andrew james balaam

Rhodesia was no more. What now?
This is the true story, the memoirs of a soldier, a hardened man who almost gave his life for the country he loved. A country that left him ostracized, condemned, vilified for his role in her history. How do you survive after the fall of Rhodesia? Where do you fit in after Skuzapo, the specialist infiltration unit of the Selous Scouts? And how do you live with the choices you made?
From the blistering heat of Phalaborwa to the freezing cold of the Maluti Mountains. From the sun-baked beaches of Port St Johns to the bone-chilling reality of a solitary confinement cell run by the Transkei Army. These are the real-life memories of Andrew Balaam - raw, unflinching and told in his own voice.
He fights his conscience. He tries to justify training terrorists. He attempts to reason it as necessity - acceptable for survival. But after the Selous Scouts, after Skuzapo, what options were left? Struggling to embrace becoming a paycheque soldier, torn at the thought of becoming a man with no regard for the well-being of others. A man willing to do anything, to accept anything, to be used and abused by his employer in return for a monthly wage. The type of man he once despised.
Was he becoming that which he hated?
Was he changing into the Enemy?
Was he morphing into a Chameleon Soldier?
Gripping, confessional, and unforgettable: Chameleon Soldier is not a tale of glory. It is a memoir of fear and resilience, of blood money and broken ideals, of a man who could change his colours but never his soul. And in the end, he discovers that the gods of the past - those once revered - turned out to have feet of clay.