Honours at last for Long Tan veterans

[Antipodean Andy]

Honours at last for Long Tan veterans | NEWS.com.au

ALMOST 42 years after they earned gallantry awards among the blood and gore of Long Tan in Vietnam, three ex-officers will get their medals and the brave troops from Delta Company will finally receive an allied citation.

Eighteen Australians died and 21 were wounded during the iconic Battle of Long Tan on August 18, 1966, when 100 Diggers from the 6th Battalion's Delta Company confronted a vastly bigger enemy force of 1500 troops that was moving to attack the Australian Task Force base at Nui Dat.

After several hours of fierce fighting and extreme bravery by the soldiers and chopper pilots who defied orders to resupply them with ammunition under appalling flying conditions, more than 240 enemy lay dead.

Former Major and D Company commander Harry Smith, who has fought a lengthy battle against "pig-headed bureaucracy" and military incompetence, said he was pleased justice had finally been done.

"It is a bit of anti-climax actually, but I am happy that the courage and performance of my soldiers will be rewarded," Mr Smith said yesterday.

He was recommended for a Distinguished Service Order (DSO) after the battle, but it was downgraded to a Military Cross (MC).

His platoon commanders Dave Sabben and Geoff Kendall were recommended for MCs but were downgraded to Mentioned In Dispatches (MID) under the quota system that limited the number of gallantry medals.

There is wide agreement that the cool-headed courage of the commanders and Sergeant Bob Buick saved many more Aussie lives.

Mr Smith will now receive the Star of Gallantry which is equivalent to the DSO and Mr Sabben and Mr Kendall will be granted the Medal for Gallantry which is the equivalent of the MC.

The Government has overturned one of the review's recommendations and will grant the South Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry Unit Citation with Palm which was awarded in 1967.

That medal will sit on the chest of D Company veterans alongside the US Presidential Citation.

Due to the ridiculous awards system other senior officers, who were nowhere near Long Tan, received higher awards, thus downgrading Smith and his men.

The Rudd Government adopted the recommendations of the review set up by the previous government.

[Antipodean Andy]

Long Tan awards 'long overdue' | NEWS.com.au

AWARDING the nation's second-highest military honour to the officer who led Australian troops in the Battle of Long Tan is long overdue, Veterans' Affairs Minister Alan Griffin says.

The Vietnam War battle, on August 18, 1966, claimed the lives of 18 Australian soldiers and left 21 wounded.

During the bloody conflict, the 100 men of D Company 6 RAR fought against 1500 North Vietnamese regular troops and Viet Cong guerrillas.

Company commander Harry Smith and two of his fellow officers are to receive gallantry awards, while other veterans of the battle will be able to wear a unit citation recognising their bravery.

Mr Smith will be offered the Star of Gallantry, which is second only to the Victoria Cross.

"It's basically one under a VC, it's very significant and it's long overdue," Mr Griffin told ABC Radio.

Former platoon commanders Dave Sabben and Geoff Kendall are to be offered the Medal for Gallantry, equivalent to the Military Cross.

The decision, to be announced by the Federal Government today, restores the original recommendations made shortly after the battle. It was unclear why the men were not awarded the originally-recommended medals at the the time, Mr Griffin said.

"Certainly recommendations were made at the time.

"They went up the chain of command in Vietnam but by the time they came out the other end, they changed."

The recommendations were never reviewed, he said.

"What normally happens at the end of a conflict, they have a thing called the end-of-war list, an end-of-war review, and you go back through what alterations were made to recommendations over the time of that conflict.

"These particular issues weren't considered as part of that end-of-war review."

There had been many different stories and views about what actually occurred after the battle, Mr Griffin said.

"I guess the important point and what we should focus on today is very much the fact that the gallantry of these men, but also of D company as a whole and all those involved, is being duly recognised, finally."

The Government would consider any other unresolved concerns regarding individual awards for Long Tan after a review by the independent Defence Honours and Awards Tribunal.

