Join the conversation

1. Permalink

   

   David Faber

   Visiting Research Fellow, University of Adelaide (logged in via email @bigpond.net.au)

   I generally endorse Ms Spizzica article and comments. I feel Mr James objections are based on a confusion of the term `concentration camp' with the notion of an extermination camp. The term was originally a euphemism for a prison camp. Concentration camps were and are camps for the concentration of a given population; hence Ms Spizzica's characterization of internment camps [another euphemism] as concentration camps is correct, however colorful it may seem, given the bad odor which surrounded Kitchener…

   show full comment

   I generally endorse Ms Spizzica article and comments. I feel Mr James objections are based on a confusion of the term `concentration camp' with the notion of an extermination camp. The term was originally a euphemism for a prison camp. Concentration camps were and are camps for the concentration of a given population; hence Ms Spizzica's characterization of internment camps [another euphemism] as concentration camps is correct, however colorful it may seem, given the bad odor which surrounded Kitchener's anti-insurgency `methods of barbarism' and Hitler's camps. Would we say that Solzhenitzyn's Gulag Archipelago was only a system of prisons or labour camps and not concentration camps? If not we can hardly demure with Ms Spizzica's constructively provocative definition. The issue of what the Japanese or any-one else did to our POWs is irrelevant to the issue of an apology, especially given that an apology generally benefits those who make it as much if not more than those who receive it.

   1. Permalink

      

      David Faber

      Visiting Research Fellow, University of Adelaide (logged in via email @bigpond.net.au)

      Further to my above comments & in reply to Mr James further remarks, I feel his distinction between ethnicity & citizenship in the 1940s is anachronistic. Certainly they went together then, in reality & in the official mind, more than they do now. How otherwise to explain the significant number of British subjects of Italian origin who were interned? To suggest that some aspersion is cast on the sacrifice of Australian families whose men served by noting the impact on the Italian community of the…

      show full comment

      Further to my above comments & in reply to Mr James further remarks, I feel his distinction between ethnicity & citizenship in the 1940s is anachronistic. Certainly they went together then, in reality & in the official mind, more than they do now. How otherwise to explain the significant number of British subjects of Italian origin who were interned? To suggest that some aspersion is cast on the sacrifice of Australian families whose men served by noting the impact on the Italian community of the loss for the duration of interned breadwinners is taking things to an `us & them, right or wrong' extreme. How can such trenchant defense of the policy injustices of yesteryear benefit the nation or the defense community of today. Mr James reservation to the nation of the right to intern without trial foreign nationals of enemy states and Australian traitors is chilling. Is he thinking of the present `war on terror?' Would he intern without charge Iranian refugees? Or interlocutors he disagrees with?

2. Permalink

   

   Neil James

   Executive Director, Australia Defence Association (logged in via email @ada.asn.au)

   The suggestion that there should be a national apology to civilian citizens of enemy countries who were interned in Australia during World War II should be discussed. But it should also be rejected.

   After all, many Australian prisoners-of-war, and some civilian internees, were mistreated in World War II. Especially by the Japanese - and to an extent significantly greater than the isolated cases of hardship endured by enemy internees in Australia. Have all of these countries, including Italy, apologised…

   show full comment

   The suggestion that there should be a national apology to civilian citizens of enemy countries who were interned in Australia during World War II should be discussed. But it should also be rejected.

   After all, many Australian prisoners-of-war, and some civilian internees, were mistreated in World War II. Especially by the Japanese - and to an extent significantly greater than the isolated cases of hardship endured by enemy internees in Australia. Have all of these countries, including Italy, apologised to Australia?

   Some sense of perspective needs to be maintained. Especially where Australians are wrongly described as racist during a war we fought against genuinely racist evil pursued by Germany, Japan and even Italy (in North Africa).

   The apology issue is also unfortunately often raised without an adequate understanding of what actually occurred and why. Nor of the international and Australian law then applying (and largely still applying).

   Nor that the Italian civilian internees and most Italian prisoners-of-war (except for self-declared fascists) were all released when Italy changed sides in 1943 following the fall of Mussolini.

   This has led over the years to historically inaccurate, emotive and often dubious and even silly claims about the internment. And indeed to mistaken calls for an apology when none is really required.

   This is not deny that some internees in Australia may have suffered hardship at times, but that it should be examined in the context of the time not using modern opinions. After all, Australia faced a major threat of attack and a potential existential threat of occupation by the Axis Powers.

   In September 2009, for example, such a lack of perspective was displayed in a letter in the Weekend Australian (September 12-13) incorrectly, and worse recklessly, claiming that 4000 Italians were somehow “held in concentration camps in Australia during World War II for the sole reason of their ethnicity”.

   Their ethnicity had nothing to do with it and their internment (not imprisonment) was not in “concentration camps”.
   
   The lawful internment of Italian (and German and Japanese) nationals during World War II was based solely on their citizenship and presumed loyalty as enemy aliens during time of war.
   
   Such wartime internment was and remains fully consistent with international law (especially the 4th Geneva Convention) and commonsense practice.
   
   But even more importantly, there is a huge difference in fact, practice, law and morality between internment camps run properly by a liberal democracy according to the Geneva Conventions as a temporary wartime emergency measure (in Australia) and concentration camps run for any period by a dictatorship in breach of international humanitarian law.

   It is both incorrect and immoral to obfuscate this clear distinction.
   
