Lynx

By Dan Goosen

‘Paka’ Lynx leads an exciting life, growing up on a farm in Tanzania with his father, who is a professional hunter. Political upheaval forces his family to move to a gold mine in South Africa where his experiences are totally different.

Upon completion of his military service and university studies he remains restless. He re-joins the military and is driven by challenges through his leadership abilities and tactical thinking. As a military officer he initialises an important new tactic pertaining to riot control.

Paka accompanies Mark Peters, his colleague, from the British SAS doing special operations. They comprehensively take on situations without recognition and publicity, unknown, non-existent, unseen, as if it never happened.

Going forward he becomes a Military Attaché, the CEO of a military related company and serves a term as an Ambassador.

His life is centred round his beloved wife Sue, and the twins Mark and Lorna. Their adventures on their game farm includes ecology lessons, conservation and hunting.

Paka is however destined for bigger things in life, his biggest challenge yet, is still to come.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dan Goosen
• Release date: Oct 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005207182

Book preview

BOOK ONE

Chapter One

Military life had always been exiting. I had recently been promoted to the rank of Major and was the Commanding Officer of a unit specialising in urban and unconventional warfare.

The training was a new concept in a developmental stage. A lot of time had been spent refining what we were doing. I phoned my colleague from the British SAS Colonel Mark Peters. He was busy with a similar exercise, with unrest it was not practical to shoot people in urban areas. The amount of collateral damage was much too high.

After a discussion with Brigadier Anton Venter, permission to work jointly with the British to find the best possible solution was granted.

My reason was that I needed to attend a course and a conference in England and would be away for an unknown period of time.

We left for England the next day, we congregated in the offices of the defence department. We studied footage of urban unrest, as well as urban warfare in towns and cities, we had a delegation with us to help with the decision making. I had my three NCO’s which were my right hand. Mark had two officers with years of experience.

My three go to guys were Sergeants. Lappies, a big man, highly innovative and a tactical thinking man. He was the strongest person I had ever met. Rumour was that he used a little bit of steroids which he thought nobody knew about.

Freddy was six foot three and broad shouldered a very resourceful person, if you needed it, he could get it, and he was a person who had back up plans for back up plans.

Mylie was my secret weapon. He was of average height and slim, he could run like an athlete, hide in plain sight and not be seen. He could go into places and come out without been noticed. Mylie could use a knife like something out of a movie, I had seen him attack three people armed with a knife in a warfare operation and walk away unscathed.

Marks two guys were officers from British Intelligence, they were very intense compared to my ‘rag tag’ guys. Marks guys could possibly analyse a breadcrumb in a railway station.

After watching countless videos, we made a few assumptions and a few calls later we had our first experimental tactical team.

We followed the Israeli’s as well as the Chechnya’s, our urban weapon of choice would be a Ruger semi-automatic twenty-two calibre rifle, this fired reliably with sub sonic ammunition, the rifles came factory standard with suppressors.

We could source these from a company in America without too many questions being asked. This would be almost silent, not over penetrate targets and have a range of two hundred plus metres.

We also found a company in South Africa who was experimenting with an innovative idea.

When we did basic training, we used what was known as a ‘thunder flash’. These gave of an explosion like a huge firecracker, this would disorientate people,

This new innovation fired from a twelve-gauge shotgun had a huge explosive sound, this was around one hundred and eighty decibels.

These could also be incorporated with a high concentration of pepper spray. These had different ranges, from twenty-five metres to one hundred and fifty metres.

The sound of these going off was like a bomb going off and, the inclusion of highly concentrated pepper spray was designed to disorientate masses into panic.

This would disperse crowds mainly by panic and feelings of asphyxiation, also burning of the skin and everywhere that there was perspiration, or were wet or moist, like your eyes and your nose inside.

We had a call from an African country who had riots due to election unfairness, we flew in under cover of darkness each of our fifty members had been drilled with the tactics we would use.

The soldiers would be divided into five troops of ten each, my three sergeants and Mark’s two officers would each be in charge of a contingent of ten troops.

Each soldier was armed with twenty-two rifle five magazines of twenty-five rounds, a shotgun with an eight-round magazine, each had five speed loaders of eight rounds for the shotgun, these were loaded with hundred metres pepperbangs as we now called them.

