Alexandre Binda, compiled and edited by Chris Cocks (30º South Publishers, 544pp, £50).
Review: John Elliott
HISTORY, declares former Rhodesian premier Ian Douglas Smith, will show that the battle for his country was not a war against a “liberation army” but against terrorists who threatened a bastion of Christian civilisation in a lonely African outpost.
“From the beginning of hostilities to the end, the panache and fighting spirit of the Rhodesians was epitomised by the officers and men of the Rhodesian Light Infantry (RLI), who fought throughout with courage, fortitude and reckless disregard for their own welfare,” writes Mr Smith in a tribute published on the first page of this picture-rich, glossy, coffee-table publication.
Here your reviewer must declare an interest. As a 20-year-old in the late 1960s he completed a year of National Service in the Rhodesian Army, beginning with several weeks of old-fashioned basic training straight out of the British Army manual, delivered in the main by RLI regulars whose accents revealed their formative years were as likely to have been spent in London or Liverpool as Southern Africa.
To us part-timers, the troopers of the RLI were the real deal: tough, resourceful, confident, up for it, within our borders or without, a self-contained, scary band of hell-raisers who fought hard, played harder and spoke an incomprehensible, slang-filled patois. To the white citizens of Bulawayo and Salisbury they were heroes, although many would have taken their nickname – The Saints – with a large dose of salts.
Arguably one of the most effective counter-insurgency units of all time, the RLI developed the “Fireforce” concept of ruthless airborne envelopment and annihilation of the guerrilla enemy. A superb fighting unit, they won every battle but lost the war.
Their last commanding officer, Lt Col Charlie Aust, now living in the UK, is unequivocal about the RLI’s legacy. “Tutored under the auspices of the British Commonwealth, the unit grew and matured in peace and war to become one of the finest regiments of a small and determined army, which itself became the most efficient and successful irregular warfare machine ever known in Africa or indeed, perhaps the world” is how he puts it in a foreword to the book.
Built on a foundation of Rhodesians, the ranks of the RLI were augmented by soldiers from the armies of many nations, not least that of the United Kingdom. Ironically, that tradition operates today in reverse, with hundreds of Zimbabweans currently in the uniform of the British Army.
Binda, who served for 15 of the 19 years (1961-1980) that the regiment existed, has woven together a mass of personal and operational detail, maps, sketches and photographs compiled by Chris Cocks, who saw action with 3 Commando, 1 RLI.
Insertions by helicopter and parachute (from ever-reliable Second World War-vintage Dakotas) were followed by hard, aggressive action on the ground. At the height of the war troopers were jumping two or three times a day into contact zones. One racked up 79 operational drops.
An American NCO in 3 Cdo reckoned soldiers on Fireforce missions – operations deep into the bush – required two qualities: a healthy instinct for survival and a lot of luck. Another believed what was needed was aggression, a high standard of sharp-shooting and initiative. “Slow or hesitant reactions and poor shooting,” he said, “wasted the effort of everyone involved in putting sticks on the ground.”
This, writes Ian Smith, was a regiment that “filled Rhodesians with pride”. Binda’s book tells us why.
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