Paul Matthysen

Although the South African Recces never captured the popular imagination in the same manner as the SAS, the Green Berets or even the Selous Scouts, they were a formidable band of soldiers and their entry requirements were among the highest in the world.

The ‘Recces’ were the Reconnaissance Regiments of the South African Defence Force and date back to 1972 when partly in response to increasing isolation on the one hand and communist encroachment – especially in neighboring states – on the other, the Directorate of Military Intelligence established 1 Reconnaissance Commando at Oudtshoorn.

The Recces built up a reputation for extreme courage and stamina and, in 1980, with the formation of Zimbabwe, 3 and 6 Reconnaissance Commandos were activated for former members of the Rhodesian Selous Scouts and the SAS who joined the SADF.

In 1993, under the new political dispensation, the Recces were disbanded and the units renamed the 45 Parachute Brigade and, a couple of years after that when MK, APLA and the Homelands Defence Forces were incorporated into the new SANDF, the 45 Paras became the Special Forces Brigade.

It was never easy to get into the Recces and in the heyday of apartheid they were feared as vicious psychopaths – yet although trained to kill when necessary, the Recces were not primarily a fighting force.

First and foremost they were intelligence gatherers: their purpose was to perform covet operations, to get in and out undetected – and to do this successfully they had to be among the best of the best.

This book is short on stories of courage and derring-do: the humanizing personal element is almost entirely absent. What it does contain though are thousands of facts, pictures, diagrams and tables – a complete reference work to all things Recce.

Recce uniforms, knives, equipment, buckles, crockery, caps, ties, and certificates – even promotional items like limited edition bottles of wine, Zippo lighters, coasters and sugar spoons: they’re all here.

A glossary of terms and abbreviations is a godsend for those of us unversed in military nomenclature, but the omission of an index is hugely unfortunate and decreases the value of the book immensely.

Close observation of the Roll of Honour at the back of the volume and of the pictures throughout reveal the surprising diversity of this ‘sinister’ organ of the white male Afrikaner Calvinist Apartheid State.

Long before the country became desegregated, the recces were a microcosm of unity with black and whites, men and women, Catholics and Protestant working and dying together, joined in the Reconnaissance Brigades to an extent they could never be in civilian life.… (altro)