True North

By Roger Rooney

In 1962, Australian Army adviser Lieutenant Jack Burns is deployed as part of 'The Team' to the Mekong Delta, the hotspot of the Vietnam War, where he is teamed up with Lt. Colonel John Paul Vann and about to undergo the ultimate test of his convictions.

As Jack is honing his craft in the Delta, Tran, a teenage soldier girl with the North Vietnamese Army makes her way down the Ho Chi Minh Trail and into the Delta, where she must stare down the might of US firepower at the Battle of Ap Bac. In a war without frontlines, Jack and Tran must fight to survive in the most dangerous place in the world - South Vietnam.

A love story set against the traumascape of the Vietnam War, True North is a page turner that HALO drops the reader into the contested paddy fields and the viscous military swamp that was Vietnam divided between the corrupt Diem regime in the South and a ruthless communist-cum-nationalist fanaticism in the North. And with Big Brother American raging like some crippled giant, an Ozymandias of the Mekong Delta.

More than that, the readers sees the conflict through the vulnerable eyes of an Australian adviser to the South, and a fighter from the North who just happens to be a beautiful young women. The reader travels with the two protagonists, Jack and Tran, separately and together through some of the most harrowing events of the first years of the war.

Vietnam itself is evoked with an authority that is certain to engage the reader, and the battle scenes are so powerful that images remain long after the reader has returned the book to its place among the most memorable in their collection.

The subject of the novel – the early Australian and American interventions in what became the Vietnam War – is a complex and contentious one that has rarely been tackled beyond military explanations. True North provides many insights into the geo-political, economic and religious drivers to the war. A novel for the readers of military non-fiction and non-war buffs alike, True North has maturity of structure, characterisation and expression and provides great perspective and insight into the effect of war on those directly involved.

True North is resolved in a manner that is not only courageous it is beautifully symbolic at both the historical and personal levels of the narrative. It is unexpected and unsettling, and captures well the tangled web the Americans and Australians were wading into in 1963.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Feb 14, 2018
• ISBN: 9780648249207

Book preview

PART 1

Saigon

August 1962

1

Jack Burns was killing time with Frank ‘Torch’ Abbott, waiting for his first audience with Colonel Ted McIntosh, Commander of the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam.

No-one is more anti-communist than a Catholic, said Torch.

Jack drained his coke and looked at Torch, who was on 48 hours leave in downtown Saigon. It was before midday and most of the customers sprinkled around the shadowy basement bar were drinking to cool off, not to get drunk.

Torch looked at Jack drinking his coke and explained that the trick was to have several different drinks going at one time. A bottle of beer, a coke and a water were lined up on the table in front of him.

You’ll get used to the humidity…after about four months, Torch said. That’s when your southern blood thins out, makes you feel cooler. Like a local.

Torch, nicknamed for his fiery thatch, swung back on his chair, balancing on two legs. He rocked back and forward, hitting the grimy brown wall behind him with the back of the chair. Flakes of the French-era paint chipped away with each thud.

Remember how much you used to annoy Sister Ann, sitting up the back of the class, banging away like that?

Torch beamed. Any attention was good attention in his book, even as a 24 year-old.

You know, there’s a French priest running his own private army at one of the villages near here. A priest on patrol! Can you imagine it? He reckons you can’t hand out M-1 Garand rifles to villagers unless they’re Catholic. We test ’em first - see if they can recite a Hail Mary. If they can’t, they’re Buddhist and probably VC. Torch drained his coke then slid the empty bottle across the table. It stopped millimetres short of the edge.

You remember how Hail Mary goes, Jacko? McIntosh will test you on it, for sure.

Jack checked his watch and then squeezed his eyes shut for a second, a muscle twitching in his jaw. Then he took a deep breath and looked at Torch to see what the next shit-stir would be.

You gotta understand the religious angle to get this war, mate. And American domestic policy. Torch rocked back on his chair, banging the wall behind him over and over. There are 10,000 American soldiers here now. You round the Australian contingent out to, what, 30? The American command doesn’t want to know you – to MACV you’re a headache and to President Diem you’re bait. Word is he wants the Australian advisers placed up at the DMZ so they get killed and Canberra sends over more advisers.

Torch laughed and Jack pushed the table forward, so Torch was left balancing with just the toe of his boot.

You know what would be funny, mate? If the head of the Australian Embassy Protection Service was discharged from a bar stool injury.