For emergencies all soldiers were also issued with a sidearm and two fifteen round magazines.

There was about two thousand people milling around, a lot of AK forty-seven rifles where been brandished around, every now and then shots were being fired off into the air, there were a lot of assaults, violence was rife. The local army had all but given up on controlling the crowd. A large amount of the police and military had joined the rioters.

We entered the road that was been taken over by the rioters from both sides, there were many side streets for escape. We fired off two hundred pepperbangs to start the riot clearance, suddenly nobody could breathe, shirts were used to cover faces, people screamed and held their hands over their ears, the rioters were in total disarray, the military and police were the first to run.

Some of the hardened rioters who we suspected were mercenaries took cover and fired at us from behind burnt-out trucks and cars.

The troops opened fire, half with pepperbangs and the rest returned fire to the shooters with the semi-automatic twenty-two rifles. Within the next fifteen minutes there was an unconditional surrender, the people we suspected were mercenaries, were in fact mercenaries, they had been hired to disrupt the elections.

Soldiers who were identified as part of the rioters were arrested by the elite unit of the Presidential Guard. It was unknown know how many casualties or deaths there were. The mission was a success the calm was restored. We returned to our aircraft and disappeared into the night as silently as we had arrived. Once again there was no media coverage, some speculation but no proof of our presence.

On the long flight from London back to South Africa my mind wondered about when I was growing up, my thoughts went back to when I was a child living on a farm in Tanzania.

Chapter Two

Although my name is George Lynx, one of the tribal elders nicknamed me Paka Mwitu. Which is the closest Swahili description for Lynx or wild cat. This was shortened by the kids and eventually by everyone to Paka. Which translated to cat. This name was to follow me for the rest of my life, which had consisted back then mainly of playing with the kids from the local tribe, learning their language and playing their games. We fought with sticks, threw our assegai’s made and shot Masai bows and arrows.

There were strength and fighting competitions. These were all out fights. No quarter given, although it might have looked serious it was always a game. Blue eyes and a bloody nose were all part of it. Strangely though, after fights, there was never any animosity, always laughter and jokes about who had won.

I learnt how to track animals. We weren’t allowed far from home so we tracked rats, rabbits, rock hyraxes and even small buck. We could tell everything about them, were they walking, running, feeding or going to breed. We figured out how to make snares for animals, where to place them, we were also taught by the tribal elders about the plants, what could make you sick, what helped for different sicknesses, what we could use on our spears to kill animals, but not poison ourselves if we ate the animal. We went about fishing, collecting fresh water mussels, and knew what which fish fed on, and where the fish were. What the crabs’ movements meant, warning signs of when the river was going to rise, and the currents of the river especially after rains.

About big game animals I learnt from my father and his friends, stories of legendary animals, man eating lions, dog catching leopards, and rogue elephants. Methods of hunting them, where to shoot them, the importance of a backup shooter when hunting dangerous game, what gun calibre to use and bullet weights for different types of game.

I wanted this life to go on forever and could not see myself leaving all this and going off to Boarding school.

I went on quite a few hunting expeditions with my dad and actually got to shoot a Nyala on my seventh birthday. Everybody had been told that story, it became better every time it was told, and the story had such a tail added to it. The nyala was shot just before it was going to be attacked by a pride of lions, other versions also abounded such as that I had killed it with a pocket knife. That poor nyala died a hundred deaths before the story became old news.

Chapter Three

I arrived back in South Africa, we had a debriefing. The tactics we used were successful, we had contained a situation. They had a minimum of civilian casualties.

It was reported that a lot of rioters ended up with respiratory problems, their military claimed that they had a teargas cannon and this dispersed the crowd. Mark had a similar response from the powers that be, in his country.

This was going to work, but the tactics and statistics of how many how and where to place shots was not going to be made general knowledge, the weapons, the tactics and what the less lethal method was, was a secret project.

I had been gone for a month, and was collected as usual from the military air force base. I arrived home to a warm welcome, Sue and my Ruby sister were waiting for me. I asked Sue to please look after my apartment. Which now also had pot plants, courtesy of Sue.

