Interview with Warrant Officer Peter Rosemond, CSC, OAM
On the eve of the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, the Australian Army Journal completed a series of interviews with former senior leader- ship and senior soldiers to compare their observations on the Army post-
Afghanistan with that of the post-Vietnam era. Former Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM) of the Army, Warrant Officer Peter Rosemond, CSC, OAM (retd) describes the Army as he knew it in the Vietnam era and comments on what he regards as the challenges facing the current army post-Afghanistan.
Warrant Officer Rosemond: I would like to [begin by explaining] where I fitted into the Army during and following Vietnam. I deployed to Vietnam in 1969 as a 19-year-old corporal. I commanded a tank for the best part of a year and upon return immediately started training for promotion to sergeant, scheduled to return to Vietnam.
At that time, the tank regiment had proven itself as a force worth maintaining, so in 1972/73 I had the privilege to trial the M60 and the Leopard tank for the Army. In the latter part of 1973 into 74 I began wondering how many years after the withdrawal from Vietnam I would go round and round the Puckapunyal range in a tank.
The Army changed its training system in 1974 from subjective to objective training. As a gunnery instructor I was additionally tasked to rewrite the gunnery syllabus including designing and enabling terminal objectives and allowing for retesting without extending the training time. This was in addition to instructing, so I was a busy young sergeant at 24 years old. During this same time I applied for a transfer to the Cavalry Regiment to broaden my armour experience so I came out of tanks and went to 2 Cav
AAJ: So how would you describe the environment post-Vietnam? What was the situation Army faced in the period after the withdrawal? What sort of financial situation did Army face? What was the impact of the strategic guidance and discus- sions on the size of the force?
From a sergeant’s perspective, strategically I knew what the regiment was doing and I knew in detail what the squadron was doing and my role within this, but in terms of the Army, Puckapunyal and the tank regiment were quite isolated. I wasn’t seeing what was happening in the world of logistics and the other arms units. I did however know that units were moving and being amalgamated — the infantry went from nine battalions to six. It was about 1975 where I started to see the effect of this. At this time corporals and sergeants from the infantry were offered corps transfer and some came to the School of Armour to be retrained from being infantry section commanders and platoon sergeants to being crew commanders and troop sergeants. I know a lot of the guys who did this and I commend them for having the courage to step out of their developed world on this whole new challenge at rank. I think this was reasonably successful; some of those guys became RSMs.
AAJ: Did that create an ‘us-versus-them’ type of culture?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: No, there was nothing derogatory and they were treated no differently, they just fitted in.
AAJ: With that in mind, in the years following, were there any cultural issues, any divides between those who had and had not served in Vietnam and if so did this affect morale?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Before Vietnam if I had hitchhiked in uniform along the Hume Highway near Seymour, one of the first three cars to pass would have offered me a lift. On my return had I have done it, one of the first three cars would have tried to run me over. I had some interesting experiences on my return. Soldiers were seen completely differently between 1968 and 1970, such had the community changed its view of the Army. This was an anti-Vietnam thing; enough has been said about the community taking its frustration out on the Army not the government. I think governments have learnt a lot from this as well as the community. People now realise that it’s not the Army’s fault; the Army is just doing what it’s tasked with.
AAJ: In another interview that was conducted recently with Warrant Officer Woods he commented that he came across people who were valued for the medals that they wore, not for their competence. Would you agree with this sentiment?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: I came across more of this in the later years, not at that time. In later years, say in the 80s, the Army started to say that being in Vietnam was irrelevant. I saw Vietnam as a journey of learning. In my opinion, active service is active service and it doesn’t matter how long ago it was, your opinion should be heard. I agree that there were people in the 70s who lived their reputation. I would say the same to young people today, that it’s a learning experience and that you should work as hard as you have to in order to be the best that you can be for tomorrow.
