Also keep in mind that the Rhodesian government had a plan to transition to majority rule, unlike South Africa when they dug their heels in right up until the end.

Rhodesians wouldn't give in to Commies, but don't let anyone tell you they were bitterly clinging to the old ways.  They had a plan to educate a new crop of educated, capable, Westernized blacks to assume control via elections.  It was impossible, with foreign meddling, to do this.  

Ian Smith's autobiography lays it out.  We may get caught up in the day to day ops of the bush war, but politically they were on the right track in the 70s to have a successful transition of power.  Smith's paternalistic language would probably be jarring to many people nowadays, bordering on infantilizing their black population, but it isn't inaccurate.  If they were going to assume control of a Western style democracy, they had to be prepped for it.  The alternative, a Commie strongman with "blame whitey" slogans, is far too easily swallowed by the masses.

Sorry to hear about your micro penis... along with that big chip on your shoulder.

But hurt, you are. You lost. Just leave it be.

Other great source books for the conflict are the Africa@War series published by 30 degrees South publishers in Pinetown South Africa

They have a whole series that covers Rhodesia, Biafra, South Africa, Kolwezi, Casinga and etc. I ordered most of the series from them in 2016. Not sure if they still publish or not, but some great source books for when I was working on my Masters. Those books led me to other books and so on and so on.

And my interest in the conflict - and other conflicts of the 60s-90s in sub Saharan Africa revolved around counter insurgency operations and European intervention into African conflict zones. Rhodesia’s government internal policies not related to military operations were not a factor to me.

Selous Scouts were some of the best ever at conducting infiltration, reconnaissance and as needed direct action.

Through things like land apportionment, Rhodesia's government provided a lot more prosperity to some than it did to others.



"We totally had a plan to transition to majority rule" is the Rhodesian Lost Cause myth. In actual fact the 1970 constitution reduced black representation in government. While it theoretically provided for increased black participation over time, no actual increase occurred in the decade it was in place and it capped black representation at 50% of the assembly, making majority rule impossible.

But but but but he’s a “vet”.

They had an entire continent of examples of what happens when blacks rule.

You think maybe they were smart enough to know better than to do the same?

Rhodesia wasn't a lost cause. It was a cause lost.

Went from the thriving, bread basket of Africa to..Zimbabwe for very specific and clear reasons.

It is pathetic that people ignore truth.

Someday I'll find one to go with my Rhodi CZ's  

Even if he does at least he has a job and doesn’t live on “disability” cuz my PTSD.

Francis is that you?

This.

Operation Dingo was full of awesomeness

I think that majority rule was inevitable. Less than 10% of the population could never keep more than 90% of the population subjugated in a world where the AK-47 exists.

I think that spending a decade and a half telling 90% of the population that they'd never achieve equality made things worse by driving people into the arms of the commie guerilla groups. Robert Mugabe was a nobody at the time of UDI. For all the Rhodesians' tactical brilliance, the Bush War was a massive strategic failure.

I work full time and draw exactly ZERO from the VA in connection with my service, but nice try.

Yes, and because of the commies and their melanin and deviant sexual preference based hiring practices (as well as who gets "equal" treatment under the law) we will likely get to find out how great a north american zimbabwe can be.

The Selous Scouts did some incredible damage in Eland.

The Rhodesians had  an incredibly staffed and trained military - despite the sanctions.

Five Romeo Romeo has an ongoing series on early Rhodesian History available on youtube, though its a very casual atmosphere. John Van Zyl often has interviews with Rhodesian Army soliders. Fireforce ventures on Instagram occasionally posts memorials for soliders of various sticks. That's about the extent of my knowledge because I'm scouring for actual Rhodesians to tell their history.

... talkin' about the man!

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What Carter and the rest of the world couldn't wrap their ignorant brains around was you can't take a functioning 1st world country and hand the keys over to a group of people who are still living in mud huts.  The transition would take time, decades most likely to educate the majority population so that they could take the reins.  There is also something to be said that had the white man not been so charitable to the black population the imbalance would most likely not have occurred.  

Most data I have seen says many of the black in southern africa were immigrants and absent western/modern medicine and agriculture most likely would not have had the population growth to have such an imbalance. Take our own country, absent our charity what do you think would be the life expectancy of most 3rd world immigrants coming to the US today?  

Majority Rule is itself a lost cause. It doesn't work. Not here, not in Africa, not in Europe, Asia, nowhere. It's a trite sound bite that appeals to the very lowest thinking level of your brain, but when implemented in reality causes nothing but death and sorrow.

