LIFE AFTER 9 RAR - PHUOC TUY 1970
After 9 RAR departed for Australia, I stayed on because having arrived as a 'reo' at the end of July 1969, I still had the rest of my year to do. I was posted to be Platoon Commander of the D&E Platoon at Task Force Headquarters. I was pretty dischuffed by this because it sounded somewhat pogo-ish to me, but it turned out to be anything but. We spent every bit as much time sneaking around in the J as did the Battalions and the diggers were as professional as those I'd served with in 9 RAR, although with the constant rotation, it had a different character to it to say, 5 Platoon. Still, I had blokes like Jim Muir and Col Moyle from the 'old crowd' so it wasn't a totally new start.
Some time around May 1970, I was given the job of protecting an engineer road maintenance group working on Route 2 north of Binh Gia. We set up a Night Defensive Position (NDP Kylie) near the road and I was pretty smug because I had my intrepid Platoon, a section of APC's, a troop of tanks and a troop of Engineers all under my command - quite the little Napoleon. Any way, in their usual sandcastle way the Ginger Beers pushed up a large earthen fortress-style wall for the NDP and in doing so disturbed every creepy crawly for acres around. This included the biggest python I had ever laid eyes on, which the aforesaid intrepid Platoon captured. Big - this thing was monstrous! of course, once you have caught a behemoth like that what do you do with it - you can't cuddle it or teach it to dance, especially if it doesn't like you, as this thing plainly didn't. I wanted the serpent let go, but the diggers cajoled me into letting them keep it (1 thought maybe it was the Napoleonic thing to do!). There was a big tea chest-type container inside the NDP which became the reptile's temporary home and I sort of forgot about it, what with being Napoleon and all.
The next day, the Task Force Commander, my direct boss and he-who-sat-at-the-right-hand-of-God, arrived with an entourage by helicopter to inspect the NDP. As the Brigadier and Lieutenant Bonaparte strolled around the little base, I thought what a nice, kindly old bloke the Brig was (now that I am a Brig I realise that niceness and kindliness are a natural state for one of that rank, although I am eternally young!). As we chatted he spied a tea chest in amongst a collection of military kit and casually inquired what was in it. Momentarily my eyes went shitty as I realised it was the snake gaol, and Imade the fatal error of saying, "nothing really, sir". Thinking he had caught me out with some contraband, the Brig gave a loud and menacing "well, let's look shall we!" and with astonishing speed for one so venerable, darted to the chest and threw open the lid. His scream reverberated around the base as yards of very angry python erupted from the box, jaws agape. All was bedlam with the Brigadier thrashing around among the boxes and piles of kit as he blundered away from the predator, with Bonaparte and the entourage in hot pursuit' and diggers going in all directions trying to corral the snake. When he could focus on the job, he called me by some very disgusting nouns and adjectives and left the NDP, with his sycphant staff casting reproving glances at me from the ascending helicopter.
Plainly, the snake had to go. Letting it crawl back into the J was the obvious solution but the diggers weren't sure if that was avdvisable, given that we frequently patrolled out there and an aggrieved giant python with a long memory was not something you would want literally and figuratively hanging over your head. The story gets murky from here: Our CSM in HQ Coy (to which we belonged) and the Platoon didn't like each other, to put it mildly. He never left the wire and used to give a very hard time to our diggers who were back in base for any reason. Revenge was nigh. Several of our senior snake charmers somehow managed to cram the creature into a very large hessian bag which when flill and tied at the top, was so packed with snake coils that you couldn't tell what it contained. The neck was tied with a slip knot and a luggage tag reading "Urgent - for the CSM from the D&E Platoon" was attached.
A driver in on the act was coopted to deliver the parcel to the CSM's desk back at Nui Dat during lunch (he'd be in the mess as normal, having a couple of surreptitious sherbets). The Coy clerks were warned by the same individual. It worked like a charm - the CSM returned from lunch and was heard to go into his office wondering aloud what 'those D&E bludgers' had sent him, followed by a scream to outdo the Brigadier's, as he slipped the knot on the bag and the snake did its thing. The CSM hurtled out of the HQ at the speed of light until unfitness took over - the clerks found him sitting in the road a couple of hundred metres away, clutching his chest. I have very few regrets over my service in Vietnam but I have always regretted not seeing that whole scene. The CSM vowed to get us but somehow things were never the same after that.
The snake should have got a gong, but where would you pin it!
Submitted by "The Lifer"
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