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SPEECH BY THE PRIME MINISTER
OPENING OF THE TELECOM AUSTRALIA THEATRE
AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL
CANBERRA 11 NOVEMBER 1991
Dame Beryl Beaurepaire,
Ben Humphreys
Brendon Kelson, Director of Australian War Memorial
Mel Ward, Managing Director Telecom
Your Excellencies
Distinguished Guests
Ladies and Gentlemen
The Australian War Memorial is a unique institution not just
in this country, but in the world.
It is not simply a museum, though it is a museum. It is not
simply a memorial, though it is a memorial. It is not a
tomb, though all the Australians who died in war are present;
here. The Australian War Memorial contains all those things
museum, memorial and mausoleum and more. It is, to quote
John Curtin at the opening of this extraordinary building
fifty years ago today, " the sanctuary of Australian
traditions." A sanctuary where C W Bean the father of the Memorial said
we should " feel the presence of the dead", where we would
find their " relics and records" close by, and where we would.
find understanding through knowledge. In Bean's inspired
view this was the most profound way to commemoration and
remembrance. I
Their spirit would be here, because unlike most other
countries we know their names. -Although Australia returned
just one body home in World War One, we had no need for a
tomb of the unknown soldier, for we know who they were and
we remember them.
Bean read the words of an Australian soldier, dying alone in
a muddy hole in France in the First World War and kept them
as motivation through the long years it took to establish
this great shrine. The soldier wrote, " At least in
Australia they will remember me."
On this Remembrance Day, at this opening of a new page in
the story of' the Australian War Memorial, it is fitting that
we should remember what those Australian traditions are,
what the Australians whose names are fixed forever in bronze
died for: liberty, democracy, the rule of law, national
sovereignty and peace.
In 1991 those traditions, which are not so uniquely
Australian that we have not wanted to share them, are as
important as they ever were.
We have seen over the past two years that those traditions
are what people all over the world demand as well in
Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, in Africa, Asia
and South America.
This year, Australians have again served with distinction in
war, to defeat aggression in the Gulf.
Australians are still serving overseas, under the United
Nations in the Western Sahara.
Before this year ends, Australians will be serving in
Cambodia, under the United Nations, to underwrite a peace
settlement which Australian diplomacy has been instrumental
in achieving..
No one can overlook the poignancy of the opening of the of
this Memorial fifty years ago, on the eve of that massive
struggle in t~ he Pacific which did so much to shape Australia
and its regio~ n.
The Pacific War was the greatest crisis in our nation's
history, and we emerged from it much changed. In its way it
was a rite of passage as fundamental as Gallipoli.
For if Gallipoli gave Australians a sense of our identity as
a nation, the Pacific War brought us to understand our
location as a. nation, and our destiny as a part of the Asia-
Pacific region.
It marked the decisive turning point of the colonial era in
Asia, and the emergence of the complex community of
independent nations which are today our neighbours and
friends. It also marked the final chapter of our own colonial era,
and the foundati6n of our unique partnership with the United
States a distinctively Pacific relationship which has
grown to reflect our increasing acceptance of the Asia-
Pacific region as the place where we live.
It is fitting that today's ceremonies are the first of a
series on which, over the next year, Australians will look
back with that vividness which an anniversary brings to the
events of fif-ty years ago.
There will be a series of special events to mark particular,
dates; the fall of Singapore, the bombing of Darwin, the
Battle of the Coral Sea, and the Kokoda Trail. The
Government wrill participate fully in these events.
I plan to be! in Darwin in February to commemorate the first
bombing raid.; in the Coral Sea in May to commemorate the
great naval battle which laid the foundations for allied
control of the Pacific Ocean; and on the Kokoda Trail later
in the year to remember those great battles in which
Australians turned the tide of the Japanese march.
In marking these anniversaries, we will be recalling not
only the sacrifi ces made by Australians in defence of their
country, but also the sacrifices of our allies, particularly
the United States. Each year the anniversary of the Coral
Sea has been an occasion for the US and Australia to
remember the fire in which our alliance was forged.
