‘Three-Two’
On arriving in the big transport plane or ‘Flossie’ at the huge rear echelon logistics base at Grootfontein in South West Africa, all the Signals Officers and NCOs were called in to a large hall. We were each asked to stand up in turn and indicate our preference for Comcen (Communication Centre) or Tactical Signals. Comcen were the rear-echelon Divisional and Brigade-level Communication Centres, whereas Tactical Signals were the front line Battalion-level communications. With my surname being near the end of the alphabet, I had plenty of time to work out that this would determine where we would be posted. The thought of being stuck in an air-conditioned Comcen hundreds of miles back from the real war filled me with dread – I had to get into the bush. When called upon, I stood up … “My preference is for Tactical Signals … and I would like to go to 32 Battalion, Commandant”. There was a deathly hush. “What do you know about 32 Battalion Lieutenant?” “All I know is that they work mostly in Angola with black Portuguese-speaking troops, Commandant”. There was another pregnant pause as I stood thinking that I had overstepped the mark. In a stage whisper that carried to the back of the hall, he turned to his snickering side-kicks “Manne (men), we have us here a REAL Captain Caprivi!” My heart sank as I thought I had really cooked my goose. When the names were read out with their postings, he singled me out and made me stand up again. “Taylor … ja kerel (yes boy), Rundu, and 32 Battalion” he said ominously. “Shit!” I thought, “Does he know something I don’t?”
I had to wait a few days to get the next flight up to Rundu. When I arrived it was into a scene reminiscent to that in the film Platoon when Charlie Sheen arrived in Vietnam. Looking out I could feel the blistering heat and see the dry African bush stretching endlessly from the other side of the simmering tar runway. As we disembarked down the ramp of the Transall C160, the troops ‘Klaaring out’ were boarding the plane. Never having seen any of them before, I looked carefully at the 32 Battalion guys going home. They stood quietly to one side, wearing their now faded camouflaged berets with the Buffalo insignia. While they were still strong healthy young men, their measured, deliberate movements betrayed their fatigue. Yet they had an unassuming confidence about them that belied their age and they carried the unmistakable air of the legendary bush fighters the unit was famed for. Long stretches in the African bush interspersed with intense firefights with the enemy had clearly left their mark. I was determined to make it into the unit, and even more determined to live up to their standards.
The handful of us sent up from Grootfontein, were called into the Signals Officers’ office at Sector 20 HQ, Rundu. The Captain there started talking about all sorts of units we were going to, not mentioning 32 Battalion. When I respectfully informed him of the fact that I was posted to Three-Two he went apeshit … “No one tells me how to run my outfit and you can be sure you aren’t going to that fucking Battalion, who do you fucking think you are and what is so special about fucking 32 Battalion!!” he ranted and raved. “Jusslyk!” I thought, “what is it about this unit that gets up everyone’s nose?” I spent an uncertain few days, seriously pissed off about having got this far only to be thwarted by what appeared to be the Captain’s dented ego. He eventually got over himself and dispatched me to Three-Two …
I walked tentatively down to the Battalion HQ alongside the airfield. On introducing myself as the new Signals Officer I was met with “Oh OK, there’s your office” and then was largely ignored for the first week. The Officer Commanding (OC), Commandant Deon Ferreira (also known by his codename ‘Falcon’), finally found the time to call me into his office. He watched me with a bemused look while he introduced me to the unit and wished me luck. I had briefly met the previous Signals Officer on his way out. He had largely left the signals to sort itself out while he played at commander of any logistics convoy that happened to be running between the various border bases. There was a lot to be done to get things in order. I was therefore thankful for the quiet time over Christmas of 1979, using it to find my feet with regards to the administration of the run-down signals unit. I established a firm friendship with another Engelsman in the HQ, 2Lt Tim Patrick, who had gone to the same school as me back in SA. He was with our intelligence guys.
