Episode 91 – Russians on the Lomba and the Olifant Battle Tank

[Music] Welcome back to South African Border Wars with me, your host, Deers Lathan. This is episode 91. Fumpler had taken a battering at the Battle of the Lomba River in the 3rd of October 1987. The SEDF had crashed 47 per gate, and they had also dealt 21 per gate as serious blow, as you've heard. Operation modular had led to a mauling and the Angolans began withdrawing north. The South Africans had been victorious despite being hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned. The Rattles had somehow defeated the T-54s and T-55s. The Pateria Cabinet was delighted, but now faced a serious question that had not been fully addressed before the Lomba bloodlating. Now what? Fumpler was withdrawing, but they weren't defeated. Furthermore, their logistics center at Quito, Guanavali, was untouched and operating. The bridge the Rikis had destroyed was up and running once more. It was almost immediately that folks like the Chief of the SEDF Yani Hellnest, knew consolidation of the games was crucial, along with preventing the enemy from regrouping. Bana, the political leadership, had decided that they'd throw everything they could at this invasion in Draingola. They'd gone too far to pull back, they'd grab the target of the tail and couldn't let go. With the Angolans, it was a bitter defeat, and the end of Fuplers' operations, Saludando a'octobre. Salute a'octobre, their grand offensive of four main brigades, which were supposed to seize Mavingo from Unita, then push on to Unita's HQ at Jamba and destroy the rebel movement once and for all. Not this time. And so, the 5,500 survivors withdrew to Quito, Guanavali. The next phase of Operation Module, it was about to begin, where the South Africans would send their heaviest weapons and more troops into southern Angola. Pretoria's propaganda, meanwhile, was that there was no South African troop in Angola, despite the overwhelming evidence which you'll hear a little later from the Russians. It's a statement of the weakness of the political strategy that a nation pretends its forces are not involved in a conflict. It demotivates their own soldiers who are dying on foreign territory, at least those who are not specially trained special forces. It was going to be a long and bloody fight for control of Quito, Guanavali, that would last until the ceasefire in 1989. Russian advisors, who were part of Fuplers' brigades on the lumber and based in Quito, confirmed just how badly the Angolan army had been mauled. Igor, anatolyovich Dakin, was on the ground in Guito when the battered 21st and 47th brigades stagged back. "There on the lumber misfortune had but fallen him," he wrote in his journal. "There had been battered with shells from the rapid firing guns of the South Africans." Russians had died, half a dozen at least, during this fight. Ineta, it also began to turn the screws on Whopla and the Cuban and Russian allies and were sniping at the harried soldiers, bombarding them with mortars and ambushing their patrols. The SED of Topras mulled what to do. 2-0 brigade commander Willy Mayer told his superiors that the operation was a success and commandant Box Smith of 61 mechanized battalion agreed, saying the men should now go home. There were a number of options open to the SEDF right now. First, they could continue reinforcing the area around the lumber and Ineta could use this to jump off against Whopla, keeping them off balance. But that presumed the Angolan army would remain east of Guito Cuenavali, which was not clear. The second was to form a brigade and then advance along San Jinita west of the Guito River to Guito Cuenavali itself and attack. "You need to already held most of the ground east of the Guito River, so this made some sense, particularly from a strictly military strategy point of view. The aim would be to seize Guito Cuenavali as the main strategic town and then to hold it." But the South Africans would need more than a month to get their logistics and material together, and that would be more than enough time for Whopla to regather their strength. And it was going to be a very difficult assault bloody, with many SEDF casualties likely to be registered. The political leadership definitely did not want photographs of dozens of body bags being shipped home to not circulating in local South African newspapers. The third option, which kind of split the difference between the first two, would be to immediately chase Whopla into Guito then surrounded, ensuring that the Angolan army was now well west of the Guito River. As I've mentioned, the perception amongst the SEDF officer corps was that neither side held the initiative. However, given Whopla's overwhelming number advantage they did, everything that Jinita and the South Africans now planned was actually in response to Whopla's deployment, not the other way around. I'm sure some of the generals would disagree with this, but think logically about the