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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
National
Paul Daley

Australian War Memorial defers military history prize after judging panel awards it to book on Ben Roberts-Smith

Chris Masters Ben Roberts-Smith Matt Anderson Council Memorial Kerry Stokes Nick McKenzie Guardian Australia Seven West Media War Crimes
Australian War Memorial, Canberra, Australia
The biennial award was inaugurated in 2020 in honour of Les Carlyon, the celebrated journalist and military historian and a former member of the war memorial council. Photograph: 4FR/Getty Images

The Australian War Memorial has effectively overruled a decision by its appointed judges to award a military history literary prize to a book about the alleged war criminal Ben Roberts-Smith.

War memorial sources and documents seen by Guardian Australia show that an external judging panel chose Chris Masters’ book Flawed Hero: Truth, Lies and War Crimes as the 2024 winner of the Les Carlyon literary award for military history, after a panel comprising memorial employees had included it in a shortlist of six from 59 entries.

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