bombing  and there were the labourers carrying supplies and wounded  back and forward on the Bulldog Track, and so on."

Kokoda hero Stan Bisset MC OAM dies at 98

BY PATRICK LINDSAY

STAN BISSET (1912-2010), who died on the Sunshine Coast yesterday, was one of the heroes of the Kokoda campaign in WWII, and Australia’s oldest Wallaby rugby international.

I’ll never forget watching Stan as he stood in front of his beloved brother Butch’s grave at Bomana War Cemetery outside Port Morseby. It was August 1998, during what Stan and his fellow Kokoda Diggers called ‘The Last Parade’, their pilgrimage to say a final farewell to the mates they left behind.

It was the first time Stan had visited the grave since Butch had died in his arms on the Track 56 years earlier. He stood there silently for a long time. I could see the emotions surging through him.

As always, he stood ramrod straight but tears welled in his noble eyes as the memories flooded back.

There before him lay Butch, his life cut short by the terrible random selection of war like so many others on the Track. Stan had vowed to lead a good and productive life to honour Butch’s sacrifice.

And he had been as good as his word. He had raised a fine family, forged a long and successful career and had done all in his power to keep Butch’s memory and the story of Kokoda alive.

While I watched, Stan gently wiped the tears from his eyes with his powerful hands and then brought them to his side. He squared his shoulders and paused. Then he swept his right arm up in a crisp, practised salute: an homage from a warrior, a farewell from a brother.

Stan had a deep-rooted sense of duty and an unshakeable sense of honour. He had star quality: that indefinable amalgam of physical presence and character that sets the remarkable ones apart. He was a genuine sporting hero who blossomed into a military hero in the cauldron of war.

I vividly remember when I met him for the first time, doing interviews with the veterans for a documentary. My immediate thought was that they’ve ordered a hero from Central Casting and they’ve sent the perfect specimen.

Stan’s former commanding officer and lifelong friend, the late Phil Rhoden, told me that Stan had no time to grieve for Butch during the battles along the Track and took many years to recover from the loss.

Like so many other Kokoda veterans, the campaign was one of the defining experiences of Stan’s life. Somehow, Stan dealt with the blows and got on with his life.

Stan Bisset is quite simply one the finest men I ever met. I was privileged to call him a friend and a mentor for twenty years. He personified so many attributes of the Digger to me: courage (both moral and physical); compassion; selflessness; independence; loyalty; resourcefulness; devotion; coolness; and humour.

He carried himself with the bearing of a natural leader and a champion sportsman. Even as he neared his century, he continued to inspire me and all those who know him with his dogged refusal to surrender any ground to Father Time.

Since the rediscovery of the Kokoda story about 15 years ago, barely a day would go by without someone wanting to contact Stan and meet him. Without fail, he gave his time and his support.

In 2000, Stan was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for his service to veterans, particularly through the 2/14th Battalion Association.

Stan is survived by Gloria and his children and grandchildren

Stan Bisset, like his story, is timeless.

Patrick Lindsay is an author and Chairman of the Kokoda Track Foundation. This obituary appeared earlier on the Foundation’s website - http://www.kokodatrackfoundation.org

Kokoda improvements boost trekker safety

BY KEITH JACKSON

THE AUSTRALIAN Government has committed an additional $3.1 million to fund safety projects along the Kokoda Track.

Environment Minister, Peter Garrett, and PNG Tourism and Culture Minister, Charles Abel, said the grant was an important joint initiative.

The first tranche of $1.8 million, announced in September, helped fast-track vital safety enhancements along the Track following a tragic plane crash in August.

The second tranche million will fund major safety projects associated with airstrips, roads, footbridges, communications and trekking health and safety.

The funding will cover navigation equipment, a dedicated radio frequency and new weather broadcasting for flights to Kokoda and the Kokoda airstrip will be upgraded and brought back to its original length.

A vehicle route to Kokoda airstrip will be constructed and the Owers Corner road upgraded to all-weather status.

At the same time new a new radio network will be installed to give trek leaders and communities more reliable communication access.

The Ministers said that over the last six months, the so-called ‘Kokoda Safety Package’ had already addressed key areas including maintenance and equipment for local airstrips and urgent repairs to the Owers Corner road and nearby bridges.

"This season is expected to see a record number of visitors to Kokoda,” Mr Garrett said, “and while all the risks associated with this challenging walk cannot be completely removed they can be reduced.

"The government is really pleased to be working with the PNG government to improve safety on the Kokoda Track, as well as assisting local communities."

Mr Abel said it was important that communities along the track are looked after because of their support for trekkers.

