Thoroughly researched and generously illustrated, Australia 1944-45 is the compelling final instalment in Peter Dean's Pacific War series.

The island of Bougainville in the South Pacific was the site of one of the largest and most gruelling campaigns fought by Australian forces during the Second World War. During the offensive against the Japanese from November 1944 to August 1945, more than 500 Australians were killed and two Victoria Crosses awarded. A veteran later described Bougainville as 'one long bloody hard slog'. Despite this, little is known about the campaign, which was dismissed as an unnecessary and costly operation. In the first major study of the Bougainville campaign since 1963, Karl James argues that it was in fact a justifiable use of Australia's military resources. Drawing on original archival research, including wartime reports and soldiers' letters and diaries, James illustrates the experience of Australian soldiers who fought. Generously illustrated with over forty photographs, this important book tells how this often overlooked battle played an important part in Australia's Second World War victory.

This riveting book follows a small group of Australian front-line soldiers from their enlistment in the dark days of 1940 to the end of World War II. No ordinary soldiers, they were members of Don Company of the Second 43rd Battalion, part of the famous 9th Australian Division, which sustained more casualties and won more medals than any other Australian division. Inspired by American historian Stephen Ambrose's landmark book, Band of Brothers, about the US Army's Easy Company of the 506th Regiment, Mark Johnston, one of our best military historians, here gives an Australian company the same treatment. His book is a unique and powerful account of the everyday experiences of a small unit of Australian soldiers on the front line.

Very few Australians today know of the fierce air battles fought across the Top End of Australia in World War II. For more than two years Japanese aircraft crossed the coast and bombed relentlessly. Savage dogfights were fought between the legendary Zero fighter and Allied Kittyhawks and Spitfires. Big twin-engine Betty bombers rained down blast and fire upon airfields and towns, even penetrating as far inland as Katherine, some 300 kilometres from the coast. Nearly 200 Japanese aircrew died in the onslaught. This book lists all of their names and describes all of the combat missions - and reveals for the first time that the number of combat flights, aircraft shot down, and aircrew who died is far higher than previously thought. Scores of aircraft were downed in combat operations ranging from Exmouth to Townsville, with the majority of action taking place in the Northern Territory. This new extensive research shows the number of air raids was higher than the previously suggested figure of 64, with 78 raids on the Territory alone, while 209 enemy combat flights were carried out across Northern Australia. 187 Japanese airmen died when their aircraft were brought down. In many cases their bodies lie in remote sites across the vast bush and coastal waters of the north. Many of the wrecks have never been found. The Empire Strikes South describes all of the aircraft used, and gives an insight into the world of fighter pilots and aircrew. With a full range of new colur graphics by renowned illustrator Michael Claringbould, this significant new research reveals a battle for Australia that has been previously unknown.

The Australian Independent Companies and the Commandos into which they evolved were unique sub-units of the Australian Army during the Second World War. The Independent Companies were units raised to fight in an autonomous unconventional manner, and while supporting them, were independent of higher formations. These units were unlike any other in t

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This volume concludes the Army Series. It describes the Australian Army campaigns in the last months of 1944 and in 1945. It tells the full story of the fighting in Bougainville, New Britain, round Wewak, at Balikpapan and Tarakan and in British Borneo.