Episode 77 – The Recces blow up locomotives and 32 Battalion dresses like UNITA

[Music] Welcome back to South African Border Wars with me, your host, Des Leitham. This is episode 77. But the second half of 1984, the Joint Monitoring Commission was virtually on its last leg. And the SADF special forces were involved in a number of missions both by sea and across the cutline. The first we can hear about was an audacious plan to blow up Angolan railway, rolling stock, including locomotives at the Shunting Yard at Lobito in Binguela Province, on the Atlantic coast north of the Catumbella history. If you travel there now, it's a beautiful beach palm trees swaying the breeze, small fishing boats come and go, the sea is an azure turquoise. Forty years ago, it was a crucial hub in the MPLA's infrastructure. After 1974, diesel-electric locomotives were used to ferry heavy weapons and material between Lobito and Hwambu to the east, and that was on the main route towards Zambia and southern Congo. By 1984, this railway line had been out of operation for at least six years because of unit sabotage, but the movement of war material between Lobito and Hwambu was important to Foupler. Twenty-two of the locomotives were GEU-20Cs from the United States, and in 1983, another twelve had made their way there from Brazil. Because the South African rollways used the same locomotives, it meant the wreckies could practice on the same machines. The initial idea was for the wreckies to strike in February 1984. This was shelved, and the SID have then resurrected the plan in September, and named it "Operation Equator". They wanted to destroy both the locomotives in the Shunting Guard and the railway line, but this meant two raiding teams would be needed. It was a job for one wreckie, and Colonel Andre Besbier was appointed as overall commander, and Captain Krubert-Nill was appointed for wreckie boat commander. The strategy when it came to damaging these locomotives was interesting. The plan called for the same part to be destroyed on all the machines, which meant they could not cannibalize them and repair them, and the most effective object on these locomotives to put out of action was the bell housing of the generator, which would also destroy the dynamo wiring. The buffens got to work and designed a woodcock two-mind house in aluminium, four strong magnets would fix this to the target, along with a mercury motion sensor and a timing mechanism. The rollway line was going to be blown up using pick two mines with delayed settings of more than seven days, and a soft, destruct setting of 92 days. Explosive was a slurry that hardened when exposed to air. This meant they could bury their explosive alongside the line, making it very difficult to find. It was a form of IED, a passing locomotive would trigger the device, and it would explode a second or two after sensing the weight. The delay was important. The unit had been blowing up Angolan rolling stock, and Fuplar now used a ballast-filled wagon ahead of the locomotives so that it would protect the locomotive from an immediate blast. In overall, Commander of the mission was Captain Dahn von Seil, who headed up the 12 raiders targeting the locomotives. Captain JC Arasmas led the team of eight who were tasked with mining the rollway line. Two striker craft would insert the wreckies. The SES Oswald-Birot under Commander Jacques Deacon and the SES François Arasmas under Lieutenant Commander Brian Duncan. The SES Tafelberg Research Ship would steam about in the vicinity as maritime backup. The 26th of September was chosen as D-Night, with the 27th as backup with weather or other factors caused a delay. After all the activities recently, the MPLA in Angola was monitoring the South African naval movements closely, along with the Russians, who obviously had a higher surveillance capability. Most of the loading and movement was going to take place at night to try and throw the enemy off-sint. All comms during the mission would be carried out on the Hopper Radios and a whole new set of codes were instituted. So on the 20th of September, 1984, one wrecky moved from Derben to Donkerrat and the two striker craft met them there. They loaded the food and other material onto the boats, and on the 22nd of September, they headed off on their mission at 10pm. The striker craft arrived off Lobito at 1900 hours on the 26th of September and began their run-in. That set up a boxed area, which was five nautical miles wide, along the beach, from west of the Katumbella River mouth. All the activity would take place in this box. At 2000 hours, 15 of France's arasmas discorded the two barricueders' small boats. The first boat from the France arasmas carried a recon team of both two as their fire support. A four-recky swimmer on each boat secured the landing and the three-man teams, CryptoShort. The beach was deserted, but luckily, footprints could be seen running at all angles. The smith there landing would be harder to detect. They walked south and found a grove of palm trees and a small canal that ran out to sea. This was excellent cover, and the reconnaissance team used a footpath alongside to traverse the railway line then a tired road. It was the main Lobito Benguela road, which the SADF had traveled along in 1976 during Operation Savannah. The traffic was heavy, all sorts of vehicles, including water tankers and other military tracks were hustling past, so the recon team lay low for a few minutes. Then they used a gap in the traffic to get across the road. From there, they walked another two or three kilometers. It was just off the midnight that they realized they'd headed the wrong way and returned to the boats. But they were pretty sure about the location of the railway line and the best spot to lay their mind. At 0215, they were back on board the strike craft. Meanwhile, the Oswald-Berroid headed north-west of this position and dropped off the second recon team which headed to the Shunting Art and railway depot at 21 hours for 15. They used the same tactic, one boat with recon team and one with fire team support. It was easier for them to spot their points of interest, the Barracuda pilots using the lights on a grain elevator inside Lobito Harbour as