Top historian says Ben Roberts-Smith should keep his medals

War Memorial’s former head historian says Ben Roberts-Smith’s reputation ‘will be understood in the long run’ and that tributes to him should remain for now.

Chief of the Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston (left), salutes Australian Army soldier Corporal Ben Roberts-Smith, VC, MG, during the Victoria Cross for Australia investiture ceremony at Campbell Barracks, Perth, in 2011.

The Australian War Memorial’s former head historian says Ben Roberts-Smith should keep his Victoria Cross, and that tributes to him at the nation’s shrine for remembering veterans and Australia’s history in war should remain for now.

Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton stayed silent on Thursday after a judge found Victoria Cross recipient Ben Roberts-Smith committed serious war crimes, including murder, while serving with the SAS in Afghanistan.

Professor Peter Stanley said the judgment would encourage people to look at Australian military history “more dispassionately”, but he did not believe any action should be taken to alter tributes to Mr Roberts-Smith at the memorial or strip him of his Victoria Cross at this stage. “I think it’s best to acknowledge in good time, but today of all days, the War Memorial shouldn’t be changing the text panel next to his VC,” he said.

“It’s in the long run that his reputation will be understood and evaluated.”

Professor Stanley said while there was historical precedent for a VC to be stripped in cases where a recipient was convicted of a crime, he did not believe it was appropriate until criminal charges had been proven.

Roberts-Smith photographed immediately after the action that won him the Victoria Cross in Afghanistan.

“There have been occasions when VC winners have had the medals rescinded for criminal behaviour, criminal offences, but not very many,” Professor Stanley said. “And there’s over 3000 VCs; I wouldn’t think more than a handful have had the decorations taken off them, and no Australians.

“The important thing to remind ourselves is that (Mr Roberts-Smith) hasn’t been found guilty of a criminal offence.

“He’s just lost his defamation battle.”

Of the roughly two million Australians who have served in the military since the Boer War, only 101 men have been awarded the Victoria Cross, which can be awarded to any rank for “conspicuous bravery or the devotion to the country in the presence of the enemy”.

Just eight men lost their medals for various offences, until George V in 1920 declared the decoration should not be forfeited even if a VC was to be “sentenced to be hanged for murder”.

It comes as opposition veterans affairs spokesman Barnaby Joyce urged Australians not to view the outcome of the defamation trial as a reflection on service men and women and argued the high-profile case had been mired by “emotions, innuendo and facts”. “At the full front of my mind is that the Australian people put this to one side, no matter their opinion when understanding the incredibly honourable role our defence force undertaken by men and women taken through its history, and into the future,” Mr Joyce said.

Queen Elizabeth II shakes hands with Roberts-Smith during a reception for the Victoria Cross and George Cross Association in 2018.

“Without them, we would not have the liberty, the freedom, the nation that we have.”

Justice Anthony Besanko ruled Mr Roberts-Smith had committed murders of civilians, including of Ali Jan, the farmer kicked off a cliff in the village of Darwan.

Australian National University Professor John Blaxland said the result was reflective of Australia’s “too-clever-by-half” approach in Afghanistan and Iraq, and that the nation should not be surprised that “something would go awry” over successive deployments.

“Too much was expected by too many of too few. Successive governments, Labor and Coalition, endorsed a carefully calibrated approach to Australia’s military commitment that relied too heavily on one small component of the ADF,” he said.

Greens defence spokesman David Shoebridge urged Labor to urgently progress compensation for families of the victims of alleged Afghanistan war crimes after it was a key recommendation of the Brereton report.