Australian Intelligence Corps

Artillery leaflet shells being packed with PSYOPS leaflets, these shells "airburst"
over the target showering the area with the leaflets​

The entry of Japan on the side of the Axis forces in 1941 led to a significant expansion of the Army and consequently the Australian Intelligence Corps. Australia itself was directly threatened and its people suffered numerous attacks by Japanese aircraft and sporadic naval bombardments. The damage done to the Army's intelligence effort by the economic effects of the inter-war years came home to roost. A realistic assessment showed that the pre-war struggle to maintain information databases on Australia, its dependencies and surrounding areas had produced mainly superficial information. The depth of information required by mid-20th Century high intensity land operations was not there. Immediately a monumental effort was begun by the Allies to secure Australia as a base area in preparation for an impending drive to recapture lost areas and to defeat the Japanese.

Allied Translator and Intepreter Service Detachment, Bougainville 1945.
Note the group is multinational and combined service, including
Australian Army, RAN Volunteer Reserve and US Army Nissei Japanese linguists ​

Australian intelligence personnel had a significant impact on the Allied effort to defeat the Japanese. Their early estimates of enemy courses of action were remarkably accurate. Australian intelligence predicted the disastrous consequences of dispatching troops to Malaya and Netherlands East Indies (modern day Indonesia). They accurately predicted the path of the Japanese move against Port Moresby over the Owen Stanley Ranges in New Guinea. Unfortunately, circumstances were against field commanders and many Australian and Allied personnel, both military and civilian were to suffer before the tide was turned.

LT Cathie, marking the map in the Intelligence Room of Advanced Land Headquarters,
Brisbane, Australia.
CAPT Burr looks on and comments​

Nevertheless, it is remarkable how quick the Allies were to exploit two of the most unheralded intelligence coups of the war against Japan. Australian intelligence personnel were directly involved in the capture and exploitation of two sets of documents which became pivotal to the future intelligence effort. The capture and translation of the Japanese Officer List enabled the Allies to develop a detailed understanding of the command structure of the entire Japanese Army. Australian Order of Battle analysts, working on translations of this and other documents became the acknowledged international experts on the order of battle of the Japanese Army. The other really significant operation occurred in 1943 when the Japanese 20th Division's tactical codes were captured and subsequently translated. This action was described as the 'seminal moment' in the history of the Allied signals intelligence organisation in the South West Pacific Area, known as Central Bureau.

Under the protective gaze of Papuan soldiers,
CPL RB Walden, escorts Japanese PW into the POW Compound at Rabaul, 1945.​

In 1942, the Corps was boosted by the formation of the Field Security Wing and the raising of specialist units for field censorship, air photographic interpretation and the establishment of a full time intelligence training school. In the context of Allied cooperation, the Army commander, General Blamey (a former intelligence officer of the 1st Australian Division at Gallipoli in World War 1) suggested the formation of a combined intelligence organisation to bring together the naval, land and air intelligence services of the Allies involved in the fight against Japan in Australia's region. The merit of the suggestion was immediately acted on and the various intelligence assets operating in Australia were merged under the umbrella of the Allied Intelligence Bureau, the head of which was to be an Australian Army officer. The charter of the Allied Intelligence Bureau was to obtain and report information of the enemy, to hinder the enemy by sabotage and destruction of morale, and to lend aid and assistance to local efforts to the same end in Japanese territory. Captain Peter Figgis was awarded the Military Cross for his command of a party which operated in areas held by Japanese forces. The presence of this party became known to the Japanese whose reconnaissance planes and land parties searched continuously in an endeavour to locate it. With total disregard for this threat, Captain Figgis continued to report enemy movements until he was ordered to withdraw inland so as to evade capture, and be available to resume his assigned role when opportunity offered. His party evaded capture and were eventually extracted to continue the fight in other operations.

The Corps grew to a previously unimaginable size as the campaigns against the Japanese ensued. By the end of War, Corps personnel were serving in:

• force, brigade, division, corps and army level intelligence sections
• the various echelons of Land Headquarters
• Lines of Communication intelligence sections
• Central Bureau (signals intelligence)
• Allied Translator and Interpreter Service
• Allied Geographic Section
• Combined Operations Intelligence Centre
• Far Eastern Liaison Office (a psychological operations unit controlled by the Director of Military Intelligence)
• the Security Service
• Army air photographic interpretation units
• the 1st Australia Field Censorship Company (a unit unique in concept and execution to Australia)
• the special operations elements of the Allied Intelligence Bureau
• prisoner of war and alien internment camps
• seconded to Allied intelligence headquarters and units as far afield as India and the Philippines.

