Military conscription was introduced in Australia for the first time between the years 1965 to 1972. Referred to as National Service, eligible men of 20 years of age were selected by a birthday ballot. The gift from the government was 5 years of armed service, including 2 years full time that could include active overseas missions, with a high likelihood they would end fighting on the front line of the Vietnam War.
Given the randomness of the selection process, the numbers of ‘Nashos’ was evenly spread across the country. However, by a statistical quirk, the impact was most profoundly felt by the Kooljimup Koalas Australian Rules Football Club in the Great Southern Region of Western Australia. Across 3 years from 1969 to 1971, every single player in the 20 years age group had their birth date called out. In that period an astonishing 23 players found themselves deployed to Vietnam. Such was the impact on player numbers, the club had to go into temporary recess in 1972.
Thankfully none of the players were killed or seriously injured, and the club were able to resume playing in the Wick Valley Football League in 1973. However, as expected, their military service had a lasting impact and many of the players initially struggled to settle back into civilian life. In a way, the football club provided stability and familiarity. Life at the club felt more akin to the military life that they’d left behind, but without the risk of malaria and constant machine gun and mortar fire.
As the players trained together in preparation for their return season, coach Les Fadden, a former Korean war veteran himself, decided that the club should embrace their military heritage.
Pre-season training took the form of boot camp; the players moved into a bivouac in crown land adjacent to the Kooljimup Recreation Reserve and the canteen ladies were replaced with former army cooks from their battalion. A proposal to bury land mines on the outer wings to encourage the players to use the corridor, was only narrowly defeated in a team vote. Instead, snipers were positioned in trees and ordered to fire their air rifles at any player leading out towards the boundary line.
After an extraordinary meeting, the club voted to dispense with their traditional red with a white yoke jersey design and adopted the black & green colours of the 2nd Royal Australian Regiment. Initially the new jersey featured green and black stripes with the image of the battalion mascot on the left breast: a black footed ferret.
From the outset of the season, it was obvious that while the newly named Kooljimup Ferrets may not have been the most skilful side in the competition, they were clearly the fittest, bravest and most likely to identify the trajectory and range of incoming ordnance. However, after the first round of the season against the Gribben Goannas, the League administration banned the use of live artillery, and this skill set became less of an advantage. Coach Les Fadden spoke about the League crackdown in his autobiography ‘Les We Forget’
‘Were our tactics excessive? Probably, but the boys had come home with a whole new skill set and we were just trying to press home that advantage. League HQ made it pretty clear after we’d given the Goannas a pizzling, that the use of weaponry of any kind was off the table. To be honest, that was probably fair enough. Their Vice-Captain Harry Wiley had no idea how to defend himself against a frontal Ka-Bar knife assault and nearly lost an eye just before half time. However, it was the clampdown on the taking of prisoners, use of espionage and encrypted radio messages that we thought was a bit rich. At the next team meeting, we decided that we’d make it look like we’d rolled over, but in reality, we were going to use what we’d learnt about guerrilla warfare to get an edge on our opponents.’
The next match of the season saw the Ferrets playing at home against the Wicklow Weevils. After running out on to the field of play in readiness to take on the Ferrets, there was much confusion amongst the Weevils, the umpires and the spectators of both sides. Historian Dennis Broadkirk summed up the prevailing mood of uncertainty in the Weevil’s club History ‘Wee Vil Vin’
‘From the moment the Weevils arrived at the ground until the umpire blew his whistle to start the game, there was absolutely no sign of the opposition team. However, once the umpire bounced the ball, they seemingly emerged out of nowhere. Clumps of dirt, mounds of leaves and fallen branches suddenly manifested as players. The Ferrets took the ball out of the centre and had a goal before the Weevils could even twitch. It had been rumoured that they’d changed their jersey design to more natural tones, but this was much more. Not only were the jumpers in a camouflage pattern, the players were also cloaked in bark, foliage and mulch. Any bare skin was smeared in non-reflective, woodland toned face paint. Their subterfuge was so successful, that even though they won the game by 134 points, the umpire was unable to award any votes at the end of the game, because he could neither see the players, nor tell them apart.’
The Ferrets had a narrow victory the following week playing away against the Grantleen Ghost Bats. However, in the next match when they hosted the previously undefeated Ungalarie Undertakers, they won by an astonishing 171 points.
As the season reached the halfway point with the Ferrets undefeated and on top of the ladder, alarm bells were ringing at the Wick Valley League Administration. A pattern of narrow wins when playing away, followed by the absolute annihilation of their opponents when playing at home, had tongues wagging. The League President, Len Klinger called in a favour from an old mate, Major Scott McLindon, who had served in the British SAS. McLindon was charged with the responsibility of secretly spying on the Ferrets as they trained and played. The findings of his tabled report were explosive.
‘I initially suspected that the league administration may have succumbed to paranoia and inflated the level of malefaction being perpetrated by the
Kooljimup Ferrets Football Club. However, the reality was that the level of subterfuge being employed at home games in particular, was in fact beyond anyone’s estimations.
