by Shaun Clarke
‘It’s fucking tension,’ Alf explained, not joking any more. ‘It’s doing everything for nothing. We yomp through the fucking ulu, we wade through the fucking swamps, we get eaten alive by mosquitoes and midges and tormented by flies – and what’s it all for? You don’t see a thing out there. You hear nothing but the fucking birds. You keep looking over your shoulder for an enemy that isn’t there and you start wanting to shoot your best friend just for something to do. Then you come back here. You’re stuck in this fucking longhouse. There are more flies and midges and mosquitoes, plus the stench of your own shit and piss coming up through the floorboards. This is life in the raw in the fucking jungle and it’s driving me crackers.’
While the hearts-and-minds campaign was not without interest, living on their own just outside the kampong in their own, now crowded, fetid longhouse was both uncomfortable and boring, making each man feel increasingly alienated from himself, forcing him back into his private thoughts and making him dwell on the past.
Being in the jungle reminded Alf of his two trips to Malaya, first in 1953 with the regular Army and then five years later with the SAS. Born in Birkenhead, one of the five children of publicans who worked night and day, Alf felt at home as one of a large group and had therefore taken naturally to the Army. Destined for National Service anyway, he had decided that enlisting would give him certain advantages and, true enough, his first posting overseas, to Butterworth, Malaya, had turned out to be the best experience he had ever had. Depressed when his tour of duty was over, he had signed on for the newly re-formed SAS, gained his winged badge, and soon found himself back in Malaya, this time fighting the communist terrorists in the jungle. Having survived that experience, he was flown back with the others to England, then seconded to the US special forces for advanced medical training in America. He had enjoyed that period, but, for all his moaning, preferred being back in the jungle with his best friend, Pete Welsh, by his side.
Pete was thinking pretty much the same thing. In fact, ever since arriving he had found himself thinking repeatedly of how, when he had first joined the SAS, he had had a chip on his shoulder the size of the Rock of Gibraltar and nearly been thrown out of the regiment because of it. An illegitimate child, he had been raised in London’s Finsbury Park by an lone, alcoholic mother who earned her crust as a prostitute and took her revenge out on men by beating her only child, Pete, badly throughout most of his childhood. Joining the Army to escape her, Pete had been trained as an explosives expert and posted to No 101 Special Training School, Singapore. From there he transferred to the 3rd Corps where, with other sappers, he harassed the Japanese by blowing up railways and bridges of strategic importance. He then joined the SAS, and served in Malaya.
Though an excellent soldier, Pete had still got a chip on his shoulder at that time. He only lost it when, in the Telok Anson swamp, actually planning to indirectly kill a fellow trooper who had humiliated him, he realized what he was doing and saved the man’s life instead.
Rather like Pete, Dead-eye had joined the Army to escape life at home and had found there a new pride and confidence. Born and bred in West Croydon to a violent lorry driver and a brow-beaten mother, Dead-eye had grown up to be a relatively withdrawn individual, but he had gone even more deeply into himself after witnessing Sergeant Lorrimer’s death. Posted to the 2nd Battalion, Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, where his prowess on the firing range soon became a talking point, he realized that he loved being a soldier but wanted an even greater challenge. This led him to apply for a transfer to the SAS when it was re-formed to combat the Emergency in Malaya. He had met Lorrimer there.
Dead-eye had respected Lorrimer more than any other man he had ever known. A veteran of World War Two, a former member of the legendary Long Range Desert Group and the original 1 SAS, also in North Africa, as well as Force 136 – the clandestine resistance unit set up by the British Special Operations Executive (SOE) during World War Two for operations in Japanese-occupied Malaya – then again with the SAS in Malaya during the Emergency, Lorrimer was a legendary old hand who had taught Dead-eye everything he now knew. They had often spent weeks together in the jungle, fighting the CTs with a deadly combination of the Browning autoloader shotgun, the 0.3-inch M1 carbine, No 80 white-phosphorus incendiary hand-grenades, home-made bombs, and even, when silent killing was necessary, with their Fairburn-Sykes commando knives or a crossbow. That had been one of the greatest experiences of Dead-eye’s life to date, cementing his friendship with Lorrimer for all time.
