Fatfox9's Blog

We were often required to carry out some pretty strange missions during the war and the one I am going to describe to you now is just one of them.

At the time I was posted to 4 Independent Company, an Infantry unit, located in a town called Wankie. I was responsible for running the 1 Engineer Squadron operations room. Those of you who are familiar with this base will remember that it was on top of a hill and one should not confuse the location with the old 1 Independent Company base on the left hand side of the main road as you left Wankie, travelling towards Victoria Falls.

We had a good set-up in Wankie that comprised of four offices, one of which was my sleeping quarters, another the operations room itself, one for my Sappers to live in, and one for Engineer stores. I had three Sappers under command who manned the radios and carried out other duties to support our little HQ and we were a rather happy bunch.

Our primary task was to maintain and support our Engineer callsigns in the Operation Tangent area and these consisted of Troop strength sub-units based at Deka and Victoria Falls. In addition to this we also had a responsibility to provide Engineer support to the operational efforts of the Officer Commanding 4 Independent Company whenever required.

The map below shows the area of our responsibility, including Wankie (now renamed Hwange), Deka and Victoria Falls:

This map below shows what is left of the 4 Independent Company base today – indicating where the Engineers were located (if my memory serves me correctly):

On this specific day I was called to the radio by our duty operator, who informed me that it was I Engineer Squadron Headquarters (Callsign 1) looking for me (Callsign 11). I picked-up the hand-set and called them up and was surprised that the Commanding Officer (Sunray) was on the other end. I had therefore either committed some high-level violation, or he had some dodgy mission for me. Luckily it was the latter, but if I had known what the mission was I would not have been so relieved as it turned into a badly resourced and dangerous task that to this day I cannot fathom the logic of. Anyway you can judge for yourself – read on.

Intelligence collected over the years by our spooks had led to the assumption that the gooks did not always navigate with traditional methods, meaning map and compass with time and distance (no GPS in those days). The reasons for this ranged from lack of navigation training to possibly a lack of equipment. To improvise they would instead use a number of known prominent landmarks that they used for navigating from point A to point B. Ingenious, simple, and it worked. These landmarks could be buildings, large trees, fence-lines, river junctions, cross-roads and so forth – anything that could be easily identified and confirmed. They also used T-junctions in roads – and it was one of these features that I was tasked to make uncomfortable for them. Working on “hot” intelligence my mission was to take a number of R2M1/2 anti-personnel mines and a single TM46 anti-vehicle mine to booby trap a certain T-junction in our area of operations (I cannot remember the exact location but there was also a trading store right at the junction). We would also take 2 rolls of detonating cord, plastic explosives and a pressure release switch (number 6) – and lots of black insulation tape.

“Hot” intelligence normally meant that there was credible evidence from sources that imminently, there would either be an attack, gooks crossing into Rhodesia, or movement of gooks within a known area. It therefore also meant that the mission would need to be carried out covertly and at pace. This was going to be challenging as we had been given little pre-warning and all I had was 24 hours to complete the mission or the opportunity would be gone. The only information that I was given regarding this mission was that a group of terrorists was going to be using a certain T-junction as a navigation point on their route to other parts of the operational area. Our job was to stop them at the T-junction by either eliminating them or disrupting their plans.

With the benefit of hindsight, laying a booby-trap was not a very clever idea from the start – for one it would take time to mobilise to the area and to set the trap, and secondly, a well placed ambush would have been a far better (and quicker) option to my way of thinking. At the time though, I got behind the plan and proceeded as instructed.

Due to the fact that we were supporting minefield maintenance teams at Deka and Victoria Falls, we had personnel mines in the 4 Independent Company magazine as well as plastic explosives and detonating cord. The pressure release switch and insulating tape we had in our Engineer store – so we were at least prepared equipment-wise. I was to be driven to an area close to the T-junction and accompanied by an infantry call-sign and one of my Sappers during the actual laying phase. This meant it was just me and a single Sapper (lets call him Moyo) laying the traps while the infantry stick would keep their eyes open for bad-guys. We had packed everything into back-packs to make carrying all of the kit easier – all except the vehicle mine which I carried by hand after collecting it from Wankie Special Branch.

On the way to our drop-off point I wondered how were we to lay this booby-trap without being seen or heard. Considering that there was a trading store right in the middle of the target area that was sure to be quite busy in the daytime, with surely some of the customers being gook sympathisers, or Mujibas (informers, usually youths who supported the gooks). We were being forced to do this at night – not a very clever idea as laying mines in the daytime is dangerous enough as it is – at night its just plain silly and not recommended.

