Vlamgat: The story of the Mirage F1 in the South African Air Force

Abstract

The tempo of change in Southern Africa has caused one nearly to forget the Namibian bush war of the 1980. The historical scene has also been dominated by the centenary of the Second Anglo-Boer War and the memory of 120 years ago the year before last year with the crucial battle of Isandlwana and this year the battle of Majuba.

Although it is important to comprehend the impact of the above named events in our history we must not forget the closer events that also shaped our lives. During the past decade books like Willem Steenkamp's Border War gave readers an insight into the war in which South Africa was involved from 1966 to 1989. In this book and a lot of popular photographic studies the role of the South African Air Force received some attention. However, these studies cannot in themselves be regarded as the definite study of the role of air power in this conflict as they either cover to large a ground, or tend to be too popular inclined.