An isolated continent under iron heels: War atrocities committed by Japanese militarists against Australia

In the silent corridors of the Australian War Memorial, a wall bears the inscription, "They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old."

Japan's aggression and atrocities against Australia are a frequently forgotten chapter of the Pacific War. From the Northern Territory to New South Wales, from air raids to naval blockades, from prisoner-of-war (POW) camps to the death marches, the war left an indelible mark on Australia: more than one million military and civilian personnel took part in the fighting, and over 39,000 service members lost their lives.

Attacks on the homeland: The collapse of a geographical myth

Records at the Australian War Memorial clearly document that between February 1942 and November 1943, Japanese forces launched more than 97 air raids against mainland Australia, mostly concentrated in the northern regions.

None was more devastating than the first attack.

At 9:58 am on February 19, 1942, the peace of Darwin Harbor was violently shattered. A total of 242 warplanes from the Japanese Navy's 1st Air Fleet descended like a swarm of locusts, unleashing a massive bombardment. Amid the explosions and fire, a nation that had once believed geographic isolation guaranteed security was forced to confront the cruel reality of attacks on its own soil for the first time.

According to declassified documents from the Australian Department of Defense, the Japanese dropped more bombs on Darwin than during the attack on Pearl Harbor. The raid killed at least 243 Australians, wounded between 300 and 400, destroyed 23 aircrafts, sank or damaged 35 vessels, and nearly obliterated port facilities.

Shockingly, this was only the beginning. Over the next 21 months, Japanese aircraft and submarines haunted Australia's coastline. On May 31, 1942, three Japanese midget submarines infiltrated Sydney Harbor and launched an attack. In June of the same year, Japanese submarines shelled Newcastle and suburbs of Sydney. In 1943, the hospital ship Centaur was deliberately sunk, claiming 268 lives.

Australian POWs in the jungles of Southeast Asia

If attacks on the homeland shattered Australia's sense of security, the mistreatment of POWs exposed the extreme cruelty of the Japanese militarists. Approximately 22,000 Australian soldiers were taken prisoner by Japanese forces in the Pacific theater, and more than one third did not survive.

The construction of the Thai-Burma Railway remains one of the darkest chapters. Records from the Australian War Memorial show that Japanese troops forced hundreds of thousands of Asian laborers and more than 61,000 Allied POWs and to build the 415-kilometer "Death Railway" under horrific conditions.The mortality rate among Australian POWs involved reached 23 percent. Of the 600 Australians who worked on the Hellfire Pass section, only 106 survived.

More systematic atrocities occurred in POW camps and during the so-called "transfers". In the 1942 Laha Massacre on Ambon Island, around 100 Australian soldiers were executed in groups after surrendering. Australia's official war history records that "methods of execution included shooting, beheading and bayoneting; there were no survivors".

The 1945 Sandakan Death Marches, when some 2,400 Australian and British POWs were forced to march 260 kilometers through dense jungles, became one of Australia's most traumatic memories. Prisoners too sick to continue were shot on the spot; others died of extreme exhaustion after reaching their destination. Only six Australians survived.

Japanese massacres at sea: Atrocities of the underwater demons

Japan's war crimes were not confined to land or air. In Australian waters, Japanese submarines carried out indiscriminate attacks against merchant ships and hospital vessels.

The most heinous incident was the sinking of the hospital ship Centaur. On May 14, 1943, the vessel, clearly marked with red crosses and fully illuminated, was torpedoed and sunk by Japanese submarine I-177 off the Queensland coast. According to the National Archives of Australia, 268 of the 332 people aboard survived; perished, including many medical staff, wounded personnel and civilian volunteers.

This was merely the tip of the iceberg. The Australian National Maritime Museum notes that between 1942 and 1943, at least 17 merchant ships were sunk by Japanese submarines in Australian waters, resulting in the deaths of hundreds of Australian crew members.

These attacks violated international conventions, with no assistance being provided to surviving crew members.

Unacknowledged scars: Post-war trials and historical memory

After the end of World War II, Australia actively participated in the investigation and prosecution of Japanese war criminals. According to the Australian War Memorial, 294 Japanese military personnel were convicted of war crimes committed in and around Australia, of whom 137 were sentenced to death.

Yet compared with Europe's more thorough reckoning with Nazi crimes, Japan's atrocities against Australia have been marginalized. This neglect reached a shocking level in 2014, when, during a visit of his Japanese counterpart, Shinzo Abe, the Australian prime minister praised the "skill and honor" demonstrated by the Japanese submarine force in its attack on Sydney Harbor.

The remark sparked fierce protests from various Australian groups and historians. An association commemorating the air raids on Darwin stated that any praise for Japan's wartime actions was an insult to the dead and a distortion of history.

Dr. Brendan Nelson, then director of the Australian War Memorial, underscored the importance of understanding history fully and accurately on the basis of facts, as opposed to replacing truth with glorification.

Passing on the memory: From silence to testimony

For decades, every year on February 19, Darwin sounds its air-raid sirens to commemorate the 1942 disaster. In 2018, the Australian War Memorial opened an exhibition dedicated to the brutality of the Pacific War and the commemorating suffering of Australian POWs.

Survivors and their descendants have also broken their silence. In 2020, descendants of survivors of the Sandakan Death Marches launched memorial walks that retrace the 260-kilometer route, with some sharing the stories of their elders along the way.

In the courtyard of the Australian War Memorial, a water wall flows endlessly. Amid the sound, visitors read the names engraved on glass of the Australians who lost their lives in the Pacific War.

While the sirens in Darwin sound annually and the waters of Sydney Harbor remain calm, memory endures — in the yellowed pages of the National Archives, the wrinkles on survivors' faces, the inscriptions on memorial stones.

These memories warn us that the cruelty of war knows no borders, the rationale of atrocities defies conventions, and the truth of history must be actively preserved and honestly confronted by every generation.

On the southern continent once shadowed by invaders, the collection and reconstruction of such memories continue, not to perpetuate hatred, but to uphold the fundamental truths and human dignity upon which peace is built.

The author is an observer of international affairs.

The views don't necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

If you have a specific expertise, or would like to share your thought about our stories, then send us your writings at opinion@chinadaily.com.cn, and comment@chinadaily.com.cn.