American-British-Dutch-Australian Command

History of the command

It is intended that General Wavell should have a staff in the south Pacific accessible as Foch's High Control Staff was to the Great Staffs of the British and French armies in France [during World War I]. He would receive his orders from an appropriate joint body who will be responsible to me as the Minister of Defence and to the President of the United States who is also Commander-in-Chief of all United States forces.

Wavell arrived in Singapore, where the British Far East Command was based, on January 7, 1942. ABDACOM absorbed this British command in its entirety. On January 15, Wavell moved his headquarters to Bandung in Java and assumed control of Allied operations.

The governments of Australia, the Netherlands and New Zealand lobbied Winston Churchill for an Allied inter-governmental war council, with overall responsibility for the Allied war effort in Asia and the Pacific, based in Washington D.C. A Far Eastern Council was established in London on February 9, with a corresponding staff council in Washington. However, the smaller powers continued to push for a body based in the US.

In the meantime, the rapid collapse of Allied resistance to Japanese attacks in Malaya, Singapore, the Dutch East Indies, the Philippines and other countries had soon overwhelmed the Malay Barrier, and left the ABDA Area split in two.

Wavell resigned as supreme commander on the February 25,1942 handing control of the ABDA Area to local commanders. He also recommended the establishment of two Allied supreme commands to replace ABDACOM: a south west Pacific command, and one based in India. In anticipation of this, Wavell had handed control of Burma to the British India Command and reassumed his previous position, as Commander-in-Chief India.

Following the destruction of the main ABDA naval force under Rear-Admiral Karel Doorman, at the Battle of the Java Sea, in February-March 1942, ABDA effectively ceased to exist.

As the Japanese closed in on the remaining Allied forces in the Philippines, MacArthur was ordered to re-locate to Australia. On March 17, the US Government appointed him as Supreme Allied Commander South West Pacific Area, a command which included Australia and New Guinea in addition to Japanese-held areas. The rest of the geographic area of the Pacific Theater of Operations remained under the Pacific Ocean Areas command, led by Commander-in-Chief Admiral Chester Nimitz of the US Navy.

The inter-governmental Pacific War Council was established in Washington on April 1, but remained largely ineffectual due to the overwhelming predominance of US forces in Asia and the Pacific throughout the war.

Although ABDACOM was only in existence for several weeks and it presided over one defeat after another, it did provide some useful lessons for more successful supreme Allied commands, such as SHAEF in Europe.

Official command structure

General Sir Archibald Wavell, British Army (BA) — Supreme Commander