Winds of Destruction: The Autobiography of a Rhodesian Combat Pilot

by Peter Petter-Bowyer

  An ambush was hastily laid by an RLI callsign on the extended line of terrorist tracks that were being followed by another RLI callsign. After a long uncomfortable night the ambushers were looking forward to daylight when they all became aware of noiseless movements bang in the middle of their ‘killing ground’. They waited tensely for their officer to spring the ambush. The officer was fully aware of the movement but was waiting for it to reach a point directly in front of him when the movement ceased and everything went still.

  A very light breeze was blowing from the ambush position towards the killing ground. Had this not been so, the troops would have been aware of the unmistakable, pungent smell of the pride of lions that lay facing them. Only when there was sufficient light did the soldiers find themselves staring straight into the eyes of a line of big cats that faced them with curiosity wrinkled on their big faces. After what seemed a very long time the officer fired a single shot into the air. The lions moved as one with deep-throated growls of protest as they turned and disappeared with mighty leaps into the safety of their habitat.

  The Army base at Kariba was set on the edge of Kariba Heights giving it a superb west-facing view of Lake Kariba whose closest shore lay 1,400 feet below at the base of the mountain. I was talking with Army friends on the verandah of the Officers’ Mess and enjoying the beauty of a sunset when I received a mighty blow between my legs that laid me flat on the ground and writhing in agony. I had no sooner been downed than a wet grunting snout pushed at my ear and neck. This wasyoung ‘Oink’ the warthog who had introduced himself with that mighty upward thrust into my crutch. Only Archie Wilson’s handshake compared with the agony of this encounter.

  Oink had been found abandoned by Border Control troops who took him into their care and brought him to Kariba Heights as a baby. Oink wandered around the camp like a dog and was very spoilt. His in-built habit of thrusting upward with his snout was well known to the inhabitants who knew better than to stand with legs apart when he was around. Many unwary visitors received the same welcome as myself, which amused the Army no end. When, however, Oink’s tusks started to grow he became too dangerous to have around and was handed into the care of a Karoi farmer.

  Oink being given a drink of beer by Air Force

  Radio Technician, Ray Hooper.

  The Kariba Heights base had a variety of animals over time, two of which were confirmed alcoholics. A dog and a baboon visited the pubs every evening and wandered around begging for beer. The young soldiers poured portions of their drinks into bowls from which these two animals drank. It did not take too much to make either the dog or the baboon drunk yet they continued to be plied with beer until they disappeared into the night to sleep it off. Badly hungover next morning, these animals behaved differently but their plight was all too obvious. The dog slept in the darkest places indoors whilst the baboon spent much of the morning hunched up in the shade of a tree with his hands over his eyes emitting occasional grunts. By midday they were fine and in the evening they returned to the pub.

  Fish may not necessarily rate as animals, but I found one fishing incident amusing. It involved an NCO of RLI who was a dedicated and capable fisherman. He invited another RLI colleague who had never fished before to accompany him in a small boat to do some fishing on Lake Kariba. This novice experienced all the frustrations of ‘bird’s nest’ tangles and hooking himself whilst attempting to cast his lure. Then, more by accident than skill, he hooked a small Tiger fish. The experienced fisherman warned him to be careful in boating his fish because of its razor-sharp teeth, but in his excitement the novice lost his top dentures, which flip-flopped down through the clear water until lost from sight in the dark depths. With first success having been achieved, the experienced fisherman let his friend continue as he prepared to fish for vundu. When he landed a medium-sized vundu, he hit on the idea of pulling his friend’s leg. He stuck the vundu a lethal blow to the head and placed his own dentures in the vundu’s large mouth. “Hey look, Charlie, this vundu has your false teeth.” His friend’s eyes lit up as he took the dentures saying, “Gee that’s great.” But then he looked at them again, and said, “No these aren’t mine!” and threw them over his shoulder. Flip-flop, down they went to join his own dentures in the watery depths.

