(SADF) took over the responsibility from the South African Police for guarding the 1 680-km border between South West Africa and its northern neighbours, Angola and Zambia. Although I didn’t take note of it then, in June of that year 22-year-old Lieutenant Fred Zeelie became the first South African soldier to be killed in the Border War. Zeelie was also the first Special Forces soldier to lose his life in the war.
What I also did not know in 1974 was that a massive – and eventually long drawn-out – civil war was looming in Angola. In April of that year, following the so-called Carnation Revolution in Lisbon, Portugal indicated its intention to give up its colonial rule of the country. The three main Angolan liberation movements – Holden Roberto’s FNLA, Jonas Savimbi’s UNITA and the Marxist MPLA of Dr Agostinho Neto – started competing for control. Fighting broke out in November 1974, starting in the capital city, Luanda, and spreading to the rest of the country.
Angola was soon divided between the three groups. The FNLA occupied northern Angola and UNITA the central south, while the MPLA mostly occupied the coastline, the far southeast and, after capturing it in November, the oil-rich enclave of Cabinda. Negotiations between the parties and the colonial power led to the signing of the Alvor Agreement on 15 January 1975, naming the date for independence as 11 November 1975 and setting up a transitional government. The agreement ended the war for independence but marked the escalation of the civil war. Fighting between the three liberation forces resumed in Luanda hardly a day after the transitional government took office. The coalition established by the Alvor Agreement soon came to an end.
I became aware of these events only when convoys of white Portuguese-speaking refugees started passing through Upington, their cars loaded to capacity with all their worldly belongings. The MPLA, backed by the Soviet Union and Fidel Castro’s Cuba, gained control of Luanda on 9 July 1975. Many white Portuguese, having supported the colonial regime, felt threatened and fled the country in great haste, leaving most of their possessions behind. I also could not have known then that within a few years I would be taking part in the Border War, fighting shoulder to shoulder with many ex-Angolans.
In late 1975 the SADF launched Operation Savannah, a large-scale offensive deep into Angola. The operation was initiated in secret on 14 October, when Task Force Zulu, the first of several SADF columns, crossed from South West Africa into Cuando Cubango province. The operation was aimed at eliminating the MPLA in the southern border area, then in southwestern Angola, moving up into the central regions, and finally capturing Luanda.
With the Angolan liberation forces busy fighting each other, the SADF advanced rapidly. Task Force Foxbat joined the invasion in mid-October. The territory the MPLA had gained in the south was quickly lost to the South African advances. In early October South African advisors and antitank weapons helped to stop an MPLA advance on Nova Lisboa (later Huambo). Task Force Zulu captured Villa Roçadas (later Xangongo) then Sa da Bandeira (Lubango) and finally Moçamedes (Namibe) before the end of October.
The South African advance was halted just short of Luanda, and the forces started withdrawing late in January 1976. Many reasons were given for the termination of the operation, but in essence South Africa at that time stood alone in its quest to oppose communist expansionism in southern Africa. Moderate African countries like Zambia and Côte d’Ivoire, which had originally requested South Africa to intervene, could not provide any assistance themselves.
Western countries like the United States (US) and France had promised support but never committed. US support of both the FNLA and UNITA was sporadic and inconsistent, and finally came to an end at the critical moment when South Africa was poised to take Luanda. Neither UNITA nor the FNLA was politically strong enough to sustain a takeover of Luanda.2
3
The Seed is Sown
DESPITE the new visitors to our town, the Border War was not at the top of my mind. I was fighting another war – my own battle for survival at boarding school, where things had become rather challenging for me.
I became a prefect at the too young age of sixteen, when I was in standard 9 (grade 11). As the only school prefect residing in the boys’ boarding house, I often had to stand my ground against the toughest of the district.
Surrounding the front yard of the boys’ hostel were lush green mulberry trees that bore juicy fruit in summer, naturally serving as a welcome supplement to the monotony of hostel food. However, the mulberries also held an attraction for the coloured boys of the neighbourhood, mostly the kids of maids working in our whites-only suburbs. For a number of junior boys in the hostel it became a pastime to ambush the coloured boys, isolate one or two of them, and then beat them to a pulp.
Soon the coloured kids, realising the dangers of picking fruit from the trees, started taking only the ripe fruit that had fallen to the ground, thinking this would be seen as a lesser transgression. But to the hostel boys the fruit was “theirs”, whether it was still on the tree or lying on the ground, so the practice endured. At the same time, a group of senior boys would sit on the steps in front of the main entrance and direct the youngsters, shouting encouragement once the boys had launched an attack.
I didn’t think much of it until one day when I was passing the outer perimeter on my way from the shop. A young coloured boy was lying on the ground, sobbing and bleeding from the face, and unable to get up. A number of his attackers were still hanging around, shouting abuse at him and telling him to clear off. On the steps in front of the building a number of seniors were watching the show, shouting an occasional encouragement.
I walked over to the boy and helped him up, and then tried to wipe the blood from his face with my handkerchief. But he was too frightened and shied away, protecting his face with his arms. Eventually he limped off.
Turning back to the hostel, I faced the group of attackers. There was defiance in their gaze; how could I betray them by caring for their prey? I chastened them for abusing one small boy while they were many. I ordered them to go back to the hostel and made my way to the entrance where the spectators were still sitting. As I walked past them, they cursed me under their breaths for befriending their enemy. No one challenged me openly, but from then on I had to deal with being called all sorts of names behind my back.
From ensuing discussions about the attacks on the coloured boys, I realised the majority of the boys in the hostel did not support the wilful abuse, but neither did they challenge the hardliners on the issue. For a small minority the abuse was just “innocent fun”.
During that time I also had an unfortunate run-in with one of the resident teachers. He was the staff member on duty one Monday morning when I reported that two guys had laid their hands on some alcohol and got terribly drunk over the weekend. The two culprits were serial offenders, and everyone in the boarding house was aware of their antics.
Later he called me in and confronted me in the presence of the two perpetrators. He said that if I declared there and then that the two pupils had been drunk, he would expel them immediately. The catch was that I knew both boys’ parents were personal friends of the teacher, and that there was no way this kind of harsh action would be taken against them based only on my word.
I left the office biting my lip, after the teacher had forced me to admit that I had made it all up. After that, a number of guys had it in for me, and the teacher – who taught agriculture – was watching me for anything that went faintly wrong at the hostel. On top of that, some hostel kids started calling me “Dropper”, for “dropping” the two innocent drinkers in their time of trouble.
By the end of my third year at boarding school my dad accepted a call to become a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church in Africa, the black arm of our denomination in Upington. Although we lived in a white suburb, my father’s church was in Paballelo, the mainly black township outside town, from where he would serve both the black and coloured congregations. I was rather relieved to leave boarding school and move back in with my folks.
I took every opportunity to accompany my dad to church services and meetings, and so got to know the coloured and black communities around town rather well. At the time the political situation in South Africa was highly volatile and any kind of mixing between the different race groups was unthinkable. This kind