SAS: Secret War in South East Asia

by Dickens, Peter;

  ‘SAS; don’t shoot.’ Shouted Elgenia.

  ‘Come out with your hands up … Now.’

  ‘Jesus!’

  The latter invocation was not part of the drill, but what else could they say? Even when Elgenia had left the river he would have presented the convincing image of a broken-down scarecrow. Now, when fouled from matted hair to ragged boots with nauseous slime, he was hardly recognizable as human, far less as the British soldier with unimpaired vigour and morale which he actually was.

  Not a hero, though, needless to say.

  ‘Oh they were glad to see me back, obviously, because I was part of the Regiment; they cared more than they said. I was concerned for the Regiment too; I’d been an embarrassment to Major Hardy and I felt a bloody idiot coming back without a weapon.’

  The Regiment, however, thought he had really done quite well; at any rate his name in it was made – Algy.

  Ten days later, Charlesworth took 30 men – including Elgenia, for his intimate knowledge of the country – to assess the effect of the raid on Sentas and its garrison, but they were frustrated by the river being flooded and impassable. Then, even as they were patrolling, the enemy showed that he had not been deterred from launching his incursion, by doing so from the next camp downriver, the SAS detecting many signs of it but being unable to intervene. It comprised about 70 men with CCO involvement, and nearly reached the Serian road before being checked and finally checkmated by helicopter-borne 2/7th Gurkhas in a series of bishop’s and knight’s moves that had by now been developed to a high skill. Few of the raiders returned to Kalimantan. The Gurkhas’ achievement was most satisfying to them and they did not mind being given the opportunity at all; though the SAS did, a bit.

  Now it was ‘B’ Squadron’s turn to leave Borneo as ‘A’ had done, wishing they could have had just one more try. But the moving finger had writ and they had to go; so after a final head-call, to ensure that nobody was still out looking for Batu Hitam, they went.

  CHAPTER 13

  ENVOI

  March to August 1966

  VICTORY IN BORNEO

  Not only did ‘B’ Squadron go, but nobody from 22 SAS came out to relieve them, the field being left to the Australian and New Zealand SAS. The Aden war was nearing its climax with the SAS heavily committed in souk and alleyway as well as desert, while in Borneo General Lea had reasons for hoping that Indonesia might be having second thoughts about Confrontation. Common sense certainly dictated that she should; if her chaotic economy were not reconstituted soon the communists might well take advantage of public disorder and rise again, and since she could not conceivably reconstitute it herself she must solicit aid from the west, which would not be given until she stopped behaving irresponsibly.

  Confrontation would, in any case, get Indonesia absolutely nowhere so long as the British stayed in Malaysia, though it was hard to determine whether that message was beginning to sink in. However, there now began a gruesome and appalling massacre of communists by the hundred thousand, a savage expression of the loathing invariably engendered by those misguided people, which signalled the removal of a major malign influence.

  Concurrently, Lea became aware of peace-feelers, surreptitious and tentative at first, but discernible. Despite incursions continuing – perhaps initiated by Indonesian blood-brothers of Nick Neill, or so as to save face and negotiate from strength – he ordered a halt to offensive operations as he had long wished to do. Cross-border reconnaissance to obtain warning of incursions continued, but the work was very hard with scant success because, as now became incontestably manifest, it was the deterrent effect of ‘Claret’ more than the British defences that had preserved Malaysian Borneo for many months.

  That was in March 1966. In April a second incursion came in towards Serian, one of the CCO’s strongest areas; but the Army and Police were well up to their jobs and there was no real danger. At the same time, peace noises became less muted and the Indonesian attitude almost conciliatory. Economic help was sought, and Britain was the first to offer it – the two countries, as may be recalled with a wrench of the mind, never having been other than at ‘peace’ with each other. Signs of change were evident in the field too; an SAS patrol watching an Indonesian base-camp found that the troops had left, to the delight of the villagers who invited the Australians inside to heal the sick and be entertained, a happy and fulfilling consummation for all the SAS Regiments.

