The Brisbane Line VOL 5; ISSUE 4, December 5, 2017 We must focus strongly on defence Table of Contents and security issues From 26 to 28 October the National Conference of the Royal United Focus Strongly on Defence ........1 Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies Australia Ltd. took place in Canberra. This is the national Peter Mapp made Life Member 2 body to which each State and the Australian Capital Territory are the stakeholders. Celebrated ALH History..............3 The Department of Defence wishes to only deal with “one body” in its relationship with each State of the Victoria Barracks Guided Tour 7 Commonwealth, and the relationship between Government and each State vital to the existence of RUSI. Railways in WW1 ........................7 In the past, the Department of Defence made funds Preparing for the Worst ..............8 available in the form of a grant with which the National Body and each of the States and the Australian Capital Territory operated. For 2016 and 2017 the Department of Defence Dispute in the South China Sea 9 has not made an annual grant available. They argued that they gave support in the form of “kind”, and this has been the use of RUSI Hall, in the case of Queensland. Radical Islam Threat .................10 For the year 2018 there is a grant application to Defence by RUSI National for grant funds to be made available. This Donate your books to RUSIQ ..11 will be conditional on the fact that each State and the ACT will focus on Defence and Security issues. Obituary .....................................12 The undertaking from the stakeholders must now involve current issues on Defence and Security. In my opinion this is not a inappropriate requirement from Government, when More on War Dogs.....................12 they make funds available, with which to support RUSI in each of its branches. RUSI Queensland has overheads which must be met. Continued Next Page Correspondence to: A publication of the RUSI Queensland Branch, Royal United Service Institute Queensland Inc (RUSIQ). Victoria Barracks Brisbane, Promoting Australia’s National Security and Defence. ENOGGERA, QLD 4051 A constituent body of the Royal United Services Institute of Australia. RUSIQ Phone: +61(0)7 3233 4420. Email: [email protected] or Victoria Barracks, Brisbane, Qld 4000 President’s Mobile: 0415 313 600. President: [email protected] or Secretary’s Mobile: 0411 313 600 Secretary’s Mobile: 0411 511 369. Secretary: [email protected] or Email: [email protected] Treasurer: [email protected] Web: www.rusi.org.au The Brisbane Line Page 2 The annual subscription and the small profit from each lecture will not sustain a substantial cash flow. RUSIQ has sought to attract a financial sponsor, but this has not materialised. A drop off in attendances and natural attrition does not help the position. The solution is for more senior ranking and informed speakers, on vital defence issues and security issues. In other words, returning to our core business. In the new year Rear Admiral Simon Cullen AM CSC [Retd], and Major General Paul McLachlan AM CSC [Commander 1st Division, Deployment Joint Force Headquarters] will be our lecturers. We are also making an initiative to attract existing servicemen, and younger members to our organisation. It is my intention to recruit a young serving officer to the RUSIQ Executive. It may be that RUSIQ will conduct evening lectures in parallel to our Monthly Day Lecture. We are on a journey to reinvigorate and grow RUSIQ. -- Peter Mapp, President, RUSIQ. Rear Admiral Simon Cullen, recently retired, was in the Royal Australian Navy for more than 35 years. He had significant military planning expertise. He managed and executed executive orders in support of operations for both peace and wartime missions. Highly respected, he engendered an incredible record of trust at the most senior levels of government. He proved to be a successful leader of large and diverse groups of people during both peacetime and crisis. In 2014 he was Deputy Commander of RIMPAC, the world’s largest naval exercise. Major General Paul McLachlan enlisted in the Regular Australian Army in 1982 and graduated from the Royal Military College - Duntroon in 1985. In November 2015, he assumed command of the 1st Division and Deployable Joint Force Headquarters. He is a graduate of the Australian Defence Force School of Languages, where he was awarded a diploma in advanced Japanese in 1991. He also holds a Masters degree in Strategic Studies and recently completed a Diploma in Complex Strategic Procurement. Peter Mapp made Life Member of RSL In late November 2017 RUSIQ’s President, Peter Mapp was inducted into the Life Members for The Returned and Services League of Australia (RSL). This