SAS Heroes

by Pete Scholey

  His first ever training jump with full equipment, which included an equipment container strapped to his right leg, was almost his last. Being 6ft 6in (1.98m) tall, Lofty was obliged to nod his head forward to duck under the lip of the aircraft’s fuselage door. Nodding his head forward like that, combined with the unbalancing weight of the equipment container, made him perform a beautiful forward roll on exiting the plane. Although he didn’t realize it at first, this meant that his legs became entangled in the rigging lines. When he looked in the direction he thought was ‘up’ to check his canopy, what he actually saw was a white circle with a red cross on it – the roof of the medical team’s ambulance that was waiting for him on the ground! He managed to kick one of his legs free and released the equipment container, which was designed to dangle on a cord as the paratrooper descended. This action pulled him half-way vertical – he still had one leg stuck in the rigging and was now heading for a landing flat on his back. Kicking the rigging lines off his entangled leg with his free boot, his feet swung into the vertical just in time to touch the ground. He reckoned it was the best landing he’d ever made.

  Lofty’s parachute experience goes to show that nobody’s perfect – you can’t be the best at everything. But I would defy most trainee paratroopers to keep their heads while plummeting earthwards and extricate themselves from that upside-down drop in the way that Lofty did. His clear thinking and calm demeanour, no matter how panicked he may have been feeling inside at times, was an inspiration to those around him. He was the epitome of a professional soldier, with an admirable sense of fair play and compassion. Once when we were in Aden in 1964, we found ourselves stuck on a hilltop, too far from the exchange of fire that we could see to be able to make any real impression except with the Bren gun that I was carrying. Lofty told me to give the group of rebel gunmen that we could see a few bursts, knowing that this would drive them into cover and give our lads, at whom they had been firing, less of a problem. Sure enough, the rebels tucked themselves away behind some rocks. An expert in directing mortar and artillery fire, Lofty then called in a mortar bombardment of the rebels’ position among the rocks, bringing in such accurate fire that the rebels took a real pasting. When the smoke cleared, we were amazed to see one of them stumble out into the open, clearly disorientated but otherwise unharmed. I made to get him in the sights of my Bren gun but Lofty, perhaps remembering being on the receiving end of a bombardment in Korea, simply said, ‘If he can survive that lot he deserves a break. Let him go.’

  About a year after we came back from Aden, Lofty left the troop to spend the rest of his service as an instructor with the reservists in 23 SAS. I never felt the same after he had left. In fact, I transferred to a different troop, joining the free-fall mob in 16 Troop. The SAS had become my home, but without Lofty there it seemed about the right time for a change of room.

  SERGEANT IAIN ‘JOCK’ THOMSON

  Iain ‘Jock’ Thomson was one of the most dedicated, natural soldiers I have ever met. He was a superb weapons handler and the star of the battalion shooting team when we served together in 2 Para, competing against other British forces teams at the annual shooting event at Bisley. The squad from 2 Para regularly won the team award and Iain generally swept the board in the individual events. Yet there was nothing grand or arrogant about our Jock. He was always willing to help out weaker shots, working with some of the lads on the rifle range when it came time for our annual range classifications. Failing to classify meant the loss of your trade pay, so obviously everyone wanted to pass. Being able to shoot straight, of course, might also save your life and let you enjoy spending your pay.

