Anzac story moves into new era

First light breaking over the surf at Gold Coast beaches on Sunday saw the welcome return of the treasured, moving rituals we missed so much last year — Anzac Day Dawn Services. From capital city cenotaphs to thousands of suburban and bush memorials, the nation came together, as Scott Morrison said in pre-dawn darkness at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, “to reflect, remember, give thanks and draw strength’’. In Christian churches, Anzac commemorations were linked to Good Shepherd Sunday, honouring the one “who willingly risks his life to protect his own’’. As Archbishop Anthony Fisher said at the Anzac vigil mass at St Mary’s Cathedral in Sydney, the difference between a mercenary and a committed soldier is not skill or experience, but motivation and character.

Numbers at Anzac ceremonies in some states were constrained by local COVID-19 strictures and booking rules, to the irritation of some attendees and would-be attendees. In Perth and Peel, residents enduring their second day of yet another lockdown marked the occasion, as the nation as a whole did last year, by holding a candle or light in driveways, windows or on balconies, to strains of the Last Post played on iPhones.

Anzac Day comments by our ninth Defence Minister in 14 years, Peter Dutton, again showed he has his priorities correct and the Morrison government has the backs of ADF personnel. Thanking more than 39,000 troops who served in the Middle East over 20 years of almost permanent conflict, the focus now needed to be on home, Mr Dutton told News Corp. Troops could now catch up, ramp up on training, allow new war-fighting acquisitions to arrive and be rolled out and operators to skill up on their use to build greater capacity, he said. Skills learned in the conflict zones in the past 20 years would serve the nation well as Australia faced multiple threats, including the militarisation of bases and islands on our doorstep, notably by China, and foreign interference and cyber threats; and China’s “heavy influence” on our neighbours.

With refreshing frankness, Mr Dutton articulated the deep-seated concerns of many Australians, including defence personnel. Nobody wanted conflict with China over Taiwan or anything else, Mr Dutton told the ABC’s Insiders. But such a war should not be discounted. “I think China has been very clear about the reunification … a long-held objective of theirs,’’ he said. “If you look at any of the rhetoric that is coming out of China … particularly in recent weeks and months … they have been very clear about that goal.” That sobering assessment is a reality check. The government acted wisely last week overruling Victoria’s Belt and Road deals with Beijing. It is now examining other such deals, including by our universities. The Chinese control of the Port of Darwin, given under a 99-year lease arrangement with the Northern Territory Country Liberal Party in 2015 for $506m, must also be revisited. As we have noted in several editorials, that flawed deal sparked “security and diplomatic concerns that went all the way to the White House’’ under Barack Obama. At the time, federal cabinet under Malcolm Turnbull was reportedly not aware of the deal until hours before then-NT chief minister Adam Giles announced it.

Australia is going to be on a “rollercoaster ride for years’’, Peter Jennings, Australian Strategic Policy Institute executive director, wrote in Inquirer on Saturday: “National positions are hardening. Neither Beijing nor Canberra will back down and the prospects for negotiation are zero given China’s ‘wolf warrior’ mania.’’ A new, critically important era in our history has begun. And, as Jamie Walker writes, our great generation of WWII veterans is fast approaching a tipping point. Fewer than 7800 of the nearly one million people who answered the call to arms during the nation’s darkest hour, from 1939-45, are likely to be alive in June. The fade-out of the WWII veterans, now mainly well into their 90s, was evident from their dwindling ranks on Sunday. Those left, understandably, were showered with affection. Our Anzac story is moving on.