Photos Aussies and Kiwi's in Vietnam

[BravoZulu]

Is this a suppressed OWEN smg?

Close mate, it's an M60 with the foreguard removed and refitted with an Owen foregrip, the boys were quite the improvisers

 

[BravoZulu]

Phuoc Tuy Province. May 1970. Special Air Service Regiment (SASR) troopers return to the 1st Australian Task Force (1ATF) base at Nui Dat. Leading from the chopper is patrol commander Sergeant John O'Keefe.

 

[BravoZulu]

Bien Hoa Province. May 1968. At FSB Harrington, US Army Staff Sergeant Don Williams, 4th/12th Infantry Brigade (Left) shares a beer with Sergeant Bob Moore of 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (1RAR) during Operation Toan Thang

 

[BravoZulu]

Aug. 4, 1969 photo provided by the Australian War Memorial, Australian soldiers Murray Madden, left, John Meredith, right, and their captain Colin Toll watch locals tend to their vegetables at Phuoc Tuy, Vietnam.

 

[BravoZulu]

Members of 8 platoon, C Company, 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, in the battalion lines at Enoggera, Queensland, prior to deployment to Vietnam in May 1966.

 

[digrar]

I'm not even sure where the old 6RAR lines were at Enoggera, I just assumed they were always where the Battalion is now. But that looks more like where the original 8/9RAR lines were, near the current RAR memorial walk is located.

 

[morris]

Members of the 6th Contingent, RAN Clearance Diving Team 3 (CDT3), work on the demolition of a barrier constructed by the Viet Cong to impede traffic on an inland waterway. The team’s tasks in Vietnam include ordnance demolition work, demolition of enemy bunkers, booby traps, mines, and enemy prepared underwater obstacles. CDT3 also regularly inspected the hulls and anchor chains of ships anchored in the bay off Vung Tau.

Unidentified RAN members of Clearance Diving Team 3 (CDT 3) disembarking from South Vietnamese assault boats as they prepare to examine riverside mangroves and canals. The team, accompanied by SVN soldiers, was routinely tasked with the detection and destruction of submerged enemy barricades and mines. The Australian wearing camouflage uniform at right is carrying a Self Loading Rifle (SLR) and has a skein of detonator cord wrapped around his shoulders.

 

[BravoZulu]

Phuoc Tuy Province. 30 August 1968. Private Darryl Ward, a soldier of 4RAR/NZ (ANZAC) keeps watch against Viet Cong activity while protecting a bulldozer during Operation Lyrebird.

Phuoc Tuy Province. c June 1966 - April 1967. Australian infantry and troopers of the 1st Armoured Personnel Carrier Squadron, Royal Australian Armoured Corps (RAAC), rest momentarily on a group of M113A1 APCs.

 

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Thua Tich, Phuoc Tuy Province. March 1971. Soldiers of the 3rd Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (3RAR) Pioneer Platoon ride aboard an M113A1 Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC) from the 3rd Cavalry Regiment (rear), as it drives through a charred area of scrub during Operation Briar Patch I. Another APC (right) is carrying more 3RAR troops, while in the background are two Centurion Mk V/1 tanks of the 1st Armoured Regiment. Photo by Captain John Tick, Officer Commanding 2 Troop, 1st Field Squadron, Royal Australian Engineers (RAE). [AWM P05389.013]

 

[guest0001]

Vietnam War. c 1968. Privates Normie Cameron (left) and 'Johno' Johnson (right), members of Fire Assault Platoon, Support Company, 7th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (7RAR), and their tracker dog Tiber, rest up in the field during an operation. Tiber was the first reinforcement tracker dog, sent to replace an earlier dog, named Cassius who had died of heat exhaustion. [AWM P01979.006]

 

[guest0001]

Vietnam War. Phuoc Tuy Province. 7 March 1967. Australian troops from 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (6RAR), are air lifted out of the paddy fields after a two day search and destroy mission against the Viet Cong. They are being supported by Bell UH-1 Iroquois helicopters of No. 9 Squadron, RAAF based on the coast at Vung Tau. Photo by Barrie Ward. [AWM VN/67/0025/11]

 

[BravoZulu]

Phuoc Tuy Province. June 1969. Lance Corporal Bob Allen pauses after thirstily gulping his first cool drink in days. He has just returned to the 1st Australian Task Force (1ATF) Base at Nui Dat after a patrol with 3rd Squadron, Special Air Service Regiment (SASR).

 

[digrar]

The Battle of Coral kicked off a couple days and 52 years ago. One of the interesting stories from the battle was the tracking dog who took off after a second night of heavy attack.

