RON C THE C THEORY RAR RAR
Soldiers from 5 RAR disembarking a US Army helicopter during Operation Toledo in September 1966 He was also the first National Serviceman to be killed in Vietnam. Noack was critically wounded during a water resupply and died of his wounds at 36th Evacuation Hospital on, sixteen days after he said farewell to his family. It was on this operation that the battalion's first soldier, Private Errol Noack, a 21-year-old from Adelaide, South Australia, was killed. For this operation the battalion was under the command of the US 173rd Airborne Brigade and worked alongside two American parachute battalions to clear the area out to mortar range, so that the base could be established. Upon arrival in South Vietnam the battalion, under Warr's command, commenced operations on by participating in the clearance of the 1 ATF base at Nui Dat in Operation Hardihood. After this C Company would deploy to South Vietnam on HMAS Sydney, whilst the remainder of the battalion flew by air. In March 1966 the battalion emplaned at Aero Paddock at Holsworthy and moved to Gospers for its final exercise, which included advances to contact, night movement, and defensive operations.
Each company trained at Gospers, in the Wiangaree State Forest in New South Wales, as well as at Canungra, Queensland. Nights and weekends were spent training in night movement and conducting lectures on Vietnamese customs, history, culture and language'. 'Range practices began in the dawn hours and often went until 2200 hours. As it was given only three months notice for its deployment, the training schedule prior to embarkation was hectic. From that time on Fifth Battalion were the Tiger Battalion, from the gold of their lanyards to the tiger tails tied onto the kitbags leaving for Vietnam in April 1966." First tour of Vietnam Įarly in 1966 the battalion learnt that it was to serve in South Vietnam as one of two infantry battalions in the 1st Australian Task Force (1 ATF). In order to foster high spirit in the new battalion, the idea of becoming known as the 'Tiger Battalion' was introduced and this spread rapidly and spontaneously amongst its members. According to O'Neill: "The First Battalion was in the final stages of its preparations for departure to Vietnam, and so the Fifth came in for more than its usual share of routine chores and administrative duties. This was a challenging time for the new unit. Oxley was the first Commanding Officer, but when he was promoted colonel in September 1965 command passed to Lieutenant Colonel J. The 2nd and 3rd Battalions were drawn on in a similar fashion to raise the 6th and 7th Battalions, respectively. When the Battalion held its inauguration parade on 5 November 1965, some 250 conscripts from the first national service intake were present amongst the ranks. In 1965, the 1st Battalion, organised on the Pentropic establishment (in theory some 1,300 men) was split to provide a cadre of regulars to the new 5th Battalion, whilst conscripts were used to bring the unit up to strength. To meet the challenges of these commitments, the Army needed to expand from four to nine battalions. This was a time of expanding commitments for the Australian Army: an infantry battalion serving on rotation in Malaysia since 1955 a training team deployed to South Vietnam since 1962, followed by the deployment of the 1st Battalion in 1965 and then the 1st Australian Task Force from 1966 to 1972 and a battalion commitment to Borneo from 1964 to 1966. According to historian Robert O'Neill, since both 5 RAR and 6 RAR were the first battalions of the Royal Australian Regiment 'to be composed of a mixture of regulars and national servicemen, their formation and development was a particularly vital experiment for this was to be the model for the infantry battalions of the Army from then onwards'. The 5th Battalion was formed at Holsworthy Barracks, New South Wales on 1 March 1965.
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4 Commanding officers and regimental sergeants major.
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