   Such confusion about internees in World War II is yet another example why so many are confused about the inter-related matters of national unity, loyalty, citizenship responsibilities, treason, treachery and espionage, etc, in time of war.

   Over the last few years, for example, most of those trying to comment on the lawful internment (if not subsequent and separate criminal trial) of David Hicks after his capture as a belligerent (not arrest as a civilian) in the Afghanistan War often ignored the necessary specialist international law applying to wartime internment of captured enemy belligerents (such as Hicks) and civilian citizens of enemy countries.

   There were many, for example, who incorrectly used civil law paradigms (such as habeas corpus) and wrongly assumed Hicks had somehow been “imprisoned without trial”, when he was actually interned as a captured belligerent (at least until after his controversial trial and actual prison sentence by US military commission), just as numerous enemy belligerents were interned as prisoners-of-war in previous wars.

   What is more many continued to assume this even after such incorrect interpretations were struck down by the US Supreme Court in the June 2006 Hamdan ruling.

   This confirmed the general applicability of part of all four Geneva Conventions (Common Article 3) to those interned. Even though they did not qualify as prisoners-of-war under the 3rd Geneva Convention specifically. Because they were terrorists who did not respect international humanitarian law (IHL) generally, and they did not take up arms or fight for a legitimate international authority that was capable of taking responsibility for their actions including compliance with IHL.

   Finally, and not before time, many of the gaps in our treachery laws that emerged after World War II (when the UN Charter invalidated the practice of “declarations of war” that our previous domestic legislation depended on) were finally remedied when our treachery laws were updated by the since the Security Legislation Amendment (Terrorism) Act, 2002.

   Unfortunately even these reformed treachery laws still only apply to Australian citizens not permanent residents. So in future inter-State wars we may face the same dilemmas about whether or not to intern all or some Australian residents who are citizens of countries at war with Australia and therefore potential security risks (espionage, sabotage, subversion, etc).

   But race or ethnicity will have nothing to do with it.

   Neil James
   Executive Director
   Australia Defence Association
   www.ada.asn.au

3. Permalink

   

   Gideon Polya

   (Cessional Lecturer in Biochemistry for Agricultural Science at La Trobe University)

   Excellent article. History ignored yields history repeated. Thus today there are about 4,000 innocent refugees, including about 400 children, indefinitely and highly abusively imprisoned in Australia without charge or trial but evidently for the perceived "crime" of coming to Australia by boat in the last stage of their escape from the US Alliance killing fields from Somalia to Pakistan. A Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Inquiry found that The inquiry found that between 1 July 1999…

   show full comment

   Excellent article. History ignored yields history repeated. Thus today there are about 4,000 innocent refugees, including about 400 children, indefinitely and highly abusively imprisoned in Australia without charge or trial but evidently for the perceived "crime" of coming to Australia by boat in the last stage of their escape from the US Alliance killing fields from Somalia to Pakistan. A Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission Inquiry found that The inquiry found that between 1 July 1999 and 30 June 2003, 2184 refugee children were detained after arriving in Australia seeking asylum without a visa (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandatory_detention_in_Australia ) . According to the immigration detention statistics provided by the Australia Department of Immigration Citizenship, as of October 2011 there were 4,223 refugees in detention including 370 children (see: http://www.immi.gov.au/managing-australias-borders/detention/_pdf/immigration-detention-statistics-20111031.pdf ).

   Apologies come easy in look-the-other-way Australia. Thus PM Kevin Rudd's "sorry" made no mention of "racism" (Labor has supported the exclusion of NT Indigenous Australians and other racially-defined groups from the protection of the 1975 Racial Discrimination Act) nor of "genocide" (in the over 2 century and continuing Aboriginal Genocide, the Aboriginal population dropped from roughly 1 million to 0.1 million in the first century, total avoidable deaths from disease, violence and deprivation total 2 million and currently 9,000 Indigenous Australians die avoidably out of an Indigenous population of 0.5 million, one of the most appalling avoidable death rates in the world; see Gideon Polya, "Body count: the awful truth", National Indigenous Times, Issue 131 - 14 Jun 2007 and "Aboriginal Genocide": https://sites.google.com/site/aboriginalgenocide/ ).

   Not just Italians but other enemy aliens were interned during WW2, including Jewish refugees from Nazism. The latter could be considered very lucky because while 9,000 Jews found refugee in Australia in 1933-1945, due to selfishness and criminal Zionist activism (the Zionists only wanted Jewish refugees to go to Palestine) many countries (including New Zealand, some Latin American countries and many British Empire countries) closed their doors to Jewish refugees (see Professor Martin Gilbert, Jewish History Atlas", p90).

   Of course the WW2 imprisonment of enemy aliens is not the only war-time dirty linen in the Australian wash basket. Thus the Armenian Genocide (1.5 million killed) commenced the evening the ANZAC landing after month of Allied shelling in the Dardanelles and 24 April, the day before our Anzac Day, is non-coincidentally remembered world-wide as Armenian Genocide Day. Indeed Australia has been involved in 24 genocidal atrocities of which 6 are continuing (see "Australian Anzac & Armenian Genocide, Australia's secret genocide history" http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/10256-australian-anzac-a-armenian-genocide.html ) .

