I read about the battle of Cuito Cuanavale in Angola as a security guard one night, sitting next to an Ethiopian who claimed that he was a communist. He was the nicest person you could ever meet.
I read about Nelson Mandela being released after 27 years in prison and being elected president of the ‘new South Africa’. I wrote him a letter of congratulation and to my surprise I received a letter from him enclosing a signed photo, wishing me all the best. I read how SWAPO whom we had hunted down in the Angolan bush as the sworn and hated enemy, who were the real ‘red danger’, had won free and fair elections in South West Africa and that not a peep had been heard out of them since. I pondered what it had all been about. Who was right and who was wrong? Were we the good guys or were we the bad guys?
I read cloak-and-dagger ‘tell-tale’ books on the old South African regime and realized that we might have been the ones sucked into one big lie and brainwashed for the sake of Volk and Vaderland.
In 1990, nine long years after Angola, I said ‘enough’ and visited a Vietnam veteran counselling centre in Los Angeles where I sat down and spoke to a counsellor. For the first time I told a living soul of my anger, torment and my debilitating visions. The moment the words left my mouth and travelled to another human being’s ear, I felt the spirits’ grip weaken. I walked out over the grass lawn later, elated.
It was difficult at first but I told another person, then another and each time the grip got weaker. My terrible secret was out.
I decided to write about my experiences in Angola. It took months of deep thinking, slowly bringing back the points of memory about my small war. Invited and called back, the memories all came flooding in like chickens coming home to roost but this time I was ready for them and wrote them down on paper for all to see.
The real healing had begun.
The first time I returned to South Africa to visit was in 1997, 12 years after I had left in 1985. On the second visit a few years later, I was determined to to track down some of my old 1 Parachute Battalion mates who were once my brothers.
They were difficult to find as they had bombshelled in many different directions around the world, leaving a very faint spoor to follow. Of the handful of friends I was able to find, their lives had all been affected by the bush war and changed forever.
John Delaney: one of the first to get a kill in our company, had attended a seminary and become a missionary minister, going back into Angola. He ministered at the Town of Death, Ongiva, to preach and spread the word of God. John has travelled to almost every country in Africa to minister, as well as going in to give aid among Sri Lanka’s Tamil Tigers. He is married, has three children, lives in England, is a published author and still does ministry work.
Anthony Stander: hardnosed, cold-as-ice ‘Stan the Man’, who was raised in an orphanage and reform school and who was caught with a huge amount of money after he had robbed five banks soon after leaving 1 Parachute Battalion, was sentenced to 30 years in prison. In prison Stan was reached by a Christian counsellor. He spent seven years in prison but is a saved man. Stan was, as he puts it, released after seven years on a ‘miracle pardon’. He too is married, with three children and lives in Cape Town. He is today, and has been for many years, very active in Christian outreach and is a minister in the church. He is as hard a man for God as he was a soldier in the bush.
Aaron Green: Doogy’s war still goes on. At the time of writing he has been a security contractor for an British security outfit for four years. He still sees regular action in Iraq, Algeria and Afghanistan and a year ago was the only survivor in an ambush on his motorcade in Algeria. Doogy has lived in the UK for many years, has led an interesting life owning a number of businesses—including a small factory manufacturing Mercedes gull-wing sports cars under licence. He is divorced from his second wife, has a young daughter, and when in the UK he lives on his yacht.
Michael Roberts: Mike was paralyzed from the waist down in a motorbike accident soon after leaving the army in 1981. His army mate, Anthony Stander, has stuck with him through many years and they run a roofing business together in Cape Town. Michael also stuck by Stan while in prison.
John Glover: ‘The Fox’, the Englishman who didn’t have to do military service, and whose sharp eyes saved me from going on that never-ending patrol in the sky, is living on a farm in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, happily surrounded by fat cattle. He runs a construction company, is married and has three children. John tells me that his temper caused him big problems for many years, which he ascribes directly to those years when killing was something he did without the blink of an eye.
James Anders: killed himself soon after leaving the army while challenging a group of thugs to playing Russian roulette in a bar. James suggested that they put two bullets in the chamber and that he would go first.
Taina: my girlfriend, who had won so many beauty pageants and who had stuck with me for seven years, was quickly snapped up after we finally broke up a year after the army. She has been married ever since, with two children.
So, many years now after the bush war in southern Africa, John Delaney, Aaron Green and I have got together over the years in different countries around the world and hoisted a few to the old days.
John Delaney and I prayed to lift any spirits and demons of death deep in our souls. I cried like a baby. I wept, too, when I burned the horrific closeup photographs of the dead SWAPO and FAPLA that I carried in my photo album and showed off for 18 years. Some of the people in those pictures I had personally shot. I burned them in Los Angeles, at John Delaney’s suggestion. I dug a hole in the backyard and buried the ashes there. As I did so, I felt a burden lift instantly from my shoulders.
I wished that I had done it ten years before.
I am in contact with Stan and John Glover. And yes, since I have now visited the Old Country several times and rebuilt relations with family and old friends, military and non–military, South Africa and my past are no longer a lost misty dream, but a warm reality that stays with me and nudges me into the future.
I too am divorced now, with a beautiful young daughter of thirteen. For many years I have lived and run a successful small business in Los Angeles, California. I live an active, happy life and look forward to the future. I am finally rid of most war-related cobwebs and blockages, but when they do sneak in from across the border every now and then, this time I have an ambush waiting for them.
Plate Section 1
