In this article we will begin a story about the famous condottieri of the 20th century and the amazing African adventures of "wild geese" and "soldiers of fortune". Among them were the servicemen of the French Foreign Legion, who in the second half of the twentieth century found a new area of application for their talents.
We are not your monkeys anymore
This story dates back to June 30, 1960, when a new state was formed on the territory of the former Belgian Congo - the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). At the ceremony of proclamation of independence, Patrice Lumumba said, addressing the king of Belgium Baudouin: "We are no longer your monkeys." A phrase that simply kills with its spontaneity and is completely unthinkable at the present time.
In our country, hearing the word “colonizer”, they usually imagine an Englishman in a cork helmet and shorts, beating an African with a cane, bent under the weight of a sack. Or the soldier from this photo:
But even the British considered the French to be dumb and narrow-minded racists:
However, the Belgians, perhaps, surpassed everyone: they were pathologically cruel - to the point of caricature.
But look what heavenly pictures about life in the Congo were painted by the Belgians themselves (propaganda poster, 1920s):
Meanwhile, on the rubber plantations of the Belgian Congo, workers died faster than in the concentration camps of Nazi Germany. The Belgians usually put other Africans as supervisors over the negroes, who cut off the hands of careless workers. They then sent them to the Belgian colonial officials as a report on the work done. As a result, the population of the Congo from 1885 to 1908. decreased from 20 to 10 million people. And in 1960 there were as many as 17 university graduates in the whole of Congo … for 17 million local residents. Three of them held minor administrative positions (the remaining 4997 vacancies were occupied by Belgians).
Later it turned out that there are also rich deposits of copper, cobalt, uranium, cadmium, tin, gold and silver in the Congo, and the Belgian Jules Cornet, who conducted research into the subsoil at the end of the 19th century, called the Congolese province of Katanga a "geological sensation." And the Belgians were not going to give up their economic interests in the Congo. French and British companies, also actively working in Katanga, were in solidarity with the Belgians, so on July 11, 1960, the governor of this province, Moise Tshombe (and also the prince of the African people Lunda) announced its withdrawal from the DRC.
In a confrontation with the central authorities, he decided to rely on the Belgian officers who remained in the Congo, as well as on the "Merseneurs" - mercenaries whom the Katanga newspapers modestly (but proudly) called Affreux - "Terrible".
Belgium, France and Great Britain did not dare to recognize the new state, but rendered every assistance to Tshombe.
And then the province of Kasai declared independence.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo was literally falling apart, it all ended with a military coup by the Chief of General Staff Mobutu (a former sergeant who immediately became a colonel), the assassination of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba (who had previously turned to the USSR for help) and the intervention of the UN, which sent an entire army to the Congo. This conflict was further complicated by the crash when landing in the city of Ndola (now part of Zambia) of the plane on which the UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold was (September 18, 1961). Six commissions were involved in investigating the circumstances of the disaster. Finally, in 2011, experts came to the conclusion that the plane was still shot down. In January 2018, a statement by the Belgian paratrooper P. Kopens was published, in which he claimed that the attack was carried out by his compatriot Jan Van Rissegem, who was flying the Majister training jet aircraft, converted into a light attack aircraft. Rissegem then served in the troops of the unrecognized republic of Katanga.
But let's not get ahead of ourselves.
French Condottiere
In 1961, the French Minister of Defense Pierre Messmer sent two very interesting men to Katanga: the current officer of the Foreign Legion Roger Fulk and the former major of the Navy Gilbert Bourgeau, who, at the head of a thousand "volunteers" (among them there were many former legionnaires and legionnaires on vacation), undertook to guard European mining and chemical companies in Leopoldville (now Kinshasa). Fulk and Bourgeau did not suspect then that they would become one of the most famous and successful condottieri in world history, and one of them would also become famous for the creation of the famous mercenary recruitment company known as the "Soldiers of Fortune".
Roger Fulk
This "brigade" was led by Captain (in the future - Colonel) Roger Faulques, who was called "a man of a thousand lives", later he became the prototype of the characters in the books by Jean Larteguy "Centurions", "Praetorians" and "Hounds of Hells".
Like many other officers of the Foreign Legion, Fulk was an active participant in the French Resistance, after the landing of the Allies he served in the "Free French", receiving the rank of corporal and the Croix de guerre at the age of 20.
After the end of the war, Fulk entered the Third Regiment of the Foreign Legion with the rank of sous-lieutenant. Then he ended up in Indochina - already with the rank of lieutenant: he fought in the First Parachute Battalion, where at that time he served and not yet famous Pierre-Paul Jeanpierre. Fulk was first wounded in 1948, and during the battle at Khao Bang (1950) he received four wounds at once and lay in the forest for three days until Viet Minh fighters found him. As seriously wounded (actually dying), he was handed over to the French side. Fulk was awarded the Order of the Legion of Honor, was treated for a long time and nevertheless returned to duty - already in Algeria, where he was subordinate to his old friend Jeanpierre, becoming a scout of the First Parachute Regiment. Under Fulk's leadership, several underground cells of the FLN were defeated.
