April 24th, 1981.  Five air cadets trapped on Dartmoor in blizzard! 300 motorists trapped on the Salisbury Plain; Pennine Passes blocked by deep snowdrifts! Chaos reigns! The 1/51 Highland Company Post Exercise is conducted at Barry Buddon regardless.

There was a winter landscape on the Pentlands and the Lammermuirs as the sleeper train hurried northwards over the Forth Bridge, early on the morning of the 25th. Despite wild weather elsewhere, there was bright sunshine over Fife. A more pleasant weekend perhaps than the Met forecast predicted9 Maybe, said the old sweats - but not at Barry; it has a ruddy climate all of its own!

Detraining at Dundee, We RV'd with Colour Sergeant Norton and WOII Malcolm at the Camp. They had driven the FFR and trailer up from London overnight, in the record time of 13 1/2 hours, not without incident, and not many hours ahead of the "V" Company convoy, which had a nasty pile-up on black ice near Motherwell.  The former was his usual saturnine self, the latter as perky as ever.  Fortunately for him he was en route elsewhere - away to spend the weekend with Auntie at Arbroath!

Barry Buddon was its usual self too - bleak, with a fearful wind blowing in from the, North Sea. Like a steppes scene from "Dr Zhivago". "More like bloody Auschwitz," remarked Simon Scott-Barrett.

After breakfast, briefings and orders. We had been under some misapprehension. This wasn't Barry Buddon at all, but a woodland in West Germany, alongside an autobahn, code- worded "Mole", which "G" Company was to defend and keep open at all costs. At a small stretch of the imagination Barry could be conceived to be in Germany - pine trees, cold winds and utter desolation. Only the lighthouses seemed out of character. We had only a section of mortars however, with two MFCS, no MOBATS, no artillery and no armour for the time being. It was "Apocalypse Now", day one.

Lt Scott-Barrett and Colour Norton made off for a cosy hut where between them they would represent three platoons, and initiate contacts and incidents in accordance with a master plan. These would be passed on to us, the CP staff by radio - Captain Scott-Barrett, Lt Cairns' Cpl Jones and Cpl Hanford. Lt Pearson, the IO, retreated to the comfort of the battalion CP, and did not reappear for the rest of the weekend.

For realism's sake, vehicle and command post shelter were camouflaged, and notional battlecraft observed -fighting order and weapons carried. The war was slow starting, and our radios didn't help matters. The junction box on the C42 was U/S, and comms on the A41 manpack weren't too bright either. So Pronto Minor was kept busy for two hours before we could blast off into the airwaves.

By 1400, refugees were already pouring down the autobahn in great panic, blocking essential military traffic. Roadblocks were established to divert them elsewhere.

Demolition of derelict vehicles became a bit of a problem without Sapper support. There were numerous other incidents - long range enemy patrols and helicopters sniffing out the ground. By 1700 hours the plot was thickening up nicely, keeping all four of us quite busy. NBC threat was imminent, so Noddy Suits had already been put on with respirators handy. At 17.15 the ration wagon rolled up with lots of hot goodies, and a few minutes later Battalion issued NBC State Red, to the accompaniment of back-banded sniggers. Acute indigestion followed.

The alert lasted about two hours, during which operations continued without undue interruption. Then it was off for a while; we relaxed and lit up again, and wandered across to the "K" Company CP, or Ops Palace, complete with Bar, soft music and OC's Rover vehicle (Toyota Celica) with its own cam net.

During the evening, the war lost a little of its momentum, and it was a relief for the radio to shut up for a while. Perhaps Mr Scott-Barrett was running out of original ideas. There were better ways to spend an evening, we thought, as the wind buffeted the CP tent and blew in under the loose ground flaps. The cold was really penetrating now, and the urge to go outside and perform vigorous isometrics was often felt and acted upon. To our shame there wasn't enough whisky between us to intoxicate a tom-cat, and no brew kit. Sleep was taken, 2-3 hours, sharing two sleeping bags, as two of us hadn't brought them. A "Q" Request for aqua-vitac was denied. Already we were thinking ahead of the train journey home, with minds in neutral, and Zzzzzz!

At 02.00 the battle warmed up again, with reports of further enemy patrols in contact, as well as enemy recce vehicles and APCs in the area. Noises of a large armoured (?) force were also beard in the distance. Sunray and Seagull were anxious for information, and were literally breathing down our necks. By daylight we were in close contact; no longer cold as we were too busy to feel it. Anxious too, as the battle was developing in the enemy's favour. They were here by now, trying to get control of the autobahn, with tanks everywhere. "NBC State Red" someone yelled. Pause - pull on respirator and carry on. The position was getting difficult to hold and the platoons were getting heavily brassed up. "Hold it to the last man and the last round," bellowed Seagull into the handset. Assault helicopters were tasked to support us, followed by FGA strikes, tanks and artillery. In our imagination the ground literally quaked beneath our feet, and we kept a steadily mounting tally of T-62s and BTR- 60s.  But still the enemy came on.  Our tanks had to be replenished under fire. "But I asked you if you needed replen 30 minutes ago," screamed Seagull. "You said no. Why Now?" Before long one of the assault helicopters was downed and a Chieftain hit.  Things were grim.  The autobahn was cratered as a last resort, and "K" Company was swung into action to come to our aid. But they were 12k away and would never make it in time. Our tanks were forced to break contact and what remained of 7, and 9 platoons lost ground. The mortars blazed away on their FPF target, and artillery missions were called up to break up the enemy's impetus. Nevertheless they broke through the ragged defences, raced on to the next objective, and we were pushed off our position into oblivion. When the smoke and dust cleared, we dusted down our combat smocks, lit up, and wondered when lunch would be.

The Exercise was over. It had been just another big "Let's Pretend", but very realistic, valuable training for us all, and bloody tiring. We hadn't really lost 90% of the Company's strength, and Mr Scott-Barrett hadn't really almost won the MC, as much as he deserved one.

Reality seemed a hell of a lot nicer as we climbed aboard the 13.33 for King's Cross and gradually unfroze. The picture postcard views from the train were lost on us entirely. Minds in neutral, and Zzzzzzzzz!

Niner Charlie