The Real Lessons of Anzac Day: Class War and the True Enemy
By Cal Ashnikov
For most of our history, Australia’s enemies have never been on foreign shores. Rather, the real enemy of Australian working people was and is the ruling class that profits from imperialist ventures. On the 25th of April 2021, it will be 106 years since members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps landed on the beaches of Gallipoli, my great-grandfather among them. This date marked the beginning of a disastrous campaign that saw over 8700 Australians, 2700 New Zealanders, and 86 000 Turkish people die fighting for a beach head on the other side of the world. Though many years ago, we as Australians must never forget the lessons to be learnt from the sacrifices made by those who were caught up in this failed adventure and must combat those who now appropriate a mythological narrative of this saga for their own harmful ends.
Despite the rhetoric of warmongering, nationalistic myth-writers in recent years, the landing at Gallipoli was not due to Australians fighting to build a new nation in the spirit of fraternity, but solely occurred because that was where imperialism sent our young to die to suit their agendas. Young men, my great-grandfather among them, were sent out to die as the unknowing, led by the unqualified, to do the unnecessary. Ted Matthews, the last surviving Anzac to have landed on that day some 106 years ago, said shortly before his death that ‘the whole point of Anzac Day has been lost. It’s not for old diggers to remember, it’s for survivors to warn young people against romanticising war’.[1] Indeed, we must learn the real lessons of Anzac Day. This lesson being to learn from the dangers of imperialist adventurism, of patriotic jingoism and of the agents of the military industrial complex. We, as Australians, have a solemn duty to learn from the sacrifices of so many young people before us sent to die in foreign lands, whilst the real enemy at home and abroad made money off of their slaughter. A duty to recognise and wage war against the one true enemy – the ruling class.
Appropriation of the meaning of Anzac Day
In recent years, we have seen a shift in Anzac Day from that of sombre remembrance to a patriotic celebration polluted by jingoistic nationalism. The government has perverted and appropriated commemorations so as to craft a ‘distorted Digger myth’ that aligns with their agendas and distorts the true lesson and history of this occasion. Many have noted how the government has been ‘systematically militarising Australian history and culture’ and attaching a loaded narrative that combines Australian history and identity with current Australian foreign policy.[2] This commercialisation of Anzac has led to a new Australian that is ‘largely unreflective and blind to its political exploitation’.[3]
Furthermore, as the Australian public is whipped into this patriotic whirlwind which justifies the present by linking it to our past, this has justified removing the military from criticism on their present shortcomings. Conservative lackeys, such as Mervyn Bendle, still maintain that we should take pride in the sacrifice of young Australians on a foreign shore for imperialist interests, for it was this that stopped German expansionism and militarism.[4] But why should we worship and glorify British imperialism then, or Austro-American imperialism now? Should we not learn the real lesson for Anzac Day through the ages?
The Real Lesson
Gallipoli veteran Tom Epps of the 27th Battalion stated just before his death that ‘Remembrance Day and Anzac Day should be lessons to us…they are not days about the glory of war or about nationalism but a lesson in the futility of war. It taught me how stupid the politicians and military can be. They were boneheads. The 1914-1918 war was mass murder. Ninety-nine per cent of war is stupid’.[5] From a veteran himself, we see the folly of glorifying imperialist adventurism. Out of respect for those who gave their lives, we must learn not to fall victim to the disgusting bloodshed that the ruling class and warmongers would have us lay down our lives for. As patriots, we must fight the true enemies of our country. Those who sell out our futures and trade the lives of our youth to gain nothing but financial and imperial expansion. This rings as true for Gallipoli then as it does for Afghanistan now.
Imperialist Ventures
When reflecting on Anzac Day, we must question why young Australians were sent halfway across the world to die. Harry Newhouse, who landed at Anzac Cove on the 26th of April, lamented some 80 years later in asking ‘What was it for? I don’t know. It should never have been’. In regard to the myth of Gallipoli that was being crafted towards the end of his life, he said ‘they think we became a nation, but they killed half the nation’.[6] Australia’s military, as the ACP’s Defence Policy states, should be focused on protecting Australia from invasion and intrusion into our country, rather than serving the aims of domestic and international imperialism as we did in Gallipoli, Korea, Malaya, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. As communists, we are against sending Australians to die in imperialist adventurism.
