Special Hearings — Political Party Recalls — 1997-05-16

CHAIRPERSON: Mr Mpshe are you continuing this line because there is just one little point, I don't know whether you are going to refer to it, in relation to the two incidents.  Maybe let me just ask General Viljoen.
 In the submission which is your answer to questions of the 6th of February 1997, you have got that, page 20 and page 21, it's a reference to both the incidents that Advocate Mpshe has referred to and you gave a response to, the World Trade Centre incident and the Mmabatho incident.  In your reply perhaps I should quote what you say in paragraph D on page 20 the second last sentence:
"This unplanned action...."
referring to the AWB forced entry, 
"...was the first of virtually every action which we undertook which in some way ended with an opposite result as was planned".
 And you then go on to say,
"I maintain, and will summarise later, that through third force activities of the intelligence agencies of the de Klerk government our planned actions were deliberately derailed to discredit our course".
 And on page 21, section F, paragraph 2, the third sentence, the fourth line.
"From the circumstances of this occasion...."
the occasion of the Mmabatho invasion,
"....I maintain that the action of the AWB was through third force activity from the de Klerk government".
 Now you may be aware that we had a fairly extensive discussion debate here before the Commission with regard to this elusive third force.  We were told in two submissions, one by General Malan, and then by Mr de Klerk, the third force that was discussed by the State Security Council was really a uniformed, envisaged a uniformed group that would be between the police and the army.  But the questions that most of us were saying when we use third force was to be referring to a sinister group which we thought seemed to explain some of what was happening in this country.
 You have used it in the second sense, is it possible for you to enlighten us further on what you know about this from your previous existence?
 Excuse me, Denzil Potgieter wants to add something.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson.  General just before you answer, could I also refer you to page 12 of that same first submission, the second paragraph on that page, there's a further reference.  You say,
"The suggested third force involvement in Black-on-Black violence to me is most distressing.  It seems to have happened".
Would you take that on board as well if you respond to the Chairperson's question?

GEN VILJOEN: Chairperson I think we're talking of two concepts.  My reference to a third force when I say the AWB action, I would rather say I should have used the word "agents".  I have no knowledge, in my time there was certainly not a consideration for a third force as General Malan explained it when he was here.  That was about 1986 and I retired in 1985.  So on that part of the third force I cannot give you any explanation.  What I can do is to elaborate a bit on the issue which I have raised, the possibility.
 The problem is we had a dirty war, and the revolutionary war is about what goes on in the minds of people, and it would be very easy to, through agents, create certain situations where people are easy to manipulate, such as the AWB, to create situations where you actually use the people themselves to discredit their own objectives or their own cause.
 I have spoken on this issue to General Johan van der Merwe and I have confronted him and he has given me the assurance that they did infiltrate the ANC, not the ANC, the AWB from the point of intelligence.  He said to me it was very easy to get information out of the AWB, and he explained to me how they went about this too, but he actually denied the existence of agents that would wilfully manipulate the actions of such an organisation as the AWB to reach the opposite of what they really had in mind.  However there were some other intelligence agencies which I have not approached in this regard.  
 What I say is unbelievable to see how well we have planned the World Trade Centre, and how we have even in the morning come together to have another coordinating conference, and I and my generals having been in the Defence Force we can do proper detailed planning.  And then at the very crucial moment that armoured car with AWB just came storming past.  Where did the armoured car come from?  Who arranged for it to be there?  Who arranged for that specific moment to break the glass and go in?  To me it's just fishy.  And at that stage I was worried.
 But then later on when we came to the issue of Mmabatho the very same thing happened.  What had eventually happened at Mmabatho was exactly the opposite of what we had in mind.  We sent a lot of people in order to reinforce the forces of President Mangope for the sake of maintaining peace, not for the sake of creating chaos.  And we deliberately, on the request of Mr Mangope, we prohibited Mr Terreblanche and his people to come to Mmabatho.  And I did so, not through my own authority, but through the authority of Dr Hartzenberg who was the Chairperson of the Volksfront Raad.
 So that night when I was contacted and I was told that the AWB is moving in I asked the Bophuthatswana Defence Force to send messages, to send liaison officers and to tell them that it's a message from me they must not enter the area, and yet they entered the area.  Now, eventually, they destroyed the whole cause for which we went there, and they actually made fools of us in what we were trying to achieve.
 So if you now think about the AWB knowing about this with agents of, let us say the security police within the AWB or national intelligence, getting to know of what was taking place because Terreblanche knew about this because he was a member of the Volksfront Uitvoerende Raad.  So it is the easiest thing in the world to plant a few agents there, or to have a few people, permanent members, and give them instructions, make sure that you do this, start shooting and create chaos so that the Volksfront would not succeed with what they are busy doing.
 So unfortunately I have no evidence to prove this, and maybe I am even prepared to say I might be irresponsible, but to me it is so logical that I really suspect that this would be the case.  So my term third force here actually refers to agents placed in an organisation to manipulate the actions of that organisation.  That Chairperson is what I referred to earlier on when I said we had a dirty war.  This is the dirty part of this kind of war.  
 And if you take the objectives of such things as, for example, armed propaganda, the very same thing could be, because remember when I started off I said the revolutionary war is about what goes on in the minds of people, so anything you can do to influence the thinking of the minds of people in a certain direction might be of value to you as a liberation force or as a defence force.  And the pity about this is eventually it destroyed our efforts and it had caused us a lot of embarrassment.

CHAIRPERSON: Denzil Potgieter.  Thank you General.

ADV POTGIETER: Thank you Chairperson.  General can I just come back to the Black-on-Black aspect and the section that I've highlighted on page 12, what sort of third force do you have in mind in that respect in the Black-on-Black violence situation?