The Cove Podcast

‘You think your whole life is going to flash before your eyes but I couldn’t think of anything.’ In this week’s episode, we continue with the defence of the Dili Aerodrome, using 2/2 Independent Commando Company as a case study to examine a small Australian force going up against a large opposing military. Our guest – MAJ Guy Warnock – just returned from years in the Defence Cooperation Program (DCP) in Timor-Leste but this is not where his interest in the history of Timor first started. MAJ Warnock deployed to Timor as a Special Forces Operator from the Special Air Service Regiment in the first few months of INTERFET. If you want to walk the ground of Sparrow Force, the 2/2 Commando Association of Australia (inc.), along with members of DCP-TL, have collaborated with a Timor-based adventure company to develop a Kokoda-style trek up through the mountains of Timor that follows some of the network of tracks used by the soldiers of the 2/2 and 2/4 Independent Companies and their Timorese comrades.    It’s five gruelling days covering 96km with a walking tour of the battle for the Dili Aerodrome developed by MAJ Warnock on day one and finishing with a 1700m gain in the last 36 hours or so to reach the highest peak on the island of Timor - Mt Ramelau at just under 3,000m.    Options also exist to visit the crash site of the RAAF No.200 Flight B24 Liberator A72-159 which crashed in the mountains above Dili on 17 May 1945 killing all 15 Australians on board, including five men from the Services Reconnaissance Department - AKA: ‘Z’ Special Unit and the wreckage of HMAS Voyager (I) on the south coast of Timor-Leste at Betano, which ran aground and was lost on 23 September 1942 as it attempted to evacuate elements of SPARROW Force and replace them with LANCER Force based on the 2/4 Independent Company.   Maddog Adventures maddogadventures.com.au La Rende! (No Surrender!) Trek https://maddogadventures.com.au/adventures/la-rende-trek/   —————————————————————————  Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss out on any of the heavy hitting content we have planned.

‘Tough men wanted for tough missions.’ In this week’s episode, we continue with the island of Timor but go back to WWII, using Sparrow Force as a case study to examine a small Australian force going up against a large opposing military. Our guest – MAJ Guy Warnock – just returned from years in the Defence Cooperation Program (DCP) in Timor-Leste but this is not where his interest in the history of Timor first started. MAJ Warnock deployed to Timor as a Special Forces Operator from the Special Air Service Regiment in the first few months of INTERFET.  Sparrow Force, our focus in this episode, was made up predominately of the 2/40th Battalion from the same brigade that provided the battalions for Lark Force and Gull Force but was bolstered with the 2/2nd Independent Commando Company. Sparrow Force’s task was to defend Timor from invasion by the Japanese but although Lark Force could move into Rabaul in New Guinea early because it was Australian territory, it was not until the strike on Malaya and Pearl Harbour that Sparrow Force could deploy from Darwin onto Timor to begin to prepare the defences. The 2/40th Battalion was centred on Kupang in the Dutch-held West Timor and the 2/2nd Independent Commando Company was tasked with defending the airfield in Dili in the Portuguese-held East Timor. The 2/2nd Independent Commando Company was trained by British training teams that brought new equipment and weaponry to enable unconventional tactics and guerilla warfare. Wilsons Promontory was chosen as the commando training area and was given the codename ‘No. 7 Infantry Training Centre’. As soon as the commandos arrived in Dili, they began to learn the language and the lay of the ground, completely unaware that Singapore was about to fall. This episode is the first part of telling their story. Sources & References:  The Cove Podcast and MAJ Warnock want to acknowledge the work of the 2/2 Commando Association of Australia (inc.) and in particular that of Mr Ed Willis, the son of a 2/2 soldier who has put in many decades of hard work, research and trips to Timor-Leste.  All the further reading and information needed on the battle for Timor is here, including being able to purchase Ed’s recently released battlefield guide “Timor in WW2 - an Australian Army Site and Guide” which is available at their excellent website: www.doublereds.org.au   —————————————————————————    Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss the second part of the Timor series on Sparrow Force in WWII, when the enemy land. The next episode continues with Sparrow Force in Kupang and on the 2/2 Independent Commando Company mounting a guerrilla campaign in the hills that surround Dili. 

