The author says
"To call Vietnam immoral would be insulting to Australian Vietnam veterans and the 501 who died there. It would be a slap in the face ... (and so on)"

Nonsense. To criticise the nation's decision to enter the war, whether as a "mistake", "immoral" or whatever, doesn't say anything about the actions of individual soldiers fulfilling their individual roles.

Further, to criticise particular atrocities doesn't say anything about the actions of soldiers other than those involved.

The author gets it right at the end, where he says
"In a democratic society, we should be able to debate national legends and myths and taboo subjects"

Jeremy's right. To assert that the Vietnam War was immoral doesn't reflect at all upon the soldiers from both sides who fought in it - except of course if their individual actions or motivations were immoral. I think it's just a tad precious for Sasha Uzunov to claim that calling the Vietnam War immoral would be "insulting to Australian Vietnam veterans".

And I can't let this pass:

<< Don Tate, Vietnam Veteran and author of The War Within, has made explosive claims that his unit was ordered to dispose of the bodies of enemy soldiers killed during Australia’s most controversial war by blowing them up. >>

Well I guess they would be "explosive" claims, wouldn't they?

I'd like to see our defence forces being used for defence and disaster assistance.
Assisting foreign powers in their empire building is *not* a morally justifyable use of weaponry. Blowing civillians to bits is part of the game and so war must be minimised.
Most of hype and fear against the communists is now known to be for propoganda purposes: the equivilent of Iraq's WMDs. Lies are also an inevitable part of warfare.
I believe that almost anything is justified in *defence*, but Haliburton's profits, oil futures and political influence are not reasons to risk civialian life, nor the moral standing of our nation.
As the US has just shown, war is horribly expensive and you cannot always get the losers to pay. You win by buying their companies, not by blowing them to bits. Economic warfare is the best kind, the blood and guts variety is profitable for some, but ultimately it will send you broke.

My opinion, I went , I saw, I done my time, the full 12 months, therefore I belive that I am entitled to comment, if you did not go, listen to those that did! War is, or should be a last resort. South Vietnam asked for help to protect there sovereignty from invasion by the communist north, therefore it was north Vietnam that was in the wrong no contest!

We were answering a call for help from a fallow democratic country that is the right thing to do, the wrong thing in Vietnam was for America and us to pull out and leave south Vietnam in the lurch, "THE WAR WAS WINABLE" even the north Vietnamese laughed at us for pulling out just as we had almost won the war.

The immorality of the Vietnam war was the desertion by America, with them going we had no option but to withdraw, MY OPINION? America was a coward pushed to that point by thier press and communist agitators.

Just as an aside, in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, ect. The Americans fail to back up there men/women, in war mistakes are made, usually by the high command, and or junior officers so why is it that when it hits the fan do the poor sods doing the hard yards, in the line of fire, the mud, the stench, the flies, and the BLOOD and broken bodies, cop the charges and the prison time for obeying orders?

COS THEY ARE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE TOTEM POLE.

That is also why we get cheated by governments afterwards, our crime? We servived and came home!

What a confused irrational rant.

Our involvement in the Vietnam exercise (hard to call it a 'war', given the absence of any precise enemy or objectives) was immoral because it caused enormous death and suffering to human beings, including but not limited to our own soldiers and their families, which continues to this day. Inflicting death and suffering on others is always immoral unless justified by a sufficient moral purpose. There was no such moral purpose in Vietnam and vague references to it helping win the Cold War are desperate argument by assertion, lacking both evidence and moral reasoning.

The morality or otherwise of war is not determined by the conduct of the soldiers who fight it; that is an entirely separate issue. Indeed I doubt that the author of the post has any real understanding of the concept of morality or moral reasoning at all.

ridiculous article, for the reasons everyone is pointing out.

by the way, it's news to me that world war 1 was a good war: i always thought it was one bunch of imperial assholes fighting another bunch of imperial assholes, with millions of innocents caught in the middle. what i like about the anzac business is it emphasises the futility and the horror, and then the mateship amidst the futility and the horror. one can be proud of the anzac tradition and still think it was based on a bloody stupid war.

oggy, i am glad you came back, i appreciate you risked your neck for what you think was a good cause. but your risking your neck doesn't give you any particular insight to the reasons why politicians decided to go to viet nam, or why they decided to get out, or whether either decision was wise.