User:DeWillem/sandbox/History of the South African Navy

History of the South African Navy

Early Beginnings

The South African Navy has deep historical connections to that of the British Royal Navy, connections that go back further than its formal establishment, and a relationship that defined it well into the 20th century.

Unofficially, and indirectly, the South African Navy can be associated with the formation of the Port Elizabeth Naval Volunteer Brigade in 1861. However, the Brigade reportedly later merged with artillery units the following year and ceased to have a shore based/naval responsibility.

The first military establishment with a direct, unbroken, historical link with the South African Navy is the Natal Naval Volunteers, a coastal artillery unit established in Durban in 1885. Raised to defend the Natal coast from a feared invasion by Imperial Russia, the NNV later served ashore in the Second Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) and the Zulu Rebellion (1906).

In February 1905, the Cape Colonial Government established a limited local branch of the British Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (RNVR), commonly known as the Cape Naval Volunteers, or Cape Colonial Division. From 1898, the governments of the Cape, and later Natal, paid annual contributions to the Admiralty in London and supplied coal in exchange for Royal Navy security. Similarly, the Cape government passed the Simon’s Town Defence Act (1898), permitting the construction of a new dockyard, completed in 1910, that would become the home port for the Royal Navy’s Cape of Good Hope Station, further strengthening Imperial and South African defence.

Following the passing of the South Africa Act in 1909, which established the Union of South Africa from the four provinces, the previously independent naval organisations such as the Natal Naval Volunteers and the Cape Colonial Division were later merged into a single entity. With the creation of the wider Union Defence Force in 1912, a South African Division of the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve (RNVR[SA]) followed on the 1st July 1913. The Royal Navy would assume organisational, administration, discipline and training responsibility, with the division being seen as an extension of the Admiralty.

First World War

Main article: Military history of South Africa during World War I

The British declaration of war against Germany on 4 August 1914 automatically involved the newly formed Union as, despite being self-governing, South Africa, like the other Dominions of Australia, Canada and New Zealand for example, was only semi-independent from Britain and without an autonomous foreign policy.

Despite notable Afrikaner opposition against supporting Britain, and even a military revolt, South Africa provided important military support to the Allied cause in Africa, the Middle East, and Europe.

During the First World War, South Africa could offer a limited, but strategically important, naval contribution despite not operating any vessels of its own.

Under Royal Navy jurisdiction, the RNVR (SA) manned a small quantity of converted fishing vessels that patrolled the South African coast against German surface raiders, as well as assisting in local mine clearance operations, particularly in response to the exploits of the highly successful German raider Wolf in 1917, and defending shore establishments. The heaviest loss of life caused by Wolf was the sinking of the Spanish mail steamer Carlos de Eizaguirre which struck a mine just off Cape Town on the 26th May 1917. 134 passengers and crew were killed, with only 25 survivors.

A total of 412 South Africans served in the RNVR (SA) during the war, with 164 members volunteering for the Royal Navy directly. Many would see service in British and Mediterranean waters, whilst others would participate in the land campaigns of South West Africa and East Africa against German forces.

In conjunction with the rather limited manpower contributions, South Africa offered to the Allies the crucial strategic position of controlling the Cape Sea Route - a key choke point in maritime trade and sea control that separated east from west.

Simon’s Town Naval Base in the Cape was the principal operating base for the “Cape of Good Hope Station and West Africa Station” and from where German trade was intercepted and commerce raiders attacked. Similarly, Cape Town and Durban were also equally important to the war effort. As rest stops, refuelling stations, and offering repair facilities, the Imperial sea lanes to the Middle East, the British Raj, and Australasia were kept open and secure.

With the conclusion of hostilities in 1918, members of the RNVR(SA) were demobilised and all Admiralty requisitioned South African ships were promptly returned to their owners.

https://talkinghumanities.blogs.sas.ac.uk/2018/10/31/south-africa-in-world-war-one/

Interwar

The experience of the war, and the continuing annual charge of £85,000 towards local Royal Navy costs persuaded the South African Government that there was in fact a need to develop and maintain its own permanent naval force, and to loosen the dependency on London.

On 1 April 1922, the South African Naval Service (SANS) was established to operate alongside the RNVR (SA), tasked with the protection of territorial waters, minesweeping and hydrography.

The first vessels to be commissioned by the new SANS that year were, the small hydrographic survey ship HMSAS (His/Her Majesty’s South African Ship) Protea, two minesweeping converted trawlers HMSAS Immortelle and HMSAS Sonneblom, and the SA Training Ship General Botha - all formerly in Royal Navy service. In 1923, the Gadfly-class flatiron gunboat was also transferred, becoming HMSAS Afrikander.

In its earliest beginnings,  the rudimentary South African Naval Service had a total strength of 16 officers and 117 ratings, with Commander N.H Rankin, a retired Royal Navy Captain becoming the services’ first ‘Officer Commanding’.

In 1923, an Imperial Conference was convened in London on the matter of Imperial defence and the implications on Dominion rights. Its conclusions were that the concept of local defence was to be developed and enhanced, particularly in regards to maritime communication security and the global availability of naval bases and repair facilities to ensure continued Royal Navy hegemony. However, the anti-British, pro-Afrikaner National Party of J. B. M. Hertzog was subsequently triumphant in the election of 1924 and edged South Africa away from investing in colonial policing responsibility, with a focus on being neutral except for internal unrest.

The Great Depression of 1929 exacerbated the difficulties that the SANS, and the wider Union Defence Force, was already experiencing during this time. The services’ first decade had been a bruising one, continually beset with manpower shortages, budget constraints, and a fundamental lack of political support.

With the financial crisis deepening, in November 1932 the post of Officer Commanding SANS was abolished, with command and administration reverting back to the Royal Navy and its Africa Station.

In 1933, the survey ship HMSAS Protea was returned to the Royal Navy, followed by HMSAS Sonneblom and HMSAS Immortelle a year later. Reduced to only four officers and twelve ratings, the SANS could do little but help in the administration and training of the RNVR (SA).

However, the 1930s saw a reorientation of Imperial security and South African defence policy. The rise of Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Imperial Japan coincided with a new coalition government of the National, and also Jan Smuts’ more moderate, South African Party, becoming the United Party.

With national economic recovery underway from 1934, the controversial new Minister of Defence Oswald Pirow oversaw the first increase in military spending in ten years and an expansion of the UDF under the infamous five-year plan. South African naval policy however continued to deem the cost of acquiring naval vessels far too expensive and accepted the reality of continuing dependence on the Royal Navy for maritime security. Nevertheless, after numerous discussions involving the UDF, the Admiralty, and the Committee on Imperial Defence, proposed naval measures were recommended to be acted upon in times of war. Of primary concern was the reformation of an adequate seaward defence force. For local submarine detection and coastal minesweeping, 36 whalers and trawlers would be earmarked and later converted into auxiliary vessels in a time of war.

The interwar years had seen the official creation of the South African Navy Service but also its foundering. The navy was handicapped by sporadic Afrikaner, anti-British nationalism, inadequate financial expenditure, personnel deficiencies, and a focus directed towards land and air force modernisation. By 1939 and the coming of war, the SANS could call upon only two officers and three ratings across the entire organisation.

Second World War

Beginnings

By 1939, South Africa, along with the other Dominions, had been granted legislative independence from Britain and was a de facto sovereign nation within the Commonwealth. The British declaration of war against Germany on 3 September threw South Africa into a constitutional crisis. Prime Minister J.B.M. Hertzog, and other anti-British factions of the coalition United Party called for strict neutrality, whilst the more anglophile Deputy Prime Minister Jan Smuts advocated that South Africa was constitutionality, and morally, obliged to support Britain and fight fascism. At the end of passionate debate, Smuts carried the day with 80 votes to 67 in parliament. With himself becoming the new Prime Minister, Smuts led South Africa in declaring war on Germany on 5 September.

Following the declaration of war, both the RNVR (SA) and the South African Naval Service were quickly mobilised. Whilst the South Africa Division could provide immediate manpower for the Royal Navy, the SANS was a victim of pre-war poor planning with less than ten officers and ratings, and no physical naval capability. In comparison, the Royal Australian Navy by 1939 operated six cruisers, five destroyers, and three sloops, with over 5,000 personnel.

The British Admiralty had identified that the German Kriegsmarine was the biggest threat that faced South Africa, with Italian and Japanese dangers growing later. The traditional sea lanes around the Cape were crucial to the successful transportation of Allied commercial and military equipment, as well as to secure the imperial links to the Far East, including India, Australia and New Zealand.