[Antipodean Andy]

Forgotten heroes of Long Tan | The Australian

ON Wednesday night Harry Smith uncorked two bottles of fine red wine to celebrate the award of gallantry medals to his men for their role in the epic Battle of Long Tan. "The fat lady has finally sung," Smith told The Australian.

On August 18, 1966, it was Major Smith and the gallant 100 men of D Company 6RAR - mostly conscripts - who resoundingly defeated a vastly superior force of 1500 North Vietnamese regular troops and Viet Cong guerillas. That battle, fought in driving monsoon rain at a rubber plantation outside the Australian base at Nui Dat in Phuoc Tuy province, continues to serve as a classic study in the use of combined arms to defeat a superior enemy. It claimed 18 Australian lives and left 21 wounded, with hundreds killed and wounded among the estimated 1500-strong enemy force.

The battle of Long Tan took place 42 years ago but the medal battle is far from over. There are 11 other Long Tan claimants whose role deserves to be more fully recognised, Smith says.

Whatever wrongs that now have been righted in respect of Long Tan, the precedent could open up a painful debate about other episodes of wartime heroism that long pre-date the Vietnam conflict.

The main problem with the retrospective awarding of gallantry medals is deciding what point to stop, says historian Michael McKernan, former head of the Australian War Memorial. He warns of possible legal problems with awarding the Victoria Cross of Australia to World War I heroes, for example.

Legislation covering the award means recommendations can be made only by a person or persons who witnessed the act of heroism and in the case of World War I they are long gone, McKernan says.

"Look at the fellows who were awarded the Victoria Cross at Lone Pine (Gallipoli), all seven of them," he says. "Seven men in the one action, yet nobody in the first wave received the Victoria Cross because there was nobody alive to record what they had done.

"If seven were awarded the Victoria Cross on days two and three of the fighting, then surely then there must have been some who were worthy of it on day one."

McKernan says it remains incomprehensible that 18-year-old Oerlikon gunner Ordinary Seaman Teddy Sheean was not awarded the VC for his act of heroism aboard the stricken HMAS Armidale in 1942. The Australian understands there are witnesses still alive who could testify to his self-sacrifice.

"I do not know of any braver act than to accept death," McKernan says.

"He (Sheean) went back and strapped himself to his gun and tried to keep Japanese aircraft away from his mates in the sea and he knew he was going to die."

Veterans Affairs Minister Alan Griffin admits that in the fog of war injustices have been committed. It is unclear why the men of Long Tan were not awarded the medals originally recommended at the time, he says.

"Certainly recommendations were made at the time," Griffin says. "They went up the chain of command in Vietnam, but by the time they came out the other end they changed. The recommendations were never reviewed. What normally happens at the end of a conflict, they have a thing called the end-of-war list, an end-of-war review, and you go back through what alterations were made to recommendations over the time of that conflict. These particular issues weren't considered as part of that end-of-war review."

In the run-up to last year's election it was Labor that was leading the charge for a medal review and a promise to award the Victoria Cross to a pantheon of fallen heroes.

These included Sheean, who died under fire when his ship came under attack in the Timor Sea trying to evacuate troops and refugees from what was then Portuguese Timor.

Struck repeatedly by Japanese aircraft, a wounded Sheean returned to his gun post on the stricken corvette and continued to fire at the attacking warplanes with a 20mm Oerlikon gun, thereby buying precious time for his surviving crewmates. Strapped into his firing seat, he knowingly sacrificed himself and went down with his ship, gun still blazing.

That was November 30, 1942, and apart from having a Collins-class submarine named in his honour, Sheean received no medal. In fact nobody in the Royal Australian Navy has been awarded a VC or its equivalent.

