Battle Group Alpha
Eight days after entering Angola we finally arrived in theatre, comfortably within enemy Artillery range and only a few clicks from the contested Lomba river crossing now firmly held by 21st Brigade.
Collectively, the combined force of 61 Battalion Group and 32 Light Infantry Battalion, bolstered with infantry from 101 Battalion and two Battalions of UNITA guerrillas, were known as 20th Brigade. In total, SADF forces in theatre were equivalent in strength and size to about half of one FAPLA Brigade, though with UNITA support we were arguably the equivalent strength of a full Brigade, maybe a little more, but not much. Whereas, five FAPLA Brigades in the Lomba ‘pocket’ seriously outnumbered and outgunned us in almost every way.
Operating under the command of Colonel Deon Ferreira (AKA Falcon), 20th Brigade was split into three distinct Battle Groups (BG’s) – BG Alpha, Bravo and Charlie, each designed to offer similar tactical mechanised capacities with infantry, mortar, antitank and anti-aircraft capabilities.
Mysteriously, our logistics team made up of Colin Van Aswegen, Dave Chester, Chris Gouws, Marais, Botha and Koekemoer, were despatched to support the Artillery arm of Two Zero (20) Brigade.
Charlie Squad (90mm), Alpha Company (20mm) and Golf Battery (81mm) were designated Battle Group Alpha. In addition, Charlie Squad retained her Platoon of Storm Pioneers led by Lt Len Robberts. I never knew quite why they were attached with us but their primary role, as I understood things, was to blow stuff up, a bit like Engineers. For this purpose these guys secretly carried a unhealthy quantity of TNT explosive material in their two Ratels.
A similar force to our was drawn from 32 Battalion to lead Battle Group Bravo, while 61 Mech’s Bravo Company, with its eight Anti-Tank Ratel 90’s, two Platoons of Infantry riding in four Ratel 20’s, formed up with their 32 Battalion contemporaries to become BG Charlie.
Each BG was assigned a Company of 101 and UNITA light infantry soldiers for close protection and path-finding. We’d spend the following three weeks as three distinct, quick reaction strike forces better able to attack FAPLA forces on multiple fronts when required.