Expatriates Page 20

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  The invasion of Papua New Guinea began on the morning of February 5th. With no air cover and only three oil slicks to show where Royal Australian Navy ships had been sunk at their moorings while anchored at Port Moresby, resistance by the Papua New Guinea Defence Force (PNGDF) was pitiful. Their two light infantry battalions (one at Port Moresby and one at Wewak) were quickly overwhelmed by the much larger invading force. With no weapons heavier than 81 mm mortars, they were no match for Indonesia’s assault troops.

  Landing first at Milne Bay, the Indonesians quickly set up a base and with several subsequent landings soon controlled all of the cities and major roads in Papua New Guinea. The three HMPNGS patrol boats were quickly sunk and their two Landing Craft Heavys (LCHs) were captured. The only two operational PNG aircraft—a CASA CN-235 transport and a UH-1H Huey helicopter were both intentionally destroyed by friendly fire to avoid having them captured by the advancing Indonesian troops.

  Papua New Guinea’s Firearms Act of 1978 had mandated that all pistols and “high-powered firearms” (which included nearly all rifles and shotguns, except for air rifles) be registered. Seizing the registration records was at the top of the Indo-Malaysian Army’s priority list. Within a week, they had disarmed the populace almost completely. A handful of registered gun owners had disappeared, along with their guns. They became the focus of a manhunt that offered nearly twenty ounces of gold (payable in ten Tola bars) for information leading to the death or capture of each of the fugitives.

  The Indonesian press hailed the early morning hours of February 5th as Heroes Night while the Aussie media compared it to the December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor attack, calling it the Night of Infamy.

  The surprising effectiveness of the attacks defanged both the Navy and Air Force and turned the Indonesian invasion into a conventional ground war with very little air power involved.

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  When news of the EPA monitor bombs became public, it caused a near hysterical panic. The hundreds of genuine air monitors were removed by bomb squads with much scrutiny and covered by television news crews in great detail. It was learned that most of the Indonesian agents who had infiltrated the EPA left the country before the coordinated attack. Just one of them was captured, put on trial, and given a life sentence. The outcome of his trial triggered many vocal public protests, calling for reimposition of the death penalty for mass murder.

  The months following the attacks brought more bad news for Australia. In March, HMAS Melville was sunk in the Coral Sea, and in May the frigate HMAS Te Kaha was sunk at the mouth of the Bay of Carpentaria. Both ships were defeated with repeated strikes by Chinese-made C-705 missiles launched from the Indonesian Navy’s fast missile boats KRI Clurit and KRI Kujang. In both engagements, the missiles were launched from a distance of more than thirty-five miles. In the three weeks before she went down, HMAS Te Kaha had sunk six Indonesian ships, mostly cargo vessels.

  The losses of Australia’s two remaining warships were crushing blows to morale in Australia. Aside from a few civilian cargo and pleasure vessels that were hastily fitted with missile launchers and torpedo tubes, Australia had no significant naval power. While large numbers of civilian aircraft had been purchased or donated to the RAAF, most of them weren’t useful other than as spotter planes or light transports.

  One defeatist Tasmanian journalist compared the sinking of HMAS Te Kaha to the fictional sinking of the British ironclad torpedo ram Thunder Child, in H. G. Wells’s 1898 alien invasion novel, The War of the Worlds. He asked, “What was the difference between the Martian’s heat ray and the Indo’s missile technology? Only that one of them was fictional. Nothing now stands between us and the invaders.”

  Watching the parade of bad news on television, Alvis Edwards became increasingly angry, both at the Indonesians and at the lack of preparedness shown by his own government. The most telling details came in confessions from captured Indonesian saboteurs. They revealed that the target list for the 786 Heroes included not just RAAF aircraft at Amberley, Edinburgh, Richmond, Tindall, and Williamtown, but also telephone networks, bridges, power generation stations, and refineries. They had even prepared to poison civic water supplies.

  The telephone networks were both soft and hard. The soft attacks were made via hacks on telephone software. The largest number of hard attacks involved thermite incendiary collars on cell phone towers with timer igniters smuggled via diplomatic pouch. The bulk aluminum and iron oxide powder to make the thermite were purchased locally and aroused little suspicion. There were also thermite and explosive attacks on most long-haul military communications (multichannel) shelters. Alvis later heard that some older Australian Army Reserve RATT rigs were overlooked and later proved to be crucial in providing military communications across the vast expanses of the Australian continent.

  Alvis and Vivian had a long talk about the recent events, and they decided that their frustration would be relieved only if they did something to get involved with the war effort. “There has to be something we can do, to pitch in. I think I should ask about volunteering with a weapons contractor,” Vivian said.

  Alvis nodded. “Yes, please do. We may be too old to be fighters on the front lines, but we can still do something to do our bit.”

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  Following the demoralizing sinkings of Australia’s last two RAN ships, the Indonesian Navy began some daring nighttime raids, landing Pembebasan Kerombakan Komando (PKK or “Liberation Demolition Commando”) teams and shelling Australian coastal locations, often without any substantive opposition.

