Winds of Destruction

by Peter John Hornby Petter-Bowyer

  At the same time an impending multi-party conference in London was making world headlines; but President Machel of Mozambique saw some danger to ZANU’s position if the talks took place. He turned his full attention therefore to assisting ZANLA push for an early outright military victory. To achieve this meant cutting Rhodesia’s road and rail links to South Africa and countering ZIPRA’s limited encroachment into southern Matabeleland.

  More radio-equipped FRELIMO forces were added to those that had been operating inside Rhodesia for some time and some elements had even penetrated into ZIPRA areas. Externally, FRELIMO forces deployed along the well—established communication lines through Gaza Province from the coast to the Rhodesian border were now given instructions to strengthen their bases and give maximum support to ZANLA. By mid-August ZANLA was receiving overt assistance to the extent that they had become fully integrated with FRELIMO in their bases, defences, and transport systems. With over 15,000 trained CTs poised to move through Gaza, the dangers to Rhodesia were escalating rapidly.

  This situation meant that any actions we took in Gaza would involve deliberate confrontation with FRELIMO, which until now had been avoided wherever possible. Now, however, the FRELIMO Government’s undiluted involvement with Mugabe’s ZANU party brought about a substantial change in political thinking. Major economic targets, which had hitherto been safeguarded by ‘political considerations’, no longer enjoyed such protection. This was all possible because of new thinking by the black government of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia and changed attitudes within the SA Government.

  In COMOPS there was little to ponder on how to stem the impending flood. Norman Walsh’s operational plans, shelved for ‘political reasons’ in 1977, had to be put into urgent effect. They involved in-depth destruction of road and rail communications, specifically bridges, and first priority was given to Gaza Province.

  Whereas the railway had already been put out of commission by the Scouts and SAS in numerous short-duration operations, FRELIMO had not been neutralised—quite the opposite. They had in fact acquired considerable combat experience and determination in countering RSF forays against their ZANLA brothers. They had also put together sufficient road transport to fully compensate for the loss of rail transport.

  In particular, FRELIMO had been given so much breathing space between operations that they had been able, with considerable assistance from Russian advisors, to build up a formidable military base at Mapai incorporating heavy ground and counter-air defence networks. In addition they had installed defensive positions around all strategic and economic key-points. All in all this made a job that might have been a cakewalk two years earlier complicated and extremely dangerous.

  The first phase in this operation was to cut the transport line running from the Aldeia da Barragem road-rail bridge that formed part of the Limpopo River irrigation system all the way northwestward to our border. It involved cutting the huge Barragem bridge plus four lesser ones, mining main and secondary roads and destroying all transport north of the Limpopo. Equal in importance to destroying ground communications was the destruction of Mapai itself. This was considered essential to drive FRELIMO out of Gaza and force ZANLA into adopting the safer northern routes through Mozambique that would channel them through hilly terrain best suited to Selous Scouts and Fireforce operations.

  There was some division in COMOPS thinking concerning operational priorities and actions to be taken in Operation Uric. Together with Brigadier Peter Rich and Brian Robinson, I saw Mapai as the key target around which to focus all other operations. Air Commodore Walsh supported this line of thinking, though he had no direct say in the ground planning.

  The SAS, RLI and Army Engineers were earmarked for the destruction of bridges and mining of roads, so we recommended that a strong Selous Scouts vehicle-borne force with Air Force jet support should move on Mapai at least three days ahead of these actions. The object was not to attack Mapai directly but to subject it to siege and harassment to soften up and hem in the garrison force. We knew this force relied heavily on daily supplies of road-transported water, a commodity that was very scarce in that arid area. So denial of water would be the Scouts’ prime objective.

  The planning sessions became somewhat heated and were incomplete when Op Uric was launched prematurely. This became necessary when an agreed date for the commencement of an all-parties conference at Lancaster House in London was suddenly thrust upon us. It was less than two weeks away.

  Mapai comprised the old railway town in bottom right-hand corner and the large base area nearby. The nearest available water can be seen in the shallow pan at top left side.