  Jock was a great help to me and Reg ‘Brummie’ Hassall when we applied for SAS Selection in 1963. Brum, Jock and I had been firm friends and drinking buddies ever since I was first posted to Cyprus with 2 Para in 1959. Jock and Brum were then just 20 and I was 22. We had some riotous times together, sharing the same sense of humour and having the same ‘devil-may-care’ attitude that goes with the seeming invincibility of youth. Jock left 2 Para to join the SAS about a year before Brum and I did, but he kept in touch with us, telling us how much he loved soldiering with the SAS and passing on a lot of useful tips about how to get through the Selection course when our turn came. Without Jock’s advice we would both have found Selection a lot tougher ... and it was tough enough as it was. Only nine out of the 120 candidates on our course passed, but once Brum and I were in we were posted to D Squadron and eventually reunited with Jock. He may have been wearing the beige beret of the SAS instead of the maroon of the Paras (The Parachute Regiment), but apart from that he hadn’t changed a bit. A short, stocky, tough Scotsman, Jock had what I call a ‘no-neck’ physique and a jaw like a cash register. If you hadn’t known he had once been a miner, you could probably have guessed. He had, in fact, lost his father in a mining accident, which is as good an incentive as any to get out of that dangerous occupation. Why then opt for the Paras and the SAS? A case of out of the frying pan into the firing line, maybe, but Jock genuinely loved being in the army. From the very first day we met in Cyprus, Jock showed me, by example, how to be a serious soldier ... and how to have a seriously good time. It was in Cyprus that Jock demonstrated a little-known Scottish martial art during one hair-raising night out in Limassol.

  The Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston (EOKA; National Organization of Cypriot Fighters) emergency and the fighting between the Greek-Cypriot terrorists, the Turks and the British was all but over by the time I arrived in Cyprus, but it was still not advisable for British service personnel to leave the camp in groups of fewer than four. Cyprus was a British Crown Colony from 1924 up to the time it was granted independence in 1960 and EOKA was a terrorist organization bent on bringing about a Cypriot union with Greece, causing no end of problems for the British administration and the military in much the same way that terrorists did in Northern Ireland. You might say that the EOKA in Cyprus was like the IRA in Ulster, only with sunshine. There were numerous attacks on police stations and military bases as well as on service personnel and their families. Around three-quarters of the Cypriot population were of Greek origin, the rest mainly of Turkish ancestry, although it was not until 1974 that Turkey invaded Cyprus, occupying about a third of the island, ostensibly to protect the Turkish community and dividing Cyprus into northern Turkish- and southern Greek-aligned states. Then, as now, the British maintained extensive military bases in the east between Larnaca and Famagusta and in the west near Limassol.

  One night in 1960, Jock, Brum Hassall, Pete ‘Lippy’ Lipman and I set off for an evening’s bar-crawling in Limassol, intending to meet up with a few other mates in the main square. By the end of the night, Jock and I had become separated from the rest and were heading back to camp on our own in a Greek-Cypriot taxi around 2.00am, full of laughs, chat and Bacardi and Coke. After about 15 minutes touring the backstreets we started to realize that we were not taking the most direct route back to camp. The laughing and chatting stopped. The driver ignored us when we challenged him, claiming not to speak any English. Now we were seriously worried that we were being kidnapped to face a fate worse than death at the hands of murderous EOKA terrorists. Somehow we had to get out of the speeding taxi. Jock then had a Caledonian brainwave. Being a proud Scot, it was his habit to wear his kilt when we went out on the town, so he stood up in the back of the cab as best he could, leant forward, lifted his kilt and dropped it over the driver’s head. There was a horrified shriek from the taxi driver and he slammed on the brakes. The car slewed round in a skid, then rolled gently over onto its side. We clambered out, unhurt, and as we ran off down the road, Jock yelled to the taxi driver that he should remember that both Scotsmen and Arabs wore skirts but ‘... the difference is that Arabs wear underpants as well!’

  Jock was also wearing his kilt the day he spotted a massive Claymore-like (medieval Scottish) sword in a shop window. He couldn’t resist it and bought it there and then, shoving it into his belt and walking out into the street with t
he tip dragging along the pavement, trailing sparks. It was a brave policeman who stopped him and told him to get it under wraps, despite Jock arguing that the sword was part of his ceremonial dress. That night in the mess, when he was asked what he wanted to eat, he jumped on the table, waving the sword around his head and yelling, ‘Civilians!’

  Jock’s sense of fun was legendary, but aside from the laughs and the good times we shared, Jock took his soldiering very seriously. His skills in the field were second to none and he was to need all of his expertise, his determination and his courage when we were sent into the jungles of Borneo in 1965.