  Death of Don Annandale

  SOUTH AFRICAN POLICE HELICOPTERS HAD been operating in Rhodesia ever since they first appeared during Operation Nickel. With further SAANC incursions giving rise to Ops Cauldron and Griffin, their numbers were increased to six SAP Alouettes, all of which were flown by South African Air Force pilots. Peter Briscoe had been one of these until, in January 1969, he became the first SAAF pilot to join our Air Force on direct entry. More were to follow his lead in later months. I ran Peter through the entire range of helicopter flying exercises to ensure that he was totally au fait with Rhodesian Air Force methods and standards. Since he was experienced on helicopters, this was an easy and pleasant task.

  Along with SAP helicopters there were a few Cessna 185 aircraft (named Kiewiets—an African bird belonging to the Ground plover species) that undertook light communication work. SAAF pilots, some of whom were very junior, also piloted these aircraft. One of these young pilots was a menace because he was way too sure of himself. He delighted in beating up various locations, always coming down too low for his level of experience. Within his own service Lieutenant van Heerden was known as ‘Odd Job’—a nickname that suited him well.

  The Makuti Hotel was sited on a hill with a steep drop away from the edge of the swimming pool. I was standing there in the late afternoon having a beer with Lieutenant Fanie Coetzee when we saw a low-flying Cessna coming straight towards us across the low ground. This was Odd Job who left his pull-up to clear the hill so late that his aircraft’s tail wheel touched a small tree, barely four metres from Fannie, as he zoomed past in a steep climb. The matter was immediately reported to the Officer Commanding FAF 2 who had received similar complaints before mine. But the admonitions given him by the SAAF Air Liaison Officer, on this and other occasions, seemed to go straight over his head.

  Don Annandale.

  Some time passed when Odd Job, then operating out of Thornhill, was tasked to fly the Station Armament Officer to Kutanga Range. As well as being the S. Arm. O, Flight Lieutenant Don Annandale was responsible for administering Kutanga Range, whose staff he visited regularly. When he had completed his work and was ready to return to Thornhill, Don learned that Odd Job had told the range staff he would be showing them a slow roll before heading for Thornhill.

  Don refused to board the Cessna saying he would use road transport to get home. Odd Job assured Don that he had only been pulling the rangers’ legs and that he had no intention of rolling his aircraft. Relieved by this, Don climbed aboard.

  Once the aircraft was airborne, Odd Job climbed for height and dived for a fast, low-level run past the master quadrant hut. This was standard practice and Don did not worry about it. But when the aircraft was climbing away from the pass, Odd Job commenced a slow roll. He reached the inverted position all right but then scooped into a steep dive in the second half of the roll. The aircraft was too low and struck the ground in a high-nose attitude with wings level. Odd Job died instantly.

  Don was thrown through the windscreen over the propeller and flew through the air surrounded by burning fuel that followed him to where he came to rest. By the time the three black crew of the fire Jeep reached him, Don’s rich red hair and his clothing had been burned away and his skin was hanging in sheets from his blackened, bleeding body. Amazingly Don was on his feet and got into the front seat of the Jeep unassisted. He urged the shaken driver, “Get me to hospital—I’m dying.”

  The driver set off for Que Que, which was forty minutes away. He drove as fast as the Jeep would go but fifteen minutes out from Que Que the vehicle failed to negotiate a road bend, left the tarmac paving and went into a broadside before flipping over as the wheels struck soft sand. Once again Don went flying and crashed down in soft sand and
rolled to a halt with sand and dust embedded in his suppurating flesh. The three black firemen were unhurt.

  A farmer driving from Que Que came upon this awful scene and immediately turned around to take Don to hospital. On his admission it was clear to attending doctors that there was no hope of his survival because Don had third degree burns to over 90% of his badly battered body. He survived a couple of agonising days during which time he bravely briefed his lovely wife Pat on exactly what she must do when he was gone. Don’s grieving family and the Air Force were badly shaken by the loss of this superb officer through the harebrained actions of a stupid pilot.

  The consequence of Odd Job’s appalling stupidity.

