Winds of Destruction

by Peter John Hornby Petter-Bowyer

  Lake Alexander.

  Helicopters passing over abandoned Portuguese farmlands.

  Approaching Lake Alexander.

  The main force had over ten minutes to run to target when Bill Sykes broke away, heading directly for the Admin Base. When we reached it, I was startled to find that this was not the fairly open area of ground that I had expected. Although undoubtedly the most suitable site for miles around, it was covered with fairly high grass interspersed with clumps of dense scrub that occupied almost half of the assigned area.

  At about this time the reserve helicopters from Grand Reef were approaching Lake Alexander.

  Bill Sykes and I did not see the airstrikes going in southeast of us but landed to prepare to take the DC7 drops. The rotors had not yet stopped turning when I spotted the big aircraft already running in from the east. It was two minutes too early, yet the Admin Base protection troops were already peeling out of the huge cargo door before I had a chance to call Squadron Leader George Alexander, who was flying second pilot to Captain Jack Malloch.

  The DC7 lumbered past and rolled into a slow starboard turn to re-position for its second drop. On the ground and out of sight 500 metres away, the troops were gathering up their parachutes, well beyond the position I would have placed them; had I been given the chance. As the aircraft lined up for its second run, I called George by callsign, instructing “Red light on…” then waited for the position I wanted the first fuel drop to be launched. However, well before this position, the first pallet of drums was followed rapidly by three more. All were descending way, way short, just as first helicopters arrived over the Admin Base.

  George Alexander, an excitable man at the best of times (he was part-Greek), cursed the helicopter pilots for being in the way of the DC7 that was, by necessity, staggering along close to stalling speed. I could see that all the helicopters were well clear but George who was used to Air Traffic Control separation was unaccustomed to seeing other aircraft so close to his. This was not Salisbury Airport! It was a piece of foreign bush supposedly controlled by a man, me, whose instructions were either not being received, or were being ignored because of George’s stressed state. The helicopter pilots ignored his curses and landed next to me.

  George Alexander (right) is seen here with the American astronaut Walter Schirra. From left: Wing Commander Bill Jelley (OC Flying Wing New Sarum), Group Captain John Mussell (CO New Sarum) and Air Commodore Dicky Bradshaw (DG Ops).

  One of the trooper helicopters had taken serious hits that rendered it unfit to fly, even for a one-time flight to Rhodesia. The others could not take on fuel immediately, because my instructions continued to be ignored and fuel drops were going in where George chose to place them. When eventually the Chimoio operation was over, George claimed he had not received my instructions, even though the helicopter pilots had heard them clearly.

  I had abandoned any hope of getting fuel and ammunition down where I needed them when Norman Walsh arrived, way ahead of time. His command helicopter was shot up and he needed to borrow another in a hurry. Both he and Brian were deeply frustrated by their unplanned absence from the action at the most critical time in the battle; but there was no aircraft immediately available.

  Fortunately I had already arranged for the RLI protection troops, who should have been climbing a small feature next to the Admin Base to watch for enemy movement, to roll some drums clear of the drop zone so that helicopters could commence refuelling. The first machine to be refuelled was commandeered by Norman and Brian who rushed back to the action.

  I inspected the command helicopter and the other damaged one. A complete main rotor head change was needed on the command aircraft and the other needed replacement of the entire tail cone. There was no hope of switching the complex radio system on the command aircraft, so I asked the 7 Squadron technicians present if they thought it possible to substitute the command helicopter’s damaged main rotor head with the good one from the aircraft requiring tail cone change. “What a question, sir. We will have it done sooner than you think.” With no rigging equipment or specialised tools, half a dozen technicians and two pilots descended on both aircraft with standard tools and plenty of energy.

  Northernmost corner of Admin Base as seen from a K-Car.

  I moved away from the repair party to attend to the removal of parachutes from drum and ammunition pallets lying in open ground so that helicopters could land next to them. This was important because parachutes blown up by rotor-wash could be drawn into spinning rotor blades with disastrous consequences. I was still dealing with this when the repaired command helicopter was flown in right next to me to be refuelled. I was happy to let Norman Walsh know his aircraft was ready for him. Being unable to communicate directly with the Command Dak, I asked Norman to arrange for a set of rotor blades and a tail assembly to be flown in from Lake Alexander. These arrived a little after midday and by 4 o’clock the damaged machine was ready to fly.

  Many drums had landed amongst high bushes which necessitated manhandling them into positions where helicopters could land. There was no alternative but to use all available pilots and technicians as well as the RLI protection troops who, to their credit, never hesitated or moaned but got stuck into these onerous tasks. No sooner had they completed the work than I had to impose a lighter but equally onerous task on them. This was to flatten most of the low scrub for improved landing space, concentrate empty drums lying on their sides and position full drums standing up at twenty assigned spots so that crews coming in for fuel could differentiate between full and empty drums.

