Talk:Operation Beanbag

Deletion or Merge

There is another article of higher quality about the same subject. The "Operation Beanbag" article has POV issues and uses poor sources with a heavy bias. Essentially we are presented a version of events that is very tilted towards the apartheid government's (and it's military forces) narrative, even going as far as using the SADF's internal terminology and name for the "operation".

The events are presented as an ordinary and legitimate military operation, ignoring the violation of International Law by the attackers and the atrocious and racially motivated nature of this incident, which in a purely descriptive manner can only be referred to as a massacre.

The current version of this article presents a gross violation of Wikipedia's WP:NPOV requirements and relies on just two, highly questionable sources - one of whom is a former SADF propagandist and the other a non-academic website glorifying apartheid era special forces operations against anti-apartheid movements.

I suggest a deletion in favour of the other, more qualified article. Alternatively a merger might be a compromise, but it would require a good amount of overhaul.

@Tim taboi ndiwa and Conlinp: Deletion or Merge? DouwnsG (talk) 15:40, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

DouwnsG (talk) 15:39, 6 July 2022 (UTC)

Hi DouwnsG @Tim taboi ndiwa and DouwnsG: The background to this article and all the other South African Defence Force operations articles is that it was developed as a set of articles concerning the history of SADF military operations conducted during what is called the Border War from 1966 roughly through to 1989. And that is why the reader is given links to explore the background of events as to the politics of the time.

They are a set of articles about what happened from a military history viewpoint and not as to the legitimacy of the cross-border raids, or why politics on both sides necessitated the events. Wars and battles are fought by combatants, the politicians decide the political reasons for event.

Unlike American and European editors, we in Africa don't have hundreds of authors writing article's and books about events in our continent. We have limited primary sources, we battle to find books and articles, internet based sources and digital archiving are limited. We as African editors are constantly battling western bias when creating African articles that met their western standard of notability. Then on top of that issue, we as editors have to battle through and try create articles that balances the opinions of whoever in Africa or the West, who thought they were on the right side of history.

I am in favour of merger of the Matola Raid into Operation Beanbag. You could create two further headers for the political background of events that led to the raid and a reaction to the raid with the current references from the former article.

Alternatively, you could work on an article on ANC Military operation 1960 to 1990. You can then explain why their events should be presented as an ordinary and legitimate military operations, ignoring the violation of International Law by the freedom fighters and the atrocious and racially motivated nature of those incidents, which in a purely descriptive manner can only be referred to as massacres.

Thats tongue-in-cheek. That is why, if you decide to write military history articles, you describe the event and not the political reasoning. You don't decide if you are on the right side history. See the Russo-Ukrainian War as an example of trying to find a balance of who is right or wrong. Very hard.

I could have written an article praising the MK and the ANC effort to bring political legitimacy to South Africa and condemning the violation of Mozambiquan sovereignty or I could have written an article praising South Africa's right to protect it borders and citizens from communist backed terrorists. I instead chose to write an article about an military operation event that was not all together clear from either side and at least remembers the dead's sacrifice of this stupid part of history. Take care. Thanks. Paul . Conlinp (talk) 12:10, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

Hello again @Conlinp.

Your reply indicates that you deliberately refuse to acknowledge the criminal nature of the apartheid system and the atrocities committed by the security forces of the illegitimate former white Afrikaner minority regime against South Africans both inside and outside the country? This is not an issue of debate, we have to respect the international consensus here as recorded in the 1973 United Nations General Assembly's "Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid".

If you deliberately want to create a pro-apartheid narrative downplaying atrocities committed against South African émigrés in neighbouring countries terrorised by apartheid commandos during the 1970s and 1980s, atrocities which have been condemned at the time by major western, non-aligned and East Bloc nations alike, I would recommend you to seek other venues outside of Wikipedia to pursue your agenda.

WP:NPOV strictly discourages the use of poor and heavily biased sources to spin a predefined, subjective and biased political narrative about historic events. The Matola Raid, which has been condemned by the United Nations and the Commonwealth in particular and which is commemorated annually officially in Mozambique and South Africa, can not be glamourised and trivialised as just another, ordinary and legitimate military operation by an legitimate military actor. International Law and the territorial integrity of a sovereign country have been violated and people recklessly murdered in the privacy of their exile home in this incident by apartheid commandos.

