Peter Baxter - SAAF's Border War

LMG – light machine gun

LP – local population; a more common usage was PB, from the Afrikaans plaaslike bevolking

LZ – landing zone

maanskyn – moonlight, moonshine (Afrikaans)

Mach – as the speed of sound varies with temperature and altitude, Mach + number is used to refer to the aircraft’s speed as a percentage of the speed of sound, e.g. Mach 1.0 = speed of sound and Mach 0.9 = 9/10ths of that speed (which also equates to 9nms per minute)

MAOT – mobile air operations team; the air force team usually comprised an OC (pilot), an operations officer, an intelligence officer, a radio operator and one or two clerks. The team plus their equipment could be airlifted into a tactical headquarters co-located with the army or police, or could move with the ground forces in mine-protected vehicles as an integral part of the command headquarters. The OC of the team was often called ‘the MAOT’

Mayday – international distress call

medevac – medical evacuation; differs from casevac as the patient is already under medical supervision and being transported to a more suitable medical centre

MF – medium frequency (radio)

MHz – megahertz, to denote frequency band

MiG – Mikoyan-Gurevich, the Soviet-designed family of jet fighters. The Angolan Air Force was equipped with the delta-winged MiG-21 and later the swing-wing MiG-23 variety

Military Region – for military purposes the border areas inside South West Africa immediately adjacent to the Angolan border were divided into the Kaokoland, Sector 10 Owamboland, Sector 20 Kavango and Sector 70 Caprivi Strip. The Angolans, however, divided their country into Military Regions. The 5th Military Region faced Kaokoland and Sector 10, while the 6th Military Region faced Kavango and Caprivi

Mirage – French-built Dassault, the family of supersonic fighters used by the SAAF

MPLA – Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola , Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola

MRG – master reference gyro, the main gyro which controls all the flying instruments in a Buccaneer. Failure of the ‘master’ can, under certain circumstances, cause the crew instant dyspepsia, hysteria and can be accompanied by uncontrollable tears

MRU – mobile radar unit

Nagup – the night equivalent of Gatup ( see Gatup )

NATO – North Atlantic Treaty Organization

NDB – non-directional beacon; navigational aid which transmits a signal in all directions except immediately overhead. Pilots using their ADF instrument can lock on to the NDB to receive directional information from the beacon

OAU – Organization of African Unity

OC – officer commanding

OC WAC – Officer Commanding Western Air Command

OCU – operational conversion unit

Ops Co – operations co-ordinator

ops normal – a radio transmission made at regular intervals, usually 20 minutes, allowing command-post staff to monitor the progress of low-level missions

Parabat – Parachute Battalion soldier, qualified to wear the famous red beret

PI – photographic interpreter

PLAN – People’s Liberation Army of Namibia, SWAPO’s military wing

PNR – point of no return

pongo – an infantryman, a ‘brown job’ (SADF and British Army slang)

PR – photographic reconnaissance

Puma – a twin-engine transport helicopter that carried a crew of three and 16 lightly armed or 12 fully armed troops

PUP – pull-up point

RAF – Royal Air Force

RAMS – radio-activated marker system

Recce – Reconnaissance Commando (Special Forces)

recce – reconnaissance, as in ground recce, an airborne visual recce, a photographic recce or an EW (electronic) recce of a point or area

RhAF – Rhodesian Air Force

RP – rocket projectile

RPG – rocket-propelled grenade

RPG-7 – rocket-propelled grenade, an anti-tank, tube-launched grenade of Soviet origin with a maximum effective range of 500m and an explosive warhead weighing 2.4kg. It is robust, ‘soldier-proof’, easy to use and much favoured by insurgents worldwide

RPV – remotely piloted vehicle/aircraft

RSA – Republic of South Africa

RV – rendezvous, the chosen point usually a grid reference on a map, an easily recognizable ground feature or a bearing and distance from a navigational facility

RWR/RWS – radar warning receiver/system

SAAC – South African Aviation Corps

SAAF – South African Air Force

SADF – South African Defence Force

SADF – South African Defence Force (pre-1994)

SAM – surface-to-air missile, a missile, guided by infrared or radar, fired from a launcher on the ground at an airborne target. By the end of the war the Angolans had an array of missiles which included SA-2 fixed site, SA-3 fixed site, SA-6 mobile, tracked, SA-7 shoulder-launched, [3] SWAPO used only the SA-7 but FAPLA was equipped with the entire range. SA-8 mobile, wheeled, SA-9 mobile, wheeled, SA-13 mobile, tracked, SA-14 shoulderlaunched, SA-16 shoulder-launched.

SAMS – South African Medical Services

SANDF – South African National Defence Force (post 1994)

SAP – South African Police

SAR – search and rescue

SATCO – Senior Air Traffic Control Officer

scramble – traditional term used when fighter aircraft are ordered to take off immediately

shona – a shallow pan or an open area in the bush that fills with rain during the rainy season and is invariably dry during the winter months. Also chana in Angola

SOP – standard operating procedure, common parlance for anything that is a standard, recognized drill

SSO Ops – Senior Staff Officer Operations

SWA – South West Africa, now Namibia

SWAPO – South West African People’s Organization

SWAPOL – South West African Police

SWATF – South West African Territorial Force; both the SADF and SWATF were commanded by GOC SWA

tac HQ – a tactical headquarters instituted for the running of an operation close to the combat zone, commanded by a subordinate commander with guidelines and limitations delegated by a sector headquarters

Tacan – tactical air navigation facility

tail-dragger – any propeller-driven aircraft that has two main wheels and a third under the tail. This aircraft requires different techniques when approaching and taking off from those used by the more usual tricycleconfigured aircraft

Telstar – an aircraft flown at medium altitude to relay VHF messages from aircraft on low-flying operational missions

TF – task force

tiffie – a mechanic, from the word ‘artificer’ (military slang)