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Long Tan men to finally get gallantry medals

Tony Wright

August 14, 2008

Major Harry Smith is to receive the Star of Gallantry. Inset: Receiving the Military Cross in Vietnam in 1966. Photo: Paul Harris

FORTY-TWO years after their unit fought through a long and bloody night in a rubber plantation at Long Tan in Vietnam, the veterans of Delta Company, 6RAR, will finally be allowed to wear a citation for gallantry awarded by the former government of the Republic of Vietnam.

Their old commander, Harry Smith, will receive Australia's Star of Gallantry, second only to the Victoria Cross, denied him after the battle of Long Tan in 1966 through military deceit and political secrecy.

The star was previously known as the Distinguished Service Order, and although Mr Smith was originally recommended for the honour for extraordinary bravery, his superiors downgraded it to a Military Cross.

Two D Company platoon commanders from that long-ago night, Dave Sabben and Geoff Kendall, will be awarded the Medal for Gallantry, equivalent to the Military Cross they were supposed to have received four decades ago.

Another 11 former soldiers will be able to have their claims to further awards examined before an independent Defence Honours and Awards Tribunal to be established by the Federal Government.

The Battle of Long Tan, long considered Australia's most significant battle in Vietnam, took place on August 18, 1966, when 108 members of Delta Company, 6RAR, commanded by then-major Smith, encountered a regiment of North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops. Delta Company, outnumbered by more than 10 to one, held off wave after wave of attacks until a relief force arrived. Eighteen Australians died and 21 were wounded.

Mr Smith, now 75 and recovering from a prostate cancer operation at his home in Hervey Bay, Queensland, hailed the decisions by the Government — to be announced today — as a relief and a measure of justice for his men.

"How do I feel? It's a bit of an anticlimax after all this time, I suppose," he said. "The whole thing was tied up in official government secrecy for 30 years, and the last 12 years have been a battle with the bureaucracy. I kept being fobbed off by people who wouldn't know one end of a rifle from another.

"If it hadn't been for Graham 'Stumpy' Edwards (Vietnam veteran and former Labor MP) I don't think we would have got here today. He was supportive of my quest for 12 years. And the new Minister for Veterans Affairs, Alan Griffin, has been wonderful, too."

Mr Smith said the Rudd Government deserved particular praise for overturning two recommendations made by a review panel set up by the Howard government that he said would have denied many of the Long Tan veterans the chance of proper recognition. The panel had wanted to deny the men of D Company the right to wear the insignia of the Republic of Vietnam Gallantry Cross with Palm Unit Citation.

Mr Smith vividly remembered being presented with a token of this citation in Saigon in 1966 by one of the most senior political figures of the republic, Tran Van Lam. The clear intention was that it was to go to all men of D Company, he said, but it, too, disappeared into military and diplomatic hocus-pocus.

Now, when the men of D Company attend Long Tan Day services around Australia on Monday, each will be able to wear the emblem of the citation.

"I knew this was coming and I ordered 104 of these little emblems from an American medal company, and they arrived today," Mr Smith said.

Mr Smith and his colleagues believe awards should be made to a further 11 soldiers. The Howard government's tribunal had decided no further awards should be considered.

"I really believe there is a proper chance for justice for these other men now," Mr Smith said, referring to the new tribunal. "This is a truly independent tribunal, and it will look at each matter on its merits."

With PAUL HARRIS