In those early weeks, Smuts offered the role of Deputy Director of Coast Defence and Officer Commanding SANS to a retired Royal Navy officer living in South Africa, Rear Admiral Guy Halifax. Accepting, during October 1939 Halifax began creating the small beginnings of a new service from his office in the Castle at Cape Town.  

With no purpose built warships available for the SANS, previously registered whalers and trawlers were quickly requisitioned and converted into suitable minesweeping (M/S) and anti-submarine (A/S) craft. By February 1940, the yards of the SAR & H (South African Railways and Harbours) were unable to cope with the conversion demand and private firms were brought in to increase the conversion rate.

During January 1940, the newly named Seaward Defence Force (SDF) formally assumed operational responsibilities from the Royal Navy, representing an important moment in South African naval history. This included management of M/S and A/S duties, signal stations, and the Examination Services at South African ports, as well influence over uniform, discipline and command.

By October 1940, the SDF had 183 officers and 1,049 ratings, however the initial lack of suitable instructors hindered training efficiency early on during the war and slowed expansion. The RNVR nevertheless continued to receive its agreed quota of South African recruits for deployment in the Royal Navy directly.

Tragically, whilst returning from a routine inspection of a SDF formation in Walvis Bay, the transport plane carrying Rear Admiral Halifax crashed into high ground near Elands Bay, South Africa, on the 28 March 1941, killing all onboard. Halifax had been instrumental in developing the naval service, and had successfully dealt with the sizable administrative challenge in the face of stiff British opposition who were uneasy about relinquishing control.

The subsequent Director of the Seaward Defence Force was the newly promoted Captain Dalgleish, who inherited an organisation that now totalled over 1,600 officers and ratings in early 1941, with a wide range of assignments and increasing independence. In April that year, the SDF was also opened up for non-Europeans for the first time. By October, over 800 volunteers from the Coloured fishing community were in service with the SDF, however, following government policy were assigned non-combatant role duties. .

Throughout 1941, tensions however were beginning to surface between the RNVR (SA) and the SDF. Men in the former had become increasingly frustrated over issues of pay, leave, and general conditions when compared to their own countrymen in the SDF, especially when serving in the same vessels . Overtime, these differences would be increasingly ironed out between the two organisations.

At the laying of the cornerstone for the new South African Training Base, HMSAS Unitie, in February 1942, Smuts indicated that amalgamation of the RNVR (SA) and the SDF would take place and that a unified South African naval service would exist. Following agreement regarding the merger at a Defence Headquarters conference in July, on the 1st August 1942, the South African Naval Forces (SANF) was officially established. In October 1943 the South African Women’s Auxiliary Naval Service (SWANS) was also confirmed, with around 280 ‘SWANS’ serving by the war's end.

Operations in South African Waters

Only three months after the declaration of war, in December 1939, South Africa had 15 converted minesweepers (M/S) available for immediate operations. Although previously commercial whalers and trawlers, these little ships were reequipped with a single QF 12-pounder gun, a limited number of Lewis machineguns, and small amounts of depth charges, becoming the backbone of the Seaward Defence Force. Early in the war, the allocation was seven at Cape Town, and two each at Durban, East London, Port Elizabeth and Simon’s Town, with the task of regularly sweeping the approaches to the various ports. In December 1940, M/S strength stood at 24 and by April 1941, capability reached 37 converted vessels, where it would peak for the rest of the war.

The most capable vessels formed the nucleus of the ‘Mine Clearance Flotilla’, a group of craft that would be deployed rapidly to search for, and clear, known minefields in areas outside of the port approaches. The flotilla was devised as a response to the discovery of a magnetic minefield near Cape Agulhas, which had been laid by the German surface raider Atlantis in early 1940. Later, the flotilla conducted clearances off Cape Columbine, Danger Point, and the approaches to Table Bay. Additionally, in partnership with the Royal Navy, they helped intercept a Vichy French convoy off Port Elizabeth in November 1941. New minefields were discovered off Cape Agulhas and Cape Town in March 1942, with the Flotilla once more attending to search and sweep channels. No further minefields were located off South Africa’s coast for the rest of the war after 1942.

From 1942 until early 1945, the South African coast and surrounding seas came under a sustained and critical U-boat threat. Ambushing convoys in the rich expanse of the Cape sea route had long been considered. Indeed in October 1941, the pocket battleship Admiral Scheer successfully rounded the Cape, twice, on her limited excursion into the Indian Ocean. In August 1942 the BdU, or ‘U-boat Command’, assembled a wolfpack of four type IXC U-boats; U-68, U-172, U-504 and U-156, as well as the supply boat U-459, for the long journey south towards Cape Town, known as Operation Eisbär, to target Allied merchantmen.

Having reached South African waters nearly two months later, 13 merchant ships were sunk within the first three days. In search of further success, Karl Dönitz ordered that the waters off Port Elizabeth and Durban be targeted, with several more merchants being attacked and sunk in the following weeks. Sufficient numbers of Allied anti-submarine vessels and aircraft were lacking, most merchantmen still sailed independently and the majority of South African lighthouses still functioned on a peacetime footing.

By the end of October 1942 U-boat reinforcements, consisting of U-177, U-178, U-179 and U-181, had arrived from Lorient and as well as targeting the Cape, ventured into the Mozambique Channel. In the following six weeks, a further 25 merchants were sunk. Simultaneously, an Italian submarine (Italy declared war in June 1940), the Ammiraglio Cagni, had journeyed from the Mediterranean and sank the Greek merchant vessel, the Argo, just off Cape Town on the 29th November.

In total, eight U-boats and one Italian submarine sunk a total of 53 merchant vessels in just over two months, for the loss of only one, U-179, sunk off Cape Town on 8th October 1942 by HMS Active. To follow up on this action, four more IXC boats were dispatched for Cape Town. U-506, U-516, U-509 and U-610 were formed to create the Seehund Wolfpack, with U-459 also attached. Departing from the Bay of Biscay in December 1942 and January 1943, the Seehund pack arrived in South African waters at the beginning of February, having also been reinforced by U-182.

Royal Navy and South African counter measures had been significantly enhanced, as well as the convoy escort system having been introduced along the coast. Between February and April, only 17 merchantmen were successfully attacked and sunk in South African and adjacent waters. In April, a further nine type IXD U-boats arrived, U-177, U-178, U-181, U-195, U-196, U-197, U-198, U-402, and U-511, destroying another 27 vessels. In the whole of 1943, 44 merchant ships were sunk off the coast of South Africa, with U-197 being lost to British aircraft off Madagascar, and Italian and Japanese submarines adding an additional six. The I-37 of the Imperial Japanese Navy sank the Faneromeni in the Mozambique Channel.

During 1944, four U-boats, the U-862, U-852, U-198 and U-861, sank only another eight merchant vessels. The Italian built, but German operated UIT-22 was sunk on the 11 March by the South African Air force. On 23 February 1945, U-510 sank the Point Pleasant Park northwest of Cape Town, the last merchantman lost in South African waters during the war.

After the Italian declaration of war on Britain and France on 10th June 1940, Allied shipping in the Mediterranean and the Suez Canal was at significant risk. As a consequence, for safer transportation nearly all Allied vessels travelling between Europe and the Far East were rerouted around the much longer Cape route, an extra 10,000nm of ocean.

Throughout the war South Africa, along with the Royal Navy, regularly patrolled the coast with anti-submarine vessels. Despite operating converted whalers and trawlers, South African naval forces performed defensive patrols continuously. Peaking at 15 A/S vessels, by May 1942 Cape Town had nine such craft, and Durban four. The Durban A/S Flotilla endured South Africa’s first operational loss when in April 1942 HMSAS Sydostlandet ran ashore near the mouth of the Umgeni River during bad weather.

In partnership with the Royal Navy, and South African and Royal Air Force patrols, the dirty and cramped converted vessels performed an exceptional task in the often rough seas. Out of a total of approximately 400 convoys and 50,000 ships, the transportation of nearly six million Allied troops to various operational zones, and over 2,000 various warships that had visited Cape Town and Durban, only 155 merchant ships had been sunk within a radius of 1000 nm from the South African coast.

