Rhodesian Armoured
Car Regiment

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ORIGINS

The Rhodesian Armoured Car Regiment (Rh ACR) first saw service in Abysinnia and North Africa in 1941-2 under Lieut-Col Blakiston-Houston, who gave his name to Rh ACR's base in Salisbury. Its original equipment was South African-built Marmon Herrington armoured cars (armed only with a Bren .303 (7.62mm) light machine gun), which the BSAP Armoured Car Unit continued to use for urban riot control until 1972, by which time they were 30 years old! Rh ACR was reformed after World War II, and equipped with 20 American Staghound armoured cars, but again disbanded in the 1950s. The Staghounds, which by then had passed to Support Group, 1 RLI, were moved to Kariba for border defence at the time of UDI in 1965, and one of them marked the event by firing a symbolic 37mm round in the direction of Zambia.

Rh ACR was reformed in 1972 as a Territorial unit under the command of Major Bruce Rooken-Smith. Its main equipment was the Ferret scout-car, armed with a single .303" (7.62mm) machine-gun. This 2-man vehicle was intended for light reconnaissance.

Rh ACR ORGANISATION
Initially, the Regiment consisted of 4 squadrons (A-D) each consisting of 4 troops of 4 vehicles. "C" squadron consisted of regular personnel. The others were made up largely of Territorials who were selected for Rh ACR, and given 6 weeks' specialised training in armoured warfare, vehicle handling, and gunnery followed by a 1-week crash course on mine countermeasures.

Clearly, only 64 purpose-built recce vehicles couldn't meet all the mobile tactical reconnaissance needs of a country half as big again as the UK. Hence, many of the local recce, routine patrol, and convoy protection, duties fell to locally-raised forces such as PATU reserve, using vehicles such as the Leopard already described. "George" and his companions tended to be used where fast, specialised recce vehicles were most needed ("his fire-power's might handy..."). In practice, this meant sensitive border areas and external ops, where elements of the Armoured Car Regiment were allocated at Squadron, or even Troop, strength to "Independent" (Indep) Companies.

Rh ACR's CONTRIBUTION TO AN ALL-ARMS TEAM
"Indep" companies contained armoured cars, along with elements of the Rhodesian Artillery with their 25-pdr guns, Infantry, and Engineers with mine-lifting skills. The Indep companies were "parented" by Rhodesia Regiment until 1977, and subsequently by RAR. There was a cadre of regular officers, but most of the manpower for all elements of the Indep companies (Infantry, Armour, Artillery, and Engineers) came from national servicemen on their initial 2-year call-up, or from Territorials doing their (increasingly) regular 6-8 week tours of duty.

The Indep Companies were deployed as follows. 1 and 4 were based at Wankie, (Operation "Tangent") covering Rhodesia's NW and SW borders, sandwiched between ZIPRA's main base areas in Zambia and Botswana. 2 was based at Kariba (Op "Hurricane"), covering ZIPRA's other main infiltration routes across Lake Kariba and the lower Zambesi Valley. 3 Indep, based at Inyanga, and 5 and 6, based at Umtali, (Operation "Thrasher') shared between them the unenviable task of covering ZANLA's innumerable infiltration routes into Rhodesia from its bases in Mozambique.

NEW EQUIPMENT - AND AN EXPANDING ROLE
In the last years of the war, Rh ACR was expanded and restructured to face the threat of "classical warfare" anticipated by the Rhodesian Army. D Squadron was equipped with MPCVs and expanded to include the armoured infantry which fought in them. It took part in extensive exercises on Somabula Plain in 1980 with the elements of 1 and 2 RAR which had been earmarked, and were undergoing extensive training, to operate as a mechanised infantry battalion. The MPCV was well-designed to operate alongside the Eland, and indeed was far superior to the obsolescent BTR 152s supplied by the Soviets to ZIPRA fo use in classical warfare alongside equally obsolescent T-34s. The only incident which tested this combination took place after the 1980 settlement at Entumbane. The fact that this abortive coup proved to be the end of ZIPRA's aspirations to political power speaks for itself.

CLASSICAL TANKS FOR A CLASSICAL WAR
Rh ACR was the unlikely beneficiary of the fall of the Ugandan dictator !di Amin. A freighter laden with T-55 tanks from Libya destined for him sought refuge in Durban after his atrocious regime had been toppled - ironically by similar tanks operated by the Tanzanians! The South Africans appropriated the tanks "in lieu of port dues", and offered them to the Rhodesians, who used them to equip the newly-formed E Sqn Rh ACR. They took part in the 1980 exercises described above, and it is rumoured that they were ready to roll in a coup planned at the time of the 1980 election. This scenario would make a fascinating plot for a thriller, because there is little doubt the tanks' influence could have been crucial. Subsequent photos show these tanks, supplemented by others of the same type, being used by ZNA's North Korean-trained 5th Brigade.

OTHER Rh ACR EQUIPMENT
E Sqn also had a number of T-34/85 tanks, which were said to have been captured from FRELIMO oncross-border raids. Bruce Rooken-Smith doubts this, and suspects they were supplied after the 1980 settlement from ZIPRA sources. One of these T-34s now reposes in the Army Museum at Bulawayo, but these aged and unreliable vehicles were never highly regarded, or much used, by either Rhodesian or Zimbabwean Armoured Corps.

In 1979, Rh ACR acquired Magirus-Deutz transporters for its tanks from South Africa. Because these vehicles were acquired late, they were not mine-protected like the earlier Leyland vehicles dubbed "Muppets". These had a trailer designed by Rio Tinto Zinc which could be used to transport up to 3 Elands, but was incapable of handling a T-55.

Cap Badge
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