In one of the weirdest wars in the world (though somehow there have been weirder), the government of Australia declared war on EMUS?!

Emus are a large flightless birds native to Australia, the second largest living bird in the world. They have long necks and shaggy brown feathers and are known to run at speeds up to 30mph (or 50km/h), they can grow up to 5.7–6.2ft (1.75–1.9m) and weigh up to 66–150lbs (30–68kg).

The war, though technically more of a military operation than a full on war, was meant to address the issue of emus destroying crops in Western Australia. This military operation was largely unsuccessful due the the goal being to “cull” or to selectively remove around 20,000 emus from the larger emu population with machine guns but only managing to kill 1,000 of that 20,000 emu goal. The operation was assigned to three members of the Royal Australian Artillery, Major Gwynydd Purves Wynne-Aubrey Meredith (Command), Staff Sargent McMurray, and Gunner J. O’Halloran, accompanied by a cinematographer, two Lewis machine guns, and 10,000 rounds of ammunition. On November 2nd, they tried formation tactics but the emus scattered, rendering that method useless on changing the population. On November 4th, they laid an ambush at a water source and then opened fire after thousands of emus were in range, though a gun jammed and the emus scattered. Due to the emus being fast and having tough hides it was hard to kill them. 

The war was considered lost by the Australians due to the ratio of the large amount of artillery casualties compared to the relatively small amount of emus killed (a little over 3,000) and it was a huge disappointment to the people. It is now a fun history fact that a war was started on emus and the emus won!

Sources:

https://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/emu-Information on emus

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Emu-War-Information on the Emu War