Operations in Mediterranean Waters

South African naval forces became involved in the Mediterranean theatre of war as the result of an urgent appeal from the Admiralty in London to the South African government on 20 November 1940, on behalf of Admiral A.B. Cunningham Commander in Chief (C-in-C) of the Mediterranean Fleet. Cunningham desperately required more anti-submarine and escort vessels, and deemed that the converted trawlers of South Africa would be sufficient.

The Admiralty was notified on the 22nd November that the Seaward Defence Force had accepted, and suggested that the newer, larger and more seaworthy vessels be sent: the HMSAS Southern Floe, HMSAS Southern Isles, HMSAS Southern Maid, and HMSAS Southern Sea. Designated the 22nd South African Anti-Submarine Group, the modest four vessel flotilla, with little actual A/S training, left Durban on the 15 December 1940 and arrived at Alexandria in Egypt just under a month later.

Having arrived in this new theatre of war, the 22nd Group were assigned individual tasks of convoy escort, A/S patrols, towing disabled ships and ferrying prisoners of war and other stores on the exposed Alexandria to Tobruk route, often as the only significant military vessel. When at Tobruk, the Southerns would spend nearly a week on local patrol, often under heavy air attack, before returning to Alexandria and repeating the exercise. With the harbour at Tobruk, and its approaches, littered with sunken wrecks, suspected minefields, and with an unlighted and vague coastline, strong sandstorms and heavy cross seas, conditions were highly challenging.

Exactly one month after their arrival as part of the British Mediterranean Fleet, South Africa suffered its first naval loss to enemy action in the war. At 04:00am on 11 February 1941, HMSAS Southern Floe struck a mine off the coast of Tobruk, broke in two, and sank almost immediately. It wasn’t until the evening that her sister ship, HMSAS Southern Sea, sighted wreckage and rescued the only survivor, Leading Stoker C J Jones, RNVR (SA).

As the year progressed, the Royal Navy was under mounting pressure in the Mediterranean, and the Southerns increasingly operated as the sole escort, often as the only significant anti-aircraft platform, in the convoy. Whilst South African vessels did not play a part in the evacuation of British and Commonwealth forces from Greece and Crete in April and May 1941, the reduction of available warships for duties along the North African coast increased the burden on the Southerns significantly.

The back and forth nature of the war in North Africa had led to Tobruk, and its vital port, being surrounded by the Afrika Korps and their Italian allies from April 1941. As it was the only significant port east of Benghazi, and west of Alexandria, the decision was taken by Churchill to defend Tobruk at all costs. As part of the ‘Tobruk Ferry Service’, the Southerns were tasked with supplying the besieged forces with ammunition, fresh troops, and other necessities, whilst evacuating wounded personnel to Alexandria or Mersa Matruh. Evading constant air attack, and keeping channels clear of mines, without significant support, the South African ships received prominent acclaim for their commitment to keeping Tobruk provisioned and fighting. After a siege lasting 242 days, Tobruk was relieved on the 8th December 1941, with a total of 34 ships sunk, and over 30 damaged whilst delivering nearly 35,000 tons of stores, over 34,000 reinforcements, and the evacuation of 47,000 men.

Cunningham later sent a message of thanks to South Africa which praised the performance of these little ships, and that although "they are rather out of the limelight, their excellent work and seamanlike handling coupled with the courage and determination shown in the face of continual air attack reflects the greatest credit on officers and men".

Although scheduled to return to South Africa by the end of May 1941, the situation in the Mediterranean following the evacuation of Crete, and the pressures on the Royal Navy for available vessels, forced the Admiralty to request the Southerns stay for another six month tour, and that a replacement for the sunken HMSAS Southern Floe also be sent. HMSAS Protea, a more modern converted whaler, although of a similar design to the Southerns, set sail from Durban in August join the 22nd Group that, by the end of 1941, had been awarded: six DSO's, ten DSM's, one CGM, one DSM, and five crew members were mentioned in despatches.

Towards the end of their second tour in the Mediterranean, Cunningham was again reluctant to see the South African vessels leave. After another request to the South African government by the Admiralty, Smuts agreed that not only would the tour be extended indefinitely but that a further seven vessels, this time minesweepers, would be provided sailing from Durban on 1 November 1941. Although again converted whalers and trawlers, and even inferior to the Southerns, these ships, HMSAS Bever, HMSAS Gribb, HMSAS Seksern, HMSAS Imhoff, HMSAS Treern, HMSAS Parktown and HMSAS Langlaagte, provided not only much needed magnetic mine clearance but also adopted the critical roles of convoy escort, as well as a limited anti-submarine and air-defence capability.

As the war in the Mediterranean continued, one of the more notable naval actions for South Africa occurred off the coast of Tobruk on 25 May 1942. The previous day, HMSAS Southern Maid, HMS Grimsby and the 3,741-ton tanker SS Helka had been delayed entry to the harbour at Tobruk due to rough sea conditions on the approaches and a violent sandstorm on land. Whilst waiting offshore on the morning of the 25th, seven Ju 87 dive bombers of the Italian 239a Squadriglia attacked the small convoy, sinking the tanker Hekla and seriously damaging Grimsby. As the day progressed, a second attack of Ju 87s, this time from the German I/StG 1, succeeded in sinking Grimsby. HMSAS Southern Maid, whilst zig-zagging and throwing up continuous anti-aircraft fire, was hit several times with four wounded and one dead. Numerous aircraft were observed to have been hit, however only one Ju87 was confirmed destroyed. Southern Maid rescued 160 survivors from the two sunken ships, six times the small vessel's normal complement, before successfully withdrawing to Mersa Matruh. The following week, whilst also on the ‘Tobruk Run’, sister ship HMSAS Southern Isles suffered four casualties but confirmed one Ju87 destroyed.

During the Second Battle of Tobruk (17 - 21 June 1942), and the subsequent evacuation before the Allied surrender, South African naval forces were again at the forefront. After successfully sweeping a channel clear on the approaches, HMMSAS Bever and HMSAS Parktown were also tasked with embarking evacuation parties from Tobruk. On 20th June, whilst having embarked nearly all the men allocated to them, the two South African vessels came under a significant amount of direct enemy shelling from German tanks that had broken through right to the harbour’s edge. Bever received two hits, with one dead and four wounded, and Parktown was subject to immense machine gun fire from motorised troops that had taken up position near the waterfront. With several direct hits and one dead, HMSAS Parktown was the last Allied ship to leave Tobruk. As a result of the fall of Tobruk, over 10,000 men of South Africa’s 2nd Infantry Division fell into captivity.

Whilst underway, Parktown took in tow a disabled tug that was overcrowded with men. With speed reduced to crawling five knots, she fell behind the main evacuation flotilla and was soon alone at sea. The following morning, on the day the Tobruk garrison surrendered, Parktown was attacked by multiple E-boats, believed to be Italian, and a fierce gunbattle ensued. Despite taking direct hits on the engine room and on the Bridge, one of which killed her Commanding Officer, the crew of Parktown abandoned ship only after all ammunition had been expended and when the vessel could no longer operate. It is reported that the E-boats continued to fire on survivors in the water until an unknown aircraft compelled them to withdraw. For his actions in the engagement,  Sub Lt Francis, wounded in both legs, was subsequently awarded the DSO, with the Commanding Officer of the Bever, Lt. PA North, being awarded the DSM. HMSAS Parktown was the second South African vessel to be lost to enemy action.

A month later, HMSAS Protea and Southern Maid gained the unique distinction of being the only South African vessels ever to successfully search and destroy an enemy submarine. On 11 July 1942 off the coast of Lebanon, the two ships depth-charged the Italian submarine Ondina for over two hours before forcing the boat to surface. After the crew abandoned the submarine, HMSAS Protea rescued the 41 Italian survivors. Her Commanding Officer, Lt. G Burn Wood, was afterwards awarded the DSO for his part in the action. In addition, in March 1943, Protea participated in a three day hunt for an unidentified submarine alongside other Royal Navy vessels after two ships in their convoy had been torpedoed. Although not confirmed as destroyed, significant amounts of diesel and oil reportedly rose to the surface after an engagement on the third day.

By August 1943, two years after first being deployed in the Mediterranean, South African naval vessels participated in the invasion of Sicily, Operation Husky, by escorting convoys and landing craft to the landing zones. On 7 October 1943 a convoy escorted by HMSAS Southern Isles was attacked with torpedoes, sinking the minesweeper HMS Hythe. Engaging with depth charges, and later sighting oil, Southern Isles later disengaged before rescuing 19 survivors from Hythe.