I guess that National Service has to be mentioned in this mix. I joined the Army in 1967 and the advertising at the time was to join the new, modern Army. To me it was the new, modern Army and I didn’t understand the old Army. I joined the new, modern Army and it was really good. Now in this mix there were National Servicemen and they challenged through maturity, life experience and, I guess, their astuteness. In most cases, National Servicemen brought university, trade or work-related skills to the Army from the civilian world at a different level to the 17-year-old recruit who perhaps left school, did some work and joined the Army.
They challenged the Army’s staid or fixed mindset on how things were done. There was a lack of flexibility and the National Servicemen got rid of that. The Army grew so quickly that it had to change. It had to do away with seniority; people were now being promoted on ability, not time in rank. In a post-Vietnam era, that legacy remained where people were selected on ability and suitability rather than seniority.
I had a lot of problems as a young sergeant; I was 21 and I often had comments from other sergeants that I was lacking something because I was so young. The responsibility was mine; I was young and had to prove to my peer group and corporals that I could do my job. I think the Army learnt a lot post-Vietnam, from it and from the legacy of the National Servicemen contributing in a way that they probably didn’t realise, that changing dynamic.
I will just give you an idea of how National Servicemen changed the dynamic. A National Service tank driver was being micro-managed and told when to change the gears etcetera. The gear stick in a Centurion was a three-foot steel rod which links back to the gear box. This one fellow undid the bolts that hold it in place and, at the right moment, took the gear stick out, stepped out of the tank and gave the gear stick to the crew commander, stepping off the side of the vehicle. The Crew Commander was on the vehicle, gear stick in hand doing five miles an hour stopping in a creek. This sent a message; National Servicemen were mature men who saw the world differently to the 17-year-old who was imbued with this ‘do what you are told when you are told and grow with it’ mentality. They didn’t know any other way. Being a little older I was seeing both sides.
AAJ: In the wake of Vietnam, there was an increase in female involvement in the Army. Are there any lessons that can be learnt in increasing female participation, especially with the recent removal of restrictions in combat roles?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Being in Armoured Corps there were no females in the regiments, but there were at the school as drivers and the like. Females and males are both soldiers; if you treat them like soldiers and respect them like soldiers then there is no issue. I don’t care if there are females in every corps in any job in the Army. I actually feel that females have a role in Special Forces as a female in casual wear can walk into areas where fit, Special Forces-looking men can’t. There’s evidence from other countries, the Brits have had female special operators in Ireland. Train females from the bottom up and I think they will be successful, try to transfer them at middle rank and I think there will be real issues.
You look around armies of the world and there are females everywhere. You can’t ignore 50 per cent of the population and disregard them because they are female; some women are a lot more capable than men.
I worked with a female sergeant when I was in Germany in the mid 70s who was a Centurion Commander in the Israeli Army during the Six Day War. I think females can be anywhere in the Army, but I do question if the public, the media and the government are ready for the first female who is a mother, wife, sister or daughter, to be taken prisoner or killed in combat action, not in support or an accident but as a direct result of combat.
AAJ: A recent paper by Lieutenant Colonel Cate McGregor ‘An Army at Dusk: The Vietnam-era Army Comes Home’, suggests that, up to the last decade of the 20th century, Army training was too focused on jungle training, that it was training for the last war rather than a future war. Do you agree with her observations?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: No, I worked at Portsea as a field training instructor. I don’t think we were hanging onto Vietnam at all. I think we were teaching the doctrine requirement of commanders at every level on patrol in both open and close country. I didn’t see that as what we did in Vietnam, I just saw that as conventional training at the doctrine level completing all processes through to the delivery of orders and their implementation. By the time that I was at Portsea as a warrant officer in 1981 I think Vietnam was irrelevant; it was to what I was doing.