  May, however, brought yet another incursion, near Bareo, and truly it was an anxious time for commanders and men on the border, though they always succeeded in containing the raids; but General Lea with his ear to the ground did not re-start ‘Claret’, and in an act of sublime courage announced that the troops would be home for Christmas. Later in the month Indonesia made a direct approach to Malaysia and a meeting was staged: the result became known as the ‘Bangkok Accord’, although it did not resolve all the differences or stop incursions which persisted even during the talking. Leisurely face-saving negotiations continued in June, still accompanied by incursions, and it even began to seem that a serious attempt might be made to infiltrate Brunei and leave a force there after the peace. But at last direct visits were exchanged between the antagonists, and an Indonesian mission was established in Kuala Lumpur; it was led by none other than Colonel Moerdani, whose life had been spared by Large and was now put to good use. On 11 August 1966 peace was declared.

  Victory was total. Not the sort in which the enemy is smashed to smithereens and then ground to pulp, but the better kind that all wars ought to aim for, whereby one’s objectives are limited to those that are truly vital, the force used is adequate to ensure success but not excessive, de-escalation is pursued whenever possible, and propaganda is based on truth and never strident; so that when the day is won the least physical and mental damage has been caused and friendship can be renewed with the fewest hard feelings. The vital achievement was Malaysia’s complete independence of Indonesia – even to the extent of retaining British bases or not as she chose (which she did). Friendship revived almost overnight. That was greatly helped by a change of government, for Soekarno had at last been toppled by Suharto, and although the latter had been as keen as anyone to crush Malaysia when the going seemed good he could now put the blame on the old reprobate.

  General Lea assesses Confrontation as a serious attempt to dominate the tip of Asia and the islands – Maphilindo – in line with Indonesia’s ancient empire. ‘Tactically, she tried to do it by armed subversion and infiltration to establish cells of terrorists and saboteurs, while strategically she built up considerable forces and threatened to use them. Such activity amounts not merely to an internal security problem: it is Aggression. It was beaten by reacting promptly and very firmly, by matching their strategic threat with Navy, Army and Air Force, and by inflicting disproportionate casualties until Indonesia was convinced that her aim of crushing Malaysia was unattainable.

  ‘Success therefore was first and foremost a military one. It has been argued that the new regime in Djakarta coupled with the parlous Indonesian economy brought about the Bangkok Accord; those were certainly important factors, but the significance of our military contribution can best be judged by asking what would have happened if we had not given it. There can be no doubt that Borneo certainly and Malaya possibly would now be under the complete control of the Indonesians.

  ‘Many voices were raised in favour of what was called a political solution, believing there could be no valid military one. This was dangerous muddled thinking because it posed a political solution as an alternative to a military, whereas in fact the two were complimentary. Peace follows war. When one side seeks a solution by force it has to be convinced by force that it can’t succeed, and only then does a political settlement become possible. But side by side with military action it is very important to remove the economic, political or sociological causes of discontent on which subversion flourishes; though, again, in order to do so you must provide a basis of security so that the police, admini
strators and ordinary people can go about their business without fear.’

  Military action, however, can vary greatly depending on who takes it, the British approach being encapsulated in Lea’s tribute to his men: ‘Morale was so high you could positively feel it. Partly from pride in a high degree of professional skill and achievement, but also from a sense of purpose. To ensure that the ordinary village dweller could choose his own way of life, poor and primitive though that might be, without living in fear of having his throat cut was a job supremely worth doing.’

  What then was the butcher’s bill, those ‘disproportionate casualties’ that proved so decisive? British and Commonwealth troops, 114 killed and 181 wounded; Malaysian civilians, 36 killed, 53 wounded and 4 captured; Indonesian troops, 590 killed and 222 wounded for certain – so the number must be increased by those who could not be counted, especially across the border, but probably not greatly as the narrative indicates, and 771 captured of whom none was tortured or murdered. For Lea they were too many; but as the price of a nation’s very existence against a huge adversary they were so slight as to be scarcely credible. Even the British offensive operations saved enemy lives, for he could not then mount his own incursions, which usually cost him far dearer than ‘Claret’ strikes.

