A Tactical Breakdown of the Greatest Military Disaster You’ve Never Heard Of

Listen, we need to talk. History is full of disasters. Napoleon in Russia. The charge of the Light Brigade. New Coke. But none of them—none—hold a candle to the absolute, unbridled incompetence of The Great Emu War of 1932.

This isn’t just a story about birds. It’s a story about hubris. It’s a story about the Australian government looking Mother Nature in the eye and saying, “Hold my beer, I’m gonna go fight some poultry with a machine gun.”

And Mother Nature laughed. She laughed so hard she peed a little.

The Setup: How to Bake a Disaster Cake

The ingredients for this catastrophe were simple:

1. The Great Depression: Everyone is broke and sad.
2. The Australian Government: “Hey, let’s give traumatized WWI veterans land in the desert to farm wheat! What could go wrong?”
3. 20,000 Emus: Large, flightless, prehistoric-looking turkeys that run 50 km/h and have the emotional intelligence of a brick but the survival instincts of a Navy SEAL.

The veterans—broke, depressed, and staring at fields of dying wheat—noticed that 20,000 emus had decided their farms were an all-inclusive resort. The birds were eating the crops, trampling the dirt, and kicking over fences just to be jerks.

Did the farmers ask for better fences? Did they ask for financial aid? No. They were Aussies. They went to the Minister of Defence, Sir George Pearce, and said, “We need machine guns.”

Their logic? “We used these on the Germans. Emus are bigger than Germans. Therefore, machine guns will work on emus.”

Math check: That is not how math works. But Sir George Pearce, clearly a man who operates on pure chaotic energy, said, “Sold! Send in the army!”

The Invasion: Two Guys and a Truck

The Australian military mobilized. They gathered their elite forces. They prepared for total war.

They sent three guys.

Specifically: Major G.P.W. Meredith, Sergeant S. McMurray, and Gunner J. O’Halloran.

Their arsenal? Two Lewis machine guns and 10,000 rounds of ammo.

That’s it. That was the invasion force. Three dudes in a truck against a feathered army of 20,000.

But wait, it gets better. The government brought a film crew from Fox Movietone. They weren’t expecting a war; they were expecting a propaganda film. They were planning to title it “How We Killed All the Birds and Looked Cool Doing It.”

Spoiler: That movie does not exist.

The “Battle”: Things Go Sideways Immediately

Day One: The soldiers arrive at Campion, Western Australia. They spot a flock of 50 emus. They line up the machine guns.

The emus are out of range.

The soldiers try to get closer. The emus, sensing that these armed morons might be dangerous, do the unthinkable: They run away.

This shocked the military. The Australians were used to enemies who stood in trenches and waited to die. These birds were employing “Guerrilla Tactics.” (Or, as birds call it, “Not wanting to get shot.”)

They manage to kill “perhaps a dozen” birds. A dozen. Out of 20,000. That is a success rate of 0.06%. If a surgeon had that success rate, he’d be arrested.

The Ambush: The Gun That Got Stage Fright

A few days later, the military spots the motherlode: 1,000 emus gathered near a dam. This is it. The Battle of Stalingrad, but with snacks.

They set up the perfect ambush. The birds are waddling into the kill zone. Gunner O’Halloran takes aim. He squeezes the trigger.

The gun jams.

After twelve shots. Twelve.

Out of 1,000 birds, they killed twelve. And then the gun—their only advantage over nature—just said, “Nope, I’m good,” and quit.

The remaining 988 emus looked at the exploding gun, looked at the screaming soldiers, and presumably said to each other, “Run for your lives! Their weapon is defective! Also, they are terrible at aiming!” And they scattered.

Major Meredith tried to fix it. He decided to mount the machine gun on the back of the truck to chase them down.

This sounds cool in theory. In reality, it was a disaster.

• The terrain was rough.
• The emus can run 50 km/h.
• The truck cannot aim while moving.

So, picture this: A truck bouncing over rocks, a man shooting wildly into the sky, and 1,000 birds running faster than the vehicle, flipping them the bird (pun intended) as they disappear over the horizon.

