A Half Bottle of Jack Daniels

I needed to reorient.  I wasn’t a combat soldier as I had originally envisioned.  My spiritual mentor, Col Thieme, had labeled me “unstable and unreliable” and I was struggling to find my way as a chaplain.  Who could I talk to who would understand--maybe Robin Moore could help?  

Robin had this beautiful home just a couple of blocks from Andrew Fleming hospital in Salisbury.  He would write each morning and spend his afternoons socializing among government officials and soldiers for the series of articles and book he was writing on Rhodesia.  I didn’t like the Saturday afternoon parties around his pool with dozens of soldiers--too much drinking and too rowdy for serious conversation.  [I recently read Robin’s 1991 historical novel The White Tribe which reprises his time in Rhodesia.  It turns out that Robin didn’t like the degenerating nature of those Saturday parties, but felt that the foreign soldiers needed the venue to let off steam.]

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Robin invited Pegi and me to come over in the afternoon.  We sat on his veranda sipping Jack Daniels.  Name brand alcohol was not available in Rhodesia, but Robin kept his bar well-stocked from his trips back and forth to New York.  

[In case you are wondering, Col Thieme actually promoted drinking from the pulpit in his constant references to his favorite Glinlivet Single Malt Scotch and his penchant for fine wines.  I had worked the night shift at Berachah Tapes and Publications.  One of my duties was to clean up the conference room where the Colonel would retire after teaching bible class each night of the week.  Every night, there were at least two empty bottles of wine that he had shared with his executive secretary, Katie Tapping.  So, I was never troubled by the American Christian legalism that prohibited drinking.  I was, however, troubled by the fact that he was drinking with someone other than his wife every night of the week and the undeniable impression that he was having an affair with his long-time assistant.]

My conversation with Robin didn’t clarify anything for me, but it did alert me to concerns that the Special Branch of the police was paying uncomfortable attention to Americans serving in the Rhodesian Army.  It made me slightly paranoid.

I had a private conversation with one of Robin’s assistants, a retired Special Forces Colonel who had known Robin in Vietnam when he wrote The Green Berets.  This Colonel, whose name escapes me now, had also worked for the CIA.  If he is portrayed correctly in Robin’s later work, The White Tribe, he was on CIA assignment when he persuaded Robin to come to Rhodesia.  

As a Jew, I was always interested in the situation in Israel.  Nevertheless, this colonel suggested that it would be in Israel’s best interest to allow the formation of a Palestinian state:  “If they don’t give the Palestinians their own state, they will outnumber the Jews in a generation.  Then Palestinians will have the majority vote.  This would be a disaster for a Jewish state.”  This was 1977, long before there was a hint that Israel would ever accept a two-state solution.  I had never considered such an outcome and neither had my Col Thieme!  Maybe his so-called “divine viewpoint of history” that he said one could get from the study of bible doctrine was nearsighted. 

I found myself wondering about all my assumptions as I wandered out of Robin’s house with a half-full bottle of Jack Daniels--a gift from Robin.  Pegi and I made that half-bottle last until just before we left Rhodesia in May of 1978.  It got down to fumes, but we would take the cap off from time to time to sniff and remember better times before the paranoia began to take hold.

Next:  ♪♪ Paranoia Strikes Deep ♪♪