Jack lent over, grabbed Torch’s chair leg and yanked. Man and chair crashed to the ground. The bar was completely silent. The only movement was a blizzard of brown paint chips swirling through the air. A heartbeat passed, then the white man with the wiry red hair burst out laughing. The big one who’d dropped him grinned broadly, distinctive dimples flashing in both cheeks. The room unfroze. Crazy white men being loud; situation normal.

2

Colonel Ted McIntosh was Roman Catholic and Australia’s greatest jungle warfare tactician.

Jack stood outside the Colonel’s office, the wall fan pushing hot air down on to him like a blowtorch, making it difficult to breath. His khaki parade uniform was heavy with damp patches, the cloth sticking all the way across his shoulders. Sweat trickled down the curve of his spine, collecting in his arse crack. The three-wheel cyclo he’d taken from the bar had meandered so slowly that he might as well have walked. Not even a near collision with a 4-tonne lorry made the little man peddle faster.

A Warrant Officer thundered away at the typewriter, apparently oblivious to the heat.

Spare some water? Jack asked.

Indeed, we can. He pointed to a tray with a half empty water jug and some sticky looking glasses. Fill your boots, Sir.

Jack poured out the last of the warm water and drank it, imagining himself back at the bar with ice cold drinks.

Jack recited the names of Vietnam’s forty four provinces in his head while he waited. The first run through he listed them geographically, south to north. The second time he arranged them by population, smallest to largest. He was half way through listing them by army Corps areas I to IV, when the Colonel’s door opened and a group of US and Australian officers filed out the door. Jack’s heart accelerated. He straightened so he was standing bolt upright and mopped his brow one last time.

The Colonel’s aid finally looked up from the typewriter and smiled. You can go in now.

The wait was over. Taking a deep breath he ducked his head clear of the low door frame and stepped into the room. Colonel E.P. McIntosh DSO (with bar), Commander of the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam, pushed a file tied with red tape to one side and rose to take Jack’s salute.

Lieutenant Burns, welcome.

Jack saluted and then lowered his arm. Sir.

He remained at attention in front of the Colonel’s desk.

At ease Lieutenant. Safe trip, I see. Your father in your ear with all sorts of advice as you were leaving? He was never short of it at the Jungle Training Centre.

He expects me to do him proud, Sir.

The Colonel nodded. And your mother? Worried, no doubt?

Jack allowed himself a tight smile. He was confused. He hadn’t expected familiarity from the Colonel.

Well, we’ll get you over for dinner with Margaret and Claire before you deploy so you can write home with something for both of them.

Thank you, Sir. I’m also eager to receive my brief.

The Colonel sat down behind his desk and waved for Jack to sit opposite. He was an orderly man. Documents and stationery were arranged with precision. A spare dress uniform hung on a suit stand. The weight of all the Colonel’s service medals made it sag on one side. The number of his medals – or ‘gongs’ in military slang - gave everyone under his command confidence. He’d been First Commandant of the Jungle Training Centre in Canungra for four years, followed by two years’ service in the Burmese army teaching counter-insurgency. Burma was where he caught the attention of the CIA. Unconventional warfare was his specialty. Vietnam was his time.

Colonel McIntosh leaned forward in his chair. Welcome to the front lines of democracy, Mister Burns. My G2 calls this building the neo-colonial nerve centre. I call it the best job in the world.

The Colonel rolled his chair back then stood and walked over to one of the plastic maps of Vietnam on the wall. Blue texta markings identified the location of the South Vietnamese army, which was commonly referred to using its acronym ARVN which was short for the Army of the Republic of Vietnam.

Red texta explosions charted recent skirmishes. Lowering a clear plastic overlay, he let the shadings sink in, with about half of Saigon’s surrounding provinces shaded red. These areas were controlled by the Viet Cong and the soldiers sent by the communist North. They’d ruled the northern half of Vietnam since driving out the French in 1954.

"The communists called these the Liberated Zones, the Colonel pointed to the red areas with his index finger. It’s where the communist’s army, the Viet Cong and NVA has gone round declaring land reform, forcing the villagers to pay taxes and give rice to the Communist Party. Problem is most of them are still paying rent to their rich Saigonese landlords. He clasped his hands around his arms and rocked back on his heels. The working class is getting poorer thanks to the Communists. MACV couldn’t have orchestrated a better strategy for cultivating anti-communist sentiment in the neutral villages."

Jack acknowledged the irony of the situation with a nod of his head. MACV, pronounced MAC-Vee, was the Military Assistance Command Vietnam, established six months earlier. It was headed up by US General Paul D. Harkins, who had no background in counter-insurgency warfare and no previous deployment to South-East Asia.

