51-541: Townsville City is a coastal suburb at the centre of the City of Townsville , Queensland , Australia. In the 2021 census , the suburb of Townsville City had a population of 2,945 people. It is the city's central business district and a major hub for businesses of all sectors in the Northern Australia region. Townsville City is a strip of land along the northern-eastern bank of Ross Creek at its mouth at
102-563: A guerrilla campaign. This suggestion was not, however, adopted. According to historian Peter Stanley , "No historian of standing believes the Japanese had a plan to invade Australia, there is not a skerrick of evidence." In its 1943 report An Investigation of Global Policy with the Yamato Race as Nucleus , the Japanese government's Institute of Population Problems envisaged that Australia and New Zealand would be incorporated into
153-626: A brief landing on the Australian mainland during January 1944. Matsu Kikan ("Pine Tree"), a joint army-navy intelligence unit, landed to assess reports that the Allies had begun to build major new bases on the northernmost coast of the Kimberley region of Western Australia , facing the Timor Sea . After leaving their base at Kupang , West Timor , the unit – comprising 10 Japanese personnel in
204-455: A commandeered fishing vessel crewed by West Timorese civilians – made brief visits to the uninhabited Ashmore Reef and Browse Island . On 19 January, Matsu Kikan entered York Sound on the mainland. While smoke was seen in hills to the east, the Japanese vessel was anchored and camouflaged with tree branches. Landing parties went ashore near the mouth of the Roe River . They reconnoitred
255-488: A need to commit massive troop resources to the conquest of Australia, with the massive logistical problems that would produce. The generals were confident that Australia could be bullied into surrender to Japan by isolating it completely from the United States and by applying intense psychological pressure. The dozens of subsequent air raids on Northern Australia in 1942 and 1943 were mainly small and aimed to prevent
306-542: A population of 2,910 people. In the 2021 census , the suburb of Townsville City had a population of 2,945 people. The dominant land use in the Townsville CBD (Central Business District) is commercial but with a growing residential aspect. Office buildings include Northtown Office Tower, Verde Tower ( Queensland State Government ), 420 on Flinders ( Ergon Energy and National Australia Bank , and Central Plaza (Drake International). Some companies that have offices in
357-718: A process to formally define their boundaries and to gazette them, which is almost complete. In March 2006, only South Australia and the Northern Territory had not completed this process. The CGNA's Gazetteer of Australia recognises two types of locality: bounded and unbounded. Bounded localities include towns, villages, populated places, local government towns and unpopulated town sites, while unbounded localities include place names, road corners and bends, corners, meteorological stations, ocean place names and surfing spots. Sometimes, both localities and suburbs are referred to collectively as "address localities". In
408-575: A public library in Flinders Street. The suburb is home to the Perc Tucker Gallery and Umbrella Studio for Contemporary Arts. Saints Theodores Greek Orthodox Church is at 654 Sturt Street ( 19°16′02″S 146°48′26″E / 19.2673°S 146.8071°E / -19.2673; 146.8071 ( Saints Theodores Greek Orthodox Church ) ). Their feast day is the first Saturday of Lent . There are no schools in
459-539: A vacant Congregationalist church building in Denham Street and its contents were purchased and re-erected on the Sturt Street site. The first service was held on Thursday 23 November 1893. In January 1903 the building was damaged by Cyclone Leonta . What could be salvaged was used to erect a church hall. A building fund was set up for a new church and hall, but it was not until 1922 that a replacement church
510-526: Is now work or fight as we have never worked or fought before ... On what we do now depends everything we may like to do when this bloody test has been survived. Former Head of the Centre for Historical Research at the National Museum of Australia Dr Peter Stanley has been critical of the oft-repeated, widespread myth that Japan intended to invade Australia, commenting "the invasion myth helps justify
561-526: Is split between the City of Newcastle and City of Lake Macquarie LGAs; and Woodville , which is split between the City of Maitland and Port Stephens Council LGAs. In unincorporated areas , localities are declared by the relevant state authority. Proposed Japanese invasion of Australia during World War II In early 1942, elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) proposed an invasion of mainland Australia . This proposal
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#1732797562607612-400: Is used in rural areas, while the term suburb is used in urban areas. Australian postcodes closely align with the boundaries of localities and suburbs. This Australian usage of the term "suburb" differs from common American and British usage, where it typically means a smaller, frequently separate residential community outside, but close to, a larger city. The Australian usage is closer to
663-545: The Coral Sea , thus the suburb is bounded to the north by the Coral Sea and to the south-east by Ross Creek . It is overlooked to the west by Castle Hill . The land is mostly low-lying, just about sea level, apart from Melton Hill ( 19°15′21″S 146°49′08″E / 19.2559°S 146.8189°E / -19.2559; 146.8189 ( Melton Hill ) ) which creates a natural boundary to North Ward to