‘I taught 11,000 people how to put up a stretcher.’ In this week’s episode, the creator of the popular Instagram page Tuesday Night Violence Co. joins us to talk through equipment and gear setup. The creator – CPL Mitchell Clark – is currently posted as the Training Sergeant at 2nd/17th Battalion, Royal New South Wales Regiment (2/17 RNSWR) but spends his spare time providing ‘hot chips’ for diggers on fitness, gear and tactical planning activities. CPL Clark has bounced in-and-out of full-time and part-time service and today he takes us through his philosophy for gear selection and setup and what having his gear squared away does for his mindset. CPL Clark came to Army with a teaching background and finds real fulfilment in teaching and mentoring diggers as a Junior Non-Commissioned Officer. The Instagram page gives him the ability to reach almost 12,000 followers and he started when he returned from a rewarding deployment to Iraq, trying to work out what was next. He now conducts Research and Development for several different companies, designing gear to improve his DP1 and then thrashing prototypes to help diggers in the battalions spend hard earnt money on excellent equipment. CPL Clark uses the conditions faced by Lark Force in Rabaul to emphasise that we need to make what we have work, and that our issued gear is world-class and envied by fighters in other nations. When looking at either issued or non-issued equipment, versatility and redundance are the two most important things that must be considered. Versatility so that everything we carry is high value and redundancy to ensure that we can still fight even when things go wrong. We go through packs, sleeping gear, shelter and heaps of other equipment to describe what makes fighters more lethal. We sum up the episode with CPL Clark taking us through three high value items that you should consider when posting into your first unit. ————————————————————————— Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss out on any of the heavy hitting content we have recorded with CPL Clark and many other amazing guests. If you haven’t already done so, go back and listen to Invasion Rabaul and Age in War which CPL Clark recommends in this episode.

‘Language leads to culture and then culture leads to understanding.’ In this week’s episode, we talk through what it would be like to deploy to a pacific or southeast Asian nation using Timor as our case study. Our guest – MAJ Guy Warnock– just returned from years in the Defence Cooperation Program (DCP) in Timor-Leste but this is not where his interest in Timor first started. MAJ Warnock deployed to Timor as a Special Forces Operator from the Special Air Service Regiment in the first few months of INTERFET. MAJ Warnock tells stories about diggers predicting that the Australian Army would end up in Timor years beforehand, troopers itching for any information that they could find before flying into Dili, including learning Bahasa in the halls of Swanbourne Barracks from a tape player and how his force element equipped themselves before deploying. To the soldiers that first deployed to Timor on INTERFET, this was the main event. Commanders now need to encourage all soldiers to learn a language. Language leads to culture and culture leads to understanding. Allowing soldiers to learn a language like Bahasa or Tetum and then seeking opportunities for them to deploy on Mobile Training Teams or post to DCP will build the soldiers we need for the fighting of tomorrow. Lean into the qualifications, interests and expertise that you already have in your team because you may be surprised at what each member can offer. Make a deliberate effort to force continuity in command. Large changeover of commanders and their staff make it incredibly difficult to build highly functional teams that can deploy into volatile and uncertain countries to either kill the enemy or protect the people of the host nation. ————————————————————————— Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss our second and third episode in the Timor series on Sparrow Force in WWII centred on Kupang in West Timor and Dili in East Timor and on the 2/2 Independent Commando Company mounting a guerrilla campaign in the hills that surround Dili.