The Colonel shifted position and tapped the map on the spot that Jack recognised as My Tho, located in the Mekong Delta in the country’s south west. It was a lone blue star in a sea of red.

This province is at tipping point. My Tho City was the last victory for the French when they took over Vietnam 100 years ago. Now the communists want it back. It’s the gateway to the Viet Cong sanctuary in Cambodia and 30km from President Diem’s bedroom. I’m sending you there.

Jack felt a rush of adrenaline tear through him. Like every true warrior, he lived to be tested under fire.

The Colonel moved away from the map. He hitched his pants at the thigh before sitting back down behind the desk.

You’ll be under the command of the US Advisery Team 4. MACV wants three fully operational ARVN battalions down there. They need to be backed up by the part-time soldiers, the provincial and village militia. The plan is to block the communists then hit ’em when they try to run back across the border. He passed Jack a folder. It felt empty. The Australian team had only arrived in Vietnam six weeks before, so chances were it was empty.

Jack looked from the file back to the Colonel. Your job is to train the ARVN and militia in core skills: weapons drills; physical fitness; battle drills; night fighting; and responsiveness to discipline. You also need to cover village defence, saturation patrolling and combined arms techniques for when we bring in the firepower. The ARVN’s track record suggested that its single goal was not to win the war, but to prevent the next coup against President Diem, South Vietnam’s American-nominated leader. Before being installed as Prime Minister he was a religious mystic in Bruges, Belgium. His only qualification for the job was his staunchly anti-communist views. And the second ingredient to Jack’s assignment – the militia – well, they were being armed and funded by the CIA. He was being asked to mix oil and water then place them under tremendous pressure to produce a diamond.

Deploying you to the Delta means we’ll have an Australian military presence across all four army Corps areas. I need to know what’s happening at the province and district level throughout the country. I want my advisers listening to what the locals actually need. I want them identifying what’s working to increase our control of the countryside. Once we understand what’s happening in the field, we push MACV to roll out a unified strategy across all the provinces.

Christ thought Jack. He truly believes he can steer this war. Australia was the very junior ally, but there was no denying it had the most to lose. Britain was pulling out of South East Asia after forming Malaysia in 1960, leaving Australia and New Zealand as the only true democracies in a region with communist insurgents in nearly every country.

The Yanks need to question their basic assumption that they just need to roll up for three years and they’ll win. That’s where the Brits went wrong in their first three years in Malaya. You can’t just send battalions out to the jungle to bush-bash their way to random contact with the enemy. Conventional soldiers think of the jungle as being full of lurking enemies. This is not a conventional war and to win we’ll do the lurking.

The Colonel scanned Jack’s face. He might have been looking for a reaction or perhaps he was cataloguing the clear similarities between Jack’s features and his father’s. Any questions Lieutenant?

Sir, you’re suggesting that if we’re to succeed in Vietnam we need to shape doctrine, not just follow it?

Absolutely correct, Lieutenant. The situation out there is worse than I’d been led to believe. And it’s getting nastier by the day. The VC plan is being steadily consolidated, while the Government’s plan is only developing on paper. Our strategic policy is passive and most of the time we’re on full defensive. Each of the four Corps commanders work autonomously, there’s no unified approach. We need to consolidate, take control, and get the local ARVN and militias on the offensive. He thumped his fist on the table to emphasise each point.

You deploy in 36 hours. Congratulations Lieutenant. You’ve just joined the Special Forces. It’s not the infantry – we use a flat structure. I’m the Commander but everyone gets to have their say so forget all that Big Army stuff they drummed into you at RMC. I want my Advisers making suggestions to me from the field and I’ll agitate for the US commanders to be similarly accessible to junior officers.

Jack knew he would push himself beyond every limit for this remarkable man. Who else but a true visionary would so openly admit weakness, ask for help from a junior officer and then promise to actually listen to a subordinate? His views would be regarded as heretical by the Duntroon establishment, rife with its academic acolytes and elocution lessons. Jack admired him even more. He’d been an outsider at Duntroon, a working class Irish Catholic in a swarm of private school educated WASPs.

The Colonel stood, indicating the meeting was over. "Welcome to the Team."

Thank you, Sir.

Jack nodded and smiled tightly. One of only thirty Australian military advisers in Vietnam. The chosen few.

Jack threw a sharp salute before turning on his heel to leave. He was almost to the door when the Colonel spoke again.

And come for dinner with the girls tomorrow night. I want to hear what your father’s been up to since he got out of the service.