  Because of the political time factor, General Walls hurriedly ruled out Mapai, as he believed destruction of communications had to take first priority and, if successful, this would effectively force Mapai’s collapse. He also wanted to ensure that all air support would be available to the SAS, RLI and Engineers operations.

  On D-Day minus one, 1 September 1979, fuel, explosives, ammunition and most participating troops were parachuted into the forward Admin Base located in remote ground 200 kilometres inside Gaza. Then, on D-Day, a heavy guti (low cloud with heavy drizzle) came down, forcing a postponement. Luckily the miserable weather only lasted one day instead of the usual three days.

  Mapai knew something was afoot and sent out many armed patrols to seek out the Rhodesian forces they knew were active somewhere to their east. They had no idea how many Rhodesian soldiers were there or what their mission was.

  On D-Day, now 3 September, a helicopter force comprising SAAF Pumas (thanks to the South African Government favouring Prime Minister Muzorewa) with five Cheetahs and twenty-four G-Cars left Rhodesia at first light. They all had full fuel tanks to avoid having to refuel at the Admin Base before uplifting troops to their assigned targets. Whereas all the Rhodesians were functioning under the codename Operation Uric, the SAAF participation was titled Operation Bootlace. This was to reduce the risk of being accused by the international community of joint involvement with Zimbabwe-Rhodesia.

  The helicopters were still approaching the Admin Base when a FRELIMO patrol comprising twenty-four men happened upon the base. In a sharp exchange twenty-two FRELIMO lay dead. Another was captured wounded but one managed to escape.

  What with the delay due to weather, Lancaster House talks only seven days away and discovery of the Admin Base, General Walls was in a bit of a quandary. He was flying in the Command Dakota with Air Commodore Walsh and staff. Time had become more critical and some operational adjustments had to be made on the run.

  SAS made up the largest component of the ground force and were flown to the huge Aldeia da Barragem target just 150 kilometres northwest of Maputo. They landed under cover of Hunter strikes against the main FRELIMO defences. Thereafter, the SAS fought through the surviving elements of the enemy force, capturing a couple of heavy anti-aircraft guns that they later put to good use. One SAS soldier was wounded during multiple encounters and a Cheetah was called forward from a secondary refuelling point just six minutes’ flying time to the north of target.

  As Flight Lieutenant Dick Paxton approached for the casevac he was inadvertently routed over a FRELIMO strong point and suffered a direct hit from a missile that exploded on the main rotor gearbox. In the ensuing uncontrolled crash, technician Aircraftsman Alexander Wesson was killed outright. Dick was injured but was extremely lucky to be dragged from the wreckage by a very brave SAS Sergeant, Flash Smythe, before burning fuel engulfed and consumed the Cheetah.

  By late afternoon, the SAS had completed the difficult and stressful task of setting up the charges on the road and rail bridges. Charges had also been set on at least one of the four irrigation canals’ sluice gates. Having detonated these charges, the SAS team was to hold its position until next day to confirm that both bridges were wrecked before their planned extraction.

  Surprisingly, the forces at the other four bridges had been unopposed. They completed their work, confirmed their bridges destroyed, knoc
ked hell out of all enemy transport in their immediate areas, and then flew back to the Admin Base—as intended. RLI mine-laying teams worked throughout the day along main and secondary routes.

  Back at COMOPS we thought everything was running to plan. But as night fell, we learned that the SAS Barragem force and most of the RLI mine-laying teams were being recovered to the Admin. Base. This struck us as very strange indeed because they should have been on their tasks until at least the end of D-Day plus 1.

  The reason for the withdrawals came as a real shock. General Walls had decided to change direction and attack Mapai. We could not understand our commander’s thinking. All along it had been agreed that conventionally defended Mapai was too strong a target to take on directly; hence the inclusion of Selous Scouts during initial planning. A prolonged period of softening and harassment had been considered of paramount importance to demoralise and weaken the defenders. But now a small force of just 200 men, mentally unprepared and armed only with light infantry weapons, was under orders to attack a much, much larger fresh force that was alert, dug-in and armed with vastly superior weapons.

