by Shaun Clarke
The briefing was conducted by an SAS intelligence officer, or green slime Head Shed, who informed them that the socalled ‘confrontation’ between Britain and Indonesia was being fought in an area as intractable as Malaya. The main problem facing the British commander was that he had only five battalions to cover over 1,500 kilometres of jungle-covered border. Also, in addition to Sukarno’s Indonesian insurgents, he had to contend with an internal threat in the shape of the Clandestine Communist Organization, or CCO, composed mainly of Chinese settlers from Sarawak. The SAS would therefore be operating along the border, not engaging with the enemy necessary, but providing early Indonesian or CCO incursions.
‘Notengaging with the enemy?’ Taff whispered into Marty’s ear. ‘What does that mean?’
‘Reconnaissance patrols,’ Marty told him.
‘Bloody waste of our skills,’ Taff responded, unless absolutely warning of any
sounding affronted.
In order to accomplish this, the green slime Head
Shed droned on, the SAS would live almost entirely in
the jungle, relying on the Border Scouts for local
information. Once they had ingratiated themselves with
the indigenous population, their function would be to
patrol the areas where the Indonesians were most likely
to cross the border. Their main zone of operations,
however, would be the unexplored stretch of jungle
known as ‘the Gap’, lying east of the Pensiangan
valleys of Sabah, where small Indonesian patrols were
known to infiltrate by less visible routes. Largely
unexplored, the jungle of the Gap was populated with
Land and Sea Dyaks, Muruts and Punans, some of
whom were headhunters.
‘In other words,’ the Head Shed dryly summarized,
‘the Gap will be the ultimate challenge to SAS
ingenuity and endurance. The best of luck to you.’ ‘Condescending bastard!’ Pat O’Connor whispered. The rest of that first day was entirely taken up with
preparations for the lengthy patrol. For jungle clothing,
they were given OGs similar to those worn in Malaya,
but the soft peaked hat with its sweat band had a yellow
marker inside for identification and the rubber-andcanvas jungle boots had a special‘riveter’s cleat’ metal
plate inserted in the sole to prevent sharp objects, such
as punji stakes, going through the sole and into the foot.
This reminded Marty of Tone’s death in Malaya and did
not make him feel good. In this he was not alone. ‘Fucking punji pits,’ Pat O’Connor said. ‘I could
take just about anything they threw at us in Malaya, but
those punji pits gave me bad dreams. What a way to
go!’ He stopped and glanced at Marty, recalling that he
and Tone had been close friends. ‘Sorry, mate. Me and
my big mouth.’
‘No sweat,’ Marty said.
Their kit consisted of ammunition pouches, two
external water bottles, and the usual Bergen rucksack
packed in this instance with a useful bamboo carrier,
two spare water bottles, a rolled-up sleeping bag,
canvas sheeting and camouflaged hessian for temporary
bashas, and an escape belt with high-calorie rations,
hexamine fuel blocks, fishing line and hooks, a small
knife, a button-compass and a small-scale map. ‘I always feel like a Boy Scout,’ Taff Hughes mildly
informed them as he was carefully packing his kit into
his steadily expanding rucksack, ‘when I’m sorting out
this stuff. Bit of an adventure holiday, really. That’s
what it feels like.’
‘Were you ever in the Boy Scouts?’ Marty asked
him, realizing once more that he knew practically
nothing about the seemingly mild, absolutely deadly,
Welsh lad.
‘Yes,’ Taff said. ‘Joined the minute I was old
enough – on my birthday– and stayed in it as long as I
could. Loved it– the uniform, the drills, the camping
out – it was right up my street. That’s why I ended up in
the SAS. When I heard about the SAS, it seemed just
like the Boy Scouts for grownups. I still feel that way.’ ‘Wonderful!’ Pat O’Connor exclaimed in mock
disgust. ‘Suddenly I’m in the fucking Boy Scouts. And I
thought I was special.’
‘The only person who might have thought you were
special,’ Bulldog Bellamy said, ‘is your mother. Now
shut up and let’s move it.’
The weapons chosen as most suitable for the patrol
were the AR-15 lightweight assault rifle with 20-round
box magazine and the 7.62mm SLR, previously used by
the regiment in Malaya. Each man was also given a
supply of ‘36’ hand grenades and ‘80’ white phosphorous incendiary grenades, which were clipped to the webbed belts around the chest and waist. All of them were given a standard-issue Browning 9mm High Power handgun with 13-round magazines and a Len Dixon holster. They were also given a Fairbairn-Sykes fighting knife and a parang of the kind they had also
become familiar with in Malaya.
‘I see that parang,’ O’Connor said, ‘and I know it
means work. Fucking backbreaking work. We’re in for
a hard hike.’
‘I don’t mind,’ Taff said mildly.
‘You never mind anything,’ Marty said. ‘You’re
inhuman that way.’
