Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to make a statement on indulgence. It has been 50 years since the start of the Vietnam War and 40 years since it ended. As each year passes the Vietnam War becomes more distant. At a guess, half of the Australian population was not even born until the war had ended.

With each passing year we lose more of the Australian solders who served in Vietnam. As other speakers have said, it was a war in which many Australians opposed our involvement.

The war was justified at the time by a campaign of fear of the Red Peril moving southwards, along with a simultaneous struggle for supremacy between the United States and the then Soviet Union. Hindsight can be very revealing where in the absence of emotion, fear, prejudice and self-interest past events can be judged more objectively and more rationally. For those who served Australia in Vietnam such reflections and judgements are academic. Our soldiers carried out their duties and they served their country. Vietnam veterans will forever carry with them the brutality, horror and psychological scars of war, as do the soldiers who served before them, those who served after them and those who continue to serve Australia today.

History has shown that Australian soldiers were not treated well on their return from the Vietnam War. In more recent years several steps have been taken to acknowledge and correct the wrongs of the past. As a result, Vietnam veterans are today more widely receiving the rightful recognition they deserve. The commemoration of Vietnam Veterans Day on 18 August each year is perhaps the most significant public display of our nation's gratitude to the Australians who served in the Vietnam War. Over 500 Australians died in Vietnam, 59 from my home state of South Australia. Of course, 18 August is also the commemorative date of the Battle of Long Tan, a battle that reinforced the Australian characteristics of valour, courage, mateship and true grit that emerged in Gallipoli half a century earlier.

Over the decade-long war there was no shortage of acts of bravery but the Battle of Long Tan holds a particular significance given the extraordinary odds the Australian regiment prevailed over and the number of casualties that resulted. The background to the Battle of Long Tan is that in the early hours of the morning of 17 August 1966 the Australian operations base at Nui Dat was fired upon by Vietcong. On 18 August 105 Australians and a three-man New Zealand artillery team were sent into the Long Tan rubber plantation under heavy machine gun fire and mortar attacks from Vietcong forces estimated to be over 1,500 and possibly up to 2,500 troops. Australia suffered a loss of 17 lives in the battle and a further death of the result of wounds. An additional 21 soldiers were wounded. This comprised around one-third of the number of overall Australian and New Zealand soldiers who were engaged in a battle. It is estimated that the Vietcong forces lost some 245 lives in the battle as well as over 350 casualties. Long Tan is one of those events where the soldiers who were present emerged with mixed emotions—perhaps a tear of joy knowing that they had survived a terrible ordeal and a tear of sadness knowing that 18 of their mates would not return home.

In my own community the Battle of Long Tan has become the rallying point for Vietnam veterans in the area. A short distance from my home in Pooraka a memorial has been established in Henderson Square in the Montague Farm estate to commemorate Australia's involvement in the Vietnam War. Each year on 18 August a memorial service is held at Henderson Square to acknowledge our soldiers who served in Vietnam and to remember those who lost their lives or were injured. Other than when I have been here in Canberra, I have attended each of those services, as I did again this year. Once again the Montague Farm memorial service was supported by the Salisbury Council, children from Mawson Lakes Primary School and the Pooraka Neighbourhood Centre. I particularly thank Nicola Kapitza from the City of Salisbury for her input into organising the service and Heather Hewitt and her team from the Pooraka Neighbourhood Centre for hosting the luncheon refreshments after the service. The presence and poetry from the Mawson Lakes Primary schoolchildren were also heartening because it tells me the children are interested in what happened in the past and that the Vietnam story will be passed on through them to future generations.

The next morning, Sunday, 19 August, as I have also done in the past years, I attended the Vietnam Veterans' Day service in Adelaide at the Torrens parade ground where a state memorial in memory of those who served in Vietnam now also stands.

The service was lead by Mr Harley Doyle, Vietnam Veterans Association of Australia state vice-president, with an address by Premier Jay Weatherill and a wonderful rendition of Amazing Grace by Linda McCarthy. A special feature of the Adelaide service was the inclusion in the parade and the service of an Australian Vietnamese contingent, reflecting the joint efforts of Australian and Vietnamese people in the war. Following the service, a day with activities and entertainment was organised to make it a family day for all those who attended. A week later, on Saturday, 25 August, I also attended the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Service held at the Tea Tree Gully Memorial Gardens. That had been organised by the Tea Tree Gully RSL. This is the second year that the Tea Tree Gully RSL has organised the service, and it is hoped that this service will also become an annual event.

Through the numerous Vietnam veterans activities that I have been associated with over the years, I have come to know many Vietnam veterans as personal friends. They are good people whom I have the utmost respect for. They have served Australia and honoured their fallen mates, and they do their best to get on with their lives after Vietnam.

Once again this year, a group of Vietnam veterans embarked on their walk for charity. This year, the walk was from Bublacowie on the Southern Yorke Peninsula to Adelaide via Clare and Kapunda and was the first walk for charity through the major farming areas of Yorke Peninsula. This was the fourth walk the group had organised, having previously walked from Port Augusta to Adelaide twice and once from Renmark to Adelaide. The purpose of the walk for charity is twofold. Firstly, to raise funds for the Legacy Club of Adelaide, the Vietnam Veterans Long Tan bursaries and the Foundation Daw Park, which is the fundraising arm of the Repatriation General Hospital. Secondly, it is to raise awareness of and to promote a healthier lifestyle for Vietnam veterans. The unavoidable effects of age are now preventing many of the veterans from participating in the walk and this year may have been the last of the organised charity walks.

I will also take this opportunity to acknowledge the recent deaths in Afghanistan of Sapper James Martin, Lance Corporal Stjepan Milosevic, Private Robert Poate, Lance Corporal Mervyn McDonald and Private Nathanael Galagher and to offer my condolences to the family and colleagues of each of those soldiers. As with every Defence person, each of those soldiers served Australia without questioning the rights or wrongs of the war. It particularly saddens me that three of those Australians were killed by a cowardly person whom they trusted and whom they would have risked their own lives for.

Finally, yesterday I attended the annual charter lunch of the para sub-branch of the National Servicemen's Association. The proceedings commenced with a roll call of branch members who had passed away in recent years. It was a sobering moment for those present, knowing that so many of their mates have now passed on. It was, however, equally comforting to know that their colleagues had not forgotten them. As with the Vietnam vets, I have had a long association with the Nashos and I very much appreciate the genuine friendship I have with so many of them.

This motion is about remembering the Australians who served in Vietnam. As we do that, we remember all of those people in Australia who have served in our defence forces and continue to serve in our defence forces. It is perhaps one of the very special parts of our society where Australians serve. I do not think there would be another sector quite like it. It is understandable that the mateship you see amongst them is so strong, and it is understandable that we as a nation should show our respects and our appreciation for the service they give to this country through motions such as this. I commend the motion to the House.

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