  When Denis Healey rose in the House of Commons to set the seal on Borneo and close the file, he spoke both as the Secretary of State for Defence who had presided over the triumph and a deeply read scholar: ‘When the House thinks of the tragedy that could have fallen on a whole corner of a continent if we had not been able to hold the situation and bring it to a successful termination, it will appreciate that in the history books it will be recorded as one of the most efficient uses of military force in the history of the world.’

  ‘D’ Squadron had returned to Borneo in July but were not invited to the peace celebrations in Kuching. They and other units were not even allowed to stay in the capital so that the victory would seem to have been Malaysian with just the occasional help from Britain. In fact, the Malay Regiment from the mainland only hit the headlines twice: once when they were trounced at Kalabakan in 1963 and now when they strutted like conquerors among those they treated as inferior rustic colonials, provoking disturbances until confined to barracks.

  The Malaysians’ desire to run their own country was understandable but their method ungracious, and the SAS, banished to the Island, ‘got a bit uptight’ as one of them reported. ‘But then we said to hell with it if that’s the way they want it…’ and went about their business tidying up a few loose ends. Jonathan Mackay-Lewis watched a house on the Serian Road for a CCO suspect, a Chinese girl, until locals started to cut down the ferns where he and his patrol were hiding. They stood up, smiled politely and withdrew, de-escalating the confrontation. Mostly, however, the Squadron led what they called a lotus-eating existence by which they meant filling their time constructively with hard training in jungle-craft, boatwork and, predictably, demolition.

  They left Borneo along with all the British forces well before Christmas, relinquishing the Haunted House to which the ghost then returned; she was certainly there in 1978, when our driver was visibly uneasy at visiting the place and covered his tracks afterwards with wraith-repellent herbs in his windows, The Ibans, Land Dyaks, Muruts, Kelabits, Punans and the rest were turned over to the Malays under whom they prospered, if not exceedingly then rather better than they would have done under the Indonesians, or the communists.

  THE FRONTIERSMEN

  Can we ever fully understand men such as the SAS with their love of danger and compulsive yearning to attempt the impossible? Yet what is strange in laying hold of our brief span of life and living it to the full? In welcoming stress as a spur and overcoming its anxiety by achievement? In performing a service vital to humanity and enjoying it? Is it not far stranger to imagine that we can escape anxiety by avoiding stress or by taking pills, or that accepting our needs from others and working as little as possible for inflated wages will give us any satisfaction at all?

  The SAS strive to attain skills and an endurance of hardship unlimited in degree for good practical reasons. The frontier, of its nature, is harsh, hostile and lonely; just reaching it and living there is daunting enough even before any task is attempted. Then, the SAS must be better fighters than their enemy without knowing in advance how good he will be, and only by keeping a jump ahead will they be able to surprise him by doing something he thinks impossible. The SAS go always a little further not just for the challenge but because they have to, and although a large unit can carry some individual weakness if the leaven is good, every man in a tiny SAS patrol must possess all the qualities.

  The relentless pursuit of excellence is only possible for men who want to do it above all else, the least reservation reducing the standard. When Alf Tasker said, ‘If you’re fighting for your life with a fifty-fifty chance you’ve got to enjoy it’, he surely meant that if your heart is not really in it the odds against you will shorten. One SAS wife describes their dedication – to adventure, the Regiment; and the nation – as ‘radiant’, a particularly revealing insight, since it contains no hint of jealousy; perhaps she knows she is secure in accepting the old warrior-lover’s confession ‘I could not love thee, dear, so much, lov’d I not honour more’. Such motivation is rare; though an enemy may well possess it, too, however evil we believe his cause to be, and we are lucky to have the SAS in our service to do vitally important and dangerous things that we cannot do for ourselves.