‘Nothing wrong with me,’ Taff said, unconcerned. ‘If there’s nothing wrong with you,’ O’Connor told
him, ‘there was nothing wrong with Jack the Ripper
either. Christ, this Bergen is heavy!’
The unusual heaviness of the rucksacks, Marty
realized, was due to the fact that in support of the
signaller – heavily burdened with his A41 British Army
tactical radio set as well as personal kit and weapons –
each of the other men carried spare radio batteries and a
SARBE lightweight radio beacon to enable them to link
up with casevac helicopters should the need arise. Also,
in support of the team’s demolition specialist, each man
was issued with his share of mixed explosives, mostly
plastic such as RDX and PETN, electrical and nonelectrical initiators, and the relevant firing caps and
time fuses. Finally, as every man in the patrol had been
trained in first-aid and basic medicine, he was obliged
to carry his individual medical pack, which included
codeine tablets and syrettes of morphine, mild and
strong antiseptics (gentian violet and neomycin
sulphate), chalk and opium for diarrhoea and other
intestinal disorders, the antibiotic tetracycline, and an
assortment of dressings and plasters.
In short, they were much better equipped, though
more heavily burdened, than they had been in Malaya. At dawn the following morning, after a hurried
breakfast, they were driven by Bedford truck to the
airfield, where they transferred to a stripped-out Wessex
Mark 1 helicopter piloted by an Army Air Corps
lieutenant. After taking off, buffeted violently by the
wind, the chopper ascended vertically until it was well
above the treetops, then it headed west, flying over a
vast panorama of densely forested hills and mountain
peaks, winding rivers, waterfalls, swamps, shadowy,
winding pathways through the jungle and aerial
walkways stretched across the gorges
, hundreds of
metres above boiling rapids.
‘My stomach heaves just to think of those
walkways,’ Pat O’Connor confessed. ‘I just don’t want
to know.’
‘I don’t mind them,’ Taff said.
Eventually, after a relatively short flight, the
chopper descended to the LZ, chosen because it was in
a jungle clearing located within ‘yomping’, or
marching, distance of the RV. Jumping out of the
chopper, one after the other, into the whirlwind of
swirling dust, stones and foliage whipped up by the
still-spinning rotors, the men, half deafened by the
noise, ran at the half-crouch into the surrounding trees
and had melted into them even before the chopper took
off again. By the time it had ascended and headed back
to base, the jungle clearing was empty.
From the LZ, in appalling heat and humidity, the
troopers hiked the rest of the way, hacking through the
dense jungle undergrowth with their parangs while
being attacked relentlessly by fat black flies, ravenous
mosquitoes and midges. About an hour later, though it seemed longer, they reached the RV– another clearing on the bank of a narrow river snaking through the forest. There they found Sergeant Will Pankhurst waiting for them in a shelter consisting of two Y-sticks hammered into the ground about six feet apart, with a length of rope running tightly between them and a waterproof poncho draped over the rope, its ends pegged down to form a tent. Pankhurst had been in the jungle for a couple of months now, gaining the trust of the aboriginals in the first of the Iban kampongs selected as a base for the troop. Though pale and undernourished, he looked pretty cosy in his triangular
shelter.
‘Welcome to Paradise,’ he said, waving languidly to
indicate the babbling river and surrounding jungle. ‘It
isn’t exactly home and hearth, but it does sustain a
man.’
Judging by the emaciated appearance of the speaker,
Marty wasn’t too sure of that. Nevertheless, while he
and his mates had a rest and brewed up on their portable
hexamine stoves, Pankhurst gave them a short briefing,
explaining that once in their selected kampong they
would break into small groups and spend the next
couple of weeks ingratiating themselves with the Iban,
adopting a hearts-and-minds approach as they had done
in Malaya. Finally, when the trust of the natives had
been gained, the SAS commander would persuade the
village headman to let him bring in more troops by
helicopter – the regular Army, Royal Marine
Commandos and Gurkhas – to turn the kampong into a
fortified camp.
‘Once that’s established,’ Pankhurst said, ‘we’ll use
it as an FOB and commence reconnaissance patrols into
the surrounding jungle, either with or without the help
of the Iban trackers, who may or may not be agreeable.’ Finally, before leading the men on through the
jungle to the kampong, Pankhurst informed them that,
though the natives were physically small, generally
cheerful and lazy, they
offended, so the SAS
careful not to do that. ‘I’m telling you this,’ he said, ‘because the Iban
don’t dress above the waist – not even the women – so
you have to be careful about how you behave with all
those bare boobs and tits around you. No fancy remarks
and no ogling,’ he added when some of the troopers
giggled helplessly. ‘The Iban men carry spears and will
use them if you get up their noses. Okay, let’s move
out.’
