Republican candidate Richard M. Nixon’s promise during the 1968 presidential election campaign to extricate the United States from the Vietnam War, combined with the loss of American domestic political support resulting from the January 1968 Tet Offensive, saw a fundamental change to how the war was conducted. The United States began a process of withdrawing their own combat forces and placing the burden for future combat operations on ARVN formations. While the Australian Government was aware of this change in policy, it was not actively included in American political deliberations and hence was unable to take an active position in the face of Vietnamisation. Left with no detailed guidance on the intended timelines for American withdrawal, the Australian Government could provide no direction to Army on the level of future commitment to the war, other than to reinforce the existing rhetoric that participation in the conflict remained vital for Australian national interests. In this policy vacuum, Army leadership concentrated on the military aspects of the war, with the CGS Exercises of both 1967 and 1968 exploring the implications of increasing the size of the force deployed to South Vietnam.

On 29 April 1965 the Australian Government announced the commitment of an Australian battalion to South Vietnam. Prior to the public announcement, discussions had taken place in Hawaii as to the nature of any future commitment in Vietnam. The staff talks, held early May to late April, were between the American Commander-in-Chief Pacific Command, Admiral U.S.G. Sharp Jr, an Australian delegation led by Air Chief Marshal Sir Frederick Scherger, and a New Zealand delegation headed by the Chief of the New Zealand Defence Staff, Admiral Sir Peter Phipps. The participants discussed broad American strategy and possible options as to where any future Australian and New Zealand forces could be deployed within the overall American design. Sharp strongly supported the concept of American forces being deployed in enclaves. He believed that the mere existence of American forces within these enclaves would deprive the North Vietnamese Government of an opportunity for victory and thus encourage them to begin negotiations. If the Australians and New Zealanders did deploy in an enclave, the Americans would provide all combat support capabilities (armour, artillery and air support) as well as the necessary logistic support.

At the Australia, New Zealand and the United States (ANZUS) security treaty council meeting in May 1962, the US Secretary of State asked the Australian Minister for External Affairs for a contribution of instructors to help the US training mission in South Vietnam. This approach was hardly a surprise to the Australian Government, as the US State Department had made similar approaches for military support to the Australian Embassy in Washington, DC in November and December of 1961. After some negotiation on the nature and conditions of the Australian commitment, on 24 May 1962 the Minister for Defence, A.G. Townley, announced that Australia was to deploy up to 30 military instructors to Vietnam.

In 1968 the dual operational requirements to conduct counterinsurgency and main force operations simultaneously also challenged the way 1ALSG provided logistic support to 1ATF. In 1966, HQ AFV and 1ALSG had constructed a logistic system to provide support to 1ATF centred on a static base at Nui Dat, with 1ATF conducting operations within Phuoc Tuy province. However, the events of the impending VC Tet Offensive in January to February 1968 would bring a radical change in how 1ATF operated, requiring 1ALSG to provide support not only to Nui Dat but also to a series of air-mobile operations and associated fire support bases (FSBs) established outside the province.

The announcement by Prime Minster Holt on 8 March 1966 to send a task force to South Vietnam represented an expansion of the policy associated with the initial deployment of the battalion group. While 1RAR was making an Australian contribution to the conflict, the small size of the force meant it had operational and political limitations. A battalion was too small to conduct operations independently from an American parent unit, reducing its operational flexibility and the political effect of the Australian involvement. Increasing the size of the Australian commitment to a task force would enable Australian forces to exercise their own operational doctrine. It would also placate some criticism that under American leadership 1RAR was suffering a disproportionate number of casualties compared to the American battalions – even if such criticism was unwarranted. Politically, a task force would mark a substantial Australian contribution to the war and thus further reinforce the Australian commitment to ANZUS.

The geography of South Vietnam posed particular challenges for the conduct of any military campaign. Dominated by a mountain chain that runs from the China–Vietnam border to just north of Saigon, the landscape comprises dense jungle in the highland areas flanked by a coastal strip on the South China Sea. South of Saigon, the Mekong Delta combines with the Mekong River to form a vast alluvial plain. The climate is either hot and wet or hot and dry, these conditions respectively producing excessive mud or debilitating dust. The climate also created tropical diseases in endemic and epidemic proportions, adversely affecting the health and efficiency of troops in the field and making medical treatment challenging since it was difficult to ‘preserve and maintain medical supplies and sophisticated medical equipment’.

In early 1967 the new commander of 1ATF, Brigadier Stuart C. Graham (succeeding Brigadier Jackson), planned and conducted a ‘classical’ counterinsurgency campaign. His focus on intensive patrolling, intelligence gathering, enemy logistics, political infrastructure, and the need to separate the civilian population from the influence of the VC were all elements germane to the British Army’s campaign during the Malayan Emergency. Graham emphasised the political and psychological nature of counterinsurgency warfare as opposed to the American approach of kill ratios and body counts, which he considered to be misguided. By the end of Graham’s tenure in October 1967, he believed that VC forces had either been forced out of Phuoc Tuy province or confined to their sanctuaries at the margins of the province.

The Australian Government’s involvement in South Vietnam was undertaken as a war of choice, driven by the desire to maintain the ANZUS alliance and keep America engaged in the defence of South-East Asia. While Menzies justified the Australian deployment in South Vietnam as responding to a direct threat to Australia from China, there was no Australian military assessment to support such an assertion. Since Australian national sovereignty was not at risk, the conflict did not require the significant economic and manpower commitments typically associated with the Second World War. Indeed, keeping the Australian commitment to the Vietnam War limited was the primary and recurrent aim of government policy. For defence planners and politicians alike, there was little other guidance, as the conflict suffered from a clear lack of aims in both Washington, DC and Canberra.

In 1962 the Australian Government deployed Australian military forces in support of the Republic of Vietnam. Before the cessation of combat operations and complete withdrawal in 1972, this commitment would escalate from an initial advisory team, to a battalion group, to a three-battalion task force with supporting armour, cavalry, aviation, artillery and associated logistics elements.After the war in Afghanistan, this would be the Australian Army’s second-longest conflict, lasting almost 11 years and surpassing the previous longest Australian commitment which was to the Malayan Emergency (1955 to 1963).