situation. The SEDF was vacillating about Guito as a target. Whopla had compounded this confusion was a lack of proper information. SEDF intelligence about the enemy's movements and intentions was porous. Radio intercepts with the main source, not the hours on the ground, in spite of the wreckies attempts at filling the gap. Whopla has still had in the region of 12,000 troops across this part of southern Angola, whereas the SEDF not more than 1300. Whopla controlled the air above Guito, and all the way to Movinga, although the SAA force was proving more than useful in their continuous bombing raids, as I'll explain. On 8 October, Libinbach ordered Mayor who was based in Movinga to pursue the enemy and destroy them east of the Guito River before they could sit up proper defensive positions there, and reinforcements would be sent from South Africa to bolster Mayor's numbers. It had taken Bittoria 5 days to decide what to do after the battle of the Lumber on 3 October. 5 days in which Whopla had time to reorder themselves. Unita was busy bombing and harassing the Angola and Army, but it was back to guerrilla warfare technique, not an organised advance by a mechanised army. Whopla's dominance in the air began to make its presence felt. On 8 October, 2 MiG-21s attacked 61 MiG's armored car squadron, and this time they came in low and fast. Usually, the MiGs would stay high above 20,000 feet to avoid Unita's US supplies stinger missiles, but this time they came in very low, copying the SAA force tactics and hit a rocket, killing one soldier and severely ruining another. This was the first time a MiG in a ground support role at Hitton, SAAD, Vehicle and Killed Troops, but it wouldn't beat the last. On the ground, 2-0 brigade was joined by 4-side battalion, a fully mechanised unit with extra G5 batteries, 4 self-propelled G6 guns, although one broke down, and most importantly, a squadron of 13 Ulyfun tanks. Because these were to play such a significant role in the upcoming battles, I'll just spend a few minutes talking about their production. The Ulyfun saw elephants, with South Africa's main battle tank and based on Britain's Centurion tanks. Victoria ordered 203 Centurions from the UK in 1953. These Centurions entered service between 1955 and 1958, and included about 17 armored recovery vehicles. Then in 1972, the South African Army retrofitted some of its Centurions with the engines and transmissions of American-made M-48 pattern tanks, and that was in an attempt to improve technical performance. But later, as sanctions began to bat, South Africa bought the Mark V versions from Jordan and India. An arms company we believe was based in Greece was the front for these purchases. Just out of interest, the same company had assisted in the sale of G5 guns to both Iran and Iraq during their 80-year war between 1980 and 1988. I should do an entire episode on the acidity of procurement of arms, and the amazing company Arms Core, which manufactured quite high tech systems throughout the period of sanctions levied against South Africa during a party. Back to the Ulyfun. Now the Jordan and India were actually aware of the destination of the tanks they were selling. These had been scheduled for scrapping anywhere. In one day, a couple of dozen of these rusting hulks popped up on a ship in Durban Harbour. Because of the United Nations arms embargo, the Victoria government, with hold from Israel, France and the United States, began to develop a major arms industry. The centurions refitted with V12 fuel-injected engines, which meant they put out a significant 810 horsepower, coupled to a new three-speed automatic transmission. Two forward gears, one reverse. This first attempt at upgrading centurion was codenamed Skokjean, but only eight tanks were produced. Skokjean, as all good South Africans know, is a dangerously alcoholic drink that is brewed in one day and sometimes features battery acid. The packs are significant punch, and that was the idea behind the Ulyfun. The government then embarked on their semil project in 1974 and fitted the eight Skokjean tanks with modified engines, eventually 35 of the Mark 5As, as they were known were produced. Two years later, the Ulyfun was born out of this process, and it was basically a new tank on an old chassis. The Ulyfun Mark I entered service with the SA Armored Corps in 1978, and Israeli engineers worked closely with the South Africans at this time. The Israelis were rebuilding the centurions too in a project called Shot, and one of the new features was a laser sight. They also spend quite a bit of time upgrading the engine, the suspension, the turret drive, and providing night vision equipment. One of the innovations was providing the command of these tanks with a handheld laser rangefinder, another contribution from Israel, and happily co-opted by the South Africans. By 1983, the Mark I A Ulyfun had started production and went into service in 1985, just in time for the upcoming battles of