Kokoda

Kokoda

Now a major ABC TV Documentary.

"Never in my life ... had I seen soldiers who looked so shocked and so tired and so utterly weary as those men" - Brigadier John Rogers, Australia's Director of Military Intelligence, 1942.

Few of us know the true story behind the legend of Kokoda; few know the guts inside the myth. Kokoda was a war without mercy; a predatory war, where men hunted each other like wild animals. Paul Ham's Kokoda is the bestselling history of these crucial battles that helped saved Australia from the threat of Japanese attack. Now the inspiration for a major two-part ABC documentary, Kokoda is set to win over a whole new audience.

In this acclaimed account, Ham describes both sides of the appalling struggle along the Kokoda Track in 1942 when a few badly trained Australian troops confronted the Imperial Japanese Army in the worst terrain imaginable. No army had fought in such conditions; no Allied general believed it possible. Yet Kokoda was a vital struggle; undoubtedly a turning point in the Pacific War. The diggers were fighting for their very country's survival as the last free nation in Asia.

In Kokoda Paul Ham captures the spirit of the soldiers and commanders who clashed in this war of exceptional savagery, and tells of the brave souls on both sides of the campaign whose courage and sacrifices should never be forgotten. Paul Ham co-wrote, co-produced and appears in the ABC's two-part documentary based on this book, which, for the first time, took a camera crew along the full length of the Kokoda Track. He is also the author of Vietnam: The Australian War and the Australian correspondent for the London Sunday Times.

The documentary premieres on Thursday, 22 April at 8.30pm on ABC1. Part two screens on Thursday, 29 April at 8.30pm on ABC1. Kokoda will be available on DVD from Thursday, 6 May 2010.

Praise for Kokoda
"A fascinating and compelling read" Sunday Telegraph
"So assiduously has Ham plied his way through the terrain of official blunders that it's impossible to read Kokoda without feeling both profound sadness and rage" Daily Telegraph
"Ham's meticulously researched book, brings fresh insight to the story of the campaign which turned the course of the war in the Pacific, with his inclusion of a Japanese perspective" Adelaide Advertiser
"Ham has done a superb job of passing backwards and forwards between the lines to tell the overall story from the Japanese position for perhaps the first time" Courier Mail
"Ham's work stands above the rest and will quite possibly become popularly recognised as the book on Kokoda" The Age

Paul Hamis the author of the highly acclaimed Kokoda (HarperCollins, 2004) and the Australia correspondent of the London Sunday Times.

He was born and educated in Australia and lives in Sydney, having spent several years working in Britain as a journalist and publisher.

Kokoda
ABC Books
Author: Paul Ham
ISBN: 9780733328275
Price: $35.00