Fatfox9's Blog

* Gobshite (also referred to as Gobbie, or Gobbies): One who engages in nonsensical chatter or unwanted conversation. For example- What’s that gobshite talking about now?

“Down in Mukumbura where the Gobbies lay the mines,
A Gobbie laid a mine in another Gobbies line,
Said the Gobby to the Gobby, keep on your own line,
And never lay a mine in another Gobbies line”

Minelaying song sung by Rhodesian Sappers laying mines during Cordon Sanitaire operations, Mukumbura.

I have absolutely no idea how I have remembered this song all these years.

The most recent National Service intake of Sappers were referred to as Gobbies.

Below is a photo of the early Mukumbura minefield. Note the gook breach in one of them.

Place name: Mukumbura

Latitude: 16° 13′ 57″ S

Longitude: 31° 42′ 31″ E

Below is a gook infiltration map. Mukumbura is in the North-East.

Operation Hurricane

The object of Cordon Sanitaire was to use minefields and patrols to channel insurgents into designated areas from which the local population had been removed. They could then be tracked and killed before they reached populated areas.

The first Operation Hurricane “no-go” area was along the Mozambique border in May 1973. Other “no-go” areas were extended along vast stretches of Rhodesian border in an attempt to establish depopulated “free-fire” zones for Security Force operations. This concept that anyone seen moving in an area is considered a terrorist and can be killed was tried in some areas of Vietnam too but was not particularly successful.

More to follow on Mukumbura in the next instalment.