Angels were the real pioneers of today's PNG

BY JOHN FOWKE

"The flag was raised by a Kokoda veteran, alongside a PNG flag raised by a surviving Fuzzy Wuzzy Angel. He said the Kokoda Diggers had fought in the worst conditions imaginable and forced the enemy to retreat.

“They stopped a threat which, if successful, would have exposed the entire Australian mainland to invasion,” Mr Lynn told the gathering. “It’s been said that the first Anzacs created a nation, but Kokoda saved a nation.” He praised the 10,000 Fuzzie Wuzzies.

“They were paid 10 shillings a month,” Mr Lynn added, “and we would have been defeated without them” – The National

_______________________

Mr Lynne is a recognisable authority to the many Australians who are becoming more and more attracted to the idea of Kokoda as some sort of mumbo-jumbo, media- driven proving-ground for the affirmation of the Howardite "Australian Way" and to impart some sort of mystic meaning to lives which like lives everywhere are largely pointless and best to be lived for the day. These are men and women who think nothing of making it plain that they intend to raise money for pet charities by walking the Track; causes located far and away from PNG.

Ever more addicted to that version of vocal patriotism which Dr Johnson famously characterised as the last resort of scoundrels, Australians are becoming ever-more embarrassingly loud  in their proclamation of an unique, perceived national character, proclamations voiced in terms which ignore the fact of the very broad mix of ethnicity present in Australia today.

PNG Attitude runs the risk of becoming PNG Platitude if it does not speak out to make the real position clear and scrub away the scum of patronizing spin with which Australians, especially the tour-operators, increasingly heap upon the native combatants in the WW2 campaigns we are talking about.

The native men, later named Fuzzy-Wuzzy Angels, were in fact a largely unwilling and confused corps of young-to-middle-aged conscripts who had much in common with the also-conscripted and also-resentful Militia component of the Australian forces they supported.

The Fuzzies, all unknowing, were the real pioneers of modern, independent PNG simply by being among those who faced and fought and ultimately subdued the rapacious Japanese Empire, they were heroes in this context and this needs to be said, loud and clear.

The services they provided to Australians were a subsidiary issue, and we do PNG's few remaining ex-WW 2 servicemen, Police and the ex-Fuzzies great insult by placing them in a historic role as loyal, smiling, simple native helpers for the Australians.

They were warriors in their own right, and served and fought in brave and often special-force-like defence of their own land, when the  truth is told; and it needs to be told for the benefit of young, present-day PNG'ians as much as to correct the egregious sales-pitch of the tour operators.

Whilst the ongoing promotion of the popular version of the story may be satisfying for an increasing, and increasingly -ill-informed, number of Australians, the truth is that the Fuzzies, the PIB and the RPC were the pioneers of modern, independent PNG.

Not the Pangu Pati in its white socks and polyester shorts, nor the United Party with its Australian Country Party contacts and Uncle Tom ideals. These fighting men were real blood-sweat-and-tears pioneers who helped to see that their proto-independent nation remained free of Japanese imperial conquest firstly, and secondly, and only secondly, protected Australia from a similar fate.

Trek firms fly high while PNG Angel Day flags

At the same time a World War II flag from Kokoda flies over Sydney today, celebrations in PNG to remember the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels have been cancelled.

The flag, said to have flown above Kokoda 67 years ago when Australian trrops retook the village from Japanese forces, will fly again at Sydney’s Kokoda Track Memorial.

It was brought to Sydney by Soc Kienzle, whose father Captain Bert Kienzle was the officer-in-charge of the Angels.

"My earliest memory of the flag is when I saw Dad take it to a safe at the plantation," says Mr Kienzle.

Director of the Kokoda Track Memorial, NSW politician Charlie Lynn, who also runs commercial tours of the Kokoda Track, praised the 10,000 Angels. "They were paid 10 shillings a month," he said, "and we would have been defeated without them."

About 6000 Australians make what Mr Lynn calls “the Kokoda Track pilgrimage” every year in an industry estimated to be worth about $60 million annually.

There is controversy in PNG about whether Papua New Guineans receive much benefit from the industry as most of the trekking companies are Australian-owned.

And in PNG the inaugural Fuzzy Wuzzy Angel Day commemoration has been cancelled because of lack of funds.

Yesterday was meant to be a special day of remembrance for the esimated 50,000 Papua New Guineans who helped Australian soldiers during World War II.

When the PNG government announced Fuzzy Wuzzy Angel Day last month it said ceremonies would be held at historic sites across PNG.

But Culture and Tourism Minister Charles Abel says there is no money for celebrations.

He says an event will be organised next year.

Meanwhile an old flag will fly over Sydney today as the commercialisation of Kokoda goes from strength to strength.

