The Great Emu War

There are stories carved in the soil of old battlefields.
And then there are the ones etched in feathers and farce.

In 1932, Australia fought a war it would never forget…though many hoped to. It wasn’t against invaders from another nation or rebels rising from within. No. This war was against a creature with no flag, no army, and no mercy: the emu.

Yes.
A war against birds.

And not only did the birds fight back…
They won.

A Post-War Nation Meets a Prehistoric Problem

After World War I, Australia was doing what many countries do after trauma: trying to rebuild. The government handed land over to returning soldiers and said, more or less, “Grow wheat. Be heroes again.”

It seemed noble enough. Rebuild men through earth. Heal wounds with harvest.

But there were problems.

The Outback is not soft soil.
It’s cruel land, erratic with rainfall and hot enough to boil optimism. And when the Great Depression rolled in like a bad omen, wheat prices plummeted. These returned soldiers, now farmers, were losing everything. And that’s when the emus came.

Imagine it. You're struggling to grow food, the sun has teeth, and suddenly 20,000 six-foot feathered tanks show up and turn your wheat fields into a salad bar.

These birds didn’t just peck and pass through.
They devoured.
They stampeded.
They snapped fences…opening the door for rabbits, which were already chewing their way across the country in their own quiet invasion.

Australia didn’t just have a bird problem.
It had an ecosystem in revolt.

Related: The Tunguska Explosion, another moment when the natural world reminded us who’s boss.

Call In the Military

Desperate farmers turned to the government, pleading for help.
The government, ever dramatic, said: let’s use machine guns.

And thus, the War Office deployed a squadron to Western Australia in November 1932. It wasn’t a big force…just a couple of soldiers, two Lewis machine guns, and 10,000 rounds of ammunition. They were led by Major G.P.W. Meredith, who surely didn’t expect his military legacy would be defined by birds.

Related: The Philadelphia Experiment, because when governments get weird, they get really weird.

This was no mere pest control operation.
This was classified, armed action against a bird uprising.

The First Encounter: A Feathery Fiasco

On November 2nd, 1932, the soldiers spotted their first large emu flock. The men positioned their machine guns, waited for the perfect moment…

And opened fire.

The first shots struck a few birds. But the rest?

They ran.
They zigzagged.
They vanished into the brush like ghosts with beaks.

It turned out that emus didn’t stand still and wait for death like enemy infantry.
They scattered.
They dodged.
They outran bullets.

Some birds were hit and kept running.
Unbothered.
Bulletproof.

One soldier later remarked it was like trying to shoot “armored cars with feathers.”

Related: Ball Lightning, another elusive force we tried and failed to capture.

Round Two: Emus vs. Truck

Not to be outdone by oversized poultry, the soldiers tried a new tactic:
Mount a machine gun on the back of a moving truck and give chase.

In theory, this would allow them to pursue the emus at high speed and mow them down en masse. In reality, the truck bounced so violently across the uneven terrain that no one could aim. At one point, the gunner was nearly thrown off the truck bed. The driver crashed into a fence. And the emus?

They outran the truck.

Let me say that again for history’s sake:
The emus outran the military truck.

Score so far:
Emus 2, Australia 0.

The Final Offensive: Thousands of Bullets, Not Much to Show

For the next several days, the soldiers kept trying. They fired thousands of rounds into the wheat fields. They tried ambushes, patrols, traps. And while 200 to 500 birds were reportedly killed, it barely made a dent in the estimated 20,000+ emus sweeping across Western Australia like a feathered sandstorm.

Worse yet? The emus adapted.

They started splitting into smaller flocks. They became more evasive, more mobile, harder to track. Every time the gunners thought they had them cornered, the birds slipped away.

The press had a field day. Headlines mocked the “war effort.” One journalist noted the emus had “won every round so far” and described them as a “feathered enemy that defies bullets.”

By November 8th, the military operation was officially abandoned. The campaign had lasted barely a week.

Final score?
Emus 3, Australia 0.

Related: Where Have All the Worms Gone? because nature doesn’t explain itself, even when we ask nicely.

What Happened After the Emu War?

Embarrassed and out of ideas, the government turned to less dramatic solutions.

They offered bounties for emu kills, improved fencing, and encouraged local hunters to handle the flocks more discreetly.

And Major Meredith?
He reportedly joked that if the army had a division of emus, they could take on any power in the world. It was a bitter, backhanded compliment from a man who’d faced one of the strangest foes in history.

The emus continued thriving. Today, their population is estimated at well over 600,000. They remain unbothered, undefeated, and (if birds could smirk) probably still laughing.

Related: The Mad Gasser of Mattoon, another baffling encounter that left communities confused and media delighted.

So... Why Is This Story So Funny?

Because it’s real.

Because it sounds like satire.
Because we’re used to humans winning, and here, nature won.

There’s something both humbling and hilarious about a global empire being stopped in its tracks not by a rival government or mutiny, but by birds that refused to die.

Because nature isn’t a “problem” to solve.
It doesn’t follow orders.
It doesn’t get cornered.
Sometimes, it fights back…not out of anger, but simply to exist.

And sometimes?
It runs faster than your truck and doesn’t care about your machine guns.

Honor the Emus (or At Least Hug One)

If you’d like to pay tribute to the real victors of 1932, there’s this adorably smug stuffed emu… a soft, silent reminder that resistance comes in all forms, and sometimes it’s covered in feathers.

Related: The Hessdalen Lights, proof that the unexplained still walks among us, even when it runs on two giant bird legs.

Thoughts From the Battlefield of Absurdity

The Great Emu War remains one of history’s weirdest and most wonderful stories…not just because it's funny, but because it's true.

Australia declared war on birds.

The birds won.

And we, somehow, are better for knowing that.