Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Uncle Charlie served electrical fitter/mechanic apprenticeship at the Mount Morgan Mie during the Second World War and served in the Volunteer Defence Corps (VDC) during this time, the mine being of strategic importance so he operated the mine then in afternoons and nights stood too to guard it as a teenager. On completion of his apprenticeship he enlisted in the RAAF as an aircraftsman electrical mechanic to serve in the British Commonwealth Occupation Forces (BCOF)-Japan from 1946 and was assigned to rebuilding damaged power stations due to his industrial technical experience. He was selected for aircrew training on No. 2 Flying Training Course, the RAAF's second post-war aircrew training course, and after initial training at RAAF Point Cook, was selected for navigator training and posted to the RAAF School of Air Navigation, RAAF East Sale, for training, from which he graduated as an NCO navigator under the immediate post-war "P" rank system. Selected for the RAAF strike/bomber force, he underwent specialist training as a bomb-aimer at the RAAF Air-Armaments School and then posted to 82 Wing, RAAF Amberley for Lincoln bomber operational conversion training and was posted to No.1 (B) Squadron and then in 1950 deployed to RAF Tengah, Singapore, with No.1 Squadron, for operations against communist terrorists in the Malayan Emergency. He flew as bomb-aimer and front air-gunner over Malaya and was Mentioned-in-Dispatches (MID) for his service in Malaya as a Flight-Sergeant navigator, one of the first post-war RAAF aircrew awards. On return to Australia he was commissioned and as PLTOFF Reif MID, proceeded on posting to RAAF Amberley to train as one of the initial RAAF aircrew on the new Canberra jet-bombers, the unit to be No. 2 Squadron. He flew the 1950's atomic bomb tests operations and in the mid-1950s was posted to the UK on exchange with the RAF as a navigator in No. 50 Squadron RAF as part of RAF Bomber Command, flying on alert and training missions as part of the RAF strike capability against potential Soviet aggression in Europe. As a flying officer he returned to Australia in 1956, promoted to flight-lieutenant, and was posted to air-weapons testing over the Woomera rocket range in No.2 Air-Trials Unit (2ATU). FLTLT Reif served as a staff air-navigation instructor at the RAAF School of Air Navigation in the very early 1960s and then served as a navigation/air-weapons instructor at No.2 Bomber Conversion Unit, 82 Wing, RAAF Amberley, training RAAF pilots and navigators to fly the Canberra jet-bomber as a weapons platform. He also served as 82 Wing's air-intelligence officer in the early 1960s. In 1966 he returned to operational navigator/bomb-aimer posting with No.2 Squadron at RAAF Butterworth, Malaysia, and in April, 1967, was one of the initial squadron aircrew deployed to Phan Rang air base South Vietnam, to undertake air-combat strike operations against Viet Cong guerrillas. He flew the initial trials with RAAF Canberras and South Vietnamese and USAF forward air controllers (FACs) and was the first RAAF aircrew over the US Marine Corps base at Khe Sanh that was under siege from the North Vietnamese. After completing his tour of duty in South Vietnam he returned to RAAF Butterworth to fly as a navigator with RAAF Transport Support Flight, Butterworth, operating C-47 transports throughout South-East Asia on VIP/diplomatic missions and resupplying police and military forts along the Malaysian/Thai border. In 1969 he transferred from the General Duties branch to the Special Duties branch as an administration officer (ADMINO) and was promoted to Acting-Squadron Leader and subsequently served at No.24 (City of Adelaide) Squadron, including period as the temporary commanding officer, and later at RAAF Williamtown on No. 76 Squadron, a strike navigator in with "knuckleheads" of which he was originally posted as the squadron air-weapons officer! In 1973 SQNLDR Reif posted to Air Force Office, Department of Defence Russell Offices, Canberra, from where he remained as a senior staff administration officer until retirement in early 1978 after which he served on as a public servant in the Department of Defence embryo computerised world in Deaken Offices to the early 1980s and final age retirement. Always a very loyal and dedicated RAAF aircrew officer!