Fighting Men of Rhodesia ep195 | Lt Alan Balson part 1 | RLI & 1 Indep. Coy RAR
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- čas přidán 9. 05. 2023
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Brilliant story teller. Thank you.
Always a good day when there is a new story about Rhodesia.........! Thanks for the great work that you are doing to document the Rhodesian War History..... and all of the great characters that populated the country as well as the ranks of it's military...!
Thanks
Thanks for your comments on my portraits. So glad my choice to draw Alan, led to this interview, so rich with interesting stories! Rivetting!
Wonderful work, they are amazing! thanks 🙏
Thanks Lorna, your drawings are amazing.
Nice to see you Alan. I write about that Sheen of blood in my book Choppertech. I was the guy who uplifted you. Aye Beaver0
Thanks Beavs, good to hear from you. Thanks for uplifting me out of that marsh. That is one thing that no war movie will ever get correct, the microdroplets of blood flying around from the dead and wounded.
Best book of the war!!
Fantastic stories...thank you for sharing them so candidly 👍👍👍
You are welcome. I told them as I remembered.
Once again well done Tony and big respect Alan. Appreciate your service. Aye, Jim
Thanks Jim
Thanks Jim, bless you brother (Tony B)
Alan describes the incident at Essexvale which we all became aware of through press releases by SF Headquarters, but the details always remained vague. let me share my similar experience. At that time, I was a sergeant conducting training at the Khami Battle Camp just outside Bulawayo and we NCO's were instructing about 120 trainees under very strange circumstances. This was February/March 1979. As far as I recall being told, this was the first racially mixed national service intake(about 50/50 mix) but we could not figure out why we had been sent these men as they were barely out of first phase and very green. We were usually doing retraining of seasoned troops after their R&R. I later realised that the brass knew they were going to have to deploy as many men as possible for the upcoming elections and somehow it become our task to get these men ready ASAP. So, a few weeks before we got the surprise radio message that trucks were on their way from Brady Barracks to uplift us for deployment somewhere(one hour's notice), myself and a fellow sergeant, who was a Matabele, were teaching skirmishing drills out in the veld and a particular trainee, who was a Shona, kept advertising his position when he dropped and rolled by waving his weapon in the air like an aerial, instead of tucking it in against his chest as he hit the ground. So the black sergeant laid into this trainee with his rifle butt in frustration. About an hour after this, while the trainees were standing around under a tree and taking a short break, a couple of youngsters came up to me in a panic to report that the trainee who had been the victim of the sergeant's ire, was removing the tape from his magazine and preparing to load. By that stage of the war, it was standard practice when taking trainees out on exercises or range practice in mostly operational areas, to have them carry fully loaded mags - but with tape over. I immediately cocked my weapon and confronted this recruit who initially would not put down his weapon, but only complied when I aimed at his head at point blank range. It was a close call that shook everyone present, especially as the Essexvale incident was still fresh in our memories. We understood the incident to have been triggered by tribal animosity between the sergeant and the trainee. I marched that recruit back to the camp where the MP's later arrived to take him away.
Yes Henry as l recounted in my 2nd talk with the Shangaan trackers where l was the only white soldier amongst 12 soldiers & the follow up troops kept on wanting to stop for a smoke break. I got the distinct feeling that there was no desire to track to contact & one of the black stick leaders told my lead tracker to say that he had lost spoor. When he refused (saying that l was actually doing the tracking which was BS) he was told "to watch his back" should we have a contact! This was the incident that made me do a Recce course with 4RR so at least l would be operating with similar minded troops
Thanks Alan & Tony. I look forward to Part 2.
on its way soon
Thank you Alan !!
Exceptionally good talk gentleman, Ele's, Lions, enormous tape worms, heap of punch up's! What else can you ask for!!! Thanks Alan for taking the time to share with us your bush war experiences! Thanks Tony, for setting the scene and geographical positioning...
Pleasure boet (Tony B)
Thanks a lot for that, it took a bit of prodding to get me on here. It was theraputic to talk about stuff from those days that haven't been spoken about for years.
Excellent talk, Alan. I attended Graham Watson-Smith's funeral (after he died in Oman) in Harare, along with many others, including Tony Husher. I knew him briefly while in 1RAR. He was laid to rest in a private ceremony at his parent's farm in Bindura. The circumstances surrounding his death remain unclear. We heard he died while riding a high-powered motorbike on an airstrip, at night, next to his regimental base. Perhaps others know more? RIP, Graham.
I heard from his brother a couple of years ago. During the crash he hit his head on a rock and that is what killed him. Very sad.
Thank you, Tony and Alan - very interesting (Tangent - Vic Falls).
God bless you Prop!! (Tony B)
Thanks Prop
Awesome stories right there!
Amazing.
Very interesting video much respect
Brilliant again
Cheers boet!
Alan, an absolutely fascinating talk on the Rhodesian bush war. Many new details from your perspective. Also, many thanks to the creators and production team.
Thank you.
Great interview Tony! This channel has always had fascinating interviews but the interviewers (John, Hannes, Tony) are real pros. Thank you for the content. I find myself rewatching these. I wish there were movies made of Rhodesia and the amazing and brave men and women. Keep em' coming!
Thanks for the encouragement mate (Tony B)
best video so far i wlook forward to hearing more from this guy
Alan knows the Beit bridge area very well. I'm from Siyoka Beit bridge. Alan the river you were in Siyoka is Mutshavhizi river. Along the banks of that river there is Majini secondary school that's my school. I did my primary school at Majini before moving to Beit bridge school . My aunt lived in Mtetengwe not far from Mtetengwe river. Alan reminds me a lot of stories about our liberation war. My dad worked for Liebigs Towla Range. I wish I could meet the man and talk more about our history in Rhodesia.
Thanks for the great stories.
Thanks Tony for the opportunity. Appreciated.
An absolute pleasure and thanks to John and Hannes for being brave enough to give me freedom on this channel!
Thanks Alan for sharing this history! interesting and entertaining! A magnificent job Tony with this interview, your contextualizing is brilliant, tying everything together and really aiding in understanding these stories. Thanks so much 🙏
Thank you for your compliment Nathan, much obliged! 😃 (Tony B)
@@Toncor12 👍🙏
Thanks Nathan, it was a pleasure. Glad you enjoyed it.
I think I would have joined Rhodesian army instead of magandanga had I been an adult during the war.
Interesting is the lion part for me. Dube n Zebezebe
They were both very good soldiers and good friends.
I am the younger Brother of Kojak you know Leon Padda my cousin
The attacks on the keeps would have been a "duck shoot" much the same as the camps in Chimoio. Our guys would have won that one as well !!
I dont know, here they knew we were coming, they had their heavy machine guns dug in and aimed at our approach. Though the guns may have been neutralized by arty and bombing and also our 106mm Anti tank Rifles. We will never know. The open ridge we has to advance down toward the Assembly Point was not the best in that particular scenario.
Thanks
Wow thanks so much Chris! 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
How about Watson Smith’s story in detail?
What is an “AS”?
all very proper till it got to the tape worm lol . Good Lord lol
*~ RHODESIA ~*
Hi Alan was your father Eric
Yes
What is that accent of yours Alan ?
It's Canadian, he's lived there for several decades married to a Canadian girl.
@@Toncor12 cheers
I had an East African Accent, but as a previous answer suggested....42 years married to a Canadian will adjust any accent you have!
@@alantags7033 tks and look forward to your next talk.
@@alantags7033hi Alan was your father Eric ?