From an Armoured Corps point of view, pre-Vietnam we trained for conventional operations. We then modified our training pre-deployment to counter-revolutionary warfare (CRW). In 1969, the first half of that year was conventional operations, spread out [over] long distances, live firing, fire and manoeuvre to switching into a base camp called Nui Dat 2, where we then did CRW. We were no longer spread; we were line ahead, tracking one another. We did cordon and searches, using tanks in this role. Upon our return we went back to conventional training. We hated doing CRW as it was easy. We trained in doctrine-based conventional operations for the entire capacity of the force. So dropping back to do CRW was easy and something that we didn’t seek.
I think this may be a challenge for the Army in that it will need to ensure that all learning is doctrine-based, not based on personal experience. Doctrine is the blueprint for how and what you do. It’s too easy for people to say that they want to teach things their own way because their way is easier or what they did on operations. There are many examples I could provide you from my career where this has occurred and when we have gone back to doctrine-based training, the rate of accidents has significantly reduced. If there is an investigation it’s doctrine that will be investigated, people need to understand that. I learnt that in the early 70s rewriting training for tank gunnery. It has to be doctrine, it has to be covering everything required and it has to be tested.
AAJ: As a commander you would have appreciated the requirement for the transi- tion from CRW back to conventional operations. Did the soldiers appreciate why this was necessary?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: That came down to the leadership and focus; we were focussed on individual excellence and skills. This is where the Army needs to really look. If you look and teach what you did on the last operation mistakes get taught as not all practices required in one environment are required in another. Take silent cocking for example. When we transitioned to the Steyr there were a lot of UDs as there was a requirement to silent cock the SLR in the jungle on continuous opera- tions in close proximity to the enemy. Trying to replicate this with a Steyr when conducting different operations resulted in a lot of UDs. This is where you learn how you train with the benefit of learning through doctrine.
AAJ: As a peacetime army, how did the Army promote or undertake training to maintain motivation for service in order to retain personnel? Can you describe the exercises that you did? Did the Army place a greater emphasis on adventurous training, sport, overseas postings/ attachments, regional engagements or other methods?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Resources were always tight, especially for my corps as tanks weren’t seen as strategic priority one. In 1968 the notice for them to go to Vietnam was very short and repair parts and fuel were very hard to get, but ammunition seemed to always be in abundance. Post-Vietnam the ammunition was restricted and mileage allocation very tight. So much so, that an innovative unit commander at the 1st Armoured Regiment took my squadron off the Puckapunyal Range by borrowing a squadron’s worth of M113 in order to change our training from creeping around the range. We went to Murrayville to train in the desert. It was a complete change of training focus and I guess a challenge to commanders. Pre-dating technology, navigating was a massive issue. Navigation skills in the desert, orientation and live firing were all put into practice. I guess there had to be a lot of innovation at the sub-unit/unit level even though there were resource restrictions to ensure that the training remained interesting.
AAJ: How was that received?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Very well received because it was a challenge. We had to change from being tank crews to being M113 operators, it was stimulating training. We were however challenged in the 73/74 period with equipment and resource constraints being very tight. I recall doing dismounted training where we didn’t have small arms blanks and yelling ‘Bullets! Bullets!’ — the soldiers thought it was a bloody joke. [We went] from being in a time of resourced operations to the non-resourced 70s where they were quite tight.
AAJ: What did they do to retain people then if they weren’t able to replicate realistic training and if they didn’t have the ammunition and people had to yell ‘Bullets! Bullets!’?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Initially they didn’t do anything due to the downsizing of the force structures. People corps transferred where there were opportunities and Armoured Corps was one of them; retention wasn’t really a big thing. When the government was in turmoil and the budget was blocked, I happened to be on exercise in Singleton. Supply was blocked and we weren’t getting paid. When supply is blocked there is no government money, it’s a critical time. We were told by the Army formally that if we had a financial circumstance where we needed to guarantee an income that we were free to go and get another job. We were told that there was no guarantee as to when supply would be back and there would be no mandate forcing us to come back as the Army and therefore the government had failed its obligation.
