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Fire Support Patrol Base Coral

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In 1968, a mix of national servicemen and regular soldiers, around 22 years old faced the biggest and bloodiest battle fought by Australians in Vietnam. The Battle of Coral Balmoral was Australia’s largest, longest and most costly battle of the Vietnam War. The Battle of Coral Balmoral took place in Vietnam from 12 May to 6 June 1968. It was a series of battles in which an Australian Task Force operating in an area away from its base in Phouc Tuy Province was pitted against a Division of North Vietnamese Regular forces. On four occasions, the 7th North Vietnamese Army Division attacked the Australian Bases ‘Coral’ and ‘Balmoral’ in human wave assaults with the support of mortars, rockets and heavy weapons.  On two occasions, these assaults over-ran the Australian positions and through gallant close quarter fighting, the Australians were able to hold their ground and eventually repel the NVA. On three other occasions, Australian forces fought prolonged encounters with enemy who were well entrenched in heavily defended bunker systems.  During this period of 26 days there were 56 other contacts and firefights with enemy force. The Official History of the Vietnam War On the Offensive: The Australian Army in the Vietnam War 1967-1968 (McNeill & Ekins 2003) describes the battle:

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… the Australians fought their largest, most hazardous and most sustained battles of the war.

 

The engagements around FSBs Coral and Balmoral exceeded in both intensity and duration the battle of Long Tan.

 

Both the total number of units and men engaged on both sides and the total casualties incurred by each side were greater than those in any other actions by Australians in the Vietnam War.

 

These Battles were to become indelibly identified with the steadfastness and courage of Australian soldiers.

 

This battle was the first time since World War II that an Australian brigade-size Battle Group, based on two battalions of infantry, support troops and Royal Australian Air Force, engaged the Regular forces of another country. It remains the only Australian military action with that credential to this day. More ‘Diggers’ were killed and wounded during this prolonged engagement than at any other time during Australia’s ten-year involvement in the Vietnam War.

 

It was a major political and strategic victory for the Australian Task Force in South Vietnam and for the Australian Government. The then Commander of American Forces in Vietnam, General William G. Westmoreland, visited Fire Support Patrol Base Coral and was reported to have verbally recommended to the Australian Commander that the Australian force be awarded the American Presidential Unit Citation. This offer was never officially recorded or followed through.

 

It is interesting to note that the Supreme Commander of Allied forces Vietnam felt compelled to visit the Australians after the battle to congratulate them and to see for himself the ‘cut’ of soldier that had produced such an outcome. He did not visit any other Australian engagement during the Vietnam War. This military respect afforded the soldiers of Coral Balmoral remains largely untold and unrecognised.

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