One of the more unusual incidents involving South Africa occurred on the 2 October 1944, off the coast of Athens, Greece. After leaving the Poros, HMSAS Southern Maid was engaged by a German shore battery stationed on the island of Aegina. Responding in kind, a lively gunnery duel between the two lasted for 30 minutes before Southern Maid sailed out of range. Although suffering no damage, she similarly was unable to effectively damage the shore battery.

Later in 1943, five South African minesweepers, Boksburg, Gribb, Treeni, Seksern and Bever, and also Protea participated in the liberation of Greece, and later the evacuation of British and Indian troops from Krioneriin after skirmishing with the ELAS (National People's Liberation Army) who opposed the Allied occupation.

HMSAS Seksern reportedly destroyed 97 mines over three days whilst in the vicinity. Operations in Greek waters however would claim the final two South African combat losses of the war.

On 30 November 1944, whilst operating with Seksern, HMSAS Bever struck a mine in low visibility in the Gulf of Nauplia, south of Athens. Disintegrating and sinking almost immediately, seven survivors out of a crew of 23 were rescued.

In the New Year  at 09:00 12 January 1945, HMSAS Treern became South Africa’s final naval loss in the Second World War. Whilst towing a tug containing high octane spirit in the Trikeri channel after leaving the Greek port of Volos, Treern struck a mine and sank rapidly with only one survivor.

In April 1942, as harbours and ports in the Mediterranean became increasingly congested with wreckage and debris, Admiral Cunningham dispatched a personal message to Smuts requesting a salvage vessel be sent for urgent service, as well as South Africans to man it. Agreeing, by November HMSAS Gamtoos, a 794 ton coaster, had been converted and left for Alexandria.  In time she would become one of South Africa’s most legendary wartime vessels.

In January 1943, Gamtoos had the distinction of being the first Allied vessel to enter Tripoli harbour after the Axis retreat, after gradually removing up to seven blockships in the approaches. Within a week, and ahead of schedule, enough area had been cleared to allow two merchant vessels to begin simultaneously unloading supplies for the British Eighth Army, an action that won praise from both General Montgomery and Churchill, who later came aboard during a visit to Tripoli.

After continued work along the North African coast, Gamtoos was transferred to Naples following the invasion of Italy. Later, she would replicate her previous distinction and become the first Allied vessel to enter the harbour of Marseilles, shortly after the landings in Southern France. The harbour had been entirely demolished by the retreating Germans with cranes destroyed, wharfs filled with sunken barges, and the entrance to the inner harbour blocked by the submerged liner SS Cape Corse. In total, Gamtoos faced one tanker, one cable laying ship, three passenger lines, and 20 cargo ships in the immediate vicinity which she would have to clear. In all it took only a record 18 days.

For the rest of the war, Gamtoos was assigned the ports of La Ciotat, Ajaccio, Naples, Malta, Genoa and worked in the Aegean sea, before sailing for Hong Kong in March 1945. From June 1944 to December 1945, her Commanding Officer was a young Lt H. H. Biermann, future Chief of the Navy from 1952 and Chief of the South African Defence Force from 1972 to 1976.

Operations in the Far East and the first South African warships

As the Second World War came to a close, South Africa received a proposal that would later be seen as a watershed moment for the young service.

In May 1944, the British government offered to make three frigates under construction permanently available to the SANF, in exchange for 3,600 South African recruits for service in the Royal Navy. The proposition was initially unworkable due to the immense manpower limitations South Africa was already under. Keeping the Sixth Armoured Division in Italy at full strength was a priority, and the racial policy of only allowing those of European descent to perform combat roles, as well as relying solely on volunteers for overseas military service was a significant logistical problem.

In reply, the South African Acting Minister of Defence Mr F.E. Sturrock recommended that whilst the frigates would have South African crews, instead of providing the additional recruits the ships would remain under Royal Navy control. The Admiralty accepted the proposition.

These new ships, the Loch class frigates, would be South Africa’s first purpose built warships and represented a huge jump in capability, and prestige, even if providing the manpower posed a significant issue. HMSAS Good Hope was commissioned on 9 November 1944, followed by HMSAS Natal on 1 March 1945. Serving in the North Atlantic during the final months of the war, Natal has the unique distinction of sinking German submarine U-714 only four hours after leaving the builder’s shipyard, before being assigned to the 8th Escort Group of the Western Approaches Command.

After being refitted for tropical duties, with her anti-aircraft armament being significantly increased to counter the threat of Japanese Kamikazes, Natal escorted convoys in and around Malaya and Singapore as part of Operation Zipper, before being allocated guardianship at Saband, Sumatra.

Recalled after several weeks in the Far East, Natal joined her sister ships Good Hope and Transvaal (which entered service shortly after the German surrender in May 1945) in repatriating over 700 troops from Egypt back to South Africa.

In June 1945, two River-class frigates were transferred from the Royal Navy to South Africa. With a previous hard service life as anti-submarine convoy escorts earlier in the war, HMSAS Teviot and HMSAS Swale, as they were re-christened, were handed back to the Royal Navy only six months later.

Causalities and Contributions

South African naval contribution to the Allied war effort, if materially limited, was nevertheless significant.

In home waters South African vessels, in partnership with the Royal Navy, ensured the safety of the strategic Cape sea route and the maintenance of all sea-lanes of communication around the southern tip of Africa.

With the Mediterranean and Suez Canal having become too dangerous for shipping, particularly between June 1940 and May 1943, the position of South Africa and subsequent naval protection ensured the interconnection of the Commonwealth, and arguably eventual victory.

Given this, the only front that affected South Africa directly was the war at sea. Almost as soon as war was declared German surface raiders, U-boats and minefields threatened the Cape, with Italian and Japanese submarines also joining the battle as the war progressed.

War production and raw materials flooded out of the Union for the war effort, often protected by South African naval vessels. Whereas before the war South Africa had only small scale facilities for ship repair, due to the substantial increase in maritime traffic the Admiralty recognised that maintenance could be done in South Africa far away from Axis aircraft, allowing for a huge expansion of industrial capability. At its peak, South African workshops could service up to 250 ships a month, with the Royal Navy base at Simonstown also being indispensable.

South African naval contribution in the Mediterranean theatre, and later the Far East, is no less remarkable, but also largely forgotten today. From 1941, South African ships and their crews assisted in operations in nearly every area of the Mediterranean, from the battles along the North African coast, to the invasion of southern Europe, and ensuring mine free waters in the Aegean. Although limited in numbers, and consisting of ill-suiting converted whalers and trawlers, their achievements of submarine hunting, convoy escorting, and mine clearance to name a few were strategically important.

Having entered the Second World War without possessing any operational naval craft, less than ten personnel, and deep political and ethnic divisions between Afrikaner and English speaking whites, at the cessation of hostilities on the 2nd September 1945, 1,436 officers and 8,896 ratings had served in the South African Naval Forces, and on board Royal Navy ships, as well as the Fleet Air Arm. South African sailors served in every theatre of war, including the war against Japan, with 324 losing their lives. 225 awards were issued, and 26 battle honours gained. Using converted fishing vessels for nearly the entire course of the war, the South African Naval Force by 1945 operated three purpose built warships and would enter the post-war years with a far greater grasp of its own maritime power, along with a high reputation.

1940s and 1950s

After the end of hostilities, a year later on 1 May 1946 South African Naval Forces were reconstituted as part of the Union Defence Force proper before undertaking its final name change in July 1951 where the SANF officially became known simply as the ‘South African Navy’ (SAN).

The result of the general election of 1948 would have a significant influence on the future direction of the navy, and marked the beginning of the shift away from Royal Navy reliance, therefore following a different path from other Dominion and Commonwealth navies. The triumphant Afrikaner National Party was intensely suspicious of the persisting influence of the United Kingdom within South Africa. The previous government of Smuts, although himself an Afrikaner and former Boer Commander, was perceived to be inexcusably pro-British by the Nationalists, a traitor to their cause of a free and independent Afrikaner nation.

The new, and formerly pro-Nazi Defence Minister Frans Erasmus, soon commenced a process of promoting Afrikaners and sought a reduction of British influence throughout the defence force by retiring or dismissing English-speaking officers and appointing Afrikaners in their place.