Now, in this jungle in Borneo, which was strikingly similar to the jungles of Malaya, Dead-eye was recalling his old friend with particular, deeply wounding clarity. Only work could assuage his pain.
Luckily, the work was plentiful. Once the Gurkhas, Royal Marine Commandos, British Army and other D Squadron, SAS, personnel had moved into the kampong and completed its fortification, the smaller SAS patrols were able to move deeper into the jungle on R & I missions. Eventually, when four villagers who were clearing another landing zone for the SF helicopters were shot by a passing Indonesian or CCO patrol – no evidence of their identity was left behind – which led to the other Ibans becoming more fearful and less cooperative than they had been, Major Callaghan decided to send patrols even deeper into the ulu to seek out the enemy and, if necessary, engage with them.
Often augmented by one or two members of the local Police Field Force, these teams made circular tours of the area, some lasting up to five days and including visits to many other kampongs en route. Before moving out, the men painted their weapons with quick-drying green camouflage paint, then wrapped them in strips of cloth specially dyed to match the jungle background and disguise their distinctive shape. In both instances, the men were particularly careful not to let the paint or strips of cloth interfere with the weapons’ working parts or sights. After wrapping masking tape around the butts, pistol grips and top covers, they replaced the noisy sling swivels with para-cord, which made no sound at all.
Once the weapons were disguised, they camouflaged themselves, applying ‘cam’ cream and black ‘stick’ camouflage to the exposed areas of their skin, including the backs of their hands, and their wrists, ears and neck. The facial camouflage was applied in three stages: first dulling the features with a thin base coating diluted with water (they would use their own saliva when in the jungle); then making diagonal patterns across the face to break up the shape and outline of the features; and finally darkening the areas normally highlighted, such as forehead, nose, cheek bones and chin. To complete this effect, areas normally in shadow were left a lighter shade.
When applying personal camouflage the patrol members paired up to check each other’s appearance and ensure that nothing had been missed.
‘You look beautiful,’ Pete said.
‘Not as lovely as you,’ Alf said.
‘You’re just saying that to make me blush, but I think you’re sweet anyway.’
‘Terry looks sweet,’ Alf said.
‘And he’s blushing,’ Pete noted. ‘Pay a virgin a compliment and she’ll blush. It’s just one of those things.’
‘I’m not blushing,’ Terry said.
‘Yes, you are,’ Pete replied. ‘We just can’t see it because of the cam cream, but you’re blushing, I’ll bet.’
‘Just shove off,’ Terry said.
‘He’s so bad-tempered,’ Alf told Pete, looking deeply, seriously wounded. ‘He’s a virgin, so you try to be gentle and that’s how he behaves. What’s the world coming to?’
‘Just knock it off,’ Terry said. ‘Go and look in the mirror and get excited and have a good wank. It’s all you’re fit for.’
‘What a foul mouth!’ Alf said.
They moved out on patrol, relieved just to get out, each carrying a bergen packed with enough food and water to last a minimum of five days, each carrying his own personal weapons, including their semi-automatic rifle, commando knife and parang, the latter used to hack a path through the dense, often lacerating, undergrowth
. Like kampong policemen, they moved on foot. Unlike kampong policemen, they moved unobtrusively, in single file, the lead scout of the patrol followed by the commander and his radio operator, with a gun carrier at the rear playing Tail-end Charlie.
When Dead-eye went out with his three chosen men – Pete, Alf and Terry – as well as three Ibans and five constables from the Police Field Force, they found only signs that some Muruts had been hunting there. Leaving the three tribesmen and the five Police Field Force constables to construct a thatch-and-bamboo observation post overlooking a winding path through the ulu, which they suspected was an Indonesian supply route, Dead-eye and his three SAS men tracked down the Muruts just for the practice. A few hours later, they found them in a jungle hide where they were lying up with their blowpipes and dead pigs scattered around them, eating jarit and getting drunk on tapai. Being friendly, hardworking people who had taken to the British presence in the ulu, they invited the SAS men to join them. The subsequent socializing went on for three days, as to leave early would have been impolite. During that time, while the men forced down the vile food and became increasingly lightheaded from the alcohol, they picked the brains of the Muruts and learnt a lot about Indonesian and CCO troop movements. Though drunk more often than not, Dead-eye managed to keep his head enough to jot down everything he was hearing.
