 The Australians had continued to operate independently within Phuoc Tuy province , and while the war had become a series of big unit search and destroy operations in a war of attrition for the Americans , they had pursued their own counter @-@ insurgency campaign . Regardless , differences of opinion between Australian and American methods had produced friction , and increasingly impatient with the Australian approach , in early 1967 the Commander US MACV , General William Westmoreland , had complained to the Commander Australian Forces Vietnam , Major General Tim Vincent , demanding a more aggressive approach . However , the Australians were convinced that deliberate patrolling techniques were more effective in separating communist forces from the population in the villages while working towards slowly extending government control , and such urgings went largely unheeded . 
