At dawn on the 20th of April, 1967, HMAS Sydney crept into Vung Tau Harbour, in Phouc Tuy Province, South Vietnam, threading its way carefully through the clutter of junks and warships anchored in the tranquil waters. Within hours, the 1000 soldiers she carried would be deposited on the mainland. Ironically, this date was even more significant to me in that it was one year to the day since I shook hands with my father outside Richmond Army Barracks and walked in a very involuntary fashion from civilian life into the army. Obviously, then, it would be of further significance one year later when it would be the date upon which I would officially become a civilian again, my two year’s conscription completed, should I survive. In fact, as it happened, the army would see fit to get rid of me some time before then. And finally, in 1969, the 20th of April date would be significant again, for on that day I completed the first draft of the novel I wrote based on my experiences in the war zone.
    It is therefore an anniversary that I never allow to pass without a certain shudder, not least of all because it is also Adolf Hitler’s birthday.

Boredom is the true enemy of the soldier, and indeed it is, but it is also the true enemy of the author who tries to write about it. They say that Norman Mailer achieved this in The Naked and the Dead, but I think he merely achieved the tedium.
    I had two big problems with this book, neither of which were necessarily Mailer’s fault to be fair. One was the idiotic use of the word “fugging” which of course was thrust upon him by the morality of the time. He only needed to be published ten years later and it would have been different, but you just plain cannot almost say fucking. Either you do or you don’t. It’s the difference between fuckin officers and their fucking troops, unless of course they’re fooking Poms.
    The second was that at that stage I still hadn’t met an actual American and thought they were all movie characters, and these guys never seemed like real people to me. You couldn’t get a handle on them unless you decided which movie actor would play their part. I must confess I haven’t totally got over this—I still suspect they talk that way because they’ve seen too many Hollywood movies.
    Like I said, not really Norman’s fault. Fortunately, he did write some better books that allowed a more sensible attitude.