Guido-Quanavali. There was a parent from the mid-70s that the Ulyfans Mark I, 20 pound, again was woefully underpowered when facing the Soviet T-54s and T-55s. So the Mark I A had a 105mm L7 rifled cannon and eight smoke grenade launches on other side of the turret. A new engine and better arm, crucially, they also had laser sighting capacity and knots sights. So this first quadrant was going to be joined by a second as the fighting run quit to a Kwon Avali escalated. But there was still some pushback from the top brass. Army commander Katlibenbach told 61 max boxsmith and commander Diohn Ferreira that no tank could be deployed without his say so. The commanders on the ground thought this rule was in a word "madness", so ended up deploying them when they felt like it, which was almost straight away. The South Africans were now going into a gunfight with a gun. On the 9th of October, more Russian advisers joined the 21st and 25th brigades in quit to a Kwon Avali and then set out south towards the Quitto River Bridge. They rested at a point 11km along the old Portuguese road at the 25th brigade command post. Early the next morning, this military column of vehicles swung off the old road and into the bush. The Angolans had learned from the South Africans to avoid using main roads, now they were cutting alternative routes through the forest. T-54 in 55s were clanking along through this new road. Behind them the entire column began to stretch out, took them 5 hours to travel 8km. By mid-morning on the 10th of October, uniters soldiers bombarded this convoy with mortars and opened fire with small arms. The Russians, in particular, were shocked that this was happening so close to Kwon Avali. It took them a few hours to cross the Shambinga River after they had driven into one of uniters' notorious minefields, which slowed this column down once more. As the engineers worked out an alternative route, the men of Fuplars 25th Brigade endured uniters snarping at times. Then they stopped at the south bank of the Shambinga River, just off to 4pm and settled down for the night. The artillery jewels were going to become a daily occurrence because on the 11th of October, the SCDF began bombarding quit to a Kwon Avali and its airbase from long range over 30km away. The Angolans then hurriedly moved the all-important aircraft and helicopters back to Manong. SAA Force attacks also increased. They appeared mid-morning of the 11th over the Russian positions, and translator Igor Zhdokin wrote in his diary that the OSA-AK anti-aircraft missile system tracked two and claims they hit a couple of planes. However, there is no record of this in the acidity of archives for the 11th of October. You need to attack Fuplars Vanguard once more, and a ferocious mortar artillery and small arms battle developed south of Kwon Avali for over half an hour. You need to withdraw when the Angolans began to outflank them. This Fuplar column melted for the night about 10km south of the Old Portuguese Road. At dawn on the 12th of October, you need to renew the attack on the 21st Brigade, still hunkered down waiting to move towards Mavinga once more. The Russians watched as Fuplar opened up with B10 anti-tank recorder scans, 120mm mortars, Bm-21 rockets, and the fearsome and feared 40 barrel 120mm calibre automatic cannon, which was bolted to the back of a Ural truck. Then one of these trucks was blown up when a unit of mortar escorted direct hit. The SAF was mirage made another appearance bombing the 21st Brigade vehicles. The Russians spent most of the afternoon monitoring the SAD of radio. First they heard the South Africans discussing events of the day. In English, then suddenly some began talking in Polish. The translators understood Polish better than English, but they couldn't make out both sets of speakers. The Russians thought that these were Polish common specialists hired by the South Africans. We all met the Poles if you spent any time in the SCD of At the Time. Most of these had fled the Russian oppression in their homeland in the 70s and 80s, and relocated to South Africa, which had built quite a name for itself as a place that fought communists. Of course, the Poles hated communism, and in particular the Soviet version. I'm not sure who these men were being tracked by the Russians on that hot day in October 1987, but it just goes to show how small this world is. Back in Pretoria, all of these little exchanges was not top of mind. A confusing series of orders now flowed across the Army and other organisations. I'm going to try and explain what happened. Because Pretoria was now fighting a very complex internal war against the ANC and PAC, it had begun to unravel best military practice in what could be called a series of baffling decisions as the top brass pre-varicated about Angola. At the same time, the South African state was actually running short of cash. Operation modular was still active, six weeks after it began no sign of imminent success. Fappler