Sheep magazine Archive 2: issues 10-17

The British response was merciless. “We burnt down rebel villages and
shot their goats and cows,” one officer wrote. “Any enemy corpses we
recovered were propped up in the Salalah souk as a salutary lesson to
any would-be freedom fighters.” Another officer explained that unlike
in Northern Ireland, where soldiers were anxious to avoid killing or
wounding non-combatants, he believed that in Dhofar there were no
innocents, only adoo: “The only people in this area – there are no
civilians – are all enemy. Therefore you can get on with doing the job,
mortaring the area and returning small arms fire without worrying about
hurting innocent people.”
In their determination to put down a popular rebellion against the cruelty
and neglect of a despot who was propped up and financed by Britain,
British-led forces poisoned wells, torched villages, destroyed crops and
shot livestock. During the interrogation of rebels they developed their
torture techniques, experimenting with noise. Areas populated by civilians
were turned into free-fire zones. Little wonder that Britain wanted to fight
this war in total secrecy.
47
There was no need to resort to the Official Secrets Acts or the D-notice
system in order to conceal the Dhofar war, and the ruthless manner in
which it was being fought, from the outside world. Two simple expedients
were employed: no journalists were permitted into the country, and
nobody in government mentioned the war. When Wilson published
his account of the Labour government of 1964-70, for example, he
mentioned the war that the US was fighting in Vietnam almost 250 times.
His own government’s war in Oman was not mentioned once.
SEPTEMBER 2016