The Great Emu War
Throughout history we see wars that are fought for a multitude of reasons. Some are fought over resources others over religion or even to gain political power. Then there is this odd category of wars where they are fought mostly for public opinion, there might be a good reason to fight them but the real underlying cause is really to improve public opinion. Wars in this category include the War on Drugs, the War on Poverty, even really the War on Terror. Not trying to get political but oftentimes these wars drag on for a long time and end up doing the exact opposite of what they were intended for. One war that falls into this category is Australia’s Great Emu War.
Photo Courtesy of Rachel Fegan
Causes
After the First World War, Australia had a great deal of difficulty attempting to figure out what to do with the thousands of veterans returning home. Not many returning were cut out for factory work and even if they were Australia did not have enough of an industrial base to employ them all. The government eventually came up with what was called the Soldiers Settlement Scheme. With this veterans were given grants for land that was to be used for agriculture, and the Australian government would subsidize whatever crops they grew. At first this seemed like a great solution, much of Australia's unsettled land would now be occupied and the veterans would receive sufficient payment for their service. However few farmers saw any real success from their fields. Most of the land they were given was arid and crops struggled to grow, and to add insult to injury the Australian government did not subsidize the crops as they originally promised. Plus many farmers were ineligible for loans to improve their farms. Then on top of all that the Great Depression hit. The icing on the cake? The large native flightless birds known as the Emu.
Emus were a great nuisance to the farmers, often digging up seeds and trampling crops that had already grown. Emus are also incredibly strong creatures, they would run about and break barbed wire fences which would affect farmers livestock. They were a great hindrance to the farmers that already had enough on their plate, but it was one thing that the farmers knew they could actually do something about.
The veterans had seen first hand the devastating effect of machine guns during the Great War. So they approached the Australian Minister of Defence, Sir George Foster Pearce, and requested that they be provided with machine guns and ammunition that was to be used to thin the Emu hordes. Unsurprisingly the Minister of Defense rejected their offer. Instead Major G. P. W. Meredith of the Seventh Heavy Battery of the Royal Australian Artillery was put to the task of decreasing the number of the estimated 20,000 birds.
Photo of Minister of Defense Sir George Pearce
Major Meredith along with a cameraman and two other soldiers from the Seventh Heavy Battery armed with a couple Lewis Guns and 10,000 rounds of ammunition made their way to Campion. This is where the first “battle” of the war was to take place. Two quick side notes here, the inclusion of a cameraman to document the activities of the soldiers is strong evidence that this was something the Australian government was doing for public opinion purposes. They were very much trying to show the people that they were doing something to help the veterans, especially after the lack of loans and the memory of the nonexistent subsidies were still fresh in people's minds. For the second point, one may wonder why the farmers went to the Ministry of Defense first and not the Ministry of Agriculture. To put it quite plainly, the veterans did not trust the Ministry of Agriculture.
The War
On the morning of November 2, 1932 Major Meredith and his men hastily unloaded their equipment as they spotted a flock of 50 Emus. From range they opened fire, raining down a hail of concentrated fire on the group. The birds quickly scattered. The rest of the day the soldiers took turns attempting to herd the Emus into a big enough group for the machine gun to mow down. After firing at thousands of Emus by the end of the day only about a dozen of the birds had been killed. (There are claims that one of the reasons for so minimal results on this first day was due to the soldiers firing on the Emus at a range of 1000 meters but I could not find any credible sources to back up this information.)
Two days later the soldiers set up an ambush at a dam where many Emu were known to congregate. Hiding in the bush in the early morning hours the soldiers let loose with their Lewis Guns at near point blank range on an estimated 1000 Emus. It would have been a large victory if not for the gun jamming after the first few rounds. The soldiers frantically tried to unjam it but by the time they were back in action the Emus had fled. The rest of the day they attempted to lure the Emus back but the birds were having no part of it. Only about 11 Emus were killed on this second day of fighting. After this bout one of the soldiers was quoted as saying, “The emus have proved that they are not so stupid as they are usually considered to be. Each mob has its leader . . . who keeps watch while his fellows busy themselves with the wheat. At the first suspicious sign, he gives the signal, and dozens of heads stretch up out of the crop. A few birds will take fright. . .” As one might imagine the media had a field day with this, talking of how the birds had outsmarted the Australian military.