Australian Intelligence Corps Association

 

The Allied Intelligence Bureau (AIB) was a joint United States, Australian, Dutch and British intelligence and special operations agency of World War II. The AIB was responsible for operating parties of spies and commandos behind Japanese lines in order to collect intelligence and conduct guerrilla warfare against Japanese forces in the South West Pacific. The AIB was formed in June 1942 to coordinate the existing Allied propaganda and guerilla organisations. The first controller of the AIB was Colonel C.G. Roberts. At its peak the AIB contained men from ten individual services and controlled or coordinated 8 separate organisations.
The role of the AIB was to Obtain information about the enemy, "to weaken the enemy by sabotage and destruction of morale and to lend aid and assistance to local effort to he same end in enemy territories."

Allied Intelligence Bureau - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The last two links are to a site with quite a bit of info,

Full text of "Allied Intelligence Bureau"
http://www.ozatwar.com/sigint/aib.htm
http://www.ozatwar.com/sigint/sigint.htm

 

Thanks Jack. I do have quite a bit of info from all over LOL.

 

Hi guys new here today im after any imformation in discription of allied & axis artillery shells , length, width & rim sizes of all thanks

 

Hello Garth. Im not quite sure why you posted your request in this thread. You might like to try this one. You may get a better response.

Information Requests - World War II Forums

 

From Australia @ War by Peter Dunn
Via: https://www.facebook.com/Ozatwar/posts/10205583387933821
https://www.facebook.com/Ozatwar
"Everything you wanted to know about military activities in Australia during WWII"

CENTRAL BUREAU IN AUSTRALIA DURING WWII
A Research and Control Centre for the Interception and cryptanalyzing of Japanese intelligence.

Central Bureau was one of two Allied Sigint organisations in the South West Pacific area (SWPA).
Central Bureau was attached to the HQ of the Allied Commander of the South West Pacific area.

The other unit was the joint RAN/USN Fleet Radio Unit, Melbourne (FRUMEL), which was subordinate to the Commander of the USN 7th Fleet.
"Sigint" is a code name for Signal Intelligence. Sigint operations were so secret that they were given their own special classification of "Ultra Secret".
The word "Ultra" was used as a code name for intelligence derived from interception and decoding of Japanese military and naval messages.

Central Bureau was a joint American-Australian Sigint organisation which was established on 6 April 1942 under the command of Major General S. B. Akin
with its headquarters based in Melbourne. General MacArthur advised Washington of his decision in a dispatch on 1 April 1942.
He described the role of the group as "the interception and cryptanalyzing of Japanese intelligence".
The name Central Bureau was chosen so as to convey no information whatever to outsiders as to the nature of the work being done.

The following personnel were absorbed into Central Bureau:-
- The intelligence section of the former No. 4 Australian Special Wireless Section
- Australian Military personnel
- RAAF personnel
- US Army intelligence personnel who had escaped form the Philippines
- US Army intelligence personnel from USA (6 officers and 8 men of the 837 Signals Service Detachment)
- British intelligence staff from Singapore

A small group from Australian naval intelligence, led by Paymaster Commander R.E. Eric Nave and Professor A.D. Dale Trendall also became party of the secret new unit.
They had been working on Japanese diplomatic codes.
Central Bureau was established in a gabled, ivy-clad mansion called "Cranleigh" in Domain Road, at South Yarra, Melbourne.
Central Bureau's role was to research and decode Army and Air intercept traffic and work in close co-operation with other Sigint centres in the USA, United Kingdom and India.
Mic Sandford was appointed AIF Commanding Officer at Central Bureau.
Major Abraham "Abe" Sinkov, a mathematician, was appointed Assistant Director of Central Bureau.
Sinkov had previously joined in the Signals Intelligence Service which had been founded by cryptanalyst William J. Friedmann.
Sinkov had previously been in charge of an intercept station in Panama.
He had visited Britain in 1941 to facilitate the exchange of wireless information.

Read more and enjoy the pictures at: http://www.ozatwar.com/sigint/cbi.htm