For the navy, the rapid curtailment of British influence manifested itself most notably on 1st December 1952 when the thirty-six year old Commander Hugo Biermann, one of only a handful of Afrikaner officers in the service, was promoted to the head of navy and elevated to Commodore, an immediate jump of two ranks. Earlier that year, the previously used title of HMSAS (His/Her Majesty’s South African Ship) changed to just SAS (South African Ship), in 1957 the Royal Navy transferred control of Simon’s Town naval base to the SAN after 70 years of occupancy, and later, in 1959 the British crown which had featured in the SAN cap badge and other areas was replaced by the Lion of Nassau from the crest of the country’s coat of arms.

In the immediate post-war years the South African Navy, like other Commonwealth navies, underwent significant levels of qualitative, and quantitative, expansion as the Royal Navy disposed of its surplus war materiel.

With the gradual retirement and return of its hastily converted auxiliary minesweepers back to their civilian owners, South African Naval Forces possessed a fleet of mostly harbour defence vessels, trawlers and whalers, two boom defence vessels and its three wartime Loch-class frigates, HMSAS Good Hope, HMSAS Natal and HMSAS Transvaal.

In 1947, two surplus Algerine-class minesweepers, were acquired from the United Kingdom, HMSAS Bloemfontein (formerly HMS Rosamund) and HMSAS Pietermaritzburg (HMS Pelorus), as well as a Flower-class corvette which was converted into the hydrographic survey ship HMSAS Protea (HMS Rockrose).

During this time, the three Loch-class frigates acted as escorts for the battleship HMS Vanguard while it served as the Royal Yacht during the Royal Family’s tour of South Africa in 1947. At the end of the year, with the United Kingdom’s permission, the frigates participated in the annexation of the Prince Edward Islands and helped install a meteorological station on the outpost. Various overseas goodwill tours became the mainstay of the class, with visits to the Belgian Congo, French Madagascar, and Portuguese Mozambique, as well as participation in the celebrations of Australia’s Golden Jubilee in Sydney in 1951, before all entered refits and conversions during the middle of the 1950’s. In 1956, a South African Air Force (SAAF) Sikorsky 2-55 helicopter successfully touched down onto Good Hope - the first helicopter deck landing for a South African warship.

In 1950, South Africa further expanded her naval capability and purchased the first of two former British W-class destroyers, HMS Wessex and in 1952 HMS Whelp. Although a significant and remarkable improvement in fleet potential from only five years previously, the relative sophistication of HMSAS (later SAS) Jan Van Riebeeck and SAS Simon van der Stel, as they were known in South African service, placed serious pressures on levels of available manpower as, until conscription for white males was introduced in 1967, the navy was reliant on only volunteers of European descent. As a result, only three years after her purchase SAS Jan van Riebeeck was placed in the reserves, where she would remain for the next 20 years.

Her sister ship, SAS Simon van der Stel, however became a successful “grey ambassador” for South Africa and conducted numerous international visits of goodwill. On 14 July 1954, she began a 147-day tour of Europe, visiting Sierra Leone, French West Africa, and then the Netherlands (a first for a SAN warship), before calling upon the United Kingdom. After collecting the newly purchased Ford-class seaward defence boat SAS Gelderland (formerly HMS Brayford), their return journey saw them visit France, Portugal, back to French West Africa, and finally French Equatorial Africa.

In 1955, South Africa and the United Kingdom signed the Simon’s Town Agreement, a mutual defence agreement of naval cooperation. Under the agreement, the Royal Navy formally transferred any enduring command over the South African Navy to the government of South Africa, thus completing its journey towards being entirely independent of direct British influence. Similarly, the Royal Navy relinquished control over the naval base at Simon’s Town. In return, South Africa promised to allow the Royal Navy use of Simon’s Town in times of peace and war, even if South Africa remained neutral, as well as allowing allies of the United Kingdom to operate from the base. The two countries also designated defence responsibilities aimed at protecting the sea routes between the UK and the Middle East.

A further stipulation of the Simon’s Town Agreement had been that the South African Navy would continue to expand and acquire four additional frigates, ten coastal minesweepers and five seaward defence boats from the United Kingdom at a cost of £18 million. From 1954 the first seaward defence boats were delivered, SAS Gelderland being the first. She was followed by Nautilus, Rijger, Haerlem and Oosterland  from 1955 to 1959. Designed to detect and engage enemy submarines in close inshore waters, these five vessels continued in service with the SAN well into the 1980’s.

The acquisition of the Ton-class coastal minesweepers, Durban, East London, Johannesburg, Kaapstad, Kimberley, Mosselbaai, Port Elizabeth, Pretoria, Walvisbaai and Windhoek was concluded by 1959, and again constituted a substantial expansion of independent capability, regional defence, and vessel availability. Consequently, the two Algerine-class minesweeper frigates previously purchased in 1947 were subsequently placed in the reserves to alleviate fleet manpower shortages, and later converted into training and accommodation ships.

The first of the four additional frigates to be sold to South Africa after the Simon’s Town agreement was the Type 15 anti-submarine frigate SAS Vrystaat (formerly HMS Wrangler), which arrived in South Africa in February 1957. In the immediate years following Vrystaat undertook various international goodwill visits that were common for South African warships at that time, including Portuguese Mozambique, the Belgian Congo, and in 1960 visited Portugal to participate in the naval review commemorating the quincentenary of the death of Prince Henry the Navigator. In 1963, Vrystaat was placed in reserve just six years after being commissioned due to significant corrosion, deteriorating condition and increasing expense. She was later sunk by the submarine SAS Maria van Riebeeck as a target ship in 1976.

1960s

By the early 1960’s, the South African Navy was fast reaching its highpoint of international inclusion and is generally considered to be the golden age of a well balanced, modern and effective service optimised for conventional naval engagement alongside friendly Western partners.

From the end of the Second World War, until roughly the British termination of the Simon’s Town Agreement in 1975, it was essentially unthinkable that South Africa would not side with the United Kingdom and NATO in any theoretical conflict against the Soviet bloc - indeed it had participated in the Korean War as part of the United Nations. Despite a deep Afrikaner hostility towards Britain, white South Africa, both Afrikaans and English speakers, remained even more unsympathetic towards atheistic communism and the support it gave to African nationalist movements. As a self described free, civilised, and western nation, White South Africa on the whole was accepting of this pro-NATO Cold War outlook.

Despite no longer being linked to the British Crown following the successful republic referendum of 1960, and the subsequent loss of Commonwealth membership after a rebellion in protest of apartheid (led primarily by India and the newly independent African states), the continued importance of the Cape Sea Route and South African minerals would have, for the West, ensured that South Africa and her navy remained indispensable.

Throughout this period, the South African Navy often exercised with other international forces, and the Royal Navy would regularly, if increasingly discreetly, be the SANs most important partner. With the close historical connections and support between the two,  the “South African Navy was perceived by many of the senior officers in both navies as simply an extension of, and in all but name and administrative function, an operational section of the Royal Navy.”

From 1962 to 1964 the South African Navy received its final purchase of the Simon’s Town Agreement, three Type 12 President-class frigates: SAS President Kruger, SAS President Steyn and SAS President Pretorious respectively. These were first rate, ocean going fast fleet anti-submarine escorts that propelled the South African Navy into the age of a modern warship operator on equal footing with any western navy.

As the decade unfolded, the President-class would continue South Africa’s customary role of international goodwill visits and naval exercises despite mounting apartheid condemnation and criticism. The high esteem for Smuts and his South Africa in those immediate post war years had by the 1960s almost entirely disappeared. Changing global attitudes towards race, traditional colonial empires giving way to majority ruled independent states, and an ever more international unease towards the realities and violence of apartheid, would in time have extensive ramifications for South Africa and its navy.

From July - August 1963  President Kruger and President Steyn participated in Capex 63, a training exercise with British and French warships. The following year, Capex 64, President Steyn and President Pretorious exercised with only Royal Navy vessels. In 1965, the British Government decided to downgrade the exercise to a Weapons Training Period and later, as apartheid disapproval grew further, to exercise only with the SAN on an ad hoc basis if the Royal Navy were in the vicinity. One such exercise occurred in 1967 with the aircraft carrier HMS Eagle, the frigate HMS Loch Fada, and the submarine HMS Ambush.

