Pirates of Ng.Gaat

What was it like in the 1965 period of Confrontation. We were all in Form Four, My father had just passed away suddenly. Life was hard for most people and the streets were full of soldiers in uniforms. Some were from Malaysia, some from overseas. The air was often disturbed by helicopters flying areound.

All was not well on the ground and in the air.

Even though most people said that life had to go on as normal, it was not the case for MOST people. War is not an easy situation .

The voice on the short-wave intercom was that of Lieut. Tim Donkin, 25-year-old Royal Marine

commander of the Royal Navy's helicopter detachment at Nanga Gaat, which ferries the

Paras to their lonely outposts along 400 miles of Sarawak's remotest and most primitive jungle

border with Indonesia.I was sitting strapped in the deck of Lieut. Jimmy James's helicopter. The two pilots were ferrying

Para patrols to an area sparsely populated by the nomadic Punans, who still hunt with blowpipes and poisoned arrows.

Down below, in a tiny clearing amid the dense tall  trees, I could see an orange parachute laid out as

a signal. I saw a man in jungle green shoot a  smoke signal into the sky. I saw another run forward to gather up the parachute. We were hovering, sinking on to the pad. I unhitched my harness. Darby Allen, the young ginger-haired

aircrewman from Leeds, gave me a thumbs-up sign. And, there I was, standing 500 yards from the

border, facing four of the most disconcerted young Paras you ever saw. When one found his voice he said; " Are you the

lot? Aren't we getting any blokes and grub today?

"

I said I sincerely hoped so. I had a vested interest in the arrival of the second helicopter. It came within minutes. Quickly they off-loaded their four blokes, their grub for a fortnight, their bulging rucksacks and self-loading rifles and

ammo, watched me climb back in and waved me a cheery farewell. The newcomers would stay on border patrol here

for six weeks. The other four, with four weeks of

patrol completed, would be picked. up in two

weeks. As I looked down on those eight young

faces I thought of what one of them, a lad from

Fife, had said the night before at Nanga Gaat:

“Do you know what's the loneliest sound on

earth? He had asked me. " It’s the sound of a

chopper moving away from you after a drop."

Glimmer

I now had a glimmering of. how he felt. For six

weeks his job would be to search the Sarawak

jungle borders for signs of the enemy, to track,

him, assess his strength, hide from him and live

to report his whereabouts. And this in a terrain

where an enemy can hide a yard from you and

you never know. .

He would sleep for 42 nights in a hammock slung

between two jungle trees, live on field rations of

rice, tea and tinned meat, cook with smokeless

fuel, sprinkle his clothes and hammock with

Insect repellent. yet get scarred all over with

bites. He would eat monkeys, mouse deer and

wild pig, slaughtered for him silently by Punan

blowpipe and poison dart. He would tread where

no white man had ever trod before.

And all the time he would five with the sure

knowledge that, if captured, he would be killed,

slowly and cruelly The Indonesians disembowel

and decapitate their prisoners.

These men, all volunteers, all in their late teens

and: early twenties drop in with instructions to

identify themselves as closely as possible with

any local natives they meet, share their way of life

and enlist their aid as trackers. Some have

interpreted this so literally they have horrified

their C0.s by emerging from the jungle with their

hair shaven and fringed native fashion, tribal
tattoo marks. on their throats, wearing Punan
loincloths instead of Jungle greens and carrying
blowpipes and poison darts, instead of rifles and
ammo belts. That they are doing a superb job in
public relations was demonstrated on the next
pad we visited. To this pad had come 40 Punans
—the shyest and most primitive people in
Sarawak. They had come to bid farewell and
bring gifts to the four British lads who had lived
among them for six weeks—the first white men
they had ever seen. To Tim Ashton (23) from
Stockton-on-Tees, they gave a parang, a
blowpipe and darts and some tobacco wrapped to
palm leaf.
He told me they had shot much game for him
with their blowpipes. " Stewed monkey tastes just
like mutton," he said. " It's a smashing change
from baked beans.”
Shelter



He said the Punan hunters became very
distressed when they missed a pot shot with a
blowpipe. " They blame their ghosts. They're very
superstitious. My tracker had his own personal
ghost and used to hold long whispered
conversations with him at night to allay his fears.
His personal ghost was represented by a stick
and some leaves and he carried them about with
him,"
After completing our Para
dropping and collecting mission,
we came to the very roof of
Sarawak, to a 5,000ft. mountain on
the pinnacle of which was perched
a little plastic-roofed bamboo
shelter,
It contained two young surveyors
of the Royal Engineers, who had
been winched down on to it from a
helicopter to take readings for the
first accurate map of Sarawak.
We dropped them their rations for
the next two weeks and mail from
England
The mountain was Bukit Dema 5212 ft. The
young surveyors were Michael Pooley & Brian
Houldershaw
All this happened on the last day of a memorable
weekend I spent with the most unlikely
detachment of the Queen's Navy—the so-called
“Pirates of Nanga Gaat."
Their correct title is 845 Naval Air Squadron; their
ship is the commando carrier H.M.S. Bulwark.
Their base is 150 miles up river, at a junction
where the Gaat joins the Rajang. The junction is
of the Batang Baleh & Sungai Gaat
When the emergency began they offered to take.
sole responsibility for running a chopper service
from Nanga Gaat to move troops and supplies
over an area of impenetrable Jungle the size of
Wales, They expected to be relieved by the R.A.F.
after a few weeks and return. to fleet duties.
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