  The Air Force, having at most eight available Hunters and five Canberras, could not possibly hold a cab-rank to provide the ground troops with ‘on call’ heavy support. Most of the time the aircraft would be out of the area—a frightening thought indeed. There was absolutely nothing we could do about this in COMOPS other than hope and pray that General Walls knew something that we did not.

  As it happened our mutually expressed fears were well founded. The nightmare that followed next day started off with the downing of a SAAF Puma well short of Mapai itself. An RPG rocket exploded behind Captain P.D. Velleman instantly killing him and his crewmen, Lieutenant N.D. Osborne and Sergeant D.W.M. Retief. There was no hope for the twelve Rhodesian soldiers aboard as the helicopter smashed through trees and broke up in a line of flaming wreckage.

  The only casualty I knew well was the Army engineer Captain Charlie Small whom I had worked with on projects of mutual interest to Air Force and Army. Before his death he had played a big part in preparing the SAS for the intense bridge demolition work yet to come.

  Hunters and Canberras struck and re-struck Mapai before ground forces, now depleted by 6%, landed near the target. From the outset it was clear that FRELIMO was too well established to simply pack up and run. Close-quarter contacts in the face of intense enemy fire from every conceivable type and calibre of weapon proved the Rhodesian troops’ abilities to cope with heavy enemy fire, but the target was just too large and complicated to be quickly overrun by such a small force armed only with light infantry weapons.

  The intensity of anti-aircraft fire directed at attacking jets amazed even the most battle-hardened soldiers. Equally amazing, and extremely discomforting, was that these heavy weapons were turned against the troops whenever the jets were not around.

  General Walls soon realised that Mapai could not be taken without committing the troops to a long period of sleepless close-quarter combat—possibly another three days. However, the inevitability of unacceptably heavy Rhodesian casualties forced him to decide on a withdrawal—not a pleasant situation for Rhodesia’s top general. Just another command cock-up in the endless list of failures by senior British generals! By nightfall the Mapai force was back in Rhodesia. The next day, remaining RLI mine-laying teams were collected and the Admin. Base was wrapped up.

  Op Uric had fallen short of its primary aim of denying FRELIMO and ZANLA easy access through Gaza. One reason for this was that the road bridge over the irrigation barrage had not been rendered totally unusable because the engineers who built it had laid greater quantities of steel reinforcing than was revealed in the design plans. Had the SAS remained on target, as originally planned, they would have finished the job. The second reason was that the Hunters, wholly occupied in supporting the ground force at Mapai, had not been given opportunity to destroy vehicles trapped between the downed bridges.

  This was the first occasion the RSF had failed to overrun the enemy. It was an issue that dampened spirits even more than knowing that our Government was about to face difficult times in their talks, commencing 10 September, with the devious Brits and our communist enemies. Neither ZAPU nor ZANU were any happier because they too utterly distrusted the British Government—not that this gave any comfort to us.

  The international press inferred that a ceasefire followed by all-party elections in ‘Zimbabwe’ would be the outcome of the talks. Such ceasefire and political preparations for ‘one man one vote’ elections were envisaged for early 1980. Nkomo was in a worse position than Mugabe if such elections were to take place so early. ZAPU was sitting high and dry because Rhodesian forces had rendered all hope of an effective ZIPRA invasion impossible, whereas ZANU was well placed with thousands of ZANLA CTs in the country and many more immediately available to flood across the border.

  In London, ZAPU and ZANU presented themselves as the ‘Patriotic Front’. This apparent coming together of bitter enemies may have impressed the British and the OAU but it certainly did not fool Rhodesians. We knew only too well that ZAPU and ZANU would be at each other’s throats the moment the conference ended, no matter the outcome. Nevertheless, more to counter ZANLA than to challenge the Muzorewa Government, it was obvious to us that ZIPRA urgently needed to get as many trained men into the country as possible to prepare the ground for the envisaged election.

  With all fronts likely to explode in our faces, it was clear that we were in for a massive increase in the intensity of over-border operations. Knowing that events in and around Rhodesia would influence the political standing of opposing parties at Lancaster House, we needed to indulge in operations that would strengthen the hand of Prime Minister Bishop Abel Muzorewa and his delegation. To do this meant taking no-holds barred actions in both Mozambique and Zambia.

