Inequalities of Sacrifice: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Labour in Northern Australia during the Second World War

Abstract

Engagement in total war posed hitherto unasked questions about how to contain or deploy Australians previously 'outside' the nation. World War II witnessed an extraordinary intervention of the government into the economy and labour force that was unprecedented since the colonial autocracy operated the convict system. In order to mobilise the nation for total war after December 1941 no aspect of public life in Australia was untouched by regulation and bureaucratic control. Able-bodied Anglo-Australian men were conscripted into the defence of the nation and its territories; the operation of the Manpower Authority directed untapped categories of women into paid employment; those interned enemy aliens not deemed security risks after mid-1942 were organised into the Civil Alien Corps to work on Allied Works Council projects in remote areas. Debate ensued about whether Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples could be mobilised within this wider process, and, if so, in what capacities? Was their 'loyalty' to the nation which was ultimately fighting to preserve a white British derived bastion to be counted upon? Were they potential collaborators with the Japanese in the case of invasion? Would participation in the national endeavour give them unacceptable claims for full citizenship in the postwar period? The processes involved in deploying Aboriginal and Islander peoples into the national war effort was by no means easy. Several categories were identified, each of which required its own inclusion or rejection within wider mobilisations. Two broad strategies however operated. The first involved the degree to which Aborigines were either still tribalised or incorporated into capitalist labour structures. The second addressed their actual location and its strategic vulnerability to enemy invasion. Thus, the Army was faced with a series of combinations involving category and location in order to defend northern Australia. Except for those who were not subject to discriminatory 'protective' legislation, Aboriginal men were exempt from compulsory military training under Section 61 (1) (h) of the Defence Act of 1909. Essentially only those not identifying culturally as Aborigines and were thus recognised by bureaucratic procedures were obligated to join the Australian Imperial Force or the Australian Military Force. Thus, few had the opportunity to defend the nation as soldier-citizens. Tribal people, for instance, could hardly be mobilised by the Manpower Authority. Many of them lived in northern areas most vulnerable to enemy attack or invasion; but, whether in the first instance or indeed how to enlist the services of able