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I've just finished reading Harry Smith's Long Tan - The Start of a Lifetime Battle, and found it hard to put down.
Harry Smith was the commander of D Coy 6RAR during the battle of Long Tan in August 1966. Despite the title, his book covers events prior to and after the battle, as well as his own account of his company's ordeal when it defied an estimated regimental attack from main force NVA assisted by local elements of D445.
The book has the flavour of an exercise in setting the record straight, and he pulls no punches describing the intelligence failures that led to the encounter battle, the incompetence of senior task force commanders, and his conflict during the heat of battle with these same commanders in getting the artillery support he needed for the survival of D Coy.
Smith (who died in 2023) was a soldier's soldier, and disinclined to suffer fools gladly, especially when it came to the allocation of honours and awards for his soldiers. He spent the remainder of his life post Long Tan fighting for justice for the members of D Coy who were denied awards because of the quota system that operated at the time, and for many years post Vietnam.
Because there was a ceiling placed on the number of decorations to be awarded, senior commanders who experienced the battle from their command posts safe behind the wire at Nui Dat received honours whilst the soldiers under fire for hours had recommendations rescinded. Smith did extensive research for years, especially after the thirty year rule revealed the correspondence relating to these awards.
It makes pretty shocking reading, and it obviously motivated Harry Smith to fight for his men until the situation was largely remedied in November 2016, representing the culmination of a fifty year battle.
Smith's commentary on the human costs of the war makes interesting reading. One example -
Whilst I have always been deeply saddened by the loss of the 18 young men in a battle that should not have happened in a war we could not win, and as well, the 521 men who gave their lives during the Vietnam War, I must say now feel too for the families and loved ones of those young enemy soldiers we killed. Many of these soldiers were just teenagers. (p187).
Apart from the remarkable narrative of Smith's battle for his soldiers, this book provides an amazing insight into the way the Australian military is organised, and the difficulties experienced by a career soldier attempting to maintain a stable family life. Again, Smith's honesty shines through, and he is quite frank about his failed marriages.
The book had a special resonance for me, as I have been to Long Tan twice, and went to school with Frank Topp, who was killed in the first few minutes of the battle. He was a local, and I got to know his mother before she died a few years ago.
My first sight of Long Tan was in April 1970 when we used a site near the rubber as a forming up point before we set out along the dry bed of the Suoi O Lo Nho on a night company move into the AO of our second operation.
The second time I was there was in March 2006 on a tour with my sons and a group of Vietnam veterans, most of whom were ex 8RAR.
The second visit was much more pleasant than the first.
