Customer Reviews

Delta Four: Australian Riflemen in Vietnam

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I consider these type of anecdotal reference work to be of real historic significance. Where mainstream academic historians pursue the causes and consequences of conflicts, they tend to be squeamish when it comes to recording the nitty gritty of actual combat in the field. This kind of verbal/anecdotal history of soldiers stories has only been with us in quantity since the the US civil war and has proved of great worth in looking back on conflict as a personal perspective. In this sense I have reviewed this work as if I were a researcher in 100 years time, trying to gain some intimate insight from contemporary accounts.

Regrettably, the author has tended to treat the subject matter as a sort of expanded personal dairy rather than a specific historical work, which is a shame really since it has importance. Although Australian forces in this war were of little strategic importance and overshadowed both in military achievements and size by their American big brothers, they did perform valuable service in their assigned area of operations. Since America and Australia are similar types of countries in historical, cultural, political and economic terms, this book could have gone further than it did.

The book cover graphics has the obligatory Huey backgrounded against erupting flames, just to remind readers that it refers to Vietnam and not the Boer War. The back cover carries a picture of the author wearing a grim-visaged but somewhat chumly expression. Interior plates consist of two maps of dubious quality, clearly obtained from different sources since one is in miles, the other kilometres, some grainy photographs of soldiers doing soldierly things and little else.

The first half of the book travels well, of particular interest is the chapter 'Bread and Butter' which details the bushcraft required for jungle fighting, providing good detail of ambush techniques (a drawing of a typical ambush site with scale would have helped), march and harbour disciplines required for operating in dense foliage conditions; contact drills (handy for supermarket shopping: "Right Dear, get that machine group up and give covering fire over the vegetable aisle while I call in an airstrike on the hot bread counter and make a dash for the meat specials".). This is strong, interesting stuff for those seeking first hand knowledge of jungle warfare.

Unfortunately only in a few places does the narrative rise to the point where the reader may gauge what it was like to fight in the jungle. One passage I will quote is from Capt Schuman (page 129) "...it was...when you were trying to break the contact that used to wear you down. And sometimes it used to last for five minutes with no follow up and other times it would go on for a day where you were just hounded and hounded and hounded, and you would be fighting and knocking off the next scout, or trying to knock off the next section commander to blind them. Getting lower and lower on ammunition..." (and this passage doesn't even refer to Vietnam, Schuman is talking of Borneo operations). And...well, that's about it really.

The back section of the book trails away into chapters on the, almost standard, soldiers return to Vietnam and their reminiscences with warriors of the Viet Cong and NVA, plus a final wrap-up in a series of 'where are they now' bio's of the participating soldiers.

The lack of maps makes descriptions of fighting confusing. In one particular episode there is a account of an attack on a bunker system that becomes lost to the reader because it is difficult to pick up the relationship of what is happening - reading the text makes you feel the firefight is raging over vast distance whereas the battle is taking place within a few hundred square metres of space. Even a few sketch drawings could have resolved this dilemma and give the reader a more comprehensive point of view.

What is missing is any anchor to the conflict itself, and this is where the work falls to bits. McKay has treated the work as an anecdotal tale rather that a historical piece and its worth must be viewed in this context. While I am sure that those soldiers mentioned and quoted by name would derive some pleasure in seeing their names in print, the real value of this type of writing is putting it into perspective with the war as a whole. There are no detailed comparisons in say, respective small arms of each side, Aussie jungle warfare techniques as opposed to the US `big battalion' concept of fighting, whether the results of contacts were more effective than the other belligerents (the Koreans for example), was the equipment issued to Aussie soldiers better than other forces (I always considered the Australian issue to be significantly inferior; uniforms were poorly designed, the SLR was too long, too heavy and clumsy to use and US ration packs were better - they had cigarettes in them!). In this sense McKay seems to have written the work for self gratification rather than a genuine commentary of the times, told by those who lived it.

On the whole the soldiers stories seem strangely politically correct as if their memories have been edited by time (or the author) and while their narratives ring true, the commentaries don't seem to match with my own recollections of the era. There is none of the anecdotes, buzz-words or jokes used at the time and it seems that these have been edited out because they are now `too offensive' for modern readers, thereby diminishing the historical accuracy and putting a skew into the narrative that throws the realism of the times out of kilter. Additionally the author fails to tackle any deeper serious issues like psychiatric casualties or the specific affects of prolonged combat exposure or even whether the Australian military's `battalion rotation' concept was better than the US `individual soldier' replacement program.

In the end the work goes flat and becomes boring which is, as I mentioned before, a bit of a shame really since I think the subject matter is worthy of recording. Probably 2.5 stars.