is a very high honour, and proclaimed by the RSL national body. The picture shows Peter (left) being presented with his Life Member’s award by Mrs Wendy Taylor, President of RSL South East District and RSL State Director, and Mr.John Strachan, RSL State Vice-President. To be eligible for Life Membership, an individual must have served at least 15 continuous years as an RSL member, and spent at least 10 years in “outstanding service to the League”. Outstanding service to the League must be service beyond normal expectations of a member, especially in an honorary capacity. The fact that the member has been an office bearer or member of a Sub-Branch Executive Committee for a number of years, on its own, does not qualify a member for Life Membership. Mrs Taylor said: “It is particularly important that the efforts and dedication of the member’s ‘outstanding service’ in achieving the Charter and Purposes of the Sub-Branch to the betterment of veterans. All aspects of members’ RSL activities must be included and expanded in the citation.” The Brisbane Line Page 3 RUSIQ celebrated ALH history of 100 years ago with CAPT Catts Above: The 2007 oil painting by Ron Marshall of the charge of the Australian Light Horse at Beersheeba on October 31, 1917. Pictured is just one section of two regiments of Australian Light Horse that braved shell and machine-gun fire to gallop more than three miles of open plain, and with bayonets drawn, to charge and capture the Turkish stronghold of Beersheba. “The men of the Australian Light Horse (ALH) were dramatic, almost glamorous figures and it is easy to see their exploits as some splendid adventure. But theirs is a record that is superb in its own right. We don’t need to embellish it. The history of the ALH is a great story and one worth telling and re-telling”. This is how CAPT Adele Catts, (pictured right) Manager, Army Museum South Queensland, warned RUSIQ members about not propagating myths about Beersheeba and other military successes. CAPT Catts has a personal interest because her grandfather, SGT Geoffrey Rowney, served with the 12th Light Horse Regiment of Northern New South Wales at both Gallipoli and Beersheba. She proudly wears medals in honour of her grandfather and the “sweetheart badge” he later passed to her mother. CAPT Catts talk to RUSIQ on October 31 thus well-commemorated the 100th anniversary of the charge of the ALH at Beersheba by the 4th and 12th Light Horse Regiments of the 4th Light Horse Brigade on 31 October 1917. “No other action by Australians in the Middle East of WW1 has caught the public imagination as has the charge at Beersheba. It has been the subject of two feature films: ortyF Thousand Horsemen, 1941 and The Light Horsemen, 1987.” She said: “In this lecture I am not providing the definitive look at the charge rather outlining the context and exploding some myths. For those whose interest is aroused, RUSI has an amazing Library from which you may borrow.” The Brisbane Line Page 4 “Re-enactment troops, such as the local QMIHT, are often formed to recognise and honour those men and horses of a district who served in the ALH. I have an ambivalent feeling towards many of these troops as they are often inaccurate in their dress or drill. However, for my sins I have been made a Life Member of QMIHT. I try to keep in mind that they are groups of civilians keeping LH heritage alive,” she said. “Let me clarify the term ‘Light Horse’ (abbreviated to LH). It was because of the build of the horses that the mounted infantry and mounted rifles were known as Light Horse”. These horses were suited for reconnaissance and mobility tactics. The men would ride up, dismount, fight and ride off. They were not the heavy horses used by the artillery for pulling guns or by the Service Corps for pulling supply wagons. The horses used by the mounted troops were known as “Walers” a short form of New South Wales from where they originally came. Remember Queensland was originally part of the mega state of NSW. The Walers were not a breed but could be a mix of English thoroughbred, semi-draught horse, Welsh pony, Timor pony and brumby. The term was first coined by troops in India where, since the 1830s a healthy trade had been built up in the export of Australian horses to the British Army stationed there. These horses were able to supplement their feed by eating available herbage and to go for long periods between watering enabling them to produce incredible feats of endurance. The ALH were volunteers, 35% recruited from among the tough outdoor men of the Australian bush and about 65% from towns and cities. Their uniform set them apart from the other corps; their most distinguishing embellishment being the emu plume which had its origins here in Qld.