This is the place where the rock of friendship and the foundation stone of relations between our two countries rests and while we've had a long history together in places like Port Moresby and Lae and other places it is really here that the soul of the relationship sits, here in Kokoda. Because it was here that Australians decided to defend your liberty as well as their own and you decided to defend yourselves and help us defend ourselves. It was here young Australian men fought for the first time against the prospect of the invasion of their country, of Australia.

Never before, even though we fought in many conflicts, mostly imperial conflicts, in conflicts where we felt pangs of loyalty to what was then known as the “Mother Country” to Britain and to the empire to fight in Gallipoli with heroism and in Belgium in Flanders and in France and in other places, this was the first and only time that we've fought against an enemy to prevent the invasion of Australia, to secure the way of life we had built for ourselves. And those young Australian men fought here, 2,000 of them died, 600 Americans died later and we should never forget their sacrifice, that the families who live so distantly in the United States lost 600 sons here should never be forgotten and they cost the lives of 13,000 Japanese who fought for their country and what they believed were their country's strategic interests which were, of course, interests which we could not accept and could only abhor.

The lesson of this place is that these young men believed in Australia and we need to give Australians, all Australians, particularly young Australians, an Australia to believe in. We can't deny young Australians their birthright to a past with meaning for them and a future with meaning. It has to be a future with meaning and everything we see here—there can be no deeper spiritual basis to the meaning of the Australian nation than the blood that was spilled on this very knoll, this very plateau, in defence of the liberty of Australia.

So, Prime Minister, can I thank you on behalf of your countrymen, some who I've met here today who actually fought in that campaign, for those who died in that campaign, to the relatives here today of loved ones who were lost in that campaign but who gave their lives selflessly in the defence of Papua New Guinea and the defence of Australia and the broader defence of liberty in the Pacific.

This was the place where I believe the depth and soul of the Australian nation was confirmed. If it was founded in Gallipoli it was certainly confirmed in the defence of our homeland here.

The Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels

Many a mother in Australia,

When the busy day is done,

Sends a prayer to the Almighty

For the keeping of her son.

Asking that an Angel guide him

And bring him safely back

Now we see those prayers are answered

On the Owen Stanley Track,

For they haven't any halos,

Only holes slashed in their ears,

And with faces worked by tattoos,

With scratch pins in their hair,

Bringing back the wounded,

Just as steady as a hearse,

Using leaves to keep the rain off

And gentle as a nurse.

Slow and careful in bad places,

On the awful mountain track,

And the look upon their faces

Makes us think that Christ was black.

Not a move to hurt the carried,

As they treat him like a Saint,

It's a picture worth recording,

That an Artist's yet to paint.

Many a lad will see his Mother,

And the Husbands, Weans and Wives,

Just because the Fuzzy Wuzzy

Carried them to save their lives.

From mortar or machine gun fire,

Or a chance surprise attack,

To safety and the care of Doctors,

At the bottom of the track.

May the Mothers in Australia,

When they offer up a prayer,

Mention those impromptu Angels,

With the Fuzzy Wuzzy hair.