Military intelligence � My personal experience (Part 2)
Richard Moleofe | Friday June 6, 2014 16:44
Among the first units to be formed in the formative years of the defence force was the Military Intelligence headed by Major Fire Katse who had come from the old Police Mobile Unit (PMU) which was a paramilitary unit of Botswana Police Force. When I came into the military institution in 1990, there was some transcending transformation as most of the Old Guard from PMU were slowly vanishing from the ranks of BDF through a natural process of aging.
One attribute these old men possessed in common was wisdom, at least a majority of them. The New Guard of Officer Cadets some of whom had gone to the world’s finest military academy of Sandhurst which is only second to West Point in the US were itching for change. According to them, it was time the BDF conformed to being a military as opposed to being a police paramilitary wing. And they were right.
At the time when Major Katse established MI, the immediate need was the protection of the President especially from the Rhodesian infiltrators. From the onset they worked like the American Secret Service whose primary role is the protection of the President. Like the US Secret Service, MI largely operated in private clothes to avoid detection by members of the public. After Zimbabwe gained independence in April 1980, the security challenges changed and MI had to revert back to doing military intelligence work and they were now faced with a mightier enemy south of here.
The incursions of the South African Commandos into Botswana in pursuit of the liberation movements’ asylum seekers required a total paradigm shift in the thinking and the manner in which they operated. This became the defining moment for the MI. This unit was stuck in its old ways and instead it transformed itself in the wrong way as they now became spies against their own comrades in arms.
This is where the hatred and the enmity of regular soldiers and the MI operatives stated and continues to exist to this day. Under Katse’s predecessor, Colonel Rankhudu, MI operatives were thinly spread throughout operational units of the BDF for the sole purpose of spying on other soldiers and the tradition has continued to today. At one point it got so bad that a pilot assaulted the MI agent that was always tailing him at a shebeen in Francistown.
Years later MI was lucky to be headed by Colonel Fisher who wanted to instil proper military intelligence work ethic on the unit. Fisher encountered stiff resistance because the whole unit was complacent with none accountability and the spying on fellow soldiers instead of doing what their job description required. You know the universal truth about military intelligence is that they are supposed to stick to what their name says. Ultimately Fisher left and he had achieved very little in getting the transformation of this unit rolling. He later became a victim of the very unit he headed.
So from the synopsis above we come to understand why there is so much noise about the missing intelligence equipment. BDF’s MI was tailored to its circumstances at the time of its inception and their primary role hasn’t changed with time it seems. It puzzles me even with my military background and experience of 20 years with BDF how on earth a military intelligence organ would lend a civilian civil servant tools of the trade. If there was any urgency to fulfil any clandestine operation at that level of government, it is the role of DIS to carry out the role and not MI. MI should strictly focus on intelligence information gathering which is for the benefit of operational units.
The reason why there have been serious gaps in military intelligence gathering is because MI has lost direction. From the late 70s to the mid 80’s BDF’s MI had a challenge of keeping up gathering information about the South African Defence Force which often sent their intelligence operatives into this country disguised as professionals. One of the greatest achievement of Bureau of Security Services (BOSS) was the successful setting up and operation of the infamous Newslink Newspaper which recruited some of the top journalists in the country. It was through the collaboration of ANC and PAC intelligence operatives that the falls company was bust. So the BDF was forced to forge a relationship with the refugees who were acting primarily with their own security in mind.
After South Africa got liberated in 1994, there followed the Truth AND Reconciliation Commission which forgave all the sins of all those who committed crimes through political influence. At the time Botswana announced that all those Commandos who infiltrated the country and killed people here will continue to be regarded as murderers and pursued to justice. Upon hearing the news, the former exiled South Africans filtered information into Botswana’s intelligence organs about the whereabouts of these culprits and Botswana Government was reluctant to act. When I studied at the University of Cape Town I came to learn through sources there that some of the people in our government are afraid of being exposed if they pursued these killers because at one point or another, some of our people here collaborated with the white rulers in identifying the refugee hideouts.
When one of the officers that I served with at BDF HQ arrived at the South African Naval College, some black students passed information to him about the Commando Group that conducted the raids here. The officer collected all the necessary information and asked to meet me. After our meeting I urged him to pass the information to MI because he was senior and more familiar with the finer details. Regardless of his efforts MI did nothing.
The details included the position of the base where this Commando Group still operated from and he also had an opportunity to visit the base during one of their student tours. Something I did not have access to since I was studying in a civil institution. In fact some of these fellows continued to enjoy holidays in Botswana and apparently one of them was at the time running a safari company in the Okavango.
I was not surprised that MI sat on this rich information. Out of an earlier experience, I had passed on similar information about the Commando raids in Gaborone. I was attending a military conference which was held at Klaperkopi in Pretoria in 1996. This is an exclusive security facility for SADF MI and it sit right at the top of a hill as the Afrikaans name suggests.
On one of our breaks I had a fruitful chat with one of the retired major generals of the past era who shared with me his personal account particularly on the June 14, 1985 Commando raid on Gaborone. In fact he was just bragging about his achievements as team leader. According to him, he was stationed under the Tlokweng bridge for the entire time of the operation with explosives at the ready to demolish the bridge if BDF raised any unexpected resistance. Their withdrawal came right after the last of BDF’s American made V150s armoured vehicles crossed the bridge in pursuit of the killers.
I am not writing about speculated information. I passed this information to Brigadier Masire who was Chief of Staff at the moment and he promised to send and MI officer for a de-brief and I am still waiting to this day. The MI account brought here may be painful and discomforting to certain individuals because it compromises their integrity and loyalty to the principle of country first. But in my view this account is honest, bold and truthful in its full essence. MI needs to get back to the drawing tables after a thorough introspection.
*Richard Moleofe is a Retired Military Officer