Aussie Rules: Kokoda as a training drill is obscene

BY PATRICK SMITH

Hawthorn [Australian Rules Football Club] is doing what so many clubs of any code do and it should make us feel very uncomfortable.

The club confuses football with war. It is an easy and lazy thing sporting clubs do. It is never more prevalent than around Anzac Day. A simple match of footy becomes a theatre of battle.

Coaches have taken clubs to the Shrine in the dead of night. Ostensibly to honour the fallen but really to bond the team. It is a trick, a gimmick.

Any comparison between a game of sport and warfare is to both disrespect and trivialise the sacrifice of the men and women who gave their lives for their country. Australians suffered dreadful injuries, were maimed, families torn apart. War as a metaphor for football is obscene.

Hawthorn, under coach Alastair Clarkson, is preparing to walk Kokoda for a third time. The coach hopes to recapture the spirit that drove the club to the premiership in 2008. The club has reduced the experience to a training drill.

Clarkson told the Sunday Herald-Sun on the weekend: "We love to indoctrinate some important messages and there is no better way of doing that than retracing the footsteps of our forefathers who trekked the famous track in 1942.”

It is irksome to use the Kokoda experience as anything other than a mark of respect to our soldiers, the dead, the injured, the men and women mentally shredded by the primitive awfulness of the jungle war.

To piggyback leadership and fitness schemes off the experience for commercial reasons is nothing but distasteful. As it is, the track is becoming more a business enterprise than a piece of history, both proud and tragic.

To walk the track can be done for only one purpose and that is as a mark of respect and thanks to our fighting forces. To use it as anything else is management hubris.

Walking Kokoda to improve your chances of winning football matches is just as inappropriate. War is not a management gimmick.

This is an extract of an article by Patrick Smith published in The Australian newspaper on Tuesday 27 October

Photo: Hawthorn footballers Brendan Whitecross and Cyril Rioli on the track

The Foundation - the honest brokers of Kokoda

 When a trekking company owner dismissed Dr Genevieve Nelson as an “armchair expert speaking from a cocooned office in Sydney” on matters to do with the iconic Kokoda Track, allies soon leapt to her defence.

They didn’t really need to, because her Track record spoke for itself – nine traverses in the last ten years, a PhD gained studying village level education at Naduri, Efogi, and Manari and other villages in the area, and a burning commitment to the people of PNG.

Since January, Genevieve has been executive director of the Kokoda Track Foundation, an Australian philanthropic organisation which aims to repay the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels by helping to improve their lives and their descendants’ lives.

It’s already doing that in an instrumental way assisting with education and healthcare, trying to protect their environment, and helping the growth of responsible trekking and tourism.

The Foundation’s current projects include providing 124 school scholarships to students from villages along the Track, funding educational supplies to 23 schools, supporting the Kokoda Memorial Hospital and constructing seed multiplication nurseries to rebuild village food gardens destroyed by Cyclone Guba.

 I met Genevieve and Foundation chairman, author and journalist Patrick Lindsay [left], at the Jackson Wells offices in Sydney yesterday and we agreed to cooperate in promoting the work of the Foundation through the PNG Attitude blog and newsletter.

There is a quintessential comfort in this arrangement, since there is much controversy surrounding Kokoda’s commercial trekking operators. Aligning with a philanthropic organisation with no commercial interest in what has developed as a $50 million and highly profitable industry should put us on the side of the angels.

The Foundation has a philanthropic model designed to significantly enhance the relationship between Australia and PNG and one that puts most similar organisations to shame. We must hope that it may spread its wings in future to embrace other parts of PNG.

It also has an excellent website here and if you want to become a member for just $50, as I did last night, you can subscribe here.

In fact, given that PNG Attitude has no subscription fee, if you feel like giving something back, I think you ought to join the Foundation.

The real & gritty story of the Kokoda Track

 BY ROSS WILKINSON

Fit young men, fresh from the Middle East and the battle fields of Syria, were sent to Port Moresby.  Their immediate mission to head across the Owen Stanleys to relieve the beleagured and greatly outnumbered and outgunned "chocos" of the 39 Battalion at Isurava.  They were going to show these Japs!

On that first climb up to the crest of Imita Ridge, in their khaki shorts and shirts of the Western Desert, they were strung out and struggling.  Suddenly it wasn't a picnic any more! Each carrying 30+ kilos of personal equipment, weapons and ammunition.  Everyone was carrying two mortar bombs for the 2 inch mortar, extra grenades and an extra bandolier for the Bren LMG.

Occasionally someone would drop out of the line exhausted.  His mate would stop, pick up his pack and move on.  The line never stopped until nightfall.  The next day it would start all over again.