Ruby and Sue had been living at my apartment, apparently her husband Don had gone off the rails, he was assaulted coming out of a bar late one night after a night out with the boys.

Apparently, this had become a normal weekly outing for him. He was in hospital, pretty badly beaten up.

I sympathised with my Ruby sister, after arriving at work the next morning as usual, I summoned my three Sergeants, closed the door and switched of the surveillance system we all had in our offices.

I told them what had happened and sent Mylie to snoop, I wanted to know exactly what happened. I received a call after lunch while in a meeting, apparently Mylie was cornered by some criminals. I excused myself.

Lappies, Freddy and myself, met at the place Mylie had phoned from. He was sitting at the bar holding a napkin to his side, there were six men standing around verbally abusing him.

Lappies walked in, found the biggest man, picked him up above his head and bodily threw him into a wall. Freddy and I started on our own destruction path.

Mylie just sat there, the bodies were strewn all over the floor. Mylie showed us the blood on his side, he had been stabbed, and he identified the ringleader as the person who had stabbed him. We removed the reprobates from the bar, they were put into Lappies’s army truck. They were taken to the old deserted detention barracks and parade ground was earmarked for a new military development. It was also used to unconventionally rehabilitate unsavoury elements who did things like threaten the state or assaulted military personnel. I needed to question them each privately about Don Ferry. Strangely they had lost all their bravado. The stories were all over the place when they were interviewed individually, everything was recorded. We got them together as a group and played all the recordings back to them. They were left there for the night, under guard of Lappies and Freddy.

I took Mylie to the military hospital where he received a few stitches, the wound was shallow and not dangerous, and it just bled a lot.

I arrived the next day at around midday. They had had time to consolidate their story, apparently Don was quite the ladies’ man him and his two friends had flirted with the girlfriend of one of these guys.

When the trouble started the other two ran away, leaving Don to face the music.

During further questioning the truth started to emerge, they had insisted that Don and his friends pay for their dinner and drinks. Either that or they would wish they were never born. Well, those were the words that they used. Fear is a strange thing, it brings out the honesty in a man. We contemplated what to do with these men, I could not go to the civilian police as we had abducted them. I asked them what they thought should happen to them and said it was possibly better if we buried them there, no questions would be asked. You have never seen such reformed men in your life. Freddy and Lappies took each of them home, just to see where they lived, and told them it was better if they gave up drinking and hanging out in pubs. I had told them that there was a file on each of their families, where they were and a friendly reminder of who we were, we could make whole families disappear.

I visited with Don in Hospital, he went a deathly white when I walked into his hospital room. I told him that I knew exactly what had happened. While in the room one of his big mouth doctor friends that ran away came into the room, he laughed and thought it was hilarious. I asked him if he was a man. Did he have what it took? Or did he run away and not stand by his friend when there was trouble? I told him in no uncertain terms that for his own safety he should move to another province as I had spoken to the thugs and had given them his name and his home address and all his families’ information, strangely he now turned a deathly shade of white.

My Ruby sister was not sure of what had happened, I gave her a watered-down version, with the exception of the two runners, and told her I thought they would be moving on shortly, as they were a bad influence on Don. My Ruby sister moved back home two days later when Don was discharged from hospital, apparently two doctors had resigned and had moved, one to Cape town and the other to Botswana. Don’s nonsense was over. He never got restless again for a boy’s night out, well not as far as I was aware.

Chapter Four

Sue was vaguely aware of what I did, she questioned me and I said it was just a fact-finding mission and that nobody got seriously injured. She was also getting increasingly inquisitive about my conferences which lasted for months in England. I told her that as a senior officer, part of my work was liaison with other military institutions all over the world.

We had supper that night and spoke until the early hours, she had basically forced me tell her what had transpired with Don. I told her the truth, she looked at me and asked me why I was such a closed book and that nobody could get close to me, the only one that I ever confided in was my Ruby sister. I capitulated and told her about my military life, what it entailed, she was aghast and could not believe that I was capable of such things.

These things, I said made free life possible, riots, unrest terrorism in all forms made life in places unliveable. When you see oppression, people begging the government in charge for basic necessities like fresh water and staple foodstuffs, while they travel in their private jets, yacht’s and sports cars, have banquets for foreign dignitaries and celebrities. All this while the masses starve and are persecuted for rioting just to get food.