Bob Denard
Another commander of the "vacationers" was Gilbert Bourgeau - also a partisan during World War II and a veteran of Indochina. He was much better known as Robert (Bob) Denard.
He was born in China in 1929 - his father, an officer in the French army, was then in the service. He spent his childhood in Bordeaux. Since 1945, Denard served in Indochina, in 1956 (at the age of 27!) He was already a major. But from the army he was "asked" after he, having pretty much taken on his chest, smashed the bar: he decided that there he was treated with insufficient respect. He went to Morocco and Tunisia, served in the military police, and then became a member of the OAS and was arrested on suspicion of plotting the assassination of French Prime Minister Pierre Mendes-France, and spent 14 months in prison.
In an interview with the Izvestia newspaper, which G. Zotov took from him in 2002 (he later called this conversation the main journalistic success of his life), Denard said:
“Very often I found myself in a situation: if I do not kill, they will kill me … And then there is no choice left. But never in my life have I shot a woman or a child. The same goes for revolutions: I didn’t make them on my whim, it was work”.
Somehow I immediately remember the "immortal" lines:
Knife and ax workers, Romantics from the high road”.
So, Roger Fulk and his people were then subordinate to Tshombe.
And later, having already parted with Fulk, Denard headed his own battalion - "Commando-6".
Mike Hoare and Wild Geese
Thomas Michael Hoare arrived at Tshombe at about the same time.
Michael Hoare was Irish born in India (Calcutta) on March 17, 1919. Shortly before the outbreak of World War II, he joined the London Irish Rifle Regiment, where he quickly became a shooting instructor. In January 1941, he was sent to study at a military school in Droibich, the certification issued to him then by the commander read: "Strong-willed and aggressive type."
At the end of 1941, Hoare, with the rank of second lieutenant, was sent to the 2nd Reconnaissance Regiment of the 2nd Infantry Division, which in April 1942 was sent to action against Japan. Hoar fought in Burma (Arakan campaign, December 1942-May 1943) and India (Kohima, April 4 - June 22, 1944). He served in the long-range reconnaissance group of Brigadier General Fergusson, ended the war at the headquarters of British troops in Delhi, at that time he was 26 years old, and he was already a major.
Demobilized, he received a degree in accounting, and in 1948 he moved to South Africa, to the city of Durban. He lived well: he ran a yacht club, arranged safari for wealthy clients, and traveled. I also visited the Congo: I was looking for the son of an oligarch from South Africa, who disappeared in the jungle. At the head of a small detachment, he then boldly marched into the unknown lands of Africa. And in one of the villages called Kalamatadi, he found a young man … half eaten by cannibals. To please the customer, Hoare ordered the destruction of the cannibal village.
As you can imagine, a person with such abilities and with such a character required much more adrenaline than he could get in Durban. And so at the beginning of 1961 he ended up in Katanga, where he headed the Commando-4 unit. Why "4"? This unit became the fourth in a row, which was commanded by Michael in his life. In total, 500 white mercenaries and over 14 thousand Africans were under the command of Hoare. Among Hoare's first soldiers there were many lumpen, he himself recalled:
"There were too many alcoholics, brawlers and parasites who were not hired anywhere else … There were cases of homosexuality."
But Hoare quickly put things in order, weeding out the most worthless and training the rest. The discipline in his units was always at their best, and the methods of education are simple and effective: with the handle of a pistol on the head for attempts at wrangling, and once he personally shot one of his subordinates, who was very fond of playing football, big toes as punishment for the rape of a local girls.
Hoare's other battalion, "Commando-5", or "Wild Geese", became much more famous: mercenaries were called that in medieval Ireland, and Hoare, as we remember, was Irish.
For this unit, Hoare even compiled a set of 10 rules: in addition to the usual combat instructions (such as "always clean and protect your weapons"), there were such: "Pray to God every day" and "Be proud of your appearance, even in battle; shave every day."
And the tenth rule was: "Be aggressive in battle, noble in victory, stubborn in defense."
Preserved information about the "salary" of the first "Wild Geese" in the Congo: privates received 150 pounds a month, 2 pounds a day for pocket money, 5 pounds a day during the fighting. In the future, the payment of their "labor" increased: upon concluding a contract for six months, they received (depending on the position and the intensity of hostilities) from $ 364 to $ 1,100 per month.
The most famous "goose" of this battalion was Siegfried Müller (Congo-Müller), a World War II veteran on the side of the Third Reich, who later wrote the book Modern Mercenaries, Modern Warfare and Combat in the Congo.
