The Vietnam war was in a time of huge controversy. What had started off as sending engineers and medics turned into one of the biggest events in the 1960’s.
Since the Vietnam war started in 1955, the US government had been putting New Zealand under pressure to send troops to the war in Vietnam and then, in 1963, New Zealand Prime minister Keith Hollyoake agreed to sending some ‘non-combatant’ troops (engineers, doctors and nurses) over. In 1964, New Zealand sent another 25 army engineers and then, in May 1965, the government announced that they would send fighting troops to Vietnam.
The Vietnam war was the first war that New Zealand did not fight alongside Britain, its traditional ally. Instead we fought with America and Australia. The Vietnam war was fought between Communist Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam or Viet Cong) which was supported by the Soviet Union, China and other Communist countries. They were fighting The Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam), backed by the US, Australia and other anti-communist countries.
Most of the fighting in Vietnam was done in the jungles. One Vietnam war vetran said “when I was on a patrol, the jungle was so thick that my patrol and an enemy patrol passed within only 5 metres of each other, we just didn’t see each other. It was only when the last person on the enemy patrol spotted us and opened fire that we knew they were there”. At its peak, there were 543 New Zealand soldiers, about 50 other NZ personnel and one artillery battery serving in Vietnam. That artillery battery was the 161 artillery battery, deployed into Vietnam in 1965. In the battle of Balmoral, the gunners that operated the battery were highly praised for their accuracy and volume of fire.
While the war was going on overseas there was another war happening right here in New Zealand. From 1964 all the way to 1971 there were hundreds of anti-Vietnam war protests, all around the country. People believed that this was not our war to fight and disagreed with the way we were using our weapons. There were many times when protesters covered themselves in red paint to represent the innocent vietnamese civilians bloodshed. Other protests were about just wanting peace. Those protests were first of a kind in New Zealand as in the past, civilians had not expressed their opinions about war in such a public way.
The Vietnam war is a huge item in New Zealand history. There was pressure from the US government, extreme fighting conditions and hundreds of protests. We will always remember this event in history.
-By Lucas H
Most of the fighting in Vietnam was done in the jungles. One Vietnam war vetran said “when I was on a patrol, the jungle was so thick that my patrol and an enemy patrol passed within only 5 metres of each other, we just didn’t see each other. It was only when the last person on the enemy patrol spotted us and opened fire that we knew they were there”. At its peak, there were 543 New Zealand soldiers, about 50 other NZ personnel and one artillery battery serving in Vietnam. That artillery battery was the 161 artillery battery, deployed into Vietnam in 1965. In the battle of Balmoral, the gunners that operated the battery were highly praised for their accuracy and volume of fire.
While the war was going on overseas there was another war happening right here in New Zealand. From 1964 all the way to 1971 there were hundreds of anti-Vietnam war protests, all around the country. People believed that this was not our war to fight and disagreed with the way we were using our weapons. There were many times when protesters covered themselves in red paint to represent the innocent vietnamese civilians bloodshed. Other protests were about just wanting peace. Those protests were first of a kind in New Zealand as in the past, civilians had not expressed their opinions about war in such a public way.
The Vietnam war is a huge item in New Zealand history. There was pressure from the US government, extreme fighting conditions and hundreds of protests. We will always remember this event in history.
-By Lucas H
