Great Britain & The Vietnam War

An interesting presentation delivered at the National Army Museum several years ago. It is marred by the presenter's lack of public speaking experience, but there are lots of little-known facts outlined.



The most contentious slide for me featured the photo above. Quite apart from the fact that sky could be anywhere, and that I could not find a specific source for the photo on-line, what would an RAF Vulcan have been doing over the Mekong Delta in 1965? It turns out that there was a Vulcan involved in a SEATO Exercise called FOTEX 65 off the west coast of Malaysia from 15-25 March 1965, and it was based at Butterworth airbase (near Penang). If this photo is what it is claimed to be, the Vulcan might have been flying to the RAF airbase at Kai Tak in Hong Kong after the exercise, but I have found no evidence of it. And Operation Game Warden started in December 1965, so I am left wondering why the RAF would leave a lone strategic bomber based in South-East Asia for several months. Flying over the Mekong Delta is however the most direct route from Butterworth to Hong Kong..... I also find myself wondering what US Marines would have been doing in the Mekong Delta in 1965....

This is very perplexing OTB, but interesting as hell. I have to agree about the presenter.... dry as Melba Toast.

I'm still looking for something on Canada's involvement in the Vietnam War.  There is a small display on it at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa: 28,000 Canadians crossed the border to sign up for service in Vietnam. About the same as the number of US draft dodgers heading the other way across the border... Someone must have done some sort of podcast, broadcast or whatever about it...

I'm from Ottawa originally, and when I was in the service I met a couple of grizzled, old Warrant Officers who eluded to their voluntary service in Vietnam.

There were indeed USMC in the delta very early on, which would have been the perfect environment for their training and equipment.  They were withdrawn after a single operation as they needed to be fed into the concentration up in I Corps, so the delta was left to the Army by default as opposed to plan.  Might have been a totally different war had the the Army taken over I Corps and the Marines deployed into the waterways.

I need to watch this presentation, sounds quite interesting.

Thanks Darby - I didn't know that. Now I am only wondering why the RAF might have kept a strategic bomber in Malaysia until December 1965 or if the guy doing the presentation got the wrong month....

BravoSix wrote:I'm from Ottawa originally, and when I was in the service I met a couple of grizzled, old Warrant Officers who eluded to their voluntary service in Vietnam.

One thing I can be 100% sure about is Britain did have some "content" and involvement in the Vietnam war.

When 1 RAR first deployed as part of the 173rd Brigade based out of Bien Hoa they took their Carl Gustaf MRAAW with them but Sweden would not provide Australia with any ammunition for them as they did not believe in the Vietnam war.  They was some "creative accounting" and logistics sourcing and some ammunition did somehow find its way into Vietnam via Australia and some of that ammunition just may have come from British contacts.

Australia and Britain have always had and still do participate in cross service personnel swaps as Australia does with the US, NZ and Canada.  There were a few British serviceman, mostly army but Navy and Air Force as well, that were serving in Australian units at the time those units were deployed to Vietnam and the British Government did not dissuade the individual or the Australian Army, Navy, or Air Force from using the British serviceman in Vietnam.

Quite a few British SAS were on cross postings during the Vietnam war and I am led to believe a lot volunteered for cross postings on the hope that is were they would end up, especially if they had served time in Malaya/Borneo and were very experienced in jungle fighting and fighting non-traditional combatants like the Konfrontasi.

Hi all,
found this from a feed on a 'history-of-the-day' site ;
This is likely the most interesting pearl of history regarding "British involvement in Vietnam" in the opening moments of 'first Indochina War' that gets overlooked. ie ; in the months immediately after WW2 had ended  when the Japanese had surrendered to the British in the south (and Nationalist Chinese in the North) and HoChiMinh's Nationalist (/Communist) party declared "Vietnamese independence" in the vacuum, and seized power.
Then back came the French colonial administration and British troops to disarm the Japanese occupation forces and assert French colonial control.  
 
