The Seychelles affair
In 1978, Seychelles exiles in South Africa, acting in behalf of ex-president James Mancham, discussed with South African Government officials launching a coup d’état against the new president France-Albert René. The military option had been decided in Washington, D.C., after concerns for United States access to its new military base in Diego Garcia island, and the determination that René was not corruptible in favour of the Americans.[2][3]
Associates of Mancham contacted Hoare, then in South Africa as a civilian resident, to fight alongside fifty-three other mercenary soldiers, including South African special forces (Recces), former Rhodesian soldiers, and ex-Congo mercenaries[4]. Hoare agreed to fight for Mancham [citation needed].
When attempting the military deposition, Hoare and the others were disguised as a beer drinking fraternity, the “Ancient Order of Frothblowers”, arriving in a Royal Swazi jet on Mahé, and carrying their own weapons; nine mercenaries (Hoare’s advance guard) were already in the island on the evening of 25 November 1981.[citation needed]
An alert customs officer thwarted the coup d’état when he saw an AK-47 assault rifle in the luggage of one of the mercenaries.[2] Forty-five of the mercenaries escaped by commandeering an Air India jet (Air India Boeing aircraft Flight 224), which landed while they controlled the airport, forcing its return to Durban.[2] Four of the mercenary soldiers who were left behind were convicted of treason in the Seychelles;[4] however, South Africa negotiated their release with a $3 million ransom payment.[citation needed]
In January 1982 an International Commission, appointed by the UN Security Council, inquired into the attempted coup d’état. The UN report concluded that South African defence agencies were involved, including supplying weapons and ammunition[5].
Being associated with the South African security services,[2] the hijackers were initially charged with kidnapping, which carries no minimum sentence, but this was upgraded to hijacking after international pressure.[4]. Throughout his trial Hoare insisted that his operation had been blessed by the South African government: I see South Africa as the bastion of civilisation in an Africa subjected to a total Communist onslaught... I foresee myself in the forefront of this fight for our very existence; he was released in 1985.[citation needed]
One of the soldiers, an American veteran of the U.S. – Vietnam War, was found not guilty of hijacking, for being seriously wounded in the firefight, and had been loaded aboard while sedated.[4] Many of the other mercenaries were quietly released after three months in their own prison wing.[2]
[edit] The Wild Geese
In the mid-1970s, Hoare was hired as technical adviser for the film The Wild Geese, the fictional story of a group of mercenary soldiers hired to rescue a deposed African president. Ironically, Colonel Alan Faulkner (played by Richard Burton) was patterned on Hoare himself. At least one of the actors in the film had been an actual mercenary under Hoare’s command.
[edit] Works by Mike Hoare
Congo Mercenary, London: Hale (1967), ISBN 0-7090-4375-9
Congo Warriors, London: Hale (1991), ISBN 0-7090-4369-4
The Road to Kalamata : a Congo mercenary’s personal memoir, Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books (1989), ISBN 0-669-20716-0
The Seychelles affair, Bantam, ISBN 0-593-01122-8
Three Years with Sylvia, London: Hale, ISBN 0-7091-6194-8
Interesting! Thanks.