Special Hearings — Armed Forces Hearings — 1997-10-08

GEN VILJOEN: No, sorry, it's not in there.  It is a French peasant who quoted in the 16th century book on the Horrors of Wars or Religion in France, he said
"Who will believe that your course is just when your behaviours are so unjust"
So we had to bear this in mind and he carries on by saying:
"This question must be posed to all modern war but it poses a particular challenge to terrorism for the claim is typically advanced that for the overwhelming justice of the cause justifies the kinds of actions that terrorists commit"
And this was the situation which we were confronted with in 1986.  So we then had to adapt ourselves and I will not carry into the detail on that situation.  
 I was going to deal with a number of other subjects, I was also going to deal with some aspects of intelligence - military intelligence, especially the issue of communication operations but I think I will leave that now.  And I would like to conclude by saying a few things and I will switch over back to Afrikaans again.
 In conclusion, I want to refer to our acceptance of responsibility.  As previous heads of the army, we do not want to avoid responsibility for our activities.  We want to put it on our shoulders of our subordinates who acted in a disciplined way in executing their duties.  We will not follow the way and try to place all the responsibilities to the top structures of the politicians.   This old defence force was undisciplined and would not have acted without authorisation.
 This struggle cost many lives, not as may as in big wars but these incidents were accepted so intensively by the people in the communities.  It caused a lot of hatred.  Every life is precious and the loss of a life is not acceptable.  We would have wished to avoid that but without negating our accountability, we did not choose this struggle, we reacted.  The strategy of terror had in itself the essence of the violation of human rights.
 The inter-action between strategies caused an unworthy character on both sides.  The world reacted against the destruction by nuclear war and certain steps were taken to avoid that.  And this war to interact on the spirit of people, this should also be regarded as unwanted.  This is a war in which people become victims.  In my contribution I wish to warn against easy judgement against uniformed people from both sides.  It is easy today during the luxurious circumstances where you can have a good night's rest to criticise the army and also the revolutionary people.
 These judgements will debase the spirit of these people.  This positive observation is the spirit between these people and can take place much easier than in the political atmosphere.  To put it shortly, we who fought against one another can make peace easier until the politicians come between us.  Forgive easier and make peace easier until political intervention, then the relations tend to harden.
 And a last observation.  The Commission was dissatisfied that so few defence force members applied for amnesty.   So few, almost a million were involved in operations over the years and that's true that a very few people applied for amnesty.  I want to give a few reasons.  In the first place the army is by far consists of conscripts, they came from all levels of society and for all political spheres.  I was not possible to contravene acts or these things would become known and the conscripts changed too regularly to become part of the gross violations of human rights.
 The defence force made a study in the 1960's and realised that good relationships should be maintained because we want to operate correctly and we tried to establish training programmes in this regard and there was no place for violation of human rights.  The most operations of the liberation armies were illegal.  There should be more applications from that side than from our side.  We can understand the position from the other side, they had to do these things to arrive to their purpose and that was why we requested general amnesty for situations of war.
 The argument which is posed that the army was an unfair situation is propaganda but legally that does not put the actions of the old army against the laws.  The old army - our primary task which has been given to us in a legal way, it was necessary to do these things and this will be the test of a reasonable person.  Another reason why so few applications for amnesty came from the army was that we respected the non-combatants.  We know terrorism and counter-terrorism ...[inaudible] killed non-combatants is not morally justifiable, that's why we had to avoid that.  
 There are sources available to saying that in a struggle like this, certain officials may be targets on moral grounds.  Regarding the principles of a justified war, activities should be planned in such a way so few people from the civil society should lose their lives.  This was not always possible but we never - we always took this principle into regard.  If this happened it was unavoidable but we do not regard that as gross violation of human rights.  The army followed a progressive training policy and with regular intervals these people were re-trained as new tasks and strategies developed, new training was done.  People were just not pushed into a certain situation, we had high level commanding officers, very high discipline and it had very good results. These people should not be estranged when they try to reach for reconciliation.  
 We always subscribed to high principles.  We've tried to explain why in the South African defence force there's no reason for many amnesty applications.  It is a very painful recollection that there has to be a few amnesty applications.  The people who deviated from the norm should not discredit this massive organisation who did their work well, this would create a negative perception.   You were wrong in your supposition when you asked the question that the army was responsible and that they have to apply for the gross violation of human rights but thank you for allowing us to be able to bring this under your attention today and that we could have been any assistance to you.  Thank you very much.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much General Viljoen and thank you very much for keeping well in the time.  Could I just ask you, the last presentation that you made that you've just read from, is that available from here - it is in here?

GEN VILJOEN: No, it's not in there Sir.  Sorry, it was given to you right now.

CHAIRPERSON: Fine, thank you very much.  I just want to make sure that we've got the record.  Thank you again, it's a long and arduous task that you performed today and we appreciate it very much and also to those who assisted you in compiling that.  This certainly will be a very good backdrop for us to proceed in our work and I just want to make the point, without wasting any time, that it may be that we will want to meet with you once we have been able to read through this carefully, in case there are any clarifying points
that may come up - either privately or by writing or whatever.  
 And I think it was General Meiring who very kindly suggested that it there were further questions arising out of this, that we could find a way of getting those further answers within 30 days.  So we will proceed along those lines.  Thank you very much  indeed and now I would like to call General Joubert to the stand please.

CHAIRPERSON: General Joubert, I'd like to welcome you formally - you've already stood so thank you very much for anticipating the need to take the oath which my colleague Mr Ntsebeza will now take from you.

MR NTSEBEZA: Thank you Chairperson.

GEN JOUBERT: (sworn states)

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you, you may be seated.