Colonel Mike Hoare led the flock of Wild Geese to the African Wars of Independence. Our starting point was New Year’s Eve 1964.

Rather than being a night of celebration and hope for the European population of Stanleyville the night ahead was to be a catastrophe without equal. The threatened and vulnerable city’s total population was set at 150,000 souls.

Fired up by revolutionary rhetoric and urged on by messianic firebrands, hordes of mostly young native Africans descended on the beautiful Belgian-built city of Stanleyville. 

Known as Simba, these wild natives presented a fearsome sight. Fuelled by drugs such as khat and believing they were invincible the marauders had the effect of acid on a Vatican artwork.

Rather than keep the peace the United Nations self-styled peacekeepers took to their heels.  It seemed something of a UN habit when we paused to reflect on a similar cowardly outrage that was to follow years later in Srebrenica during the Balkan Wars.

Congo Crisis ambush, re-group and attack. The peacekeepers’ spineless retreat left the city’s European population undefended. The attacking Simba were psychotic tribesmen and for these drug-crazed savages, it was open season on Europeans.

These jungle primitives were handed on a plate thousands of civilians courtesy of Belgium and the United Nations. 

Their favoured method of killing was to make a nun drink gasoline and then cut her open to set her on fire. Children were tied between Jeeps and torn apart. Crucifixion and castration were the norm. Only those who were there would understand (the scale of gratuitous depravities).’

The armed forces of the post-colonial transition government were not up to the job of aiding the city’s betrayed Europeans. For this reason, several about 120 mostly European mercenaries were hastily formed. Of these perhaps 100 were English speakers and only about 35 had any military experience. This was neither the time nor the place for the perusal of job applicants’ curriculum vitae.

These 120 men were tasked with doing what the United Nations and the emerging nation’s armed forces had failed to do. Divided into fighting units this small and poorly armed force clandestinely advanced and ‘injected into Stanleyville’.

LEFT: COLONEL ‘MAD MIKE’ HOARE.

The mercenaries’ purpose was to somehow secure the city, provide the terrified population with sanctuary and to set up a token defence. This done, the unit would hold out until greater forces could be employed and deployed.

Victims of Simba atrocities: Whilst ensconced the dogs of war would deal with the Simba. The small band of audacious soldiers-of-fortune had much to keep them occupied.

By this time, not only Stanleyville but the entire Katanga Province was suffering or facing the Simba menace. Units of the Wild Geese were to take the credit for the rescue of missionaries sprinkled throughout the Wamba and Mungbere countryside. The mercenaries also liberated and evacuated the Didi Oil Refinery.

The demagogue leading the Simba was the self-promoted General Olenga. The vainglorious warlord was not acting independently. 

The former railway clerk took his inspiration and orders from a native woman known as Mama Orena. Very much a shrewd and manipulative woman this mirror-image of South Africa’s Winnie Mandela empathised well with the native psyche.

Since the fake liberation of European South Africa, the image of Nelson Mandela’s wife has been laundered by media. Mandela’s wife is however best remembered for her passion for neck lacing victims.

The hapless prey would first be beaten to near death. The coup de grace would be administered by Mandela and her cohorts. A car tyre would be doused in petrol, placed on the unfortunate’s shoulders and set alight. Similar was the savage mindset of the Simba.

A natural leader, Mama Orena balanced rhetoric and drug hand-outs to create a psychosis that convinced the Simba natives that they were indestructible. 

Little is known of her fate after the liberation of the region as her tracks have been covered up. The considerable reward of $50,000 was placed on her head but it was never claimed. It is rumoured that Mama Orena went into self-exile in the United States.

The very name Simba struck terror into Europeans and Africans alike. Such was the mindless savagery of the Simba that two well-equipped battalions of government Armée Nationale Congolaise simply evaporated on word reaching them that the Simba were approaching.

Hardly surprisingly these Central African drug-crazed warriors, without the necessity of doing much actual fighting soon commanded half of the former Belgian Congo.

As the Simba poised to descend on Kasai Province and the frontiers of Portuguese occupied Angola the Simba appeared unstoppable. To his credit, Prime Minister Moise Tshombe acted decisively.

A resourceful and experienced leader he set about pulling together whatever forces were necessary to turn back the Simba tide. Moise Tshombe wasted no time and he was not too fussy about the background or credentials of those who made up the defensive forces.

As a consequence, the reactionary war against the Simba was soon going well. However, there was a desperate need for resourceful battle-hardened experienced mercenaries.

It was no secret that for the large part, the conventional forces of the Congo Republic were poorly trained and inexperienced natives in uniform. The army of the new Republic was in effect little more than irregulars. There was also a need for experienced servicemen to train these irregulars and conventional forces.

Again, Moise Tshombe acted decisively. The vacuum of military talent was filled by several hundred European dogs-of-war recruited in Paris, London and Brussels.

These formations of mostly experienced troops were largely made up of German, French, South African, Irish, Spanish and Portuguese military veterans.

Many of these men were veterans of World War Two campaigns and often former enemy combatants. Their soldierly expertise was decisive in the war against the Simba despite the fact that their presence as Europeans actually assisted the anti-European propaganda of the opposing forces.

The presence of these mostly European mercenaries was pivotal and the Simba onslaught was stopped in its tracks.  What motivated Europe’s ex-servicemen to drop whatever they were doing and deploy to Central Africa? 

First and foremost a soldier is a fish out of water in civilian life.  He misses the discipline, the training, comradeship and adventure.

If the pay is good then that is, of course, a bonus. Europe’s unemployed ex-servicemen were promised gold and substantial land by Moise Tshombe in return for their presence in his armed forces.

Held out was the promise of a privileged life as a European settler in a post-emergency peaceful and prosperous Congo Republic. As in the then Rhodesia, Portuguese Mozambique, Angola and European-managed South Africa, there would be ample opportunity for pioneers to own and manage vast swathes of productive landholdings.

These fighting men must have imagined sprawling villas and gardens, household staff and the perks of a settler’s life. Who then would wish to face their future as a factory manager, truck driver or perhaps salesman in Dublin or Ostend?

Mercenaries who had already been attracted to the Congo Republic found their ranks swelled by these new recruits. Most if not all these former servicemen were colourful characters and earned the last gladiator’s sobriquet.

Many British ex-servicemen would have seen action in Burma and Malaya, Cyprus, Korea, Aden, Kenya, Palestine and elsewhere. These Wild Geese were to become the fire-fighters in the war against the Simba.

The camaraderie and spirit not to mention the influence of the dogs-of-war can never be underestimated. The Congo Crisis was not confined to Katanga or any other single province.

Throughout the Congo Republic, there were many areas of armed conflict. Unrest, fighting and atrocities were widespread as warlords jousted for position and influence. Like wildfires, conflict was prone to break out anywhere. 

When conflict did break out it spread alarmingly and without warning. With hindsight, the Congo Crisis offers the opportunity to give due credit to a pan-European fighting force that was central to a conflict in which there were quite definite divisions of black and white.  Not in an ethnic sense but in a sense of good against evil. PLEASE SHARE OUR INSPIRING STORIES

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THE STIGMA ENIGMA. Michael Walsh award-winning novelist. Double-crossed in love, ex-mercenary Jack Scarlett has the sinister sinners of Liverpool’s underworld in his cross-hairs. Detective Chief Inspector Eric Jansen vows to stop his high-octane lethal feud. Can Detective Chief Inspector Eric Jansen stop Jack Scarlett, and does he really want to? CLICK PIC OR LINK TO BOOK https://michaelwalshbooks.wordpress.com/