   In the worst Australia-complicit atrocity of WW2, by withholding wheat from its huge wheat stores Australia helped Britain deliberately kill 6-7 million Indians in the World War 2 Bengal Famine (Bengali Holocaust) (see "Bengal Famine. How Australia & UK killed 6-7 million Indians in WW2": http://mwcnews.net/focus/editorial/13742-bengal-famine.html and "Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History": http://janeaustenand.blogspot.com/ ). Today, Australia as a world leader in annual per capita greenhouse gas pollution is disproportionately contributing to a worsening climate genocide that is set to kill 2 billion Indians , 0.5 billion Bengalis and 0.3 billion Bangladeshis this century if man-made climate change is not seriously addressed (see "Climate Genocide": https://sites.google.com/site/climategenocide/ ).

4. Permalink

   

   Neil James

   Executive Director, Australia Defence Association (logged in via email @ada.asn.au)

   Gideon Polya's extremist rants are not worthy of a reply. It is puzzling why those moderating this discussion allow his extremist polemics to be published as they show no objectivity, and certainly no academic-standard analysis, at all.

   Once again I suggest that Mia Spizzica's belief that wartime internment was based on ethnicity or race is not correct. Perhaps her apparent confusion arises because Australia was a much more ethnically homogeneous society in that era and internment then may seem…

   show full comment

   Gideon Polya's extremist rants are not worthy of a reply. It is puzzling why those moderating this discussion allow his extremist polemics to be published as they show no objectivity, and certainly no academic-standard analysis, at all.

   Once again I suggest that Mia Spizzica's belief that wartime internment was based on ethnicity or race is not correct. Perhaps her apparent confusion arises because Australia was a much more ethnically homogeneous society in that era and internment then may seem ethnically-based to modern readers because mainly foreign citizens were involved.

   Wartime internment of aliens was, however, primarily based on citizenship, and therefore presumed loyalties, and the consequent risk management required during time of war when security monitoring resources were necessarily limited if internees were permitted to continue residing in the general community. There was also a need to prevent popular reprisals against those living in the community who might be commonly suspected of enemy sympathies or connections (whether such suspicions were justified or ill-founded).

   It should also be noted that some potential Australian traitors were also interned as a wartime security measure - especially the members of the "Australia First Movement" who, ironically, were extreme Australian nationalists and all ethnically Australians from an Anglo or Celtic background.

   Others interned at various times, regardless of ethnicity and obviously not influenced by it, were various communist and fascist sympathisers. The former during that part of the war when the USSR supported the its earlier non-agression pact with Nazi Germany and vigorously opposed the war effort. The latter throughout the war.

   I suspect that those making or exaggerating claims about supposed widespread internment based on ethnicity (and not foreign citizenship or domestic treachery) are falling for the historiographical mistake of "presentism", whereby current attitudes are misused to describe past events rather than them being analysed properly using the attitudes, etc, of the time.

   There also appears to be a bit of the "condescension of posterity" whereby because we know what happened (ie. we won World War II) there is insufficient appreciation of the necessary decision-making conditions and imperatives during the war, especially its early stages when the Axis powers were winning.

   Finally, those claiming internment was based on ethnicity, not foreign citizenship or domestic treachery, appear to omit consideration of all those many Australian citizens of other than Anglo-Celtic or indigenous ethnicity who were not interned, and with many of them loyally serving in Australia's defence force during the war - including many of Italian heritage.

   While no-one should doubt that there may have been individual cases of hardship for some of those interned, or that there may have been some cases of wrongful internment (for all types of internee) at times, no collective apology to all those interned is required because no collective wrong was committed.

   Moreover, Australia's legal right during time of war to intern foreign citizens from enemy countries, and Australian traitors, remains lawful under both Australian and international law. And so it should.

   Neil James
   Executive Director
   Australia Defence Association
   www.ada.asn.au

   1. Permalink

      

      Mia Spizzica

      (Historical & Philosophical Studies at University of Melbourne)

      Mr James' comments are welcome, if constructive, but since he is closely associated with the military point of view can only be one-sided as well. Of course there were may reasons why individuals were interned and without double, as stated in my previous reply, there were persons of British origin who were deemed to be of concern to the military.

      However, Mr James fails to consider that there were not just a few but many thousands of civilian FAMILIES that were adversely affected because their…

      show full comment

      Mr James' comments are welcome, if constructive, but since he is closely associated with the military point of view can only be one-sided as well. Of course there were may reasons why individuals were interned and without double, as stated in my previous reply, there were persons of British origin who were deemed to be of concern to the military.

      However, Mr James fails to consider that there were not just a few but many thousands of civilian FAMILIES that were adversely affected because their breadwinner was removed by the military. If one examines the tribunal reports for release in 1943 of almost 5,000 Italians, all but a mere handful of these were found to be innocent of any association with the Fascist government of Italy.

      While over 43% of Italians living in Queensland were interned, only about 5% of Italian Australians living in Victoria were imprisoned, yet there was absolutely no trouble from the Victorian Italians. How can one argue that internment benefited both Australians and Italians if those who were not interned in Victoria did not exploit their freedom to undermine the Australian government and war effort? Internment did not benefit any of the families, the Australian economy, or the Australian military who could have used their resources more far productively for the war effort. POWs and the few who were deemed to be of high risk were the only people who should have been interned, not cane cutters, fishermen, shopkeepers and miners.

      Another sad internment story was that of a whole community of Indigenous Australians who were forced to relocate from central Australia to coastal Queensland and Palm Island for reasons that are too complex to detail here. What benefit was this to the war effort? It certainly herolded the destruction of that community of hundred of people.

