The Australian Army’s first-ever ski unit

[lebanon]

An interesting fact found while searching for the traces of the Australian Army passage in Lebanon during WWII.

Australian Embassy Photographic Exhibition Commemorates 70th Anniversary Of Liberation Of Beirut (http://www.ragmag.co/cat/1/australian-embassy-photographic-exhibition-commemorates-70th-anniversary-of-liberation-of-beirut)

In fact many of their works are still visible, like the planting of eucalyptus trees along the coastal road or rail track and road bridges, the picture of the below engrave is found on the barrier of one of these briges.

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/imported/2011/12/1028.jpg

I will try to feed this thread with more pictures if I find more interesting related things.

[LWB123]

Thanks for the interesting lead on the Lebanon engagement. Appreciated.

History, especially military history, in contemporary Australia seems to start and end in the Dardenelles or more recently Afghanistan. The rest which is genuinely significant seems to go largely unread outside military scholarship and the odd enthusiast.

I am presently working in Bulawayo which was a major staging point for the various Mounted Rifle and Bushmen contingents' entry to the Boer War (there is yet no official memorial in Canberra after 112 years - the nurses finally got one about 10 years ago). Few school kids will ever hear of Elands River, Rustenberg or the Onveracht Hills which should be up there with Kokoda, Tobruk, Long Tan etc.

Cheers,

[lebanon]

Sites found on the subject.

If someone is interested to locate places, I am ready to help.

Australian Ski Troops - World War 2 Talk (http://www.ww2talk.com/forum/north-africa-med/10017-australian-ski-troops.html)

Syria–Lebanon Campaign - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Road to Damascus (http://www.ww2australia.gov.au/damascus/)

War Cemeteries in Lebanese Republic (http://www.dva.gov.au/commems_oawg/OAWG/remembering_war_dead/WWI_WWII/Pages/cemeteries%20lebanon.aspx)

[kaa45]

I am presently working in Bulawayo which was a major staging point for the various Mounted Rifle and Bushmen contingents' entry to the Boer War (there is yet no official memorial in Canberra after 112 years - the nurses finally got one about 10 years ago). Few school kids will ever hear of Elands River, Rustenberg or the Onveracht Hills which should be up there with Kokoda, Tobruk, Long Tan etc.

Cheers,

Geelong,Vic., has a Boer War Memorial :D
Danny

[LWB123]

Geelong,Vic., has a Boer War Memorial :D
Danny

True.

So has Brisbane, and a fine one too, but the point was being made about the National Capital.

There is a committee that has been trying to scrape some cash together to get one finally erected in Anzac Parade.

Cheers,

[bob10]

[QUOTE=lebanon;1587150]Sites found on the subject.

If someone is interested to locate places, I am ready to help. /QUOTE]

Thanks for your kind offer, mate. Australians have been involved in the Middle East, and Lebanon since the First World War. It is interesting to note that the Australian Army fought and defeated not only the Vichy French regular Army elements in Syria/Lebanon during WW2, but also units of the French Foreign Legion.The relationship with the region did not finish with the end of WW2, however.Australian observers joined UNSTO [ The UN Truce Supervision Organisation] in 1956, a few months before the Suez crisis, and have served with it ever since.Only one Australian observer has died while serving with UNSTO, to my knowledge. On 12 January, 1988, Captain Peter McCarthy was killed when the vehicle in which he and a Canadian observer were travelling hit a landmine near the village of Shama, southern Lebanon.A little known fact is that since Sept. 1948,there have been Australians somewhere in the world on a peacekeeping operation , every day. Bob