Return to Sarawak (Borneo Island)

Story
Sarawak Borneo Confrontation
Behind the water pipe and wire, the boy Nyanin. Holding him is a Rifleman from Fiji, Peni Levaci, an all-round sportsman who played rugby and was an Army heavyweight boxer.

FORTY YEARS ON - RETURN TO SARAWAK
(by General Sir Roger Wheeler)

As part of a trip to Malaysia in 2007, I thought it would be fun to take a trip down memory lane by returning to Serian District of Sarawak where I joined the Rifles in 1964. By then the Battalion, commanded by Corran Purdon, had been in the Far East for more than 6 months. We were there as part of the British Forces who were supporting the Malaysian Government to deter and defeat Indonesian incursions into Sarawak, a campaign known at the time and since then as Confrontation.

The Battalion initially deployed from Hong Kong into a vast area along much of the Rajang River basin, with Battalion headquarters based in Sibu, an important administrative centre. By the time I arrived in August 1964 the Battalion had moved, but I decided to start my trip there just to see what it looked like. Having flown into Sibu, we took the high speed ferry to Pelagus rapids, and I thought a photograph of the modern river transport, a very high powered diesel speed boat, would make an interesting contrast to the longboats of yesteryear [Photo 1]. I also thought that for those who passed through Kapit it might be interesting to see the contrast between the old police station, which I believe was a company headquarters, and the new District Council office next to it [Photo 2 & 3]. For all the change to modern buildings, one thing that has not changed is that the people wherever we went remain very friendly and genuinely pleased to meet up again with the British who had helped them in Confrontation — not an attitude one meets everywhere in the world.

After a few days in and around a much changed Kuching, with a 15 storey Hilton amongst other alterations to the landscape, we set off down the tarmac dual carriageway for the Serian District, the real purpose of my visit. What a contrast from the dusty road down which I had travelled in the back of a 3-tonner, commanded by Sgt Downie, who complete with handlebar moustache was I believe the Provost Sergeant of the day. Serian itself has of course changed too, but was still recognisable, the old shops are still there as is the District Office, and indeed some of the buildings in the nearby army camp look remarkably like Battalion Headquarters as I remember it [Photos 4, 5 & 6]. The area is prosperous and Serian itself is a thriving market town. I was particularly interested to find the pool in the nearby river that we occasionally used to swim in, the pool itself is unchanged complete with diving rock covered in moss exactly as I remembered it. The difference is that it is now surrounded by a "botanic" garden complete with tea houses for the tourists, whereas in our day it was in the jungle and not used at all by the locals!

When I joined B Company under Denis Lucy's command in 1964, we were based in Balai Ringin with a forward platoon base in Nibong. Balai Ringin is unrecognisably modern, reached by a continuation of the fine tarmac road. But it was Nibong that I really wanted to see having spent several months on a fortified hill nearby. So off we set initially on the tarmac road, through huge oil palm plantations which have replaced the jungle, and after an hour or so with an increasing number of potholes, we reached Nibong, a kampong near the border that in our day could be reached only by helicopter or foot patrol. It was a strangely emotional feeling to return to a place that immediately felt so familiar, as Alec Shooter or Sean Esteridge, the other two platoon commanders, would no doubt have felt on returning to their platoon base. Remarkably the Headman, Robert [Photo 7] is the son of the Headman when we were based on the hill outside the kampong all those years ago, which only added to the sense of deja vue. When I produced some black and white photographs of David taken in 1964 it caused quite a commotion. He died some 15-20 years ago and cameras were a rarity in his lifetime, so no photograph of him exists. After a very friendly welcome in the new kampong meeting house, we started to walk round the kampong [Photo 8 & 9], a mixture of old and new buildings surrounded by prosperous farmland no longer based on shifting agriculture.

Suddenly a small man appeared from the fields, who was clearly very excited, repeatedly calling out the name "RUR". I was wearing our shamrock-badged jungle hat and when the excitement had died down, we looked again at my black and white photograph collection taken on our platoon base hill. "That's me" he cried at one of these [Photo 10a - above], and it soon became clear as we talked that this man was Nyanin [Photo 10] who, as a young teenager, had helped us dig trenches and fortifications - how amazing after 43 years. He insisted on taking me out of the kampong up to the hill which is now covered in vegetation. But the perimeter trench is still there, as indeed is some of the barbed wire, and the cuts in the hillside which we made for our "houchies", as well as the square hole that was the platoon HQ bunker. It was a strangely emotional experience to meet the people and the sons of the people of Nibong to whom we were so close all that long time ago as we pursued the "Hearts and Minds" policy aimed at gaining their support for our operations and on occasions useful intelligence too.

After refreshing juice straight from the coconut and bananas, we set off for Mujat and Mongkus, another 45 minutes by road instead of the day's patrol that it used to take us. Once again the Rifles jungle hat brought comment from the older Dyaks, whose longhouses have altered little in the last 40 years - just wriggly tin in place of the atap roof [Photos 11 & 12]. The Headman at Mujat appeared and immediately produced a visitors book, so the return of at least one old Rifleman was recorded, no doubt there will be others whom I am sure will receive just as warm a welcome as we did.

Quis Separabit

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