There have been many great wars throughout history—wars that have been told from parent to child, sung about in ballads, and written in grand epics and wars that consisted of courageous men fighting one another in a furious battle, struggling for freedom and survival.

Well, this article is not about one of those wars. This war only lasted six days, with only two major battles ever taking place, making it one of the shortest wars in human history; except, this war was not fought between men. This was psychological warfare, wild with outright hostility on both sides between man . . . and emu. Today, I will be telling the story of the Great Emu War of Australia.

Yes, it is officially referred to as a war, and, yes, it actually did happen. Several problems culminated together that eventually led to the Great Emu War. The first World War had ended, and all of the Australian soldiers who served in action returned home. As often happens after major wars, the Australian government struggled with finding jobs for the fresh veterans. One solution was a “soldier settlement scheme,” which offered up parcels of land for wheat cultivation and sheep raising to interested veterans. Nearly 5,000 ex-soldiers accepted the offer. However, there is always a catch, and it turned out that all the land given out was in Campion (Western Australia), and the grounds were not suitable for farming.

To make tensions worse, the Great Depression hit in 1929, causing wheat prices to fall into the gutter. Even though the government promised certain subsidies, they never came. So, Australian farmers were already a wee bit stressed even before the Emu crisis began.

If you were like me before this article and are not sure what an emu is, let me pause. Basically, they are about as weird as every other animal found in Australia.

I once heard a joke that they look like they are part bird, part velociraptor, and I think it’s a pretty apt description. They are big, flightless birds that look very similar to ostriches. Their heights are never less than 5.7 feet (I’m sorry, but I am not comfortable with a bird who is taller than me—it is not only terrifying but an insult to my pride). They stand on two legs with these super long necks and can run up to about 30 miles per hour. Also, their feet are apparently strong enough to kill a human, so that’s fun.

Anyway, every year, emus migrate inland for the breeding season. In the year 1932, about 20,000 emus wandered into the newly cultivated lands of Campion and discovered that it had oodles of their favorite food: wheat! Well, I’m sure you can imagine the kind of devastation thousands of horny emus can reap on all those quality wheat fields, and wowza were the farmers not happy about it.

Up until this point, emus were considered a protected species—after all, they are an Australian national animal—but all that flew out the window when the farmers were soon calling for blood. At first, the ex-soldiers took matters into their hands by shooting up as many emus as they could when they saw them wandering onto their properties for a quick snack. However, they quickly realized they were out-numbered and out-gunned by the enemy and took their grievances to the government.

The Minister of Defense at the time, Sir George Pearce, decided to take the situation Very Seriously. The ex-soldiers requested machine guns to take care of the problem, and I guess Pearce said, “Yes, this is a perfectly logical idea” because several military men under the leadership of Major G.PW. Meredith traveled to Campion armed to the teeth with 10,000 rounds of ammunition and two Lewis guns. This was the beginning of Great Emu War.

You may be thinking this is all overkill for a bunch of innocent birds. Well, you’d be wrong.

On November 2, Meredith led his small battalion (this sounds fancy, but it was just some volunteer farmers and maybe two military soldiers) to where a group of some 50 emus was said to be gathered. They found the emus munching happily on some wheat like the vermin they were. Slowly, they began trying to herd the emus together within the range of the guns. Smelling danger, the emus went on the defensive, scattering in all directions so they could limit their casualties. Many escaped unharmed into the forest.

A few days later, on November 4, the men decided to try again, and Meredith planned an ambush attack near a local dam where over 1,000 emu forces had gathered. Having learned from the previous mistake, the soldiers waited until the emus were at point blank range before opening fire. However, within minutes, one of the guns jammed, allowing the rest of the birds to escape. Only 12 emus had been taken out by the end.

Meredith realized they were at an extreme disadvantage against their quick-legged enemy, so to level the battlefield, he and his men attached a machine gun to a moving vehicle. However, this tactic proved to be a horrible failure, as the gunman was too busy trying to hold the gun steady while on top of a moving vehicle to be able to shoot the thing properly. All the emus raced away unscathed, safe to fight another day.

In his later reports, Meredith recalled how “each mob has its leader…who keeps watch while his fellows busy themselves with the wheat. At the first suspicious sign, he gives the signal, and dozens of heads stretch out of the crop. A few birds will take fright, starting a headlong stampede for the scrub, the leader always remaining until his followers have reached safety.”

So, according to Meredith, these emus were capable of sophisticated military strategy. I’m just saying, people are worried about apes evolving into sentient creatures but maybe we need to be watching out for these emus instead.

Anyway, since the emus ultimately proved far smarter than the Australian military, they technically won the war due to the battalion exhausting its resources. Although the actual number of emu casualties is debated, ranging from only 50 to over 900, it still is not enough to justify the over 9,680 rounds of ammunition used during the course of the “war.”

Apparently, the Australian House of Representatives agreed. On November 8, 1932, after the local news outlets gave a humiliatingly negative coverage of the war and conservatives who had gotten wind of the event expressed quite a bit of outrage, the House of Representatives decided to bring an end to the whole affair. Defeated, Sir George Pearce withdrew Meredith and his men from Campion.

Unfortunately for the Australian government, they still were not able to avoid citizen derision. An ornithologist named Dominic Serventy commented, “The machine-gunners’ dreams of point-blank fire into serried masses of Emus were soon dissipated. The Emu command had evidently ordered guerrilla tactics, and its unwieldy army soon split up into innumerable small units that made use of the military equipment uneconomic. A crestfallen field force, therefore, withdrew from the combat area after about a month.”

A witty one, that Serventy.

Admittedly, it makes sense that it was so difficult for Meredith’s men to take out their emu adversaries. Their seemingly superior intellect and terrifying speed aside, an emu could apparently take multiple bullets before it would die. At one point, the men allegedly found a fallen emu that had over five bullets in it—but it was their vehicle running the bird over that killed it, not the bullets. So, obviously, the feathery freaks are descendants of some alien race or something because that is bananas.

When Meredith reflected on his battles against the great emus to a local paper, he said, “If we had a military division with the bullet-carrying capacity of these birds, it would face any army in the world. They could face machine guns with the invulnerability of tanks. They are like Zulus, whom even dum-dum bullets would not stop.” Honestly, I would love for the Australian government to create an emu regiment for their military. I mean, imagine the possibilities.

Although the Campion soldiers would try to curb the emu problem several more times, the government refused to give further aid, and all of their attempts proved unsuccessful. Today, emus still roam the Australian countryside and are still a national animal. However, I guess the Aussies were never truly able to get over their resentment because emus are now often farmed for their oil, meat, feathers, and leather. I guess that was the only way the farmers could make a living (sorry, too soon?).  

What can I say? History is wild, kids. I suppose the moral of this story is that emus are terrifying, and you should not mess with them. Or, if you’re desperate, just farm them. You know that old saying: if you can’t beat them, eat them.