By Thandisizwe Mgudlwa – AfricanBrains

“It is not sufficient to merely train military personnel today; they also need to be educated. A solid understanding of the legal, political, social and economic terrain is essential.”

These words belong to Prof Lindy Heinecken, Associate Professor of Sociology at StellenboschUniversity.

She is to present a workshop on military leadership and training at the upcoming Land Forces Africa conference and exhibition in Johannesburg next month.

Prof Heinecken feels that landward forces in Africa face specific challenges within the next 20-30 years, including dealing with military operations that are not conventional in nature, implying that future landward forces must develop the capacity to deal with guerilla tactics as well as other strategies employed by rebel groups such as civil disobedience and disinformation.

She explains:  “they need to be far more agile, decentralised, flexible and innovative to deal with these types of attacks.  Another important aspect is that future deployments will take place in states where even if there is peace, it is a fragile peace because of the lack of state capacity.”

Commenting on specific skills to deal with specific challenges facing this portfolio Prof Heinecken then declares that soldiers therefore need specific skills to deal with these combat and peacekeeping scenarios.

“Soldiers train for war and they down train for secondary functions. Feedback from military personnel indicated that more intensive training is necessary to prepare for and deal with unusual hostile situations and for better intelligence.  Today, it is not sufficient to merely train military personnel; they also need to be educated.

She continues: “A solid understanding of the legal, political, social and economic terrain is essential, or what has been referred to as the human terrain. This is necessary to enable soldiers to think and act from a ‘local’ perspective. They need to understand the culture, traditions, practices and power structures of the host country they are trying to assist and not to be seen as an intervening force, pushing an agenda down on the population.”

The military sociology professor also emphasizes the requirement of a highly sophisticated intelligence: “The wars in Africa do not require highly sophisticated technology. What they require is highly sophisticated intelligence. Rebel forces have gained control against technically advanced modern armed forces using light lethal weapons and transport suited to the terrain; and this could be donkeys, not tanks.

“I would say that in Africa, it is far more important to be equipped with the necessary ‘knowledge’ of the terrain, than with sophisticated weapons that cannot be used effectively in counter-insurgency type operations.”

Prof Heinecken’s workshop on “Military leadership and training for a collaborative Southern African Development Community (SADC) landward force” on 28 May at the Land Forces Africa event, is aimed not only at military personnel, but all those involved in supporting land forces in their deployments.

Prof Heinecken adds: “Today, land forces deploy with many other ‘forces’ and organisations involved in either peacekeeping or post-conflict reconstruction and development (PCRD).  This is particularly important for the military, as often they are not the lead organisation in planning and executing in PCRD missions and when they are asked to take the lead, need to be know and understand how to manage diverse groups.”

The Land Forces Africa conference will gather some 400 leading African defence force officials and security industry stakeholders to discuss the collaboration and streamlining of landward military operations inSouthern Africaand further abroad, to counteract internal and external threats.

This programme is scheduled to feature more than 30 industry experts, who are emphasising the push for a joint military approach inAfrica.

The prominent names include Lieutenant General Chander Prakash, Force Commander, MONUSCO, UN,Mr El Ghassim Wane, Director: Peace and Security, African Union, Ethiopia,Lieutenant General Vusimuzi Masondo,Major General Gaolathe Galebotswe, Commander of Ground Forces Command, Botswana Defence Force, Ambassador Sisa Ngombane, Deputy Director General – Africa Multi-Lateral, DIRCO, Martin Reeves, Manager: SA Army Portfolio, Armscor

With well-known security industry technology experts who will be there including representatives from SAAB, Denel, Grintek and BAE Systems.