  You can’t run in a jungle. Forget anything you’ve seen in the movies – Rambo charging through the jungle in his vest and headband or even Tarzan swinging through the trees. These are things that only happen in Hollywood jungles. There are several different types of jungle, but in none of them can you thunder around like a rugby player or swing on vines like an Olympic gymnast. Jungles are hostile environments through which you must pick your way with great care. In a tropical rainforest, which is what most people imagine when they think of a jungle, the entire area is covered by several layers of canopy formed by the interlocking branches and broad leaves of the trees. At the tops of the tallest trees, the canopy will be over 200ft (60m) high, and below this, smaller trees will spread their branches at various levels down to around 33ft (10m). This blocks out almost all direct sunshine, creating a gloomy half-light on the jungle floor and making undergrowth fairly limited, although the forest floor is still a treacherous maze of tangled roots, fallen leaves and rotting logs. The poor light also combines with webs of vines and lianas, some festooned with razor-sharp spines, and the sheer density of tree growth to reduce visibility to less than 165ft (50m). Tarzan wouldn’t be able to swing very far before he smashed into a tree trunk and Rambo would have his bare arms and shoulders ripped to shreds by the lower vegetation, providing he didn’t break his ankle on a tree root first.

  Below any breaks in the canopy, on the fringes of the forest by the banks of rivers or where land may have been cleared for cultivation, the primary jungle gives way to secondary jungle. With access to sunlight, plants such as grasses, thorny shrubs, ferns and bamboo grow in profusion, creating walls of vegetation through which you can only progress by hacking or slashing with a panga or jungle knife. The temperature climbs to over 86°F (30°C) during the day, with strength-sapping humidity levels that leave your clothes constantly soaked with sweat, if they’re not already wet through with rain water. After a time, whatever you are wearing will start to rot and disintegrate. Your skin chafes on the damp clothing and your feet rot inside your damp boots. You are under persistent attack from all manner of biting or stinging insects and leeches (another good reason for wearing a shirt with a collar and long sleeves) that inhabit the jungle floor as well as live on the vegetation, although larger jungle animals such as snakes, wild pigs and jungle predators are quite shy and will generally try to avoid you. Progress through a jungle is slow, arduous and exhausting. After about 5.00pm you have to stop completely to make camp before the sun goes down, after which it’s pitch black, making any kind of movement completely impossible. Even under ideal daylight conditions, you can’t really expect to walk more than about 1,100 yards (1,000m) in an hour.

  Now imagine that you are not walking, but dragging yourself arm over arm across the tangle of roots on the forest floor. Imagine that you can’t stand because you’re in so much pain from a broken leg – not just a simple snapped bone from an unlucky fall, but a thigh shattered by an enemy bullet. Imagine that you are losing blood from a gaping wound that you’ve had to pack with a field dressing. Then imagine that you are being hunted by the enemy and that capture means torture and almost certain death. Now fire your rifle in the air. You know that this will help them to keep stalking you, hunting you, but you also know that it will help to lead them away from a wounded comrade who is even worse off than yourself. That’s what Jock Thomson did, and it’s just one of the reasons why he is one of my heroes.

  In December 1962, several months before I was accepted into the SAS, it was decided that the Regiment should be sent into Brunei in Borneo where an uprising against the ruling sultan had taken place. All SAS troopers had to attend weekly briefings that gave fairly detailed updates on what was happening in trouble spots around the world, so that we would have a reasonably good knowledge of where we were going and what to expect if we were suddenly shipped out somewhere. By the time we were due to go to Borneo, we’d had lots of ‘classroom’ time on the situation in Brunei.