Even though experienced from his years in Malaya,
Marty could not help feeling oppressed as he hiked
through the jungle, into a vast silence that made his own
breathing seem too loud. Here, instead of a riot of birds,
flowers and brightly coloured foliage, there was only a
sunless gloom deepened by the dark green and brown of
vines, tree-ferns, snakelike coils of rattan, large and
small palms, long and narrow spiked leaves, knotted
branches and mud. Though the hike took only ten
minutes, it seemed much longer, and Marty was not
alone in sighing with relief when the troop emerged to
the relative brightness – grey light filled with motes of
dust– that fell down through a window in the canopy of
the trees upon the thatched longhouses of the kampong
spread out around the muddy banks of the river. Raised on stilts, the longhouses were piled up one
behind the other, each slightly above the one in front,
on the forested slopes that ran uphill from the river.
Some did indeed, as Marty noticed with a shivery
feeling, have shrunken human skulls strung over their
doorways. The spaces below and between the houses, could be murderous when troopers had be particularly where the ground had been cleared for cultivation, were crowded with Iban villagers – also known as Sea Dyaks because they had once been pirates– who were stripped to the waist, male and female, and engaged in a variety of tasks, such as cooking, fishing, laundering, picking forest fruit – figs, durians, bananas and mangoes – or working in a small, dry padi where their basic foods, rice and tapioca, were grown. All of this they did with no great display of energy, except when playing odd games and giggling. Their longboats were tied up to a long, rickety jetty which bobbed and creaked noisily in the water. Buffalo and pigs also congregated there, drinking the water or eating the long grass as chickens
squawked noisily about them.
‘They fish in that river,’ Pankhurst explained. ‘They
also hunt wild pig, deer, birds, monkeys and other
animals, using traps and the odd shotgun, but mostly
blowpipes that fire poisoned arrows. Annoy them and
they’ll fire one of those bloody arrows at you or stick a
spear up your arse. They’re not as mild as they seem.’
Within a few days the SAS troopers had got used to the bare breasts of the women and were involved in the diplomatic task of ingratiating themselves with the natives in general. This they did by living in various kinds of temporary shelters in a jungle hide just outside the kampong, with walking distance of it, and spending most of their time in the kampong itself, interacting with the Iban, or Sea Dyaks, to create goodwill.
So gentle and good-natured were the Dyaks, Marty thought, you couldn’t imagine them as pirates, let alone headhunters. Yet they were, or had been, headhunters at least, as could be seen by the blackened, shrunken heads above the doors of their longhouses. Certainly they lived a primitive, relatively casual life, fishing in the rivers, hunting animals with blowpipes, tilling the kampong’s one small, dry rice-and-tapioca padi, and constantly maintaining their longhouses with products from the jungle. They also engaged in amiable barter, trading jungle products in return for clothes, boots, rifles, tins of baked beans, chewing gum and cigarettes. Trading seemed to be the easiest way of gaining the affection of the Dyaks, leading to much giggling and mutual back-slapping.
‘It’s better than Petticoat Lane,’ Marty said, ‘and more entertaining.’
‘It’s a pain in the arse,’ Pat O’Connor responded, ‘and takes all fucking day.’
Once the bartering had become commonplace, the SAS started winning the Dyaks’ hearts and minds in other ways: showing them how to use explosives for various small tasks, such as blowing fish out of the water, running an open-air clinic to deal with their real and imagined illnes
ses on a daily basis, entertaining them by tuning the short-wave radio into various stations, which invariably reduced them to excited giggles, training certain of them in the selective use of modern weapons, and teaching the more important men of the village to speak English.
‘If that’s English they’re speaking,’ Pat O’Connor complained, ‘then I must be speaking fucking Swahili. But I suppose we’ll get used to it.’
‘I’m used to it already,’ Taff informed him. ‘I understand what they’re saying.’
‘That’s because you’re Welsh,’ O’Connor retorted.
Spending most of their waking hours with the Dyaks made for a long and exhausting day for the SAS. Invariably, it began at first light, when, just after breakfast, they would make the short hike through the forest from their jungle hide to the kampong. After about twelve hours in the kampong, taking their lunch with the Dyaks, they would make their way back to the hide, usually at last light, concealing their tracks as they went, to have a brewup and feed gratefully on ‘compo’ rations. Unfortunately, the Dyaks were sociable, and often, in the interests of good manners and better relationships, the troopers would be obliged to stay in one of the longhouses to partake of native hospitality. For all of them, this was pure torture, particularly since the Dyaks’ favoured meal was a stinking mess called jarit– a length of thick bamboo filled with raw pork, salt and rice, then buried for a month until it had putrefied. Indeed, while Marty, Bulldog Bellamy and the imperturbable Taff Hughes were able to digest this stinking mess without too much bother, others could do so without throwing up only when drowning it in mouthfuls of the fierce rice wine, tapai, which looked like unfermented cider, scalded the throat, and led to monumental hangovers. Nevertheless, when taken through straws from large Chinese ‘dragon jars’, the tapai was potent enough to drown the stench and foul taste of the jarit.