My grandfather fought in the Rhodesian Bush War with internal affairs, I believe it was his job to protect many of the villages from terrorists in the region, often by putting up fences and wire around the PVs. I remember him telling me that before entering the village, he'd tie a log to the back of his truck and drive it in a circle around the village the night before, which would make it easy to check for footprints in the morning to see if anyone had entered or left the village. It was important because often times terrorists would infiltrate into these villages overnight, kill everyone in the village, and then wait in the houses to ambush security forces as they entered.
He didn't see much combat himself because it wasn't his job, that was more for the RAR. I remember him telling me about how he saw the RAR operating in a valley when his convoy was stopped by military police due to the presence of terrorists in the valley. He said that they used to deploy by flying helicopters low to the ground, but not landing, they'd jump out of the choppers like 10ft off the ground while it was still moving.
My grandfather used to make conveyor belts before the war (and after), and he was very good with rubber. He said that they used to put conveyor belts on the bottom of their transport trucks which would make them more resistant to anti-vehicle mines. He told me about a man in his unit that, at some point, drove over one of these mines and survived, but he said the whole truck was blown way up into the air, to the point where he could see over the trees. Scary stuff
Since he was with intaf and wasn't on the front lines, they didn't get much of the good gear, and with the sanctions imposed on Rhodesia, it was hard to get good gear in the first place. Because of this he was only ever allowed to carry two magazines of ammunition with him, and then a bunch of ammo. In basic training he said that they would blindfold him and make him practice loading the magazines blind as fast as possible so that it could be done in a stressful situation at night.
He used to tell me about the Selous Scouts lol. They were essentially the special recon for the Rhodesian security forces and would spend months in the bush tracking down and killing terrorists, so naturally they were a bit 'detached' from society. He said many of them would come back home but would have to spend a week away from home before returning to their families to 're-adjust'. He told me about this one time he saw a couple in a country club, pretty pretentious rich white people place, and they were playing 'freckles' at the bar. Needless to say it wasn't very popular in the loving county club lmfao
Interestingly enough my family doesn't have many photos at all of the time they spent in Rhodesia. Camera film was one of the items they couldn't get due to the sanctions, lol. So all that we really know about Rhodesia is just the memories and stories he passed down. Unfortunately he passed away last month in April, and many of those memories died with him. Before he passed he gave this necklace to my grandmother:
https://i.imgur.com/0Bq7Ul4.jpgAnd asked her to give it to me. Apparently he made it himself in the bush, rope and all. Pretty cool.