A piece of trivia for all, but an important one. You can win beers on this!

The Australian soldier, was responsible for delivering the first defeats against all four Axis armies. Yes four! The Vichy French occupied Syria, were sympathetic if not directly collaborating with the Germans and Italians, so they were relieved of their arms and booted out by force.

The others were. Tobruk as detailed by Volgograd, Bardia for the Italians and our choccos and regulars stopping and defeating the Japanese in New Guinea.

The sad thing about pub or mess trivia nights is that they are often spoiled by some bloody know-it-all who reckons the quiz master has got it wrong.

Step forward me.

The question should read:

Which nation was responsible for inflicting the first defeats against the armies of Germany and Japan in WW2?

Vichy France was not a signatory to the Tripartite Pact. Australian Army units did not engage units from Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia or the other associates/puppets given in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axis_powers.

The battle of Bardia was 3-5 January 1941. The Greeks had already halted the Italian invasion in November 1940 and successfully counter-attacked on 9 November, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capture_of_Klisura_Pass.