Serving in Special Operations Command (SOCOMD) is an aspiration for many and attainable for some. It is a popular choice for ADF members seeking to take their career to the next level and civilians wanting more out of life than a trade or corporate job can offer.Recruiting is underway to identify the next generation of Special Forces Operators, Engineers, Signallers, Medics and Enablers. Depending on the role, some candidates participate in the Special Forces Selection Course (SFSC) – one of the longest and most gruelling selection courses in the world.We’ve partnered with the ADF School of Special Operations to produce a series of episodes to give you insights straight from the source. If you’re interested in joining SOCOMD’s units - 1st Commando Regiment, Special Air Service Regiment, 2nd Commando Regiment, Special Operations Engineer Regiment or Special Operations Logistics Squadron then this is the series for you.This episode features two SOCOMD Psychologists who discuss enhancing mindsets and building mental toughness for the Special Forces Selection Course. Together they possess a wealth of collective experience in SOCOMD and have witnessed first-hand how mental preparation can impact performance on Selection, the Reinforcement Training Cycle and Operations. Their discussion provides helpful strategies to assist candidates when responding to different scenarios during Selection and beyond. The insights they have gained from engaging with successful and unsuccessful candidates provide helpful tips to assist future candidates facing those tough and challenging moments on Selection. The key takeaway - if you are not there at the end of Selection, you won’t have the opportunity to be selected. Therefore, you need to build those mental skills to help you persevere and thrive to the end.SOCOMD is looking for high calibre individuals who are ready to play a part in cutting-edge warfare now, and into the future. Could it be you?Find out More: Special Forces Operator - ADF Careers

In this engaging conversation, MAJGEN Chris Smith, the Deputy Chief of the Australian Army, shares insights on warrior culture. He stresses the need for a culture that prioritizes team success over individual accolades, highlighting loyalty, discipline, and moral restraint. Smith critiques romanticized soldiering, emphasizing the importance of melding personal values with national expectations. He discusses historical examples and the ethical dilemmas faced in combat, advocating for a resilient and principled warrior ethos in modern military training.

‘You can’t discern where [the rockets were] actually landing and by night, the noise is enveloping.’ In this week’s episode, we talk about the conflict in Israel, Lebanon and Syria with two people that were on the ground on October 7th, 2023. Our guests – MAJ Mick Evans and CAPT Rhys Turner – talk us through their deployment on OPERATION PALADIN and what it was like being there when thousands of rockets started flying.OPERATION PALADIN is the Australian Defence Force support to the UN Truce Supervision Organisation (UNTSO), whose activities are spread across Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Syrian Arab Republic. Both guests deployed for a lengthy 12-month stint, with MAJ Mick Evans spending his time in Syria and CAPT Rhys Turner spending his time in Israel and then southern Lebanon. We explore the geo-political situation in one of the most complex regions and conflicts in the world, attempting to unpack everything that they both learnt over their long deployments.We talk to the training they received at the Peace Operations Training Centre, their infiltration into what was intended to be a ‘normal’ deployment, what happen on and after October 7th and the varying conditions within each country. Rhys observed the Israeli mobilisation where thousands of troops were mobilised and moved throughout the country. Mick was at an Observation Post that had rockets flying over the top of his position, dropping short some 600m from their position.————————————————————————— Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss out on any of the heavy hitting content we have planned.

‘You don’t need to be dead to sell life insurance.’ In this week’s episode, we talk about how to look after yourself and those that you command. Our guest this week is the Senior Medical Officer (SMO) for the Directorate of Army Health – LTCOL Gordon Wing MBBS – who was an infantry officer who deployed to East Timor as a Company Second-in-Command, to the Solomon Islands as an Adjutant and to Afghanistan as a Combat Team Commander and then chose to follow a life-long dream of becoming a doctor.On this week’s episode, we shift tact from the future of land warfare and history to talk through some more practical skills to help commanders and individuals negotiate the systems that enable recovery. While often misunderstood, the Military Employment Classification (MEC) System is not a medical system, it is a personnel system. It’s designed to put up a forcefield to enable an individual's rehabilitation, and most of the members that need to recover from injury return to a deployable MEC status on completion. Medical Officers and those that provide healthcare to ADF members make recommendations; however, they do not make decisions on an individual’s MEC status. Once a member is reclassified to a different MEC status, they should be presented at an Individual Welfare Board and then at regular Unit Welfare Boards to ensure that the member’s rehabilitation is on-track and that they are receiving the support that they need.An Individual Welfare Board is more encompassing and held ad-hoc to consider all relevant information regarding the support to a member and their family. A Unit Welfare Board considers the need of all members within a unit and are commonly held quarterly. Welfare Boards are not just conducted for a member undergoing medical rehabilitation or recovery, they can also be conducted for complex personal issues; or, for those being investigated for, and/or charged with, a serious offence. Both types of Welfare Boards are designed to provide subject matter expert advice to the chain of command to ensure that the correct support is being provided to achieve the best possible outcome for the member and their family.This episode contains the practical skills to negotiate the MEC System, to get the best outcome for the members that we support and to return to fighting fit. If you have civilian dependants, sign up for the ADF Family Health Program to be eligible for unlimited GP visits and $800 per dependant in family benefit for other services. Find more details at https://adffamilyhealth.com/.————————————————————————— Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss out on any of the heavy hitting content we have planned.