The Tactical Genius of the Emu

Ornithologists later studied the “Emu Command Structure.” They determined that the birds had “leaders” who kept watch.

Here is a bird’s thought process:

“Is that a truck with a gun? SQUAWK! EVERYONE SPLIT UP! You go left! You go right! Steve, you just run in a circle to confuse them! Go, go, go!”

The Australian army was fighting a highly coordinated, highly motivated enemy that had evolved over millions of years to survive crocodiles and droughts. The Australian army was fighting with a truck that didn’t work.

The Emus won.

The Aftermath: 10 Bullets for One Dead Bird

After a month of “warfare,” the military retreated with its tail between its legs. They had fired 10,000 rounds of ammunition.

Do you know how many birds they confirmed they killed?

986.

Let’s do the math. That is 10 bullets per bird.

Imagine shooting a guy ten times and he still might survive. That is the emu. These things are built like feathered tanks. Major Meredith literally wrote in his official report: “These birds can face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks.”*

Sir, you are a Major. You are comparing a chicken to a Panzer tank. That is not a threat assessment; that is a cry for help.

The Australian House of Parliament was furious. They had spent money, ammo, and dignity, and the only thing they had to show for it was a film reel of a truck getting stuck in the mud.

The Actual Solution: Money Talks

So, how did Australia finally solve the Emu Problem?

Did they send tanks? Napalm? tactical nukes?

No. They put a bounty on them.

In 1934, the government said, “Hey, if you kill an emu, we’ll give you money.”

Do you know how many emus were killed in six months?

57,000.

The soldiers killed 986 in a month. The farmers, motivated by cold hard cash, killed 57,000 in half the time.

Lesson Learned: Capitalism is a more effective weapon than the Lewis machine gun.

The Moral of the Story

The Great Emu War is the only war in history where the “enemy” won by simply existing. The emus didn’t have a strategy. They didn’t have weapons. They just had beaks and legs and a refusal to die.

They proved that sometimes, you can have all the technology, all the training, and all the government funding in the world, but if you pick a fight with nature…

Nature is going to beat you like a rented mule.

So next time you see a bird, give it a nod of respect. It might be a distant cousin of the tactical geniuses who made the Australian military look like the cast of Jackass.

The Emus: 20,000. The Australian Army: 0. History never forgets.

A Flock of Unfeathered Soldiers: The Great Emu War of 1932 as a Case Study in Ecological Mismanagement, Military Hubris, and Political Theatre

A Dissertation Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Environmental History

By [Your Name]

Department of History
University of [Your University]
[Month, Year]

Abstract

This dissertation interrogates the 1932 Emu War in Western Australia, an event conventionally memorialized as a humorous historical anecdote, to reveal its significance as a critical nexus of ecological, military, political, and social history. Through archival analysis, ecological modelling, and discourse analysis of contemporary media, this study argues that the “War” was not a farcical aberration but a logical, if catastrophic, outcome of post-World War I agricultural policy, settler-colonial environmental manipulation, and federal-state political tensions. The failure of the military operation, led by Major G.P.W. Meredith, was not merely a tactical blunder but a profound demonstration of the limitations of technological hubris in solving complex ecological problems. The emus (Dromaius novaehollandiae), through their resilience and adaptive behaviours, became unwilling protagonists in a drama highlighting the vulnerabilities of marginal wheatbelt agriculture during the Great Depression.

This work deconstructs the event across five thematic axes: the ecological context of emu migration and human landscape alteration; the political economy of the Soldier Settlement Scheme; the military operation’s tactics and logistical failures; the mediated creation of the “Emu War” narrative in press and parliament; and the long-term legacy in wildlife management policy. It concludes that the Emu War serves as a seminal case study in failed top-down environmental intervention, where biological reality decisively trumped military and political presumption, forcing a reluctant shift towards integrated pest management and revealing the deep-seated conflicts within Australian federalism.

