Ranjit (third left) talks to the veterans.
KOTA KINABALU: Veterans from the 7th Field Squadron, Operation Granite, Royal Australian Engineers 1964 were back in Sabah for a trip down memory lane, exactly 50 years when they first arrived here during the Indonesian Confrontation in 1964.
“Everywhere we went in Sabah, we were welcomed like kings and fed like we have been starving.
“Thank you for your friendship, for the honour bestowed upon us. It is quite overwhelming,” said Kenneth Park, one of the ex-servicemen at a get-together function at Lok Kawi Army Camp here yesterday.
Twenty-one servicemen, including their spouses, joined the trip to Sabah. They are between 70 and 80 years old.
Fifty years ago, Park said the governments of Britain and Malaysia asked Australia to contribute towards putting a stop to the confrontation.
“Your (Malaysian) government asked for infantry battalion … but the Australian government was tied up at that time with Vietnam just starting up.
“The best we could offer was a field squadron of engineers with just 200 men,” he reminisced.
Nonetheless, whatever areas the squadron was in, served as a form of deterrent to the enemy, he said.
When the squadrons arrived, a third of them were sent to Sandakan, some to Kuamut to build airfield, while the remaining stayed here to build roadwork in Jesselton.
Looking back, Park said our country had been different then with few roads. He deemed his experience here as a great adventure.
“We had to take bulldozers on barges up to the Kinabatangan River. That was an adventure.
“We had very little excitement from the enemy over from the other side, (but we) had a little excitement from currents in the rivers,” he joked.
The veterans and their spouses flip through scrap books.
The veterans and their spouses will be heading for Sandakan to attend the Sandakan Memorial Day on August 15, a day to commemorate the fallen heroes of the Australian and British prisoners-of-war (POW) who endured the Death Marches from Sandakan to Ranau in 1945.
“We particularly want to be there for Sandakan (Memorial) Day to give our tribute to the men there.
“It is an important day in our history; we want to participate (in the memorial).”
Present at the event were Task Force 450 commander Major General Datuk Ranjit Singh Ramday and commander of the Fifth Malaysian Infantry Brigade, Brigadier General Hj Jalaludin Hj Manan.