Out gunned

We were completely out gunned during Confrontasi with Indonesia. Right from small arms, armour and artillery. Not to mention the naval and air force. Our small arms were the SLR, HBSLR, SMG, and a Browning pistol for close battle combat. Indonesia were equipped with the US M15 assault rifle. We had two field regiments of 105 mm Howtizers and a Bty of 40mm Air Defence artillery. Our armour comprised the Ferret scout cars. No APCs and tanks yet. Indonesia had 155mm artillery deployed in the Nunukan area.

The battle lines were drawn all accross the international boundaries between Sabah, Sarawak and Indonesia. The FEBA  was mostly narrowed to Sabatik Island in Sabah and the Second to Fifth Divisions in Sarawak. From Lubuk Antu to Long Pasir in Sarawak. From Wallace Bay to Sungei Limau in Sabah. 

We were out gunned.

Commonwealth forces were still opertional, albeit on a lower scale, mostly deterrent. British Far East Land Forces had its HQ in Labuan. Most of British ground forces were withdrawn to Brunei and Semunajung. MAF took over the battle. We were deployed to all British originated single gun positions in Sabah and Sarawak. Commonwealth forces were conducting covet special operations to great effect.

A Bty each from 1 ARTY and 2 ARTY were deployed to man all the Commonwealth forces handed over gun positions, 1 ARTY in Sarawak and 2 ARTY in Sabah. S Bty AD was deployed to Sandakan Sabah, in anticipation from an imminent air threat from the Philippines. I was not privy to why we did not deploy 2 full regiments. I was too young to discuss and question strategy then. I was proud and glad that I did my fair share of roulements to Sabah. I actually enjoyed every moment in the front line. Being out gunned never affected me. I had my single gun, my gun position, my heaven. I was GPO and there was no tomorrows.

All my worldly possessions were in my issued kit bag, haversack and patrol bag. I was glad that we had a Sabah Allowance as it was just adequate for our merriments with cheep liquors. Cigarettes and condoms were free issue. I slept in a foldable camp bed in the GPO's Oven bunker next to the Command post.

Out gunned ? Who cares? My personal thoughts were only filled with Nor Azizah, our darling and screen sensation in the 1960s. I had her centre page poster on the wall of my Oven bunker and a picture of her in the inside cover of my shooting performa. She would take away all our stress and cares in the world. Our favourite song was "Help me make it through the night" and "Widuri". I can't sing, but who cares. I was in seventh heaven as a GPO.

Was I afraid? You bet I was. Stories of Indonesian raids by their special KKO forces in Kalabakan had sent shivers down our backs. I had experienced several "stand to" calls in addition to our standard "stand to" drills daily at first and last light. I still shudder and recall several shouts by our sentry "Musuh !!" and we "stood to" the whole night.

Our gun position were sometimes shelled during the night with enemy mortar fire. Luckily no shells were on target. I still believe the enemy were only firing HF fire to demoralise us. We would reply to their mortar fire with our gun fire into predicted targets derived from the crack and boom sound method to give us a sense of direction and distance of their mortatr position. This was the best we could do lift up our morale. We did not have a Locating Bty. Our only protections were sand bags and the Oven bunkers. The gun had gun pits with OHP ammo dumps.

What was our role? We did not have the range as 10K wasn't much coverage. Not to mention target crests and dead grounds. As most of our targets were firable only in high angles and our Howtizers were a great asset. High angle compensated for short of range. Our area of interest were basically covering areas at known cross over points along the international boundary. We had DF targets , a DF(SOS) target near our gun position and hundreds of predicted targets handed down from Bty to Bty as we did our roulements. We just changed the target number prefixs. E Bty used Papa target Prefixs. For metrological data we had to rely on Lt Gill Singh's Sabah Drop factor, a unique met chart designed by him. Lt Gill was a Singaporean who joined us in 2 ARTY in the 1960s. He was to return to the SAF and became SAF's Chief Artillery Officer. Lt Gill was a metrological officer before joining the army.

I had fired onto an enemy OP position at the entrance of Sungei Melayu. The enemy had HMGs and were firing at our BK who was enroute on a routine visit to our gun position at Sungei Limau. We were on target. I had fired in the direction of Nunukan from Sungei Limau gun position in retaliation to enemy threat to our BOP location in Wallace Bay. Yes admittedly non of our guns have the range to hit the targets in Nunukan, but we still fired in the direction to Nunukan in defiance. Our single gun positions were at Wallace Bay, Bergosong, Sungei Limau, and Semantan.

The enemy had 155 mm guns in Nunukan. And we were just inviting an artillery duel. Enemy Gunners were real "gentlemen" and had not responded with counter battery fire. Indonesian artillery had the range to fire accross Selat Nunukan into our area.

Out gunned or not, we fought the confrontasi with pride as Gunners. Hopefully we should not be out gunned or "out-anything" in the future.

Take care. Once a Gunner always a Gunner.

Allen Lai