Service and sacrifice remembered

THEY had different reasons for attending, but veterans of the Vietnam War and their supporters came together last Sunday as one to reflect upon the impacts of the conflict.

Held at the East Asia Memorial on Sturt Street, the commemoration in the year of the 50th anniversary of Australia’s withdrawal from war, and ahead of national Vietnam Veterans Day ceremonies on Thursday, 18 August.

Secretary of the Ballarat Vietnam Veterans Association Ballarat Sub-Branch, Gordon Hunt, said it was important to keep the impacts of the conflict alive.

“More than 60,000 Australians served in Vietnam, we should honour them, we should keep them in the memory of the public,” he said.

“We are an event, we didn’t have the same significance as Gallipoli or Western Front, and in a lot of cases people really didn’t want to know about us. We just keep doing this and keep reminding them.”

Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War ran between June 1962 and December 1972, with 521 killed and 3000 injured.

Mr Hunt signed up to the army and began his active service in 1966 as a pay clerk attached to the 1st Australian Task Force headquarters.

He said that with that passing of World War One and most World War to veterans, direct connections to ex-service people were reducing, however wider community support for veterans was on the increase.

“People are paying more attention now more than ever,” he said. “Yet what the pubic probably fail to realise is fight afterwards is probably more ferocious than the actual fighting of the battles.

“What we’ve had to go for veterans’ welfare, we came home to a dysfunctional Department of Veterans Affairs, a government in denial – didn’t want to know about us, and we have come all that way.”

Ron Fleming is the president of the Buninyong Branch of RSL and also a veteran of the Vietnam War.

Like many who ended up serving for Australia, Mr Fleming didn’t get a choice, he was called up as part of the national service program.

At 21 years old he eventually tasked to the 161st Independent Reconnaissance Flight that helped track troop movements and identify enemy targets on the battlefield from the air.

“Those whose marbles came out, and those who eventually got selected, went into national service for a two-year continuous period,” Mr Fleming said. “About 14,500 national service men went to Vietnam.

“There was a commitment, the national service men who were deployed overseas carried out their roles with that same Anzac spirit.”

One thing both Mr Hunt and Mr Fleming agree on is that support for Vietnam War veterans, as well as military personal who have served the nation in subsequent conflicts was lacking.

In support of that cause, Tasmanian Senator Jacqui Lambie attend the service and echoed those ideas.

A long-time advocate for veteran’s support, she has personal experience in the armed forces having served in the army as a military police officer.

“The Vietnam Veterans took me under the wing very early,” she said.

“I don’t think they were expecting me to become a senator, but they were looking for younger people to come through and support them and the Australian Peacekeeper and Peacemaker Veterans’ Association.

“It’s not the Australian public that have dropped the ball, it’s politicians that have. DVA in itself has gone into chaos, it’s basically disappeared. There is no foundation left to it.

“That’s got nothing to do with the Australian public and the support ex-service men and women get from them, it’s come down to our politicians have got no idea how to fix the situation.”

That void that’s been left in the support of ex-military personnel has been filled in part by the veterans themselves.

“We need to find the Vietnam veterans in our community, enquire as to whether then need support and direct them to those services that are available,” Mr Fleming said.

“The Vietnam Veterans Association set up the Vietnam Veterans Counselling Service, which is now part of Open Arms.

“But that was an initiative to look out for their people, because at that stage, there was not that sort of service.”