After this they changed tactics once again, deciding now to borrow trucks from local farmers and mounting the machine guns on the back of them. This, again, did not work. The drive was too bumpy for the gunners to properly aim and the Emus could easily outrun the trucks when not on the main roads. Though a newspaper from the time claimed that the trucks were, “The best method yet tried of countering the pests”. There is one instance of note that happened during this vehicle trial. The driver of one of the trucks became particularly aggravated with one Emu and decided to run it over. As with everything else this did not go as planned. The Emu flew into the cab of the truck and its body became stuck in the steering wheel causing the driver to lose control. The truck careened off of the main road and into a farmers fence, taking out a good portion of it. Again the media had much fun at the soldiers expense for these actions.
Image Courtesy of Strasbourg
The End of the First and the Start of the Second
On November 8th, only six days after the war had started, Major Meredith and his men were recalled, thus ending the Emu War. They had spent roughly 2500 rounds of their allotted 10,000 rounds of ammunition. There are estimates ranging between 50-500 Emus being killed by the soldiers though the general consensus is between 200-300. A newspaper from the time corroborates the 300 number.
Major Meredith did try to look at the bright side stating in his official report that the Australian forces had, “Sustained no casualties”. A quote from Major Meredith sums up the strength of the Emus, “If we had a military division with the bullet-carrying capacity of these birds it would face any army in the world…They can face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks. They are like Zulus whom even dum-dum bullets could not stop.”
There was a second what one might call “war” when another offensive was launched on November 13. At the behest of the farmers Major Meredith and his men returned with their machine guns and to their credit did fare a bit better, killing roughly 50 Emu the first day and averaging about 100 a week. However they were recalled once again when Major Meredith did some calculations and reported to parliament that it took roughly 10 bullets to bring down one Emu. The Australian Government then put in place a bounty system and provided ammunition for the farmers to use. In the next six months more than 55,000 Emus were killed.
During a parliamentary meeting it was asked if a medal should be minted for those who fought in the war. One politician stated that any medal should go to the Emus as they, “Have won every round so far”.
Further Requests
These short offensives wouldn’t be the last time that farmers would request military assistance to deal with the nuisance birds. Farmers made similar requests for assistance in 1934, 1943, and 1948. Even going so far as to ask that the Emus be bombed by low flying aircraft! These requests were never granted and the Emus, to this day, are hunted by local farmers. The bird is even a common food source of which there is no short supply of.
Photo Courtesy of 10daily
For those reading that may worry about the birds population, it has remained stable ever since the culling of the birds first started. Also as for the cameraman that accompanied the soldiers he did take good videos and photographs, some of which you can view online, but the Australian government did not release much of it at the time. This mainly being due to the newspapers already reporting on everything that was happening and damaging the view of the Australian military enough.
Personal Thoughts
The Emu War has captivated me ever since I first read about it and I wish there were some more official accounts of it. Maybe if I ever go to Australia I will be able to look through some archives that are not available online. It is definitely one of the more strange wars and the Australians technically losing just makes it all the more entertaining. Before knowing that this was a war that’s main purpose I did wonder why they didn’t just go with the bounty system first, but now it makes sense. I do believe the government had good intentions and did expect moderate success from the campaign but everything just seemed to be working against the them. Another thing that I do still wonder is why they picked an artillery officer instead of an infantry officer? If anyone knows why or has any theories do let me know.
Sources
http://ergo.slv.vic.gov.au/explore-history/australia-wwi/abroad-wwi/returning-soldiers
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/running-ponies/the-great-emu-war-in-which-some-large-flig
http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/pearce-sir-george-foster-7996
https://www.australiangeographic.com.au/topics/wildlife/2016/10/on-this-day-the-emu-wars-begin/
https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/2317086
https://unusualinteresting.com/australia-lost-an-official-military-operation-against-emus-in-1932/
https://10daily.com.au/news/australia/a180819yug/remembering-the-great-australian-emu-war-of-1932-20180820
