Da Costa was born in Lobito, then a lively coastal town in the Benguela province of Angola, to a white Portuguese father and a mother from one of the local tribes. In early 1976 Da Costa arrived at Buffalo Base in the Western Caprivi with a group of ex-FNLA soldiers,...
2Lt. Jacobus. G. Hoon and 2Lt. Pierre Lundberg together with Cpl's I.J. Pretorius and Daniel. J. Schutte were the first Permanent force leader group who trained the first group of Pathfinders in September 1978. After the initial deployment at 101Bn, Capt Pierre...
He started his career at 1SSB and then attended the School of Armour after becoming involved in the development of the Rooikat armoured fighting vehicle. But it was in Southern Angola where he made his name commanding the armour part of 32 Battalion’s Support Group....
He was a sergeant in 1 Recce Commando, qualifying in 1977. After years of operations, including as a mountaineering instructor, and team leader, he left for Wits University to study further. Soon, he was back at 1 Recce Regiment and eyed (wrongly) with much suspicion...
Oliveira Martin Gomes was separated from his family as a teenager in the chaos of the Angolan Civil War and found his way to Walvis Bay, South Africa. It was there were he was recruited into the newly formed 32 Battalion, having shown a proficiency in English and a...
Schalk W. Fourie served in 1 Reconnaissance Commando/Regiment between 1978 and 1988. As such, and as a demolitions/explosives expert, he was involved in all major Special Forces missions of that era. SW started his military career as a national serviceman at 1 Special...
This is the Russian F1(Ф1), a High-Explosive-Fragmentation (HE-Frag), defensive, striker-release (SR), hand-grenade, nicknamed the Limonka (lemon-like), used as an Anti-Personnel (AP) hand-grenade and also used as part of a booby-trap (BTP), it has been copied in many...
This is the American M26, a High-Explosive-Fragmentation (HE-Frag), Anti-Personnel (AP), delay (DLY) detonating, hand-grenade which has a notched fragmentation coil liner including the M26A1, A2 and A3 and is manufactured in various countries. Its distinct lemon shape...
During his career, he went on many operations, mostly with the seaborne specialists, 4 Recce. Some were spectacular, like Ops Kerslig where he won the Honoris Crux and many more. His list of decorations besides the Honoris Crux (HC) is the Southern Cross Medal (SM),...
