at Rabaul

300 Civilians Were Murdered at Rabaul

Demand For

Inquiry

AT least 300 Australian civilians lost their lives in June, 1942, when the vessel on which they were being taken, as prisoners, from Rabaul to Japan, was sunk off the Philip pines.

Those men should not have been prisoners of the Japanese. They could and should have been evacuated from Rabaul, on the ships which were available in Rabaul Harbour, within the 40 hours between the time when it was known the Japs were coming, and the hour (early morning of January 23, 1942) when the Japs arrived.

Why were they not evacuated?

THE Japs came in great strength.

One Australian battalion, and three or four-score members of the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles, offered a very courageous, but utterly useless resistance. The majority of soldiers and civilians fled westwards into the jungle. The Japs seized the port and destroyed the ships, including one large Scandinavian vessel which could have carried the whole gar rison to safety.

The Japs rounded up most of those soldiers and civilians and put them into prison camps. Their fate is told in the article on page ??

ON at least two occasions since 1942, we have asked that there be an •inquiry into the circumstances sur rounding the seizure of those civilians

at Rabaul by the Japs. Why were they left there, and not brought away by the available ships? The Commonwealth Government officials, with whom lies the responsibility for this tragedy, hlave ignored all re quests for an inquiry. It is said that one Australian Minister remarked with a sneer: “Oh, this is only a journalist hunting for a sensation!”

Now, on behalf of the widows and children of the hundreds of Austra lian men who were needlessly sacri ficed in Rabaul, we say to the Aus tralian Government and its officials: “Unless you can show, by formal in quiry, that failure to evacuate the Rabaul civilians is the fault of par ticular persons, you must accept responsibility for the murder of these men.”

WE have a clear recollection of the circumstances. An examination of the files of Australian newspapers between January 18 and January 25, 1942, will show that the approach of the Japanese invasion fleet from the north was indicated. The news which was passed by the censors for publication was disconnected, but it all pointed in the one direction.

Service and Government messages must have given, to those responsible, a clear and connected picture of what was coming. If they did not, then there was incredible inefficiency in Australia’s defensive organisation.

If there was a clear picture of events, then Australia’s military and adminis trative officials must explain why they did not instruct those Rabaul civilians to get aboard those ships in Rabaul Harbour, and leave as quickly as possible.

Or did the military genius that presided over the New Guinea district imagine that one AIF battalion, six 6-inch guns, five Wirraway planes, and 72 members of the NG Volunteer Rifles could drive off the Jap expedi tion, reported on January 21 or 22 to be approaching Watom Island in a convoy of at least 40 ships? If that military genius did take that view point, then he should be made to pay the penalty of his blundering. He then should be held responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Australian civilians.

SOME reports lay the blame on the military commandant at Port Moresby. Others just as confidently lay the fault at the door of a high official in Canberra who (it is said) ordered both civilians and ships to remain in Rabaul, when the Acting- Administrator, Mr, Harold Page (how dead), urgently asked for instruc tions.

But this is all guesswork. We can not know for a certainty where the blame lies until this official con spiracy of silence is broken down, and all the records are laid open to inspection by a properly authorised Commissioner. Officialdom has shown very clearly that it does not want an inquiry. If an inquiry is ordered, -officialdom probably will go to some

lengths to dodge responsibility, and to smear on the whitewash.

Mr. Ward was not Minister for the Territories when Rabaul was invaded, so his refusal, up to date, to order an inquiry, suggests that he is trying to protect either a Ministerial friend or certain high officials. . . ..

MR. WARD did not show the same reluctance in ordering an inquiry when he was trying to gain u political advantage. Mr. Ward, a couple of years ago, apparently was anxious to get rid of Mr. Leonard Murray, Civil Administrator of Papua* Mr. Murray had been unceremoniously thrust out of the Territory by the military panjandrums; his salary had been as unceremoniously chopped off by Mr. Ward’s Department, so that Mr. Murray presently was compelled to go and get a job from the United States Army; Mr. Murray was ignored, for a couple of years, by Mr. Ward, in all matters relating to the Territories. In other words, Mr. Murray was invited to resign, and take himself out of the Territorial picture.

But the annoying Mr. Murray clung to his Commission as Administrator of Papua—not because of monetary considerations (he can go on to an advantageous pension at any time) but because he was anxious to help the native peoples of Papua, to whom he had given a lifetime of So Mr. Ward gaig to a Melbourne KC, Mr. Barry, a Royal Commission to investigate all the circumstances surrounding the seizure by the rnilitary commandant of administrative authority from Mr. Murray, at Port Moresby, in February, 1942. There had been no public outcry about this incident—in fact, the announcement of the inquiry came as a complete surprise to all Terntonans—and, probably, to Mr. Murray. No one wanted the inquiry except Mr. Ward and the Brass-hats.

However, public money and a great deal of the time of public officials was expended on the inquiry; and Mr. Murray was obliged to defend

himself against a variety of charges brought against him by the Brass hats. The Commissioner exonerated Mr. Murray from most of the charges; but—and apparently against the weight of evidence—he found the Administrator was guilty of being un co-operative, and of ignoring the welfare of the natives in some re— spects. This, of course, was exactly what Mr. Ward wanted; and, in con sequence, Mr. Ward was able to go confidently ahead, get rid of the Papuan Civil Administration (and Mr. Murray’s commission) by creat ing a Provisional Government, and ignore Mr. Murray’s obvious claims to the new Administratorship (although Mr. Murray’s appointment had been eagerly sought by the great majority 0 f the civilians of both Territories).

Now, if Mr. Ward, without any apparent cause, could arrange for a Royal Commission of Inquiry into alleged official confusion in Port Moresby in February, 1942, where there was no Jap invasion and no loss of civilian life, why should he not order an inquiry into what hap pened in 'Rabaul in January, 1942, where there appears to have been the most damnable official bungling, re suiting in hundreds of civilians losing their lives? ti/|R, WARD, however, will do noth 1ng ._ hi « twn vp ™» rprnrfi as Territories Minister suggests that he h a t es the thousands of sturdy in dividualists who comprise the Terri tories European population (evacu ated, and likely to remain so); and that he will do almost anything to embarrass- them. The Australian Ministers will do nothing, unless literally forced—that is their policy, And n 0 can be expected from the disciplined and spiritless ranks of Labour.

But there still is, in Australia, a f ree p Ub iic opinion and a fairly free press; and it is in that direction that Territorians should direct their ap peal for an inquiry into the bungling which cost the lives of 300 New Guinea civilians.