Forgotten ANZACS : the campaign in Greece, 1941 / Peter Ewer.

Collection type	Library
Author	Ewer, Peter.;
Call Number	940.541249 E94f
Document type	Monograph
Year	2008.
Pagination	vi, 419 p., [16] p. of plates : ill., maps, ports. ; 24 cm.
Publisher	Scribe Publications,
Note	Includes index. Bibliography: p. 379-387. Every school child in Australia and New Zealand is brought up on the legend of the ANZACs, but how many know the story of another Anzac force which fought not at Gallipoli, but in Greece a generation later? On 12 April 1941, General Thomas Blamey, commander of the Australian Imperial Force in the Mediterranean, issued an order of the day announcing the formation of a new Anzac Corps. Australian and New Zealand troops were at the time fighting side by side in Greece against an invading German army that had been triumphant everywhere. With the very existence of his force in the balance, Blamey invoked the spirit of Gallipoli to inspire his troops, suggesting: the reunion of the Australian and New Zealand Division gives all ranks the greatest uplift. The task ahead though difficult is not nearly so desperate as that which our fathers faced in April twenty-six years ago. We go to it together with stout hearts and certainty of success. Those hopes would be quickly dashed. Desperately outnumbered, and fighting in deeply inhospitable conditions, the Anzacs found themselves engaging in a long retreat through Greece, under constant air attack. Most of the Anzac Corps was evacuated by the end of April, but many men got only as far as Crete. Fighting a German paratroop invasion there in May, large numbers were taken captive and spent four long years as prisoners of the Nazis. The campaign in Greece turned out to have uncanny parallels to the original Gallipoli operation: both were inspired by Winston Churchill, both were badly planned by British military leaders, and both ended in defeat and evacuation. British bungling at Gallipoli was one thing; but in Greece, Churchill authorised his commanders to leave the Anzacs to their fate if their rescue compromised wider British interests. Just as Gallipoli provided military academies the world over with lessons in how not to conduct a complex feat of arms, Churchills Greek adventure re
Place made	Carlton North, Vic.

Abstract

For king and country ... and the paid adventure -- Tracks they travelled -- Building a Balkan front -- Blocking a blitzkrieg : Battle of Vevi, 10-13 April 1941 -- At the feet of Zeus they fought -- Disaster averted : Battle of Pinios Gorge : 17-18 April 1 941 -- Of rearguards and treachery -- Anzac Dunkirk -- Battle of Crete : 20 May-1 June 1941 -- Legacies.