Christmas message recorded in Cairo, Egypt on 23 December 1941 by the Commander of the 2nd Australian Imperial Force (2nd AIF), General Thomas Blamey for playing to the Australian troops in the Middle East

"Fellow members of the AIF (Australian Imperial Force), I have just had the privilege of visiting home for a very short period. I was called home by the Australian Government to discuss with them all the affairs connected with you and all that pertains to you over here. While I was there I met so many of your friends and so many of your relatives and I got so many personal messages for so many of you that I haven't been able to pass them all along. So, I am happy to have the occasion of talking to you all and I hope there are a great many of you listening in. The messages that I bring back are messages of love from home and the loving Christmas time and the hope that you will soon be back amongst them all to enjoy Christmas with them. Flying down the coast of Australia watching the seas break on the sands along Southport, all the people of Queensland enjoying themselves, all down the coast of New South Wales, the beaches full of people all enjoying the summertime that is just coming in. Down into Victoria and South Australia the fields also so delightfully green and fresh. It was just a late spring in Australia and everything was at its best and it all seemed just so very light hearted. But in the homes of the people from which so many of you have come there is a much deeper feeling and while the war effort is so great and so heavy they are ready to take it and they are putting the whole of their weight and the whole of their energy and the whole of their thought and time into it. Taxation has been made tremendously heavy but nobody is growling, its all their effort to win the war. And so they have let you come away quite readily and quite happily because they feel that you are putting all that there is in life for you into your effort to do it too. And I am quite happy to know that you are training and preparing and working in everyway that you possibly can to fit yourselves for next year's struggle. It is strange that it is just a year ago since our 6th Division was so very busily occupied in Libya driving the Italians out of it and securing the great booty and the great bag of prisoners that they have sent back. And now again both Italian and Germans are well on the run. So it is in Russia the Germans are on the run before the Russians. What an extraordinary change it is in the last twelve months. It is only a little over twelve months ago since we thought our lines with Australia were cut, that there was no possibility of getting our ships up the Red Sea. There was difficulty everywhere and now a change comes over the picture and we are on the upgrade. It is true that the Japs, the barbarians of the east, have taken a part and have now come into the picture. But what has been the effect of this? The sudden attack, the trecherously sudden attack on Hawaii, was like a slap in the face to a noble people and it brought unified America into the war. And now the whole of of the civilised nations of the Pacific literal have joined together and there will be an immense unity of effort and an immense unity of achievement in the Pacific within the next few months. There is a unity of spirit there that bodes ill for the Jap and while he will probably score a few victories and attain a few achivements in the next few months before the full weight of our power is thrown upon him don't have any fear for the result. The unity of America, of Canada, of Australia, the Netherlands Indies and with the British fleet joining in will be more than the Japanese can stomach before the next twelve months are out. And as for our homeland an effort to invade that and to conquer it is beyond his power. He is certainly attacking the Philipines and attacking Singapore area now but it is an immense effort to go to the coast of Australia with a sufficient force to enable him to accomplish anything. So you need have no fear for your homeland, it is quite safe. The only thing that could be of danger would be the power of the Japanese to sweep the British and the Americans navies from the sea and that is far beyond his powers. I have no misgivings I think that the entry of the Japs bringing unity as it does into all of our english speaking efforts will be something that will definitely shorten the war, and I hope it may be so. But my message to you from home is they are thinking of you, they are dreaming of you and they are sending you all of their loving thoughts over this Christmas time and wherever you may be, wherever your home may be in Australia the hearts of all those at home are with you here in the Middle East." END OF RECORDING.