We had stopped some way from the target and done our best to camouflage our vehicles and settled down in an all-round defence until darkness fell. Some of us slept……I’m sure that I did anyway.

I awoke in pitch darkness and there was movement all around me. I checked my watch and it was probably around 2100 or 2200 – something like that anyway. We had already planned to walk into the target area and we hoisted our packs and fell into a single file formation with the infantry who would be navigating us in. We were going to approach the target from the north and this would bring us in at the top of the long leg of the T-junction and on high ground – the road sloped downwards quite steeply to the actual junction itself, and the trading store. Please see my drawing below for a better idea of what the ground was like and what we were going to be doing booby-trap wise.

The mines that we used looked like these:

TM46 anti-vehicle mine – (unknown copyright holders and apologies in advance)

Once we had arrived at the top of the hill and neared the road we took up positions from where we could observe the store and road for any movement or other activity. It was actually very quiet and strangely peaceful, and after giving it another 15 minutes or so I let the infantry stick leader know that we would commence laying the trap – he nodded and put his troops in as good a position as possible to offer covering fire for us to withdraw from the road if necessary.

Moyo, as a trained Combat Engineer would lay the mines on one side of the road and I would do the other. I would also lay the TM46 at the T-junction and fit the pressure-release switch as an anti-handling device. The plan was to ensure that if anyone tried to lift the mine it would detonate.

Laying the TM46 was hard work as besides the actual excavating of the hole and setting the pressure-release switch, I also needed to run a detonating cord line to the where the first anti-personnel mines would be laid on the verges. It was a complicated and tricky set-up but the best we could do under the circumstances and time given to us. Laying the anti-personnel mines was just as difficult as the verges of the road were hard packed and covered in small pebbles that made digging and covering the mines extremely dangerous. One pebble or clump of soil landing on a mine would set the whole lot off. Please bear in mind that every mine was connected to the next mine with detonating cord. The idea being that if any of the anti-personnel were activated there would be a mighty big bang and hopefully the gooks would take some pain.

I’m not sure how long the entire laying operation took but it was still dark by the time we finished. I will say it again that this was a very dangerous task that we had been given. Laying mines in the darkness is scary stuff, and the terrain made things more uncomfortable than ever – the soil was unforgiving and hard as hell – I know we were making enough noise to wake the dead and I am pretty sure that we had compromised ourselves over and over. The whole thing was pointless the more I looked at it and by the time we were finished it would have been a foolish move to double check everything, as I should have.

Imagine this:

• each anti-personnel mine had to have a two turns of detonating cord wrapped around it, armed and then covered
• a small channel needed to be dug between each mine to connect them to a common ringmain – each time we done this we were tampering with a number of fully armed mines
• working amongst the rocks and pebbles made covering mines difficult, especially in the dark
• ensuring everything was covered and concealed to avoid discovery was practically impossible in the dark
• working around fully armed mines, slipping and taking mis-steps is an accident waiting to happen

At the end of the day we done the best that we could and left the area by a different route with the infantry leading once again. Arriving at our vehicles it was time for a quick cup of coffee and then we were out of there by first light. I was looking forward to putting this one behind me and today I really consider this to have been one of the most pointless, unproductive and dangerous tasks I have ever had to carry out, not only from a personal perspective but also for the troops I was responsible for.

I never ever found out if the trap was sprung, and if it was by what or who? Terrorists, or an innocent civilian – or livestock? This is the danger with these devices – they know not friend or foe, killing or maiming anyone or anything that sets them off. The idea was for an aircraft to fly over the target now and again and check for a crater from the TM46 at the T-junction that would confirm detonation……..I’m not sure if these flights took place at all to be honest. Aircraft were needed elsewhere and certainly not to go and check a T-junction, so the result remains a mystery to me till this day.

To finish this one off let me just say this; booby-traps have their place in warfare, however they should be planned correctly, deployed with sufficient time to ensure the safety of the layer, and never used as a stand-alone substitute for a well-laid ambush. The way we were told to do this one could easily have cost own forces casualties and the planners should be ashamed of themselves – knee-jerking desk-jockeys with little insight into how things actually work on the ground are very, very dangerous indeed.

Thank goodness that the Rhodesian Corps of Engineers were some of the best trained Sappers in the world. Its the reason I am still here and able to write this blog.