By Ian StuartVietnam veteran Pat Duggan came home from the war 40 years ago and was almost made to feel ashamed of what he had done.
Do not tell people where you have been, do not wear your army uniform in public, he was told by defence officials as he and other Vietnam veterans struggled to cope with the emotional aftermath, not only of the war, but also from the public damnation and derision New Zealand troops faced for going to a war that was highly unpopular.
For decades they were ignored. For nearly 40 years there was no official acknowledgement of their service or welcome home and that hit the soldiers very hard emotionally.
Many veterans very nearly went over the edge, said Duggan, who was to launch his book on Vietnam, What Have They Done to The Rain, on Anzac Day.
Duggan, 65, a member of 161 battery who served two tours in Vietnam, said severe post traumatic stress disorder hit many Vietnam veterans, unlike their Viet Cong enemies.
"I reckon it is because when they (the Viet Cong) were walking back to their home towns, they were welcomed like heroes and treated like heroes.
"We were told to go away and be quiet and don't tell anybody. That played on people's minds a lot. It tipped a few over. We were told not to wear our uniforms in public and not tell anybody we were Vietnam veterans."
When it was suggested they were being told to be ashamed of what they had done he replied: "damned right".
He said that attitude continued until the early 1980s when staff working at the defence headquarters in Wellington wore civilian dress to work and not their uniforms.
Duggan said the first recognition of the war was in 1998 when the Vietnam veterans organised their own event, Parade 98, and marched through the streets of Wellington but it was without any Government help or formal acknowledgement -- although then Prime Minister Jenny Shipley was on the dais when they marched past.
"But it wasn't an official welcome home."
Ten years later came the official welcome home with Tribute 08 -- 37 years after the soldiers arrived back from a war which took 37 New Zealand lives. With it came official recognition and an apology for the way they had been treated.
For the soldiers who marched in Tribute 08 it was a touching and emotional moment and produced many years.
"The crowd lining the parade route was full of applause. Good on yer Kiwi, yehaw. It was uplifting."
Duggan said before the tribute march, the years of rejection affected him tremendously but writing a book on the Vietnam conflict also helped deal with some of the tough memories of the war.
The book is due to be launched tomorrow at the Papanui Returned and Services Association, one of the few buildings still largely undamaged in earthquake-torn Christchurch.
"I got the chance to express my emotion through the book and it was such a weight off my shoulders. It was wow, I have told it."
He said the book was the only one written about the war from a gunner's perspective. He said he wanted to tell the story of a generation of New Zealand soldiers who had to explain themselves for going to war.
"The Government of the time decided our freedom was at stake. We were fighting for the same freedom that allows civilians to march in protest peacefully.
"War is an abomination...
"Governments start them, young men and women fight, suffer and die in them.
"Just don't blame the soldiers. If you want to talk to a true pacifist, talk to a soldier who's been to war."
Duggan said the emotion of war still brought tears to his eyes, even 40 years later.
On a trip back to Vietnam to make a documentary he visited one of the most famous sites of the war for both New Zealand and Australian soldiers -- the Battle of Long Tan where New Zealand artillery fire saved many Australian lives.
"The body count for the VC (Viet Cong) was 245 but talk to the Vietnamese themselves and they reckon it was closer to 900.
"The Vietnamese didn't like leaving bodies lying around on the battlefield and took as many off the battlefield as they could, the same as we did."
That visit was for Anzac Day, 2008, and was highly emotional.
"All the memories came flooding back and I fell to my knees and cried."
Duggan said like many other veterans he was feeling the effects of exposure to Agent Orange, the defoliant sprayed on the bush and forest to remove cover for the Viet Cong.
Strangely, he said, his medical records were not complete. They did not include details of two spells in hospital, including two days when he was brought in from the front line and lay in a coma for two days.
He was "as deaf as a post" and wore two hearing aids because of the war and had peripheral neuropathy -- damage to the nervous system which he said was also a legacy of the war.
"It reminds me of my service in Vietnam. That was a result of exposure to the dioxin and I am losing the feeling in my legs."
Duggan, who will be a parade marshal for Anzac Day in Christchurch, said the day would be emotional for many reasons, some of it remembering lost mates and war dead, but also for the people of Canterbury who still needed support after the earthquake.
NZPA