On such an exercise there is a default rule (standing order) for
CASualty EVACuations - the trainees will have been briefed about it
before commencing the exercise.
I understand your brother's intentions and from that perspective
I'd be pretty pissed off about the outcome. However, objectively
speaking and all things being equal, there were two key errors of
judgement that cost your brother dearly. The first was that he
overreacted to the situation. Dehydration is not an emergency, and
even if the team was out of water, Brunei is not a difficult place
in which to find water.
The second is that he made the misjudgement of taking the car -
that was an error on three levels. First, he assumed that the car
was abandoned - this was a failure on his instructors' part because
they should have instructed your brother better about the
circumstances in Brunei. The SAF trains there upon the goodwill of
the people of Brunei, and as outsiders, SAF personnel must have
respect for property there in order to maintain the goodwill.
Second, your brother would already have seen that the people in the
jungle are not rich - there is no reason that they would abandon a
working vehicle, and in rural areas people are not as
security-conscious as in urban areas, so finding cars unlocked is
not unusual. Third, in any situation, a vehicle is not an
insignificant piece of property, and as an officer cadet your
brother was expected to have the sense to understand the
implicatons of taking it without permission - the taking of such a
piece of property would unquestionably be a chargable
offence.
I sympathise with your brother's situation, but ultimately the
penalty is pretty difficult to argue against. In his position, the
one person I'd have a real problem with is the guy who got
dehydrated because there's no reason for him to have gotten himself
into such a state.
This may sound harsh, but from experience I'd say that Brunei's a
very comfortable environment if you take care of yourself, and that
kind of trouble is entirely avoidable. It's each man's
responsibility to ensure that he doesn't create trouble for his
mates.