Keywords: Environmental History, Military History, Australian History, Human-Wildlife Conflict, Dromaius novaehollandiae, Soldier Settlement, Great Depression, Wildlife Management, Political Ecology.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction: Beyond the Meme – Situating the Emu War in History

• 1.1. The Problem of the “Funny Story”: Historiography and Popular Memory
• 1.2. Research Questions and Thesis Statement
• 1.3. Methodology and Sources
• 1.4. Chapter Outline

Chapter 2: Ecology of Conflict: Emus, Wheat, and the Altered Landscape of the Western Australian Wheatbelt

• 2.1. Dromaius novaehollandiae: Biology, Behaviour, and Migratory Ecology
• 2.2. The Soldier Settlement Scheme: Imposing an Agricultural Dream on Arid Margins
• 2.3. Convergence Point: Drought, Depression, and the 1932 Influx
• 2.4. The “Vermin” Designation: Constructing an Ecological Enemy

Chapter 3: The Politics of Desperation: Petitions, Parliament, and the Authorization of Force

• 3.1. “An Army of Feathers”: Farmer Grievances and the Deputation to Sir George Pearce
• 3.2. The Minister’s Calculus: Target Practice, Public Relations, and the Secession Spectre
• 3.3. Conditions of Engagement: Financing a War on Birds
• 3.4. The Fox Movietone Camera: Staging a Military Publicity Exercise

Chapter 4: Operation Emu: Tactics, Technology, and Tactical Failure

• 4.1. Command and Control: Major Meredith and the 7th Heavy Battery Detachment
• 4.2. The Lewis Gun in the Bush: Suitability and Logistical Constraints
• 4.3. Chronicling the Campaign: The First and Second Offensives (Nov 2 – Dec 10, 1932)
• 4.4. Assessing “Victory”: Body Counts, Ammunition Ratios, and the Meredith Report

Chapter 5: The Emu “Command”: Avian Agency and the Biology of Resistance

• 5.1. Scatter Tactics: The Breakdown of Herd Structures Under Fire
• 5.2. Physical Resilience: The “Invulnerability of Tanks” and Energy-Dispersion Morphology
• 5.3. Leadership and Sentinel Behaviour: Anecdote versus Ethological Reality
• 5.4. Adaptive Migration: The Long-Term Strategic Victory of the Emu

Chapter 6: Reception and Ridicule: Media, Parliament, and the Birth of a Legend

• 6.1. Press Framing: From “Serious Campaign” to “National Joke”
• 6.2. Parliamentary Theatre: Pearce as “Minister for the Emu War”
• 6.3. International Echoes: Conservationist Protest and Global Amusement
• 6.4. The Ornithologist’s Verdict: D.L. Serventy and the “Guerrilla Tactics” Assessment

Chapter 7: Aftermath and Legacy: From Machine Guns to Bounties and Fences

• 7.1. The Bounty System (1934-): Devolution of Control and its Efficacy
• 7.2. The Fence Solution: Modifying the Rabbit-Proof Fence Network
• 7.3. Subsequent Military Requests (1934, 1943, 1948) and Government Refusals
• 7.4. The 1950 Ammunition Release: Final Capitulation to Armed Citizenry
• 7.5. Cultural Legacy: From National Embarrassment to Iconic Irony

Chapter 8: Conclusion: The Emu War as a Paradigmatic Clash

• 8.1. Revisiting the Thesis: Synthesis of Ecological, Military, and Political Failure
• 8.2. Theoretical Implications: Agency in Environmental History, the Limits of Techno-Fix
• 8.3. The Emu War in Comparative Perspective: Global Human-Wildlife Conflicts
• 8.4. Final Reflections: What the Birds Knew

Bibliography

• Primary Sources (Archival, Newspaper, Parliamentary)
• Secondary Sources (Historical, Ecological, Political)

Appendices

• Appendix A: Chronology of the Emu War (1932)
• Appendix B: Map of the Campion District and Operation Area
• Appendix C: Annotated Transcript of Key Parliamentary Debates
• Appendix D: Analysis of Emu Casualty Reports and Discrepancies

Chapter 1: Introduction: Beyond the Meme – Situating the Emu War in History

On November 2, 1932, a small detachment of the Royal Australian Artillery, armed with two Lewis machine guns and 10,000 rounds of ammunition, commenced operations against an estimated 20,000 emus in the Campion district of Western Australia. Six weeks later, having expended the majority of their ammunition for a confirmed kill count of 986 birds, they withdrew. Labelled the “Emu War” by a satirical press, this event has endured for decades as a staple of trivial pursuit and internet humour: the time the Australian army lost a war to birds.

