SAS: secret war in South-East Asia: 22 Special Air Service Regiment in the Borneo Campaign, 1963-1966

273 Pages·2016·44.17 MB·English

by  Great Britain. Army. Special Air Service Regiment, 22nd;Dickens, Peter

SAS
SECRET WAR IN
SOUTH-EAST ASIA
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SAS
SECRET WAR IN
SOUTH-EAST ASIA
22 Special Air Service Regiment
in the Borneo Campaign, 1963–1966
Peter Dickens
FRONTLINE BOOKS
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SAS: Secret War in South-East Asia
A Greenhill Book
Published in 1991 and 2003 by Greenhill Books, Lionel Leventhal Limited
www.greenhillbooks.com
This paperback edition published in 2016 by
Frontline Books
an imprint of Pen & Sword Books Ltd,
47 Church Street, Barnsley, S. Yorkshire, S70 2AS
For more information on our books, please visit
www.frontline-books.com, email [email protected]
or write to us at the above address.
Copyright © Peter Dickens, 1983
(cid:2)(cid:3)(cid:4)(cid:5)(cid:6)(cid:7)(cid:8)(cid:3)(cid:9)(cid:5)(cid:10)(cid:11)(cid:5)(cid:12)(cid:4)(cid:9)(cid:4)(cid:6)(cid:5)(cid:13)(cid:7)(cid:14)(cid:15)(cid:4)(cid:16)(cid:17)(cid:5)(cid:9)(cid:10)(cid:5)(cid:18)(cid:4)(cid:5)(cid:7)(cid:19)(cid:4)(cid:16)(cid:9)(cid:7)(cid:20)(cid:4)(cid:19)(cid:5)(cid:21)(cid:17)(cid:5)(cid:9)(cid:3)(cid:4)(cid:5)(cid:21)(cid:22)(cid:9)(cid:3)(cid:10)(cid:6)(cid:5)(cid:10)(cid:11)(cid:5)(cid:9)(cid:3)(cid:7)(cid:17)(cid:5)(cid:23)(cid:10)(cid:6)(cid:15)(cid:5)(cid:3)(cid:21)(cid:17)(cid:5)
been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and
Patents Act 1988.
ISBN: 978-1-47385-599-1
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by
any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise)
without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who
does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to
criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
CIP data records for this title are available from the British Library
Publishing history
SAS: Secret War in South-East Asia(cid:5)(cid:23)(cid:21)(cid:17)(cid:5)(cid:20)(cid:6)(cid:17)(cid:9)(cid:5)(cid:24)(cid:22)(cid:18)(cid:25)(cid:7)(cid:17)(cid:3)(cid:4)(cid:19)(cid:5)(cid:7)(cid:16)(cid:5)(cid:26)(cid:27)(cid:28)(cid:29)(cid:5)(cid:18)(cid:30)(cid:5)
Arms and Armour Press, London as SAS: The Jungle Frontier. It was
reprinted in 1991 by Greenhill Books and is now reproduced exactly
as the original edition, complete and unabridged.
Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY
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CONTENTS
Preface, 5 January to October 1964
Glossary, 9 Chapter 8: 'A Little Further', 107
'A' Squadron's third tour, June to
Chapter 1: Incident on Melancholy
October 1964
Mountain, 13
Chapter 9: Threat to Kuching, 133
Chapter 2: 'It's a Great Finger-
'B' Squadron's first tour, November
Poking Regiment', 33
1964 to February 1965
Chapter 3: 'Arcadia', 39
Chapter 10: 'Licensed to Kill', 149
'A' Squadron's first Borneo tour,
'D' Squadron's third tour, February
January to April 1963
to May 1965
Chapter 4: 'Confrontation', 57
Chapter 11: 'Get Back In!', 181
'D' Squadron's first tour and 'A'
'A' Squadron's fourth tour, May to
Squadron's second tour, April to
September 1965
December 1963
Chapter 12: Squadron Ops, 211
Chapter 5: 'Contact', 69
'B' Squadron's second tour, October
'Dl Squadron's second tour,
1965 to February 1966
December 1963 to April 1964
Chapter 13: Envoi, 227
Chapter 6: 'Crush Malaysia', 87
Victory in Borneo, March to August
'Dl Squadron's second tour
1966
continued, April to June 1964
Bibliography, 239
Chapter 7: 'Pursuit of Excellence', 97
'B' Squadron raised and trained, Index, 241
MAPS
1. The Borneo Frontier, 232-33
2. The Long Pa Sia Bulge and Pensiangan Front, 234-35
3. Sarawak First Division Frontier, 236-37