From the middle of the 1960’s it became clear that technology allowed for a greater engagement radius around a vessel and that the sonars of the President-class could detect submarines far beyond the range of the Limbo anti-submarine mortars. Appreciating the strides that the Royal Navy had recently undertaken with shipborne helicopters and the impressive ‘standoff’ long range engagement potential, the SAN quickly followed suit. All three ships of the President-class underwent a refit that included the construction of a small flight deck and hangar that would house a Westland Wasp helicopter,  installation of anti-submarine torpedo tubes amidships, and general refurbishment of electronics, radar and fire-control systems.

During this period, the three Second World War era Loch-class frigates were beginning to show signs of decay and increasingly expensive maintenance. Transvaal was placed into the reserve in 1964, with sister ship Good Hope later joining. Both had been assigned training and fishery protection tasks during the final years of their careers, before being laid up in Simon’s Town and sold for scrap in 1976 and then scuttled as artificial reefs in 1978. Natal, after being converted into a hydrographic survey ship in 1957, continued in service and often participated in the International Indian Ocean Expedition, as well as searching for survivors of the Greek tanker World Glory that foundered during a storm in July 1968. Herself also antiquated, she too was withdrawn from service and sunk as a target ship off the Cape of Good Hope by gunfire from President Steyn and aircraft from the South African Air Force that same year in 1972.

The similarly ageded W-class destroyers were casualties of the evident manpower shortages of the pre-conscription era, an issue further exacerbated by the introduction of the President-class. Simon van der Stel would spend the majority of her career in the South African Navy repeatedly in and out of service, a fate that was also destined for her sister ship Jan van Riebeck. After numerous episodes of reactivation and then again in reserve, Simon van der Stel was for the final time deemed too expensive to maintain and scrapped in Durban in 1976. Jan van Riebeeck was also reduced to the reserve in 1975 for the final time, before being decommissioned and sunk as a target ship in 1980.

In 1967, the SAN gained the significant ability of conducting extended operations without international assistance with the purchase of the Danish tanker Annam, later to be reconfigured as the replenishment vessel SAS Tafelberg. As part of the 10th Frigate Flotilla, along with President Kruger and President Pretorious, they trained with the Argentinian Navy in October of that year. In 1968 the flotilla, with Kruger substituted for President Steyn, sailed for Australia participating in the Remembrance Day ceremony in Melbourne, after visiting Fremantle and Sydney.

The order of three Daphne-class submarines from France in 1968, to operate submarines for the first time in its history, once again catapulted the service into a previously unknown realm of capability and sophistication. The early 1970’s would see the Navy operating at the height of its blue-water power projection ability with the first of the Daphne class submarines, Maria van Riebeeck, being commissioned in 1970, with Emily Hobhouse and Johanna van der Merwe entering service the following year.

1970s

The 1970’s saw continued international exercises by the SAN, particularly with the Royal Navy. Sanex’71 involved numerous RN vessels together with the recently commissioned submarine Maria van Riebeeck. In 1973 the SAN again with the Royal Navy took part in an unannounced, although intensive, convoy defence simulation exercise.

SAS Emily Hobhouse ‘attacked’ an imagined convoy consisting of President Kruger, President Steyn, the destroyer Jan van Rieveeck and the nuclear powered attack submarine HMS Dreadnought, as well other replenishment vessels acting as merchantmen. In an exceptional performance by the new SAN submarine force,  Emily Hobhouse successfully evaded the protective screen of the convoy and ‘sank’ three of the four ‘merchant’ ships, one escorting frigate, and HMS Dreadnought. The following year, the same Royal Navy task force, returning from the Far East, exercised with the SAN until the Canary Islands before the SAN then exercised southwards back to Simon’s Town with the replacement RN task force.

The second half of the decade saw South Africa facing severe amounts of international isolation and criticism. In 1973 the UN labelled the policy of apartheid a ‘Crime against Humanity’, which was magnified further by the brutal state repression and subsequent killings following the Soweto uprising in 1976 and the death of Steve Biko in police custody in 1977. The following year, a UN arms embargo, loosely in place since 1962 became mandatory. International economic disinvestment from South Africa was also stepped up placing huge strains on the economy, and critical cornerstones of the country's regional foreign policy faced collapse.

On 16 June 1975, after considerable international pressure, the United Kingdom terminated the Simon’s Town Agreement signed twenty years previously. Although the Royal Navy would continue to call periodically at South African ports, the United Kingdom renounced the ability to utilise these ports in times of war, demonstrated during the Falklands War in 1982. For South Africa, whilst the military consequences were negligible, the political fallout was the further sense of being isolated internationally, and increasingly from long-time allies such as the United Kingdom.

Similarly, South Africa’s ‘cordon sanitaire’ of neighbouring friendly white minority governments was by this point in a state of disintegration.

In 1974 a democratic coup led by sympathetic army officers replaced the old hard-line dictatorship in Portugal and overnight the Portuguese Empire in Africa effectively came to an end, whilst in Rhodesia white minority rule was barely surviving against the backdrop of an intense armed insurgency. In 1979 a form of power sharing was adopted by Rhodesia, paving the way for black majority rule the following year.

In the South African administered mandate of South West Africa (modern day Namibia), the previously low intensity conflict being waged by the People’s Liberation Army of Namibia (PLAN) since 1964 morphed into a far wider conventional conflict when South Africa intervened in the Angolan War of Independence and subsequent Civil War in 1975 in order to forestall the communist inspired MPLA organisation from seizing power and supporting PLAN.. In time, the South African Border War in South West Africa and the Angolan Civil War would become indistinguishable from one another.

Operation Savannah, the first major covert South African intervention in Angola which began on 14 October 1975, saw the Navy fulfil its duty in assisting Defence Force partners. Until the drawdown of the intervention in January 1976, in which South Africa assisted UNITA and FNLA forces fighting the Cuban backed MPLA for territorial control, multiple SAN vessels were deployed off the coasts of Angola and South West Africa in what were the first operational patrols for the Navy since the Second World War. The collective force of two frigates, several minesweepers, two submarines, and the replenishment vessel Tafelberg were tasked with monitoring the area for suspected arms shipments from the Eastern Bloc or Cuba that could aid the MPLA and its partners.

Although the SAN was not planned to take any direct part in the land operation, the serious defeat at the Battle of Quifangondo on 10 November 1975 led to the Navy being promptly called upon to rescue by sea a number of army gunners from behind enemy lines in Northern Angola that had been assisting FNLA forces in attempting to capture the capital Luanda. The nearby coastal town of Ambrizete was selected as the extraction point and the frigates SAS President Kruger and SAS President Steyn, along with SAS Tafelberg for logistical support, were assigned to the area. Using the Westland Wasp helicopter and inflatable boats, all 26 South African personnel were successfully rescued from the beach. General Constand Viljoen later called it "the most difficult night ever in my operational career".

As South Africa became increasingly involved in the Border War and frequent interventions into Angola, coupled with growing political isolation internationally, the Navy began to readjust away from its previous international outlook and organisation. At the start of the decade in 1971, Portugal, then a valuable African ally, had been chosen over Britain and France to construct four corvettes, based on the Joao Coutinho-class, that would replace the President-class frigates. However, following the ‘Carnation Revolution’ in 1974 the new democratic Portuguese government, in an effort to break from its controversial past engagement with South Africa, decided to cancel the agreement. The then Minister of Defence, P. W. Botha successfully sought military connections with Israel and nine ‘Reshef’ or ‘Warrior-class’ missile strike craft were ordered in 1974, with three being built in Haifa and six under licence in Durban, South Africa. South African relations with Israel had been becoming increasingly friendly since the late 1960s, with comparisons being made by both sides in regard to the fight for survival by a minority peoples against the ANC and the PLO respectively. Following the Soweto uprising and subsequent mandatory arms embargo, South Africa had been forced to accept the cancellation of another significant naval procurement of two new Type-69A light frigates and two Agosta-class submarines from France. With the Government deciding not to seek any similar replacements, it marks a symbolic moment in what can now be seen as the end of the South African Navy’s attempt to model itself on a blue water force with modern western capability similar to that of Australia, Canada, or New Zealand.

Other changes in the decade included two of the ‘Ton-class’ minesweepers being converted into general purpose patrol ships, whilst two others became the Navy’s first minehunters. Between 1978 and 1980, the Department of Transport’s former Antarctic supply and oceanographic survey ship, the A331, was commissioned by the Navy and was reportedly assigned to electronic surveillance duties along the coasts of northern South West Africa and Angola. In August 1980, SAS President Steyn was permanently withdrawn from service and to be used as a source of spare parts for her two aging sister ships.

