Robert Menzies - First Term As Prime Minister

First Term As Prime Minister

On 18 April, Menzies was elected Leader of the UAP and was sworn in as Prime Minister eight days later. A crisis arose almost immediately, however, when Page refused to serve under him. In an extraordinary personal attack in the House, Page accused Menzies of cowardice for not having enlisted in the War, and of treachery to Lyons. Menzies then formed a minority government. When Page was deposed as Country Party leader a few months later, Menzies reformed the Coalition with Page's successor, Archie Cameron.

Fellow Australians, It is my melancholy duty to inform you officially that in consequence of a persistence by Germany in her invasion of Poland, Great Britain has declared war upon her and that, as a result, Australia is also at war. —Menzies' radio broadcast to the nation on 3 September 1939 informing Australia that the country was at war with Germany and her allies.

In September 1939, Menzies found himself a wartime leader of a small nation of 7 million people that depended on Britain for defence against the looming threat of the Japanese Empire, with 100 million people, a very powerful military, and an aggressive foreign policy that looked south. He did his best to rally the country, but the bitter memories of the disillusionment which followed the First World War made his task difficult, this being compounded by Menzies' lack of a service record. Even more damning was that as Attorney-General and Deputy Prime Minister, Menzies had made an official visit to Germany in 1938, when the official policy of the Autralian government, supported by the Opposition, echoed its London masters in supporting Neville Chamberlain's policy of Appeasement.

Menzies led the Coalition into the 1940 election and lost the large majority he had inherited from Lyons. The result was a hung parliament, with the Coalition two seats short of a majority. Menzies was able to form a minority government with the support of two independent MPs, Arthur Coles and Alex Wilson. Labor led by John Curtin refused Menzies' offer to form a war coalition, and also opposed using the Australian army for a European war, preferring to keep it at home to defend Australia. Labor did however agree to participate in the Advisory War Council. Menzies sent the bulk of the army to help the British in the Middle East and Singapore, and told Winston Churchill the Royal Navy should strengthen its Far Eastern forces.

From 24 January 1941 Menzies spent four months in Britain discussing war strategy with Churchill and other Empire leaders, while his position at home deteriorated. The Australian historian Professor David Day has suggested that Menzies might have replaced Churchill as British Prime Minister, and that he had some support in Britain for this. This support came from the British press in the form of Viscount Astor, Lord Beaverbrook and former WW1 Prime Minister David Lloyd George, who were trenchant critics of the autocratic style of Winston Churchill and favoured replacing Winston with Menzies. He also had some public support for his staying on in the War Cabinet for the duration, which was strongly backed by Sir Maurice Hankey, former WW1 Colonel and member of both WW1 & WW2 War Cabinets. One Australian writer Gerard Henderson has rejected this theory, yet others such as Australian history Professors Judith Brett Latrobe Uni. & Joan Beaumont ANU support David Day, as indeed does Menzies' daughter Heather Henderson. She even goes on to state that Lady Nancy Astor 'even offered all her sapphires if he would stay on in England'. When Menzies came home, he found he had lost all support, and was forced to resign on 27 August. The UAP was so bereft of leadership that it was forced to then turn to former Prime Minister Billy Hughes as its new leader. However, the nearly 78-year-old Hughes was viewed as a stopgap leader, and a joint UAP-Country Party conference chose Country Party leader Arthur Fadden as Coalition leader--and hence Prime Minister--even though the Country Party was nominally the junior partner in the Coalition. Menzies was very bitter about what he saw as this betrayal by his colleagues, and almost left politics. He was, however, persuaded to become Minister for Defence Co-ordination in Fadden's cabinet.