On the basis of his memories in the GDR, the film "Commando-52", banned in the FRG, was filmed. And then the East Germans also shot the film "The Man Who Laughs", in which his former colleagues told about Mueller. This film got its name because of the "trademark" smile, which has become Muller's "calling card":
Muller was called a "Prussian", "Landsknecht of imperialism", "an executioner with experience" and "a former SS man" (although he had nothing to do with the SS), and his character was "a collection of bad features of the German nation", but he himself proudly called himself "The last defender of the white West."
However, some consider him just a show-off and a talented "self-promoter" who created a myth about himself - a heroic legend in which he appears as a true Aryan, an ideal mercenary and super-soldier. And all of his "iron crosses" and jeeps decorated with human skulls are called props and decorations of a vulgar operetta.
In fact, Mueller did not seem to live up to Hoare's hopes: he was appointed platoon commander, he was soon transferred to the post of chief of the rear base.
Black jack
In Katanga, there was also a Belgian (more precisely, Flemish) Jean Schramm (also known as Black Jack), who lived in the Congo from the age of 14. In his "best years" more than a thousand Africans worked on his huge plantation (its area was 15 square kilometers) near Stanleyville.
That all changed in 1960 when the plantation was ravaged by supporters of Patrice Lumumba. Schramm, who had nothing to do with military affairs and did not serve in the army, led a self-defense detachment, for some time "partisan" in the jungle, and then created a "black and white" battalion "Leopard", or "Commando-10", in which the officers were Europeans, and the rank and file were negroes from the Kansimba tribe. Thus, Jean Schramm became the most famous and successful layman among all the commanders of mercenary squads. In 1967, his name will thunder all over the world, and for a short moment Jean Schramm will become better known than Mike Hoare and Bob Denard.
Comandante Tatu and the Simba Movement
And in 1965, the Congo was also visited by black Cubans, led by a certain "Comandante Tatu" - to help comrades from the revolutionary movement "Simba" ("Lions"), headed by the former Minister of Education and Arts Pierre Mulele.
Especially frostbitten "lions" were adolescents of 11-14 years old who practiced cannibalism (youths), whose cruelty knew no bounds.
And Mr. Mulele, whom some European liberals then called the Black Messiah, Lincoln Congo and "the best son of Africa", was not just a former minister, but also a shaman of the "new school" - a Christian trained in China with a Maoist and pseudo-Marxist bias (very fashionable in Africa at that time). He declared the murdered Lumumba a saint, who should be worshiped in specially built sanctuaries, and generously gave his followers a potion of mugangs (local sorcerers) "dava", making them invulnerable. According to him, this drug worked flawlessly: it was only necessary not to be afraid of anything and not to touch women. To convince his people of the effectiveness of the "dava", he used a simple trick of "shooting" the rebels who had drunk the potion with blank cartridges (who, by the way, were not privy to Mulele's venture, so the "volunteers" trembling with fear had to be tied up so that they would not run away). The funny thing is that Simba's opponents also believed in the "magic water of Mulele", who often surrendered without a fight or retreated, because they believed that there was no point in fighting people who could not be killed.
Trouble for the rebel Simba began when they encountered Belgian paratroopers who attacked them as part of Operation Red Dragon in Stanleyville, Kisangani, and Mike Hoare's white mercenaries. At first, the "invulnerable" simbu were not even afraid of aviation. Gustavo Ponsoa, a Cuban pilot for Hoare's squad, recalled:
"Some even waved to us a second before our missiles smashed them to pieces."
But let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Meanwhile, under the name of the mysterious "Comandante Tatu" was hiding none other than Ernesto Che Guevara.
It is quite difficult to reproach this "romantic of the revolution" for sympathizing with blacks, and he had never even heard of political correctness and tolerance. His answer to the question of Cuban businessman Luis Pons "What actions is the revolution going to take to help blacks" became truly legendary:
"We're going to do for the blacks what the blacks did for the revolution, that is, nothing."
What can I say here: this Argentinian knew how to "formulate" and speak in aphorisms.
Miguel Sanchez recalled that in Mexico, preparing for the landing of troops in Cuba, Che Guevara constantly called one of his associates (Juan Almedia) "negro". It sounded insulting in his mouth, and it hurt Almedia very much. Sanchez advised him: "Listen, Juan, when Guevara calls you El Negrito, call him back El Chancho (Pig)."
This technique worked: Che Guevara got rid of him and made no attempts to "remember" and somehow take revenge either then or later.
However, class solidarity is above all. Che Guevara honestly tried to teach his African "brethren" anything other than the merry massacre of everyone they could reach. But miracles do not happen, and the legendary commandant did not succeed. But more on that in the next article.
In general, you yourself understand: when all these talented, experienced and authoritative people appeared on the territory of the Congo, it was a sin for them not to fight there, and hostilities began very soon. We will talk about this in the next article.
