The South African Border War - Operation K or Koevoet the crowbar (Warning-not for the squeamish)
United Nations Security Council Resolution 435 called for the end to South Africa's military buildup but allowed for police units.
In 1979 South Africa promptly created a paramilitary unit called Koevoet which was designated as a strictly police element.
Once again, to limit casualties among the South African conscripts, locals were recruited to form a special unit that would be highly active on the hottest areas.
Originally formed to be an intelligence gathering unit they quickly switched to a mainly "search and destroy" role.
Bounty incentives for kills, prisoners and captured weaponry attracted a distasteful element to the unit.
Strategies included impersonating insurgents, interrogation and intimidation(read: torture when necessary), patrols and following up on recent attacks.
When suspicious tracks were found they would be followed up using Casppir armored vehicles with trackers running out front.
By leapfrogging or sending out one vehicle further ahead to see if the tracks could be found, and if they were, the vehicles behind would race to catch up, they were able to gain on rapidly retreating insurgents on foot.
By such methods they would, after a decade, be responsible for killing or capturing some 3,225 guerrillas and fighting an estimated 1,615 engagements.
They did however become notorious for many questionable if not downright atrocious practices.
Such as photographing themselves with their "kills" like hunting trophies
and strapping the bodies of dead insurgents to their vehicles or dragging the bodies through villages to intimidate the locals.
The SADF did not approve of many of these practices since they were rather crude and undermined their "hearts and minds" campaigns. Since they were a police contingent they were however not subject to the military.
Below is a documentary on Koevoet from youtube with some rather lengthy operational footage, covering typical follow up type search and destroy missions, culminating in a "contact" or engagement with insurgents on foot.
Previous posts in this series can be found at the bottom of this post:
The South African Border War - 1976, The end of a chapter and the beginning of a new phase.
The South African Border War - Mines, Mines did I say mines?
The South African Border War - Enter the Ratel
The South African Border War - The United Nations Security Council Resolutions
The South African Border War - Operation Reindeer begins.
The South African Border War - Operation Reindeer - The Cassinga Fiasco
The South African Border War - The South West Africa Territorial Force
@gavvet really sadistic when it happens
to face the guerrilla is very difficult
I've felt when guerrilla warfare occurred
many civilians were victimized, since guerrilla warfare could not set a definite target
thank you and interesting post @gavvet
because the guerrilla"enemy" is unclear frustration lead to atrocious acts.
@gavvet yes ,, very true to your speech
very difficult to determine their existence (guerrilla).
are you afraid of them (guerrilla)?
ultimately the defenders against terrorism often use the same type of intimidation techniques and subsequently lose "the moral high ground", but how far is one prepared to go to defend oneself?
This is something that Americans know nothing about. All we heard about were the later triumphs over apartheid and the installation of Nelson Mandela. I am a student of history and I have no knowledge of this conflict.
Just goes to show how we can be very self-centered.
Thanks for bringing it to my attention!
Why law keepers become law breakers is something that happens all over the world. Being so inhuman and drag bodies to intimidate other people should not be tolerated. @gavvet
yup, power corrupts.
Can't imagine what their mindset is like in those conditions to be mounting the bodies on their vehicles...brutal. I've worked with people fleeing from war (not so much the people fighting them), I've hear their stories. I'm sure many of us have heard stories in person or online too. But when you stop and think about what would drive someone to do this, we're talking the minds of severely traumatised, desperate or just downright deranged people who would have done it anyway!
I don't agree with war, I don't agree with humans losing their thirst for life either, to wrap themselves in cotton wool. Life is brutal sometimes and sometimes we can forget that.
Put a few people with the wrong type of personality together in a bush that is far away from everything, make them answerable to no one and there is no telling what brutality will emerge.
Stanford prison experiment type stuff...
Yeah exactly. We're all animals at heart, I've seen it happened with my own eyes on a small scale. Desperate, isolated minds (not necessarily isolated individuals). People get violent, rumours are usually rife causing problems and mindset shifts.
It’s so terrible what goes on in other countries such as South Africa. We sit all high and mighty, worrying about nothing in particular other than when our phones are on low charge while things like this are going on. I think the world is partly blind to such atrocities. Interesting post but you are correct to say it’s not for the squeamish.
Very interesting post the Border war was hectic .
all kinds of things happen far away from eyes and newspapers
I am sure there is not a country on this planet that has not got some dark secrets of war . It is sad to think how cruel it rely is out there and most people don't have a clue.
Horrendous behavior, monetary rewards for bodies, torture, no accountability, absolutely horrific. Thank you for sharing I upvoted, this may be the only avenue to get the truth out. Most people have no idea what went on. I certainly didn't.
What will they scare there are the civilians butt not the guerillas. The guerillas or rebels knows the game and they will just cope with it and the civilians will get numbed on what they had seen @gavvet
The civilians become scared to join the guerrillas. At least that was their thinking.
Well I have to say I am not surprised by the photos. This is war, men turn into animals and do things they wouldn't even think of doing. :(
Having said that, I know very little about this war :) time to do some googling!