714-629: The Battle of Midway in May and June 1942, and all subsequent Japanese operations in the vicinity of Australia were undertaken to slow the advance of Allied forces. This is all despite key battles, including the Battle of Milne Bay , where the Japanese suffered from the first defeat of a land battle at the hands of an Australian Brigade, and the Kokoda Campaign , where the Australians prevented
765-559: The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere , with Japanese settlers to be placed on agricultural lands. After the fall of Singapore, Prime Minister of Australia John Curtin compared its loss to the Battle of Dunkirk . The Battle of Britain occurred after Dunkirk; "the fall of Singapore opens the Battle for Australia ", Curtin said, which threatened the Commonwealth, the United States, and
816-857: The Kwantung Army in Manchuria as it both feared that the Soviet Union would enter the Pacific War and wanted to preserve an option for Japan to invade Siberia . Prime Minister Hideki Tojo also consistently opposed invading Australia. Instead, Tojo favoured a policy of forcing Australia to submit by cutting its lines of communication with the US. In his last interview before being executed for war crimes Tojo stated, We never had enough troops to [invade Australia]. We had already far out-stretched our lines of communication . We did not have
867-723: The Pacific War led elements of the Imperial Japanese Navy to propose invading Australia. In December 1941 the Navy proposed including an invasion of Northern Australia as one of Japan's "stage two" war objectives after South-East Asia was conquered. This proposal was most strongly pushed by Captain Sadatoshi Tomioka , the head of the Navy General Staff's Planning section, on the grounds that
918-559: The Allied air units based there from attacking Japanese positions. The Attack on Sydney Harbour in May 1942 had the goal of diverting Allied forces away from Midway Island prior to the Japanese attempt to capture it and the subsequent Japanese submarine campaigns off the Australian east coast in 1942 and 1943 were attempts to break the supply line between Australia and New Guinea during the New Guinea Campaign . Moreover,
969-840: The American or British use of "district" or "neighbourhood", and can be used to refer to any portion of a city. Unlike the use in British or American English, this term can include inner-city, outer-metropolitan and industrial areas. Localities existed in the past as informal units, but in 1996 the Intergovernmental Committee on Surveying and Mapping and the Committee for Geographical Names in Australasia (CGNA) decided to name and establish official boundaries for all localities and suburbs. There has subsequently been
1020-634: The Army believed that any invasion of Australia would have to involve an attempt to conquer the entire Australian continent, something which was beyond Japan's abilities. The possibility of invading Australia was discussed by the Japanese Army and Navy on several occasions in February 1942. On 6 February the Navy Ministry formally proposed a plan in which eastern Australia would be invaded at
1071-746: The Australian Taxation Office and recently completed is the Queensland Country Bank Stadium that opened 29 February 2020 with a concert by Elton John . In coming years new projects under construction will include new offices for the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority , a new access stairway to Castle Hill, and completion of the Townsville Courthouse upgrade. CityLibraries Townsville operates
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#17327975626071122-451: The CBD include Wilmar International, RID Insect Repellent, Suncorp Insurance, Adani Australia. Townsville City is home to many regional offices of government organisations as well as many private companies, serving as a hub for northern Queensland. There has been extensive construction in the city centre over the last 20 years. As of 2020 some new projects include Flinders Lane, a new home for
1173-657: The Japanese attempt to capture Port Moresby in New Guinea by advancing along the Kokoda Track and landing at Milne Bay between July and September 1942 aimed to capture the town to complete Japan's defensive perimeter in the region. Once secured, Port Moresby was to have been used as a base from which Japanese aircraft could dominate the Torres Strait and Coral Sea , and not to support an invasion of Australia. A small Japanese reconnaissance unit carried out
1224-497: The Japanese reaching Port Moresby, the capital of the Australian Territory of Papua , in late 1942. The Australian townships of Darwin and Broome were attacked by air a number of times, and the fact that Sydney Harbor was also attacked by two midget submarines certainly would have given the Australians and Americans the impression that the Japanese were considering invasion as a strong possibility. This also supported
1275-603: The Navy's calculations of the number of troops needed to invade Australia differed greatly and formed a central area of discussion. In December 1941 the Navy calculated that a force of three divisions (between 45,000 and 60,000 men) would be sufficient to secure Australia's north-eastern and north-western coastal areas. In contrast, the Army calculated that a force of at least ten divisions (between 150,000 and 250,000 men) would be needed. The Army's planners estimated that transporting this force to Australia would require 1.5 to 2 million tons of shipping, which would have required delaying