Labor MPs have also pushed for a retrospective VC for the "man with the donkey", John Simpson Kirkpatrick, whose brief and colourful life ended as a stretcher-bearer on the bullet-swept shores of Anzac Cove at Gallipoli in 1915. Attached to the 3rd Field Ambulance, Kirkpatrick made repeated forays up "Shrapnel Gulley", delivering water and ammunition and bringing back wounded soldiers on his donkey, variously known as "Duffy", "Murphy" and "Abdul". It earned him legendary status among the Gallipoli Diggers until he was killed by a burst of machinegun fire. He had been at Gallipoli for just 3 1/2 weeks and was mentioned in dispatches for "gallant and distinguished service". Several petitions have been launched to get him the VC.

Others want a second VC conferred on another World War I hero, Albert Jacka, VC, MC and Bar. Jacka won eternal respect at Gallipoli as Australia's first Victoria Cross of that war. He was cited for single-handedly wiping out a Turkish position after jumping into a trench and bayoneting most of the occupants. His subsequent exploits in France were no less heroic, prompting Australia's official war historian Charles Bean to say he deserved a second VC.

Bean described Jacka's actions - recapturing a section of trench at Pozieres, freeing recently captured Australians and forcing the surrender of another 50 Germans - as "the most dramatic and effective act of individual audacity in the history of the AIF".

Kirkpatrick's supporters charged he was dudded by wartime military bureaucracy, a complaint as strong in 1918 as Smith's view of the military brass in Vietnam.

In the 1999 report of the independent review panel of the end-of-war list on Vietnam, the authors found a strict medal quota system was in operation by the Australian Defence Force throughout the conflict. "Although (the) army attempted to change the quota late in the Vietnam War, that amendment did not occur," the report found. "Army unit commanders sometimes made nominations that exceeded the quota. Some awards were therefore struck out."

According to Smith, the Vietnam medal quota ratio was one for every 250 men; for a mention in dispatches it was one for every 150 men. This is in contrast to Australian Army Training Team veterans, whose medal ratio was assessed at one for every nine men.

The due recognition this week means Smith will be awarded the Star of Gallantry, the nation's second highest military honour. Two fellow officers, Dave Sabben and Geoff Kendall, are to receive the Medal for Gallantry awards while the remaining D Company veterans will be allowed to wear a South Vietnam unit citation in recognition of their bravery that day.

It follows approval by the Rudd Government of the main recommendations of an independent review carried out by a panel of retired senior army officers.

Major General Peter Abigail, a panel member, says there are aspects of the Long Tan medal saga that continue to cause disquiet among Vietnam veterans.

"I think over the years it's become an issue that a number of people just couldn't let go of. Ours was the first review focused on the honours and awards that related to the Battle of Long Tan, and when we examined the circumstances and the facts as such as we could determine, we came up with the recommendations that we made," he says.

Among them, a recommendation that Long Tan veterans not be allowed to wear the unit citation conferred by the former government of South Vietnam. That was overruled this week by the Government, but Abigail says he is not upset.

"As far as we could determine the case (to uphold the citation) was not made," he says. "We didn't feel free in our terms of reference to recommend the setting aside of foreign awards guidelines.

"However, there was a precedent for that when (former Howard) minister (Mal) Brough did actually set the guidelines aside. But that is a ministerial and government prerogative.

"I'm comfortable our report was considered and pretty well supported by the government response. And I wish the tribunal well in their further consideration."

Speaking from his Hervey Bay home in Queensland, Smith says he is very pleased with the Rudd Government's decision to establish an independent tribunal to tackle award claims.

"I and my colleagues have been very frustrated by advisers in various departments in Canberra who just would not believe the words of people who were at the battle," he says. Smith praises the work of Griffin, who he says has achieved more in the past three months than previous ministers had achieved in 12 years.

The new awards proposed by the panel and upheld by the Government are the equivalent of those recommended in 1966, he says.

"I was recommended originally for the Distinguished Service Order and that was downgraded to the Military Cross," Smith says. "Military Crosses for my two platoon commanders, an appropriate award for them, were also downgraded because you could not have three Military Crosses in one company and that's protocol."

He describes as a "kick in the teeth" the army's 1966 decision to substitute a mention in dispatches instead of the Military Cross originally recommended for the two platoon commanders, Sabben and Kendall.