Екінші дүниежүзілік соғыстағы 9-шы Австралия армия дивизиясы

WW2 Australian Army formation

The 9th Division was a division of the Australian Army that served during World War II. It was the fourth division raised for the Second Australian Imperial Force (2nd AIF). The distinctions of the division include it being:
in front line combat longer, cumulatively, than any other Australian division;
one of the Australian military's most decorated formations; and;
like the 6th and 7th Divisions, being one of only a few Allied army units to serve in both the Mediterranean and Pacific theatres. During 1940, the component units of the 9th Division were sent to the UK to defend it against a possible German invasion. After serving during 1941–1942 in the North African campaign, at the Siege of Tobruk and both the First and Second Battles of El Alamein, the 9th Division returned to Australia. In 1943–1944, it served in the New Guinea campaign and, during 1945, in the Borneo campaign. It was disbanded, following the end of the war, in early 1946.

The 9th Division was the fourth AIF division raised, being formed in the United Kingdom in late 1940. Initially it consisted of only two infantry brigades which had been formed in Australia and dispatched to Britain in order to defend against a possible invasion following the Fall of France—the 18th and 25th Brigades—under the command of Major General Henry Wynter. Later, the 24th Brigade was also assigned to the division.

After completing its initial training in Australia, Great Britain and Palestine, the units of the 9th Division were sent to Cyrenaica in Libya in early March 1941 to complete their training and equipping as part of the garrison of this region. Short of equipment such as machine guns, mortars, anti tank guns and carriers, most of the division's artillery and cavalry units did not accompany the infantry brigades to Cyrenaica at this time. The 20th Brigade was the first unit from the division to move, departing on 27 February, although it was joined shortly by the other two brigades and it was during this time that the division suffered its first casualties when German bombers attacked the transport column in which the 2/13th Battalion was travelling, killing two Australians and wounding one other. By 9 March the 20th Brigade relieved the 17th Brigade from the 6th Division, along the Cyrenaican frontier. The offensive began on 24 March, quickly forcing the British units along the frontier back as it drove towards Benghazi. Two days later the 26th Brigade took up positions in the west near the coast to support the 20th Brigade which was holding the pass at Er Regima. Lacking their own transport, they had to rely on that provided by other units and thus the withdrawal had to be undertaken in stages. In order to achieve this, the 2/13th Battalion was used as a rear guard and late in the afternoon of 4 April it undertook the division's first action of the war when the Germans attacked their positions in the Er Regima Pass. Supported by British artillery, the battalion, spread out across a front managed to delay a German force of about 3,000 personnel mounted in lorries and accompanied by armoured cars and tanks. Only lightly armed, however, they were unable to prevent the Germans from outflanking them and gradually they were forced to pull back before, at 2200 hours, their transport arrived and they were able to withdraw just as they were faced with encirclement. In this action the 2/13th Battalion suffered five killed and 93 wounded or captured. The 7th Division's 18th Brigade had arrived two days earlier and together with a number of British artillery and armoured regiments and an Indian cavalry regiment, the 18th King Edward's Own Cavalry (now 18 Cavalry), they were placed under the command of Major General John Lavarack and ordered to hold the port for at least two months while a relieving force from Egypt was organised. For his part in the attack Edmondson was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross,

Over the course of the next six months the 9th Division and the rest of the garrison repelled repeated attempts by Rommel's forces to capture the port. The Australian defence of Tobruk was anchored on three factors: the use of the pre existing Italian fortifications around the port, aggressive patrolling and raiding of Axis positions and the firepower of the garrison's artillery. Fighting from fixed positions, the Australian infantry successfully contained and defeated repeated German armoured and infantry attacks on the fortress. After the failure of the British attempts to relieve the fortress in May and June 1941 the 9th Division was successful in gradually improving Tobruk's defences through aggressively raiding Axis positions. Upon the request of the Australian War Cabinet, the bulk of the 9th Division was withdrawn from Tobruk in September and October 1941, and handed over to the British 70th Division The defence of Tobruk cost the 9th Division 3,164 casualties including 650 killed, 1,597 wounded and 917 captured.

Following the end of the war the 9th Division remained in Borneo and performed emergency relief and occupation duties until the arrival of Indian troops in January 1946. The 9th Division began gradually demobilising on 1 October 1945 with soldiers with dependants or long service being the first to be discharged. The division's headquarters was disbanded on 10 February 1946 and the last unit of the division was disbanded in May 1946. While the majority of the division's personnel returned civilian life after the war, some continued to serve with the British Commonwealth Occupation Force in Japan, joining the 66th Infantry Battalion.