An Unpopular War Read online

  Part of your daily routine was learning how to march and drill on the parade ground. Every day around nine or ten in the morning we would break for tea. To get out of the sun and off that hot sandy gravel parade ground for tea was what kept me going. Sometimes people would pass out and be carried off. Teatime was 20 minutes. We were marched off the parade ground to have tea in these dreadful polystyrene cups. I had about three, four, five cups and about 30 or 40 biscuits! Psychologically I think it reminded me of home. It was heaven in a cup.

  – Paul, age 18

  It always amazed me how the different divisions of the army called time when marching their troops. I think the only people who did it according to the textbook were Infantry School in Oudtshoorn. The tradition must have been passed on to each intake from instructor to instructor where the two-liners and lieuties all used the same sort of calls to march their troops. Their instructors called time as ‘Links, regs, links regs.’ In an area where there were a lot of different corps you could close your eyes and know who was being marched past. Stand outside SAWI on a Sunday morning at about eight o’clock, and without seeing them, you could tell which corps was being marched past Northern Transvaal Command HQ to the different churches. The Tiffies you would recognise by their call of ‘Lux hearse, lux hearse’, the ‘hearse’ always being a higher note than the ‘lux’. PD School was always the best: ‘Brie, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya, hearse!’ The ‘yas’ were always sharp, like a little yapping dog, and the last ‘hearse’ was quite a high note. I’m sure corporals used to practise these in their spare time and also see, while drilling their troops, how many commands they could get into a sentence. The best ever was Staff Sergeant Marx at PD School, who was drilling JLs at double time towards an approaching lieutenant. His command to his platoon went something like this: ‘Brie ya-ya-ya-ya-ya, hearse. Brie ya hearse kom mense trek af die duim elmboog reguit swaai jou arm saam met jou maatjie voor en langs jou nek teen die kraag maag in bors uit kyk op peloton oëëëëëë regs, môre luitenant, oëëëëë front brie ya hearse!’ [Come people thumb down, elbow straight, swing your arm with your buddy in front of and next to you, neck against the collar, stomach in, chest out, look up, platoon eyes right, morning lieutenant, eyes front!] The biggest fuck-up I ever saw on a parade ground was when the same Staff Sergeant Marx changed the commands on a Wednesday morning bataljon aantreeparade to English. He knew every single command perfectly, but the troops didn’t have a fucking clue! You are supposed to do parades in both languages, but in three months we had only ever heard commands in Afrikaans. Most people understood ‘attention’, but anything from then onwards was just like cows shitting on a tarmac road. That was what they said when the drill was bad: ‘Mense, julle klink soos koeie wat op ’n teerpad kak!’ [People, you sound like cows shitting on a tar road!]

  – Jeremy, age 18

  In the summer, Phalaborwa was unbelievably hot. That’s why the intake was always mid-year: July was much cooler. On parade or while training, guys would just drop from heat exhaustion, and we were not allowed to step out and go and help. We were army property and it was the responsibility of the medic to run over and try to revive the guy. If he was in a bad way, he’d be loaded into an ambulance, which was always on standby next to the parade ground. Otherwise the medic just got him back to his feet and he rejoined the parade. They were very good about you drinking lots of water, but some guys were not as fit or just didn’t have a body mass that could cope with the heat as efficiently as others. The Infantry really had it rough. There were two hills, and we sat on top of one sipping colddrinks and firing the occasional mortar at the poor skiet piet guys running around doing fire and movement exercises below. A Red Cross flag hung from the flagpole at the top of the camp, and if the temperature reached 36 degrees Celsius, it was dropped to half-mast and an air raid siren went off. This meant there could be no more physical training and we had to return to our bungalows and lie on the floor under our bunks. Everyone was relieved when that happened.

  – Clint, age 18

  They’ve changed it back now, but in 1980 the legislation was that you had to have a licence for an air gun, a pellet gun. I went down to Parkview Police Station with my father to get one and was told I was too young. I was 17. My father had to apply for it. When I got to the army and they were issuing rifles, I said I wasn’t yet 18 and was not allowed to have one. The corporal gave me a slap on the ear and said, ‘Troep, vat die fokkin’ geweer!’ [Troop, take the fuckin’ rifle!]

