Rutherford, Phil

Phil Rutherford was born December 2, 1949 in Sydney. His father was a British sailor in World War Two: he joined the Royal Navy and saw the world, fighting in both the Atlantic and Pacific.  Wanting something different after the war he settled in Australia and married, choosing to move into the countryside when Phil was young.  Phil grew up in a small country town in the idyllic 1950s, attending school and playing in the great outdoors with his friends.  The Cold War was at its height during this time, and Phil had some awareness of the regional conflict. He went into the cadets while in school and after graduation he joined the regular forces, even though Australia had conscription in place after 1965.  Public opinion in Australia was for the war, so at age 19  – on June 11, 1969 – Phil arrived at Tan Son Nhut Air Base near Saigon. Phil was assigned to one of the small battalion infantry divisions. At Nui Dat – where he joined his unit – he received signals intelligence training but no infantry training: he felt unprepared for war. Phil worked with the American NSA in Saigon, and for 8 hours/day, Phil utilized direction finding to track North Vietnamese radio traffic and decipher it. Phil was transported by an old APC, and his tour ran 365/days + 2 hours from June 11, 1969 to June 11, 1970. Phil concluded, “The war was born out of our time. We had to do it.” Crestwood students were able to zoom with Phil Rutherford in November 2025.