This dissertation contends that such a characterization, while undeniably entertaining, constitutes a profound historical simplification. The Great Emu War was not a joke, but a crisis—a flashpoint where converging vectors of ecological stress, economic catastrophe, political anxiety, and military doctrine collided with tragicomic force. It represents a uniquely transparent case study in the failure of a simplistic, martial solution to a wicked problem born of human environmental manipulation.

1.1. The Problem of the “Funny Story”
The existing scholarship on the Emu War is sparse and largely anecdotal. It appears as a curious footnote in military histories, a colourful vignette in environmental surveys, and a guaranteed laugh line in popular histories of Australia. Murray Johnson’s 2006 article in the Journal of Australian Studies stands as a rare serious treatment, meticulously reconstructing the event’s timeline. However, a comprehensive, interdisciplinary analysis that treats the event as a significant historical episode in its own right is absent. This dissertation seeks to fill that gap, moving beyond the meme to ask serious questions of a seemingly absurd event.

1.2. Research Questions and Thesis Statement
This study is guided by the following questions:

1. How did the intersection of post-WWI agricultural policy (the Soldier Settlement Scheme) and the ecological realities of the Western Australian wheatbelt create the conditions for the 1932 emu “invasion”?
2. What political calculations motivated Defence Minister Sir George Pearce to authorize a military response, and how was the operation structured and executed?
3. In what ways did the biological and behavioural characteristics of Dromaius novaehollandiae contribute to the operational failure, challenging anthropocentric notions of tactical superiority?
4. How was the event framed, reported, and debated in contemporary media and political circles, and how did this process create the enduring “Emu War” narrative?
5. What were the immediate and long-term consequences of the failure for wildlife management policy and the relationship between the federal government and Western Australian farmers?

Thesis Statement: The Great Emu War of 1932 was a decisive failure of technocratic, militarised environmental management, precipitated by unsustainable agricultural expansion into marginal lands. Its outcome was dictated not by human tactical error alone, but by the irreducible agency and adaptability of the emu population, and its legacy was the reluctant adoption of more diffuse, enduring, and ecologically integrated methods of human-wildlife conflict mitigation.

1.3. Methodology and Sources
This project employs a multi-method approach grounded in environmental history and political ecology.

• Archival Research: Analysis of War Office records, parliamentary papers (Hansard), and agricultural department files from the National Archives of Australia and the State Records Office of Western Australia.
• Discourse Analysis: Close reading of newspaper reportage from 1932-34 (e.g., The West Australian, The Daily News, The Sunday Herald) to trace narrative construction.
• Historical-Ecological Analysis: Synthesizing modern ornithological data on emu behaviour with historical accounts to assess avian agency.
• Comparative Analysis: Contextualising the event within broader global patterns of human-wildlife conflict and state-led eradication campaigns.

1.4. Chapter Outline
The dissertation progresses thematically. Chapter 2 establishes the ecological and agricultural stage. Chapter 3 unpacks the political decision-making. Chapter 4 details the military campaign. Chapter 5 recentres the emus as active participants. Chapter 6 analyses the public and political reception. Chapter 7 traces the aftermath and policy legacy. Chapter 8 concludes by synthesising the event’s broader significance.

Chapter 2: Ecology of Conflict: Emus, Wheat, and the Altered Landscape

The war was not sparked by emu aggression, but by human geography. This chapter establishes the environmental preconditions for the conflict, arguing that the Soldier Settlement Scheme constituted a massive ecological experiment that inevitably triggered a faunal response.

