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Ok here we go! The highlight of every full time NS is ATEC 2. The highlight for reservist soldiers, is also ATEC 2. You would have known by now what is ATEC. If it is something new to you, here is the list of links to the posts regarding ATEC
https://www.anwarhadi.com/blog/exercise-wallaby-again-part-1
https://www.anwarhadi.com/blog/ict-4
I think it was a 2 weeks ICT. Should be. Or maybe more. The first week should be the preparation and final “revision”. We went through our SOPs and tactics in different tactical situations. I have forgotten about this week already. But I can roughly remember it was quite fun. We had high morale because this would be the last time we would be “cheong suaing”. Basically means that it would be the last time that we would be going into the jungle and have our tactical exercises. The last time in our life. Hopefully…
2nd week in. It’s time to put our battalion to the test. Waah I really cannot remember already. But I am sure it is the normal things. Walk… walk…. attack… defend… walk….attack… defend… How far we walked, where we walked, how many missions we had, I have totally forgotten about them all. Which is actually quite sad to not remember. I understand why I won’t remember though. Because it was tough. It was auto pilot. It was mission after mission. It was tiring. And the thing I hate most… walking in the jungle at night. Heavy load on my shoulders and back. Clothes all wet due to the perspiration caused by body heating up. But you shiver everytime you stop because of the drenched clothes in the cold of the night. Hot and cold at the same time. I cannot explain it. It was just miserable. I kept psyching myself up. This is the last time. No more mission. No more jungle. No more cheong sua. No more suffering. Endure and Carry On.
FINAL MISSION
All good things will come to an end. We finally had our final mission. I think it was quite standard. We capture an enemy objective and then defend the area in case of any enemy’s efforts to recapture their place.
Ok so we managed to capture a hill in the jungle. Like I said, I cannot remember where. The enemy ran away and now we have to defend it. So we dig our shellscrapes, hide in it and wait. For how long, no one knows. We just wait for them to come and fight back. If they fight back. We just waited.
I remember that it was in the bright of the day. What time? I cannot remember. It was in the day. The dreaded thing about defending is, we won’t know when the enemy will come. And if they come. We won’t know if we have to conduct a quick attack or a block force. We were tired and the shellscrapes were so comfortable. To do a quick attack means we have to leave the shellscrape and chase after the retreating enemy or capture a nearby objective to strengthen our position. A block force means we will have to be redeployed further up and block a counter attacking enermy force and protect our battalion back at the defence site. It was a lot of uncertainties and we were tired.
But our morale was high. We know that it will end soon and we will leave all these “army fighting in the jungle” thing behind.
Then, it happened. And this one…. I remember vividly.
Ok so we managed to capture a hill in the jungle. Like I said, I cannot remember where. The enemy ran away and now we have to defend it. So we dig our shellscrapes, hide in it and wait. For how long, no one knows. We just wait for them to come and fight back. If they fight back. We just waited.
I remember that it was in the bright of the day. What time? I cannot remember. It was in the day. The dreaded thing about defending is, we won’t know when the enemy will come. And if they come. We won’t know if we have to conduct a quick attack or a block force. We were tired and the shellscrapes were so comfortable. To do a quick attack means we have to leave the shellscrape and chase after the retreating enemy or capture a nearby objective to strengthen our position. A block force means we will have to be redeployed further up and block a counter attacking enermy force and protect our battalion back at the defence site. It was a lot of uncertainties and we were tired.
But our morale was high. We know that it will end soon and we will leave all these “army fighting in the jungle” thing behind.
Then, it happened. And this one…. I remember vividly.
THE ENEMY
We were chilling and then we saw the enemy from a far. I think it was a company size enemy. A company size means there were about 500 soldiers. But…. but….. in a simulated warfare, there will be a group of people carrying coloured flags. So if one single guy walks carrying say a green flag, it means he is representing 7 soldiers. A yellow flag represents 28 soldiers. Something like that. So it wasn’t really 500 soldiers attacking us. It was just about maybe 20 soldiers with different coloured flags.
We were excited. We were excited for our final fight. We were disappointed that it was just simulated with flags. We were hoping to see real soldiers who we can fight with. But heck. We fired away.