      Mr James seems to dismiss the often acute pain suffered by civilians directly caused by internment as a minor issue. Even after 70 years, it is not minor to those families that I have interviewed. How can one be so dismissive of a 'few' people suffering due to war, when every life [according to international laws] has equal value in a democracy? So are a few civilian Italians [or Japanese, or Javanese, etc.,] lives and destroyed families a reasonable price to pay for Australia to feel better about itself - even when it was avoidable? We are discussing civilians, non-combatants, women and children, bystanders, not spies or kamkazi bombers. The threat of invasion in 1941/42 by the Japanese was real. I agree with you on this Mr James on the horror that everyone maust have felt. When I say everyone, I include Italian migrants as well.

      A military world view and philosophy during wartime can tend to exclude and demonize civilians from enemy nations. We have seen this many time in more recent conflicts, which are not part of my focus here. The attitudes that are presented by Mr James' arguments made little sense to the simple working migrant folk [from any nation] whose blood, sweat and tears built this nation before 1940. What seem to be presented is the view that they [the migrants whose only crime was their birth in a foreign nation, that became an enemy-nation] should rightfully have been sacrificed to save this nation from its own insecurities. My prespective is that of those involved as the victims of wartime internment, so I cannot concur with the military view that internment was a good thing. Incarceration has never been seen as a positive event to look forward to in one's life.

      I wonder if anyone could explain, how is it that Victoria's Italians didn't do what the military claim they were poised to do? Perhaps part of the answer lies in the fact, then as now, that these migrants were mostly apolitical and were not at all interested in wars, fighting or nationalism. Italians in Australia were not a fighting people. They simply wanted to work hard to support their families in a new nation, without arguments or political issues. It was not their fault that Mussolini was at war, as they had left Italy to get away from its complex politics. Many were already Naturalised British Subjects [NBS], yet 1,009 Italian NBS were interned as well as about 60 Australian-born Italians. So, I maintain that ethnicity was a key factor in their internments.

      Mr James, if you are interested in further dialogue on this very contested issue, it would be of value of we could discuss it in a public forum such as Insight on SBS with many eminent scholars, notable historians and world experts on civilian incacerations during wartime in WW2. I would be pleased to open the debate to logical, respectful discussion on WW2 issues, but not to include later conflicts or other issues. So in brioef: Civlian incacerations during wartime: WW2 with reference to previous conflicts for historical grounding.

      I dare say it would be an amazing, lively debate and one that has been a long time in coming - 70+ years. I look forward to further discussions.
      Mia Spizzica, JP
      Australian Centre
      University of Melbourne

5. Permalink

   

   Neil James

   Executive Director, Australia Defence Association (logged in via email @ada.asn.au)

   Gideon Polya is not correct about the Geneva Conventions - as he is about most of his other polemical claims on this and other topics.

   The first Geneva Convention (those applying to Prisoners-of-War in World War II) was signed in 1929. The 1949 set of Geneva Conventions were the updated ones based on the experiences of World War II and extended the Conventions to the protection of non-combatant civilians.

   Previously (ie, in World War II), as I noted in my comment above, the existing international…

   show full comment

   Gideon Polya is not correct about the Geneva Conventions - as he is about most of his other polemical claims on this and other topics.

   The first Geneva Convention (those applying to Prisoners-of-War in World War II) was signed in 1929. The 1949 set of Geneva Conventions were the updated ones based on the experiences of World War II and extended the Conventions to the protection of non-combatant civilians.

   Previously (ie, in World War II), as I noted in my comment above, the existing international law was a mix of longstanding customary law and various Hague Conventions from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

   The general point applicable here is that International Humanitarian Law (IHL) has a subset called the Laws of Armed Conflict (LOAC) which includes the Geneva and Hague Conventions but also customary international law. LOAC applies to all conflicts, whether "declared" or not as armed conflict exists in international law as a material fact alone.

   The internment of enemy citizens by Australia in World War II was entirely lawful. Indeed Australia was an exemplary upholder of such international law in our treatment of internees whereas the Axis Powers (Germany, Japan, Italy, etc) were not. This was verified at the time by the International Committee of the Red Cross.

   Neil James
   Executive Director
   Australia Defence Association
   www.ada.asn.au

   1. Permalink

      

      Gideon Polya

      (Cessional Lecturer in Biochemistry for Agricultural Science at La Trobe University)

      According to Wikipedia, quoted in my post: " The Geneva Conventions comprise four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish the standards of international law for the humanitarian treatment of the victims of war. The singular term Geneva Convention denotes the agreements of 1949, negotiated in the aftermath of the Second World War (1939–45), which updated the terms of the first three treaties (1864, 1906, 1929), and added a fourth treaty. The articles of the Fourth Geneva Convention…

      show full comment

      According to Wikipedia, quoted in my post: " The Geneva Conventions comprise four treaties, and three additional protocols, that establish the standards of international law for the humanitarian treatment of the victims of war. The singular term Geneva Convention denotes the agreements of 1949, negotiated in the aftermath of the Second World War (1939–45), which updated the terms of the first three treaties (1864, 1906, 1929), and added a fourth treaty. The articles of the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949) extensively defined the basic rights of prisoners (civil and military) during war; established protections for the wounded; and established protections for the civilians in and around a war zone. The treaties of 1949 were ratified, in whole or with reservations, by 194 countries" (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Conventions ).