Yes, Sir.

3

The music drifting out of the Colonel’s villa on Phan Dinh Phung Street was hypnotic. Jack didn’t understand the French words, but the emotions of the female singer were clear. It was a song about heartbreak and longing. Next door the Catholic Archbishop’s residence sat piously, only one light visible from the street. No noise, no movement.

Jack showed his ID to the security guard and he was cleared through the gates into a lush, private jungle. The path leading up to the two storey house was poorly lit and the gravel crunched underfoot. Rounding a bend Jack noticed a dirt track off to the left of the main path. He stopped and stared into the inky blackness, testing his eyes to see how long they took to adjust. Shapes of mango trees appeared. He looked back over his shoulder to the security hut, then stepped off the track and into the darkness.

Walking soundlessly now, Jack tested his peripheral vision as he’d been taught at Canungra, relying on the cones at the edge of his eyes to see the starlight where the retina could not. He recognised the shape of a bicycle leaning up against a tree off to the left. A conical shaped straw hat dangled off the handlebars. Satisfied, he swivelled to head back. He’d moved quickly and found himself against a large bush with sharp fronds that sliced his neck. It stung like a paper-cut and he swore as he swatted away a drizzle of blood. He headed back to the main path and up to the house.

The lights of the French courtyard villa glowed brightly as he rapped lightly on the door. He counted to thirty before the door was opened by a young woman wearing a pale green cotton dress, which hugged her curves. Long blond hair was swept to the side so it tumbled over one shoulder.

She stared a moment too long at his face. Tilting her head to one side she giggled and stuck her hand out in an overly formal handshake.

Bonsoir Lieutenant Burns and welcome to Chez McIntosh.

Hello, Claire. Thank you. He smiled broadly at the theatre as he shook her hand.

He knew Claire would have been at the wedding where he’d met the Colonel seven years before, but he didn’t remember her. He guessed she was about 17 now and she sure as hell was memorable.

My goodness! You’re bleeding – what happened?

Jack shook his head. It’s nothing. Just a scratch.

Come on. I’ll just wipe the blood away. My father isn’t home yet, you’ve got time.

Taking him by the arm, she led him down a long hallway that opened into a sitting room. She poured water from a jug on the sideboard, handing one glass to Jack to drink and the other she used to dip the edge of a linen napkin. Armed with her make-shift nursing materials, Claire stood staring up at him.

Jack’s brain whirred into gear. She couldn’t reach the cut unless he sat down. He lowered himself stiffly into a wicker chair and prayed it would be quick. He’d never been able to say no to his little cousin either when she wanted him as her patient in the game she was playing.

She dabbed at his neck, butterfly soft. ‘How long have you been in-country?"

I arrived yesterday.

And what do you think, so far?

Um…It’s good. Saigon is okay.

Come on! You’re the first Australian I’ve talked to since we arrived. What stands out for you, apart from the heat?

"Well, I suppose I hadn’t been prepared for just how French Saigon is. The architecture, the cars, the food. Even the music…"

Claire smiled and nodded. She’d finished her task. Gathering up the used cloth and glass of pink stained water, Jack watched the girl’s hips shimmy as she walked across the room to the sideboard. Her arse quivered in an astonishingly erotic fashion. Jack was mesmerised.

Christ he thought. Keep this tight and above board. This is work and totally off limits. And at her age possibly illegal.

Righto. We’d better get you to the den. Mister Morales is already there waiting. He would’ve eaten you up if he’d seen blood on you so soon after landing.

Jack stood and bowed his thanks. I’m in your debt.

All business now, she led him back towards the front of the house then down a short corridor. The white door stood ajar, its brass handle polished so brightly that Jack could see Claire’s green dress reflected back at him.

She motioned to the door. Pre-dinner drinks and war business. Good luck.

Jack knocked lightly on the door then entered.

The American civilian in his short sleeves, slacks and loafers was sitting at a large window overlooking the front garden, flicking through a collection of records. He stood and moved to greet Jack.

Merl Morales. You can call me Merl. I been incountry since ’56. First time in Nam I hear? Been under fire before?

What struck Jack the most was not the man’s accent or his confident swagger. It was his olive coloured skin.

Caught the last of the action in Malaya in ’60.

Shake that hand hombre. You met a Hispanic before? The American tried to crush Jack’s hand in the shake. From the look of you I would say the answer is ‘no’.