2.1. The Emu: A Perfectly Adapted Nomad
The emu is not a pest by nature, but a highly mobile, generalist herbivore evolved for survival in Australia’s unpredictable arid and semi-arid zones. Its annual migrations are not calendar-bound but resource-driven, following rainfall and the consequent pulses of vegetative growth. Key biological features—including efficient water conservation, an ability to ingest a wide variety of plant matter, a large body size requiring substantial forage, and powerful legs enabling sustained speeds of up to 50 km/h—made it supremely capable of exploiting new opportunities.

2.2. The Soldier Settlement Scheme: Ecological Overreach
Post-WWI, the Australian government, eager to reward veterans and boost agricultural production, allocated over 90,000 hectares of land, much of it in the ecologically marginal Wheatbelt of Western Australia. These “soldier settlers” were often inexperienced farmers working poor soils with low rainfall. The scheme, as historian Marilyn Lake has noted, was “an exercise in hope over experience.” The clearing of native vegetation for wheat created a novel ecosystem: a monocultural food source interspersed with artificial water points (dams, tanks). To the migrating emus of 1932, this was not a farm but a phenomenally rich and hydrologically reliable habitat corridor.

2.3. Convergence: The Perfect Storm of 1932
By 1932, the scheme was faltering under the weight of the Great Depression and collapsing wheat prices. A severe drought in the interior acted as a push factor, driving larger-than-usual emu populations towards the coast. The “pull factor” was the irrigated, grain-filled farms of the Wheatbelt. The result was the convergence of approximately 20,000 highly motivated foragers on the economically vulnerable holdings of desperate farmers. The emus did not merely eat the wheat; they trampled crops, broke through rabbit-proof fences (creating secondary infestations), and symbolised nature’s contempt for human endeavour.

2.4. Constructing the “Vermin”
In 1922, the emu’s legal status had shifted from “protected native bird” to “vermin.” This bureaucratic act was crucial. It stripped the emu of any cultural or ecological legitimacy in the agricultural context, reframing it as an illegitimate competitor to be destroyed. This discursive construction justified extreme measures and paved the way for the military solution sought by the farmers, who saw in the emu not a native species responding to environmental cues, but an invading army.

Chapter 3: The Politics of Desperation

This chapter transitions from ecology to politics, analysing how a local agricultural problem became a federal military operation.

3.1. The Farmer’s Petition: From Shotguns to Machine Guns
Frustrated by the ineffectiveness of shotguns against scattered, fast-moving flocks, a deputation of ex-soldier settlers bypassed the Agriculture Ministry and appealed directly to the Minister for Defence, Sir George Pearce. Their logic was born of lived experience: they had seen the machine gun’s area-denial capabilities in the trenches of Flanders. They requested this technology be deployed against the “emu menace.” This appeal to a shared martial identity was a calculated and effective rhetorical move.

3.2. Pearce’s Authorization: A Multifaceted Decision
Pearce’s agreement was not merely naïve. It was a political calculation with several potential benefits:

• Target Practice: A live-fire exercise in remote conditions.
• Political Theatre: Demonstrating tangible federal support to restive Western Australian farmers, thereby weakening the potent secessionist movement that argued for the state’s independence from a neglectful Commonwealth.
• Low-Cost Intervention: The costs were largely offloaded onto the WA government and the farmers themselves (for ammunition, food, and lodging).

3.3. The Cinematographer’s Role
The inclusion of a Fox Movietone news cameraman is telling. It indicates an expectation of success—a visually compelling demonstration of government efficacy. The anticipated footage was to be a propaganda tool, not a record of farce.

Chapter 4: Operation Emu: Tactics and Failure

Here, the dissertation provides a detailed military history of the campaign, evaluating its planning, execution, and operational metrics.

4.1. Command Structure
Major Gwynydd Purves Wynne-Aubrey Meredith, a decorated artillery officer, was placed in command of a minimal force: Sergeant S. McMurray and Gunner J. O’Halloran. This tiny detachment reflected the belief that the operation was a policing action, not a war.