      Bald denial and blanket, non-specific, pejorative, ad hominem abuse does not constitute sensible interlocution.

      Australian patriotism does not mean blind support for racist, genocidal, US imperialist wars (38 million violent deaths or avoidable deaths from war-imposed deprivation in post-1950 Asian wars) .

      Australian patriotism means defence of Australia from all those intent on killing or subjugating Australians. Since 2001, 3,600 Australians (200,000 Americans, 18,000 Brits and 1.1 million people world-wide) have died opiate drug-related deaths linked to the US Alliance restoration of the Taliban-destroyed Afghan opium industry to 90% of world market share (for details and documentation "Afghan Holocaust, Afghan Genocide": https://sites.google.com/site/afghanholocaustafghangenocide/ ).

      Those who kill 1 Australian are guilty of murder of an Australian. The pro-war, pro-Zionist, pro-US Lib-Labs complicit in the US-linked opiate drug-related deaths of 3,600 Australians since 2001 are complicit in the mass murder of Australians by the pro-war, pro-Zionist, racist Zionist-beholden, racist, genocidal US neocons.

      The Italians interned here during WW2 were vastly less threat to Australians then than the US-lackey, Apartheid Israel-lackey Lib-Labs are to Australians today. Indeed the Lib-Labs have now agreed - without reference to Australians - to permanently station in Australia 2,500 on-rotation, cowardly, racist, genocidal, child-killing, mother violating, woman-violating US Marines, the genocidal Wehrmacht that has spear-headed US hegemony that has actively or passively killed about 90 million people since 1950 - including these 3,600 Australians - in the US War On Humanity (see "Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950": http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/2007/06/body-count-global-avoidable-mortality.html and William Blum's "Rogue State" ). It is for these sorts of reasons that outstanding, anti-racist, humanitarian Jewish American scholar Professor Noam Chomsky (from 77 Nobel Laureate MIT) has called the US "a leading terrorist state" (see: http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/200111--02.htm ).

      1. Permalink

         

         Mia Spizzica

         (Historical & Philosophical Studies at University of Melbourne)

         Thank you to everyone who has given feedback or comments on the article. While I am very pleased for comments and discussions that develop my research topic's depth, I really feel that the topic is focused on the WW2 Australian homefront. Other comments and discussions relating to topics outside the WW2 internment of civilians in Australia are not as relevant to the argument I am proposing.
         
         There have been some very pertinent comments, but just as many misinformed assumptions that are historically…

         show full comment

         Thank you to everyone who has given feedback or comments on the article. While I am very pleased for comments and discussions that develop my research topic's depth, I really feel that the topic is focused on the WW2 Australian homefront. Other comments and discussions relating to topics outside the WW2 internment of civilians in Australia are not as relevant to the argument I am proposing.
         
         There have been some very pertinent comments, but just as many misinformed assumptions that are historically incorrect, at least according to the primary sources that I have based my research on. I have been very careful to make statements that can be supported by primary sources, so I stand by my article's arguments. I would also include the same courtesy for any civilians interned, no matter what background. Indeed, many British Australians were also interned [Dr G. Fitzpatrick' s thesis discusses these], as were Spaniards, Portuguese, Danes, Finnish, Javanese, Formosans, and a variety of other ethnic minorities. In fact, ethnicity was a key factor in interning people in Australia from 1939 to 1947.
         
         In terms of the 'internment camps' being 'concentration camps', I'd rather leave this discussion for another time as the concept is highly charged and my comments may be misinterpreted. However, it is clear from many primary sources , including Australian War Memorial documents, that internment camps were actually called concentration camps in Australia and elsewhere during WW1. Historically, the term was first used by the Spanish in the 1880s in Cuba and later during the Boer War by the British.
         

         
         If participants would like to continue the discussion on civilian internments, maybe it could be done in a public arena such as 'Insight' on SBS?

         I am happy for the discussion to continue, but only if is focused on the article's WW2 topic.

         Thank you all again!
         
         Mia Spizzica
         Australian Centre
         University of Melbourne

6. Permalink

   

   Gideon Polya

   (Cessional Lecturer in Biochemistry for Agricultural Science at La Trobe University)

   Neil James is incorrect about the Geneva Conventions. They were introduced AFTER WW2 in 1949, with additional parts subsequently added.

   The Geneva Convention defines the rights and protections of non-combatants: "Protected persons are entitled, in all circumstances, to respect for their persons, their honour, their family rights, their religious convictions and practices, and their manners and customs. They shall, at all times, be humanely treated, and shall be protected, especially against all…

   show full comment

   Neil James is incorrect about the Geneva Conventions. They were introduced AFTER WW2 in 1949, with additional parts subsequently added.

   The Geneva Convention defines the rights and protections of non-combatants: "Protected persons are entitled, in all circumstances, to respect for their persons, their honour, their family rights, their religious convictions and practices, and their manners and customs. They shall, at all times, be humanely treated, and shall be protected, especially against all acts of violence or threats thereof and against insults and public curiosity. Women shall be especially protected against any attack on their honour, in particular against rape, enforced prostitution, or any form of indecent assault. Without prejudice to the provisions relating to their state of health, age and sex, all protected persons shall be treated with the same consideration by the Party to the conflict in whose power they are, without any adverse distinction based, in particular, on race, religion or political opinion. However, the Parties to the conflict may take such measures of control and security in regard to protected persons as may be necessary as a result of the war" (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geneva_Conventions ) .

