Aitape-Wewak Campaign, November 1944 to August 1945

About the campaign

The Aitape-Wewak jungle campaign was challenging, and casualties mounted from battle and disease. The 6th Division, Australian Imperial Force (AIF) fought with air and naval support.

United States (US) forces had bypassed the Japanese 18th Army base at Wewak in early 1944. They took Aitape, developed a base there, and repulsed a major Japanese attack. The US forces were content to hold Aitape and not advance far towards Wewak. There would have been little or no strategic gain. The Japanese force based at Wewak no longer posed a real threat. They were cut off, short of supplies, and weakened from battle and diseases.

In mid-1944, General Douglas MacArthur, the Supreme Commander, Allied Forces, Southwest Pacific Area, secured an agreement from the Australian Government for Australian forces to take over at Aitape. Australian units began arriving in October 1944. After patrols and probes of the Japanese westernmost positions, in December, the 6th Division began 2 parallel advances. One was along the coast towards Wewak. The other was into the Torricelli Mountains towards the Japanese supply base at Maprik.

The main Allied actions in the campaign were:

• Battle of But-Dagua
• Battle of Maprik
• Prince Alexander Range campaign
• Landing at Dove Bay
• Battle of Wewak.

The Aitape-Wewak campaign is one of several fought in 1945 that were later called 'unnecessary'. It was argued that the campaign made no overall difference to the outcome of the war. The reality is more complex. Although the remaining Japanese troops were strategically irrelevant, there were also political reasons for the campaign. At the time, New Guinea was under Australian control, and it was important that Australia was seen to be clearing the last of the Japanese forces from its territory.

Battle of Wewak

Wewak is a town on the north coast of New Guinea. Allied forces subjected the town to repeated bombings because of the large Japanese air base nearby. In April 1944, the Australian capture of Madang to the east and the US capture of Aitape to the west left Wewak isolated.

In late November 1944, responsibility for the Aitape sector was transferred to the Australian 6th Division. The Division began an advance eastward down the coast toward Wewak. A second advance was directed toward the airstrip at Maprik in the highlands south of the Japanese positions. The Allies secured Maprik by late April, and operations against Wewak began.

The Japanese strength in the Wewak area was estimated at between 500 and 1,000 troops. They were concentrated in the town and caves on a small peninsula, and at Wirui Mission to the south. The Australians had a significant advantage with air, naval, artillery and armoured support.

Australian patrols clashed with the Japanese on the night of 7 to 8 May, west of the main Japanese positions. On 9 May, the Australians advanced east along the coast road, flanked by the ocean to the north and swamps to the south. Early on 10 May, the Australians pushed on to the peninsula and secured the town and Wewak Point. The Japanese withdrew to caves connected by tunnels along the 30 m high escarpments of Wewak Point.

The Australians used flamethrowers to destroy the Japanese bunkers. Engineers blew up the entrances of the caves where the Japanese hid.

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Farida Force, an Australian composite force of 623 troops, mainly commandos, made an amphibious landing at Dove Bay to the east on 11 May 1945. The force quickly established a beachhead and moved inland, across Wewak Road. The troops conducted patrols until the force was dissolved and placed under the command of the 18th Brigade for further operations.

Five Australians and up to 200 Japanese were killed in the fighting for Wewak.

Mopping-up operations, which involved killing or capturing the remaining Japanese troops, continued in the Wewak area for several weeks. Although the Wewak campaign has been regarded by some as unnecessary given Japan’s hopeless strategic position late in the war, it was a successful action for the Allies.

Experiences of Australians

Bravery at Wewak

Edward 'Ted' Kenna was born in Hamilton, Victoria, on 6 July 1919. He enlisted in the Citizen Military Force in August 1940. Then, in 1944, Kenna and his brother joined the 2/4th Australian Infantry Battalion in New Guinea. Kenna was one of 2 Australians awarded a Victoria Cross (VC) in the New Guinea Campaign for his courage while fighting around Wewak airfield, including advancing on a Japanese machine-gun post. His VC citation read:

The enemy machine gun immediately returned Private Kenna's fire and with such accuracy that bullets actually passed between his arms and his body. Undeterred, he remained completely exposed and continued to fire at the enemy until his magazine was exhausted. Still making a target of himself, Private Kenna discarded his Bren gun and called for a rifle. Despite the intense machine-gun fire, he seized the rifle, and with amazing coolness, killed the gunner with his first round.

A second automatic opened fire on Private Kenna from a different position and another of the enemy immediately tried to move into position behind the first machine gun, but Private Kenna remained standing and killed him with his next round.

[The London Gazette, 4 September 1945, Supplement 37253, page 4467]

His brave actions at Wewak airfield in May 1945 saved many lives. Read Ted Kenna's biography.

