Follow My Tracks

Combat Tracking & Pseudo Operations: Recollections

By: Kevin Thomas

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

In Follow My Tracks - Combat Tracking & Pseudo Ops: Recollections former Rhodesian game ranger, regular army Selous Scout, and professional hunter turned author, Kevin Thomas, looks at how combat tracking and pseudo-operations evolved as a counterinsurgency tactic during the Rhodesian Bush War. This civil conflict lasted from July 1964 until December 1979. Early on the importance of using skilled combat trackers during counterinsurgency operations was realised and by 1970 the Rhodesian Army had formerly established a tracking school at Kariba. During mid-1973 the concept of using pseudo-counter gangs was experimented with in the operational theatre and in December 1973 the Selous Scouts was formed and the Kariba Tracking Wing absorbed into the newly raised unit. From December 1972 the author became involved in the bush war as a combat tracker, while still serving as a National Parks game ranger stationed in the Zambezi Valley. In January 1974 he joined the regular Selous Scouts at its inception and became a pseudo-operator for three and a half years. The author also writes about how the ZANLA forces made use of Spirit Mediums (Svikiro) to give guidance and direction to ZANLA forces, and he covers the guerrillas anti-tracking methods used to try and thwart Rhodesian Army combat tracker teams.

Follow My Tracks also has chapters contributed by Lt Col Brian Robinson OLM, MCM, who was the longest serving CO of the Rhodesian SAS, and the first OC of the Rhodesian Army Tracking Wing which he established at Lake Kariba while he was still an SAS captain. Major Don Price BCR who was OC 3 Cdo RLI, and who was himself also OC of Kariba Tracking Wing when still a Lt, and a chapter by ecologist Allan Savory, who can best be described as the initiator of the combat tracking concept as a counter insurgency tactic by the Rhodesian Army. The Foreword to the book has been written by Major Nigel Henson OLM, who aside from serving in the rank of Captain with the Selous Scouts shortly after the unit was raised, went on to become the longest serving Fire Force OC in the Rhodesian Light Infantry. This book is not a 'how to' on tracking, it is an in depth look at combat tracking and pseudo-operations purely as a counterinsurgency tactic in the Rhodesian Bush War.

AI Narrator is a NoGo

Story is great and learning more about how tracking and the war was fought is always nice. The AI Narrator was horrendous. It would leave huge blank areas or read things strangely. One sentence it would spell out an acronym then the nex stay parts and spell out others of the same one. It throws you off in having to translate the AI to understand. Because of this I will always avoid AI narration in the future.