   Of course Australia has been grossly violating the Geneva Convention by its participation in all post-1950 US Asian wars, wars associated with 38 million violent deaths plus non-violent avoidable deaths due to war-imposed deprivation in gross violation of the Geneva Convention (mostly civilians and indeed mostly children).

   Just one example of Australia's war criminal complicity in US atrocities in Asia: UN Population Division data show that under-5 infant deaths in Occupied Afghanistan total 2.9 million and UNICEF informs that 237,000 under-5 infants die EACH YEAR in Australia-occupied Afghanistan (see "Afghan Holocaust, Afghan Genocide": https://sites.google.com/site/afghanholocaustafghangenocide/ ) , 90% avoidable and due to gross Australian and US Alliance violation of Article s55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention that declare that an Occupier must supply life-sustaining food and medical services to the Conquered Subjects "to the fullest extent of the means available to it".

   And as for "traitors" one wonders how one describes those Australians who resolutely ignore and are complicit in the deaths since 2001 of 3,600 Australians (as well as 200,000 Americans, 18,000 Brits and 1.1 million people worldwide) due to US Alliance restoration of the Taliban-destroyed Afghan opium industry to 90% of world market share (see UN ODC and "Afghan Holocaust, Afghan Genocide": https://sites.google.com/site/afghanholocaustafghangenocide/ ).

7. Permalink

   

   Gideon Polya

   (Cessional Lecturer in Biochemistry for Agricultural Science at La Trobe University)

   Re "academic-standard analysis" (see above, noting that I have been an academic for 40 years) means dispassionate argument supported by documented facts and NOT ad hominem, pejorative abuse as again exhibited above.

   Robert Menzies was surely a good prima facie candidate for internment during WW2. He was notorious for his pro-Nazi and pro-Fascist statements and of course for exporting pig-iron to Japan when Japan was raping China (35 million Chinese dead, 1937-1945) for which he earned the moniker…

   show full comment

   Re "academic-standard analysis" (see above, noting that I have been an academic for 40 years) means dispassionate argument supported by documented facts and NOT ad hominem, pejorative abuse as again exhibited above.

   Robert Menzies was surely a good prima facie candidate for internment during WW2. He was notorious for his pro-Nazi and pro-Fascist statements and of course for exporting pig-iron to Japan when Japan was raping China (35 million Chinese dead, 1937-1945) for which he earned the moniker "Pig Iron Bob". Thus, for example, Menzies made a speech in 1938 on returning from a visit to Nazi Germany and several months after the Nazi German invasion of Austria in which he attacked anti-Fascist Australians (no doubt including many later-to-be-interned Italians ) who "proclaim their disdain for the governments of Italy or Germany where enthusiasm for service to the State, although it perhaps went too far, could be emulated in Australia" (see Lockwood, D. (1987), "War on the Waterfront. Menzies, Japan and the Pig-iron Dispute, Hale & Iremonger, Melbourne).

   Many Jewish refugees were interned. There was a major media campaign against allowing Jewish refugees from Nazism to enter Australia, as detailed by Cyril Pearl in his account of the Jewish and other refugees sent as “enemy alien” prisoners to Australia from Britain on the Dunera in 1940 (see Pearl, C. (1983), The Dunera Scandal , Angus & Robertson, Sydney). Indeed only 9,000 Jewish refugees made it to Australia in 1933-1945 as compared to ZERO (0) to New Zealand (see Martin Gilbert, "Jewish History Atlas", Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London, 1969) and of these many were interned as "enemy aliens" (the Jewish Museum on Alma Road, Prahran, Melbourne may have data on this).

   Not all "enemy aliens" were interned. My father, a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany's ally Fascist Hungary, was permitted to serve the defence effort as an industrial chemist. He had to attend a local police station each week. My mother had a girl friend who like herself was married to a refugee "enemy alien" and who, while her husband had to register weekly with the local police station, was permitted ready access to the heart of Australian defence because her father was among the top brass.

   Of course Menzies for all his pro-Fascism was a patriot and rather more patriotic than the cowardly, US lackey Lib-Labs infesting Canberra today. Thus Wikileaks has revealed that former PM Kevin Rudd suggested war with China as an option to Hillary Clinton and that former Labor Leader of the Opposition Kim Beazley had offered Australian troops in that eventuality. However former PM Malcolm Fraser, an eminent public figure who has in many ways become the conscience of the nation in the last decade, commented thus: "A more independent Australia can do much if she works effectively with other countries such as Canada, Finland, Sweden and Norway as well as countries such as Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia. A loose coalition of middle powers can carry significant weight.

   What I am saying is not particularly new for Australia. When China was shelling offshore islands close to Taiwan in the 1950s, the US moved its Pacific fleet in or close to the Taiwan Strait, and invasion of Taiwan from China was then feared. That likelihood is now increasingly remote. But in the middle of the 1950s, only a year or two after the ANZUS treaty had been signed, then Australian prime minister Robert Menzies told the US that if it went to war with China over Taiwan, Australia would not be part of it. Menzies had a longer-term understanding of the necessity of Australia's future than has been shown by any current leaders.

   The US President cannot go to war unless both houses of Congress have passed an appropriate resolution under their war powers. It is time Australia adopted the same practice." (see Malcolm Fraser, "Slavish devotion to the US a foreign policy folly for Australia", The Age On-line National Times, 14 December 2010: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/slavish-devotion-to-the-us-a-foreign-policy-folly-for-australia-20101213-18vec.html?comments=110#comments ).

