FORT BENNING, Ga., (April 29, 2015) -- Members of the Fort Benning community came together April 25 with Australian army officers and their Families to commemorate ANZAC Day.

Named for the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, ANZAC Day is a national day of remembrance and celebration in both Australia and New Zealand.

Today, it more broadly commemorates all who served in military operations in Australia and New Zealand.

"ANZAC day services are services we hold every year at dawn on the 25th of April and it remembers the landing of Australian and New Zealand Army Corps troops on the shores of Gallipolli in World War I," said Lt. Col. David Heatley, the Australian liaison officer to the Maneuver Center of Excellence.

"(It) is significant for us because it was the first time we committed soldiers to war. It was the start of the founding nation."

During the service Heatley spoke of the importance of remembering the fallen, and carrying on the tradition of the ANZAC spirit.

"The Soldiers that landed on those shores and then fought in the campaign for the next eight months against incredible odds, whether it be a well-trained and well placed enemy or the terrain of the cliffs they had to scale and he austere environment that they lived in, they showed incredible mateship, initiative, intuition and the ability to create something from nothing.," he said. "That is the ANZAC spirit."

Commemoration of ANZAC Day began at Fort Benning on Friday with a screening of the film Gallipoli before giving way to Friday's traditional gunfire breakfast and the dawn service.

"We have our dawn service, say our prayers, remember, give thanks and then we go into a traditional ANZAC Day breakfast," Heatley said. " ... The day then transitions from one of commemoration to one of celebration. The nation comes together, we have our military parades in our cities and our towns and we congregate as a community. Here at Fort Benning we will host a traditional barbecue as well."

Five Australian families are stationed at Fort Benning, and Heatley said the Australian contingent was very grateful for the support the Fort Benning community had for the ANZAC Day events.

"It is a great comfort at the end of the day," he said. "It is a great comfort to know that you are not alone -- not just with your battle buddies from your own unit and your own country, but to know also that you're fighting for a common cause for the good of humanity to promote the freedoms that we enjoy to day, freedoms that were hard won by our forbearers.

"Fort Benning is the only place in America where the names of the fallen ANZACs are memorialized alongside their Western counterparts. People here have such good awareness of what ANZAC Day means to Australia and New Zealand. We really do thank our American friends and colleagues for taking the time to continue to learn about us and our history."

The dawn service was held at the 173rd Airborne Brigade memorial at the National Infantry Museum, which displays the badges of the Royal Australian Regiment and the Royal New Zealand Artillery. Those two ANZAC units fought as part of the 173rd Airborne Brigade during a deployment to Bien Hoa, Vietnam, in 1965-66.