Wankie Campaign – Vorster Admits to South Africa’s Involvement in Rhodesia
On 8 September 1967, the Rand Daily Mail newspaper reported that a British Foreign Office official had denied South Africa’s military involvement in Rhodesia. However, on the same evening, before a crowd at Brakpan Town Hall, apartheid Prime Minister John Vorster confirmed that South African Police members were active in Rhodesia “fighting terrorists who originally came from South Africa and were on their back to commit terrorism in South Africa. I want to make it very clear that we are doing this with the approval of Rhodesia.”
Vorster further mentioned that he had instructed one of his ministers to inform the British government of such an arrangement. Later that evening, a convoy of South African armoured cars entered Rhodesia through the Beit Bridge border post. The Rhodesian Prime Minister, Ian Smith, informed newspaper correspondents the following day, 9 September 1967 that only South African Police units, and not the military, were involved. According to Smith, the South African Police units were being trained alongside their Rhodesian counterparts in areas of “terrorist” activity, but had not participated in any fighting thus far.
Meanwhile, on the same day, 8 September 1967, the Rhodesian Joint Planning Staff sent a SITREP (Situation Report) to the South African Air Force Headquarters, to the effect that Operation Nickel had been terminated except for police action. Rhode