1326-615: The Northern Fringe Festival are hed annually in the months of July and early August. The Townsville Eats monthly food festival on the last Friday of every month. The Sunday Cotters Markets are held every Sunday in Flinders Street. Townsville CBD has a large number of heritage-listed sites. Suburbs and localities (Australia) Suburbs and localities are the names of geographic subdivisions in Australia , used mainly for address purposes. The term locality
1377-526: The Townsville Baptist Church bought the land and two cottages (at the rear of the allotment) from the original landholder, Duncan McVean, for £500. At the time the allotment took up one half of the length of Fletcher Street between Sturt and Walker streets ( 19°15′54″S 146°48′36″E / 19.2650°S 146.8099°E / -19.2650; 146.8099 ( Townsville City Baptist Church (former) ) ). In September 1893,
1428-479: The United States was likely to use Australia as a base to launch a counter-offensive in the South-West Pacific . The Navy headquarters argued that this invasion could be carried out by a small landing force as this area of Australia was lightly defended and isolated from Australia's main population centres. There was not universal support for this proposal within the Navy, however, and Isoroku Yamamoto ,
1479-506: The armed strength or the supply facilities to mount such a terrific extension of our already over-strained and too thinly spread forces. We expected to occupy all New Guinea, to maintain Rabaul as a holding base, and to raid Northern Australia by air. But actual physical invasion—no, at no time. In speeches before the Diet of Japan on 12 January and 16 February 1942, Tojo claimed Japanese policy
1530-471: The commander of the Combined Fleet , consistently opposed it. The Japanese Army opposed the Navy's proposal as being impractical. The Army's focus was on defending the perimeter of Japan's conquests, and it believed that invading Australia would over-extend these defence lines. Moreover, the Army was not willing to release the large number of troops it calculated was needed for such an operation from
1581-434: The entire English-speaking world. Not knowing that Japan did not plan to invade Australia and in February 1942 could not successfully do so, the Australian government and people expected an invasion soon. The fear was greatest until June 1942. Curtin said on 16 February: The protection of this country is no longer that of a contribution to a world at war but the resistance to an enemy threatening to invade our own shore ... It
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1632-438: The first instance, decisions about the names and boundaries of suburbs and localities are made by the local council in which they are located based on criteria such as community recognition. Local council decisions are, however, subject to approval by the state's geographical names board. The boundaries of some suburbs and localities overlap two or more local government areas (LGAs). Examples of this are Adamstown Heights , which
1683-885: The land and buildings were sold because the Townsville City Baptist Church and the Currajong Baptist Church were both too small, so the congregations decided to combine and bought a new property at Kirwan . St Anne's Church of England Girls’ School opened on 1 January 1917 with an initial enrolment of 71 students in Walker Street (now occupied by the Townsville City Council centre, approx 19°15′31″S 146°48′52″E / 19.2585°S 146.8145°E / -19.2585; 146.8145 ( St Anne's Church of England School for Girls (former) ) ). It
1734-488: The last time on 27 February and in this meeting the Army stated that it believed that Australia was defended by a 600,000-strong military force. During a further meeting held on 4 March the Imperial Headquarters formally agreed to a "Fundamental Outline of Recommendations for Future War Leadership" which relegated the option of invading Australia as a "future option" only if all other plans went well. This plan
1785-402: The million tonnes of shipping the invasion would have consumed." After the fall of Singapore in February 1942, the Australian government, the military and the people were deeply alarmed by the possibility of a Japanese invasion. Widespread fear led to an expansion of Australia's military and war economy, as well as closer links with the United States. Japan's success in the early months of
1836-710: The north-west. North Ward Road (Denham Street) runs through from north to south-east. Townsville City is situated in the traditional Wulgurukaba Aboriginal country. Townsville City takes its name from Robert Towns , a merchant and entrepreneur, who was a pioneer financial supporter of pastoral development around the Ross River area. Services of worship for members of the Baptist Church commenced in Townsville in January 1888 in rented premises. In 1891
1887-516: The parochial view Australians took of their war effort." The 1984 alternate history novel The Bush Soldiers by John Hooker depicts a successful Japanese invasion of Australia and the last-ditch resistance effort made by a handful of Australian and British troops. In John Birmingham 's 2004 alternative history novel Designated Targets , Imperial Japan launches an invasion of northern Australia. The 2001 alternate history essay collection Rising Sun Victorious edited by Peter G. Tsouras has
1938-450: The return of requisitioned merchant shipping. This invasion force would have been larger than the entire force used to conquer South-East Asia . The Army also rejected the Navy's proposal of limiting an invasion of Australia to securing enclaves in the north of the country as being unrealistic given the likely Allied counter-offensives against these positions. Due to its experience in China
