They call me Trinity

The Rumble in the Jungle

The Rumble in the Jungle

Oct 17, just another day at war, 3am start, every one a little more rested after our five-day vacation at the Lodge on the Lomba (I will backfill this interesting interlude later) the usual pre-fight preparations, Camouflage removed and stowed, clean army-issue underwear and fire-proof heavy-duty Tank-suit, my normal army-issue brown overalls set aside – I hope I get to wear them again tomorrow - weapons checked and crew psyched, we may not want any more of this war but we are in this shit up to our necks, we’re hot on the heels of 59th Brigade, they’re withdrawing as fast as they can preferring to move during the day, despite constant night and day Artillery and daytime air-force bombardments. I cannot be sure of the accuracy of the attacks they have to endure from our side, but they’re on the run and Combat Group Alpha and Bravo are taking point today, the adrenaline tank is re-fuelled and pumping steadily as we begin our low light move under cover of the cool pre-dawn darkness.

We’re travelling in a two-up formation, it seems as if we have a few kilometres to travel to reach the retreating enemy this morning so our UNITA compatriots have hitched a ride and are sitting atop the roof of our APC’s, it feels good to have a few of these guys on-board, I feel a real connection with these lads, I feel as though they are the underdog in this battle of good versus evil, West versus East, Capitalism versus Communism so I am happy to be on their side, secure in the knowledge that this is a war against terrorism and communism, I’m helping this guy, his people and his country, I’m also helping my country and my people to remain secure.

We made steady progress moving in a North Westerly direction through the sort of terrain that has become as familiar to me as the playground forests around my parents house, the soft sandy beach-like soil under us, scraggly trees and sparse grasses awaiting the November start of the rainy season are ominously similar to many other contact zones we’d been in over the past seven-weeks, if the terrain stay like this we will be able to see the enemy at ranges of 400-500 metres.

The last of the early morning mist has dissipated in the warm morning sun, the expensive night vision goggles carefully repacked in their protective case when at about 7am we encounter fresh Tank tracks moving in a Westerly direction. Fuck! Game on! The bastards have just moved through this way within the past few hours, can’t be certain if this was a Squadron of tanks attached to 59 Brigade or a smaller expeditionary force! Who knows how close we were to running slap-bang right into the T55’s and perhaps they were watching our approach at that very moment! Okay UNITA boys, this is the last stop on the Ratel-express, off you hop, get down onto the ground, go sniff these FAPLA boys out. No nasty surprises this morning please!

From the Tank tracks it is evident that the enemy is moving in a very compact [tight] formation, perhaps they are concerned about land-mines, a sensible precaution in this part of the world but hopefully our UNITA brothers haven’t mined this section of bush otherwise the Ratel-express will be seriously derailed. We could expect to survive a direct land-mine strike, but a Tank-buster mine? Now that could have very serious consequences for the crew and we don’t fancy testing the theory that our Ratel APC was hardened against such an eventuality.

The UNITA trackers pushed ahead to attempt to establish contact. Now we’re in that no-man’s land, a sense that the enemy is close, but fuck knows how close. These are those moments before making contact that can drag on forever, hyper-vigilant in the knowledge that the games could kick-off without a moment’s notice. We move forward at a snails-pace maintaining and tracking the speed of the UNITA boys on the ground approximately 100 metres behind them, Commanders maintaining our 2-up (two by two) formation until we have a much clearer sense of the whereabouts of this mornings games. Some earlier deployments had become difficult to co-ordinate due in dense bush when Commanders cannot see how individual units are progressing, and I’m sure this is why I was able to get away with making such deep progress on October 3rd – I really felt we had made significant gains on that left flank during the day-long battle, in training ops I would’ve been reprimanded for the loss of formation, but in my defence I was unable to see my colleagues on the right flank. No time for re-living past glories, this is a new game and nothing else matters, suddenly the UNITA boys appear ahead of us, casually loping past. This is unusual, there has been no gun-fire, no contact established, however we appear to be driving into a solid wall of foliage. The call comes down the net ‘The tracks have disappeared into the bushes ahead, UNITA is pulling back Charlie Squadron is to deploy in narrow formation and proceed with caution, maintain visual contact, Bravo Company will be on your 6.’ We entered a thick, dense wall of foliage, so dense that you might just as well have turned the lights out, although Night-Vis goggles wouldn’t help in this situation. If as a kid you were ever afraid of the dark you’ll have a sense of this experience of having to get up for a pee in the middle of the night, every dark corner and shadow an unseen but potentially deadly hazard! It’s 8:30am on a beautiful Angolan Spring morning but now we’re approaching unknown, well not totally unknown because we know there are a few MBT’s at the very least, but for now it’s an unseen danger and I’m 100% aware that our enemy could be right there, directly in front of us, this was not fear-of-the-dark-shit, the Tank-tracks led directly into this gloomy zero-visibility world and the enemy was either going to be well dug-in and extremely hard-to-hit – very fucking dangerous, or still on the move and fair game, but still very fucking dangerous. I never gave that much head-time there was no time for fear, we’re back at war and the enemy must know we are on their tail, every sinew of my being focussed on trying to pick out the dark Russian racing green camouflage preferred by Communists the world over. We’d soon discover where and how the contact would be prosecuted, their bombs and bullets signalling the official start of proceedings.