Get serious about army – or sell it

There is some debate about whether it was Napoleon Bonaparte who first said “an army marches on its stomach” – but there can be no doubting its wisdom.

No army can be effective if it is hungry, or without the right equipment.

World War I US Army General John J Pershing went further: “Infantry wins battles, logistics wins wars.”

Applying the truth of both of those observations to our present-day SA National Defence Force, it seems that our military will not only be hard pushed in any combat, but it would be near miraculous if it functions at all, given the state of its support services.

As we report today, some soldiers are even being forced to buy their own boots … and soldiers deployed in Mozambique experienced diarrhoea after being served rotten food in October last year.

ALSO READ: SANDF so broke, troops have to buy their own boots

While this sad state of affairs can partly be explained away by incompetence, the reality is that our defence force is simply being starved of the money which it needs to perform its constitutional mandate to protect our country.

We need to decide now whether we are serious about that mandate – and fund the SANDF accordingly. Or we may as well close the military bases and sell off the equipment.