  – Paul, age 17

  They had this little saying when you got issued your rifle: ‘This is my rifle’ (shaking the rifle) – ‘this is my gun’ (and they’d point at their crotch) – ‘this is for shooting’ (shaking the rifle) – ‘and this is for fun’ (pointing at their crotch again). We were told our rifles were our mothers, fathers, girlfriend, wife, everything. It goes wherever you go, if you go to eat, it goes. When you take a dump, it goes with you. When you go to bed, you sleep with your rifle. That rifle goes everywhere with you. I gave one guy 45 minutes of rifle PT for leaving his rifle outside the bungalow. I fucked him up solid. For rifle PT you have to hold the rifle in one position with your arm locked straight for an extended amount of time without letting it drop. If it drops, you are in even more kak. Let me tell you, after holding a rifle with one hand right out in front of you or to the side, you want to die. Needless to say, he never left his rifle lying around again.

  – Paul, age 18

  I so badly wanted to hold a rifle that I cleaned other guys’ rifles, and the only way I could get to hold a loaded weapon was to volunteer for guard duty. I was the only one who ever volunteered for guard duty. I did it just to be able to hold a loaded weapon. I used to run my arse off during the day and then pull duty at night just to hold a loaded weapon. I usually guarded the main gate of the base. This was war, and you were protecting your own area, your territory. To me it was just so amazing. Nothing ever happened when I was on guard duty, but I used to almost pray that something would happen and that I could take guys out. When I think of it now, I think: what a dick!

  – Brett, age 18

  The restrictions and controls regarding weapons in the military then were indescribable. You went onto the shooting range and you had to account for every single round. You’d have to go around and collect every single doppie after you’d finished shooting, as each round had to be accounted for. If you couldn’t find one, the entire platoon scrounged around trying to locate it. That’s how strict they were. We’d been issued with our weapons and I was off on a Sports Pass. I snuck my R5 and ammo into my balsak and took it home. I wanted to show my mates my gun. I have to say I was pretty stressed over the weekend ’cause I still had to smuggle it back into camp. When I think about it, I must have been mad! Now you could probably buy a gun on the side of the road, but then … If I had been caught, the consequences would have been so bad. Opfok from here to Christmas.

  – Paul, age 18

  Because we G4K3s were not allowed to shoot our R4 rifles, our responsibility was to be in the ditch at the far end of the shooting range and raise and lower the targets, on these big steel contraptions, for the regular troops who were doing target practice. When the troops came to the ditch to check their targets, I would inspect them from head to toe and always choose the really sexy ones, swopping places if need be to make sure I managed the sexy guy’s target. After the sexy guy had fired his rounds – and for some reason they were often not very good – I would punch holes in the target with a pencil to make him look good. My assisting the ‘gods in browns’ ended the day they discovered more holes in the target than the guy had bullets. I got the uitkak of my life.

  – Rick, age 18

  Near the end of my Basic Training I had to do guard duty around Voortrekkerhoogte. One evening I landed up being the guard duty commander, which meant I drew up lists, allocated shifts, checked rifles in and out, and made sure whoever was supposed to be on duty was, and that they were where they were meant to be. We had roadblocks around V
oortrekkerhoogte and guards around the perimeter of Personnel Services School. The guys were transported from PSS by truck. Before they got onto the trucks, it was standard procedure to clear their rifles by removing the magazine and cocking the rifle a few times to make sure there were no rounds in the chamber. It obviously wasn’t wise to travel in the back of a truck, in close proximity to other troops, with a loaded rifle. One guy cocked his rifle but forgot to remove the magazine, so he had, in fact, loaded his rifle. Not only that, but he had it on automatic. All I heard was dddrrrrrrrrrrr … as he accidentally emptied his magazine. Luckily, he didn’t hit anyone ’cause the rifle was aimed at the ground, but he missed this one guy’s foot by centimetres and the tarmac was full of holes. Naturally he was punished. PT with a rucksack full of bricks.

