conference proceedings - Australian Army

THE AUSTRALIAN ARMy AND THE VIETNAM WAR IN RETROSPECT
The Vietnam experience demonstrated that in a complex security environment the
commitment of Australian land forces requires a clear political vision of how they
will be employed and for what purpose. That did not occur in this case. Any coalition
relationship must be founded on clear understandings at the highest level. As Donald
Rumsfeld, the US Secretary of Defense, recently pointed out in the context of the War
on Terrorism, coalitions are important but the mission must determine the coalition and
not the other way around. 20 The lesson cuts both ways—it is not enough for a major
power to throw resources and troops into a conflict in the expectation that its military
might will prevail and that lesser partners simply provide another flag on the ground to
bolster the perceived legitimacy of the operation. On the other hand, junior partners have
a positive responsibility, both to their domestic constituencies and to the mission in which
they are investing their young men, to ensure that their efforts are not wasted. Australia’s
war in Vietnam demonstrated that it could not make an open-ended commitment to a
US-led coalition—particularly one involving land operations where the possibility of
suffering casualties was high. The political dimension of combined operations not only
involves the government and the military, but ultimately the electorate as well.
The most significant strategic consequence of the war was that it facilitated the
Whitlam Government’s abandonment of the long-standing policy of ‘Forward Defence’
that had prevailed during the period of the Liberal ascendancy during the 1950s and
1960s. The realities imposed by the adoption of the Guam Doctrine had already led to a
significant re-assessment of this doctrine. In March 1972 David Fairbairn, the Minister
for Defence in the McMahon Liberal Government, tabled the Department of Defence’s
Australian Defence Review in Parliament. While accepting the need for greater selfreliance,
the review reiterated the importance of the defence force continuing to make
an active contribution to regional stability. It rejected a formulaic approach to defence
policy and held that
[t]he best defence of Australia’s interests is seen to go beyond the defence
of Australian territory alone. It calls for military capability, evident to other
countries, to project Australian strength beyond the continental boundaries. In
this view Australian security would be best promoted if, drawing on increasingly
self-reliant military strength, we continue to recognise and support the security
interests which we share with those who are a part of our special strategic
environment. This implies a need to select carefully what we are capable of and
what serves to strengthen our friends in that environment. 21
20. Donald H. Rumsfeld, ‘Transforming the Military’, Foreign Affairs 81: 3 (May/June 2002), 20-32 at
31.
21. Department of Defence, Australian Defence Review, 2.
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