a reference. Then an odd incident took place. As they slowly approached the beach, they saw around 200 people sitting in an open air cinema. Most of the cinema goes were in uniform. The recon team waited in the dark out to sea, watching what happened. Eventually, at 2325, the movie ended and the crowd dispersed. The wreckies headed towards Shaw. They were going to land 800 meters south of the Shunting Art close to the main rail depot. Two swimmers first slipped overboard to check the beach and they reported that it was a steep landing with swells over 1.5 meters, so the teams went in wet. One of the radios was damaged, but they decided to keep going. Soon they stopped again. There were six military vehicles parked nearby and a small group of soldiers were enjoying a night barbecue on the beach. The South Africans were too far south anyway, so the return to the beach called the Barracuda's back swam out of them then shifted position. By now, it was 0100 hours 10. The swimmers found a beach further north that appeared to be isolated and managed to land. But now they were close to blocks of flats. So far, however, they hadn't been spotted, although the latest position was a little more dodgy. Dogs began to bark, but the wreckies continued moving through the dark to the Shunting Art. After a few minutes, they approached the locomotive's sheds. It was at that moment that an old man popped up five meters away, a security guard. All the radios recovered in black as beautiful. The old man was obviously half asleep and the Portuguese speaking wrecky, star of Sergeant Queroche told him to go back to his bed and he did. Eventually they found the locomotives. There were at least a dozen parked in the yard, the mother load. Now that they knew the targets were available, the recon teams headed back to the beach, barking dogs, heralding their progress. And by 0400, they had joined the Oswald Biro and France at Asmos. Both strike cropped, gunned their engines and raced 100 nautical miles off Lobito. The dual reconnaissance had been successful. It was nighttime for the main event. The strike cropped began making their way back to Lobito at 1400 hours on the 27th of September. They were aiming to arrive offshore well after dark. First in with the two barricoters from the France at Asmos, leaving at 20 hours 15. The raiders spotted soldiers at their first landing, so they shifted the barricoters south. At 21 hours 45, the summons checked the beach, then the raiders waited a show and entered a sugarcane field, which was uncut, offering excellent cover. Suddenly two civilians emerged on the gloom, but they ignored the wreckies, who addressed in green uniforms and looked like faplers. Civilians walked on without a word. After passing an informal camp, the raiders finally linked up with the railway line about 1km south of Lobito Airfield. It was now 2300 hours. Then the minelaying team split up, carrying their picked mines of slurry explosives. 20kg in total was to be pulled into four different holes that dug alongside the line, about 300 metres apart, over about 1km. The delays were set at 2140 and 60 days, but they were done by 0100 hours, and after clearing their footprints from the zone, they headed back to the beach. The pickup point had to be changed, because now there were two vehicles nearby. And as one of the rickies waited out to the barracuda, he suddenly disappeared from view. Corporeal Mars had hit a deep spot. Luckily, his flailing hand was spotted and he was dragged onto the boat. They were back on board the François-Dasmus at O-315. All was well. The Rollway Line operation was a success. But what had happened to the other raiding party tasked with mining the locomotives. The wreckies from the Oswald Pyro had landed just before midnight because they were too aid ashore much closer to the town itself. The landing was uneventful and they separated into two four-man teams at O-100 and moved quietly up a small street towards the southern corner of a shunting yard. Moments later, a cast which donned its lights, they were all silhouetted but the vehicle did a U-turn and headed south. Then Moments later, a local man wandered up to the two groups of wreckies but just ignored them and walked on by. This probably saved his life. The wreckies entered the shunting yard, cutting across open ground towards the locomotive sheds. The same barking dog interrupted their movements once more, but this time the old man didn't bother to pop out. He probably saw them from wherever he was and decided it was the same bunch from the previous night. By O-135, that orientated themselves and began placing the mines on the locomotives. There were 35 of these valuable machines and the wreckies now had the task of deciding which were operational and which weren't. Some were rusted and the windows were broken. Eventually 20 were identified as functional. They were all the GEU-20Cs. 16 were mine, while two other charges were placed on nearby diesel tanks. These would explode and burn and then damage smaller shunting locomotives as well as other equipment nearby. After removing all the pins by O-210, they left a few bits of unita material about and headed back to the beach. The 8 raiders had to swim out of the barracudas because of the heavy sea and by O-320 everyone was back on board the striker raft. The two striker raft headed back out to sea and at O-442, the wreckies who were looking back towards Lobito saw the first flashes of the shunting yard going up in flames. By the first of October, the striker raft were back at Saldana Bay. One wreckie was also back in Durban shortly afterwards. The operation was one of the more successful of recent times. The MPLA believed it was unita who'd blown up their 16 locomotives and the shunting yard was a shambles. It's believed no one died in the blasts, the aim after all was to destroy equipment. The locomotives were unserviceable and could not be used to carry goods between Lobito and Hwambl. While all of this was going on, remember the SEDF was supposedly still working closely with Fuplar in the Joint Monitoring Commission which was tasked with ensuring that southern Angola was empty of Swapu. This was part of some kind of pre-peace initiative, but both