WI the ANZAC's request British aid in Vietnam?

This occured to be a while ago, America did try and get Britain to commit troops to the Vietnam War but without success, but what if Australia and New Zealand made the same request.

My thinking here is that the two ANZAC countries can make a much stronger case for British deployment than the US can. Both sent large numbers of troops to fight in Britain's defence during the world wars and commited troops to Burma and Malaya, so what if they ask for the UK's help when they consider themselves under threat from communism?

Would Britain send units to South East Asia or not, and what would be the effect either way?
 
Harold Wilson isn't going to openly commit British forces to Vietnam. He might turn the SAS loose and the Marines provided their presance is kept out of the press and they cant be identified as British. Post 1965 I could see HMS Centaur being officialy transfered to the RAN and being crewed almost entirely by £10 poms and paid for by Britain. I'd like to see her operate Buccs but she'd need a long refit for that so her air group would probably be A4s with Melbourne working with her for ASW.
 
There may be a token commitment of RAF and RN units and some special forces but nothing large scale, Britain was already heavily committed in Aden and Borneo and wouldn't have had the troops to spare. You would also need a Tory victory in 1964 to make this happen.
 
I don't know if this happened OTL or not, but I would imagine that NZ, Australia and the UK discussed Vietnam and deployment either before or as deployment occured and that the latter would have made it clear that they were not getting involved.

Interesting topic to read more up about though
 
When I first started working one of the men I was working with was an ex Marine. He strongly hinted that there was some British presance with the Anzac forces in Vietnam. At one time as well RAF Beverlies were sent to perform humanitarian missions in Vietnam while the USAF face a temporary shortage.
 
With all of our other comittments it's not as if we had a lot to spare. The Indonesian Confrontation was sucking in a massive amount of resources.
 
Plus Aden, the Beria Patrol, commitments in Europe and the Atlantic, issues with African independance and a building crises in Northern Ireland. Then there were economic problems and industrial stagnation. The UK was spread very thin in the 60's and the Governments habit of spending vast sums of money developing high tech equipment and then cancelling the projects just as they reach fruition didn't help.
 
I suspect that we probably had more troops deployed per total force to active war zones than the Americans. Just looking at any year in which the US was active in Vietnam the UK had at least two major commitments ongoing on top of the normals peacetime ones.

When LBJ said he would be happy with a pipe band so long as we sent it I have a feeling that we were spread so thin that we couldn't even have sent that.
 
There may be a token commitment of RAF and RN units and some special forces but nothing large scale, Britain was already heavily committed in Aden and Borneo and wouldn't have had the troops to spare. You would also need a Tory victory in 1964 to make this happen.

If they are experienced and successful they could have out of proportion impact.
 
If they are experienced and successful they could have out of proportion impact.

The SAS in the sixties was probably the most experienced special forces unit in the world. Since the begining of the Malayan Emergency in 1948 they had been engaged non stop in counter insurgancy warfare. Malaya, Kenya, Oman, Cyprus, Aden, Borneo as well as preparing for a war in Europe. Just look at what the Australian and New Zealand SAS units achieved in Vietnam and imagine what the larger British SAS could have done. In the end it still wouldn't have worked though the actions of the South Vietnamese government and some elements of the US forces would have made it impossible to win the Hearts and Minds of the South Vietnamese villagers.
 
If they are experienced and successful they could have out of proportion impact.

The SAS in the sixties was probably the most experienced special forces unit in the world. Since the begining of the Malayan Emergency in 1948 they had been engaged non stop in counter insurgancy warfare. Malaya, Kenya, Oman, Cyprus, Aden, Borneo as well as preparing for a war in Europe. Just look at what the Australian and New Zealand SAS units achieved in Vietnam and imagine what the larger British SAS could have done. In the end it still wouldn't have worked though the actions of the South Vietnamese government and some elements of the US forces would have made it impossible to win the Hearts and Minds of the South Vietnamese villagers.

The Royal Australian Regiment implemented all the lessons and tactics learned in Malaya and Borneo and had a lot of success in their areas. In response Westmoreland criticised their commanders for "Not being aggressive enough..." I've no doubt the SAS would have had a beneficial impact but it would all have been in vain as there were so many bad things going on elsewhere. :(
 
The Australian SAS squadrons were spending a year warming up in Borneo before going to Vietnam.

A history of the Australian SAS suggests that, because of the way the various SAS units around the world worked at the time, a number of British SAS were attached to Australian SAS in Vietnam.
 
Last edited:
Well, they were pretty busy with the Confrontation, you know?
Well to be fair the Australians and New Zelanders sent some troops to help out the British and Malay during the Confrontation...

Although it was probably in their best interests to do so, so they cant exactly call on that as a favor for the British.
 
The SAS in the sixties was probably the most experienced special forces unit in the world. Since the begining of the Malayan Emergency in 1948 they had been engaged non stop in counter insurgancy warfare. Malaya, Kenya, Oman, Cyprus, Aden, Borneo as well as preparing for a war in Europe. Just look at what the Australian and New Zealand SAS units achieved in Vietnam and imagine what the larger British SAS could have done. In the end it still wouldn't have worked though the actions of the South Vietnamese government and some elements of the US forces would have made it impossible to win the Hearts and Minds of the South Vietnamese villagers.

Yeah, that's sounds about right.

THink they could make enough of a difference to change anything?
 
Firstly, it`s not Australia or New Zealand`s job to request military assistance in Vietnam, the British would have to be asked for their assistance although I think this could be easily arranged. Secondly the Confrontation was mostly over by 1966, that`s why Australia could bump it`s military commitment up from 1 btn in 65 to 2 btns in 66 and 3 btns in 67. Presumably the British could do something similar.
 
22 SAS was and is a very small regiment. It was heavily comitted to the Confrontation and a variety of other duties. I suspect the only way we could have sent a detachment to Vietnam would be to mobilise the two TA regiments, 21 and 23.
 
Top