‘The warning time that they thought they had completely evaporated in a moment.’ In this week’s episode, we take off from where we left off with Lark Force in Rabaul, New Guinea as the Allies continue to combat the Japanese advance through South-East Asia and the Pacific. Joined by my regular co-host LTCOL Steve Young, this episode is far closer to home, focused on the largest attack on home-soil being on Darwin, Northern Territory.Following Pearl Harbour, the United States identified a need to establish bases that could be held against an initial Japanese onslaught and eventually used to mount counter offensives. The United States chose Darwin because of its deep-water port and its proximity to the Philippines. The assumption was that if the United States could ship stores to Brisbane and Sydney, they could move these stores via road and rail inland to Darwin to stage before the Philippines. Darwin, at this time, consisted of four main streets, the newly established Larrakeyah Barracks and RAAF Base Darwin, a single deep-water port, and a population of less that 6,000.On the 19 February 1942 (74 days after Pearl Harbour), The Nagumo Force was tasked to attack Darwin. The commander sent 242 aircraft to destroy ships afloat in the Darwin Harbour, strike aircraft on the newly established RAAF Base Darwin and the civilian airport and attacked Darwin to deny its use by the Allies. The Nagumo Force managed to kill 250, wound 300-400 people, destroy 30 aircraft, sink 11 vessels and damage 25 vessels. Both the Japanese and the United States overestimated the impact that Darwin would have on the Pacific War and we explain why in this episode.The Bombing of Darwin is commemorated on 19 February each year in Darwin, with 8/12 Regiment, Royal Australian Artillery providing a blank firing demonstration with M2A2 105mm Howitzers, the 1st Aviation Regiment providing Tiger Armed Reconnaissance Helicopters and the RAAF’s 75 Squadron providing F-35A Lightning II multi-role, supersonic, stealth fighters to simulate the Japanese bombing and the Allied defence.—————————————————————————Subscribe to The Cove Podcast to make sure that you do not miss out on any of the heavy hitting content we have planned.

Serving in Special Operations Command (SOCOMD) is an aspiration for many and attainable for some. It is a popular choice for ADF members seeking to take their career to the next level and civilians wanting more out of life than a trade or corporate job can offer. Recruiting is underway to identify the next generation of Special Forces Operators, Engineers, Signallers, Medics and Enablers. Depending on the role, some candidates participate in the Special Forces Selection Course (SFSC) – one of the longest and most gruelling selection courses in the world.We’ve partnered with the ADF School of Special Operations to produce a series of episodes to give you insights straight from the source. If you’re interested in joining SOCOMD’s units - 1st Commando Regiment, Special Air Service Regiment, 2nd Commando Regiment, Special Operations Engineer Regiment or Special Operations Logistics Squadron then this is the series for you.This episode features Army physiotherapist, MAJ Angela Uphill PhD who conducted her doctorate on observations from Special Forces Selection. Working within SOCOMD’s Human Performance Optimisation cell, she undertook a comprehensive research project to assess the physical and performance impacts of Selection on candidates. We discuss the data and findings to gain insights about the indicators for who was more or less likely to make it through to the end of Selection. MAJ Uphill also provides some helpful tips to assist with your own training and preparation.SOCOMD is looking for high calibre individuals who ready to play a part in cutting-edge warfare now, and into the future. Could it be you?Find out More: Special Forces Operator - ADF Careers