  Recce training and Willie de Beer

  GROUP CAPTAIN DICKY BRADSHAW RETURNED from a liaison visit to Portuguese forces operating against communist terrorist factions in Angola. Whilst there he was given a briefing on the visual reconnaissance methods the Portuguese Air Force had developed for slow fixed-wing aircraft operating at 1,500 feet above ground. Dicky was taken on a recce flight to see for himself and was very impressed by all he saw and learned. Upon his return to Salisbury he lectured a number of pilots in the matter of visual reconnaissance. But only in me did he find a pilot who was genuinely interested in all he had to say because I had already experienced some recce successes, albeit conducted at low level in helicopters.

  Because of this, Dicky Bradshaw tasked me to join No 4 Squadron on an exercise that Squadron Leader Peter Cooke was conducting in Wankie Game Park. My task was to introduce the fixed-wing pilots to visual recce. Though this was a pleasant enough task it really was a matter of the blind leading the blind because I had not yet acquired any experience in fixed-wing recce. Using my Alouette as a perfect platform from which to observe the ground, I was able to show 4 Squadron’s pilots how to correctly employ sunlight to follow freshly laid trails from the air. But it was impossible to simulate operational conditions such as I had encountered in Tete, so my part in 4 Squadron’s training exercise was really a waste of rations. Nevertheless it was good to spend time with Peter Cooke and his crews who were flying the newly acquired Trojan aircraft. I shall say more about this aircraft shortly.

  Peter Cooke, seated centre, behind the mounted Secretary bird which was 4 Squadron’s badge emblem.

  I also met up with Willie de Beer who I had not seen since the buffalo hunt that ended in the death of the lone terrorist during Operation Nickel. Willie had a young lion that followed him wherever he went. This playful animal took a liking to my helicopter. Leaping in and out at every opportunity, he chewed any loose item he could find. This did no good to my flying helmet or my Air Force cap, which the brute tore to shreds.

  The 4 Squadron technicians put the cub onto the flat rear fuselage of a Trojan with a view to taking a few photographs for the Squadron Diary. The little guy immediately ran up the fuselage, along the starboard wing and flopped down at the wing tip. A Lion beer bottle was placed between the cub’s paws for a snap shot. When developed it was submitted to Castle Breweries in a failed attempt to swell squadron funds from an envisaged Lion Beer advertisement.

  The ever-playful cub became over-excited one evening and sank its teeth and claws deep into Willie de Beer’s back and shoulder. It was amazing to see how Willie managed to keep still whilst drawing the lion’s attention to a fly switch he flicked around. When the cub let go, Willie removed his shirt to inspect and clean up the wounds. I noticed that the puncture marks were very deep and black in colour.

  Posed on the rear fuselage of a Trojan.

  Willie’s lion took a liking to my helicopter.

  Not too long after this Willie had two hairy encounters with full-grown lions. The first involved a lioness that wandered into his thatched home in the Wankie National Park and inadvertently cornered his frightened wife in the bedroom. A neighbouring ranger responded to her screams for help but was killed by the panicking lioness before she broke clear just as Willie arrived. He was knocked down and slightly injured by the escaping animal.

  The next encounter occurred when Willie had to shoot a large lioness that was killing villagers’ cattle in the Tjolotjo Tribal Trust Lands. His first shot only wounded the lioness, which immediately attacked Willie and sent his gun-bearer running for safety. Willie had the presence of mind to ram his left arm way down the lion’s throat but he was being savagely clawed all over his body while his left arm was being mauled by the cat’s huge teeth. It was impossible for Willie to use his rifle as he frantically called for his gun-bearer to come back and help him. After a while the trembling man arrived. Willie, holding the gun-barrel to the lioness’s head, instructed his shaking gun-bearer to manoeuvre the rifeinto the right position before telling him to pull the trigger. His scars bore testimony to this awful experience, which he was lucky to survive.

  Trojans

  THE TROJAN AIRCRAFT THAT 4 Squadron operated was nothing like the Trojan aircraft originally ordered. During October 1964, AVM Bentley initiated inquiries through the Ministry of Rhodesian Affairs in Washington in his attempt to find a suitable training aircraft to replace our ageing Provosts. He made it known that such replacement machines should, ideally, have a much better ground-strike capacity than the Provost.