   Of course today cowardly, pro-war, US lackey Lib-Labs resolutely ignore the 3,600 Australians killed since 2001 (360 per annum) by the Americans through restoring the Taliban-destroyed Afghan opium industry to 90% of world market share (for details and authoritative documentation see "Afghan Holocaust, Afghan Genocide": https://sites.google.com/site/afghanholocaustafghangenocide/ ).

   Indeed there is an old fashioned word for people who are resolutely complicit in the deaths of thousands of their fellow countrymen in time of war but I might again be falsely, ignorantly and intemperately abused for "extremist rants ... not worthy of a reply", "extremist polemics", lack of "objectivity" and lack of "academic-standard analysis" were I to use it.

8. Permalink

   

   John Tognolini

   Mr (logged in via email @yahoo.com.au)

   Certainly an apology is long over due. I also feel Australian/Italians who were subject to racism should be apoligised to as well. My Uncle Stephen suffered many racist remarks despite being an ANZAC who not served at Gallpoli and on the Western Front and won the Military Medal twice, but also lost his brother John/Jack in action and another brother who died of illness. He also had his two younger brothers serving in WW2, one of whom was my father Victor a veteran of the Battles of Greece and Crete.

9. Permalink

   

   Sue Chapman

   Citizen (logged in via email @gmail.com)

   Well done Mr. Piccolo! There may be few actual internees living, but the scar runs deep. The bulk of cane farming in Nth Qld was immigrant run, with a string of Italian towns. Women who mostly could not speak English had to suddenly survive in an alien country, with no men or youths. Within an Australian era of deprivation and stress, they suffered extra, and passed the shock and distrust down the generations. Italian-Australians: I loved growing up in your villages, and I am sorry for what our government did to your forebears, who had voted with their feet to be Australian.

10. Permalink

    

    John Lamp

    (Senior Lecturer, School of Information Systems at Deakin University)

    My uncle had his amateur radio gear confiscated during WWII because, according to the authorities, anyone with a surname of "Kaiser" was suspect. The irony is that his father was given that surname by the orphanage in which he grew up.

11. Permalink

    

    Mia Spizzica

    (Historical & Philosophical Studies at University of Melbourne)

    Neil James' latest comments are rather misleading as have some other misinformed judgements and historically misrepresented 'facts' in previous comments.

    Mr Polya's views are on the other extreme of the pendulum so I am wondering if these are an example of the diverse reactions that my research is eliciting? Whatever the viewpoints, it is fair to keep the dicussion civil.

    Mr James, why did you not state that 5 of the 7 Board of Directors of the ADA are former SENIOR military men? I also note…

    show full comment

    Neil James' latest comments are rather misleading as have some other misinformed judgements and historically misrepresented 'facts' in previous comments.

    Mr Polya's views are on the other extreme of the pendulum so I am wondering if these are an example of the diverse reactions that my research is eliciting? Whatever the viewpoints, it is fair to keep the dicussion civil.

    Mr James, why did you not state that 5 of the 7 Board of Directors of the ADA are former SENIOR military men? I also note that there are NO WOMEN on the Board, so I can't see how your organization could possibly be a fair non-partisan, non-military, equitable representation of the average Australian perspective on this country's defense. So your argument that your organization is an independent 'watch-dog' seems rather untenable.

    Indeed, I would say that there is in fact a pro-military, anti-humanitarian agenda in most of your comments. It seems obvious how immersed your organization is in defense issues, but not with a view of a balanced bi-lateral perspective. Your views are totally biased towards the military were completely faultless in all they do on the grounds that they were defending this nation. This makes a mockery of human rights at all levels.

    Granted, it is honourable to want to defend ones nation, but at whose cost - the vulnerable migrants from 'enemy' nation? They were indeed a captive political pawn. They couldn't return to their countries even if they wanted to, nor did most want leave since Australia was their new home.

    Your historical knowledge is limited to the generally accepted necropolitical military views that have governed our history since this nation began it's long and slow path to maturity. My view is that there are other ways of recording historical events and issues and many diverse voices in our evolving national story.

    For example another voice is that of migrant families: ,'Enemy alien' origin families did not have access to any government support during WW2, whereas, Australians whose men were involved in the war effort, either at home or abroad were supported with government income. Sadly, your knowledge of this inequality of access to financial support demonstrates a gap in your historical knowledge of what really happened from 1940 to 1947c. Those Italians who were Naturalized British Subjects, lost their status on internment [1,009 NBS + 60 (circa) Australian born of Italian heritage]. Most were innocent of any wrongdoing, yet their families suffered the full consequences of war, even after 40 years in this nation. These former NBS needed to reapply [with full costs and a process of circa 5 years] for their rights again after the war, even if found innocent of Fascist sympathies. No apology for this miscarriage of justice? Hardly logical or acceptable in a civilized democracy, Mr James.

    If we claim to be far more civilized and better in every way than the 'evil enemy', why react like we say that the enemy would? As Dr David Faber stated in a previous comment, an apology has great value for those who make the apology.

    I welcome a more balanced discussion on this issue, but if this is not possible, perhaps a public forum with an unbiased moderator could work better.

12. Permalink

    

    Neil James

    Executive Director, Australia Defence Association (logged in via email @ada.asn.au)

    Mia Spizzica's assumption that myself or the ADA somehow represents "the military point of view" (whatever that might be) unfortunately clouds the whole tenor and content of her reply.

