SOUTHERN ANGOLA, 1988

The bush was sparse with the yellow grass of winter. It hung haphazardly together in moribund clumps. It’s straw texture tangled limply. The dust thick amidst the interspersed evergreen shrubs that lay scattered around the African hillside. Like freckles on a face, they stood out.

I moved my body forward another half meter. We had been observing this small village for three days now and our Observation Post or O.P. was getting stale with our bodily fluids and excrement bags. I had decided it was my turn, with much relief, to go out and get water for the team.

One of the hardest things I had ever had to do was take a dump into a plastic bag without privacy. My shoulders brushing my fellow soldiers next to me. Listening to their hushed groans at the smell. Their whispered snickers and mock jibes at the flatulence were nothing to what we would face if we were caught though, so we all endured as best we could.

Deep behind enemy lines, we were in Angola, Africa. It was a cesspit of communist activity and we had been sent to discover where it was nesting. Our four man team, a group of elite Reconnaissance Commando soldiers more commonly known as Recce's, were trained to endure all kinds of hardships.

I was the only white face in the team, and had to continually smear black-is-beautiful paint on my face and extremities to ensure I wasn’t reflecting light in any way. My hair, teeth and beard were caked in dust and tasted muddy, a result of Africa’s red clay soil. My locally ‘borrowed’ fatigues were filthy and covered in dry grass and foliage for camouflage. The clothes clung to me as sticky as the smell of my unwashed body.

Join the army they said, have an adventure they said. Some bloody adventure.

We had been dropped off by helo five days past about thirty clicks to the North. From there, we made our way back to this position. It took two days through minefields and enemy territory, sneaking and observing and reporting what we saw, but our main objective was to observe the activity at this small kraal identified on our maps as Namene. We would observe for another two days before we made our way further South for the pickup.

We had noticed nothing but a regular African village by all appearances and the most noticeable events were when the women of the village went to bathe in the river.

Splashing and laughter, combined with hauntingly beautiful singing rose up to our O.P., and my fellow soldiers stirred restlessly. We were professionals, but the allure of the comforting arms of a woman had at least two of us as skittish as colts.

Following a tip off, the objective of our mission was clearly defined to discover what the Cubans, or Russians were up to and if there were terrorists amassing close to the South West African Border in our Area of Operations (A.O.) at this specific village. However, as far as we could tell, there were no armed forces in this area at all. Nothing but regular rural African life. Chickens, cattle and goats, the main trespassers.

South of us was where safety lay, over the border to South West Africa or Namibia where, under the protectorate of South Africa the border was used by the terrorists as a staging post for Communist insertion into the black sheep democracy of South Africa. Not an ideal democracy let it be said, because only about 5% of the population could vote, but at least a country where the rule of law prevailed, and terrorism, in particular communist terrorism was frowned upon quite sternly.

Especially when that terrorism brought explosive vehicle mines to random roads and limpet mines to shopping centres that indiscriminately killed anyone, no matter which flag they were waving. The bombs were coward’s tools, but it was a statement these terrorists said, and now we as the armed forces were making our own statements. We would not take it lying down. Well, I literally would stand up if the situation called for it, but right now, lying down was my best defense. I had to remain unobserved and undiscovered.

The Recce’s had been called to infiltrate and find out where the bombs and mines came from. I was a Recce, or more formally known as a Reconnaissance Commando, and they had called upon me to lead a small team to follow the trail of breadcrumbs laid by informants through enemy territory.

I finished the ritual of observing, smelling the air, and then listening for any unnatural disturbance, and then slowly and with utmost care, dragged myself forward another half meter. Rinse, repeat. I had done this for about half a kilometer, and I was almost at where the river cut through the valley landscape. That was where, after making sure the crocodiles hadn’t noticed me, I would fill the eight canteens and drag myself back. Rinse, repeat. Who said a soldier's job was boring?

A stone clattered out to my right and I froze, as did all the natural sounds in the bush. The cicadas paused, the chirp-chirp of birds halted and my heart nearly stopped too. It was not unheard of for stones to move as an animal skittered about on its daily routine of foraging. There were also herd animals around, goats and cattle, but they were usually more noisy than that and stuck to their familiar areas. The locals rarely left the usual pathways and that noise was nowhere near a usual path. What had made the noise?