It wasn’t long before I realised that I fitted right in to the way things were done at Three-Two. I had really battled with the ‘spit-and-polish’ Army discipline of basic training. Here, the discipline was focused on what really mattered and where it counted – combat-readiness for the bush war being fought. There was respect for rank, but beyond that, everyone got on with the job at hand in a relaxed, efficient manner. The Battalion HQ at Rundu was housed in a large hanger-like corrugated iron building that had been divided into offices without ceilings; the exception being the OC’s which had both a ceiling and air-conditioning. The only other air-conditioned room was the sandbagged ‘Ops Room’ or command bunker on the one end. Wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling maps covered most of it, with the maps depicting troop deployments and the Battalion’s kills or ‘head count’; quietly sheltered behind a curtain. No ceilings meant that you got to hear pretty much everything that was going on. The daily bustle was constant and was mainly centred on logistics matters concerning the troops down at the Buffalo training base, across in the Caprivi Strip. This covered a wide range of issues such as their pay, marriages and divorces, wives and children, schooling, recruiting, training, housing, transport and troops that were AWOL (absent without leave). There were some four thousand people at Buffalo (troops and their families) and everything came back through the HQ at Rundu, to then go on up to Sector level (Sector 20, Rundu) or further back to the giant logistics base in Grootfontein … or, if necessary and circumstances required such, all the way back to South Africa.
There was a patch of very green grass leading to the apron of the airfield. The feeling of constant activity was heightened by the fact that all the aircraft would park out front if they weren’t squirreled away in a hanger; the giant transport Hercules C130s and Transall C160s, the Alouette troop and gunship helicopters, the Pumas and the infrequent Super-Frelon helicopters, the Bosbok spotter and Kudu light transport planes. And of course the jet fighters, occasionally Mirages, but more often the Impala ground strike aircraft. Only foot traffic specific to us came through our gate, with most of it being channelled around us into the greater Rundu base.
I was billeted in the regular army officers’ mess. Little did I realise how little time I would actually get to spend there during the course of the next thirteen months. It was also interesting getting used to wearing the distinctive 32 Battalion camouflage beret. As it had just been casually handed to me in the first week, I was initially a little uncomfortable wearing it as I felt I hadn’t ‘earned my stripes’ as it were. Surprisingly quickly, I drew apart from the rest of the junior officers posted with the regular battalions, as I had to be increasingly careful of what I said and how I said it … and they in turn began regarding me with an increasing mystique.
But there again, Three-Two was a very different army unit. Logistically, it fitted into the regular army structure, but officially (certainly to the outside world at the time) it didn’t exist. The Battalion had its origins in the Angolan Civil War of 1975. The troops were all black Portuguese-speaking soldiers, the remnants of Holden Roberto’s FNLA guerrilla army that had fought against the Portuguese colonials. With Angola’s independence in 1975, several guerrilla factions began fighting amongst themselves for control of the country, namely UNITA, MPLA, FLEC and FNLA. When Holden Roberto abandoned his FNLA followers, the MPLA faction gained the upper hand. The legendary and esteemed South African Army officer, Colonel Jan Breytenbach, persuaded the South African government to allow him to bring the remnants of the FNLA army into the then South West Africa (Namibia). They eventually found themselves housed in the Caprivi Strip at Buffalo Base and changed their name from Bravo Group to ‘32 Battalion’. They were led by a white leader group of regular army officers and NCOs. The idea was to use the Battalion primarily for clandestine operations in Angola, given that the rank and file soldiers were Angolans who had been in the FNLA guerrilla army and therefore sworn enemies of the Marxist-backed MPLA government that had taken over from the Portuguese.
For security reasons, the official language of the Battalion was English as the use of Afrikaans would immediately point to South Africa. As my Afrikaans still wasn’t too good this suited me just fine! We were officially not at war with Angola, so our activities there were very sensitive. Our dual role was to hunt down the SWAPO guerrillas in their bases in Angola before they came south into South West Africa (Namibia) on the one hand, and to support Jonas Savimbi and his UNITA guerrillas in their ongoing civil war against the ruling MPLA government in Angola (with their FAPLA military wing), on the other.
Commandant Deon Ferreira had taken command of the Battalion in 1979 and under his leadership, the unit had undergone extensive retraining. Honing their basic infantry skills, and entrenching the basic disciplines required to be effective anti-guerrilla fighters, the unit was set to become acknowledged as the ‘finest fighting unit in the SADF since World War Two’. This accolade was bestowed on the Battalion by Lieutenant General Jannie Geldenhuys, Chief of the SADF. On Christmas Day 1984 Geldenhuys handed a specially-made plaque to the unit (see colour section).
Under Falcon’s command, 1980 marked the year the Battalion began showing its true offensive mettle.