During the first attack on Coral, Tiber’s handler Private Bryan Meehan had laid on top of the dog in a “narrow fighting pit” for hours:
Together they felt the shock waves from the mortars. They saw the yellow flame from the tree-bursts. They heard and felt the passing of a fragment or a bullet.
When the enemy returned two nights later, Meehan chained up Tiber beside him — “but this time, he couldn’t hold him”, Burgess wrote:
Tiber broke the chain and took off through the area where I Battalion soldiers were fighting hand-to-hand, through the mortars and rockets, to the perimeter, where our own shells were falling.
The dog had apparently been frightened by the explosion of a rocket-propelled grenade, just metres away from him. Lex McAulay adds to the account of Tiber’s disappearance during the action in his book, The Battle of Coral:
Frightened by the horrendous night, Tiber, one of the dogs from Les Tranter’s tracker teams, broke loose from its handler and fled across the battlefield, heading for Mick Bindley’s comms centre. Tranter radioed an urgent message, Bindley looked out, saw the dog, leaped out, chased it and made “one of my less successful rugby tackles at it and missed, then asked myself the very reasonable question: what the hell was I doing chasing a dog around at this time of night? And very smartly returned to the pit”.
Burgess reported that Tiber “slunk back into the Australian lines” around 10 o’clock the next morning.
Bryan said: “You look real ashamed, don’t you? So you reckon you’re going to get a hiding?” He lay down on Bryan’s boots, with his head turned away. Bryan Meehan, aged 21, just gave him a pat and a drink. “I don’t blame you for going over the hill, old boy,” he said. “I didn’t like it much either. If I had four legs and could move as fast, I might have taken off, too.”

In August 1969, a report by Australian Associated Press war correspondent Robin Strathdee was published in Australian newspapers stating that Tiber was “shell-shocked and spends days wandering aimlessly”. The story led to a ministerial enquiry into the canine’s condition, and whether he was “currently employed”. The response came back:
Three dogs held by 5RAR. All are fit. Two are working. Dog Tiber is not working. Tiber took part in operations with 1RAR at FSB Coral last year and since then has not been an efficient tracker.
Strathdee’s opinion is a personal one. Tiber is happy, friendly and shows no outward sign of neuroses. He is no more aimless than any domestic pet. Latest veterinary report is that Tiber is well adjusted but possibly lazy.

Tiber was retired in June 1970 and transferred to a new home with staff at the Australian Embassy in Saigon. His canine comrades were similarly re-housed with civilian owners in Saigon following their service.

 

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Vietnam War. February 1972. Captain John Wieland (centre), discusses the training of a Cambodian battalion with the unit's commanding officer (left) with the help of a Vietnamese interpreter (right). Captain Wieland is one of thirty members of the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam (AATTV) engaged in the training of Cambodian battalions at the Long Hai and Phuoc Tuy Training Centres in Phuoc Tuy Province. Photo by William James Cunneen. [AWM CUN/72/0023/VN]

 

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ASHAU VALLEY, SOUTH VIETNAM. 1968. AN IROQUOIS UH-1D HELICOPTER BRINGS SUPPLIES TO AN ARMY OF THE REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM UNIT ON OPERATIONS. (DONOR: AUSTRALIAN ARMY TRAINING TEAM VIETNAM (AATTV) ASSOCIATION)

 

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Duc My, South Vietnam. August 1971. Having learnt the ropes of a rappelling tower at the Ranger Training Centre at Duc My, 300 miles north-east of Saigon, Vietnamese Rangers further their training with practice insertions and extractions from a helicopter. Advising with the training of the Rangers are two members of the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam (AATTV).

 

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Long Hai, South Vietnam. January 1972. A US soldier unfurls the Australian flag during an inauguration parade to welcome thirty members of the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam (AATTV) to the Long Hai and Phuoc Tuy training centres where they will be engaged in the training of Cambodian battalions. The Australian flag bearer is Warrant Officer Class 2 Brian Foster of Duntroon, ACT.

 

[BravoZulu]

Australian Army helicopters during the Vietnam War. Two SAS men with helicopter crew, 1969

After a mission inside Viet Cong territory, a five man SAS patrol runs out of the jungle cover towards a waiting RAAF helicopter.

 

[BravoZulu]

March 1971. Private (Pte) Grant Burrows of Korumburra, Vic, cleaning his M60 machine gun. The day before this photograph was taken, the gun was used to save the life of Pte Burrows and another soldier when they detected and killed a Viet Cong walking down a track. Pte Burrows was taking part in an operation with 2RAR /NZ (ANZAC) (The ANZAC Battalion comprising 2nd Battalion, The Royal Australian Regiment and a component from the 1st Battalion, Royal New Zealand Infantry Regiment).

 

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Vietnam War. Battle of Coral – Balmoral. 12 May 1968. Soldiers of the 131st Divisional Locating Battery, Royal Australian Artillery (RAA), wait at Fire Support Base Andersen to be taken by air to Fire Support Base Coral, which was just being established in Bien Hoa Province. The five soldiers on the left of the picture are (left to right): Gunner (Gnr) Wally Franklin, Gnr "Bluey" Piesley, Bombardier Nev Wortlehock, ?, Gnr John Dellaca and Gnr Ian Kennedy. The identity of the other soldiers is unknown. That night and the following day, FSB Coral would come under heavy attack from a battalion of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA). [AWM P01766.002]