When, at last, the Muruts moved on, the SAS men felt as if they had been poleaxed. Nevertheless, they made their way back to the rest of the group, who were worried that they had been ambushed by the Indonesians or the CCO.
Returning from the mission, the men, led by Dead-eye, learnt that the threat they had been instilling in the natives was real enough. That very day a force of thirty guerrillas had surrounded the police station at the border town of Tebedu in West Sarawak. After a brisk battle in which a police corporal was killed and two others wounded, the raiders had looted the bazaar. When the news reached the local military HQ, a troop of Royal Marine Commandos was sent to the scene, but the raiders had already disappeared back into the ulu, leaving leaflets which stated that the action was a continuation of the earlier revolt in Brunei.
Because of this surprise attack, Major Callaghan ordered all his four-man SAS teams in the area to dig in where they were and await further instructions.
‘That’s it,’ Dead-eye said with no attempt to conceal his pleasure. ‘The hearts-and-minds campaign has come to an end. The real war is beginning.’
4
With his SAS patrols dug in over a broad defensive arc, Major Callaghan began sending out more ambitious patrols, trying to track down the infiltrators and put a stop to them. To give Dead-eye more experience, Callaghan placed him in a patrol with Sanderson as his second in command and including Pete Welsh and Alf Laughton, as well as the new man, Terry Malkin, and the same three Ibans they had used before. The patrol was to hike into the high jungle hills of the Pueh Range, which had a peak of nearly 5000 feet and was believed to be a favourite route for CCO agents infiltrating through the jungle to reach Lundu, where the police Special Branch knew a number of communist cells were active.
‘Your purpose,’ Callaghan informed them, ‘is to explore along the mountain range and back down to the lowlands, to locate the CCO forward base used by those terrorists being infiltrated from Kalimantan. It’s in a place called – so the Special Branch believes – Batu Hitam, or Black Rock. A nice, simple job, lads.’
‘I’ll bet,’ Terry murmured.
For this patrol they had to avoid kampongs and any contact with local people, so they carried in their bergens all they might need for two weeks in the ulu. This, however, had been limited to 50lb since an excessively heavy bergen in tropical heat could overtax the strength of even an SAS trooper. Their rations would provide only 3500 calories a day (or as little as 2000 for those who chose to make the standard fourteen-day pack last twenty-one days), to save weight in their bergens. Yet to stay fully fit on such active patrols a man needs 5000 calories per day.
‘We’ve lost so much weight already,’ Alf observed, ‘we’ll probably look like ghosts when we get back, after these bloody rations.’
‘And nothing from Fortnum and Mason’s,’ Pete complained. ‘That’s been reserved for the Ibans.’
‘Complain to your squadron commander,’ Dead-eye told them. ‘Now shut up and let’s hump it.’
Before moving out, each man smeared his face and other exposed skin with the usual ‘cam’ cream and black ‘stick’ camouflage. Their clothing consisted of a long-sleeved shirt and lightweight trousers tucked into gaiters above standard-issue boots, which had moulded composition soles, cunningly doctored to leave the pattern of an Indonesian, rather than a British, footprint on the jungle floor. They also wore a soft, long-peaked, close-fitting cap or the ‘floppy’ hat that was standard Army issue, with only a yellow band sewn in the lining as a recognition sign to friendly forces when the hat was put on inside out.
‘Just imagine,’ Alf said sarcastically. ‘You’re hiking through the jungle, leaving Indonesian boot marks instead of British, so you’re tailed by a couple of your own men. You see them coming up on you, Armalites blazing, so you turn your fucking hat inside out and hope for the best. Some fucking hope!’
