Episode 67–A rifle grenade in a ribcage, an Ionde minefield mishap and a Dragon

South African Border Wars

By now, 32 Battalion had setup their HQ at Ongiva airport, a few kilometers outside the town, and 40 kilometers north of the cutline. But the Battalion was going to move their mobile Task force HQ further into Angola to Ionde as you’re going to hear and the signs were all there for what would become a pivotal year in the Border War.
It was during this period that SWAPO would be driven out of much of the area north of the cutline, which would have political ramifications for both SWAPO and the South Africans.
This area stretching from the Calueque dam and Xangongo in the west to just south of Cuvelai and Vinticente in the north - then to Ionde in the east was secured by the SADF.
32 Battalion was going to concentrate its operations mainly in the north, around Mupa and Cuvelai. By now, 1 Parachute battalion was also established at Xangongo about 130km north of the cutline. If you recall, there was a friendly fire incident in 1982 where members of 32 Battalion and 1 Parachute clashed so from now on these two specialist units were assigned to specific areas that never overlapped.
Despite controlling Ongiva, SWAPO continued to raid around the town. On December 4th 1982 a SWAPO stick attacked a small village south of Xangongo and killed one civilian, wounding four. Another civilian was shot in Ongiva in another raid by SWAPO, then on the 11th and 12th December two more contacts were reported nearby.
Further to the east, UNITA had taken control of most of southern Angola stretching from the Kavango then almost to the . By January 1983 SWAPO had increased pressure further south, bypassing 32 Battalion and 1 Parachute and swinging around into South West Africa. Fourteen separate SWAPOs PLAN platoons of around 50 men each entered Ovamboland and Kavango by February of 1983
Then on the 4th February a larger battle took place between platoon 3 Alpha company and 40 SWAPO guerillas, at least six enemy were killed and four captured, but 32 sustained four casualties including a bizarre incident where Lance-Corporal Mario Oliviera turned into a living bomb.
Ongiva had become a kind of symbol of South Africa’s ability to take control of a foreign country’s territory. At the same time, 32 Battalion’s core officer component was concerned that they were not as effective now that there was such a large volume of SADF around the southern Angolan town.
Captain Willem Ratte who commanded 32s Recce wing eventually had enough and wrote a report about this. He had begun to eye Ionde as a possible new base for the specialist battalion and said so in a report entitled Viability study for the mobile task force at 32 Battalion HQ, Ionde.
While all of this was going on, the SA Air Force was planning a new weapons platform. A 20mm cannon was installed on a Dakota DC-3.