Without the Empire we should be tossed like a cork in the cross

Hear, O children of empire, the voice of Billy Hughes, Prime Minister of Australia in the days of world war, who declared: “Without the Empire we should be tossed like a cork in the cross current of world politics. It is at once our sword and our shield.” In this utterance lies the confession of a small nation bound to a great power, seeing in that bond both protection and might.

For Hughes spoke in the shadow of the First World War, when the young dominion of Australia was still tethered to the British Empire. To him, the empire was no mere ornament of history, but the vessel of survival. Alone, Australia was small, a cork upon the ocean of nations; but within the empire, it bore the sword of imperial armies and the shield of imperial strength. Thus, he defended union as necessity, not just loyalty.

Consider the Gallipoli campaign of 1915, where Australian and New Zealand soldiers—the ANZACs—fought and fell under the imperial banner. Their courage became legend, yet their sacrifice also revealed the dependence of the dominions upon Britain’s wars. Hughes, shaped by such trials, came to believe that outside the empire, Australia would drift powerless, but within it, she could strike with force and endure behind a shield not her own.

Yet this vision was not without struggle. In the postwar years, Hughes fought at Versailles for Australia’s voice to be heard, demanding recognition of his nation even while clinging to the empire. His words thus reveal a paradox: to rely upon the empire as sword and shield was both strength and limitation. It gave protection, yet bound Australia’s fate to decisions made far away.

Therefore, let this wisdom endure: nations often seek strength in alliances greater than themselves, but with protection comes dependence. Hughes’s words remind us that the Empire was once seen as lifeline and guardian, but also as a chain. To be “tossed like a cork” is the fear of the small amid the storms of world politics; to wield a sword and shield borrowed from another is both power and peril. And thus the eternal lesson: true security is not only in union, but in the slow forging of one’s own strength.