I told her of my life, training, learning to survive, and doing operations to remove terrorists from murdering and raping half of the population on a peaceful island. My involvement of invasions of countries, the logistics, my presence and leadership to restore countries back to a liveable state.

Sue slept over at my house that night, in my bed, she snuggled in my arms. Although there was no physical intimacy. I felt that we had become closer than anybody that I ever met she even knew things that my Ruby sister did not know.

Chapter Five

I was transferred to a training camp as the Commanding Officer. The soldiers were all servicemen. I enjoyed watching the boys turn into men. I watched them learn the basics, marching, bushcraft, weapons and fitness training. I often chose a troop and ran with them, sometimes for ten kilometres, it seemed to lighten their spirit. I sometimes gave my input to the surprise of the training corporal. I gave lectures on soldiering, bushcraft, military tactics and the importance of intelligence as well as the history of the army.

Soldiers with potential were recruited, one such soldier who was above the rest was Nicky Guus. He came from a poor background, he was of average height and somewhat slim and wiry. He had a heavy beard and looked like he needed to shave three times a day. Nicky had always wanted to be a soldier as his grandfather had been. Due to his high school qualifications, he was not eligible for the military training program. Nicky and three other recruits with the same problem were chosen, they were called up on orders I told them of my plan. All three agreed, they would attend a boarding school in the Eastern Cape. Once they matriculated, they would come to me for an interview.

Volunteers for special training were also selected. The basics were simple, for sports parade they would take skydiving, and dependant on the outcome they would be sent to a parachute regiment where I knew people. There were six potentials, they were sent for trials and four made it, the other two returned, I sent them for NCO training both made it. I thought about these young men, wondering about their formative years and how they were spent, what type of environment What about their siblings, their parents. This led me back to thinking of my early years, growing up.

Chapter Six

I had my sisters and brother they were much older than me and were at boarding school far away from home. My two sisters, Olive my eldest sister, as well as Ruby, my lovely red-haired sister.

Ruby was always, well as long as I can recall referred by all of us as our Ruby sister. Dad had apparently called her that as a baby and the name stuck. When I thought to myself of Ruby, it was always as my Ruby sister. It was a highlight when they were dropped off at the station to go away for the school term. It was even a bigger treat when they returned. All the stories that they told us about the teachers, the other students, sporting events that they partook in, homework that had to be done every day and of course the mischief they got up to.

Olive my eldest sister was the studious one, even on holiday she would still spend at least five hours a day with her books. She was never adventurous in those days, a real nerdy homebody, baking and housecleaning. She felt it was her duty and her right as the eldest to take that responsibility from my mother, who was frankly quite happy to pass it on to her.

My Ruby sister, was a different kettle of fish, she would be out at first light, exploring what was going on outside, looking over the animals. She even had names for the hundred chickens we had. The dogs were always all over her, she had such a way with animals. I remember her bringing a small rabbit home one day just to show me. Ruby was an animal person, I always imagined her becoming a game ranger. She was in my opinion the cleverest person in the family and had such a quiet confidence about her. Almost an arrogance, she would not argue or use harsh language. She was my hero growing up.

Jack my brother, was a big person, he always had the other kids around him. He was the strongest kid in the neighbourhood. Jack could box, wrestle and fight. Jack was never an aggressive person, he was always a nice guy. He used to take me into the bush, he had taught me to shoot and was a hard taskmaster and together we used up most of my father’s twenty- two ammunition. He even taught me to shoot the big gun, dad said it could kill an elephant. My shoulder usually turned blue after a few shots.

Mom was always busy, experimenting with different foods and recipes, sometimes the food was great, it could also be different I remember some dishes with fondness, others were inedible and we ended up eating bread and jam. Mom was great, she was the boss. If you wanted something, you first discussed it with mom, then asked dad in her presence. With her backup, you mostly got, within reason what you wanted.

Dad was a professional hunter. His job was to take clients out into the bush, guide them, look after their safety and comforts and let them shoot whatever animal it was that they had selected to shoot.

Back then, we