Special Branch War
eBook - ePub

Special Branch War

Slaughter in the Rhodesian Bush. Southern Matabeleland, 1976-1980

  1. 320 pages
  2. English
  3. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

Special Branch War

Slaughter in the Rhodesian Bush. Southern Matabeleland, 1976-1980

About this book

This searing account primarily covers Ed Bird's Special Branch (SB) service in the Beitbridge area of southern Matabeleland, 1976-1980, encompassing Operations Repulse and Tangent of the bitter Rhodesian 'bush war'.Joining the British South Africa Police (BSAP) in 1964, Bird cut his teeth on Selous Scouts 'pseudo' operations during Operation Hurricane in 1974-1976, so was well equipped to deal with the insidious escalation of the ZANLA and ZIPRA campaigns in the south of the country.A meticulous recorder, Bird implemented and maintained the Beitbridge SB incident log, and it is this diary of terror and death upon which Bird's account hangs, interspersed with detailed accounts of fire fights, ambushes, landmine blasts, ZANLA executions, traitors and assassinations, SB 'dirty tricks' and 'turning' terrorists.Although first and foremost an intelligence-gatherer, Bird thrived on combat and against all protocol inveigled his way onto Fire Force operations and as an air mobile MAG machine-gunner on converted Police Reserve Air Wing aircraft. Decorated for bravery but overlooked for promotion, Bird's BSAP career became victim to spurious political expedience.

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Yes, you can access Special Branch War by Ed Bird in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in History & Modern History. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Information

Publisher
Helion and Company
Year
2014
eBook ISBN
9781910294321
Topic
History
Subtopic
Modern History
Index
History

Table of contents

  1. Cover Page
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright Page
  4. Contents
  5. Illustrations
  6. Maps
  7. Glossary
  8. Foreword by Winston Hart
  9. Introduction by Don Price
  10. Special Branch Beitbridge incident log by Brian Perkins
  11. Author's note
  12. About Rhodesia
  13. Prologue
  14. Chapter One: Selous Scouts attachment, 1974-1976
  15. Chapter Two: Beitbridge: first blood to ZANLA, May 1967
  16. Chapter Three: Insidious intensification, late 1976
  17. Chapter Four: Overt intensification, January 1977-June 1977
  18. Chapter Five: Landmines, ambushes and poison, July-December 1977
  19. Chapter Six: Protected villages and the litany of terror continues, January–June 1978
  20. Chapter Seven: Dirty tricks
  21. Chapter Eight: A busy two months, July-August 1978
  22. Chapter Nine: Deployment of 1 (Indep) Company Rhodesian African Rifles, September-December 1978
  23. Chapter Ten: Routine slaughter, January-June 1979
  24. Chapter Eleven: Sweet Banana and a Q bus, July-November 1979
  25. Chapter Twelve: Transfer to Gwanda, November 1979
  26. Chapter Thirteen: A case of political expedience
  27. Afterword
  28. Appendix I: The Povo system: Beitbridge area
  29. Appendix II: Samples of the incident log
  30. Appendix III: Weapons used in the Beitbridge area of conflict
  31. Appendix IV: Letter from Lt-Gen G.P. Walls to Margaret Thatcher
  32. Appendix V: Foreign and Commonwealth Office responds
  33. Plates
  34. eBooks Published by Helion & Company