HISTORY HAS TOLD US that there was no doubt the Vietcong would have enjoyed the removal of the Australians from the province. We were different from other troops that fought in Vietnam. Australians operated in relatively small numbers, right down to a handful of troops we would use in an ambush. Americans depended on very large numbers. It is not that one or the other was superior; we simply did it differently. Because grunts carried their food and supplies for periods of up to five days on their backs, troop movement in the jungle without the need for re-supply was a distinct advantage. Ambushes, harassment, and guerrilla tactics by the Australians were the norm. It has been well documented that the Viet Cong had a deep respect for the Australian soldier: we were highly trained and extremely fit.
Perhaps one of the unique characteristics of the Australian base camp was that it contained no Vietnamese. In other allied bases, Vietnamese were employed as kitchen hands, cleaners, and gardeners and for other menial tasks, which posed many security problems. In Nui Dat, we did our own duties.
The army took many measures to ensure our safety within the Task Force area. A wire surrounded the entire Australian base camp. TAOR (tactical area of responsibility) patrols were sent daily around this wire. It was a fence, a ‘strategically placed perimeter defence system to enemy mortar distance’. Then, on top of SAS hill, the highest point of Nui Dat, there was a lookout post, which maintained constant, day-and-night vigilance.
Within our company lines, there was Q Store in the middle, located in company headquarters right next to the Sig’s tent. There was a cookhouse with a canteen attached that fed about one hundred men. We ate cooked meals the entire time in base camp. The boozer, always a popular spot, was close by. The first-aid tent, clerks’ tent, artillery tent, the senior officers, and the CSM were located in this area also. My company, ‘A’ Company, was located at the far end of the airstrip, and it was a short walk through the rubber to Porky 7, the battalion helicopter-landing zone. The three platoons were scattered around the CHQ. They had designated posts for guarding the perimeter. Behind 3 Platoon were two deep trenches for expending leftover rounds from weapons after you came in from the jungle or simply for testing your weapon. The CHQ area was just like a small country town. Mail, supplies, the Sallyman, and ordinance vehicles were daily visitors. We had an open shower block with a canvas bucket that had to be filled.
Our company boasted the cutest dunny you would ever clap eyes on. It was covered in squares of coloured paint, and looked like a piece of modern art or maybe a sideshow tent. On the inside was a long flat board with four large holes side by side. Reading magazines were provided whilst one went about one’s business. Underneath was a long drop. Upon entering this unique latrine, I was often reminded of a bunch of blokes reading, sitting at a station waiting for a train, only with their trousers around their ankles. It was with great disappointment that we came back from the jungle one time to find that a tree had fallen over and destroyed our latrine during a violent storm. Luckily, no one had been inside at the time. The new engineer-built one was OK, but boring. Bloody Ginger Beers (engineers). Were they good for anything?
Modesty was a word foreign to the army. As mentioned, the showers were an open-air communal affair. The best shower, however, once the wet had started, was to stand outside your own tent naked, and to lather up in the warm monsoon rain. Then there were the crowning glories in camp, the ‘pissaphones’. Dotted around the lines, these were simply earthenware pipes protruding out of the ground at various locations. You simply stopped, unbuttoned your fly, pointed the pepperoni at the pipe, and piddled.
Because our stays in base camp were usually brief, we mostly stayed within our company lines, although at odd times we would venture out to see mates in other companies further up into the rubber plantation. Occasionally, we went to the movies in an open-air theatre to see movies not yet released in Australia. The theatre was just next to our company boundary. A couple of times, I went to the top end of the airstrip where the stage had been built to allow entertainers to perform for the troops. I admired the guts of these entertainers, who gave their time to the troops. They, too, had to put up with the horrendous noises, the humidity, and the language of diggers who hadn’t seen an Aussie girl in months.
But, without a doubt, the bar or boozer was the hub of the company. It was a large tin shed, like a converted hayshed, with a bar, chairs, tables, and walls with lots of memorabilia. Russian AK47s and other weaponry confiscated from the enemy, flags, helmets, and Vietcong trinkets, as well as the obligatory pin-up girls, covered the walls.
But the famous quote, ‘One can per man per day perhaps’, was never a problem for us. It was strange how one of the highest priorities of the army was to keep us supplied with beer. During our tour, we heard countless complaints from others permanently based within base camp about the lack of beer, or its poor quality.
Gambling was the only other form of entertainment in the boozer. My mates Blue and Hutch ran Crown and Anchor (the most common gambling game in the army). Sometimes, blue movies were shown in the canteen after tea, much to the company commander’s disgust.
Captain Matthews was the ‘Sallyman,’ the Salvation Army officer attached to our battalion. Every day while we were in Nui Dat, without fail, he would turn up in his long-wheel-based Land Rover with a coffee and a tea urn sitting on the tailgate. Blokes would come from everywhere clutching mugs, running to get a good spot in the queue. The Sallyman is one of my fondest memories of base camp.
But enough of base camp. We were grunts. We didn’t have demanding jobs in Nui Dat, like many soldiers from other corps. We hadn’t been sent to Vietnam to live in base camp enjoying movies, whatever their colour; and endless beer, no matter what the brand. It was simply a base for us in which we could have a much-needed shower; clean and test our weapons; re-supply ourselves with rations, ammunition, batteries, and new codes; read our mail; and get drunk, and sleep it off.
The dry season was ending. The clouds building up in the afternoons were becoming darker and denser. The wet was about to set in for the next six months. The arduous task of carrying numerous water bottles would soon be made unnecessary by rain so torrential that the water bottle became a token; it was filled every night by downpours. With the wet came the added enemies: mosquitoes and leeches, and numerous other creeping, biting little bastards of things.