By ANNA USHER

Mosman and Kirribilli veterans will gather at the Mosman War Memorial next Tuesday to mark 60 years since the Battle of Long Tan, the costliest single battle of Australia’s Vietnam War.

The service is one of scores across the country, but Mosman’s claim on the day runs deeper than most, and the occasion is one of great significance.

Middle Head was the training ground for the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam (AATTV) – the very first troops deployed to Vietnam. Their story is one of courage, sacrifice, and a unique chapter in Australia’s military history.

The AATTV was a specialist unit made up of elite soldiers, handpicked to serve as military advisors supporting South Vietnamese forces. They trained at the School of Military Intelligence at Middle Head, where they learned combat intelligence, Vietnamese language skills, and foreign army tactics.

On 18 August 1966, 105 men of D Company, 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment, and three New Zealand gunners from 161 Field Battery ran into more than 2,000 Viet Cong among the rubber trees at Long Tan.

They were outnumbered close to ten to one. For nearly four hours, in torrential monsoon rain, they held their ground until armoured reinforcements smashed through to them.

Seventeen Australians were killed in the battle and another died later of his wounds. Two dozen more were wounded. It remains the heaviest Australian loss of any single engagement of the Vietnam War. At least 245 enemy soldiers were killed.

The date stuck. Veterans first gathered as “Long Tan Day” at a cross raised on the battlefield on the third anniversary in 1969. In 1987, after the Welcome Home march through Sydney, Prime Minister Bob Hawke made 18 August the national Vietnam Veterans Day. Almost 60,000 Australians served in the war between 1962 and 1972, and 524 never came home.

Mosman’s own thread to the battle

Some of the nation’s most decorated soldiers lived and trained at Georges Heights and Middle Head.

Sergeant Ray ‘Simmo’ Simpson, VC, DCM had an exemplary career spanning service during WWII, Korea, Malaya and Vietnam. He arrived in Saigon with the first Australian contingent on 3 August 1962.

Captain Barry Petersen, MC, was sent to Vietnam in 1963 under the command of the CIA. Petersen was ordered to train and lead guerrilla squads of Montagnard tribesmen against the Viet Cong in the remote Central Highlands. Petersen successfully formed a fearsome militia, named ‘Tiger Men’. A canny leader, he was courageous in battle, and his bravery saw him awarded the coveted Military Cross and worshipped by the hill tribes.

Warrant Officer 1 George Chinn, DCM, completed a tour of duty in South Vietnam with AATTV 1964-65. He later accompanied the 6th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (6RAR) on its first tour of duty in 1966-67, which included the Battle of Long Tan.

The Service

Tuesday’s service will be led by Kirribilli RSL sub-branch vice president Terry Harper, himself a Vietnam veteran of the 7th Battalion. Retired Colonel Gerald McCormack, who commanded tank troops in South Vietnam, will give the Vietnam Veterans Day address.

Member for North Shore Felicity Wilson will speak as guest. The service will carry the anthem of the war generation, Redgum’s “I Was Only 19”, the Ode read by the Kirribilli branch’s Ian Nicol, and a lament on the pipes from Andy Blow. Naval chaplain Andrew Lipczynski, of HMAS Waterhen, will lead the prayers.

The public is welcome. It begins at noon on Tuesday, 18 August, at the Mosman War Memorial.