The other Buffels were somewhere abreast of us, riding into the thicket, but we could not see them. There was the crackle of rifle fire about 30 metres away to our right. Suddenly, right in front of us and coming out the dry bush, was a small figure wearing a dirty brown uniform. He didn’t even see us, his arms flaying at the thorn bushes that cluthced at him. He had an AK-47 grasped in his right hand. I started shooting at him, as did Fourie and John next to me, not even aiming. It seemed to be happening in slow motion; the only reality was the kick of the R4 rifle against my shoulder. I fired about five or six rapid shots, then everyone opened up. The small figure fell back into the thorns but kept thrashing about wildly. The earth around him came alive as our bullets kicked up sand in high spurts and I could see his clothes tug as they struck him.
He rolled over onto his belly and lay still, half-concealed by the thick thorn bush. Instantly I looked around for more targets. I flinched as bullets cracked and buzzed over our heads, probably from our own guys in the Buffel opposite us, who sounded like they were having a party. Then there was a shout from the other side of the Buffel and they all opened up at a target that we couldn’t see. I scanned the wall of bush in front of me. The veil had been lifted from my eyes now that I knew exactly what I was looking for. C’mon… bring on some more!
The shooting came to a ragged halt and the other Buffel came into view through a clearing in the bush. We had driven through the thicket. The whole thing had lasted about five minutes, if that. I became aware again of the gunship still circling above and looked up.
I could see the door-gunner with his big visor and helmet, like a big oneeyed bug sitting behind his long 20-millimetre sting. Valk 2 went in and swept the small thicket on foot, dragging the dead SWAPO and putting them in a line on the chana floor next to where we had parked the Buffels. We had killed four of them; the gunships, for all their shooting, had apparently not got any. If they did, we didn’t find them. The gunship crew must have felt safe with us around, because they landed in the chana and waltzed over to look at our handiwork.
“The bush was too thick to see them here, but we got some further back when we first saw them… back over there.”
The pale-eyed, blond door-gunner smoked a cigarette and pointed with his big bug-helmet into the bush to our right. He was tall and lanky; his flight suit seemed too small for him and his trouser-legs showed his ankles. Doep sent a section to scout for more bodies but they soon returned emptyhanded and we gave up the search.
We all lit cigarettes and relaxed for a minute. My mouth was as dry as a bone and my body felt clammy with sweat. I found myself glaring around with an intense stare and a frown, but apart from that I felt completely cold and calm. It was my first action—I felt no emotion at all. It had not been as much a fire fight as a plain, simple killing. I felt like some old colonial hunter riding high on the back of a elephant in the bush and shooting down at tigers that were trapped and tangled in the bush.
I felt no exhilaration or discomfort. I felt nothing. Valk 2 had come back from sweeping the area and reported it clean. This had probably been part of the group that had ambushed our guys five days earlier and had bombshelled into smaller groups. I looked at them lying in a row, dead. Three of them wore torn tiger-stripe uniforms, they had makeshift webbing with small round Chinese water bottles. One, who looked about 16 years old, wore a plain khaki tunic and pants and chest webbing stuffed with shiny, worn AK-47 magazines. We dragged them to the Buffels and trussed them to the bumpers at the back and front of the vehicle like deer after a hunt.
I noticed some kind of fuss going on at the second Buffel. When I walked over, I wasn’t surprised to see a couple of our platoon struggling to cut a finger from one of the dead terrs with a big Bowie knife. They were having a hard time, because when they kicked the knife that was held against the middle knuckle of the finger, the terr’s hand slipped into the soft sand. Finally they put the finger against the wheel rim while one troop held the knife in place on the joint of the finger and the other gave it a hard stomp with his boot, which cut right through the joint, leaving half a finger hanging by a thread of skin. I also noticed that there was a white bloodless patch that stood out against the black skin where the terr’s ear used to be. I knew what they were doing was wrong but the only thing I could think of saying was a stupid rhetorical question.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
“Dries up like old biltong… show the folks at home what we’re doing up here.”
The troop smiled and popped the finger into his side pouch and then proceeded to truss the terr up against the bumper. I said nothing and turned and walked back to the Buffel. I had heard that it was a popular pastime to take ears and fingers but as far as I was concerned it was bad karma. Not good. What happens if you get zapped and have to explain at the Pearly Gates why you have a string of ears around your neck? “I was going to return them but no one could hear me!”
As we drove away the only thing that was left at the scene of the killing was the small, almost intact brain that had plopped out of the 16-year-old’s broken skull as we tied him to the Buffel and which now lay in the dust of the small chana among the tyre marks and boot prints, the only evidence of what had happened here today for anybody who might happen to walk by.
I wondered where this kid’s mother was right now. Did she perhaps feel his death? What was she doing now and how long, if ever, would it take for her to find out what had happened to her young son out here in the bush? I knew what happened. I could tell her exactly what happened and even show her the only thing that was left at the scene. Her son’s intact brain, lying in the dust among the spoor of big army boots and truck tyres.
We drove back into the infantry camp like deer hunters and the infantry troops gathered around to look at the dead SWAPO, whose faces and wounds were coated in thick dust from hanging from the bumpers. The bodies would be picked up sometime later by chopper and taken to Oshakati. All terrs killed inside the South West African border had to be brought back to base and then taken to Admin HQ at Oshakati to be photographed and fingerprinted. Many more times in the future this requirement would have us riding into a camp with bodies hanging from the sides of our vehicles, sometimes a couple of days old.
That night we had a rowdy celebration with cold sodas, chocolate bars and cigarettes. The next morning, bright and early, just before breakfast, the shit hit the fan. The camp commandant came to inspect the dead terrs and found them missing half their fingers, all their ears and one of them minus a scrotum. We took it lightly and joked but Lieutenant Doep warned us that the infantry commandant was furious and rightly so.
We were told to unpack all our kit from the Buffels. We were supposed to leave that morning to continue with our vehicle bush patrol and then head in a roundabout way back to Ondangwa about 70 clicks away, but the commandant had blocked us from moving out, determined to find out who was responsible for the mutilations.
“Maybe someone heard something,” Stan sniggered.
“Or maybe they should look for some fingerprints!” the guys laughed. No one took the problem—or the infantry commandant—seriously. We soon got to realize his commitment when we spent the morning confined to our hot tents at the entrance of the camp and bored as hell. The hours dragged by slowly; we sat shoulder to shoulder, smoking and sweating and wondering what was going on. Thankfully a cool breeze from the pending rain sprang up and came billowing through the tent flaps, bringing relief after Spike’s mid-morning assault had turned the tents into saunas.