It was true. Jack had never met a Hispanic before. Merl’s skin glowed like it was polished. He glided around the room like he was two feet off the ground. He caught Jack’s look and grinned, "Big cat and all that…that’s what I am out there in the jungle. Out where you move 200 metres in 20 minutes. Out where you are as good as your ability to stay unseen and unheard. The jungle man. I was the jungle less than 24 hours ago. They airlifted me back to meet with your boss about where we’re going to deploy you guys. The Colonel says you Aussies did a jungle training course before you came out here? Did that include night manoeuvres?"

Jack tensed. Did the Yank see him step off the path? It didn’t matter. The American was probably full of shit. Probably a spook. A civilian actually in the jungle? Flying around in a Huey more like it, above the jungle, keeping his bum all shiny and clean on a joy flight.

Jack asked, Are you a spook? You guys are running the show right now aren’t you?

Merl stared unblinking, "You tell me Ossie. Do I look like the US Aid type?"

Jack demurred and the American didn’t wait for an answer.

Charlie owns the night and has damn near paid off his mortgage on the day. That little man is on the march straight to this very room. He’d be here in a few days if it wasn’t for our airstrikes and choppers.

Apparently he’d finished his stream of thought. He stopped talking and looked expectantly at Jack. Jack thought for a second, considering what useful information he might draw from Merl. The Colonel says My Tho and IV Corp is at tipping point?

Merl let out a long sigh. "Yeah, Saigon could be lost in six months. The South Vietnamese don’t go on search and destroy missions. They go on search and avoid missions. He ran a hand over his head. His buzz cut looked fresh. Let’s have a beer together when you get back on leave. We can shoot the shit – you’ll have some good stories by then. Probably at least one tale of an airlift rescue after Charlie has mauled your ARVN, or when your militia has disengaged from battle. Or better still, changed sides overnight and started fighting against you." There was no accompanying chuckle to suggest he was joking.

The American headed over to the bar against the wall. He held up a bottle of Jameson’s Whiskey for Jack’s approval. Sure, thanks.

Merl handed him a glass then sat in a club chair in the corner of the room, facing the doors. Ever alert. Jack sat opposite on the lounge. Merl took a swig. You want to know what I think? Jack knew he was going to find out, regardless. He smiled politely and raised an eyebrow. You Aussies should stay on the sidelines. This is a smack down between President Kennedy and Khrushchev – with China throwing in free guns and food.

Jack could see the Colonel was going to have to fight hard for a place at the strategy table. Perhaps the American spook had been invited over to dinner so he could be won over. He decided to keep it light. He shrugged and held up his glass in a toast to the American, If you want to be the leader of the free world, mate, you’re going to need some followers.

4

In the cab on the way home Jack replayed the night in his mind. Nothing had been what he expected. Which he liked. Growing up he was the kid who waited to open the last present. The surprises were few and far between in the adult world.

The Colonel’s daughter treated him formally at the dinner table but she caught his gaze and held it twice. She sat opposite him, between her mother and father. The round dinner table gave the gathering the informality and intensity of a family meal back home. Except they were debating geopolitics, not who was to blame for returning the car with an empty fuel tank.

This feeling of familiarity was strange for Jack. At Duntroon he revealed as little as possible about himself. He approached all his classes with deep concentration and absolute determination which made him dux of his year, but his speech still dropped into the accent of the Westy, especially under stress. At the Colonel’s table though, he forgot his self-consciousness among the passion and energy of the debate.

The Colonel’s wife had gone head-to-head with the American spook. The North shouldn’t be underestimated. They’ve got one of the world’s largest standing armies. A quarter of a million trained soldiers ranked by CIA analysts as the best jungle fighters in the world. They’ve been repelling invaders for hundreds of years, she said, leaning forward to top up her water glass. The Chinese mostly, she passed the jug to Jack.

Morales snorted with contempt. This whole debate is irrelevant as soon as the US combat troops roll up. Game over then. American soldiers kicked the British out at Yorktown, the NAZIs out of Germany, the reds out of the Philippines. We’ll kick the communist northerners out of here. He raised his beer glass and affected a Boston accent "…we will bear any burden, any price to protect self-determination, no matter how faltering or failed it is."

The house girl stacked the plates from their meals and cleared them away. The rich aroma of the roasted pork lingered. Winning the war isn’t the problem, said Jack. "Keeping the country stable afterwards could be though. What kind of government has twelve agencies – twelve - that can detain and execute their citizens at will?"

The Colonel nodded slowly. The US isn’t Britain. They don’t see themselves as imperialists who run empires. Their military and State Department don’t meddle in the running of local politics.

Merl chuckled. They leave that to the CIA.