Stuart joined the Royal Air Force in 1949 and was involved in operations during the Malayan Emergency and the Korean War. Between 1969 and 1971, Stuart served as the Assistant Air Attaché at the British Embassy in Saigon. His job was to observe the war in Vietnam.
Stuart was born in Huddersfield in 1931. When the Second World War broke out he was still at school and although there was little enemy action in Huddersfield, Stuart’s life was changed by the war. His father had served in France and died in 1943 shortly after he was medically discharged from the army.
And the war also influenced Stuart’s choice of career.
‘Later, as I [be]came [old enough], I joined the Air Training Corps, perhaps impressed by seeing the Air Training Corps, Sea Cadets, Army Cadets marching through the town on parades…’
He joined the Royal Air Force in 1949 and did his early training in Southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe.
‘There was no way of telling who was the enemy.’
Stuart first went to the Far East in 1951 when he volunteered to serve with the Far East Flying Boat Wing in Singapore. He was subsequently involved in operations during the Malayan Emergency and the Korean War.
Between 1969 and 1971 Stuart served as the Assistant Air Attaché with the British Embassy in Saigon. His role, along with around a dozen other British servicemen, was to observe the war in Vietnam.
Stuart lived in Saigon with his family where the war always felt close by.
‘There was fighting quite close to Saigon...in the evening… [you could] suddenly feel the house shaking usually for a period of about twenty to twenty five seconds…’
But he did not encounter hostility from the Vietnamese people.
‘Once they appreciated that [we] were not American or Australian, in other words not combatants, we were generally well received… We used to shop in the local market…’
From his observations, Stuart believed that there were two wars being fought in Vietnam at the same time.
‘…the war that the…American-controlled forces were fighting…and the totally guerrilla war that was being fought by the Viet Cong…’
And another problem for the American-led forces was recognising the enemy.
‘There was no way of telling who was the enemy.’
Although Stuart was based in Saigon, he travelled extensively around the country and he was able to gain a new perspective on how the Vietnamese themselves felt about the war.
‘Generally, the attitudes were fairly common across the country. Basically they wanted to be left alone to get on with their own existence…’
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