Again, nearly three weeks late with this one! Unfortunately that's the way the cookie crumbles from time to time.

Never in the history of South Africa have we had more reason to be ashamed of what was once one of the (if not the only) best and most effective military forces in Africa. In spite of our thirty year war in South West Africa against the red forces of communism nor with the atrocities committed during township patrols. Here I dare include an air force which showed the commitment of outclassing Russias' best with old technology and weapons.

Our nation showed perseverance and ingenuity with the help of the Israelis in taking what was and improving on it to better some of what's available in the rest of the world. As with most other in this country things just seem to go from bad to worse.

Let's just clear one point quickly - when I talk about the ANC government, I do that on purpose. Government cannot stop reminding us that they represent the ANC so it's only logical that they be given credit where it's due and shoulder the blame as well.

Back to our armed forces - the ANC government thought it to be a good idea (which in principle it was) to integrate past freedom fighters from across all resistance organizations into the SANDF (as it's now known). Of course that was supposed to provide employment to a select few whom had inside knowledge of terrorism and the maiming and killing of innocents (or the not so innocent). It also gave the power of one of the best defense forces in Africa to former terrorists (from the viewpoint of not only myself). Well hell - our government as it is consists of previous terrorists (call them activists, call them freedom fighters, call them what you like). Luckily for the minority white population we're a bit more civilised these days.

The first cracks started appearing with the so-called peace force which government started deploying all over Africa. Noble man our president Mbeki, spending the taxpayers money on securing democracy in troubled African countries. Nevertheless, they were not prepared. First we started reading press reports on rape, then on drunken binges and eventually on murder. The cream on top of this piece of cow dung came when the chief of the SANDF admitted to massive equipment losses during one such exercise. "Eish, it's not broken.., I just don't know where it is" springs to mind.

Little did we realise how deep this problem was until the infamous arms deal. But only now do we know why! Most high ranking officers don't have a clue what the deal is all about. Amongst major problems their soldiers are dying from Aids and their weaponry gets lost or stolen. I won't be too surprised if there's a thriving black market with illegal imports / exports from these countries where our troops are / were deployed.

In a government department such as the army and air force, discipline is paramount. Without discipline and absolute discipline there is chaos. But too often non black officers are accused of racism and military laws are changed to stop this without proper thought. The second biggest obstacle is that of language. Simple example which I wrote about some time ago - white officers at our prime training air force facility cannot fail black pilots, no matter how incompetent they are. Government thought it a good idea to "import" (wait for this) Zimbabwean pilots under contract to help out with this dilemma, only to find out that there's a huge language barrier between the locals and those a bit further north. But it's been a great help in securing that the excuse of racism on pilot selection has just about been removed at great cost. Under qualified teachers teach our kids, so what's the problem with under qualified pilots flying multi-million Rand fighter planes?

What prompted this story is an article in the Sunday Times listing some high ranking officer (brigadier-general) accusing accusing Defense Minister "Terror" Lekota of a witch hunt. The Director of Military Prosecutions reckon that he was offered the post but declared that he was not qualified to do the job, that in spite of the fact that the powers to be was aware of his criminal record. Of course the man is going down fighting and he's taking some others down with him. Various other officers are guilty of amongst other illegal possession of firearms, cheating in military exams, driving under the influence and even murder.

As I said before, give credit where credit is due - no thanks to our government. Some black individuals are really shining out there and short before long we'll see a new breed of highly qualified fighter pilots out there flying the flag (pun intended).

Some photos of Harvards skimming the water surface sent in by Felix (thanks man). Photos are just more than 300kb in size -

 

Let's have your ideas -

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