Museum tour through World War Two to Vietnam A tour through New Zealand's wars

Waimarino Bulletin, Issue 7, 2 September 1988, Page 20

Museum tour through World War Two to Vietnam

A tour through New Zealand's wars

In previous weeks this series of "guided tours" of the QEII War Memorial Museum at Waiouru have traced New Zealand's martial history from its early colonial days, through the Boer War of 1898-1902 to the First World War in 1914-18.

Today we descend the stairs at the end of the WWI gallery and enter the large hall or concourse on the ground floor containing weapons and equipment, photographs, paintings, uniforms, life size h a b i t a t tableaux and action accounts of battles and

campaigns in which New Zealand troops and their support services were involved during World War Two, the Korean War, the Malaysian Emergency and Vietnam. When conflict broke out in Europe i n September 1939 following Nazi Germany's

military take-overs o 1 Sudetenland, Austria, Czechoslavakia and Poland, both Britain and France were unprepared for the new "blitzkrieg" tactics using mass aerial bombing and fast heavily-armoured tanks which had been developed and perfected by the German war machine during campaigns in the occupied countries. However, with the onset of a European winter the German Wehrmacht didn't press home their immediate

advantage but decided to bide their time until the European spring of 1940 when their tanks and transport units could operate on firmer ground and their aircraft could fly in clearer skies. This eight month pause came to b e known as the "Phoney War" and gave Britain and France time t o build up their military, naval and air forces with France digging in behind the Maginot Line and Britain sending over an Expeditionary Force to man the unprotected northern sector along the Belgian and French borders. Both Allied armies were unprepared for the speed and ferocity of the German assault through Holland and Belgium (thus by-pass-ing the Maginot Line) in May 1940 and so World War Two began in earnest. Over the next five years this conflict was to spread over several continents and involve aerial, military and naval actions in almost every corner of the globe. But Britain and France were not the only nations unprepared for war - both Russia and America were drawn in by surprise attacks by Germany and Japan.

Neither was New Zealand any better prepared for war and certainly not as well prepared as in 1914. Museum visitors who accompanied us through the World War One gallery last week will be aware of New Zealand's ability to send an expeditionary force consisting of 8574 soldiers and 3818 horses overseas barely two months after the declaration of war in August in 1914. In September 193 9 however, on declaration of war by New Zealand, after it was decided to send an infantry division to the Middle East to help defend that vital strategic area of oil fields and the S u e z Canal, it took until early 1940 for the dispatch of troops to begin and another year (March 1941 - 1 8 months after the declaration of war) for a complete division to be united in Egypt. By this time Italy, with its expansionist adventures in North Africa and Ethiopia under Mussolini, had declared war on Britain and France on June 11, 1940 in the mistaken belief that their German Axis partners had already won the war in Europe. Individual New Turn page 21

From page 20 Zealanders had by then joined units of the British Services, mostly the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy to fight in Europe but the great majority of New Zealanders who went overseas served with the New Zealand Division in Greece, Crete, North Africa and Italy. The other major group served in the Pacific. Visitors to the Museum will find that all these World War Two campaigns in which the New Zealand Army was involved are well documented with photographs, personal eyewitness accounts, cartoons and paintings as well as collections of actual weapons used. There is a life-size tableau depicting a North African desert scene showing a Bren gun c^rrier crew and motor cycle dispatch rider under a camouflage net taking a short break and using the opportunity to catch up with the news through the NZEF Times newspaper, to shave and clean up and to eat a hurried meal of baked beans. There's a showcase which contains the small arms weapons - pistols, rifles and ma-

chine guns - of all the participating World War Two armies including Germany, Japan, Italy, Britain, Russia and the United States of America. An other showcase traces the evolution of the military carbine from the early muzzle-loading musket to the modern breech-loading magazine rifle. The bigger weapons on display include a six-inch mountain howitzer, a 3.7 antiaircraft gun, a 40mm Bofors, a 25-pdr field

gun, a 12-powder coastal battery gun, a Valentine tank and a Ferret armoured car. Another full-size habitat tableau from the World War Two period shows New Zealand troops of the Third Division disembarking by scrambling nets from a troop-ship into a landing craft manned by an American sailor in preparation for an amphibious assault on one of the Pacific islands. Nor are the women's services overlooked. There are display cases

of "Women at War" showing the contribution of the Women's War Service Auxillary (WWSA), the New Zealand Women's Auxillary Army Corps (NZWAAC), the Women's Land Army, the Voluntary Aids (VAD) and the Royal New Zealand Nursing Corps. Of particular interest to former prisoners of war is a special prisoner of war showcase representing some of the 9000 New Zealanders who were captured and held in enemy

camps during World War Two. Former prisoner of war's are invited to add their own signatures and details to this display. This main ground floor exhibition hall also contains three other life-size habitat tableaux representing New Zealanders in action in the frozen darkness of a Korean winter, a steaming jungle in Malaysia during the communist emergency and a scene showing New Zealand infantry troops disembarking from a helicopter during the Indo China/Vietnam war campaign. A total of 3800 New Zealand soldiers, 61 airmen and 28 sailors saw service in South Vietnam as part of the Australian Task Force. Of these 35 were killed and 187 wounded in action. In a specially-lit display area at the far corner of this main exhibition hall is a Medal Gallery containing a selection of war medals, campaign stars, awards for bravery, orders and other decorations for distinguished service. It is well worth spending a few moments in these hallowed surroundings to acknowledge New Zealand's contribution in times of war.