I think that both the ADF and the Australian War Memorial, through cultural and intellectual discipline, omit and distort the history of the Vietnam/US war.
The detail given to Australia's involvement in Vietnam starting in the mid 1960s is extensive. What is amusingly ignored however is anything before that, including reality.
The following is a comparrison of, the very limited, words from the ADF and Memorial websites and what I think you would read in a free society with regards to Vietnam history.
Quote:Australian support for South Vietnam in the early 1960s was in keeping with the policies of other nations, particularly the United States, to stem the spread of communism in Europe and Asia.
Australian support for South Vietnam in the early 1960s was in keeping with the policies of the United states, to stop the threat of economic and social development of Asian peasants and to setup client states wherever possible.
Quote:In 1961 and 1962 Ngo Dinh Diem, leader of the government in South Vietnam, repeatedly requested security assistance from the US and its allies.
By 1961, Diem under the direct control of Washington had already murdered around 100,000 Vietnamese in a brutal campaign of repression.
Quote:By early 1965, when it had become clear that South Vietnam could not stave off the communist insurgents and their North Vietnamese comrades for more than a few months...
By early 1965, when it had become clear that South Vietnam now ruled by Washington through a series of military juntas after killing off Diem could not starve off THE ENTIRE POPULATION OF VIETNAM, for more than a few months...
Quote:the US commenced a major escalation of the war.
The US escalated its invasion of the the country.
ADF... Quote:From the late 1950s, a civil war developed in South Vietnam between the communist supported National Liberation Front (NLF) with its military arm the Viet Cong (VC) and the US backed Government of Ngo Dinh Diem
From the late 1950s, Washington began to develop Vietnam in the same fashion that they had just developed El Salvador. The US controlled government of Diem carried out a brutal campaign of violence against the Vietnamese.
Quote:Due to a deteriorating military situation in South Vietnam in late 1964 and early 1965, the United States proposed the introduction of sizeable ground forces.
Right.... so.... they (further) invaded the smacking country?