  The most suitable machines available at the time were American T28 Trojan trainers. There were a fair number available with 800hp engines and life spans ranging downwards from three years to zero life. It so happened, however, that a number of handpicked T28s were being completely stripped down and rebuilt to create T28D models powered by 1475hp motors. Their mainplanes were also stressed for high loads and incorporated six, instead of the original two, hardpoints on which to carry weapons. At the time, each T28D was available at $125,000 per unit. Though this was more than Air Force intended to spend, eighteen of these aircraft suited AVM Bentley’s needs perfectly. So, in a letter to the RAF Chief of Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sir Charles Elsworthy GCB, CBE, DSO, MVO, DFC, AFC, our Air Force Commander wrote, The US State Department has replied to the effect that there were many difficult considerations affecting the export of commodities of this kindto Africa, and that it would greatly ease these difficulties if the British Government could say they had no objection to the deal. The Royal Rhodesian Air Force need was duly relayed to the British Government which had no objection to the acquisition by Rhodesia of ‘training aircraft’. Nevertheless the US State Department refused to let a deal go through.

  Precisely what occurred thereafter is not altogether clear to me other than that Rhotair (Pvt) Ltd, of Salisbury got in on the act by using their strong association with Français D’exportation de Matèriel Aéronautique (OFEMA). The French had no difficulties with American attitudes and offered to upgrade T28s, from either Algeria or Iran, to French Air Force standards closely equating to the American T28D.

  Wing Commander Harold Marsh.

  Crates used to smuggle the Trojans into Rhodesia.

  The first that I knew of these huge single-engined aircraft having been sent to Rhodesia occurred some time after the Americans had spiked the French deal. A senior officer on Air Staff told me about the T28 deal and why it had gone wrong. He said that when the ship carrying these aircraft and their spares to Cape Town was in sight of Table Mountain, the ship’s master received orders to turn about and return his cargo to France.

  At the time it was considered that this disastrous failure to secure ideal machines was the consequence of some loose-mouthed bragger’s words reaching top officials in the US State Department. Because the T28 Trojan aircraft rebuilt under licence in France, the USA had used its power to force France to observe UN sanctions and recover the machines to French soil.

  Since nobody at squadron level knew anything about the huge T28 Trojans, there was no disappointment when the small Aeromacchi/Lockheed 260 aircraft arrived in crates for secret assembly at New Sarum.

  T28 Trojan.

  Yet in this deal the supplier had duped Air HQ. Instead of receiving 450hp aircraft, as ordered, we rece
ived 260hp machines whose airframes made it impossible to upgrade them with 450hp motors.

  Despite this, the name Trojan was given to these piddling little aircraft because of the paperwork previously completed for the big machines. At squadron level it was thought, erroneously, that the name derived from the ‘Trojan Horse’ type crates used to smuggle the machines into Rhodesia.

  It was not until the year 2000 that I learn from historian Richard Wood of documents he had located in UK from our Director of Legal Services Wing Commander Harold Marsh ’s office telling of the impending arrival of the Trojans. By then, however, it was too late for the shipment to be intercepted and impounded by Britain.

  What other secrets Harold Marsh passed on to the Brits, or how many others like him were acting against Rhodesian interests I cannot say, but it helps explain why we lost the T28 Trojans and why there were so many more problems of ‘leaked’ secrets yet to come.

  Roll cloud incident

  AFTER THE 4 SQUADRON RECCE exercise my technician Butch Phillips and I had to return to New Sarum via Thornhill. Heavy storms were forecast for the flight that commenced after lunch. About halfway to Thornhill we encountered large storms that I was able to avoid until we were passing one huge cumulonimbus on our left and noticed the rapid development of a strong roll cloud to our right. Turning back I found the roll cloud was worse in the direction from which we had just come so I turned to resume our course to Thornhill.

  Ian Smith with Group Captain Dicky Bradshaw and the technical team that assembled the Trojans.