FAREWELL TO THE BARREN ROCKS OF ADEN

It was not just farewell to  "The Barren Rocks of Aden " (a famous pipe tune ) but to the Leicesters for four years . More significant it was farewell to my platoon who had been with me for three years in Borneo and Aden . I in fact went back to the UK a month ahead of the Battalion as it was decided that I should do these courses at the School of Infantry which I should have done on leaving Sandhurst . Also I was posted to the Junior Leaders Battalion at Oswestry in Shropshire .

I suppose you could say at that stage in life I was an angry young man . Early twenties wondering what was the meaning of life . Wanting to explore different military options like going to the SAS but on the other hand exploring the opposite sex  might be more exciting . Being shot at is exciting but it is also bloody dangerous and I do not think I had a death wish .

What about the big World outside in 1965 . Before we left for Aden we had watched the State Funeral of Winston Churchill on television. In Feb the US bombed North Vietnam and Malcolm X was shot dead in New York . Then in Mar US Marines landed in South Vietnam and Australia decided she would also support the Americans and send troops. BP finds oil in the North Sea .
In Nov Ian  Smith declares Unilateral Independence for Rhodesia which was to last till 1980 .

Things hotted up in Aden after we left and battalions like the Northumberland Fusiliers and the Argyle and Sutherland Highlanders had a much more intensive time especially Aden itself .

Having reread sections of a book Douglas sent me , Looking for Trouble by General Sir Peter De La Billiere , one bit is worth repeating ." Yet in all our occupation we had behaved in a deplorably self- centered fashion :concentrating on our own trade , we had done almost nothing for the local people. We had never built a tarmac road outside the town and although we had set up a loose up-country administration and some rather feeble attempts at schools , we had never brought the warring tribes together to create a unified state, or introduced significant improvements to their primitive way of life . The result was that the Arabs never developed any particular loyalty to us ; and the only effective way we had  by bribing of keeping the rulers on our side was bribing them with arms ammunition and money .British control of the hinterland was always fragile, and when the Communist-inspired challenge came down from the north , it began to crack up . "

As I left my platoon presented me with a watch and I bid farwell to B Coy but when I got to the airport I was turned away and another platoon commander in B Coy who had just been sacked had priority over me . Nothing for it but another night in that grotty tent . I headed down to the Officers' Club and bbid a second farewell to my favourite nurse .