  Borneo was, and still is, an island divided into four separate states: Sabah (formerly North Borneo) and Sarawak, which were previously under British rule but became independent states as part of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963; Brunei, which was a British protectorate; and the Indonesian province of Kalimantan, which occupies around two-thirds of the island. In the early 1960s, Indonesia’s President Sukarno declared his intention of creating a united South-East Asia, seeing himself as the head of an eastern superpower that would be rich in oil, rubber, minerals and other natural resources. Not all of his neighbours, however, were quite so keen to submit to Sukarno’s rule and when the idea of the Federation of Malaysia was proposed, Sukarno saw it as a clear threat to his long-term ambitions. In an effort to destabilize those nations intent on combining under the Malaysian banner, he encouraged internal subversion through a group known as the Clandestine Communist Organization (CCO). He also instigated a propaganda campaign aimed at creating fear and mistrust among the population in the region and bringing about the closure of British military bases. Brunei’s oil wealth and close links to Britain made the sultan a prime target to be overthrown as Sukarno escalated his campaign from one of subversion to outright insurrection. Although he categorically denied any involvement at the time, Sukarno’s armed forces secretly trained and equipped the North Kalimantan National Army (NKNA) which sponsored the revolt in Brunei. It would not have suited Sukarno’s plans for him to be seen openly supporting a revolution in a neighbouring state. For him to take his place at the head of the United States of South-East Asia, his image had to be that of a respectable politician and international statesman, not a warmonger.

  The Sultan of Brunei requested military assistance from Britain to help quell the rebellion and a detachment comprised of Gurkhas, Queen’s Own Highlanders and 42 Royal Marine Commando was dispatched from Singapore. Within a week, the revolution was over, although troops were still rooting out rebels in the Brunei jungles for many months. Sukarno, however, had not yet exhausted his clandestine military options. Sabah and Sarawak had already been infiltrated by Indonesian-backed insurgents, as had Brunei itself. They saw the isolated border police facilities as easy targets and on 12 April 1963 a force of around 35 rebels struck at the police post in the town of Tebedu. Of the few officers on duty at the time, one was killed and two wounded before the rebels looted the local market and fled across the border into Sarawak, whose territory surrounds Brunei. Prior to withdrawing from Tebedu ahead of the arrival of a force of Royal Marines, the rebels scattered propaganda leaflets claiming that the attack was the work of the NKNA, but it was strongly suspected that regular Indonesian soldiers were responsible.

  It had been hoped that Sarawak’s dense jungle terrain, lying as it does between Brunei and Kalimantan, might help to shield the sultanate from direct attacks. Instead, it gave the Indonesians all the cover they needed to launch incursions across the border into Brunei and the vast jungle proved almost impossible to police. Lieutenant-Colonel John Woodhouse, commanding the SAS squadron sent to Brunei, could clearly see how the experience developed by the Regiment in Malaya in the 1950s could be put to good use in this conflict. Major-General Walter Walker, commander of British Forces Borneo Territories (BFBT), was delighted to have the SAS unit at his disposal, initially believing that, with our helicopters and parachute ‘tree-jumping’ techniques, we could be used as a mobile strike force. What he didn’t
know was that none of us was happy about tree-jumping, not even Jock. We had to do at least two ordinary jumps every year to qualify for parachute pay and whenever the RAF instructor turned up to round us up for a day at Shobdon Airport, a few miles from our Hereford base, Jock was always first in the queue to volunteer to jump, he loved it so much. Tree-jumping, however, was another matter. The idea was that when you jumped into the jungle, your parachute would become entangled in the branches of the tallest trees and you would then cut yourself free and abseil down out of the tree. In practice, however, the parachute didn’t always become securely entangled, leaving you in a very precarious situation 200ft (61m) up a tree. There were many casualties sustained during tree-jumping escapades, with guys breaking their arms or legs when they hit the branches, so the practice was phased out almost as quickly as it had been dreamt up. Fortunately for us, Lieutenant-Colonel Woodhouse soon persuaded Walker that we would be far more valuable if deployed in a more subtle way. With only around 100 men at his disposal, including headquarters and logistical support, Woodhouse’s plan was to send out four-man teams to work with local tribesmen to monitor the known tracks and most likely routes the enemy would use to cross the border. With over 900 miles (1,448km) of border to cover, they would need all the help they could get and they would use the ‘hearts and minds’ policy that had worked to such great effect in Malaya to win the support of the locals.