With a lurch my heart started beating again, loudly in my ears. The adrenaline coursing through me washed the fatigue and lethargy that the fierce sun had baked into my body. My entire world was focussed on where that stone had clattered. It was off towards a small rocky outcropping. A place we had avoided as too obvious for an Observation post. Was someone scoping the area? Five minutes passed, and then ten. I hadn’t moved a muscle. My stiff body was beginning to complain, the sun baking down mercilessly. My sweat pooling in all the usual places.

The insect and bird life had just begun to continue business as usual, when another rock clattered. This time a hiss of disapproval and a voice spoke out in low urgent tones. The voice carried across the bush and I had no trouble identifying its origins. Lying down wasn’t the best vantage point, and whoever that was, it was clear they were headed in my direction. They would walk past me, maybe even over me. I had to do something. So I became one with the ground. I lowered my floppy hat to cover my eyes, and tucked all my gear under me. I was wishing I had waited until nightfall, which presented its own array of problems, but now I had to rely on the camo I had covered my body with to keep me unobserved.

It was fortunate that I was close to a wag-a-bietjie bush (Wait-a-bit bush) with its usual unforgiving fish-hook like thorns. Anyone walking this way would naturally avoid it and walk a wide path around. The shrubs were notorious for catching on clothing or flesh with equal abandon and you learned your lesson once, as you had to wait-a-bit to unentangle yourself and dislodge those devilish thorns.

The noises came closer and I was able to sneak a peak from beneath my floppy hat. The barest hint of slow movement from me ensuring I didn’t attract their attention or let my eyes reflect any light

A line of at least five men. Soldiers all, AK-47’s dangling from straps. One of them was a foreigner. Probably a Cuban, judging by his lighter complexion. The Russian “observers” never far from the Cubans were never seen out on patrol, and I didn't see any now.

The squad sized unit were walking a line across this very hillside, just off the main road. I wondered if we had done anything to attract their attention, or if it was just a routine patrol. Then from a distance the growl of engines reverberated through the ground.

As I waited, sweat pooling, stress building, I saw first one, then two, then more trucks winding through the valley, some towing artillery and AA guns. It was not a small group at all, but perhaps a full company of FAPLA, the trucks full of Angolan troops, revving their engines, as they navigated the notoriously fickle roads of Southern Angola.

The enemy knew as well as we did, that if there were any large-scale troop movements to be done, they had to be done before the rainy season. Just our luck to be right here when they decided to populate the area a month before the rains would bog down the entire region.

We were warned that there might be troop movements throughout and to avoid them, but no-one had mentioned anything about a Company sized strength, with Cuban soldiers and probably Russian advisers in the mix. And here I was, out in the open and vulnerable to discovery.

What were they doing here? The war was supposed to be winding down after the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale. Command had said the terrorist infiltrations were low key combatants, being trained by their Red friends. This looked anything but low key. I knew with absolute certainty that we could not be captured under any circumstances and that the intel of this latest discovery needed to be radioed back ASAP. and then we needed to haul ass out of the zone for extraction.

I was about two hundred meters from the river’s edge and the road ran parallel between me and the river. The trucks edging precariously along the horrendous road, grinding gears to navigate the ruts and eroded zones, when, with a resounding crack, the leading truck’s front wheel buckled and went flying off, causing the vehicle to swerve and careen until it toppled over, blocking the road entirely and throwing the entire complement of soldiers riding on the back like dice on a crap table. This brought the entire convoy to a halt and the squad walking a line towards me suddenly changed their focus to rush to aid in the calamity, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

They were less than five meters from me before they turned away to help the truck accident and its occupants, and I had ground my teeth in frustration as they neared. I could do nothing except lay still and hope for the best.

With this new development though, I could at least make my way back to the Observation Post (O.P). and gather my thoughts. Our extraction wasn’t due for another four days and our comms report wasn’t due for another two. We would have to make an emergency report, and those were always risky.

Should we just wait and see how this developed? With so many troops in the area it wasn’t a winning strategy. We also needed water. I would have to wait until dark now, but that was looking like an unlikely proposition. These troops would most likely rest up at our little village while repairs were made. With turbulent thoughts churning, I edged my way back to the O.P.