This year it will be a special opportunity to look back on
fifty years of co-operation and partnership, and look
forward to the continued growth and evolution of this
relationship over the challenging years ahead.
With this in mind a Coral Sea Commemorative Council has been
established under the chairmanship of Sir Eric Neal,
bringing tog-ether many eminent Australians to co-ordinate
and develop commemorative activities. The Council aims not
only to remind Australians and Americans of the momentous
events of fifty years ago, but also to encourage them to
look to the future of that relationship in the twenty-first
century. I am honoured to be Patron, with my friend the
American Ambassador Mel Sembler and I give the Committee my
full support.
Over the coming year we will also be remembering the
sacrifices o: E other allies in the defence of Australia. I
would mention in, particular the Dutch forces which fought
here. The government has recently agreed to contribute to
the erection of a memorial in Canberra to those forces.
And in these commemorations we will also remember the
Japanese, for7 whom the Pacific war was such an appalling
tragedy, and such an important rebirth. We will remember
not just the Pacific war a war often of great ferocity and
cruelty but also the regeneration of Japan after the war
and its extraordinary development as an economic power and
partner for Australia, and also, increasingly, as a valued
political partner in regional afid international affairs.
As we move, ever more rapidly it seems, towards the twenty
first century it is right that we should remember how far we
have come in this great country, who made the ultimate
sacrifice that has permitted us our achievements, and
reflect for et moment on where we are going.
Nothing is more constant than change: that was true fifty
years ago, when John Curtin spoke here, and it is true
today. Curtin had to look to a re-orientation in Australia's
foreign policy, to putting the economy on a war footing.
Fifty years on we have look at those things again.
The Australian War Memorial has also had to face the squalls
of change, right from the day it was opened. Conceived as a
memorial to World War One, this Memorial was of course,
opened in World War Two and necessarily had to incorporate
a second generation of sacrifice.
The story of the way the Memorial has coped or not, with
change over the past fifty years, and with the troubled time
between 1917, when Bean first thought of the Memorial, and
1941 is told in Michael McKernan's fascinating and moving
history, Here Is Their Spirit.
Suffice to say here that an institution which had not
changed with the times would not have been able to
commission and publish such a warts and all work.
The Australian War Memorial of 1991 is quite different to
the one opened in 1941. It has not in any way betrayed the
ideals of Bean it has expanded and enhanced them. Bean
looked for the best way, artistically and technically, to
display the relics and records to their best advantage.
He would, I am sure, be delighted and proud that such a
splendid venue as the Telecom Australia Theatre would be
available for the screening of the Memorial's moving picture
heritage. Especially as Bean had encouraged two photographers, Frank
Hurley and Hubert Wilkins, to try their hand at moving
pictures, an infant artform at that time.
Their work, some of which has been shown during the
Memorial's recent film festival, is a vivid, almost haunting
reminder of the terrible ravages of that war in France and
Gallipoli. John Treloar, Bean's friend and director of the Memorial
from its inception until his death in 1952, commissioned
kilometres of film during World War Two to the extent that
the Memorial collection contains some 4000 titles with about
1000 kilometres of footage.
For many years this magnificent -collection of film material
was available to only a few scholars who were able to use it
in the Research Centre.
Regrettably the great majority of Australians were denied
access to an important part of their heritage.
Through the generous support of Telecom Australia that has
now changed. I congratulate Telecom in joining forces with
the War Memorial in this major project and the Memorial
Council and management for the enterprise shown in arranging
for this important partnership.
I began by saying that the Australian War Memorial is a
unique institution more than a museum, more than a tomb,
more than a gallery, more than a research facility more
than a simple memorial. It is all of those things.
Over the past fifty changing years it has become a place of
pilgrimage until it has nearly one million visitors a year.
While I suppose some of those visitors simply come here
because it is one of the places on the tourist trail in
Canberra, I am sure that none leave here without learning a
little bit more about our Australian history, our collective
memories and our stories about being Australian.
The Telecom Australia Theatre will make a substantial
contribution to this living history.
It now gives me much pleasure to formally declare open the
Telecom Australia Theatre.