The text is as follows ,  the original source might be Vietnamese.  I have added the link to the wikipedia entry at the end if you want to read further . enjoy !

Today marks the 75th anniversary of the “Southern Resistance Day” (23 Sep 1945).

On 2 Sep 1945 President Ho Chi Minh declared Vietnam to be independent, and at midnight of 22 Sep 1945, General Sir Douglas Gracey – Commander of British Forces in Vietnam – ordered the attack to the Vietnamese Armed Force in Saigon (which was a multi-party, multi-religions military force), opening the Indochina War.

Initially The British Forces comprised of 20th Indian Infantry Division, 273 RAF Spitfire Squadron, 684 RAF Mosquito Squadron, totally 22,000 soldiers.
The French Forces comprised of 800 commandos of the 5 RIC (as attaché to the British Forces) and 2000 soldiers of the 11 RIC (the soldiers of the 11 RIC were prisoners of the Japanese, liberated by the British on 13 Sep 1945).

Facing them in Saigon were about 15,000 Vietnamese fighters from many resistance fractions.

Understanding their inferior situation both in forces and equipment, the Vietnamese forces just planned to let the control of Saigon to the expedition forces and to try to keep them from thrusting into the rural areas around Saigon. But the expedition forces were simply too strong for the Vietnamese, and by 3 Oct 1945, when the French force of 1 infantry regiment, 1 armor battalion, 1 marines company under General Leclerc landed on Saigon the battle for Saigon was effectively decided.

On 16 Oct 1945 the battle ended and remaining Vietnamese forces withdrew into the surrounding provinces. During the battle the British forces lost 3 KIA and 7 WIA, Indian Gurkha lost 37 KIA, 105 WIA and 5 MIA, French forces lost 106 KIA and 375 WIA, the Vietnamese forces lost 3,026 KIA, 576 WIA and 1,389 POW. It was strange that the Japanese also lost 110 KIA and 168 WIA.

One noted event during this messy time was the peace intermediary role of the OSS team. Seeing the deterioration might lead to a full-scale conflict, Major Peter Dewey – Head of OSS team in Saigon tried to convince both sides to step down. In the night of 18 Sep 1945, Major Dewey secretly met Professor Tran Van Giau – President of Saigon – and his governors to persuade the Vietnamese forces to keep calm. But Prof. Giau believed that it was too late to sit together with the French, who insisted on the illegal base of the independence of Vietnam.

The situation deteriorated rapidly, many individual clashes between French and Vietnamese happened.

On 21 Sep 1945 Gen. Sir Gracey declared Martial Law, and on 22 Sep 1945 the French ordered the Vietnamese to surrender the controls of Police, Treasury, Secret Services and Post & Communication to the French. The Vietnamese governors reacted by inform the OSS that they will hold a huge protest on 23 Sep 1945 regardless of the Martial Law, hoping that the OSS might persuade the French to withdraw those “humiliating” order, but the OSS was unsuccessful. At dawn of 23 Sep 1945 the British and French forces attacked the Saigon City Hall. The French caught and beat any Vietnamese they saw in sight. Major Dewey met Gen. Sir Gracey to protest this violation of human right, and he was expelled from Saigon by Sir Gracey the following day.
One very regretted event has happened, on 26 Sep 1945, while driving in the countryside of Saigon, Major Peter Dewey was ambushed and killed by the Vietnamese force, mistakenly realized as French. The one that did many things to try to avoid war was sadly killed by the forces he had tried to protect.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Vietnam_(1945%E2%80%931946)

Gurkhas with Viet Minh flags... Great photo! I had read about that and always thought it would make a good scenario but I don't have the troops....

' Released French PoW's guard a bridge over the Saigon River, being watched by an armed Japanese soldier under command of 20th Indian Div. Saigon, October 1945. '

!... another 'truth is stranger* than fiction' photo wrt the "Great Britain's involvement in the Vietnam War" subject .



*(and more interesting)