Pakistani internal security (catch all)

[Pete]

The following obituary is of one of the last British soldiers to have seen action against the Fakir of Ipi in Waziristan. The obituary caught my eye because the brigadier shares the same surname as a grandmother of mine before she married, although admittedly my branch of the family arrived in the U.S. from Cork in 1855. Note that Brigadier Prendergast was made Britain's military attache in Afghanistan at the time of India's Partition in 1947, so Britain was clearly still keeping an eye on the region. I don't believe that Britain's former status as an imperial power necessarily invalidates all of the political and military techniques they used in the region during the last century.

Brigadier John Prendergast

Daily Telegraph
London
Published: 12:01AM GMT 03 Mar 2008

Brigadier John Prendergast, who has died aged 97, won a DSO and two MCs in an adventurous military career which spanned more than 30 years.

In May 1937 Prendergast was serving with the Tochi Scouts in North Waziristan. They were leading an advance on the village of Gariom with the objective of blowing up two of the towers as a punishment for harbouring the wily Fakir of Ipi when they came under heavy fire from rebel tribesmen.

Prendergast, with four platoons under his command, was ordered to take charge. As his small force moved up, they were halted along a lip in the ground.

The tribesmen, 300 yards away, concealed in ilex scrub, could cover every inch of open terrain that separated them and, as he tried to flatten his body into the dirt, the vicious crack of bullets flying past his head was so nerve-janglingly sharp that he had horrid visions of his brains being scattered by the next shot.

"This was terrible," he said later. "I was supposed to be a leader." At school, he had boxed against opponents much bigger than himself and had always believed that he was brave. Then the thought came back, "Well, lead then."

Terrified and with the awful feeling that his legs were made of rubber, he got to his feet, waved his puny revolver and tried to get a charge going.

In a split second, he was covered with dust from the bullets striking the ground at his feet. At the same instant, he saw stark fear in the nearest rifleman's eyes and knew that his men were not going to follow him.

He went to ground again, slid down from the lip and moved one of his platoons round to the left where it could give rapid covering fire from a more enfiladed position. Then, swearing at the other three platoons and getting bayonets fixed, he led them over the edge with a loud Pathan shout of "Halla, Halla." (Attack! Attack!)

Prendergast knew that his stout stature made him a marked man but zig-zagging, he and his Pathans tore across the intervening ground. Some of his men fell, but the tribesmen did not stop to face the bright line of bayonets bearing down on them so swiftly and took to their heels. Prendergast was awarded a Military Cross.

To read the remainder of the obituary click here.