Reporting from Vietnam

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Reporting from Vietnam

Put yourself in the following scenario:

It’s 1968 and you are a reporter for a television program called 50 Minutes. Your producer wants you to travel to Vietnam to shoot a story on

Australia’s ground troops (the army) in the current war. Your research assistant has compiled some background material for you to study before you get there, as well as arranging for an interview with an Australian soldier once you arrive in Vietnam.

You are certainly going to learn a lot about the experiences of Australians in the Vietnam War: starting with the instructions the troops were given, then looking at the nature of the conflict and finally considering some of the dangers unique to the combat in Vietnam.

WHAM

It’s another seven hours flying before landing in Hong Kong, followed by a connecting flight to Saigon in South Vietnam. That’s plenty of time to do some background research on Australia’s troops in the war.

What is WHAM?

You open a folder and discover several different documents. The first is a list of instructions given to all soldiers from

Australian before they serve in Vietnam. Read the list and notice the very deliberate tone of the nine instructions.

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Source: Instructions given to Australian service people going to Vietnam

Found in Rowe J, 1987, Vietnam, The Australian Experience, Time-Life Books

Australia, Sydney, p 77.

It sounds like the Australian troops are in Vietnam to do more than just fight.

Turn to Activity 8 and answer Question 1 by completing the sentence.

You have previously attended a Government press conference and been told about WHAM. This is an acronym meaning, ‘Winning Hearts and Minds’. It is a program designed to ‘win over’ the South Vietnamese peasants and guarantee their trust and support. The friendly and courteous tone of the Australian soldiers’ instructions is a good example of WHAM.

The next source of evidence is a photograph. It shows a form of transport that will take you to your assignment when you arrive in Vietnam. Helicopters have a number of purposes in the Vietnam War. Apart from moving people around, they are useful for such things as transporting injured soldiers to medical facilities and surveying the landscape. They can also create smokescreens to confuse the enemy and of course they are used for fighting. Another activity you may have heard of is the dropping of a chemical known as Agent Orange.

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Source: A photograph of helicopters being used in the Vietnam War

Found in Rowe J, 1987, Vietnam, The Australian Experience, Time-Life Books

Turn to page 29 and answer Question 2 by circling the correct answer(s).

The helicopter was ideal for use in the dense tropical forests of Vietnam. Thousands of ‘choppers’ were built during the course of the war.

Friend or foe?

You now come to another photograph in your folder. Returning soldiers have told you that one of the most difficult aspects of fighting in Vietnam is recognising the enemy.

One tactic used to address this problem is known as a ‘cordon and search’ mission. In carrying out such a mission, Australian soldiers secure and search a village for Vietcong troops and equipment.

Sometimes, once the soldiers are satisfied that the job has been done, they will burn the village to the ground. The villagers are then re-located to a camp that is serviced and patrolled by Australian troops. This is called a ‘search and destroy’ mission. It is widely practised by US troops.

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Source: Australian soldiers undertaking a search and destroy mission

Found in Rowe J, 1987, Vietnam, The Australian Experience, Time-Life Books

Understandably, many of the South Vietnamese locals are not happy if their homes are levelled in a search and destroy mission — homes that they may have lived in all of their lives. It has even been suggested that some are so angry that they help the Vietcong. This is making Australian soldiers very cautious about who is friendly and who is the enemy.

Turn to Activity 8 and answer Question 3 by completing the sentence.

The next source in your folder illustrates another reason why Australian soldiers are entitled to be apprehensive. Your research assistant has managed to get hold of a plan of a Vietcong tunnel system.

These tunnel systems are a lot more than just a hole in the ground. Some tunnels have been found to be up to seven storeys in depth. In this space can be found living quarters for hundreds of Vietcong soldiers as well as

meeting rooms, a small hospital and enough space to store food, weapons and many other things.

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These tunnel systems are also well camouflaged and defended. Located in dense forest, with concealed entrance shafts and traps to prevent intruders, they can remain undetected for years.

