Military Engagement: Influencing Armed Forces Worldwide to Support Democratic Transitions

13. South Africa: Transition of the Armed Forces from Apartheid to Multiparty Democracy

257 13 South Africa: Transition of the Armed Forces from Apartheid to Multiparty Democracy Martin Rupiya This chapter examines South Africa’s transition from an apartheid state pursuing an aggressive Total Strategy, implemented by an almost all-white South African Defense Force (SADF), to a democratic state with a regional strategy for peacekeeping, carried out by an integrated South African National Defense Force (SANDF). The transition was difficult at times, with some violent resistance, but was accomplished in a relatively short time with impressive results. Although there are unique aspects of South Africa’s transition , there are also insights and lessons from the country’s experience that can be of value to transitions in other countries. This case study begins with a brief description of the SADF of the apartheid regime. It then describes the process for peaceful political transition that was negotiated between the National Party (NP) and the African National Congress (ANC) and the major decisions that formed the new government’s security policies . The next section covers the process of transition from the SADF to the SANDF, in which officers and troops from the resistance forces were incorporated into the government forces they had been fighting. This is followed by an analysis of the SANDF’s transformation to accommodate South Africa’s new status as a middle power and the development of the new primary mission of regional peacekeeping. The chapter concludes with an evaluation of the challenges currently facing South Africa’s armed forces. 13-2478-0 ch13.indd 257 5/20/13 3:13 PM 258 MARTIN RUPIYA The South African Defense Force The SADF of the mid-1980s was an advanced military force that followed a doctrine called Total Strategy (1961–89), which was designed to suppress internal, mainly black, opposition and weaken its external supporters from independent African states and beyond.1 The minority white apartheid state in South Africa, although shunned and sanctioned by most of the world, viewed itself as a “bastion of the Western World.” In the same way that Israel was surrounded by hostile Arab states, South Africa considered itself surrounded by hostile communist African states in league with the ANC, which it saw as bent on driving Afrikaner society into the sea. The SADF was a formidable military organization created by the Afrikaner Nationalist Party. Feeling threatened by its antiapartheid neighbors, it repressed the black majority. Also fearing outside intervention, the SADF drew on the full mobilization and technical potential of the white population. Its most powerful weapons were air-deliverable nuclear bombs. All white men were conscripted to serve two years. The four branches of the defense force were the army, navy, air force, and medical service. In the late 1980s, the professional strength of the armed forces was 75,479 uniformed personnel and 21,695 civilians.2 The wellequipped air force was superior to those of neighboring states until the Cubans lent their support to the Angolan conflict. The small professional army was augmented by a reserve of over half a million additional citizen force personnel with previous service experience. The SADF also included under its command auxiliary and special operations units, which included 200 small units (76,476 registered farmers) organized as commandos within the white South African farming area.3 All black Africans were designated as citizens of homelands referred to as bantustans (see figure 13-1). By 1984 Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda, and Ciskei (TBVC) had been granted “independence,” but these entities were recognized by no nations other than South Africa.4 The rural black population was confined to these bantustans, in which auxiliary “armies” were established to police the people’s activities. Under the Total Strategy, to weaken its hostile neighbors, the SADF sent special units across the border to support rebel groups. In Angola they worked with the Union for the Total Independence of Angola, in South West Africa (now Namibia) they operated as the South West African Territorial Force, and in Mozambique they assisted the National Resistance Army of Mozambique.5 The apartheid economy was heavily militarized. Overseas purchases of arms and equipment from the international markets were blocked by United Nations sanctions passed in 1963 and formalized in 1967. In response to the sanctions and in order to support the Total Strategy, the country developed a fairly 13-2478-0 ch13.indd 258 5/20/13 3:13 PM 259 SOUTH AFRICA: TRANSITION OF...