  Enhancing MNR’s image

  THE MNR CONTINUED TO BE a vitally important force for the eventual overthrow of the FRELIMO Government. For the moment however, we needed to direct their activities to impose limits on ZANLA by severely affecting Mozambique’s infrastructure. This had to be done in a manner that would continue to improve the MNR standing with the civilian population at the greatest possible cost to the Mozambique Government.

  Two specific targets were chosen. The first was the vital telecommunications relay centre east of Beira known as the Troposcatter and the second was Beira itself. The Beira mission will be covered shortly, but the importance of destroying the Troposcatter needs to be understood. Essentially it was to improve our intelligence-gathering capability. Most sensitive communications on the FRELIMO political and military networks relied on the highly sophisticated coding equipment of the Troposcatter, but this prevented us from eavesdropping on all enemy communications. With the advert of MNR, it was logical to destroy the facility and force FRELIMO to rely entirely on the HF networks we were already monitoring successfully.

  Extra SAS men were flown in to meet up with the MNR liaison team and, together with an MNR force, they made a successful attack on the Troposcatter station two days after the Lancaster House talks started.

  Attacking this target on the top of Monte Xilvuo right next to the main Beira to Chimoio road was no easy matter. However, drawn by the sound of the fighting and explosions that carried for miles from this elevated but successful attack, FRELIMO moved tanks and hundreds of infantry in an endeavour to cut off and destroy the mixed SAS-MNR force.

  Whereas the range of our Cheetah helicopters allowed for the timely long-range recovery of most of the force, three men were left behind. Without a radio they had become separated during a firefight through one of the FRELIMO ambush points. For two days Cheetahs and Lynx searched for these men in the hopes that they were still alive and free.

  Heavy anti-aircraft fire helped aircrew identify the positions of the pursuing FRELIMO forces and this gave proof that the lost men were still alive; but hours of searching failed to find them. Fortuitously the crew of the last Ly
nx to fly search at the end of the second day spotted the hard-pressed men’s heliograph and wood-smoke signals, resulting in rescue. Only six days later the SAS and MNR were on the move again, this time to Beira.

  Tony and me at Beira, as youngsters.

  Here I divert to give one of the reasons the SAS-MNR force was visiting Beira.

  As youngsters, my brother Tony and I occasionally went by train to Beira to visit my godfather and his wife, Alan and Sheila Martin. Alan was managing director of the Beira Boating Company and had at his disposal a fleet of launches and barges. My deep love of ships was developed in Beira docks where Tony and I had free access to the launches and boarded many ships. One point Alan made clear to us was that although Beira appeared to be a good harbour it was not a natural one because the entire Pungwe/Buzi estuary was extremely shallow. Because of this, the two dredgers we saw working daily were absolutely essential to keep the channel, specially cut for large ships, free of the sand and silt that relentlessly flowed in from the Buzi.

  Many years later in less happy circumstances at COMOPS, I raised the matter with Brian Robinson who immediately saw the dredgers as key to putting an end to Beira’s shipping. Now, on the night of 18 September 1979, the SAS-MNR had the two dredgers, Matola and Pungue, as two of their specified targets.

  To avoid walking through miles of highly populated ground around Beira, the force was dropped off for a night approach to Beira docks. Coming in from the sea in quiet motor-driven inflatable dinghies, they sailed up the wide estuary of the rivers Pungwe and Buzi, heading for the dredgers and a dark landing point near the docks.

  Subsurface limpets and other explosive devices sank both dredgers. At the same time the sea gates of Beira’s only dry dock were wrecked, rendering that facility unusable. Whilst the dredgers and dry dock were being rigged for destruction, two other forces were busy on separate tasks. The larger of the two forces aimed to enter the town of Beira to destroy the central telephone exchange and break into Beira’s prison to release all its political prisoners. The other force aimed to destroy ZANLA’s war matériel stored in a dockside warehouse.