Thunder Road to Umuahia

With the federal capture of Owerri two weeks ago, Nigeria's civil war entered a new and perhaps final phase. Secessionist Biafra, now less than one-tenth its original size, holds but one important town: Umuahia. Should it fall, Lieut. Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu would lose his last physical claim on breakaway statehood and be forced, if he is still able, to carry on his fight for Biafra's Ibo people from the jungle. As it advanced slowly but steadily on Umuahia last week, TIME Correspondent Edward Hughes joined Nigeria's 3rd Marine Commando division. His report:

Lucky Devil. By all meteorological reckoning, the worst rainy season in years should have tapered off by now, permitting the sun to steam dry the tangled greenery that stands high and thick over Nigeria's equatorial south. But on the narrow dirt roads leading to Umuahia, the deluge stopped as if to tease, then resumed this week in full force.

The rain added immensely to all the other pain brought on by civil war in the world's largest black nation. In an open truck near Owerri, rainwater seeped into a glucose bottle attached to the stomach of a chocolate-brown corporal identifiable as "Lucky Devil" from the nickname sewn into his bloody tunic. The truck, carrying a dozen wounded, had fallen into a culvert tunneled out by retreating Biafrans. Rain also slowed the stolid march of exhausted refugees from displaced minority tribes heading south from the fighting.

There were no Ibos among them. Fearing death at the hands of the federals, they had chosen to flee north in the path of the advance and now were gathering, some 5,000,000 to 6,000,000 strong, in the roughly 60-mi. by 40-mi. oblong noose into which Biafra has shrunk. The roads are heavily mined, often forcing federal soldiers to take to the thick roadside bush. There they use their submachine guns as deadly scythes, pouring thousands of rounds into the thickets and the few roadside huts they come upon. As in any war, some civilians are hit, but there has been little genocide in the ground advance, if only because almost no civilians remain be hind. The almost total absence of ordinary people in the area of fighting is one of the eerie aspects of the war.

Something Besides Guns. The fast-moving 3rd Division covers a front at least 100 miles long, operating in a deep arc that curves east from a point near Orlu. Under the iron command of Colonel Benjamin Adekunle, it is far more aggressive, daring and successful than the other two federal divisions combined, having captured the other primary strongholds of Aba and Owerri in the past month. Both towns, as well as Umuahia, are in territory originally assigned to the other divisions.

The reason for the 3rd Division's success is Colonel Adekunle himself. He is short and slight, and at 30, is well on his way to claiming the top position in Nigeria's postwar army. A spit-and-polish Sandhurst-trained perfectionist, he shrieks mercilessly at his officers and men, has even been known to swat noncoms across the rear with a baseball bat. "They were just raw bush boys," he explains. Despite harsh discipline, Adekunle has won the adoration of his men by personally leading brigades into the most dangerous action. They also love his flamboyant use of weaponry: he sometimes spends days positioning every bit of firepower he has, from Saracen armored cars to 81 mm. mortars and artillery, in a single location, then orders everyone to fire at once. The result is a fearsome noise that Adekunle proudly calls "my own special thunder."

Adekunle calls himself a true Nigerian: his father is a Yoruba tribesman, his mother a Hausa, and he is married to a Calabari. After entering the army at 18, he frequently got himself into hot water for his rebellious spirit but was selected for Sandhurst training in Britain because of his high ability. His steady slicing at Biafra's territory is partly revenge: Adekunle was once failed in a promotion test by Ojukwu (he got the new rank from higher authorities anyway). But he is also anxious for the army to take over the task of food distribution from the Inter national Red Cross.

Dribbles of Food. By and large, it is distribution--not the availability of supplies--that poses the toughest problem for relief workers. With federal troops in shooting range of Ojukwu's Airstrip Annabelle, only dribbles of food are reaching the millions crowded into Biafra. Around Ikot Ekpene, which changed hands several times over the summer, a scorched-earth policy executed by fleeing Biafrans left minority tribesmen with no food at all. Throughout the area of battle, in fact, millions of tribesmen have fled into the bush, where food supplies cannot reach them easily. Relief officials are already planning ways of speeding up distribution after the fighting ends. Also on hand awaiting the war's end are four international observers from Britain, Sweden, the Organization of African Unity and the U.N. They are the only outside protection against the genocide that the Biafrans fear when at last there is nowhere left to retreat.

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