AAJ: So how many people took advantage of this circumstance?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Well my troop sat down and we discussed it. I had faith in the Army and I had faith in the government getting this sorted out. I didn’t think that it would go for two weeks. My answer to them was that I wanted to make a commitment and go back to the exercise, and when we returned to the unit if it still wasn’t fixed, we would make a choice then. We went back to the exercise and were home before the next pay day. It was sorted out really quickly because the government and Gough Whitlam were sacked. The Opposition stated that they would pass supply and there was an election. It was fixed while we were still on exercise. I don’t doubt that the Army lost some people through this.
Retention then became an issue because in the latter part of the 70s, there was a lack of vision in what the Army was about and what its role was, what it was training for and the resources that it had available. Some of the resource limitations of that period got a lot worse.
It was an interesting experience in the late 70s and 80s and there were overseas postings and attachments to other armies. We created [Exercise] Long Look, and had other exchange programs with the Americans and the Kiwis. These were very competitive and highly sought after incentives for people to look to. I was privileged to do this and spent two years in Germany with the 1st Royal Tank Regiment. I think maintaining these sort of inter-Army or inter-service opportuni- ties is beneficial.
I actually had a secondment to the Navy on a minesweeper with my troop. We were crew on HMAS Ibis for a few weeks. This was diverse and different. The ship had a crew shortage and they needed crew so we became sailors for a while. I can lay claim now to steering a minesweeper under the harbour bridge. I have photos of me in my Army green shorts in GP boots at the helm. Those sorts of things were innovative and sought after. I think that these are the sorts of things that help people maintain the motivation for their commitment, this as well as adventurous training and sport.
Adventurous training is also beneficial as it engages soldiers in peacetime in emotions beyond their normal life skills environment. It pushes the boundaries of fear and emotions in a safe manner. Canoeing down the Murray is not adventurous, but white water rafting down the gorges in Tully is. You need to train for and go and do Kokoda, train for and go and do a wilderness activity in winter in Tasmania. These are out of your comfort zone where fear and emotion have to be dealt with. This sort of training people will talk about for years; this retains people because they have common experiences outside of the mundane because training can become mundane or repetitive.
Retention of skills is tied to retention of people. So retention right across the board is significant and the challenge is keeping the competent and right people. I am going to say that from my experience the Army has a massive problem doing this because there is a logjam. Where the logjam is, is with ‘open-ended enlistment’. I said this when they were bringing open-ended enlistment into the Army and I will say it again now. If you have a person who reaches warrant officer class one rank at my age which was 33, it’s a long way to 55. I actually did 19 years as a WO1, in RSM appointments back to back with a personal commitment to myself and nobody else that when I stopped progressing that I would get out. I didn’t want to be a WO1 who wasn’t competitive staying until I was 55 because I was on a good salary. Doing this stops a good WO2 from getting promoted which stops a sergeant and a corporal, it goes on. The brightest, best educated and most technically advanced people are roadblocked by older warrant officers and people who are not going anywhere creating roadblocks. What happens is our brightest get out, and we denigrate the Army’s capability, losing the smart people to civilian industry. With the government moving the retirement age further away under MSBS, it’s even more critical that these roadblocking people leave. Under DFRDB there was a watershed moment at 20 years of service. There were waves of people from warrant officers down to corporal who got out freeing up space for dynamic growth. We are at a point now where we no longer have this natural attrition or shedding points and we lose the smartest and best people at the wrong times.
