Heavy and Continuous Sacrifice: New Zealand, Her Allies, and the Second World War

Abstract

In 2025, the world marked the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, which continues to dominate the public imagination in many corners of the globe, including Australia and New Zealand. Indeed, recent research has shown that the conflict enjoys the greatest level of interest among the Australian public, who also feel more strongly about this conflict than any other in which Australia has been involved.[i] While similar studies are not available in the New Zealand context, the Second World War nonetheless had a significant effect on the country. The conflict remains the nation’s largest mobilisation in history. Around 140,000 New Zealanders served overseas between 1939 and 1945, and nearly 12,000 died. For a country whose population numbered only 1.6 million in 1940, this was a significant loss: one in every 150 New Zealanders died in the conflict.[ii] For many of those who returned from the war, life was forever changed for them and their families, with the ‘traumatic effects’ of the war rippling into the post-war period.