The Third Chopstick by Biff Ward review - An eloquent argument against vast evils of war

Biff Ward has written a highly emotional and sad book. As a committed protester during the Vietnam years, Ward decided to look more deeply at the war many years later. She wanted particularly to look at the post-war lives of the Australians who had fought in Vietnam.

The book is in three parts, beginning with protest. Ward had a deep-seated aversion to war from childhood so she joins the protest movement with alacrity once Australia was committed to the war.

An episode at a Sydney protest shows the reader what might be in store. Ward has an out-of-body experience while protesting in Pitt Street. She becomes a Vietnamese woman in the battle zone confronted by four or five burly soldiers intent on attacking her. Ward returns to reality just as the blows are about to fall.

Readers will discover more of these out-of-body moments which may make some uncomfortable.

Ward moves to Canberra and continues with her protest work. Those who can remember those days may recall the freezing weather for several of the demonstrations, the police presence, the possibility of arrest and the indifference of a large proportion of the population to the cries of the protesters. They were both heady and dispiriting times.

The book then jumps forward in time to the author's encounters with Vietnam veterans in Sydney. Powerful writing shows us the horror so many of these men endured.

Ward is taken to the office of the Vietnam Veterans' Federation in suburban Sydney's Granville. Here veterans work together to seek to help or to heal the range of problems many veterans exhibit. The Federation and Granville form the core of the book as readers enter the lives of damaged veterans.

One of these veteran stands out above all the others in Ward's account. Ray Fulton served in Vietnam for only a matter of months but the trauma he experienced totally unhinged him as it might have unhinged almost any person. Ray has years of utter degradation and turmoil. He was a drunk, unstable, a fighter, a wrecker. But Ray, in effect, takes over the book as, gradually, his personality envelopes the reader.

Ray Fulton finds peace, of sorts, on his land at Major's Creek, outside Braidwood, where he discovers that he possesses an uncanny ability to work with horses whom he much prefers to humans. He lives quietly, simply, and usefully although from time to time Ray will lash out at those nearest to him physically or emotionally.

Ward then makes her first trip to Vietnam to see the country for herself and again experiences a major out-of-body episode. She may be on the bus, in a bar, walking the land but suddenly she will find figures from the wartime past that come to her, mostly in a deeply troubling way.

Ward admits to the reader that the Vietnam War has become her obsession.

The last part of the book deals with Vietnam itself, as it is now. Ward starts a tour business, taking curious Australians to the sites of Australian fighting. Along the way she meets the most remarkable Vietnamese people, war's victims, and ponders, without answer, the most beguiling question: "How can they be so forgiving?" This section of the book is lyrical, beautiful and deeply moving.

An exploration of the evil of Agent Orange, the devastation it caused Vietnam and its people, which continues today, is an eloquent reminder of the barbaric indifference of the war's planners to the long-term futures of friends and foes.

It is hard to believe that such an appalling weapon was used so indifferently with such devastating results.

And then, finally, Ray Fulton takes over again. He had earlier told Ward that he had found writing his own story deeply therapeutic. Then he had cut her off and they never spoke again. But after his death from cancer the person who had shared Ray's last years at Major's Creek hands over the manuscript which, of course, Ward reads avidly.

Ray's writing solves many of the mysteries that had confused Ward and others who knew Ray. The tragedy of his life is the tragedy of Australia in Vietnam. The manuscript looks, eloquently, at so many issues, including the terrible failure of Australia's official veterans' welfare agency, Veterans' Affairs. This tells us that every veteran must fight his own battles.

The Third Chopstick is an emotional book that demands a great deal from its readers. Because Ward concentrates on those who need help, at Granville and elsewhere, the book is, to some extent, unbalanced.

Plenty of Vietnam veterans seemed to have lived good and purposeful lives though perhaps they were simply better at hiding their demons.

Readers may find this too much hard-going because it is a demanding book. But The Third Chopstick is also an eloquent and cleverly constructed argument about the vast evil of war. It is a book for our times and for all times.