The Rise of the Rifles

In their maroon tarbooshes and crisp khakis, the King's African Rifles stood tough and tall in the front rank of Britain's far-flung battle line. Whether the enemy was a spear-swinging Somali shifta or a Japanese marine behind a clattering Nambu machine gun, the well-disciplined askaris of the K.A.R. could be counted on to attack as ordered. Last week, from the headwaters of the Nile to the beaches of the Indian Ocean, the Rifles were barking again. But this time their muzzles were trained on British troops and their own recently independent governments.

The chain of army mutinies that rocked East Africa like an earthquake had its epicenter in Zanzibar, where bloody revolution sent shock waves rumbling up and down the Great Rift. Before the aftershocks subsided, the British Commonwealth governments of Tanganyika, Uganda and Kenya had been severely shaken.

Anarchy's Victory. The first mutiny erupted in Tanganyika's capital of Dar es Salaam, and gunfire rattled through that humid "Haven of Peace" for the first time since German gunboats held target practice there during World War I, when Tanganyika was part of German East Africa. Before it died away, at least 20 Tanganyikans were dead, whole blocks of the Arab and Indian quarters lay in ruins, and President Julius Nyerere's government--once considered East Africa's most stable--had been seriously discountenanced. The mutiny was made possible by Nyerere's decision to send 300 crack Tanganyikan cops to Zanzibar to help restore order there. No sooner had they left than the 1,600 African enlisted men of the Tanganyika Rifles rose with machine guns, mortars and grenades, arrested their British officers and noncoms, then defied their commander in chief to do something about it.

The rising grew out of a "misunderstanding." Five weeks ago, Nyerere put an end to the national policy of Africanization, under which black Tanganyikans were given government job preference over Europeans, Arabs and Asians. To the African troops, this sounded as if Nyerere was welshing on his promise to send British officers home later this year and put black officers in charge. They also wanted their basic pay increased from $14.84 a month to $36.40--roughly the equivalent of what dockworkers were making in Dar es Salaam.

Months, Even Years. Mutinous troops from the Colito barracks outside Dar quickly grabbed key points in the city, and as rioters raged through the streets, Nyerere went into hiding. Fearing a coup, he dispersed his Cabinet to prevent arrest, sent Defense and External Affairs Minister Oscar Kambona, a hard-working leftist, to negotiate with the mutineers. Kambona got the troops back to their barracks only by sending the British officers and men out of the country and promising to look into the pay question. But it was a victory for anarchy, and no one was more aware of that fact than Nyerere. He emerged nervous and shamefaced at midweek to tour his torn capital, found himself unable even to reprimand his cocky army for fear of a new revolt. The mustachioed, mild-mannered ex-schoolteacher had been proud that in the 17-year-struggle for Tanganyikan independence not a single life had been lost. Now he said sadly: "It will take months and even years to erase from the mind of the world what it has heard about the events this week."

Short-lived Triumph. Even as he spoke, the infection of mutiny was spreading. At Jinja, neighboring Uganda's second largest city located at the headwaters of the Nile some 50 miles east of the Kampala capital, two companies of the Uganda Rifles followed the example set by their former brothers-in-arms. They locked up their British officers and demanded a pay hike similar to that which the Tanganyikan troops had asked for. When Prime Minister Apollo Milton Obote sent his Internal Affairs Minister to negotiate, they arrested him as well. But Obote had learned from Nyerere's experience. He sent police to secure the Owen Falls dam and thus cut the main highway from Jinja to Kampala. Then, swallowing his pride, the man who had often ranted against "colonialists" and "imperialists" called for British aid. Within the hour, 450 troops from the Staffordshire Regiment and the Scots Guards were winging in from Kenya. As they took positions at the Entebbe airport and in the capital, Obote agreed to discuss the mutineers' demands, and order was restored.

In Kenya, Prime Minister Jomo Kenyatta already had begun to fear that his Kenya Rifles might be the next to rebel. With so much of Kenya's British contingent on duty in Uganda, he asked London for additional troops. Immediately, the 700 Royal Marine Commandos of Britain's home-based strategic reserve were bundled onto Africa-bound planes. But before they arrived, Kenyatta's fears were realized. Mutinous troops of the Kenya Rifles stationed at Nakuru, in the heart of the Rift Valley 100 miles northwest of Nairobi, were up in arms. They seized the armory and locked their white officers and noncoms in the officers' mess. Their triumph was short-lived. In roared British Royal Horse Artillery in Ferret armored cars, and in a brief gun battle the rising was quelled, leaving one mutineer dead and one wounded. The rest were quickly thrown behind barbed wire.

Rocketing Rout. With the Uganda and Kenya rebellions quelled for the moment, only Tanganyika's Nyerere remained in any danger from his own army. That situation was rectified at week's end when, at Nyerere's request, the aircraft carrier H.M.S. Centaur in Dar es Salaam harbor went into action.

Figuring that they could frighten the mutineers into submission with lots of noise, the British cut loose with a predawn barrage of blank charges over Colito barracks. As the sleepy mutineers ducked for cover, helicopters fluttered off the flight deck and dropped 60 combat-ready Royal Marine Commandos onto the rebel base.

Led by Brigadier Patrick Sholto Douglas, the deposed commander of the Tanganyika Rifles, the commandos burst through the main gate and began hurling "Thunder Flashes"--noisy firecrackers used in training to simulate mass attack. Douglas shouted in Swahili for the 800 mutineers to surrender. When they refused, the commandos slammed a 3.5-in. bazooka rocket through the barracks, blasting out windows and peeling back most of the roof. Three Riflemen were killed and 20 wounded, while 400 were captured. The rest, many in pajamas or underwear, headed for the bush. Julius Nyerere was back in power however tentatively. But his country would never be the same again.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.