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On 8 December 1968 the first of a number of attachments to the Portuguese Forces in the Tete Province of Mozambique took place. The objective was to assist the Portuguese in their counter-insurgency war against the Frente de Libertaao de Moambique (FRELIMO), who were then penetrating this area from Malawi and Zambia but for the most part were confined to areas north of the Zambezi River. We in Rhodesia were justifiably concerned about FRELIMO and by association their new allies, Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) occupying Mozambique, thus opening up the whole of our vulnerable eastern border. The real reason, however, was to stiffen up our allies military resolve to engage the enemy aggressively and demonstrate some of the successful methods of our joint service Counter-Insurgency (COIN) warfare.
Our first deployment was to Bene. This was in fact the Headquarters (HQ) of a cavalry battalion (Batalhao Caadores 2350). Initially, the Army component consisted of combat trackers (two teams from the SAS, myself and several junior officers from the RLI. These were jointly to lead the Portuguese follow-up troops. The Air Force contingent comprised of four helicopters and crews under the redoubtable Squadron Leader Norman Walsh. The ground element was flown to and from Bene by one of our Dakota aircraft. We were all dressed in distinctive Portuguese camouflage and were instructed that this and subsequent missions were rated as Top Secret and that the need to know principle applied, even within our respective units.
Bene is a small village situated northeast of Mt Darwin, approximately halfway between the Zambezi River to the south and the Zambian/Mozambique border to the north. It is about 20kms south of Tembue. The dam wall for Cabora Bassa Dam was under construction at that time. Because of the intensive use of anti-vehicle and anti-personnel mines by FRELIMO in Mozambique, the Rhodesians were warned not to travel by road but to use the helicopters for operational transport. This was not always possible under the conditions pertaining at the time - a heavy rainy season. As a result the ground component spent many nervous hours in the back of Portuguese trucks which only had mostly inadequate sandbags for protection. We certainly learned to be landmine-conscious and more alert.
We soon found that, despite lengthy and time-consuming conventional war type Operation Orders, including such unnecessary data as Start Lines and Phases of Attack, etcetera, that these were seldom applied in a practical sense. In fact, on one occasion an imminent surprise attack on a FRELIMO base was aborted because another phase was due according to the original order. Not to overstate the case, we found that we were making the hard-yard with little or no support from our allies, so much so that the ground troops were reinforced to provide the combat trackers with our own immediate, but limited, support. Some of our operations were described as a turkey shoot for we found that FRELIMO were not accustomed to long, bold and aggressive patrolling and immediate assaults on their bases, no matter the size. The Portuguese troops, on the other hand, when and if they did patrol on foot, were of short duration and insignificant distance. They were often too noisy and appeared to be over-dependant on fresh rations, particularly fresh bread, which dictated the length of their patrols. They also had a definite defensive complex and preferred to barricade themselves in isolated bush forts for the duration of their operational tours and venture forth as little as possible. There they became the victims of intensive mining and ambushing campaigns on the bush tracks linking the forts and subject to frequent
mortar and rocket attacks from a free-moving enemy.
There was a considerable social difference and standing between the Portuguese officers and their men. The former were mainly from the aristocracy, the wealthy or those of good education, while the latter were, for the most part, peasants and treated as such. Again as a generalisation, the officer corps gave us the impression of being aloof and on different strata from those under them. Certainly, there were some of a good calibre by any military standard but most had little liaison with their troops. The bulk of the soldiers were National Servicemen completing a three-year engagement from the Metropolis to a distant African colony that had no attraction for them whatsoever. While immigration was encouraged, the National Servicemen had to return to Lisbon for demobilization and then had to pay their own way back. Few were interested. This dangerous gap between the privileged and the peasants was made obvious in the rural bush forts where, despite the Portuguese love of football, there were seldom any facilities, not even a single goal post to shoot at, to keep the men occupied while in base. Their recreation facilities appeared to be non-existent, not a good feature in maintaining high morale but rather an encouragement to negative attitudes such as boredom and lassitude. To us man-management was seriously lacking.
Norman Walsh and I had got into trouble, and were reprimanded by our respective HQ, for using helicopters to uplift stop groups for vertical envelopment in a contact towards the end of Operation Excess. However, here in Tete and free of the military hierarchy, we used this tactic on several occasions. In one such occasion, the Portuguese had captured a FRELIMO terrorist but were unable to interrogate him for he spoke only Chinyanja (the language of the lakes - Lake Malawi). As he was a fresh capture, I questioned him and learned that his former base was at the junction of two streams fairly close to our operating base. Naturally, he could not indicate the location on our maps for he could not read a map, let alone read or write, but reluctantly agreed that he could indicate the position if we flew down one of the streams. We therefore filled three helicopters with our troops, while a fourth helicopter, piloted by Norman Walsh, with his technician, a fellow 1RLI officer, the captive and me, led the way, at low level, in the vain hope of using the element of surprise, conducting a vertical envelopment on the terrorist base. Not unexpectedly it was all in vain, but an experience nevertheless, with the agitated captive obviously thinking this was a ploy to throw him out of the helicopter. In his terror he was spraying saliva and mucus in all directions which was most unfortunate for I had to remain as close as possible to him in order to hear his directions above the noise of the helicopter. Not so amusing at the time.
Officer Commanding (OC) SAS Major Porky Rich and I alternated as the Army commander on these missions. As far as I can remember - over 40 years ago we conducted operations in Bene (twice more) Furancunco (near the Malawi border), Vasco da Gama, Chicoa, Tembue, Chifombo and several other isolated bush forts near the Zambian border. Besides the Batalhao Caadores 2350, we served with the Batalhao Caadores 2/503 and Regimento Caadores Para Quedistas (I have their pennants) amongst others whose titles I do not now remember. Although I have been critical of the Portuguese Forces operational modus operandi, their hospitality to our teams was always excellent and offered with warmth and courtesy. These attachments did have a lighter side. On one deployment to an unusually primitive fort near the Zambian border, our operations required the use of a radio relay station. We had been joined, as an observer, by a rather pompous, very English, senior officer, who was well known for his not inconsiderable theoretical knowledge of military affairs, but was rather lacking in practical experience. Being short of first-line troops as usual, we issued him with several radios, water and dry rations and sent him by helicopter to the top of a nearby bald granite hill. There he remained, in the blistering valley heat, in a vulnerable and exposed position for the duration of our commitment. As he was fairly pale in complexion and bald into the bargain, he rejoined us looking fiery red, hot and bothered, at least now with more practical experience. Also, Porky Rich and I were mates but not adverse to the odd practical joke against one another.
At one of the final debriefs to the Operations Coordinating Committee, at which the Prime Minister was present, I stated seriously that if the whole 1RLI battalion was deployed we could hold the line of the Zambezi River as a major obstacle in the northwest sector of Tete Province, but obviously, for diplomatic reasons, as well as the military pride of our Portuguese allies, this was impossible. It could have affected ZANLA’s aspirations, at least initially but, with hindsight, with the collapse of the Portuguese Empire, this would only have bought more time. The collapse of the Portuguese in Mozambique was a major, fundamental factor in the unfortunate outcome of our bush-war.