So Zimbabwe was a historical inevitability.

Majority rule was inevitable; but maybe Zimbabwe wasn't. The Bush War lead to a vast expansion of black guerilla groups, guaranteeing that the most violent black nationalists would eventually rise to power. If the Bush war had been avoided by creating an authentic path to majority rule in the 60s, the end result might have been a more peaceful transition of power, marginalization of the black guerilla groups, and a better end product; something like a Muzorewa lead Zimbabwe-Rhodesia but with the domestic and international respect needed to survive.

That's the one. Recent re-print. Good book, but I look at Cocks' recollection as the basic entry model. For a better and more informative RLI story, I recommend At The Going Down Of The Sun by Charlie Warren, BCR



Fucking outstanding build. I'd take some sandpaper to the receiver to "wear it in" a little, but all the vital parts of a Rhodesian R1 are there.



Blacks constituted, at various points in time, 60-70% of the Rhodesian Security Forces. By '79, black lieutenants and captains were being commissioned.

Yup, I lost, you're clearly the better man (by default).

Either way, you fucked another thread in GD, congrats.

Thank you for your service to the establishment.

Maybe seek out help for your personality disorder.

Lol. Get over yourself.

Projection much?

By no means exhaustive, I've posted the list of titles in my Rhodesiana section of the library. These are all hard-copies; I've not yet catalogued the digital works I have. Almost all of these can be found on Amazon.

A History of RhodesiaRobert Blake1978
The Rhodesia War: A Military HistoryPaul L. Moorcraft, Peter McLaughlin2010
The Rhodesia Regiment 1899-1981Gerry van Tonder2014
Selous Scouts: Rhodesian Counter-Insurgency SpecialistsPeter Baxter2011
Zambezi Valley Insurgency: Early Rhodesian Bush War OperationsJ.R.T. Wood2012
Bush War Rhodesia: 1966-1980Peter Baxter2014
Rhodesian Light Infantryman 1961-1980Neil Grant2015
Operation Dingo: Rhodesian Raid on Chimoio and Tembué 1977J.R.T. Wood2011
Rhodesian Fire Force: 1966-1980 Kerrin Cocks2015
Selous Scouts: Top Secret WarRon Reid-Daly, Peter Stiff1983
Selous Scouts: A Pictorial HistoryPeter Stiff1984
Assignment Selous Scouts: Inside Story of a Rhodesian Special Branch OfficerJim Parker2006
Bandit Mentality: Hunting Insurgents in the Rhodesian Bush War: A MemoirLindsay O'Brien2017
A Handful of Hard Men: The SAS and the Battle for RhodesiaHannes Wessels2015
We Dared to Win: The SAS In RhodesiaHannes Wessels, Andre Scheepers2018
Men of War: The Fighting Few Who Took on the WorldHannes Wessels2020
Shadows of a Forgotten Past: To the Edge with the Rhodesian SAS and Selous ScoutsPaul French2013
The BleedJohn Cronin2017
When the Going Was Rough: A Rhodesian StoryJames MacBruce1983
A Walk Against the Stream: A Rhodesian National Service Officer's Story of the Bush WarTony Ballinger2015
Dingo Firestorm: The Greatest Battle of the Rhodesian Bush WarIan Pringle2013
Story of the Northern Rhodesia RegimentW.V Brelsford1990
Dirty War: Rhodesia and Chemical Biological Warfare 1975-1980Glenn Cross2017
Bound for Africa: Cold War Fight Along the ZambeziDouglas H Hubbard Jr.2008
The Cheetah: Magazine of the Rhodesian Light InfantryChris Cocks2011
War In the Air: Rhodesian Air Force 1935-1980Dudley Cowderoy1987
Mr. Boomslang & 7 Other Rhodesian Fireside Tales (Volume 1)Douglas John and Milton Schorr2015
Three Sips of Gin: Dominating the Battlespace with Rhodesia's Famed Selous ScoutsTimothy Bax2013
Blue and Old Gold: The History of the British South Africa Police 1889-1980Peter Gibbs, Hugh Phillips2009
James and the Duck: Tales of the Rhodesian Bush War (1964-1980)Faan Martin2007
The Captain's Journey 2nd EditionIan Scott2016
Rhodesian Air Force Operations: With Air StrikesPreller Geldenhuys2016
Counter-Strike from the Sky: the Rhodesian All-Arms Fireforce in the War in the Bush 1974-1980JRT Wood2009
Intake 131: Memories of a Rhodesian Officer CadetSandy Sanderson2015
Beyond No Mean SoldierPeter McAleese2015
Hot and Cold: Memoirs of a Rhodesian SAS SoldierBrian Jackson2018
If I Should DieTom Hampshire2006
Fireforce: One Man’s War in the Rhodesian Light InfantryChris Cocks2000
Survival Course: Rhodesian Denouement and the War of SelfChris Cocks2018
Sanctions BusterHarvey G. Ward1982
Chibaya Moyo 2: The Rhodesian African Rifles: An Anthology of AnecdotesTelfer & Fulton (editors)2019
Spider Zero SevenMike Borlace2018
Equus Men: Rhodesia’s Mounted Infantry: The Grey’s Scouts 1896-1980Alexandre Binda2015
The Fading Light: Memories of a Professional Soldier's Five Decades of War…John Gartner2020
Jack Malloch: Legend of the African SkiesAlan Brough2020
Murder in the Zambezi: The Story of the Air Rhodesia Viscounts Shot Down…Ian Pringle2017
African Days Hollywood NightsMichael Pierce2020
Mampara: Rhodesia Regiment Moments of Mayhem by a Moronic, Maybe Militant, MadmanToc Walsh2014
Rhodesian SAS Combat ManualRhodesian Forces2020
Never Quite a SoldierDavid Lemon2000
Operation Lighthouse: Rhodesian Internal Affairs 1972-1980Gerry van Tonder, Dudley Wall2015

