ISSUE 24 : Sep/Oct - 1980 - Australian Defence Force Journal

50 DEFENCE FORCE JOURNAL No. 24, SEPT. OCT. 80positions to be established for the only time ofthe war. There were 76 enemy killed on thisoperation while the Task Force lost 23.Apart from assisting ARVN and TerritorialForces, the Task Force also carried out anextensive civic action programme. This wasdesigned to improve the health, education,comfort, economy and morale of the villagers.It was always coordinated with securitymeasures in the Province. Civic action sprangnot only from altruism but from a desire toprovide the villagers with some resistance toViet Cong claims and as a means of gaining thegeneral acceptance and support for theAustralian presence.By 1970 and 1971, Viet Cong ability tomount operations by his main force units hadbeen greatly diminished. Main routes had beenopened and market activities and movementbetween centres was flourishing. Localgovernment in the villages had become moreeffective. There was tangible evidence of thecivic action activities of the force in improvedschools, better roads and market places,improved irrigation systems, and increasedmedical and dental facilities.The major role of the Task Force, that ofdestroying the main force units, had been partlyaccomplished. Certainly Viet Cong influenceon the population had been largely reduced andGovernment control had been restored. Suchsuccess, however, was dependent on thecontinuing presence of the Task Force. TheViet Cong always had the capacity to retire intorest areas and reform, their recruits comingfrom within the Province or elsewhere. As well,the Viet Cong infrastructure in the villages, aVietnamese responsibility, was nevereradicated.When the Task Force withdrew, the TrainingTeam remained in Phuoc Tuy. Its membersobserved the gradual return of Viet Conginfluence and the erosion of Governmentcontrol. This process was continuing when theTraining Team, too, departed from Vietnam.Command and Control in Phuoc TuyProvinceThere was a need for joint control of alloperations and civil control measures in PhuocTuy. The whole of the Province lay within theViet Cong Ba Long Province, and the VietCong moved freely between the populated areaswhich was the military responsibility of theProvince, and their base areas, the militaryresponsibility of the Task Force. When IATFoperations were well clear of populated areas,commanders found it was possible to scrape bywith a fairly low level of cooperation, and theSector (the military arm of the Province) andIATF could plan their operations more or lessindependently. With the switch to pacificationsupport and the upgrading of the Regional andPopular Forces a much greater IATF presencebecame necessary in and near the populatedareas, and with it, a greater need for cooperationand control.What commanders felt was necessary was theformation of an Area War ExecutiveCommittee (AWEC) along the lines of theMalayan situation. This was found not to bepossible in Phuoc Tuy. As the Vietnamesecontrolled all civil and military functions in theProvince, other than IATF, any initiativetowards an AWEC would have to come fromthem. The Province Chief held officialauthority, but this was undermined by dissent,cross-currents of loyalties, distrust andcompeting ambitions in the Vietnamese camp.Even had an AWEC been formed, it wouldhave been unlikely to work. Alternativemeasures were therefore instituted such asinformal meetings between the Province Chiefand Commander IATF, the allocation ofdistricts to the battalions for pacificationresponsibilities, an extensive system of liaisonofficers and an attempt to form committees forparticular functions. All, for varying reasons,were only of limited success.One major result of this absence of a centralcoordinating authority was that while the TaskForce was carrying out its operations in depth,the enemy was consolidating in the population.WithdrawalThe growing dissent around the worldconcerning Western involvement in Vietnamwas echoed in Australia. Where formerly it hadbeen restricted mostly to university students,non-conformist groups, other minority groupsas well as those with proven links to theCommunist party, by 1970 the protestmovement had expanded to embrace people inall walks of life. The movement reached itsclimax in the cities of Australia with the firstand second moratorium rallies on 8 May and 18September, 1970.