  K-Car pilots and gunners arriving to refuel and re-arm reported that they were having a tough time with high volumes of small arms, anti-aircraft gunfire and more targets than they could handle. Flight Lieutenant Mark McLean, who had taken early retirement from the Air Force, was on call-up for Op Dingo. Sporting a beard he would not have been allowed to wear in regular service, he landed and removed his shattered bone dome. The graze and large swelling above his right eye bore witness to how close he had come to death from a vertical bullet-strike that had torn a section out of his protective helmet.

  As with Mark’s aircraft, every other K-Car had taken many small- and large-calibre strikes, but none too serious to keep them from returning to the fray.

  Mark had been allocated a satellite target that was believed to be a camp for wounded veterans who had returned from Rhodesia to recuperate in Mozambique. It seemed to Mark that the intelligence on this ‘soft target’ must have been totally incorrect because there were far more anti-aircraft guns there than at any of the other satellite camps. In consequence he had been forced to call on two other K-Cars to help him neutralise the heavy-calibre guns.

  During a few quiet moments at the Admin Base it was possible to hear the rumble of Alpha bomb and rocket strikes that Norman was directing against troublesome anti-aircraft guns and other points of resistance.

  During his approach to Chimoio, the medium-level cloud he could see over the target area concerned Norman Walsh. Fortunately this did not trouble Squadron Leader Rich Brand as he led his Hunters in for their initial strikes. He fired 30mm cannons at the Chimoio HQ buildings before Vic Wightman’s Golf bombs hit the same target spot on H-hour. Squadron Leader Randy du Rand saw the Golf bombs exploding exactly where he expected them and led the four Canberras over the smoke and dust to deliver 1,200 Alpha bombs exactly as planned to cover an area of 1.1 kilometres in length by half a kilometre in width.

  In spite of the shock effect of the opening air strikes, and those still in progress, some anti-aircraft guns took on the six slow-flying Dakotas as they passed in extended line astern at 500 feet, disgorging heavily laden paratroopers. During their short descent to ground, the paratroopers were surprised to see many CTs running towards them with some already passing directly below. Their drop line had been planned to be far enough from the campsites to ensure that all ZANLA within the primary target area would be contained before the paratroopers landed. As it happened, many par
atroopers landed amongst fleeing ZANLA who, though armed, seemed to have only one thing in mind; escape!

  Brian Robinson had been right in assuming that CTs would not move out along obvious escape routes but simply run in the direction they happened to be facing. He was wrong in assuming that he had planned an adequate distance from primary targets to the paratrooper drop lines because he had failed to cater for the Olympic speeds stressed CTs could achieve.

  Paratrooper commanders had no time to organise their callsigns in the opening minutes, because officers and soldiers were taking on large numbers of ZANLA running from the ongoing air activities. Soon enough the CTs realised their way was blocked, though a few made the deadly error of attempting to fight their way through the troops in hope of gaining safety in the bush beyond.

  Hunter and Vampire strikes and re-strikes were still continuing as the SAS and RLI soldiers killed hundreds of panicking CTs. The jets cleared back to base to re-arm as K-Cars moved into action, their cannons adding to the confusion of noise from smallarms and anti-aircraft gunfire.

  Those CTs who realised that they were running towards certain death around the perimeter went to ground, allowing the assault troops time to organise themselves for their advance through the camps. The exposed breast of one dead ZANLA, still clutching an AK-47 rifle, confirmed intelligence reports that there were a number of Tanzanian-trained CT females present at Chimoio.

  Brian Robinson had only just begun to give his orders when the command helicopter was hit, forcing Norman to clear to the Admin Base. The hiatus caused by the loss of their airborne commander might have been disastrous except for the calibre of men on the ground and in the K-Cars. Nevertheless, the return of Norman Walsh and Brian in the borrowed helicopter, albeit with reduced communication facilities, allowed organised movement to recommence.

  Along the entire assault line, soldiers moved forwards continuously killing every ZANLA in their path. With so much ground to cover and with so many CTs in hiding, the fighting went on all day. Independently, K-Cars took on allcomers within and beyond the primary target.

  The incoming and outgoing flow of communications to and from the command helicopter was relentless but rewarding. Norman ordered many Hunter and Canberra strikes against tough points to ensure that the roll-up action kept momentum. The gridded photographs of Chimoio allowed him to pass each target point to the striking pilots with pinpoint accuracy. Once his orders were issued, he could get on with other matters without having to oversee the strikes. At times there were as many as four targets lined up for near-simultaneous attention.

  Brian Robinson had over sixty callsigns to deal with, a mind-boggling situation that he managed with incredible skill. His numerous actions as the Army commander in Fireforce actions had certainly prepared him well for this high-pressure situation.

  Back at the Admin Base, with so much going on around me all at once over such a large area, I experienced moments of helplessness, even panic, when I felt I was not managing to do all that was expected of me. Fortunately our pilots and technicians got on with their work in typically efficient fashion, offering help or simply taking action without my having to ask them to do so. The RLI ‘protection troops’ were outstanding, having developed and maintained a smooth and cheerful routine.