Incredible collection.

Thanks! However, I'm just a fucking amateur.

Africa always wins.

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I’ve read and reread Moorcraft &McLaughlins book and also the Rhodesian civil war by Frame. Both great works. Fire force gave me a great appreciation for how the RLI conducted their operations and then it was all down various rabbit holes learning about Selous Scout operations and also how their SAS did things and the division of labor between the two. Absolutely fascinating war to study.

To all the people posting FAL’s without Rhodesian camo in here, you should be fucking ashamed.

Why? Only about half of FNs or MAGs ended up painted. Even at the end of the war, a black FAL would be commonplace.

That said, painting an FAL with babyshit and green is highly satisfying.

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Just get the fuck out of here girls.

I'm gonna avoid getting to into the poop slinging that this thread has become and try and save it.  

But suffice it to say, stories of slotting floppies sent me to Ft Benning somewhere between when we were terrified of the red menace and started killing for big oil

Anyway, my computer died between the last big Rhodesian thread (whereing I posted many pics) So I'm gonna use this as an opportunity to fill some hard drive.

First couple of posts will concentrate on Civilians as an analog for what America may become.

Ultra rare AR in Rhodesia- Mamma bear on a convoy

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This pic has been colorized, but I don't think I ever saw it.  I like this woman's spunk... yeah

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Home defense plan taken to the next level

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Women were definitely part of the safety plan

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What happens when your plan wasn't good enough (this might be from Viscount downing)

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Terrorism, definition? Deliberately targeting civilians with an eye to affecting political change.

Civilian Bus

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Civilian Vehicle

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Can't go down to the creak without your baby poop FN

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What I think of in ARF thread where people say they want a small, plane pickup truck

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Could I mount this on top of my Nissan Frontier?

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@lew By any chance have you ever heard of a book called either "The Mercenary" or "The Mercenaries"?  It was fiction about an American mercenary, I think an ex-SF capt, hired to run a cross border mission into Mozambique.  I think.  The cover of the paperback showed a man standing in Portuguese cammies, wearing a black beret, cradling an Uzi.  It was a really good book but I've never been able to find it again.

And the same people ignore the violence and other abuses from the commies and continually criticize those that oppose them.

Universal suffrage is doomed to fail. Even in successful societies the losers will eventually outnumber the successful.

Lol. “If only the whites surrendered sooner it wouldn’t have been as bad.”

@hardcorps1775

Can't say that I have, but I don't spend much time on fiction.

@hardcorps1775

"The Mercenaries: American Soldiers of Fortune" was a collection of historical stories of American professional soldiers.  It included a section by John Early who worked with the RSAS and Selous Scouts and fits the description.  Wasn't fiction (at least not entirely) I might be able to find my copy lying around

Link

He's six month old now and his ridge and swirls are more defined...............a wicked mamma's boy !

I initially thought this thread was about Ridgebacks....love the content either way !

ost.