MR WILLS
What I would have thought that at the very least you would have done, is immediately communicated with your men on the ground and said "look, this is the instruction that we have.  I want to know every single movement that occurs, I want to be brief completely about this matter and if there's some sort of reason as to why you can't adhere to van der Merwe's instruction, contact me immediately."  I want to know why you didn't do that.