Presentation Title: Getting the House in Order: Tactical intelligence in the South-West Pacific Area (SWPA)
Theme: Intelligence, Operations and Media
Presenter: Mr Nick Anderson

The aim of this presentation is to examine the Australian Army’s collection and use of tactical intelligence in the SWPA during the Second World War. The title is based on an assertion made in 1942 by Brigadier John Rogers, the Australian Army’s foremost intelligence officer, that the Army’s intelligence system was not at the standard necessary to defeat the Japanese; a new and unfamiliar enemy whom Brigadier Rogers described as clever, crafty and determined. The presentation will briefly explore to what extent the Army was able to address Rogers’ concerns throughout the course of the war. It will accomplish this by charting developments in training, equipment and doctrine, and by using the 18th Infantry Brigade as a case study through three diverse operational deployments across the duration of the Pacific War. This analysis will illuminate a level of intelligence that has been neglected at the expense of the strategic and operational levels, where the scale makes the impact of good or poor intelligence more readily apparent. While the intelligence work conducted at the tactical level in the SWPA was ‘not glamorous like a Hollywood movie’ as one veteran described it, the inhospitable climate and largely uncharted operating environment increased the importance of the work of the Australian intelligence practitioners in the Brigade and Battalion Intelligence Sections. Their ability to learn and adapt was vital in contributing to the Australian Army’s tactical success.  

Nicholas (Nick) Anderson holds degrees in Arts and Law from the University of Canberra, and is currently undertaking a Masters degree in Philosophy at the University of New South Wales @ ADFA. Originally from Bathurst, he moved to Canberra to take up a position as an historian with the Australian Army History Unit, spending ten years with the Unit before moving to a new role within the Department of Defence. Nicholas has travelled extensively in Papua New Guinea and has a passion for the country, which ties in with his current tertiary study.