  A little after midday one SAS soldier who had been killed in action, Frans Nel, and a couple of casualties were delivered to me. I had been expecting many casualties throughout the day but these were the only ones that came to the Admin Base. This was incredible considering the very high number of dead ZANLA the K-Car pilots reported seeing in their own target areas and in the ground through which the assault troops had passed.

  One of the Vampires was crippled by ground fire. Air Lieutenant Phil Haigh was flying the FB9 that sustained damage as it crossed over Vanduzi crossroads on return to base. This caused his engine to fail some way short of the border. Rather than attempt the notoriously dangerous act of abandoning an FB 9, Phil chose to glide across the border and make a forced landing in Rhodesia. This might have worked had the aircraft not run into the deep donga that wrecked the aircraft and killed Phil.

  Phil Haigh (left) with Francois du Toit.

  When Norman Walsh called me forward to inspect air weapons’ effects, it was rapidly approaching the time for recovery to Rhodesia; in fact helicopters from Lake Alexander were already airborne en route to uplift troops. It was only in the air on the short leg to Chimoio that I realised just how late it was. With so much noisy activity and so much to do, eight hours appeared to have compressed into mere minutes.

  There was too little time to inspect more that a portion of an Alpha bomb strike and one site struck by Golf bombs. Nevertheless this was more than enough to let me see what I needed to see. In fact I saw more than I bargained for and the experience shook me to the very core of my being.

  The four-man SAS callsign assigned to protect and assist me were clearly amused by my discomfort at being on the ground. The real fighting was over and for these men Chimoio had become a quiet environment. Not so for one who felt safest in the air. I dropped to ground as bullets cracked overhead then raised myself sheepishly when I realised no one else had taken cover. The next time a flurry of cracks sounded around us, I remained standing when all four SAS had dropped to the ground. “Never mind, sir,” said the nearest soldier, “it’s the ones you don’t hear that you need to worry about.”

  The air strike effects were very troubling. Analysing weapons efficiency and counting holes in dummy targets out on a prepared site at Kutanga Range was one thing. To see the same weapons’ effects on human beings was quite another. I had seen many dead Rhodesians and CT killed in Fireforce actions and had witnessed the appalling carnage on civilians blown up by ZANLA landmines; but here I was seeing something more horrifying. Those who had been killed by the troops were greater in number, but somehow their wounds appeared to me to be so much more acceptable than those taken out by bombs.

  The effect of an air strike.

  The SAS men escorting me were used to seeing bodies mutilated by grenades, landmines and even heavy airstrikes. For me it was different. An airman’s war tends to be detached. Even seeing CTs running and going down under air fire seemed remote. Never again did I accept airstrike casualty numbers as the means by which to judge our air successes without remembering the horror of what I saw at Chimoio.

  Helicopters in the Admin Base ready for lift-off to recover RLI and SAS troops back to Rhodesia. Note the extent of pathways and flattened vegetation created in eight hours.

  It was a relief to lift off for the return flight to the Admin Base and thence back to Rhodesia.

  The sun set as we crossed the border. In darkness we followed a long line of red rotating beacons as the largest-ever gathering of helicopters flew into Grand Reef. No cold beer ever tasted so good!

  The Chimoio phase of Op Dingo was almost closed. In one day, ZANLA had lost in excess of 1,200 combatants dead with a much larger number missing or wounded. This had cost Rhodesia two servicemen killed, about six wounded (none seriously) and one Vampire.

  The SAS stay-behind forces remained in ambush positions for the night and accounted for more CTs who thought all the Rhodesians had gone home. Early next morning, these men destroyed whatever buildings and equipment remained before helicopters recovered them along with selected equipment, and piles of captured documents.

  Chimoio Base lay littered with bodies, burned-out structures and destroyed equipment. Hundreds of wounded ZANLA were pouring into FRELIMO’s provincial town of Chimoio. The two ZANLA commanders we had hoped to take out, Josiah Tongogara and Rex Nhongo, were not in base and escaped as they had done before and would do time and time again.

  We knew that, when they gathered courage to do so, ZANLA’s leadership would visit the battle-site to ensure that all evidence of ZANLA’s arms was removed. They must do this before calling international observers to witness the burial of ‘Zimbabwean refugees’ because ZANLA had registered Chimoio Base, along w
ith all other military establishments, as a refugee camp.

  We knew that particular attention would be given to showing the UN High Commission for Refugees the bodies of a number of teenagers killed at Chimoio. These were the school children that had been forced, or enticed, to leave schools in Rhodesia to undergo military training in Mozambique. No doubt the chalk boards and timetables the SAS soldiers had seen in two classrooms would have been cleared of their Marxist slogans and instructions on weapons-handling. They were sure to have been adorned with make-believe items ‘to prove their good works in teenager education’.

  Phase One of Op Dingo was over. The countdown for Phase Two had already started as emergency repairs to the helicopters were hurried through with little time to spare.

  Tembue attack

  THE EASTERN SKY HAD ONLY just begun to light up on Friday, 25 November, as twenty-two helicopters lifted out of Mtoko and Mount Darwin on the first leg of the 320-kilometre journey to Tembue. The reserve force of ten helicopters was to follow one hour later with spares.