  What of the risks though? The SAS do not want to die young any more than we do, and, by means of painstaking professionalism, they have every chance of merely fading away after many years as old soldiers should. The sad loss of James Condon, ‘Buddha’ Bexton and Billy White must be seen against the corollary that all the others in their patrols ought logically to have gone the same way, and that those three with Lillico and Thomson were all the SAS casualties by enemy action in a major campaign lasting over three years.

  The frontier on which the SAS operate is, firstly, the dividing line between civilization and barbarism, and to think that it has little significance for us because our peaceful life is an immutable natural order is dangerous. Wherever there is civilization, some barbarian will batter at its gates to plunder and enslave it, and we can only enjoy it if some of us are prepared to go out there and keep him at bay. It behoves us therefore to value our armed forces when times are quiet or the frontier is as far away as Borneo or the Falklands, aware that without them it could come closer and our friends be abandoned, to our shame as well as our disadvantage.

  There is no law on the frontier. That is its second essence: no friendly policemen are on call and disputes are settled by bullets not judges, so that those who go there have no choice but to use force. Like so many cherished principles, the sanctity of human life is found in practice to depend on circumstances. Killing is sometimes justifiable even where law holds sway, and on the frontier it may be the only means of life and achievement. Its morality lies in ensuring that it is done in the name of civilization and that there is no less drastic alternative, which the British soldier does, with intelligence and deep concern. The mental effort and self-discipline he needs to master – or forego – the use of force in circumstances where most brains would seize solid with terror was well illustrated in Borneo, and to dismiss him as an unthinking man of violence is either naïve or wicked.

  Our soldiers, sailors and airmen serve the community to a degree equalled by few, since they willingly put their lives at risk to do so. More important still is their contribution to civilization itself, which is simply stated: it could not exist without them; and easily understood by those who have not shut their minds to understanding it. What may be harder to grasp is that they, understanding it well and accepting their awesome responsibility, are themselves highly civilized, deserving our support, our thanks, and – why not? – our hearts.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  BOOKS

  Carver, M. War Since 1945. We
idenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1980

  Geraghty, T. Who Dares Wins: The Story of the Special Air Service, 1950–1980. Arms and Armour Press, London, 1980

  —— This is the SAS. Arms and Armour Press, London, 1982

  James, H. D. and Sheil-Small, D. The Undeclared War: The Story of the Indonesian Confrontation 1962–1966. Leo Cooper, London, 1971

  —— A Pride of Gurkhas: 2nd King Edward VII’s Own Goorkhas (The Sirmoor Rifles) 1948–1971. Leo Cooper, London, 1975

  Mackie, J. A. C. Konfrontasi. Oxford University Press, 1974

  Mackinnon, J. Borneo. Time-Life International, 1975

  Pocock, T. Fighting General: The Public and Private Campaigns of General Sir Walter Walker. Collins, London, 1973

  Warner, P. The Special Air Service. William Kimber, London, 1971

  ARTICLES

  Bramill, Lieutenant-Colonel E. W. N. ‘Reflections on Borneo’. The Infantryman, November 1967

  Collins, Lieutenant-Colonel P. E. (Commander Army Aviation Borneo) ‘The Front was Everywhere’. RUSI Journal, May 1967

  Eley, Wing Commander D. L. ‘Helicopters in Malaysia’. RAF Quarterly, 1966

  Ferry, Major J. P. ‘Full Employment’. Journal of the Royal Artillery, 1965

  Fillingham, Lieutenant-Colonel J. A. I. ‘Operations in Sarawak’. (2/10th Gurkha Rifles) British Army Review, 1965

  Foxley-Norris, Air Vice-Marshal C. N. ‘Air Aspects of Operations Against Confrontation’. Brassey’s Annual, 1967

  Lyon, Lieutenant-Colonel R. ‘Borneo Reflections’. Royal Artillery Journal, 1966