AAJ: How did the Army deal with the wounded, injured and ill post-Vietnam? What was the policy for retaining wounded, injured and ill personnel? For how long did Army have to deal with both the physically and mentally wounded?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: We employed them; the guy who replaced me in Vietnam lost an arm and an eye in an RPG incident. A few years later he was working with an artificial arm in the Q Store. He was there for many years. When I was at the Defence Academy, the pay warrant officer had an artificial leg. He was perfect for this role, he was the master of process in pay and leave and organising the cadets for their various allowances and travel etcetera, so [he was] perfectly suited. I am tolerant of people who have war and other related injuries as long as they are doing their job. However, Army priority must be considered and resettlement and ongoing support are essential. Fostering care and support is necessary
AAJ: What was the Army’s policy and plan for dealing with the mentally wounded in the wake of Vietnam?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: I think that they’re still dealing with the mentally injured; there is no doubt that people are affected differently by operational experi- ences. People have dealt with significant trauma to humans; this has to have some effect on you, it affects the civil services like the police and ambulance officers, maybe we could learn from them as well.
What my take on this is, we did no training prior to me going to Vietnam on how to deal with a dead body, and we did no training on how to take a prisoner. Dealing with traumatised bodies or catastrophic damage to a vehicle is very difficult. I took three prisoners in Vietnam, I mean they were pretty placid because we parked a tank on them in the dark and they were too scared to move, but I had to improvise on what to do with them. These things cause emotional scars.
On the mental injury thing I would say that the Army is tenfold better than it used to be. It has now recognised that this trauma is invisible and that each case needs to be dealt with by professionals. The challenge is to get soldiers to seek help and admit injury and for commanders at all levels to support them.
AAJ: Anything else that we can learn from Vietnam?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: I think the challenges will be the same as the 70s and this is training and restructuring with budget cuts. I think Army is already behind with the budget cut issue and I’d suggest that every time that there has been a conflict through history that after the conflict finishes that there have been budget cuts and force reduction. Army has had years of good budgets and I just hope that they put good things in place to sustain the next generation of budget cuts and force reduction.
I learnt that it didn’t matter if you were a corporal or private, responsibility may fall to your decision-making, as a team commander or someone on sentry duty.
Preparing for warfighting or peace operations (making, enforcing, keeping or monitoring) we have to prepare people for the environment. By that I mean climate, geography, culture, operational rules, language and environmental factors. We have learned this, and everything I have experienced since Vietnam has had ongoing improvement in these training considerations. Witness how our soldiers engage with locals, kids and elders understanding the consequence of their actions in promoting security and reputation.
I made a presentation to a world army forum in Holland in 99, specifically preparing NCOs for peace operations. Not only was the Australian presentation voted best and most relevant to the topic, but it delivered an interactive view of examples and lessons on the above topics. We are doing this stuff better than most and continue to evolve.
My summary was: you must invest in the junior leadership with the maximum amount of responsibility and decision-making in training; this will enable them to make sound and timely decisions in operations. In the middle of the night when isolated and a decision to shoot or not shoot is required (instantly) the chain of command can’t run down and do an assessment and direct the decision. In peacetime we must train for and support decision-making at the lowest possible level. We must accept the consequences and train to improve.
AAJ: I want to ask you your opinion of the view that there is a similarity in the military’s relationship with the government now and in the post-Vietnam period.
Warrant Officer Rosemond: That’s the way that I see it also, I think the comparison is extraordinary in every sense. I don’t know where we will go with force reduction, but I think that resources will determine that.
AAJ: In periods of resource austerity, tough choices have to be made. What are Army’s non-negotiables?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Training standards and doctrine. I believe these need to be focussed on the conventional defence of Australia, with allies. This can be either on or off shore. I believe rank responsibility needs to be considered as not negotiable. If you say to section commanders that they are responsible for all of the training and leadership responsibility, let them do that. Don’t micro-manage 30 soldiers in a platoon individually then on operations expect that corporal to be able to work independently with his team; this needs to be done in training. I believe that we need to make people responsible and accountable at their rank level. This means delegation and the acceptance that there will be mistakes, these mistakes must then be re-practised correctly; if you don’t do that, then you only learn lessons from the highest level and you turn the soldiers, corporals and lieutenants into training aides for higher ranks. You also stifle innovation and resourcefulness, personal develop- ment and character
AAJ: If you had your time again what would you change?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: Nothing, I don’t think I would change anything because with everything that I did I stayed myself, I think that was really important. I was told when I was a WO2 that I wouldn’t progress if I didn’t change the way that I did things, in that I was too familiar with the soldiers, I played sport, that I would have to forego all of this to be an RSM. It was a pretty serious discussion. I considered that I had been promoted to this point in being myself, and that I wasn’t going to change and if this meant that I wouldn’t be an RSM then so be it. I think I proved that wrong and that by being yourself you will remain yourself.