had been defeated at the lumber, but by no means had they given up, their October up was stymied, but columns began moving south once more. Roller and the Fries, previously head of 61 Mech, now organised the rattles for 20SAPG8 HQ in Mavinga up to now the leadership had been squeezed into buffles. The structure of these operations was also baffling. Right at the top was SEDF head Yani Helnese, who controlled the war strategy he concentrated on the political aspects and implications. Operational control was given to cut Libembach of the Army HQ, but practical day-to-day control was really in the hands of sector 2-0. It was also focusing on counter insurgency ops in the Kavanga region, so as the fighting escalated after September, 2-0 SAPG8 HQ under Dion Ferreira took over direct control of the fighting men. But there was another HQ at the Rundu under Brigadier Johan Loh. They weren't under Ferreira's command, but reported to Willy Mayer at South West Africa command HQ in Vintok, who then reported upwards to Army HQ back in Pretoria. So there were two distinct lines when there should have been one. As October fighting increased, another headquarters was going to be inserted, elements of the South African 7th Division HQ headed up by Brigadier Fido Smith. What they were doing was anyone's guess. It was another layer of bureaucratic red tape overlaid across an already slightly confused reporting process. What happened was what happens everywhere when multilayered bureaucrats fiddle were things, micromanaging contaminated decision-making. Who was supposed to make what decision began to be a bit of a mental matrix? Eventually, the Rundu HQ was pushed aside, but there were still too many chiefs and not enough Indians. Then when the urge took them, Kavanga has Libembach and Mayer thought it would be an excellent idea to fly into the front and then to interfere in minute tactical decisions. There were worried about Fuplar pulling back further north towards Menong before there could be delta final blow, and now Kui Toh Kwanawali featured more regularly in their correspondence. If the SCDF could take Kui Toh Kwanawali, they would cut off the brigades still based south of the strategic town. On the 13th of October, the SCF was raided 21st and 59th brigades, who opened up with all the arms at the low flying mirages. AA guns, AKs, even RPGs. The entire sky looked like a rainbow, reported Russian translator Igor Zhidokin. You also noted in his diary that one plane was hit, but the SCF was disputes this too, but as to drop their bombs in disorder and made off. It is true that this first raided 0-430 was ineffective. It would be three more rays on that day, on the 21st and 59th brigades, another at noon, then 1500 hours and finally 1700. Fuplar columns reported little damage and camped that night at an old unita base. We could see the hats which were still intact, and with their communication trenches and so forth, a real fortress, I would say, notes the Russian. During a search, the England and Russians came across a large storehouse in this abandoned base at the source of the Kunzumbia River, and found a large ammunition dump of Chinese manufactured weapons. These included more than 100 shells for 60mm mortars, another 100 or so for 81mm mortars, dozens of modified anti-tank grenade launches or RPG 7Vs, and 15,000 cartridges for the updated Kalashnikov submachine gun known as the AKM. That was quite the whole, and shows how the world powers had been fiddling in southern Africa's backyard, or floating their munitions with decays and helping to turn the subcontinent into a Cold War playground. This Fuplar reinforcement column finally reached 21st Brigade command post on 15th October 1987, where the Russians met with the countrymen who'd born the brunt of the acidity of attacks on the 3rd of October at the Battle of the Lomba. Their reports were full of horrors during the Mavingo offensive, a lot of hope had rested on the Angolan Second Tactical Group of which 47 Brigade belonged. It had been reinforced with a tank battalion artillery and anti-aircraft missile defense systems. The 47th had been sent to shore up the right flank of Fuplar's assault, and was commanded by Major Tobiasch, who was chief of staff of the 6th military district, and the Battle of the Lomba, as you know, had been an ominous sign for the future for the Angolan's. The group wasn't up to the task, Rath's ego is your docking. He heard stories of how the Angolan commanding officers spent a lot of time before the attack of drinking, that the offensive was sluggish, that Fuplar troops were unenthusiastic, to spot the fact that the South Africans and Unito were heavily art numbered and they knew it. Then they crossed the Lomba River, the 21st felt they were triumphant at first, until they had been pulverized and chased them. North. The South Africans seen the mistakes and miscalculations of Fappler openly penetrated the territory of Angola. This was the beginning of the