The biggest surprise about the revelations that there may, or may not, be 17 South African “mercenaries” trapped in Donbas in Ukraine — and who now, unsurprisingly, want to come home — is that anyone is surprised.
Earlier this month the presidency said it will investigate how the men ended up in the war zone in Ukraine, leading to police saying that they will investigate the alleged involvement of Duduzile Zuma-Sambudla, a daughter of the former president. She is also on trial in another matter about social media posts during the 2021 civil unrest.
Wars have often depended on auxiliaries to do the dirty work, especially when homegrown patriots — wary of lies — resist the call to eternity in Valhalla.
That’s because whatever technological advances have reshaped battlefields, only humans, in the form of infantry, can hold the ground, and the work of infantry grunts is dangerous, filthy and nasty.
Between 1963 and 1965, 328 MK fighters were trained at a secret camp in Odessa (reportedly chosen for its comparatively balmy climate)
If you can believe anything on the internet, a broad spectrum of men are fighting for Russia — hardened soldiers of fortune, adventurers, ideologues, North Korean conscripts, prisoners sprung from jails, right-wing fanatics, left-wing socialists from Spain repaying a debt from 1936, and maybe even young people from Africa and Asia with poor prospects in a global economy rigged against them.
It’s not the first time South Africans have gone to Russia for military training. Between 1963 and 1965, 328 MK fighters were trained at a secret camp in Odessa (reportedly chosen for its comparatively balmy climate), and that was just one of half-a-dozen camps.
But that was for a liberation war at a time when the ANC cause was just and there was no shortage of those willing to fight for their and others’ freedom.
This latest voyage of the scammed, however, is something else. It’s how young women from Eastern Europe find themselves working city streets in the West, or how teenagers end up running internet scams from work camps on the Thailand-Burma border.
And it’s how 17 men, reportedly promised jobs as security guards, find themselves on the frontline of a meat-grinder that is nasty, brutish, but (sorry, Hobbes) not short. Bring them home.
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