It is important to note that by the mid 1970s an intensifying security landscape within and outside South Africa increased the required demands on the Defence Forces significantly, with the navy being no exception. From 1965 strict racial policies regarding only allowing those of European descendance to volunteer were dropped and those categorised as ‘coloureds’ were admitted, however in a purely non-combat role that had no jurisdiction over whites, regardless of rank, and initially in numbers that only totalled a few hundred. A decade later in 1975 a training base for those of Indian descent was opened, and women were also serving in uniform. As to be expected under the Nationalist Government at this time quality of service, treatment, responsibility and pay differed hugely between the different racial groups, with whites overwhelmingly being favoured, albeit with an ever narrowing ratio. Although from 1967 conscription was introduced for all white males over the age of 16, compulsory military service was never introduced for the other racial groups of South Africa

1980s

As the 1970s progressed into the 1980s, it had become increasingly questionable whether the South African Navy, and wider Defence Force, would form any part of a Western/NATO alliance in a wartime scenario against the Soviet Bloc.

Ever increasing international outrage at apartheid, the qualitative impact on the SAN due to the mandatory arms embargo, and substantial SADF commitments in the Border War, had culminated in a growing reluctance in South Africa to cooperate with the same Western nations that so frequently berated them. Similarly, from a Western perspective, openly cooperating with apartheid South Africa was becoming politically unthinkable and that given the fact the South African Navy had become essentially a coastal navy, it offered little of military value.

The new realities of international, and particularly regional, foreign policy changes for South Africa had a drastic consequence on the future direction of the navy. For the Government, it embraced the primarily defensive policy of ‘Total Onslaught’- an argument that the nation was surrounded by hostile states that  either overtly or covertly supported radical African militants and communists that threatened the survival of white minority rule - and with that the navy found itself out of strategic favour.

In 1980, it was clear that the SAN would be adapting to a new role away from international engagement and towards the limited role of safeguarding South Africa’s harbours and coastline. As a reflection of this new shift in policy, the naval portion of the defence budget fell from 17% to 9%.

Despite a smaller budget and lower levels of prestige, the Navy quickly identified ways to stay relevant in the worsening security environment. To protect the nation's harbours against possible insurgent led sabotage, 30 Namacurra-class harbour protection boats were locally built between 1979 and 1981. Similarly, in 1979 the Navy re-established the Marines (last operational in 1951-1955)  in order to man these patrol craft, as well as helping the Navy being involved in counter-insurgency operations ‘up north’ in the Border War.

Another niche the Navy successfully exploited was the covert infiltration and recovery of special forces behind enemy lines. Employing strike craft, submarines and the marines “for some of the more distant and covert operations the Navy demonstrated how rapidly and how effectively it had mastered the complex and difficult task...by using them to insert small numbers of men and then recover them on completion of their task.”

From 1980, the Navy acquired four German designed River-class minehunters, with two being built in Durban. Due to the mandatory arms embargo however, these vessels were purchased under the guise of ‘research’ ships and were operated by the Department of Transport. It was only in 1988 that the Navy formally accepted these vessels and they flew the naval ensign.

The most significant development for the Navy in the 1980s was the construction and later commissioning in 1987 of the locally designed and built Fleet Replenishment Ship SAS Drakensberg. Built in Durban, it remains the largest and most sophisticated warship to ever have built in South Africa. Three years earlier, the Navy’s other support ship, SAS Tafelberg, had undergone a refit that greatly increased her amphibious capabilities. A real boost for the Navy’s influence in the Border War, Tafelberg could deploy a company strength landing force, six landing craft, two medium helicopters and was equipped with a small hospital. Similarly, Drakensberg was also equipped with a limited amphibious capability. Despite this potential for the Navy, large scale amphibious operations were never authorised within the conflict.

Throughout the decade, as it had always done, the South African Navy continued to participate in the Border War and coastal protection as best it could, even with an ever diminishing budget and importance. For 23 years (1976 - 1989) the South African Navy maintained determined sea control around Southern Africa and provided valuable support to land operations. By regularly ensuring that enemy arms shipments were intercepted, and that special forces could be covertly deployed anywhere along the coast, the Navy allowed the wider SADF to routinely project significant force across Angola and South West Africa. At the same time, South African submarines often shadowed their Soviet counterparts in the region, and allegedly South Africa ‘volunteered’ information to Britain during the Falklands War regarding Soviet movements, particularly that surveillance aircraft were using bases in Angola to monitor the British Task Force. However, much of the Navy’s role in the Border War remains classified and as a result it is difficult to assess their actions and achievements in a complicated conflict.

In 1982, the Navy suffered its greatest catastrophe to date. Early on the morning of 18 February, SAS President Kruger, SAS President Pretorious, the submarine SAS Emily Hobhouse and the support ship Tafelberg were conducting high-intensity anti-submarine exercises south-west of Cape Town. During a scheduled manoeuvre to change the direction of the formation, at 03:55am, President Kruger fatally cut across the path of Tafelberg in a poorly executed turn. Tafelbergs’ bow pierced the port side of President Kruger tearing a large hole in her hull, with the order to abandon ship given half an hour later and the commencement of a considerable rescue effort from military and civilian aircraft and vessels. Of the 193 crewmen on board, 16 died as a result of the accident.

In 1985, as South Africa declared a state of emergency, battled large scale conventional Cuban forces in Angola, and struggled with increasing international economic disinvestment, devastating cuts to naval capability were announced with a total of 15 vessels withdrawn from service. The last remaining President-class frigate, SAS President Pretorius, six Ton-class minesweepers, five patrol vessels, a boom defence ship and an air rescue launch were paid off. By 1989, the South African Navy was a force of 24 vessels and was radically different from that of 20 years earlier. By the end of the decade, as white minority rule was coming to a negotiated end, the Navy had lost all of its major surface warships and had a drastically reduced anti-submarine/anti-aircraft capability across the board, coupled with almost complete international isolation. In the 1980s, there were only four overseas flag-showing visits made by the SAN, with those being Mauritius, Chile and Mozambique twice, and only six visits to South Africa from overseas warships, with three being Taiwan, two Chile, and one from Malaysia. Similarly, in the 1960s all major ships of the SAN had been British built whereas by 1989 the Navy had become much more diverse in its procurement. Five were British, three French, three Israeli, two German, and one Danish, as well as ten vessels being constructed in South African dockyards. In comparison to the development and evolution of Commonwealth countries such as Canada, Australia and New Zealand in the same time period, South Africa had undeniably regressed in terms of quality, quantity and capability since its hey-day of the 1960s.

From 1962 until 1983, highly sensitive South African naval information was betrayed to the Soviet Union by Dieter Gerhardt, a South African naval officer who rose to the rank of Commodore and was also Commander of the Simon’s Town Naval dockyard. After offering his services to the South African Communist Party in 1962, Bram Fischer referred Gerhardt to the Soviet Embassy in London where he was recruited by the GRU.

As Gerhardt progressed up the ranks of the South African Navy, as well as being seconded to the Royal Navy, he passed classified information about the British Sea Cat and Sea Sparrow missiles, the French Exocet missile, as well as scouting for potential recruits within British Polaris nuclear submarine crews during his time in the UK. Whilst in South Africa, Gerhardt was appointed naval liaison officer with Armscor, and between 1972 and 1978 was a senior staff officer to the Chief of the SADF in Pretoria. It was in this role that Gerhardt disclosed large amounts of intelligence relating to SADF operations during the Border War in South West Africa and Angola. Later appointed Commander of the Simon’s Town naval dockyard, Gerhardt had access to all South African naval intelligence reports from the Silvermine listening post, large amounts of technical detail on weapons systems, as well as knowledge of Western surveillance techniques on Soviet naval assets, all of which was disclosed to his GRU handlers. Similarly, during the Falklands War, he allegedly used his access to intelligence reports to supply the Soviets with detailed information on Royal Naval positions in the South Atlantic that had been intercepted at Silvermine.

After being exposed by a Soviet double agent and arrested in New York in 1983 by the FBI, Gerhardt was sentenced in South Africa to 20 years for High Treason. Released in 1992 following political pressure, he later moved to Switzerland and was granted amnesty in 1999 by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, complete with restoration of rank.