After watching one of their games, I was initially perplexed by the movement of Ferrets players around the field of play. A player might be seen heading down towards the opposition goal square, before bobbing up shortly afterwards in the Ferrets goal square. Other players seemingly disappeared into thin air only to re-emerge in the open to receive the ball.. It was mystifying. I decided that it might be easier to deduce what was happening by inspecting the field late at night. With the help of a seismic exploration device, I soon had my suspicions confirmed: The surface of the Kooljimup Ferrets home ground concealed an extensive network of tunnels. Accessed by cleverly concealed trap doors, players were able to come and go through any one of 54 entrance and exit points. Electric powered travelators allowed players to move to their desired location, at twice the average running speed. They would then reappear and create havoc on their unsuspecting opponents. Sound and light diversions were used to cover the movements of players as they came and went.’
Over the course of his investigation, McLindon also discovered the following -
- Umpires are being abducted and replaced by proxies sympathetic to the Ferrets cause. While the replacement umpire takes over officiating the match, the real umpire is neutralised using a memory erasing anaesthetic and returned to their car after the match. When they regained consciousness, they had no recollection of what took place.
- The water pressure in the subterranean showers is actually better than the showers in the clubrooms.
- Using concealed microphones and receivers linked to a radio command centre, the Ferret’s coaches are able to listen into conversations in the opposition team rooms and coach’s box.
- The use of recycled timber to reinforce the tunnel walls is to be commended.
- A holding cell containing several key opposition players explains their sudden disappearance during recent matches.
- The roomy, well-appointed cells are surprisingly well ventilated. It is my view that the standard is beyond any rival accommodation in the region, and the club should consider opening it up the public in the off season.
- Evidence of chairs with restraining devices suggests the club may be using torture to extract information about opposition game plans. However, the adjacent first aid kit is well-stocked.
- The club’s subterranean members only bar, ‘The Burrow’, may have the best selection of malt whiskeys in the region.
After receiving McLindon’s report, the Wick Valley Football League Administration called an extraordinary meeting for July 5th, 1973. While it was clear that the Kooljimup Ferrets had gained an advantage using methods that were against the spirit of fair competition, they could find nothing in the League Compendium that suggested that any actual rules had been broken.
The meeting continued into the wee hours of the following morning as the League power brokers thrashed out rule changes. In the end there were far too many new rules to add, so they compromised by changing the odd word here and there to the 1949 Geneva Convention, and added it the existing Wick Valley League Rules Compendium. To this day, they remain the only regional Australian Rules Football League to expressly rule that …
- Occupying home and away teams are to provide food and medical supplies as necessary to the population and maintain medical and public health facilities.
- Pillage, reprisals, indiscriminate destruction of property and the taking of hostages are prohibited, except during victorious Grand Final celebrations.
- Impartial humanitarian relief organizations, such as the Red Cross, are to be permitted to continue their humanitarian services throughout the Reserves and Senior games.
- Injured opposition players must not be subjected to torture or medical experimentation and must be protected against acts of violence, insults and public curiosity.
- Civilians cannot be forced to do military-related work for an occupying team.
- Persons interned or detained during home and away games are assured humane treatment as specified by the Geneva Conventions.
- Hospital ships cannot be used for any military purpose. They cannot be attacked or captured. The names and descriptions of hospital ships must be conveyed to all parties in the conflict.
With their clandestine methods revealed, and the Geneva Convention to contend with, the Ferrets game plan began to unravel during their next scheduled home game against traditional rivals the Muddabudda Mudlarks. There was no love lost between the two sides and the Larks went into the game with a plan to counteract the Ferrets methods. The Mudlarks senior coach at the time was Ken Griffiths. He discussed their tactics in their club history, ‘It’s a Mud Mud World’
‘We’d had a few blokes serve in the Nashos as well, so we knew what they were up to. We also had Norm Arrowfield, who was not only the best full back in the League, but a military lawyer who knew his way around the Geneva Convention.
They started to get on top of us late in the second quarter. That’s when we set our plan in motion. Just as they were heading into their forward line and another goal seemed imminent, we sent a column of civilian refugees onto the field. As the home team they were obliged to offer aid, food and shelter. While that played out, we piled on 4 unanswered goals and went into half time with a narrow lead.
When they came out after half time, they discovered that we had set up a temporary place of worship in their goal square and they couldn’t go into attack without risking its destruction. We’d also placed crop planters and water tanks in their forward pockets so they couldn’t find an avenue to goal, without risking accusations of religious prosecution and denying civilian access to food and water supplies. Of course, they didn’t help themselves. When they started firing tear gas shells onto our hospital ship in the last quarter, there was only one likely outcome.’
After the hospital ship incident, the match between Kooljimup and Muddabudda was abandoned, and the points awarded to the Mudlarks. The Ferrets played out the remainder of the season, but with their game plan exposed, they were a shadow of their former selves and failed to win another game.
After narrowly missing the finals, Les Fadden and his team of Ferrets, seemed to simply vanish. In fact, it wasn’t until the release of Les Fadden’s ‘Les We Forget’, many years later, that the truth finally came out.
‘As is tradition, the boys all dressed up for Mad Monday after the last home away game and we went on a pub crawl. It was a pub crawl from which we never intended to return. Each of the lads had not only dressed up as someone else, but in fact had forged new identities: Some blokes had even opted for facial reconstruction surgery, though Gus Dempsey’s bum chin had made others have second thoughts. With new passports, we all went our separate ways. Most lived on in obscurity, except Bill Fetherby who changed his name to Normie Rowe and had a half decent musical career. We may not have won the Premiership, but the 1973 Kooljimup Ferrets is the only regional Australian Rules football team to be recognised with a display at the Australian War Memorial and I’ll take that.’
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