Their personal weapons – mainly the 7.62mm Armalite, but with Sanderson carrying his usual 7.62mm SLR and Terry given an M16 5.56mm assault rifle – were also camouflaged with strips of cloth dyed to match the jungle. When Pete held his camouflaged Armalite up to his ‘cam’-painted face, the match was perfect.
‘The fucking Black and White Minstrel Show,’ Alf said. ‘Let’s all sing Swanee!’
Already feeling heavily burdened, Terry was weighed down even more with the PRC 320 Clansman radio, weighing 11 ½lb, which he carried on his back, allowing him the use of both arms. The Clansman had a hand generator system, an alternate, or emergency, rechargeable nickel-cadmium battery, and a sky-wave facility of 30–1200 miles, with a ground-wave range of over 25 miles. It could also be operated by remote control from a distance of up to two miles.
‘That’s a damned good radio,’ Pete told Terry, ‘if a bit on the heavy side.’
‘Right,’ Terry said.
‘The last man we had humping that fucking thing,’ Alf contributed, ‘collapsed after a four-hour hike with a heart attack. Went down like a log, he did.’
‘Thanks a lot,’ Terry said.
‘He was older than you, though,’ Pete said.
‘By two years,’ Alf added.
‘Won a silver cup for running,’ Pete said, ‘but that bloody radio did him in.’
‘If I’d wanted Morecambe and Wise,’ Terry said, ‘I’d have asked the BBC. Let’s just call it a day, guys.’
‘Such spirit!’ Alf sang.
The patrol was escorted by five Police Field Force scouts as far as the border, which ran north-south along the mountain ridge. There the men moved out on their own, striking west from the border, heading into Indonesian jungle where they could as easily be ambushed as ambush an Indonesian patrol.
Within minutes of hiking into the dense jungle of the mountain range, Terry again experienced that oppressive awareness of vast silence combined with a chilling absence of colour and light. Mercifully, as they were already high in the hills, they had no swamps to brave, but almost as frightening to him were the many aerial walkways that swayed in the wind high above the gorges where, in the dizzying depths, streams wound, often violently over sharp rocks, between the high, muddy walls.
The aerial walkways were like miniature suspension bridges, but made of bamboo instead of steel. The walkway itself was constructed from only three lengths of thick bamboo, wide enough to span the gorge and laid down side by side to form a dangerously narrow path. The gaps in the bamboo uprights on either side of the walkway were three to four feet wide, with other lengths of bamboo running along them to be used as handrails.
Treading along the walkway, holding onto to the bamboo handrails on either side, a man was exposed to the full force of the wind
blowing along the gorge. This was only made worse by the wide spaces between the uprights, which forced him to look down on the frightening, dizzying drop on either side. Nor could he ignore the constant, sickening swaying of the wind-blown walkway, often suspended a good hundred feet or more above the torrential river sweeping through the narrow gorge on a bed of sharp stones. There was no way to survive such a fall and all the men knew it.
Crossing the walkways was a stomach-churning experience and there were many to cross in the mountain range. Immensely relieved each time they stepped off a creaking, swaying aerial walkway, the men were then faced with yet another steep climb through the dense, often impenetrable undergrowth on the face of the steep hills. Their aching, forward advance often involved hacking away the undergrowth with their parangs, a task rendered even more difficult and dangerous by the steep fall of the hills, the loose soil underfoot and the lack of something to cling to if they slipped, since many of the branches were covered with sharp spikes and razor-edged palm leaves. The men therefore often slipped back, even fell and rolled down, while desperately trying to keep the blade of the parang away from their face and hands as they reached desperately for a hold on something that would stop them from rolling further.
All of this was made even more frustrating by the almost suffocating humidity, the sweat dripping constantly in their eyes, and the usual swarms of bloated flies and mosquitoes which frenziedly tried to feed off the sweat. They were also faced with a disturbing number of snakes, some venomous, which slept coiled around branches or slithered across the jungle paths, often hidden under the leaves on the ground, appearing as long, narrow mounds that moved magically forward while curving sinuously from left to right. Also, spiders and stinging ants often fell on them when the branches of trees were shaken accidentally.
