Malayan emergency memoir
Misadventures with Coco-Oscar
How did a British teenager find himself involved in an undeclared and little-known war on the other side of the world? Simply by accepting an offer he couldn’t refuse: to donate two years of his life defending the Queen’s dominions around the world, in his case Malaya. It was called National Service.
About the book
A conscript’s role in the Malayan Emergency
How did a British teenager find himself involved in an undeclared and little-known war on the other side of the world? He accepted an offer he couldn’t refuse: donating two years of his life defending the Queen’s dominions, in his case Malaya. It was called National Service.
Based on his 1959 ‘Demob Diary’ and the 62 letters he wrote home over 16 months, Misadventures with Coco-Oscar portrays life in a dysfunctional infantry battalion on active service seen through the irreverent eyes of a reluctant conscript.
The battalion’s commanding officer, ‘Coco-Oscar’, was a decorated veteran of World War II when his youthful bravery outshone his inherent ineptitude. The ‘Malayan Emergency’ was his first command of a battalion on active service. In this role he was obsessed by his need to impress the senior ranks above him and oblivious to the welfare of the Other Ranks beneath him. Instead of impressing senior ranks, all too often Coco-Oscar found himself having to account for a succession of cock-ups and cover-ups.
The battalion he led found itself in the wrong places at the wrong times to demonstrate any combat capability. During its brief period on active operations, the only casualties it suffered were self-inflicted; the only hostile bodies it captured were sexually transmitted; and the only fighting it did took place in bars and dancehalls.
This is the wry and comedic account of how a bolshie conscript survived two years of mindless military discipline under the capricious command of Coco-Oscar.
