Page 55 - Australian Defence Magazine Sep 2021

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BOOKS OF INTEREST 55
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BASTARD BEHIND THE LINES
By Tom Gilling
Published by Allen & Unwin RRP $29.99 in paperback ISBN 9781760875879
Scottish-born but a Queenslander at heart,
Jock McLaren was a true Australian hero. As a prisoner he escaped twice, first from Changi and later from the infamous Sandakan POW camp in Borneo. After paddling a dugout canoe across open sea, he fought for two years with American-led Filipino guerrillas, his exploits so audacious the
SECRET AND SPECIAL
THE UNTOLD STORY OF Z SPECIAL UNIT IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR By Will Davies
Published by Vintage/Penguin Random House
RRP $34.99 in paperback ISBN 9780143784982
Soon after the declaration of war on Japan, Australia established a secret military reconnaissance unit. In 1943 it became known as the Special Reconnaissance Department (SRD) and then the Z Special Unit. Training began
in a number of locations around Australia. From these locations,
Japanese put a price on his head. At the helm of his 26- foot whaleboat, the Bastard, McLaren sailed brazenly into enemy-held harbours, wreaking havoc with his mortar and machine guns before heading back out to sea. In early 1945 he joined Australia's secretive Z Special Unit, parachuting
into Borneo to carry out reconnaissance resistance ahead of Allied landings. He cheated death on numerous occasions. McLaren’s story first came to light in Hal Richardson’s book ‘One-Man War: The Jock McLaren Story’ published more than 60 years ago, which Gilling believes relies too heavily on McLaren’s flawed recollections. Instead, Gilling has drawn heavily on Allied and Japanese wartime documents to retell the story
of a courageous individual who did what he could to disrupt the enemy and improbably survived to tell the tale.
Z Special undertook intelligence gathering and raiding missions throughout Southeast Asia. The first operation was Jaywick in September 1943. Using an old Japanese fishing boat renamed Krait the vessel was re-fitted
for a voyage from Australia to just south of Singapore where
it released six commandos
in kayaks to attack Japanese shipping in the harbour. They succeeded in sinking 40,000 tons of shipping. After the successful attack, they were picked up and returned to Australia. This was followed by Operation Rimau but this time things went wrong very early. All of the raiding party were shot or captured, with the last ten being executed just before the end
of the war. In all, Z Special Unit carried out 81 covert operations in the Southwest Pacific theatre. A compelling story of the bravery and sacrifice of those who volunteered.
DERRICK VC IN HIS OWN WORDS
THE WARTIME WRITINGS OF AUSTRALIA’S MOST FAMOUS FIGHTING SOLDIER OF WORLD WAR II
EDITED BY MARK JOHNSTON Published by New South Publishing RRP $39.99 in paperback
ISBN 9781742237244
Historian Mark Johnston has done a great job of annotating the writings of Tom ‘Diver’ Derrick VC DCM, who was Australia’s most famous fighting soldier of World War II. It’s hard to comprehend that Derrick,
HITLER AND STALIN
THE TYRANTS AND THE SECOND WORLD WAR By Laurence Rees Published by Viking/ Penguin Random House RRP $35.00 in paperback ISBN 9780241422670
Author Laurence Rees says
the origins of this book can be traced to the thirty years he has spent making documentaries and writing books about the Third Reich, Stalinism and WW2. In this latest book,
he examines the two tyrants during WW2, when Germany
when he enlisted in 1940, was
a 26-year-old labourer with limited education and few civilian prospects. He went on to fight in five campaigns, won the highest medals for bravery, and died of wounds (in 1945) which he sustained while leading his men in the war’s last stages.
His career reached its climax
on the jungle-clad heights of Sattelberg in New Guinea, where he won the Victoria Cross by spearheading the capture of seemingly impregnable Japanese defences. Undoubtedly, the diaries Derrick kept throughout his campaigns, from Tobruk
to Tarakan, are among the
most important writings by any Australian soldier. Those diaries and all his other known wartime correspondence and interviews are published here for the first time in their entirety. What emerges is a compelling insight into life on the front line of war.
A must read for military history enthusiasts.
and the Soviet Union fought
the bloodiest war in history.
Yet despite the fact they were bitter opponents who never actually met, he demonstrates that Hitler and Stalin were different sides of the same coin. Hitler’s charismatic leadership may contrast with Stalin’s regimented rule by fear; and
his intransigence later in the
war may contrast with Stalin’s change in behaviour in response to events. But at a macro level, both were prepared to create undreamt of suffering, destroy individual liberty and twist facts in order to build the utopia
they wanted, and while Hitler’s creation of the Holocaust remains a singular crime, Rees shows why we must not forget that Stalin committed a series of atrocities at the same time. Rees has used previously unpublished material, including eyewitness testimony, to produce a masterwork that has been widely commended.