  Their naval gunfire targets were coastal airports, refineries, radar installations, bridges, port facilities, and a few selected factories. The shells were mainly fired from the 4.5-inch guns on their seven Van Speijk class Dutch-built frigates. These seven frigates were 113 meters in length and had 120-man crews. They all had their original Harpoon anti-ship missile launchers replaced by C-802 missiles from China, and the original Sea Cat anti-aircraft missile launchers replaced by Simbad (Mistral) launchers from France.

  Most of their nighttime approaches were feints, designed to un-nerve the Australian defenders. These feints usually ended three to twenty miles from shore with the Indo ships veering off. A few pressed on close to shore, and the shelling commenced. In one instance what looked like a feint was actually an attack: After an Indonesian Klewang class trimaran had veered off, it fired two C-705 missiles—one each at a pair of tankers anchored at the Bulwar Island Refinery, sinking both of them in spectacular blazes. These composite-hulled trimarans were particularly feared because the 63-meter ships each carried eight C-705 missiles and were purposely built for stealth. The trimarans were also fast, with a top speed of thirty-five knots.

  One much-publicized night, the Indos risked staying until dawn, repeatedly shelling the BP Kwinana Refinery on the shore of Cockburn Sound near Freemantle in Western Australia. This was Australia’s largest oil refinery, with a capacity of 138,000 barrels per day. Ava Palmer heard about this event firsthand in a telephone conversation with her grandmother, who lived just one block off the beach at Freemantle. Her grandmother described it as a night of intense fear. Sirens wailed all night. The concussion of the secondary explosions at the refineries could be felt and rattled windows up to fifteen miles away. The glow of the fires at the refineries could be seen from twenty-five miles away. Ava later learned that the lengthy shelling took the refinery off line for nearly a year.

  The main goal of the Indo raids was to bluff the Australian military into moving their field artillery and few remaining air assets to defend cities on the east and west coasts rather than on the north coast, where invasion was most likely. Ironically, the 8th/12th Regiment of the Royal Australian Artillery, normally headquartered at Robertson Barracks near Darwin, had all of its 155 mm guns defending Brisbane when the Indonesians invaded.

  Australian military planners still had doubts about Indonesian intentions, and
they had gaps in their knowledge of the enemy’s order of battle and transport capability. There was also still plenty of turmoil at home as economic adjustments were made to adapt to the post-Crunch world. This would be a “come as you are” war, and Australia was far from fully ready.

  33

  DISPATCHED

  “All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.”

  —T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, 1926

  7th Combat Service Support Battalion (CSSB) Headquarters, Gallipoli Barracks, Enoggera, Queensland—February, the Third Year

  Caleb Burroughs was summoned to the colonel’s office with vague word that he needed information about a forward logistics base. As he donned his hat, Caleb muttered to himself, “An FLB? What FLB?” He arrived at the brigade headquarters office to find Colonel Jack Reynolds poring over several maps that he’d spread over his desk. Reynolds, a balding man with a bristly mustache, was known for his informality. He waved Caleb in without giving him time for a salute. “Burroughs, I know you were reared around Darwin, so I’d like your advice for some FLBs for Task Force Dingo. We’ve been tasked with replacing the lost assets of the 1st CSSB at Robertson Barracks, just south of Darwin.” He gestured to the topmost Geoscience Australia 250K Series topographic map.

  Slightly puzzled, Caleb approached the desk hesitantly and Reynolds said, “No need to be nervous. We haven’t had any direct dealings, but you’ve come very well recommended by the staff. I’ve been told that you know the bush and you’ve got common sense. You also seem to be a good judge of character. For example, I heard that you carefully kept your distance from Captain Eggers back when he was one of the most popular men in the officer’s mess. That is, before his muck-up and fall from grace. That alone tells me a lot about you.”

  Reynolds looked back down at the maps and said, “We have plenty of time, so just begin at the beginning. It may sound odd, but honestly I’ve never been up the Top End. So brief me as if I’m tabula rasa on the Northern Territory. I suppose you should start with the climate first.”

  Caleb cleared his throat and said, “Sir, the dry season of course comes in winter, usually between May and October. The wet season up at the Top End is in the summer, from November to March. In a really wet year, we can get up to one-point-two meters of rain. People really can’t appreciate that figure until they’ve seen it firsthand. Back in 2011, we had eighty-nine full-on rain days, which was a record breaker. Not much gets accomplished out in the bush during the worst of it. The roads simply become impassible—that is, any of the unsealed earth roads that haven’t been paved or graveled. Therefore, in the summer much of the Northern Territory becomes classic ‘slow go’ or even ‘no go’ terrain, as the Plans and Operations folks call it. We call the humid period between the dry and wet seasons the buildup. People tend to get tense during the buildup, waiting for the first rains to come. When the rains do come, it is a relief since it cools off a bit.”

  Reynolds nodded, and Caleb continued. “The real wild cards are the tropical cyclones, which can’t be predicted other than arriving in a general season, which runs from November to April. I was there for Cyclone Monica, back in April of ’06. That was a bad one, still a Category 2 cyclone when it went through Darwin. Then there was Helen in January of 2008, and it tracked around just south of Darwin for five days. Helen wasn’t quite so intense, but it was still quite a mess. More rain than you can imagine.”