Regarding your argument of a scarcity of sources about African affairs: this is not true for the Southern African region and the 1980s era covered in this article. This era and region has been well covered by a wealth of academic, journalistic and first-hand account sources. The issue rather seems to be that you have to rely on dubious and unsuitable sources, since you won't find many authoritative and citable sources that would support your narrative. Hence you use publications written by authors who either served in the forces of repression of the criminal apartheid regime or are ideologically aligned with it.

I don't appreciate your insinuation that I'm here to rewrite the history in favour of a biased pro-ANC narrative, which borders on a strawman type of argumentum. A proper depiction of apartheid atrocities is not equivalent to an uncritical appraisal of the ANC, even when the ANC has been the main adversary of the criminal white Afrikaner nationalist regime which disenfranchised the majority of South Africans. Hence I'm not sure what you are trying to imply by equating the legitimate actions of the primary resistance movement against apartheid to the atrocities committed by the criminal apartheid regime? Based on that flawed premise, we would also have to condemn the WWII-era French Resistance for having attacked Nazi German infrastructure and troops.

I have to maintain my view, that it would be best to delete the "Operation Beanbag" article, since the "Matola Raid" article covers the same event and uses a more neutral and objective evidence base. DouwnsG (talk) 16:54, 7 July 2022 (UTC)

Both of the articles are subpar. Both have sourcing issues. In this case, relying on a book written by a former participant is not ideal and should be avoided except for the most mundane claims, or attributed in text ones. I'd run away from the veterans association websites, they are hot garbage. I do support writing about this topic as the "Matola raid", since that is the WP:Commonname. The Matola article is actually outright more of a neutrality violation (it calls the raid "atrocious" in wiki voice.) The problem with this one is its reliance on poor sources, the Matola raid at least cites the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, which tends to present a more complete picture of events. DouwnsG, you seem wholly focused on presenting all of this in a normative fashion and envisioning everything as a war crime. I do agree that there tends to be a problem in the literature with the South African/Rhodesian military actions being written in a fashion totally divorced from the political realities of these conflicts. I also agree that the military infobox is probably not suitable for this event. That doesn't mean that this wasn't a military operation, even if it violated another country's sovereignty and war crimes were committed in the process. See Invasion of Kagera, where the both the military elements of the battle are covered as well as the raping, looting, and murder of the invading forces. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:05, 15 July 2022 (UTC)

Regarding the Matola article: The Department of Military Veterans of South Africa is not some ominous "veterans association", but an official government department of the internationally acknowledged post-1994 Republic of South Africa. All the sources used in the Matola Raid article fullfil neutrality and credibility requirements, unlike the sources used in the Operation Beanbag article. We can agree that the Matola Raid article can be extended in the future, to feature more in-depth details.

The Matola Raid could probably be seen as an ordinary military operation, if we assume that a) the attackers were ordinary military forces acting on the orders of a b) legitimate government against a c) legitimate military target. All these aspects are questionable in this incident. Presenting the event as an ordinary military operation would actually amount to a trivialisation of the incident and a justification of the apartheid state security forces actions against the South African dissidents, who were attacked while residing in exile in a sovereign, foreign country.

Regarding the use of a more neutral terminology: it's quite a challenge to describe an event, which involved the slashing of victims ears and faces with sharp knives and the subsequent execution style killing of unarmed people in a manner, that doesn't explicitly mention the violent nature of the attack.

May I quote the United Nations General Assembly's Special Committee Against Apartheid, which condemned the Matola Raid using the following words:

"254. The regime has, moreover, escalated its acts of terrorism, subversion and

aggression against neighbouring independent African States. Reference may be made

particularly to its raid on Matola, Mozambique, in January 1981, which resulted in

the brutal killing of a number of persons and the kidnapping of three South Atrican

exilesJ the assassination and attempted assassination of South African refugees and

members of the national liberation movements residing in the neighbouring

countries, economic pressures and threats of military aggression against zimbabwe

and other neighbouring States) and the massive aggression launched against Angola

since the end of July 1981"

https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/36352 DouwnsG (talk) 11:54, 15 July 2022 (UTC)

• • • To clarify, I was referring to the veterans website cited on this article, the private unit association. -Indy beetle (talk) 05:26, 16 July 2022 (UTC)