1990s / 2000s - New South Africa

By 1990 South Africa was a changing society. In August 1988 the last South African troops had left Angola and, following negotiations as part of the Tripartite Accord, subsequently withdrew from South West Africa on 20th June 1989. On 21 March 1990, after 75 years of South African administration and fierce international criticism, Namibia was granted its independence. At almost the same time, the deep rooted fear of atheistic communism that was embedded in white South Africa had all but collapsed following the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, and the Soviet Union itself in 1991. Most importantly however was the in 1989 South Africa swore in a new, relatively unknown, State President - F.W. de Klerk.

Accepting that majority rule was inevitable in South Africa and that negotiations were essential, de Klerk in February 1990 repealed the ban on the ANC and all other banned organisations, and announced the release of ANC leader Nelson Mandela after 27 years of imprisonment. Whilst the Government and other political parties undertook the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA), and as the white electorate overwhelmingly backed a special referendum in 1992 to continue the negotiations and repeal apartheid further, the South African Navy found itself in a state of flux.

As the state disentangled itself from external and internal security operations, the South African Defence Force underwent severe budgetary cuts. The Navy endured a reduction of personnel by 23%, the disbandment of the Marines, the closure of two Naval Commands (Naval Command East and Naval Command West), two  Naval Bases at Cape Town and Walvis Bay, and the termination of the relatively advanced domestic submarine construction program. A positive for the Navy during this period was the acquisition of the multipurpose sealift/replenishment ship SAS Outeniqua, a former Soviet built Arctic supply vessel, in September 1992 as a replacement for the 35 year old Tafelberg.

Despite the austere cutbacks, the Navy was leading the way for a South Africa that was slowly being welcomed back into the international community, even before the landmark elections of 1994. In 1990, the survey vessel SAS Protea became the first South African ship to visit Europe since 1972, and in the same year SAS Drakensberg and two strike craft Jan Smuts and Hendrik Mentz sailed for Taiwan in what would be the first time the South African vessels had been in the Far East since 1945. Other international visits in the following years included Zaire, Kenya, Bangladesh, Turkey, France, Portugal, Uruguay, and the British overseas territory of St Helena.

A significant indication of reacceptance was the improving relations with the United Kingdom, the Commonwealth and the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) in particular. In May 1993, SAS Drakensberg represented South Africa when visiting Britain for the 50th anniversary of the Battle of the Atlantic, with the Royal Navy paying their first visit to a South African port in nearly 20 years with HMS Norfolk visiting Cape Town in January 1994.

On 27 April 1994, after nearly 300 years of white minority rule, South Africa held its first multiracial democratic election. Following the indisputable victory of Nelson Mandela and the ANC, South Africa had entered a new era of the ‘Rainbow Nation’ and reconciliation. The Navy, a service which had relatively avoided being associated with apartheid, continued to display the new South Africa.

As part of the countries re-admittance to the Commonwealth on 17 July 1994, 33 years after withdrawing, SAS Drakensberg flew the new South African flag on a 92-day voyage, calling at the British ports of Rosyth, London, and Portsmouth, before taking part in a ten-day multinational naval exercise. Whilst closer to home, Outeniqua delivered 8,000 tons of food supplies at the port of Dar Es Salaam for Rwandan refugees who had fled the civil war, and provided sea-training for personnel from Mozambique and Tanzania.

As the ‘Rainbow’ nation continued to be lauded, one of the starkest symbols of this new era was the explosion of foreign warships and dignitaries visiting South African ports, often from countries that did not have a previous connection, such as Russia, Poland and Japan. In 1994, 21 foreign vessels from eight countries called at South African ports, with 26 visits from 12 countries in 1995, and 27 from ten countries in 1996. In 1997 the navy celebrated 75 years, with 15 countries sending ships for the festivities.

In contrast to these highly positive, and publicised, moments of international re-engagement, the South African Navy that the new ANC government had inherited in 1994 was at a low point in its recent history.

Operationally, the SAN possessed nine increasingly obsolete strike craft (renamed Warrior Class in 1994), three diesel-electric submarines (Daphnes) that were fast approaching the end of their useful service lives, and two support vessels (later reduced to one in 2005), along with a handful of smaller patrol craft. In conjunction, as seen throughout South Africa, large portions of the white population, unsure of the country's future, were soon emigrating and taking their highly valued technical skills with them.

The acute need to re-equip the navy, and the wider Armed Forces, after the lifting of apartheid era sanctions was addressed by the Strategic Defence Package of 1999. Better known as the infamous ‘Arms Deal’, the acquisitions in the package, and those persons involved, have been repeatedly subject to substantive allegations of corruption, fraud and bribery.

A total of R30 billion (US$4.8 billion in 1999) was pledged to the purchase of modern military equipment. For the navy, its share led to a total transformation from a “brown-water” force of aging missile patrol craft and short-range submarines, to a force with significant “green-water” combat capability once again.

In 2001, with an initial request of five vessels, later reduced to four, the German Meko A200SAN general purpose corvette design was procured (in South Africa they are designated frigates), along with four British Super Lynx naval helicopters, and three German Type 209/1400 diesel powered submarines. Also under construction from 1991 were three locally built T-Craft inshore patrol boats.

As South Africa approached the millennium, and beyond, the ANC government gradually returned the Navy to a level of maritime power last seen in the 1960s and 1970s.

Current South African Navy

Today the South African Navy is one of the most capable naval forces in the African region, operating a mixed force of sophisticated warships, submarines, patrol craft, and auxiliary vessels, with over 7,000 personnel; including a marine force.

Current Deployments

The Standing NATO Maritime Group (SNMG) 1 in formation with South African navy warships SAS Amatola (F145), SAS Isandlwana (F146) and the submarine SAS Manthatisi (S101) while participating in Exercise Amazolo

The SA Navy maintains the traditional role of providing a credible military deterrent, protecting South African interests against possible enemy attack, and participating in African Union peacekeeping missions. Whilst the likelihood of a naval engagement against a conventional enemy is extremely unlikely, the South African Navy today is primarily engaged in counter-piracy operations, fishery protection, and combating narcotic smuggling.

Deploying at least a single Valour-class frigate or one Heroine-class submarine, along with aircraft from the South African Air Force, the SA Navy undergoes exercises with others, such as the United States Navy (Exercise Shared Accord/Southern Accord), NATO naval battlegroups (Exercise Amazolo), the French Navy (the annual Exercise Oxide), the German Navy (the biennial Exercise Good Hope), the Royal Navy (ad hoc exercises when visiting South African waters), the Indian Navy (the biennial Exercise IBSAMAR), and the navies of Uruguay and Brazil (Exercises Atlasur and IBSAMAR)

The navy also provided air and sea security for the 2010 FIFA World Cup by deploying three frigates as guard ships off the cities of Durban, Port Elizabeth and Cape Town.

Operation Copper

Since 2011, one of the SA Navy’s major and long-standing focuses has been that of the anti-piracy initiative, Operation Copper. After increased pirate activity in the Mozambique Channel (a crucial import/export sea lane for South Africa), and subsequent requests for help from fellow Southern African Development Community members (Mozambique and Tanzania), the navy has routinely deployed assets in an effort to provide maritime security in the region.

Since the operation first began, every Valour-class frigate has been deployed to the region on rotation, with the refurbished Warrior-class OPVs also being utilised. In 2012, the replenishment ship SAS Drakensberg was likewise deployed to the region, and alongside European warships, successfully captured seven Somail pirates. Elements of the Navy’s Maritime Reaction Squadron (MRS) are routinely embarked on deployed warships so as to give the ability to board suspect vessels.

Although gaps in deployment have occurred as a result of mechanical issues, as well as the South African Air Force withdrawing it’s C-47TP maritime patrol aircraft in 2016 from Mozambique due to maintenance problems and lack of sufficient aircrew. In 2018 the SA Navy notably deployed two warships simultaneously for Operation Copper, and were independent of foreign support.

In the Mozambique Channel piracy and other maritime crime, particularly illegal fishing has substantially decreased in the region since 2011. With an estimated running cost of R154 million a year, an extension to Operation Copper has been approved and will continue to be funded until at least the 31st March 2021.

Operation Corona

For the continued safeguarding of South Africa’s borders, Operation Corona aims to combat illegal fishing, poaching, and smuggling within its territorial waters. The SA Navy plans to carry out five maritime patrols in line with Operation Corona, with 84 days of surface and 22 days of subsurface patrols allocated for the financial year 2020/21. Deploying to known hotspot areas, the SA Navy works alongside other Government departments such as the SA Police Service and Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries, in an effort to deter rather than arrest.

External links

• www.example.com