If you try to be something that you’re not and the pressure is applied and I mean real pressure you will turn into something that you weren’t and people will begin to question you. You have to be yourself and have to be honest with yourself and I have found that regardless of rank you have to respect people. Having said that though, 19 years as an RSM was character assassination. I wouldn’t say that I forgot who I was but I was and still am a larrikin. I am the guy who, if there is an opportunity to do something, I will do it. I will set somebody up and I could give you a million examples, including throwing a saltwater crocodile into the regimental command vehicle because the Adjutant said that he wanted to see one.
AAJ: What is your fondest memory of your time in service?
Warrant Officer Rosemond [laughs]: I am really stumped, I have a lifetime of memories that all rate, but I would have to say when I said ‘Thanks, mate!’ to the Governor-General on my last day in the Army.
AAJ: How did that happen?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: It was on receipt of the Army Banner from the Governor-General on the Army Centenary Birthday Parade. I joked at the parade rehearsal that, on receipt of the banner, he would say a few words and I would respond with something like ‘Thanks, mate’. Well he laughed and said that he liked that, and General Cosgrove with horror suggested that ‘Thank you, your Excellency’ was more suitable. After the rehearsal I walked through the tomb of the Unknown Soldier and decided that I would, in fact, say, ‘Thanks, mate’. I started wondering what a soldier from 1901 through the Boer War, Gallipoli, the Western Front, the Second World War, Korea, Borneo, Vietnam etcetera would say and here I was about to receive a banner that reflected these campaigns. I wondered what a digger from that era, from somewhere like western Queensland, would say if he received the banner from a high public figure. He’d say something like ‘Thanks, mate’, so that’s what I thought and I did, I said, ‘On behalf of a grateful Army, to you and to the people of Australia, I say, thanks mate.’
AAJ: What was the response?
Warrant Officer Rosemond: There was stunned silence! It felt like forever but it was more like a second or two, as I turned and started to walk down the stairs the applause was thunderous, it was amazing. It made every news channel in Australia on TV that night. So saying ‘Thanks, mate’ to the Governor-General — that or being promoted to lance corporal.
Peter Rosemond
Peter Rosemond joined the Army in 1967 following a stint as an apprentice bricklayer. He served as a corporal tank commander in Vietnam in 69/70 and was promoted sergeant soon after returning home in 1971. As a sergeant he served in a number of armoured positions including on exchange with the British Army in Germany for two years. He was promoted to warrant officer in 1978 and enjoyed a variety of postings in a range of locations including the Officer Cadet School – Portsea. In 1983 he was promoted to warrant officer class one and served as a Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM) for the next 19 years, serving in progression with the 2/14th Light Horse Regiment, 2nd Cavalry Regiment, School of Armour, 1st Brigade, 1st Division, Australian Defence Force Academy, then Army Headquarters in his final role as RSM of the Army. His additional tasks included organising the Army Tattoo in 1988 as part of the bicentenary celebrations and numerous battlefield historical events. He concluded his service following the coordination and presentation of the Army Centenary Parade and dinner in 2001.
Since leaving the Army, Peter has taken up a role working with youth, specifically with a number of charity organisations and schools, conducting specialised programs addressing youth issues. He is currently Director of Rock Up Adventures Pty Ltd, Director of Cessnock District Learning Centre and President of Cessnock PCYC.