4.2. The Unsuitable Weapon
The Lewis light machine gun, while effective in WWI for suppressing human infantry, was ill-suited for mobile, dispersed avian targets. It was prone to jamming (notably during a key ambush at a watering hole), required a stable mount for accuracy, and its ammunition belts were cumbersome in the field. The plan to mount it on a truck was defeated by the rough terrain and the emu’s superior cross-country speed.

4.3. The Campaign Phases

• First Offensive (Nov 2-8): Characterised by failed ambushes, scattering emu flocks, and mechanical failures. After six days and approximately 2,500 rounds, estimates of kills ranged from 50 to 500. Public ridicule prompted a withdrawal.
• Second Offensive (Nov 13 – Dec 10): Reinstated after farmer protests. Meredith adopted more decentralised tactics, allowing farmers more involvement. This phase was more “successful,” but the kill rate remained dismal.

4.4. The Meredith Report and Metrics of Failure
Meredith’s official report claimed 986 confirmed kills, with an estimated 2,500 more dying later from wounds. He famously noted the emus’ “invulnerability of tanks.” The most telling metric is the ammunition-to-kill ratio: approximately 10 rounds per confirmed kill. In military terms, this was an unsustainable rate of expenditure for negligible strategic effect. The emu population remained essentially intact.

Chapter 5: The Emu “Command”: Agency and Adaptation

This chapter challenges the passive victim narrative, arguing that emu behaviour was the central factor in the operation’s failure.

5.1. Tactical Scattering
Contrary to expectations of “serried masses,” emus under fire did not panic en masse but splintered into small, fast-moving groups. This instinctual predator-avoidance behaviour rendered area-effect weapons useless.

5.2. Biological “Armour”
The emu’s anatomy contributed to its survival. Its large body mass and loose, fibrous feathering could absorb or deflect glancing shots. A non-vital wound might not cause immediate incapacitation, allowing the bird to escape and die far from the gunner’s sight, inflating perceived ineffectiveness.

5.3. The “Leader Bird” Myth
Contemporary accounts speak of “leader birds” acting as sentinels. While emus do exhibit alert behaviours, attributing military-style command structures is anthropomorphism. However, their keen eyesight and flock coordination provided an effective early-warning system.

5.4. Strategic Victory: Persistence
The ultimate victory of the emus was not tactical but strategic. Their life-history strategy—high mobility, dietary flexibility, and continuous breeding—ensured population resilience. They simply outlasted and outmanoeuvred a transient, logistically constrained military intervention.

Chapter 6: Reception and Ridicule: The Birth of a Legend

This chapter analyses how the event was transformed from a news story into a national joke.

6.1. Press Framing
Initial reports were sober. As failures mounted, the tone shifted. Headlines began employing martial irony: “Emus Hold Their Own,” “War on Emus Proves a Farce.” The media, particularly in eastern states, delighted in the humiliation of the military and the federal government.

6.2. Parliamentary Theatre
In Parliament, Pearce faced savage ridicule. Senator James Dunn dubbed him the “Minister for the Emu War.” The debate shifted from agricultural policy to the absurdity of the venture, cementing its place in political folklore.

6.3. International and Scientific Reaction
The story was picked up globally, from British newspapers to The New York Times, often as a whimsical item about colonial oddities. In Britain, conservationists protested the “slaughter.” Domestically, ornithologist Dominic Serventy provided the definitive epitaph, stating the “Emu command had evidently ordered guerrilla tactics.”

Chapter 7: Aftermath and Legacy

The military’s withdrawal did not end the conflict, but changed its character.

7.1. The Bounty System (1934)
The federal government devolved responsibility, instituting a bounty system. In 1934 alone, 57,034 bounties were claimed—proof that the “problem” was vast and that local, incentivised culling was more effective than a centralised military strike.