operations downfall. The beginning of a tragedy is how he viewed the lumber battle. His Russian colleagues had died and the survivors did not hold back. The report was chilling for the Soviets. What was not reported by Fappler's political propaganda machine at the time in which we now know was true was that their logistics had been so badly prepared that they'd run out of ammunition. But there was something even more fundamentally wrong with Angolan Army than their poor management. The officer corps said Zhidokin suffered from cowardliness. There were other reasons that the Russians noted for the disaster at the lumber that their orders were confused and the soldiers were terrified of the SCDF and finally that once the bridge had been constructed across the lumber, word got out to all units on the South and it became a chicken run for Fappler troops whose nerve had snapped. Perhaps the most telling comment folks is this and it's verbatim. Many Soviet specialists serving here in the district combat brigades had been in Afghanistan and had never experienced such horrors before. When the South African artillery began to fire, I felt particularly terrified. The Taliban were medieval in comparison, sending human meat bombs as suicide teams into Russian positions. Now and again firing a Stinger missile or two were trying to cut down Russians using AKs and machine guns. In comparison, the SCDF was more like the Ukrainian army facing the Russians. Then came the South African Air Force continues Zhidokin and we had very little room on the ground. They were squeezed against the lumber. This confirms the SCF was reports of their bombs finding their mark. But the worst was when the Angolan's turned to flight and began to throw away their equipment. What a 47th brigade who had been more South of the lumber, Zhidokin was even more horrified by reports from his surviving colleagues. Things had been fine they said while the commander of the tank battalions remained in contact with the 47th. When the commander his name was Silver apparently was wounded inside his T-54. He managed to crawl out to another tank which was then hit as well by the SCDF rifles. The platoon tank commander in the T-54 then jumped out and ran away, leaving the wounded battalion commander inside and UNITO apparently captured him. The damage was confirmed by the Russians. 18 tanks, 20 armoured troop carriers, 4D-31-22 kilometers guns, 3BM-21 rocket launches, 4 OSA-AK mobile rocket launches, 2 OSA-AK transport cars, 1P19 radar station, a host of heavy trucks, their broadcasting comm station, hundreds of mortarounds, grenade throwers and more than 200 AK-47s. The loudly proclaimed promises by the Angolans that the Russian advisors would be kept safe were forgotten. A BTR-60 armoured troop carrier of the Soviet advisors had tried to flee over the same bridge being used by the 21st on that faithful day. They were shot up but managed to escape, terrified as they were chased by a rattle 90. The Soviet advisors abandoned their troop carrier which was then blown up by the rattle. Then they crawled hugging the ground for 1.5 kilometers through the open ground of the Lomba Shona under fire continuously. The South Africans spotted this group in particular and they realized it was the Russians. They began to hit the area with mortars. Some exploded only meters away. By now the dozen or so Russians watched some of these mortars plunge into the greasy muddy holes failing to explode. It was so swampy. Nothing like this had happened to them in Afghanistan because this was an African war. The Angolans commissioner was supposed to organize the bridge crossing crossed first and then ran away. At least that's what the Russians say. There was panic and confusion. The South Africans were shooting all over the place not sparing ammunition. No one knew clearly whether to run or what to do. The huge pile of material destroyed his testament to this battle's ferocity. Only three strilla-10 AA systems, two armoured troop carriers, two EE-25 vehicles and one land rover belonging to Fapler crossed the Lomba bridge on that day. Everything else was destroyed or captured. Another telling comment by the Russians is this. They say they had the SEDF sent just one company over the Lomba River at that stage and opened fire on the Angolans. The entire 47th brigade would have landed at the bottom of the Lomba as Igor Shadokin puts it. As we know the SEDF stopped because the men were exhausted but also because the top brass were confused about what they should really do next. When we return next episode we'll hear about a briefing in Rundu and how a CIA message delivered to Pretoria would help make up Army Chief Cut Libinberg's mind about Guito Kwanavali. Please rate the podcast on iTunes. It helps raise the visibility of the series. If you want to contact me head off to abwarpodcast.com. There's a contact form in the homepage or you can direct message me onto Twitter @desleyven. Until next, doh, spitanie.