We Won the War but Lost the Empire by Roger Payne OAM

Author:Roger Payne OAM [OAM, Roger Payne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Europe, Great Britain, General, Military, World War II, 21st Century
ISBN: 9789389620436
Google: QdoDEAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Vij Books India Pvt Ltd
Published: 2020-10-10T01:01:03+00:00

WAR IN THE DESERT AND ON TO ITALY

(77) Nevil Scott - Desert Encounter

He seemed a man of quick intelligence, robust in his nature. In the melting pot of war, perhaps the gods ordain that special individuals stay out of the crush, to avoid being distorted or adulterated by being in too close contact with humanity or other such overwhelming circumstances. In occupied Europe, most likely, he would have been fighting a losing battle in some ghetto, or slowly losing human form, changing to a ghastly caricature, with large shaven bony skull and matchstick limbs, maybe even a shrunken torso clothed in striped rags an inmate of a concentration camp. In this desert setting, there was a cleanness, an austerity which preserved him. He would have to contend with desert heat, discomfort, boredom, bites and stings of crawling and flying creatures; he would drink too much fiery alcohol, but he would remain whole. The knife had a broad blade and sharp tip. It shone bright in the lamplight as he drew it from its sheath with a deliberate movement. The backs of his hands had rufous hairs and he demonstrated the blade’s sharpness on them shaving them as easy as a razor would.

He lifted his head and his eyes sought direct contact with mine. Was it imagination or were his eyes different? The atmosphere appeared to be friendly as we sat drinking the night away but he was not smiling now. In a moment of heightened awareness I seemed to see into his mind, conditioned by the history of his race; millennia of wandering the face of the earth, centuries of oppression, and, in his own lifetime, precipitous flight from the country of his birth. I looked again at those unsmiling eyes and a tick of imaginative fear stirred in me. What if the framework of his mind slipped and he sought redress in this tent for all the wrongs done to himself and his race? The paraffin pressure lamp on the tent pole hissed and plopped. I shifted in my seat. Perspiration streamed down my neck and lost itself clammily in the tucks of khaki drill round my waistband. The atmosphere was tense. I gulped another mouthful of spirit from the enamel mug in my hand and as I gulped, the sound seemed thunderous. He knew, he must know, the trepidation I was feeling. Was it true that any expression of fear before man, or animal for that matter, calls forth aggression? I was in a funk and I felt he was aware of it.

With my unsullied mind which had suffered no worse upset in my whole existence than a gentle introduction through Territorial service to the embodiment in the wartime Army ‘for the duration’, and after long exhausting training, a fierce battle at EI Alamein, our baptism of fire in the Western desert, lasting a fortnight non-stop, which the violence had not yet totally impinged on my psyche. I had witnessed the terrible carnage both sides had inflicted on the other before we pushed Rommel back and won the decisive battle.

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