7.2. The Fence Solution
The long-term solution was infrastructural: modifying and extending the existing network of rabbit-proof fences into “vermin-proof” fences, including the No. 3 Fence (Emu Barrier Fence). This was a tacit admission that exclusion, not eradication, was the only viable strategy.

7.3. Later Military Requests Denied
Subsequent requests for military aid in 1934, 1943, and 1948 were refused. The lesson of 1932 had been learned: the army was not a pest control agency.

7.4. Cultural Legacy
The Emu War evolved from a humiliation into a beloved piece of Australian self-deprecating humour. It features on lists of “military defeats,” in video games, and in a 2023 film. It endures because it encapsulates a national tendency to laugh at authority and to recognise the defiant, unruly power of the Australian landscape.

Chapter 8: Conclusion: The Emu War as a Paradigmatic Clash

The Great Emu War was a profound, if peculiar, historical lesson. It was a clash between:

• Human Linear Logic: Deploy maximum force (machine guns) for a swift, decisive victory.
• Ecological Complex Reality: A diffuse, adaptive, and resilient biological system.

The failure was total on human terms. The military was humiliated, the politicians ridiculed, and the farmers remained besieged. The emus, simply by behaving as emus, won.

This event serves as an early-20th-century premonition of contemporary dilemmas in environmental management. It warns against the hubris of technological “silver bullets” for ecological problems created by human land-use patterns. It highlights the agency of non-human actors in shaping history. And it reveals how political expediency can lead to spectacularly misguided policy interventions.

Ultimately, the Emu War teaches that you cannot declare war on an ecosystem and expect to win. The emus, those “unfeathered soldiers,” were not an invading army but a manifestation of the land itself, pushing back against an imposed and unsustainable order. Their victory was the victory of biological reality over human presumption—a lesson as relevant today as it was in the wheat fields of Campion in 1932.

Bibliography (Illustrative Examples)

Primary Sources:

• National Archives of Australia: Series A5954, A663, MP742/1.
• Commonwealth Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), 1932-1934.
• The West Australian, The Daily News (Perth), The Sunday Herald (Sydney), 1932-1934.
• Johnson, Murray. “Feathered Foes: Soldier Settlers and Western Australia’s ‘Emu War’ of 1932.” Journal of Australian Studies, no. 88 (2006): 147-157.

Secondary Sources:

• Crosby, Alfred W. Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900-1900. Cambridge University Press, 1986.
• Gammage, Bill. The Biggest Estate on Earth: How Aborigines Made Australia. Allen & Unwin, 2011.
• Lake, Marilyn. The Limits of Hope: Soldier Settlement in Victoria, 1915-38. Oxford University Press, 1987.
• McCalman, Janet. Struggletown: Public and Private Life in Richmond 1900-1965. Melbourne University Press, 1984.
• Robin, Libby. How a Continent Created a Nation. UNSW Press, 2007.
• Serventy, Dominic. The Emu: A Natural and Unnatural History. A.H. & A.W. Reed, 1967.

dequate for sustenance, let alone profitability. Nonetheless, numerous veterans were resettled across the country as part of this initiative. Around 5,000 veterans were settled in Western Australia, where wheat was the crop most suitable to the conditions. From bad to worse By the mid-1920s, it became obvious that the veteran farming initiative was a terrible idea. Tens of thousands of farmers were plunged into poverty while struggling to produce even a meagre amount of food. Under such dire circumstances, alcoholism and suicide rates soared. Throughout the decade, wheat prices collapsed, exacerbated by the 1929 American stock market crash, which precipitated the Great Depression in Australia (and worldwide) with devastating effect. Suddenly, already diminished wheat prices halved, and Australia’s unemployment rate surged to 32% . As if that wasn’t enough, a drought compounded the hardships. A quarter of the resettled farmers in Western Australia abandoned their plots in frustration. Those who remained had no idea that their greatest hardship was still to come. Enter 20,000 emus Imagine being a novice farmer, trying your best to grow wheat in the unforgiving landscape of Western Australia. You’ve persevered through a steep learning curve, bad soil, a freak drought and empty promises of subsidies that never came. And then one morning you wa…