On 27th August 1942, C Company 2/14 Battalion (AIF) arrived at Isurava and dropped into the weapon pits of the 39 Battalion (CMF) in the middle of a Japanese attack. Progressively over the next day the rest of the battalion arrived and were assigned to take over various 39 Battalion company positions. 

Continuous attacks throughout each day at different positions around the defensive perimeter.  39 Battalion, exhausted after several weeks of doing it alone against the Japs, were ordered out of the battle but refused to go.

A party of 30 wounded from the 39th, some distance back at the RAP, reasoned that their mates were in strife and headed back into the battle site. 

Bruce Kingsbury won a VC posthumously by charging into a massing enemy group which threatened the 2/14 Battalion HQ.  Charles McCallum, nominated for a VC, was awarded a DCM for single-handedly providing a rear guard for his platoon to extract themselves from the immediate threat of being overrun by superior numbers of the enemy.  He was alternately firing a Bren and "Tommygun" from each shoulder, stopping to reload one weapon with that hand whilst firing the other weapon to keep the Japs at bay.

Ultimately, the order was given to withdraw and regroup, but, unfortunately, many had to scatter.  A party largely from A Company 2/14 Battalion were cut off; 47 under Captain Syd Buckler, including 7 wounded, tried to find away around the enemy to regain the rapidly withdrawing Australian lines. The wounded had to be carried.

For three weeks they moved slowly forward before realising that a better alternative was to head back towards the North coast.  One of the wounded, Corporal John Metson, shot through both ankles, recognised that the group could not operate effectively and carry all the wounded.  Each morning he would have his hands and knees bandaged and would set off before the main party, crawling!  He would arrive in the dark at that night's encampment.

Finally, a decision was made to leave the wounded at Sangai No 2 village with the medical orderly, Private Tom Fletcher, while the main party moved at pace to find help.  Eventually the main party reached an American camp on the Kemp Welsh River several weeks later. 

Unfortunately, a flight over the village found that the entire party left at Sangai had been murdered after being betrayed to the Japs.  Corporal John Metson was posthumously awarded a British Empire Medal for his courage and fortitude and the example he set for others.  Tom Fletcher died not knowing that he had been awarded a military medal for continuously attending to the wounded under fire throughout the several days of the battle at Isurava.

This is what the Kokoda Track represents and what all trekkers should be prepared for. It is not a walk in the park.  If it hasn't happened already, I am waiting for the day that a family of a deceased trekker sues the trekking company for accepting, and the certifying doctor for providing, a certificate of fitness for something the doctor is not qualified to provide because he has never been to the Track.

When I was young, for weeks on end, I used to run between the villages when on patrol, sometimes for quite long distances.  However, I have not walked the Track and, whilst I obviously have a very close connection to the Track, do not intend to.  I am 62, overweight and have wonky knees.  I don’t need a doctor to tell me I wouldn’t make it. 

Tracking the Trail: undying controversy lives on

Has NSW Liberal parliamentarian Charlie Lynn breathed new life into a fight that is taking a very long time to reach the bell at the end of the fifteenth round?

Is it the Kokoda Trail, as I grew up with and then had confirmed upon my PNG landfall, or the Kokoda Track?

According to Foreign Minister Stephen Smith it’s ‘the Track’. And, in a comment on PNG Attitude, Charlie takes exception to this.

While complimenting the Rudd Government for its positive re-engagement with PNG – making the point that “we must ensure we do not take a 'big-brother' approach as we have in the past” (presumably when the Howard Government was in power) - Charlie reckons that Australians must recognise the right of Papua New Guineans to call the Kokoda Trail … the Kokoda Trail.

“We must … respect their right to name geographical features,” he says. “According to the PNG statute books the correct name for the track between Owers Corner and Kokoda is 'The Kokoda Trail'. The reference is PNG Government Gazette No 88 of 12 October 1972, page 1362, column 2. Notice 1972/28 of the PNG Place Names Committee."

Editorial interpolation: A pre-independence statute that I presume still obtains.

Charlie goes on: “If we would like it changed to 'The Kokoda Track' to satisfy some of the new-age historians in Australia then we should follow due process according to PNG law. Until then Australian officials should refer to it by its correct title.”

I bet it’s the first time Stephen Smith, our small but perfectly formed Foreign Minister, has been called a “new-age historian”.

Historical footnote from the Australian War Memorial:

There has been a considerable debate about whether the difficult path that crossed the Owen Stanley Range should be called the Kokoda Trail or the Kokoda Track.

Both Trail and Track have been in common use since the war.

Trail is probably of American origin but has been used in many Australian history books and was adopted by the Australian Army as an official Battle Honour.

Track is from the language of the Australian bush. It is commonly used by veterans, and is used in the volumes of Australia's official history.

Both terms are correct, but Trail appears to be used more widely.