Since the enemy is supposed to be representing a whole lot more number of soldiers, they didn’t seem to “die”. The flags just kept walking towards us. There were umpires to keep the fight fair of course. Like I said, we didn’t care. We just kept firing. When the enemy flags kept walking towards us, we called for reinforcements. I remember this. I was in the platoon 9 sector. But the enemy fire power was too strong therefore we had the whole Charlie company to reinforce our sector. It was fun to see more people joining us into the firefight. But more people also mean, more mess.
We were excited. We were excited for our final fight. We were disappointed that it was just simulated with flags. We were hoping to see real soldiers who we can fight with. But heck. We fired away.
Since the enemy is supposed to be representing a whole lot more number of soldiers, they didn’t seem to “die”. The flags just kept walking towards us. There were umpires to keep the fight fair of course. Like I said, we didn’t care. We just kept firing. When the enemy flags kept walking towards us, we called for reinforcements. I remember this. I was in the platoon 9 sector. But the enemy fire power was too strong therefore we had the whole Charlie company to reinforce our sector. It was fun to see more people joining us into the firefight. But more people also mean, more mess.
Then suddenly I hear someone on my left shouting, “Hornet! Hornet!” I cannot remember who. Then our CSM, Sergeant Lau also shouted. “Hornet! Hornet! Retreat!” In my mind was like, alamak…. must retreat. Then when everyone was retreating, Sergeant Lau gave loud shout, “go!”. I saw him struggling. Apparently he was stung by hornets. I wonder why he didn’t run. I realised he dropped his spectacles and was struggling. Hornets were swarming him. I took out my smoke grenade and threw it to his area. As the smoke exploded and started filling the air, I ran towards Sergeant Lau and pulled him through the smoke and away from the area. It all happened so fast. It wasn’t like I took a short nap while waiting for the smoke to appear.
As I pulled him through the smoke and away from the area, I felt a sharp jolting pain on my left wrist. It was my first time getting stung by hornets. Just 2 stings but it had these shock feeling. I remember I shouted “aarrghh!” and dropped to the ground. It was very quick, short sharp jabbing pain with a shocking sensation. I quickly got to my feet and continued pulling Sergeant Lau to a safer area which was the main track with the medic and the rest of the safety personnel.
When we reached the track, the safety personnels checked on us. A number of us got stung. Some have started swelling. It was funny. When all of us were accounted for, we heard them announcing, “EXERCISE CUT!” The magic word. THE magic word. And with that, our chiong sua days came to an end. In one of the day, in the year 2011… ATEC 2 was over. I cannot even remember when. It was just sometime in 2011. 11 years since we enlisted.
As I pulled him through the smoke and away from the area, I felt a sharp jolting pain on my left wrist. It was my first time getting stung by hornets. Just 2 stings but it had these shock feeling. I remember I shouted “aarrghh!” and dropped to the ground. It was very quick, short sharp jabbing pain with a shocking sensation. I quickly got to my feet and continued pulling Sergeant Lau to a safer area which was the main track with the medic and the rest of the safety personnel.
When we reached the track, the safety personnels checked on us. A number of us got stung. Some have started swelling. It was funny. When all of us were accounted for, we heard them announcing, “EXERCISE CUT!” The magic word. THE magic word. And with that, our chiong sua days came to an end. In one of the day, in the year 2011… ATEC 2 was over. I cannot even remember when. It was just sometime in 2011. 11 years since we enlisted.
AFTER THAT
After that… I cannot remember much except that I was enduring the swell on my left arm for days. I received a good service medal for the Hornet Adventure. I didn’t care about anything. ATEC was over. No more chiong sua. We made it. What was the redcon score? I cannot remember either. As long as we didn’t have to redo it.
3 more cycles, and my unit will be done.
In retrospect, it was bitter sweet. But at that time, it was a relief. Especially when the swelling subsides. Anyway, we are not done yet. 3 more cycles. A few more blog posts to go.
3 more cycles, and my unit will be done.
In retrospect, it was bitter sweet. But at that time, it was a relief. Especially when the swelling subsides. Anyway, we are not done yet. 3 more cycles. A few more blog posts to go.
Memories fade. Hornet sting scar hasn't.
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