  After a pause he continued. “The climate is tropical, so the humidity plays hell with any stores. The humidity is always fairly high, but it gets insanely high for part of each year. Corrosion of metal and mildewing of canvas is a constant struggle. Silica gel and grease are our friends. The Army will have to busy itself like the Navy, just to keep pace. Lots of wire brushing and spot painting—that sort of thing. Cardboard boxes get soft and rot. Tinned foods get rusty. So I’ll have to coach the troops on the local tricks like lacquer-painting tins and how to dip boxes and cans in melted paraffin.”

  Reynolds nodded. “What else will we be facing?”

  “Well, then there are the spiders and snakes. There are half a dozen varieties of snakes up there that are deadly. Some of our soldiers that grew up in the big cities will need some coaching. They don’t even understand the importance of shaking out their boots in the morning. We’ll have to remedy that, straight away.”

  Caleb gestured to the map and continued. “The terrain is varied and the vegetation runs the gamut from saltwater swamps to dense jungle—that’s also called closed forest canopy—to open forest, to some scrublands. Some of the steep jungle country is practically impenetrable. But a lot of the better land has been cleared and put to use for cattle stations.”

  “What about the people and the economy?”

  “Well, the economy is relatively weak. The standing joke is, ‘The Top End is just another Third World country, only with better roads.’ I can honestly say that the Northern Territory was an interesting place to grow up. It is hard to describe, but personalities seem more amplified up there. There are some world-class eccentrics. But by and large, the people are hardworking, neighborly, and self-sufficient, especially the farther you get out of town. The old Australia is still alive and well up there.”

  Putting on a slight lecturing tone, Reynolds said, “What we have before us is an unprecedented situation, Caleb. The distances are vast, and our numbers are going to be mismatched against the Indos. Because of the great distances involved, there will be considerable delay in moving our forces to react to any Indonesian landings. Our problem is that they can pick anywhere they’d like along two thousand miles of coast to make their move. For small garrisons there, it might turn out to be a classic ‘hold until relieved’ scenario. But that naturally is suboptimal. What are your thoughts?”

  “Well, sir, rather than having this turn out to be another Rorke’s Drift or, God forbid, Gallipoli, I think the best thing for us is to keep the Indos guessing. We can use the heavy vegetation to our advantage to conceal our locations. I’d much rather try to keep them in a muddle, guerilla style, than face them in a set-piece fight.”

  The colonel nodded and said, “That’s it, precisely. I’ve heard that you’re keen on military history. Tell me, have you read much about T. E. Lawrence in the First World War, or David Stirling in the Second?”

  “Yes, I’ve read Seven Pillars of Wisdom and as much as I could find about the early days of the SAS. And I’d say that I’m fairly well read about North Africa in World War Two. Fascinating stuff, sir.”

  The corners of Reynolds’s mouth turned up as he responded, “The 1st CSSB, as you know, had been at Robertson Barracks in Darwin since the late 1990s. Soon after, they got warned out in support of the 3rd Brigade’s deployment to East Timor. After that, they got comfortably settled back into Robertson Barracks, but then just before the Crunch, they got deployed again even more heavily to Papua New Guinea. Communications have been spotty, but as near as we can tell, they were obliterated there by the Indos.”

  The colonel paused to let that sink in. “So we’ve been tasked to take over their loggy role in that region, covering about two hundred fifty miles of the northern coast.”

  Burroughs nodded. “I see.”

  The colonel went on. “But we don’t want to make the mistake of just taking up their old digs and carrying on in a quasi-peacetime mode. That would be a huge blunder. We’d be sitting ducks in range of naval gunfire. Instead, we’ll use Robertson Barracks only temporarily for staging. Everything should be hidden, out in the bush. I want you to go up there and select three widely separated FLBs. Each of them will be like a brigade maintenance area, and they’ll have the same functions as a standard BMA, but the military staffing will be light. The same number of soldiers that would
normally staff one BMA will be spread out over three sites. We’ll be hiring civilians to make up the difference in requisite manpower. With the redundancy of three sites, we won’t have all our eggs in one basket.

  “There’ll of course be more FLBs at other points up and down the northern coast, but those will be handled by other brigades. Just concern yourself with the three sites we’ll need near Darwin. Your three sites should all be in no more than a two-hundred-mile radius.”

  He gestured to the map again. “So think Lawrence of Arabia. The Top Enders are going to be our Bedouins, Caleb. Instead of riding camels and horses, they’ll be driving Toyota utilities, but the principle is the same. Our job is to provide the logistics. There’ll be regular maneuver units to follow up, but odds are that for the first week—or perhaps even the first month—you and the local Stay Behinds will be left to your own devices. In the logistics world, all our bag and baggage denies us the advantage of great maneuverability. So you’ll have to be very clever in choosing the locations for your FLBs. You’ll need to pull a magic trick to make the FLBs disappear. Strike a balance between good camouflage and accessibility all within a short time frame. Obviously, you can’t bury it all, or it will be no good to us. Nor can you leave it where the Moslem hordes can find it.”