Operation Vietnam: A New Zealand Surgical First. SIGNED

Michael Shackleton

ISBN 10: 187727691X / ISBN 13: 9781877276910

Published by University of Otago Press, 2004

About this Item

Operation Vietnam: A New Zealand Surgical First By Michael Shackleton Published by University of Otago Press, 2004 - 159 pages Softcover, very good condition, minor tanning, previous owners name and address stamped inside. SIGNED personal inscription by Michael Shackleton. 'New Zealand has a long and honorable record of sending health service personnel to trouble spots around the world. Michael Shackleton was an energetic and determined pioneer. In 1963 he established and led a New Zealand surgical team in Qui Nhon, Vietnam. Until East Timor, this was New Zealand's biggest ever overseas medical operation and was sustained until 1975. His wife Annabel and five young children went along on this adventure. Setting out with little knowledge of the country they were to spend a year in, the couple were told before their arrival that Vietnam had reasonably sophisticated living conditions. This was before the direct American involvement in the Vietnam War and after the French departure from Vietnam. Instead they found disorganization and an accommodation nightmare. Operation Vietnam: A New Zealand Surgical First is Michael Shackleton's memoir of the events, with extracts from Annabel Shackleton's letters home recount the domestic side of the experience.'. Seller Inventory # ABE-1679807877946

Bibliographic Details

Title: Operation Vietnam: A New Zealand Surgical ...

Publisher: University of Otago Press

Publication Date: 2004

Binding: Soft cover

Condition: Very Good

Signed: Inscribed by Author(s)

Edition: 1st Edition

About this title

Synopsis:

Michael Shackleton led a New Zealand surgical team in Vietnam in 1963, under the auspices of the Colombo Plan, before New Zealand's military involvement and during the year that saw Kennedy's assassination and the overthrow of the Diem regime. His family went along too.
The book provides a different slant on New Zealand's Vietnam experience: the problem of setting up a surgical unit for civilians in the Binh Dinh Province Hospital with very little assistance, dealings with the New Zealand bureaucracy, difficulties of treatment with few resources and many cultural differences, and interactions with the British and the Americans. Extracts from Annabel Shackleton's letters home relate the domestic side of the experience.
Michael Shackleton was an energetic and determined medical pioneer: the unit he established continued to operate until the very test days of war in 1974, providing health care for the civilian sick and war wounded.

About the Author:

Michael Shackleton, OBE, is a retired surgeon living near Dunedin. He has been awarded the Order of National Merit, South Vietnam, the New Zealand General Service Medial (Vietnam) and the New Zealand Operational Service Medal (Vietnam).