PREFACE
It was the SAS who suggested that I, a sailor, might like to write this book. They
presumably had a reason because they are a cool, calculating lot who never do
anything without one. In this case it might have been that they were increasingly
vexed at being thought of as thugs, which their habitual tight-lipped security
tended to encourage, and calculated that, being predisposed to admire and
sympathize, I might do something to buff up their image. I could, of course, have
given no undertaking as to that, having a code of sorts and knowing nothing
whatever about them - which is the common lot of humanity unless they decide
to talk; but I was immediately heartened to find that what they wanted was the
story as I saw it, warts and all if I were to discover any, and that the high gloss
finish with which they were often presented by the media nauseated them
anyway. I realized then that this approach reflected their whole way of life;
necessarily, for on the frontier of achievement, with life itself at stake, only truth
mattered.
This attitude was so interesting that I accepted the challenge, with elation at
the honour and the prospect of telling what used to be called rattling good yarns
with a fascinating environment. But there was also sombre foreboding at the
daunting labour needed to master the complex facts as though I were a soldier; to
relate them comprehensibly without over-simplification; and achieve what I
conceived to be my overriding aim of getting even a little way under the skin of
these men who assiduously claim to be just like the rest of us but are not.
And so, for years, absorbed, wondering, and with unbounded gratitude for
their unrestrained help and warm hospitality, I listened to Malcolm 'Yank' Allen
(in the Borneo jungle), his wife Glenys, Tony 'Lofty' Allen (in Worcester Police
Station), Paddy Baker (with awe in his RSM's office), Roger Blackman, Steve
Callan, Bill Condie, Bob Creighton (in his pub the 'Pippin Inn'), Peter de la
Billi5re (who set me going and kept me up to the mark in his irresistible style),
Bridget his wife, John and Terry Edwardes, Ken Elgenia (in the horse cavalry
lines of the Blues and Royals), Ray and Dorothy England, Keith Farnes, John
Foley, Alf Gerry, Terry Hardy, Norman Hartill, Nick Haynes, Bob Heslop, Pete
Hogg, Jerry Hopkins, Don Large, Richard Lea, Eddie Lillico, Colin 'Old Joe'
Lock, Malcolm and Bridget McGillivray, Fred Marafono, Willy Mundell, Dare
Newell, John Partridge, Jim Penny, Pete Scholey, Mike Seale, George Shipley
(who with unflagging interest arranged for me to meet many of his comrades),
John Simpson (who introduced me to the SAS in the first place), Geoff Skardon,
PREFACE
'Rover' Slater, John Slim, Ian 'Tanky' Smith, Lawrence Smith, Philip 'Gipsy'
Smith (with difficulty, he being engaged in an escape and evasion exercise from
the VAT-man), Alf and Margaret Tasker, Ian Thomson, Maurice Tudor, Kevin
Walsh, Johnny Watts, John White, Mike Wilkes, Frank Williams (in the Ulu Bar
of the 'David Garrick' in Hereford, and through him 'Gipsy' Smith and several
others), Mike Wingate-Gray, John Woodhouse, Roger Woodiwiss, and some who
were not Borneo veterans but whose assistance has still been invaluable. Their
styles and titles are omitted because those matter little to themselves, judging
each other as they do by their quality as men, which is also what interests me
most. Only Lieutenant-General Sir George Lea, KCB, DSO, MBE, must be accorded
that respect since, as well as commanding 22 SAS in Malaya, he was Director of
Operations in Borneo when the war there was won; Lady Lea also helped me
considerably.
The book being my own and not commissioned, its imperfections are mine
too. One of these is my arbitrary decision to discard many good stories so that we
can get to know a comparatively few men in a book of reasonable length which
cannot therefore be a definitive Regimental history, and I humbly offer my
apologies to both SAS and other readers who think I have strayed too far one
way or the other. I hope that what I have written is true; I have certainly tried
hard to ensure that it is, being uneasily aware that, for all their deadly (meaning
deadly) earnestness, my informants were often possessed of a bubbling and
irreverent sense of humour which might well have engendered a massive leg-pull.
Therefore, I cross-checked every story, but it never happened - I think; and my
only deliberate mistake is to change the names of the jungle tribesmen who
played a noble part in defending their country and freedom but whose efforts
might not be appreciated by those in authority across the border.
I am enormously indebted to many not in the SAS for helping me to under-
stand the campaign at every level up to the highest, the jungle environment, and
the SAS themselves as viewed from outside. They are The Right Honourable
Denis Healey, CH, MBE, MP, Secretary of State for Defence during the second half
of this brilliantly successful campaign; Lieutenant-General Sir Anthony Farrar-
Hockley, KCB, DSO, MBE, MC, Principal Staff Officer to General Lea; Colonel D. F.
'Nick' Neill, OBE, MC, of the 2nd King Edward VII's Own Goorkha Rifles with
whom the SAS worked closely in the decisive cross-border phase of the
campaign; Group Captain P. H. Champniss, AFC, Royal Air Force, who
commanded 43 Squadron (Hunters) in South Arabia and largely helped to save 3
Troop SAS from annihilation; Major Charles M. McCausland of the 7th Duke of
Edinburgh's Own Gurkha Rifles, who introduced me to the jungle with the
enthusiastic thoroughness of a professional naturalist; Jennie, his wife; Gillian
Standring of the London Zoo, who instructed me expertly in the private lives of
orang-utans, king cobras and other denizens of the forest; and Major Pengiran
Abidin of the Royal Brunei Malay Regiment, who flew me to the highest peak in
his country to survey the breathtaking grandeur that is Borneo.
PREFACE
Others to whom I owe much in various ways are Major General Martin
Farndale, Colonel Norman Roberts and Mary Roberts, Bob Gaunt, Lieutenant-
Colonel Douglas Johnson, Nigel and Diana Mossop, and Tony Geraghty, the
author of Who Dares Wins and This is the SAS, who gave me the run of his SAS
photographs which I thought exceedingly kind. Finally, I am greatly blessed with
a family whose enthusiasm for the book has equalled my own; Debbie, who typed
it beautifully on a machine selflessly borrowed by John from his father's office,
whose staff also allowed it to be duplicated to their great inconvenience;
Jonathan and Marion, who guided me through the tracks and ambushes of the
publishing 'ulu'; and, most of all, Mary my wife, who has lived alongside the SAS
for longer than she or I care to remember and supported me with a constancy
nothing short of crucial. To all these people, strangers and intimates, who have
gone to such lengths of help and encouragement, my gratitude is profound.
And now to the nitty (always) and gritty (often) of the SAS in the jungle; no
high gloss there.
Peter Dickens, Withyham, 1983.