Malcolm Turnbull (Wentworth, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

On indulgence: Forty-three years ago today 108 Australians from D Company 6RAR were on patrol near the Long Tan rubber plantation when they ran headlong into an entire regiment of the Vietcong army. Through that afternoon in pelting rain, those Australian diggers fought long and hard not just to survive but also to overwhelm an enemy vastly superior in numbers. By the time darkness fell the enemy melted away, only to return later at night to clear the dead and wounded from the battlefield. Eighteen young Australians were lost in that one battle. On Vietnam Veterans Day we celebrate each year, this day, the heroism of the Battle of Long Tan and all those Australians who served during the Vietnam War. It is an opportunity to reflect also on the service and the sacrifice of those who did not come home.

Australia’s military involvement in the Vietnam War was the longest in duration of any war in our country’s history. It lasted from 1962 until 1973. Our Australian service men and women were deployed to help stop the spread of Communism throughout South-East Asia, and they served bravely. But as we remember, and as the Prime Minister noted, public opinion turned against the war. It is a matter of great regret that in the minds of some Australians for a time the controversies over the Vietnam War overshadowed the sacrifice and the service of the almost 60,000 young Australians who served proudly in Vietnam wearing our uniform under our flag. We do not ask our service men and women to serve only in conflicts that are free from controversy; we require them to serve our nation as the government of the day directs them. And any criticism for decisions taken to go to war, generally made with the benefit of hindsight, should be directed at those who made the decision, not at the young men and women who bravely and selflessly do their duty.

There is little point revisiting those arguments here today, but what we must make plain is our unreserved admiration for the Australians who went to that war. They did what the nation asked of them. They served with the same Anzac spirit, the same dedication and the same courage as the soldiers who stormed the heights of Gallipoli years ago and the soldiers who are patrolling the perilous hills of Afghanistan even as we speak here in this House today.

Today we remember all our Vietnam veterans and especially the 521 Australians who gave their lives in that conflict. We are forever in their debt.

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