Special Hearings — State Security Council Hearings — 1997-12-04

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: : I don't know how we have to work in this way.  I work with documents on which I've made some notes and I please want to find this specific place in my own documents.  These documents do not correspond.  If you bear with me I might find it.

MR MCADAM: It is just at that specific page, he sketches briefly his background service in South African police and security branch then in the South African Defence Force and going over, next to finally being on the National Party parliamentary caucus, defence study group as a member of the President's Council.   He then went on to say -   that's where he gives his background  On my page 98 he then goes on in the middle of the page  I'm going to send this person over, then he can point you directly to the page.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: : We have it.

MR MCADAM: : If I could just read firstly what he says there and then possibly I'll ask you to give comment if necessary.
"By their very nature covert operation rarely to my knowledge discussed or written about".
 He then goes onto quote, report about the Intelligence symposium held by the Intelligence service Head office in Pretoria on the 25th June 1982.   
"When survival is important it is often necessary for a service to resort to secret actions which does not comply with the laws, morality, norms or values which controls the public actions of the State.  Secretly both defensive and offensive is important coverage is used to allow the operatives to execute secret instructions".
 He goes on to say, 
"When I was instructed to present a paper at the symposium on the use of cover and secret operations as well as on the recruitment of long term deep cover agents or moles I discussed the contents of my paper with my colleagues and found no disagreements with the views expressed.  At the symposium I was not challenged on my views.  This report was also circulated to the highest level as the distribution list shows".
He then goes on on the next page to say. 
"I had no doubt that secret, violent and other actions against the revolutionary enemy were an accepted and approved procedure and our overall arsenal of counter- insurgency weapons".
 He then goes on and this is again at my page 102.  At the top of the page it says -
"Nevertheless the drift in the 80's was more and more towards a military dominated State."
 Mr Chairman we are almost to one o'clock, could we have an adjournment now and then at least we can check these two volumes and then see that they are correctly numbered and highlighted.  I think it's going to be a lot easier than having to battle like we are at the moment.
 Dr Barnard perhaps what we will do is during the adjournment we'll correlate the page numbers so that we don't waste time and then just before the break if I may just ask you one specific question in relation to Trevits which we referred to earlier.  Can I first ask you whether you received any military training?

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: : I don't following the question.

MR MCADAM: Sorry, can I just ask you whether you yourself received any military training.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: : Whether I've undergone any military training.   Yes.

MR MCADAM: And are you aware that in the South African Defence Force there is a division known as special forces?

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: Yes, I'm aware of that.

MR MCADAM: Could you briefly outline for us, as you know it, the task of special forces.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: I'm aware of the existence of the special task force in South Africa like in any country in the world.  These task forces are in America, in England there it is called the special air services.  You know they are in Israel the ...(inaudible) and in Germany there's special forces ..(inaudible),  the existence of  specialised military forces to, under specific military circumstances, provide specific top class functions is a matter as old as the history of waging wars it's not only in South Africa, it's worldwide.  To the best of my knowledge there were special forces in South Africa, and I'm under the impression this special task force with reference to the Defence Force was especially used for cross-border operations for Intelligence gathering regarding targets.

MR MCADAM: And when you refer to cross-border actions what do you mean by that ?

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: With that I mean what I've already stated in my statement, that I was in favour of should there be terrorist bases in neighbouring States military action could be taken against them.  That is in the first place.
 Secondly the responsibility to gather intelligence regarding targets.

MR MCADAM: And would you agree with the statement that in summary special forces are generally highly trained top level military operatives skilled in the conduct of operations.  They are trained to use specialised weapons in many instances and generally are trained to carry out operations which would include, as you correctly say as in other countries in the world, actions which may lead to deaths, that sometimes special forces are brought in in military conflicts and take actions which may result in deaths.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: You have mentioned a lot of concepts here specifically what are you referring to.

MR MCADAM: Sorry I will try to put it more crisply.  Would you agree that it would fall within the perview of the task of somebody in special forces to take armed action which may result in the death of a military target?

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: Yes.

MR MCADAM: Alright.  And special forces are members of the military they are not traditionally used and it would be very strange if they were used to effect arrests.  You don't generally employ special forces to arrest people for purposes of bringing them before courts of law .

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: If it's in the classical situation where there is war and peace neatly divided and where the country internally is safe and only regarding cross-border operations, that is the case.

MR MCADAM: Now earlier you told us that the functions of Trevits was the identification of targets but you maintained that it was not the function....(intervention)

MR TREURNICHT: No, Mr Chairman that was not the evidence.

MR MCADAM: I beg your partdon.   Earlier you told us that one of the tasks of Trevits was the collection of information in respect of Intelligence targets.

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: I would say there is a big difference in the way  you are formulating the question now and which you formulated previously.  I said Trevits was established to co-ordinate security Intelligence and to establish information databases regarding the specific matters regarding the internal situation and I said I can't remember very well, but it might have been that overseas Intelligence could also have been part of that.

MR MCADAM: Correct.  But they gathered that information for a purpose, that information would be handed on to another group of people, not Trevits, for action to be taken .

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: For the steps which those people could have taken, yes, that was why the information was provided.

MR MCADAM: Correct.  And included in the groups that Trevits passed information to  were in fact, you could say  the people acted on the information co-ordinated by Trevits were two groups -  firstly special forces and secondly the security police, would you agree with that?

LUCAS DANIEL BARNARD: Yes I don't have any knowledge of that.  I assumed that was the way it happened.  The Defence Force was not under my responsibility neither the police.  What the police or the army did with the information I do not know.

MR MCADAM: But I put it to you as a fact, and you don't have  information that would countermand that, that in respect of information co-ordinated  by Trevits action was taken by only two groups,  special forces and the security police .