Pacific theatre relics and rescue.

[Lang]

Another reason is there were relatively few vehicles to start with. Compared to Europe the numbers of armoured vehicles were miniscule. Because the Pacific war was a moving feast the servicable and repairable vehicles were put back on the ship for the next innings.

Even soft skinned vehicles were vastly fewer for the same size operations than in Europe due to the difficulties of shipping and the impossibility of driving anywhere in many of the combat areas.

In New Guinea and the Philippines there were huge sales in the late 40's and thousands of the remaining vehicles were sent back to Australia and USA respectively by dealers.

The climate in the Port Moresby area of Papua New Guinea (Which had the largest concentration of vehicles) is actually not too harsh with a distinct wet and dry season much like Darwin or Townsville. I put up some photos of a Dodge workshop area I took only a couple of years ago and there are dozens of restorable, mainly half-ton - Dodge bodies still there.

Very few armoured vehicles were there to start with. Lots of CMP vehicles were run into the ground by civil owners post-war. There are a few places around with groups of LVT's sitting under coconut trees but that is about it in PNG. I saw about a dozen quite complete Japanese amphibious tanks in Palau about 15 years ago but no allied armour.

Lang