Koos Stadler - Recce - Small Team Operations Behind Enemy Lines

I was told that he had gone on a drinking spree while sitting in front of his hut at Omega with his three little children. At some point he got so drunk that he picked up a bottle of hydrochloric acid that was standing next to his beer – and emptied it. He died five or six days later. In the hospital at Omega he crawled from the bed to the lawn, and when he couldn’t crawl any more he insisted that they carry him outside. He refused to die in a bed.

ALTHOUGH studying at Stellenbosch University was a pleas­urable experience and, in a sense, a welcome break from three years of cross-border reconnaissance missions, I found that my passion was elsewhere. I felt the call to join the Recces, and realised after a year that I had been away from the books on military call-ups once too often.

One morning, while my fellow students were wrestling with Greek and Hebrew in class, I drove to Gordon’s Bay and spent the rest of the day on the cliffs above the sea. While huge waves rushed in and broke on the rugged rocks far below, I peered out over False Bay and came to a decision.

No longer would I resist the nagging sensation that I belonged elsewhere. I would quit my studies, apply for Recce selection and commit myself to a career in Special Forces. There would be no turning back.

The first thing I did when I got back to Stellenbosch was to phone my dad. While I knew that he would be deeply disappointed, he did not say anything. He only asked if I had made up my mind and if I was dead sure. We spoke at length, and in the end I had the peace of mind that my father would stand behind me and support my decision.

The Special Forces pre-selection programme was a week-long series of tests done at the South African Medical Services Train­ing College in Pretoria, where about 300 hopefuls gathered from all the arms of service across the country. Pre-selection was virtually a selection in itself. To thin out the field, the physical tests were concluded first. These consisted of a battery of fitness tests (six different PT tests done in quick succession), a fifteen-kilometre hike with kit and, finally, a range of bio­kinetic tests in the gym. This was followed by a full medical examination and a series of psychological and aptitude tests.

We stayed in the barracks of the medics’ training college, where I had a bizarre experience with a guy whom I had met on the first day during the initial admin phase. Peter was a lieutenant from the Air Force’s security squadrons – tall, handsome and with distinct athletic features. He had huge calves and a torso like a gorilla’s – the kind of physique I knew I could not compete with. He was also an exceptionally jovial and easy-­going person, and everyone took an immediate liking to him. For some reason he latched on to me, and we ended up sharing a cramped room in the barracks.

After the medical and biokinetic tests, Peter boasted about his performance. According to him, one of the pretty young nurses commented on his abnormally large chest capacity, apparently just the right thing if you wanted to become a Special Forces diver. His fine figure had clearly made an impression on the medics, since they were already referring to him as the “Air Force Recce”. Little did I know that my roommate would apply his skills in other related diving spheres. That night he sneaked a girl into the barracks, and had her screaming in ecstasy on the bed barely half a metre away from me, with no shame or consideration for the other person in the room. With the erotic aromas in the air and the hushed panting and the vibration of passion, I had my own little fantasy adventure.

As soon as we heard that we had passed the test series, we were to report to 1 Recce in Durban. Of the initial 300 candidates who reported for the tests, 30 were found suitable to continue with the Special Forces selection. Peter did not make it and I never saw him again, but strangely enough the memory of that one night has stayed with me.

And so I began a whole new chapter in my life. At the end of May 1983 I drove down to Durban in my little Toyota Corolla, and passed through the gates of 1 Reconnaissance Regiment – known simply as 1 Recce – on the Bluff. Here I was at the epicentre of Special Forces training in South Africa, the very heart of the elite. I didn’t know what to expect. I moved into the officers’ mess and was, to my surprise, treated by all the mean-­looking Special Forces officers as a fellow human being!

Within a week we moved to Dukuduku, a training area close to Lake St Lucia in Zululand, for Special Forces Orientation, a five-week preparatory course before the actual selection. The aim of this course was to level the playing field, since candidates came from all sorts of backgrounds, from all the different arms of service and even from civilian life. The programme was aimed primarily at building up strength and fitness, but it also addressed the elementary military skills of musketry, map reading and navigation, basic fieldcraft, communications and weapon handling.

During one of the communications classes where we practised Morse code, a fellow student called Werner, who had a rather pronounced stutter, became the target of our instructor, Taffy. He started barking out the letters of the alphabet to the class, then pointed at someone to respond to the “Alpha?” or “Bravo?”, or whichever letter he chose to spit at his victim. The poor bugger at the receiving end then had to respond with the Morse equivalent, namely, “dit-dah” or “dah-dit-dit-dit”.

Everyone waited in anticipation for Werner’s turn. And, sure enough, when Taffy attacked him with a vicious “ALPHA?”, Werner rose weakly from his desk and started stuttering, “dit-­dit-dit…”, to which Taffy responded by screaming, “Sit down, you fool, it’s only one ‘dit’!” Everyone roared with laughter and Taffy had to stop the lecture for us to come to our senses.

Each week we walked progressively further and with a heavier pack, and the PT became more strenuous by the day. At the end of the programme eighteen guys were left from the original pre-selection group. We were in top shape and in good spirits. No selection could stop us now!

The Special Forces selection course, also presented in the Dukuduku State Forest, was intense, but it was way too short for me to ever think of giving up. In addition to the eighteen candidates who had passed Special Forces Orientation, eleven medical doctors were earmarked to do the selection with us.

In 1983 the demand for qualified doctors during special operations forced the authorities to allow doctors to join Special Forces – and do the actual selection – while doing their national service. Once they passed the selection, they would do selective Special Forces training so they could be deployed on certain special missions. As an incentive, they could work in a hospital of their choice after completing their national service to specialise in a specific field of interest. Many of the young doctors doing national service saw this as a way to advance their careers, and did not mind sweating a bit of blood to make it happen.

Over three days we were exposed to a series of the most strenuous physical exercises – intended also to be psychologically taxing. One particularly challenging test involved a team of five having to carry a fuel drum filled with water over a distance of 12 km. The team had to improvise a way to carry the drum using two logs and some rope. Since two of the guys in my team were tall, they took one end while the shorties (myself and another midget) took the other. It was up to the team to decide how to rotate the fifth person. The shorter guys ended up taking most of the weight. This was character-building stuff, as we were also carrying our full kit and rifles. The end never seemed to come.