Angolans and the South Africans were not applying themselves to the process with any degree of honesty. Later, Petoria would claim that only the Angolans could be blamed for the collapse of the JMC, but this is disingenuous. It was not in Petoria's interest right now to work towards Nimbabien Peace either. The reason is this. Back in South Africa, the ANC's unofficial internal ally, the United Democratic Front had been formed and protests in the country's black tarnships had exploded into violence. PWBurt's government was convinced that only a military option could save the country from the ANC and the security forces were expanding their power. They also feared that if Nimbabien achieved independence, Swapu would support the ANC from next door. This was not a moment to start talking peace. The entire political strategy unfolding in the South precluded any sort of cease fire in Angola. The ANC furthermore was intensifying its bombing campaigns on South African civilians as well as security force infrastructure. It had already bombed the SAA force headquarters in Petoria's church street in 1983, killing 19 people and injuring 217. The level of tit-foot-tat violence was spiraling back home and the SAD of leadership became more hard-line when it viewed actions in southern Angola. The gloves had come off. It was at this time that three two companies received an interesting set of orders. The JMC initiative was floundering and it was clear that Swapu was capitalizing on the agreement negotiated by Petoria and Luanda. They were infiltrating what was supposed to be a free zone in southern Angola, free of armed insurgents. As there was no obvious way to deal with this openly, Petoria launched a series of clandestine steps to stop Swapu from reestablishing themselves in Fouplers areas. This meant three two battalion would now dress and operate like unita and a new banner called 154 battalion. Major Jan Hojart, who was 2RC at three two battalion, was tasked along with commandant Janskutta of military intelligence to set up this new initiative. They needed equipment, uniforms, arms, ammunition. Both then travelled to depots controlled by the chief of staff intelligence and Petoria and selected t-shirts. Russian-made RPD machine guns, uniforms and brand new felt schooner, which unita troops had taken to wearing instead of boots. These are well-known South African shoes. They're made from soft raw hide and we know them as "fellies", ideal for use in hot conditions and extremely light and durable. These were shipped off to the operational area near the cutline, along with AK-47s, RPG-7s and Mercedes-Benz and Sarmal 100 trucks. No product identified as South African could be used. So, Skutta and Hojart dreamed up a new kind of Poloni in tubes and pre-cooked maze porridge as well. It was going to be a big problem with the Poloni tubes as you'll hear next episode. Veteran Bignorke describes in his book Three Two Battalion that the soldiers airmarked for this special set of operations had no idea what they were in for. Operation Forte was one of the most sensitive ops of the border war, conducted at a time of increasing political tension inside and outside South Africa. Fewer than half a dozen people knew what was going on. The equipment was hidden inside the CSI store in the Rundu military base so that prying eyes couldn't spot the odd outfits and arms. Everything began to roll on September 1, 1984. Echo company commander Lieutenant Neil Walker Bokstrot was headed up by Captain Button Haynes, Gulf and Captain Fred Turner and a support company under Sergeant Major Mike Rogers were quietly ferried from the Three Two Buffalo base to Rundu. There they found a bunch of special vehicles hidden under top ballons and cargo net. Three Two O.C. Colonel Eddie Fulune and Sergeant Major Farniew Bay led the strange convoy west out of the base towards Amunni. The troops looked around at their fellow soldiers and all believed they were heading off to Ilundu for the normal deployment into Angola or perhaps they were going to patrol the cutline. That night they rested at the old Neppara base, then moved Arted Dawn on the 2nd of September to Impungu which was right on the cutline. They stopped there once more awaiting spares for the trucks which were choppered in and Major Jan found the favour logistics officer stepped off the puma. He didn't look himself mainly because he'd been forced to shave off his significant moustache and had blackest beautiful smear across his face, his arms and in fact anywhere his skin showed. This was not normal procedure for a logistics senior officer. Furthermore he was dressed in civils, was civilian clothes and drew a few quizzical stairs. What was going on? The convoy took off again heading north across the cutline instead of turning further west to Amunni and on a sandy track that hadn't been touched for months. The Mercedes-Benz tracks bogged down regularly but they managed eventually to reach the border. This is traditionally where SADF troops would receive their final briefing. Colonel Eddie Fillion called the officers and NCOs together and broke the news. "Where are you new to now?" he said. "We have to start thinking and acting like Unita and since they have no sense of time the watchword is Kusasa," which is funniglou for tomorrow. You heard last episode how the wreckies had already been operating a swabbo with turns swabbo insurgents. Now three two was pretending to be Unita. They were going to head into Angola along a 25 km stretch of uncharted territory without landmarks, traveling in a northeast direction towards a small village called Cartouitui. That's on the Kubunga River south of a town called Savati and it was when the sun set that night that the men of this operation heard but the true nature of the mission was. They were going to hunt swabbo down quite far into Angola pretending to be Unita. It was an uncomfortable silence that descended on the camp that night. What happened next is for next episode. Please rate the podcast on iTunes. It helps increase the series visibility. If you want to contact me you can email me through the website abwarparkas.com or direct message me on twitter @deslathan. Until next, I'll see you next time. [Music]