Turn to Activity 8 and answer Question 4 by circling the correct answer(s).

One particular Vietcong tunnel system shows how well disguised they are. Several storeys deep, this tunnel system was eventually discovered directly under an American military base!

Suspicious minds

The last two documents in your folder refer to another aspect of the conflict in Vietnam — guerrilla warfare. They are further evidence of the

psychological war that Australia’s soldiers faced.

Source: An Australian describes the aid given to guerrillas

[A peasant from South Vietnam] would lend his children to the Vietcong, the younger as messengers, the older as fighters. Now he would donate to the cause, now he would pay taxes, now he would supply food and sanctuary [refuge/shelter] and guides who would help the guerrillas...

Asprey R, 1975, War in the Shadows, Macdonald and Janes, Melbourne, p 1084.

Source: An Australian soldier describes the uncertainties of the war in Vietnam

Vietnam cannot be compared to other wars because there was no front line. It was a never-ending nightmare and we could never relax completely, because we didn’t know who the enemy was. Out the bush, in base camp, on leave, it made no difference, you had to watch your back. Friend and enemy looked the same. Friendly villagers by day were Viet Cong by night and even the children and the elderly had to be viewed with suspicion and distrust, because they were the offspring and the parents of the enemy all around us. Gary McMahon found at www4.tpgi.com.au/users/garymcma/ptsd.htm

Turn to Activity 8 and answer Questions 5 and 6 by completing the lists.

The sources demonstrate that the Vietcong are strongly defending their country with guerrilla tactics and local knowledge.

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Activity 8

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Check your responses by going to the suggested answers section. Now sit back and enjoy your flight to Vietnam!

Your interview

No sooner have you arrived in Saigon than you board a helicopter bound for Bien Hoa. Bien Hoa, a town of 60 000 people, is north of Saigon and the location of an American-run base.

It is here you will meet and interview Ron Kelly, an Australian soldier. He will add to the knowledge you already have about Australia's involvement in the Vietnam War. To make your job easier, your research assistant has prepared a list of questions for your interview.

Read each of the following questions out aloud and then click on the

question to hear Ron Kelly’s answer. As you are ‘interviewing’ Ron, look at the photographs as well.

(If you have difficulty accessing the audio files, use the links on the Resources page.)

• Are you in Vietnam as a conscript

or a regular soldier?

• Is there any rivalry between the two

groups?

• How long is the Tour of Duty that

the conscripts are doing?

Source: Ron Kelly, 1965

• In Australia we’ve heard about the ‘Winning Hearts and

Minds’ or WHAM program. Is your duty to cooperate with

the South Vietnamese people regularly emphasised by your superiors?

• What do you yourself actually think of the South Vietnamese people?

Source: Search and destroy mission from a helicopter

• What is involved in a ‘search

and destroy’ mission that is part of your job? What is the

objective of these missions? How do the locals react?

• What does being on patrol

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• Do you regularly come

under fire while you’re on patrol and how much fighting have you seen?

• Have you come across any

Vietcong tunnel networks or booby traps?

• We see a lot of helicopters

here. What are they used for?

Source: Weapons found in a Vietcong tunnel system

Source: Australian soldiers relaxing

• Do you get any time away from

the war for relaxing? Where can you go?

• Do you have to set up

temporary camps when you are on patrol?

• Is there any such thing as a ‘typical’ day in Vietnam?

Source: Inside a typical camp

While you have been interviewing Ron Kelly, your research assistant has been taking notes. Unfortunately, he is not a very good note-taker and has made some mistakes.

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Activity 9

Based on your interview with Ron Kelly draw a line through any incorrect statements in the following list. This will leave you therefore, with only correct statements.

1 Ron Kelly was conscripted into the army.

2 Ron Kelly’s barber was actually one of the Vietcong.

3 The South Vietnamese villagers don’t tend to interfere with a search and destroy mission.

4 Search and destroy missions often involve contact with the enemy. 5 A Vietcong tunnel system was once discovered because a tank fell

into it.