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Life on the ground

Life for infantry soldiers on the front line was difficult and dangerous. Nerves became frayed as they tried to anticipate where and when the next action might be. The Japanese were rarely seen until they opened fire on the Australians. Those who followed in the rear of the infantry, such as the artillery, were equally vulnerable.

There was also naval and air support. But while the Australian aviators flying the bombers, transports, or light aircraft returned to base where they had showers, a mess, and comfortable beds, the only way an infantry soldier could access these was to be wounded or fall sick and be evacuated.

Sickness caused the evacuation of many troops. Malaria-carrying mosquitoes were another enemy, inflicting more casualties than the Japanese. The sick and the wounded were returned to the base hospital at Aitape. Casualties on the coast were evacuated in watercraft. In the mountains, some troops spent weeks being carried by New Guineans along rough jungle tracks. Others were fortunate enough to be flown out in small aircraft.

The Wewak area is very remote, and supply was a constant struggle. Supplies were ferried to Wewak from Aitape by the 43rd Australian Landing Craft Company, which was the only means of transportation between the 2 points. It had around 60 vessels, including 7 fast supply launches, and moved around 700 tonnes of supplies per day. Each month, it used approximately 21,000 gallons (over 95,000 L) of fuel.

Activities of the 43rd Australian Landing Craft Company during the 19 months in New Guinea. The Company is the sole means of transportation between Aitape and But to Wewak. Approximate strength is 60 vessels, including 7 fast supply launches. Average tonnage moved per day is 700. The unit uses about 21,000 gallons of fuel per month.

Wewak in popular culture

After the war, many veterans wrote both fiction and non-fiction accounts of their experiences. One veteran who turned his war service into a novel was journalist John Hepworth. Hepworth wrote The Long Green Shore based on his experiences as a soldier assigned to 2/2nd Australian Infantry Battalion in the Aitape-Wewak Campaign. He wrote the story shortly after the war, but it wasn't published until 1995, after his death.

Hepworth, whose birth name was Alfred John Christmass, was born in Pinjarra, Western Australia, on 4 September 1921. He was investigated for his links to the Communist Party in Perth from about 1935. In 1940, he moved to Sydney and enlisted in the AIF under the alias John Hale Davidson. He was assigned service number NX13686 and served in Egypt, Syria, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and New Guinea during World War II. After the war, he worked as a journalist for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation under the alias John Hepworth. The Australian Government could not confirm his military service history due to the false names. Service and intelligence records for Davidson/Hepworth are held by the National Archives of Australia.

The Long Green Shore begins with the voyage of the 6th Division troops to Aitape. One of the novel's central characters, Pez, views the shoreline from his troopship:

At first glance the green bank of palms and jungle growth seemed solid. But as Pez gazed he saw the long palm-leaf buildings take shape under the camouflage of trees … You could pick out ant-swarms of activity where they were loading cases on trucks at the food dumps and the flow of movement in the marshalling yards on the beach … Inland, the hazy, fanged, green mountains piled up into the mist of distance. Thick white cloud lay in the valleys and trailing scarves of it clung on the climbing jungle trees of the mountainside.

The soldiers of the 6th Division were a mix of:

• those who had served in 'the islands' before in 1942 and 1943
• those who had served only in the Middle East in 1941
• reinforcements from Australia who had never seen combat in any theatre of war.

For the old soldiers it was another move – there had been plenty like this before, they knew what was coming. But the new men could sense the breath of the unknown and mysterious enemy – the shadows of the long green shore – and violence and death they did not know but had often dreamed about.

[John Hepworth, The Long Green Shore]

On 10 May 1945, after an amphibious landing added to the number of troops closing in on Wewak, the Japanese base fell. Fighting continued inland around Japanese strongholds until the war's end.

As the Australians closed on Wewak, they encountered Indian troops who had been brought to the islands as prisoners of war (POWs).

A young man he was, but he looked ancient and bone-thin with the dirty-grey pallor of starvation shining through the Punjab copper of his skin. He had crouched all night in the rain outside the sentry lines and came in half an hour after dawn, waving a piece of cloth and crying: 'Master! Master! Don't shoot – Indian! Indian!

[John Hepworth, The Long Green Shore]

About 3,000 Indian POWs captured in Singapore in February 1942 had been shipped to Wewak. Most of those the Australians encountered had escaped. They saw reaching Allied lines as their only hope of surviving. Some died in the attempt. The survivors were emaciated and weak. Learn more about the Indian POWs of Wewak.

Commemorating veterans of the campaign

Australians commemorate the anniversary of the Battle of Wewak on 15 May each year. It is remembered as the campaign that was the last to take place on mainland New Guinea in World War II. Australians suffered the loss of more than 440 men, and more than 1,100 were wounded. Their service and sacrifice is remembered. Some 9,000 Japanese troops also lost their lives in the campaign.

The Department of Veterans' Affairs published a commemorative book Aitape-Wewak 1944-1945 that includes a photo essay. It's part of the Australians in the Pacific War series.