  – Michael, age 21

  Washing, Ironing, Inspection

  The guys had a fat laugh at me. When we first arrived at the army, they searched our bags. We’d been told to bring washing powder, and my mom had packed me Skip. Skip is for automatics, and the guys were, ‘Hah! You think there are washing machines?’ Fat chance. I knew to expect the worst. We washed everything by hand. I also learnt to iron using Robin starch, which helped iron the crease down the front of your browns and was excellent for ironing our shirtsleeves. What we also used to do was to go to a tailor and have that crease stitched in, which was called a gyppo naat.

  – Nick, age 20

  On my first pass I bought an iron – not one of those steam irons, just a good old-fashioned plain one. It took flippin’ ages to iron overalls, but it was great for other things. This one night we stole bread – well, actually we were on guard duty, so we could pretty much go where we wanted, as we were the ones with the rifles. We took the bread to our room and used the iron to make toast. We craved the simple things.

  – Paul, age 17

  In the army you had to chain your washing to the line, and if you didn’t, you soon learnt why it was necessary. I’d hang up my socks, shirts and our horrible old women’s broekies, Santa Marias, and come back to find one sock and some shirts had been swiped. I didn’t take a length of chain with me to the army, but I quickly bought one. It was a vicious circle: people just took what they were short of. Even if it was labelled, it didn’t mean much; it was still stolen.

  – John, age 18

  Inspection involved so much. Your pikstel clipped into one another had to be spotless. Some okes started cleaning them with Brasso, not realising what it did to you. Do you know what Brasso does to your guts? You have no idea how horribly sick they got – such gippo guts. The knife had a bevelled edge, and they would hold it up to the window and check down the length of the blade. Any mark, water stain, anything, and you got opfokked. Your trommel at the foot of your bed also had to be polished.

  We had to stryk our clothes and our bed. In Basics you got your overalls and a big floppy gardener’s hat, your web belt, your water bottle, socks, boots, takkies for PT, so there wasn’t too much to iron, but God help you if there were railway tracks; one line only. We did iron our clothes a lot too, because you wanted them to have houding. Browns that looked new weren’t fashionable in a military way. You ironed your clothes until they were almost worn out. But that damn bed! You had to iron your bed so it looked like a matchbox. To do this you used your clean boot brushes, spray bottle, starch and shaving foam. They taught us how to fold the bedclothes, and God help you if you stood inspection in the morning en daar was ’n slang in die bed [and there was a snake in the bed]. It had to be level and flat. In order to get it that way, you had to climb underneath the bed and clip a clothes peg onto the mesh and the mattress. The beds were those horrible hospital metal mesh beds with a thin flat mattress used by hundreds of fat okes before you. You had to clip it in such a way that it didn’t sag in the middle and look like a canoe. If there were any wrinkles or unevenness, you had to jump on your bed and ‘maak dood daardie slange’ [kill those snakes]. You stood inspection in your boots, and of course if you had to jump all over it, you got boot polish on your sheets and somehow you had to find the time to wash the sheets. It was better to sleep on the floor after you had made your bed for inspection; that way you could get a little extra sleep in. But they got wise to that and would come and check during the night.

  – Paul, age 18

  We had this one guy who was not very bright. Our platoon was made up of guys who were supposed to be physically and mentally challenged. Shame, he was very dumb. He would be sitting polishing his boots and we would shout his name and distract him. We then quickly removed his spotless boots and replaced them with a pair that needed cleaning and polishing. You could do the same thing with ironing. He didn’t seem to notice that his ironing pile included a whole lot of our stuff. We really used him. I guess that was one advantage of having a person like that in our platoon.

  – Rick, age 18

  Some bungalows had stone floors, others had wood. All had to be polished like a mirror, otherwise you would fail inspection. Remember Cobra wax, in the big green tin? We used that. The floor was so slippery from being so highly polished that even your bed used to slide on the floor. For inspection they would look at the shimmer on the floor, and if they saw the slightest mark, they would empty the sand from the fire bucket, take the hose, and spray the floor down. This was after eight of you had spent hours on your knees polishing the floor. Even clean boots left a mark, so I made these slippers so that we didn’t have to take off our boots when we came into the bungalow. They were square pieces of industrial polish cloth that looked like a carpet tile, and we cut them into giant feet and Mickey Mouse head shapes. I wrote Nike Air and put big ticks on mine. Imagine all these guys with shaved heads, in their browns, skating around the floor. It was brilliant. We kept the floor clean and polished it at the same time. If you demanded troeps to clean to that degree now, they’d lock you up in a loony bin.