However, we are not pacifists. We recognise the fact that fascist and imperialist forces can only be combatted with revolutionary war, and that we must defend ourselves against imperialist incursions into our nation, as we did when the Japanese Empire threatened our borders in the Second World War. This was shown with Communist involvement in the war. Sharkey said at the time that involvement in the conflict was justified as a ‘war of independence on the part of the democratic peoples against fascist imperialist aggression’.[7] Australian Communists in the past have repeatedly supported campaigns where Australia was combatting imperialism, working to mobilise production and improve conditions for both current and ex-service personnel during the war, pioneering a campaign for housing and equal pay for servicewomen.[8] Communist organising during the Second World War was also seen as good for morale, with attempts to transform the army into a people’s army becoming widely accepted and respected.
Thus, as Communists we support mobilising to defend the interests of the Australian people, to fight imperialism and fascism. But we actively oppose imperialist extravagance that doesn’t serve the people, but only the interests of capitalist warmongers. This is seen when we spend $89 billion on twelve new submarines, whilst only $3 billion is put towards social housing.[9] The policy of the party emphasises the need to shift away from being a consumer and participant in the US military empire and shift instead towards public owned military supplies that are locally produced. In turn, these materials and assets should be geared towards defending Australia, providing disaster relief and protecting the interests of the Australian people against its real enemies. Who are these enemies?
Enemies in Class
The real enemies of working Australians, in 1915 as today, are the ruling capitalist class that control the means of production and exploit the lives of working people to make profit and secure their interests, whether in the workplace or on the battlefields. It is not possible to address the death and destruction the military industrial complex causes through reforms, as it is inherently intertwined with capitalism and materialism.
As our Party states, ‘to realise a defence policy that is truly about defending Australia and its people requires working class political power and a socialist economic system’.[10] It is idealistic, naïve and foolish to believe in pacifist notions to accomplish change within this system. Australia needs a military that is able to defend itself against the provocations of the agents of imperialism and those who would seek to restore their privileges, and rather orient it around defending Australia, her land and her people. We must learn the real lessons from the sacrifices made by our forebears at Gallipoli all those years ago. Lest we forget the working-class Australians sent to die for imperialism thousands of miles away from their homes and families. Lest we forgive the rich warmongers that sent those Australians to die for those profits. May we never again forget that the true enemy of working-class Australians is the imperialist class enemy. All power to the people.
For more information, our defence policy can be read here:
https://www.auscp.org.au/defence-policy
References
[1] Stephens, Tony. Gallipoli 100 years, the veterans: Ted Matthews. The Sydney Morning Herald. December 11, 1997
[2] McKay, Jim. “The Anzac Resurgence and Its Critics.” In Transnational Tourism Experiences at Gallipoli, 65–91. Singapore: Springer Singapore, 2018.
[3] McKay, Jim. “A Critique of the Militarisation of Australian History and Culture Thesis: The Case of Anzac Battlefield Tourism.” Portal (Sydney, N.S.W.) 10, no. 1 (2013).
[4] Bendle, Mervyn F. “The Assault on Anzac: The Legend and the Left.” Quadrant 53, no. 7-8 (2009): 7–14.
[5] Stephens, Tony, and Steven Siewert. 1996. The Last Anzacs - Gallipoli 1915. Sydney: Allen & Kemsley.
[6] Ibid
[7] Symons, Beverley. “All-Out for the People’s War: Communist Soldiers in the Australian Army in the Second World War.” Australian historical studies 26, no. 105 (1995): 596–614.
[8] Ibid
[9] AHURI. 2020. "What’s in The Federal Budget For Housing, Homelessness And Cities? An Overview Of The Government’s Spending in The Delayed 2020-21 Budget". Canberra: AHURI.
[10] Defence Policy — Australian Communist Party". 2021. Australian Communist Party.