The book highlights Australian historical events in both world wars. The issues written in the book were tackling the impacts of world wars on the Australian economy, the soldiers and servicemen, the government, and women or indigenous people in society (Miles, 1947). It also highlights several essential points in Australian war engagement, for instance, the impact of experiences faced by women in society during the war.

“I saw war firsthand; she had no illusions about its grandeur. She saw it in terms of the dead, mimed, and realized its futility p170. This chapter seeks to recover some of the stories that reflect the fluidity of the boundaries of war as it affected a range of women’s experiences in the paid and voluntary labour domain. It extends beyond the “emotional labor” of Red Cross Volunteer war work on the home front as described by Bruce Scates and the contested battlefields between professional and volunteer, the “veiled warriors” of Christine Hallett’s seminal study of allied nurses. Unlike Britain, New Zealand, and America, the Australian military was very conservative when it came to what were considered suitable tasks for women in war. Even though Australian women had won the battle for suffrage years earlier than most of their allied sisters, this significant political success appeared to have had little influence when it came to a war service.” (Miles, 1947)  

It was recognized as a success when it provided the war survivors with a diverse theatre, the Western Front, though it later led to a terrible loss of lives and other diverse effects on Australian lives.    

The researchers use this book as a primary historical source on Australia’s world war impacts to update the current society on past experiences and how they could handle such worse experiences like world wars just suppose the war emerges again. The book and other primary written journal sources are essential in giving historical images of Australia’s war impacts.     

The secondary visual source

The artwork source is “Bombs welcomed by Troops in Jungle” by The Anzac legend

The visual artwork images showcases the rivalry between European nations driven by nationalism caused the outbreak of World War I between the years 1914 to 1917, with Australia as an earlier British colony still had to close its ties with Britain (Dennis-Henderson, 2020). By the time Britain affirmed war on Germany in August 1994, it was obvious Australia would support its mother country in that particular war, with several Australian men joining the army to support Turkey’s Gallipoli campaign from the year 1915. While the Gallipoli actions should continue to be commemorated, it was necessary to emphasize the important actions with Australia being involved on the Western front (Kerby et al., 2019). The images display the first main war for Australian servicemen and soldiers that occurred in Gallipoli Peninsula, Turkey, giving a foretaste of the obliteration fueled by the campaign that occurred between April to December in the year 1915.

War Impacts on Australians

Both World War I and II imposed adverse effects on the Australian soldiers and servicemen mentally and physically (Miles, 1947). The physical aspect was through multiple injuries they encountered and harsh environmental conditions during the war. The mental effects are associated with the trauma and horror-like experiences they faced at war. The National Australia Archives depicts that over 900, 000 Australians were involved in the armed forces during World War II, leaving behind many soldiers with multiple injuries and mental issues (Dennis-Henderson, 2020). Statistically, approximately 27,000 war soldiers succumbed; over 23,000 Australian soldiers were physically wounded, while a good number of about 32,000 soldiers were confined by other nations. This indeed showcases the pain and distress undergone by the soldiers and their families.

The Australian participation in World War II imposed various challenges, according to statistical research showing that about four percent of the total population lost their lives by the end of World War II as a result of war and harsh environmental issues (Miles, 1947). This led to an economic crisis in Australia, a country based on agricultural products as the key economic activity. The war imposed unfavorable environmental conditions for farming activities in several ways, like insufficient human labor to work in agricultural firms because men were involved in war activities. Besides, the war imposed a disruption in international shipping, a major transportation mode for imported and exported products (Kerby et al., 2019). This delinked the country’s business partnership with various foreign investors and other nations, meaning that a country with poor or no trade partnership couldn’t sustain its economy.

Australia’s participation in the world wars was a threat to various families’ relationships in that the family setting lost its values and was no longer the same (Dennis-Henderson, 2020). Jean King, a wife to one of the servicemen, stated that soldiers and servicemen during the World War looked down upon their lives full of post-traumatic stress and horrific imaginations from their war experiences. They later adopted a weird culture, full of smoking and drinking activities, with the assumption of relieving them of war stress and trauma (Miles, 1947). Contrarily, this worsened the family relationship, for they would vent out their stress on family members after drug consumption. Several soldiers were forced to exclude themselves from their families and live in more secluded areas, while others took their own lives just to cope with war experiences.

The Anzac spirit’s impact on the world war was more beneficial than harmful to Australian soldiers and servicemen (Miles, 1947). The spirit imposed positive qualities like courage on the soldiers, good humor, and mentorship to Australian soldiers and servicemen during and after the war experience. The Anzac spirit faced various criticisms from soldiers and servicemen, but it gave them hope and encouragement to participate in the world wars.

Women and children were negatively impacted by the World War II experiences in that women were to replace men in the workforce because men were taking part in the war (Miles, 1947). The elder children were then pressured to take care of the younger siblings back at home. The government also had to be involved in supporting its soldiers, either through war tools or foodstuffs. Generally, both world wars imposed adverse impacts on Australians’ lifestyles.     

References

Atkinson-Phillips, A. (2018). Beyond the ANZAC spirit: commemorating civilian experience of          war. Studies in Western Australian History, (32), 135-147.

Dennis-Henderson, A. G. (2020). Analysis of World War One Images using Natural Language Processing (Doctoral Dissertation).

Kerby, M., Baguley, M., Lowien, N., & Ayre, K. (2019). Australian Not by Blood, but by Character: Soldiers and Refugees in Australian Children’s Picture Books. In The Palgrave Handbook of Artistic and Cultural Responses to War since 1914 (pp. 309–326), Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.

Miles, F. (1947). The Story of Famous Australia. Southerly, 54(4), 169–186.