CANBERRA, ACT, Aug. 15 -- The Prime Minister of Australia issued the following media release:
Eighty years ago, Prime Minister Ben Chifley began his address to the nation with a sentence of perfect simplicity - and infinite power:
Fellow citizens, the war is over.
The signing of the surrender was some weeks off, but the darkness that had engulfed the world - and made its last stand in the Pacific - was at last lifted.
Here in Sydney - as they did in towns and cities across Australia - crowds poured into the streets. They sang and danced amid a joyous blizzard of paper.
Chifley, who had seen his friend and predecessor John Curtin worn down by the gravity of war leadership, turned his words to all who had fought the darkness - but not li...