1989-550: The same time other Japanese forces captured Fiji , Samoa , and New Caledonia , and this was again rejected by the Army. On 14 February, the day before Singapore was captured , the Army and Navy sections of the Imperial General Headquarters again discussed invading Australia and during this discussion Captain Tomioka argued that it would be possible to take Australia with a "token force". This statement
2040-596: The strategic planning of the Brisbane Line . Former Australian War Memorial principal historian Dr Peter Stanley states that the Japanese "army dismissed the idea as 'gibberish', knowing that troops sent further south would weaken Japan in China and in Manchuria against a Soviet threat. Not only did the Japanese army condemn the plan, but the Navy General Staff also deprecated it, unable to spare
2091-439: The suburb. The nearest primary schools are Townsville South State School in neighbouring South Townsville to the east, Townsville West State School in neighbouring West End to the south-west and Townsville Central State School in neighbouring North Ward to the north-east. The nearest secondary school is Townsville State High School in neighbouring Railway Estate to the south. The Northern Australia Festival of Arts and
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2142-520: The surrounding area for about two hours and filmed it with an 8 mm camera . The following day, Matsu Kikan personnel again reconnoitred the area, before returning to Kupang. Matsu Kikan did not see any signs of recent human activity, and little of military significance was learnt from the mission. An officer involved with the mission reportedly returned to Japan shortly afterward, where he suggested landing 200 Japanese convicts in Australia, to launch
2193-748: The war were not precursors to invasion, as is sometimes claimed . The large air raid on Darwin on 19 February 1942 and the Attack on Broome on 3 March were conducted to prevent the Allies from using these towns as bases to contest the invasion of the Dutch East Indies and was not related to an invasion. According to Frei: The generals of the Army General Staff, and the Prime Minister of Japan, General Hideki Tojo, did not see
2244-457: Was built. Having insufficient funds for new bricks, a disused powder magazine, eight miles from Townsville at Brookhill and purchased and the congregation dismantled and cleaned around 30,000 bricks. In December 1921, tenders were called to erect a new brick church adjacent to the former church. The building contract was signed for £832/6/- and the foundation stone was laid on 8 July 1922. The new church opened on Saturday 23 September 1922. In 1981,
2295-484: Was labelled "so much gibberish " in the Imperial General Headquarters' secret diary. General Tomoyuki Yamashita : He said that after he had taken Singapore, he wanted to discuss with Tojo a plan for the invasion of Australia... Tojo turned down the plan, making the excuse of lengthened supply lines, which would be precarious and open to enemy attack... The dispute between the Army and Navy
2346-467: Was laid in 1956. The Mundingburra site was officially opened on 13 April 1958 with the move to the new site taking place at the end of August 1958. Still Anglican, it is now a co-educational school known as the Cathedral School of St Anne and St James . In the 2011 census , the suburb of Townsville City had a population of 2,500 people. In the 2016 census , the suburb of Townsville City had
2397-631: Was operated by the Society of the Sacred Advent . From 1942 to 1945 during World War II when a Japanese invasion was feared, the school was evacuated to Ravenswood while the Women's Auxiliary Australian Air Force occupied the school's facilities in Townsville. In 1953, the need for expand results in the purchase of 23 acres (9.3 ha) of land in Mundingburra , where the foundation stone
2448-716: Was opposed by the Imperial Japanese Army and Prime Minister Hideki Tojo , who regarded it as being unfeasible, given Australia's geography and the strength of the Allied defences. Instead, the Japanese military adopted a strategy of isolating mainland Australia from the United States by advancing through the South Pacific . This offensive was abandoned following the Battle of the Coral Sea and
2499-519: Was presented to the Emperor by Prime Minister Hideki Tōjō and in effect ended discussion of invading Australia. The FS Operation was not implemented, however, due to Japan's defeats in the Battle of the Coral Sea and Battle of Midway and was cancelled on 11 July 1942. As the option of invading Australia was rejected in February 1942 and was not revisited, the Japanese attacks on Australia during
2550-419: Was settled in late February with a decision to isolate rather than invade Australia. The Army continued to maintain its view that invading Australia was impractical, but agreed to extend Japan's strategic perimeter and cut Australia off from the US by invading Fiji , Samoa , and New Caledonia in the so-called Operation FS . The question of whether to invade Australia was discussed by Imperial Headquarters for
2601-701: Was to "eradicate the British colonies at Hong Kong and in the Malay Peninsula as these were 'evil bases used against East Asia', and turn these places into strongholds for the defence of Greater East Asia. Burma and the Philippines would get independence if they co-operated with Japan; the Netherlands East Indies and Australia would be crushed if they resisted; but if they recognised Japan's true intentions would receive help in promoting their welfare and development." The Army's and
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