  – Paul, age 18

  I only remember one time that we actually got driven back from Schurweberg, the combined unit’s shooting range, to Voortrekkerhoogte. Every other time they found some or other reason to make us run back to camp. I remember one time we must have really fucked up. According to them we had been ‘shooting like women’, so a Samil arrived and dropped off poles and tyres. We were told to get them back to camp by six that evening, when we were to stand inspection. I still remember running back and we were all singing, among other chants, the old ‘Why are we run-ning? SWAPO! SWAPO! Why are we sweat-ing? SWAPO! SWAPO!’ It’s amazing how they got the indoctrination in, in everything we did. We got back in time, but of course we were sweaty and dirty and failed the inspection. We were told to stand again at nine that night. Shrapnel, our corporal – so named ’cause he had really bad acne scars – walked in and did the usual old hackneyed pickupapillowcaseandthrowitdownthelengthofthebungalow shit. Of course it’s going to pick up something. And of course he’s going to do the usual Dutchman corporal thing and say, ‘You is pigs.’ He then proceeded to throw two fire buckets of sand and two fire buckets of water onto the bungalow floor and make us do Bungalow PT – over a bed, under a bed, over a bed, under a bed – fucking up an entire inspection. We were told we would be standing inspection the next morning at seven. It’s the first time I ever knew the whole bungalow to pull together. We decided en masse, after moving all of the trommels, beds and kaste out of the bungalow, and washing down and polishing the floor, that we wouldn’t have time to wash and iron dry all the sheets and pillow cases, so we broke into teams. One team was responsible for washing and ironing dry the top third of the sheets and the whole pillowcase, while the rest were setting full uitpak inspection bed by bed. I’ll never forget sliding around the polished floor on ‘taxis’ while I matched up everyone’s numbered moving parts with their stripped-down rifles. We got our inspection done in time. Shrapnel never pulled back one sheet. If he had, he would’ve found the dirtiest beds in the entire Defence Force. So we took a usual standard opfok and smiled. JLs one. Poes corporal zero.


  – Clayton, age 17

  Sometimes we were at sea for long periods, and fresh water was precious on a small boat. There was no fresh water to wash our clothes in, so on wash day we used to thread the clothing onto ropes and stream it out behind the boat. It would churn along behind the boat, and sea water was the best way to get uniforms faded and soft.

  – Louis, age 17

  Your browns are all shiny and new, and only after nine months could you iron your first line across your back. That meant you were a roof. In our unit, after one year you could iron a second line, which meant you were a blougat. The third line ironed across your shirt back was when you had done 18 months. When you only had six months left in the army, you were then one of the ou manne.

  – Anthony, age 18

  Chefs and Blue Eggs

  They taught me to cook, but it’s different when you are cooking for over 1 000 guys. Everything’s boil or oil. Catering in the army was about good quality food fucked up. We used to get the best quality food, fucked up by the chefs in the kitchen. Two thousand four hundred eggs? They were blue, whether boiled, scrambled or whatever. By the time the guys ate them, they were blue because they had stood for so long. We used to crack them, two at a time, into these huge varkpanne filled with about three inches of oil. You had to do it in such a way so that as you finished cracking in your last eggs, you started spooning out the first ones you had dropped in. You then put them on top of layers of bread in another varkpan. The bread absorbed the oil and the guys used to fight for that bread. Karoo lamb? Beef? Awesome quality. We would brown it a little, then chop up onions and unpeeled carrots – not nicely diced or chopped finely, you know, just hacked up – then we’d take the hosepipe and fill these huge pots with water, throw in the beef, onions and carrots, and walk outside to have a smoke and just leave it to cook. We left it until it was so completely cooked that it was brown in the middle. Tentklappe – tent flaps – that’s what their ‘roast’ beef was called. There was fuck-all roasting involved!