6 Australian troops get four-week breaks to rest and relax.

7 Soldiers must defend temporary camps overnight in case they are attacked.

8 Every day is much the same for Australian soldiers in Vietnam.

Check your responses by going to the suggested answers section. Your research assistant might not have been very accurate with his note taking but your film crew has shot some excellent footage of Australians in action in Vietnam. Your task now is to watch the footage and write a script for it, using the knowledge you have gained in Vietnam.

Go to the exercises section and complete Exercises 2.5 to 2.6 as directed by your teacher.

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Transcript of Ron Kelly’s answers

1. I’m a regular soldier. We are now receiving some national servicemen as

reinforcements.

2. I have never seen any rivalry between the two or between the soldiers. Every

time… everyone has to rely on each other to survive.

3. Every person over in Vietnam has to do a 12-month tour unless you get sick

or wounded or whatever and you get ‘medivacked’ home.

4. We do cooperate with the Vietnamese on some things, but other things you

have to keep a secret from them because you don’t know who you can trust and who you can’t. The civilian population won’t help you because they’re frightened of being punished by the Vietcong themselves.

5. Some of them are nice people. On occasions they can’t be trusted, as I said.

We have a barber here who’s cutting our hair by day and they’ve now caught him spotting for the Vietcong’s mortars of a nighttime.

6. I’m a section commander and I lead out on search and destroy. I’m

responsible for those sections. Between us we have to go out and seek the enemy, destroy them in whatever method we can. The locals don’t interfere with us because if they do, they can be classed as a VC sympathizer and they’d probably get the same as the others. The press sometimes overstate things they see and do over here.

7. There are numerous types of patrols, like we do one like a clearing patrol

where we just go out in the morning and it only takes five minutes or ten minutes to go round your area just to clear out the front. Others are search and destroy operations which last anything up to six weeks, where you go out and you seek them out and you’re dropped out by helicopter or truck or an armoured personnel carrier and if you need resupply, they drop it off to you by the same method.

8. Most search and destroy operations you do come into contact with the

enemy, either the enemy themselves or their camps; sometimes you come across graves which you have to dig up to inspect to make sure there’re not food caches hidden in the grave or weaponry under the body. You make contact with them; you get involved in a firefight. My section has been involved on numerous ones since we’ve been here.

9. Yeah, we have come across a few tunnels. One of the tunnels we came

across was very close to our camp where a tank was coming back off an operation and it fell down into a tunnel system, which they were trying to dig down underneath the airport. We’ve also been dropped off on one occasion on tunnels, on Two Chee Tunnels, where we had a big fight and they go

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down to up to anything to seven storeys under the ground. And sometimes we or our engineers had to go in these tunnels and clear them out.

10. The helicopters over here are used for numerous duties. You have medical evacuation, resupply, they ship personnel all over the place. You have them for fire support missions like the medivac helicopter. I was very pleased to see one of those one time when I was wounded myself and had to come back on one. So, they do a very good job that way.

11. Yes, everyone gets four days’ break away from the camp or patrols. I’ve just come back from a trip to Vung Tau for my break. Vung Tau is just south of Saigon on the coast down there. Some people have been sent to Thailand, Singapore. Once every now and again, you get a day’s leave into Saigon itself. I just go in and have a few drinks and whatever, and come back to camp.

12. Yes, every night that you’re on patrol, you have to go into a defensive position. So you have to dig a small trench and set it up like a fighting pit, in case you get attacked through the night. You have to prepare your meals and set your sentries up the same as everyone. And then you have to do your duties, like two hours on and two hours off through the nighttime.

13. No, I don’t think there is such a thing as a typical day. There is always something different. One day you can just be cutting grass, other days you’re digging latrines, escorting people here and there or out on patrol fighting, or just regularly laying back there, trying to get as much sleep as you can.