    The ADA is Australia's independent, non-partisan, national public-interest watchdog for defence and wider national security matters. It is not the defence force's professional representative organisation, nor is it a body comprised of former defence force members. Most ADA members have never served in our defence…

    show full comment

    Mia Spizzica's assumption that myself or the ADA somehow represents "the military point of view" (whatever that might be) unfortunately clouds the whole tenor and content of her reply.

    The ADA is Australia's independent, non-partisan, national public-interest watchdog for defence and wider national security matters. It is not the defence force's professional representative organisation, nor is it a body comprised of former defence force members. Most ADA members have never served in our defence force. See http://www.ada.asn.au/faq.html

    A few moments checking what the ADA actually is and actually does might havbe avoided such mistaken assumptions.

    The idea that there is necessarily a "military point of view" (on anything) or that the ADA merely reflects it (if it does exist) is nonsense.

    More specifically, Mia avoids the matter of citizenship by use of unspecific terms such as "Italians", "Italian Australians" or "Victorian Italians", etc. Cases of internment cannot be discussed effectively unless it is established (in every case) what actual citizenship was involved. Real or purported ethnicity is not specific enough.

    For example, was such an "Italian-Australian" still an Italian citizen resident in Australia. Or were they a British subject (Australian) who was of Italian heritage but not born there, or if born in Italy one who had legally renounced their allegiances as an Italian citizen.

    Furthermore, as even Mia notes, not even all Italian citizens were interned, especially where it could be proven they were not a security risk.

    Mia's comparative statistics about the rate of internment in Queensland compared to Victoria also needs to be intrerpreted carefully as there were other strategic, operational and demographic factors in play.

    For example, the presence of potential enemy aliens in north Queensland obviously presented a greater security problem in that location than it would have done further south.

    North Queensland was under enemy attack, was thought to be the likeliest area of the continent to be potentially invaded, and was the region with the greatest concentrations of Australian and allied troops - to prevent such an invasion and afterwards as the major mounting base (and training region) for operations to regain New Guinea and the South Pacific islands from 1942 onwards.

    All these strategic and operational security factors influenced decisions on internment. Some of the measures taken then might seem excessive now but they must be judged in the context of the times not using modern academic fashions and passions.

    Concentrations of Italians of Italian citizenship, and Australians of Italian heritage, in coastal areas of north Queensland were also a strategic factor, especially when compared to those in Victoria who were generally more dispersed and living in regions without the same strategic and operational security implications.

    Finally, the argument of having family breadwinners removed is somewhat insensitive when this also applied to many Australian families with their men away fighting the war. Many never to return.

    The bottom line remains that no collective apology is required to interned citizens from enemy countries because no collective wrong was perpetrated. This is a separate issue to whether individual apologies might be justified to the few who might have been interned
    when other security options might have worked.
    
    Happy to debate such topics on programs such as "Insight".

    Finally, do the markedly subjective and generally irrelevant rants of Gideon Polya actually add anything to this discussion?

    Neil James
    Exrecutive Director
    Australia Defence Association
    www.ada.asn.au

    1. Permalink

       

       David Faber

       Visiting Research Fellow, University of Adelaide (logged in via email @bigpond.net.au)

       Mr James recall to researching the profile of the ADA reminds us that he too might benefit from a little reading. He would find Ms Spizzica's admittedly provocative employment of the term `concentration camp' for `internment camp' only too warranted if he consulted even the Wikipaedia article on `Internment Camps'. But Wikipaedia, although a good place to start an enquiry, is no place to end it. If he consulted `Collar the lot!' by the Gillmans about the contemporary British experience of wholesale…

       show full comment

       Mr James recall to researching the profile of the ADA reminds us that he too might benefit from a little reading. He would find Ms Spizzica's admittedly provocative employment of the term `concentration camp' for `internment camp' only too warranted if he consulted even the Wikipaedia article on `Internment Camps'. But Wikipaedia, although a good place to start an enquiry, is no place to end it. If he consulted `Collar the lot!' by the Gillmans about the contemporary British experience of wholesale refugee internment in May & June 1940 he would know that one Australian, young Latham, son of the former UAP leader & High Court justice, covered himself in glory damning the entire exercise & MI5 with it as politically stupid. Any honest appraisal of the Australian case, which concerned a less politicized Italian community mostly,must come to the same conclusion. Brian Fitzpatrick warned of the danger to civil liberty, supposedly the cause for which we were fighting, in his `National Security & Individual Insecurity' of 1939. By the time Northern Command conducted a second round of internment in North Queensland after Pearl Harbour, the British precedent had already been roundly criticized as counterproductive to the war effort & unjust to antifascist refugees, the bulk of the Europeans interned by Britain. Lafitte `The Internment of Aliens' `Judex: Anderson's Prisoners' & `Scipio: 100,000,000 Allies..." had all lambasted a policy which is said to have cost Australia large sums which could have been better spent on a better focused war effort. While only a handful of antifascists were interned in Australia, one, Francesco Giovanni Fantin, was murdered by a fellow internee acting for fascist conspirators. Even the minority of fascists & sympathizers could have been better controlled in the community rather than go to the injustice & expense of mass internment without charge. The fallacy that such measures are alright in wartime for us `democracies' but not for `totalitarian regimes' is a non sequitur. How are they to be distinguished, when the measures undertaken are the same?