Graham Edwards's veteran story

Graham Edwards served in Vietnam as the result of some firmly held beliefs.

"I'd been to a Catholic school. We had the fear of Communism flogged into us, and it just seemed to me to be a worthwhile war at that time, one that Australia should be involved in. I fell for the domino theory, but I guess like lots of other young blokes, it was also a sense of adventure and following in the footsteps of previous Australian generations."

By 1970, the dangers from enemy land mines were a constant threat to Australian servicemen.

"And I remember some 5RAR blokes saying to me that, 'your biggest problem won't be contact with the enemy, it's going to be running into land mines.' So there was a psychological issue there, it didn't stop us doing our job, but always at the back of your mind was the danger of minefields."

Graham was a machine gunner with an assault pioneer platoon. While on patrol in May 1970, he stepped on an M16 'jumping jack' mine.

"It just exploded. I had no idea, no knowledge that I'd trodden on the mine. This fallacy that you can hear a click, you can keep your foot on it and it won't explode, is nonsense. For I don't know how long I just had this incredible feeling of peace and drifting away, and the next thing these waves of pain just broke over me and I wondered what the hell had hit me. And I looked down and knew straightaway that I was in significant trouble, my legs were just a bloody mess. I wasn't game to put my machine gun down in case I put it onto another mine so I just had to sit there; in absolute agony, being driven mad by the pain, being driven mad by the sun, so dry, I was parched. And I just had to wait while my mates were able to get a path up to me."

Back home, Graham's young wife Noelene received the news.

"She didn't know what the hell was going on. And eventually two army blokes came up and gave her a telegram to read to say: 'Private Graham John Edwards, land mine incident, has suffered the amputation of his limbs.' They didn't say anything to her; they just gave her the telegram to read."

Three weeks after the amputation of his legs, Graham was flown home to Australia.

“It was an emotional time, a really confronting time, but it was a very warm time too, to finally come into the embrace of a loved one and my family and to be reunited but never ever the way I ever wanted to be reunited, and I still feel a sense of emotion, when I see homecomings of other troops today and I see them walking off the ship or walking off an aeroplane, and walking into the arms of a loved one and I would have given anything, even today, for that sort of a homecoming.”

The rehabilitation offered to Graham was inadequate, incompetent and humiliating.

“As opposed to the waves of Second World War blokes who came home where there was a range of programs, and educational areas they could put someone into, the blokes coming home from Vietnam came home in dribs and drabs and we were just slotted in where we could. And I think in retrospect too, we were seen as a problem, not as a person. So where do you hide this problem, what do you do with this person to get them out of the way, and to get them off our books so we can eventually discharge them from the army and push them onto someone else's responsibility, that's what it appeared to me.

The last thing I ever wanted was my children ever to grow up thinking that their father was a cripple. So I did throw myself into community activities and they were the sorts of things I think that kept me sane. Although in retrospect, I had times when I got incredibly angry, times when I just had to go off by myself, wishing that things were totally different but just getting on with what I had to do.”

Graham Edwards met every challenge head on. He educated himself, and, driven by veterans' welfare, moved into public affairs and politics, serving with distinction in the Federal Parliament of Australia.

“We all carry passions with us, and of course, the passion of being a Vietnam veteran, who was prepared to carry the fight up to bureaucrats and to governments was something that I always felt that I was doing, not on my own behalf, but on behalf of a whole generation of Vietnam veterans, so, when the issues were there and when the opportunities arose, I went in there to kick heads, because there were heads that needed kicking.