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Rhodesian/SADF Loadout Discussion


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Bit of a thread revival - whilst this is not exactly new (and I'm guessing pricey for what it is?) http://www.kitmonster.co.uk/product_info.php/cPath/24/products_id/1744

 

How does the M83 vest fair as a skirmishing assault vest? It seems to be great for everything bar pistol mags and it doesn't look like it would support the use of a pistol belt all that well due to the...kidney (?) pouches but I can appreciate that it wasn't designed for the 'direct action' plate carrier and blast belt ops more common today.

 

Trying to find a rig that works well for fast skirmishing but can also be useable in milsims where you might get a big radio chucked at you and you need to carry day long supplies.

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I've got a M83 chest rig and the build quality is great, however it may not be useful for long milsim events as there aren't many pouches for extra stuff after mags.

 

Is the pouch placement the same as on the viper copies? I ask as I found some of the mag pouches were badly placed and when filled would get in the way of others making fast mag changes more difficult

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Bit of a thread revival - whilst this is not exactly new (and I'm guessing pricey for what it is?) http://www.kitmonster.co.uk/product_info.php/cPath/24/products_id/1744

 

How does the M83 vest fair as a skirmishing assault vest? It seems to be great for everything bar pistol mags and it doesn't look like it would support the use of a pistol belt all that well due to the...kidney (?) pouches but I can appreciate that it wasn't designed for the 'direct action' plate carrier and blast belt ops more common today.

 

Trying to find a rig that works well for fast skirmishing but can also be useable in milsims where you might get a big radio chucked at you and you need to carry day long supplies.

 

That's a high quality replica of the M83 vest hence the price. IMO mag postistions are a little awkward and has an abudance of utility space making it more suitable for longer patrolling rather then DA (90% of airsoft) stuff.

 

I have one of these: http://www.gbfmilitaria.com/shop/african-camouflage/sadf-nutria-brown-chest-rig/ and it rocks. As it's a chest rig you can use a belt easily and a buttpack should carry most of what you need.  

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That's a nice bit of Karrimor kit, but I prefer the original, of which I have far too many. Saying that, it's not a bad idea to modify the back to take a larger pouch...




I agree, for airsoft use, the M83 Vest type is not so good. I've done it a few times with various designs and MUCH prefer the M83 chest rig as piccied above. Fill it with mags, a grenade if you must, and a bag of BBs and speedloader in the rear pouch is all you need. I have a couple of Specops holsters (with mag pouches built in) on a belt (with a couple of Rhody water bottles on the back) if I really must use a brace of handies- Brownings, of course. Sadly nobody makes left handed Patt 58 or SADF web holsters.






Btw, would anyone be interested in buying the Rhodesian Foreign Legion T shirts? I have an original (posted a zillion pages back) and have commisioned an exact replica and can print many more...




20131003_173927.jpg




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And dressing up in uniforms and running around playing soldiers doesn't?

 

No, I don't think it does at all. It's no worse than any of the T shirts from UKMCPRO. And it is a REPLICA of an ORIGINAL I have from that era that was presented to foreigners who had signed up to help stop the collapse of Rhodesia and the so called domino effect of Marxism in Africa. I'm sure my grandmother and her family appreciated all the help they could get from these foregners, some of which who gave up their lives, to save hers. Ulitmately, they lost (or came second as the T shirt suggests...) but as you can see, they never lost their sense of humour or irony.

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I think it's in the same vein as the 'Adolf Hitler European Tour: 1939-1945' T-shirts I saw in Camden Market from time to time. It's funny in an irreverent way, but there's no doubt that irreverence makes light of the deaths of a lot of people. That's before you get into the extremely murky politics of the end of the colonial period in Southern Africa.

 

I'm no historian, but I'm going to guess that the foreigners who volunteered to fight for the white majority Government against the ZANU and ZAPU black nationalist movements are on the wrong side of history these days, just the same as those who volunteered to fight for the white majority Governments against the ANC.

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It was also all part of the previously mentioned Domino Effect much talked about at the time as pretty much all the black nationalists were supported by their Kommie puppetmasters. Go to South East Asia and fight local commies and nobody cares- fight local commies in Africa and you're racist? Much of the southern African wars of the time are glossed over nowadays as politically inconvenient, and didn;t get as much support as Asia at the time because nobody cared about Africa. No offence, but I don;t know if you're old enough to have lived through this stage in world history, but they (the Kommies) were perceived as a genuine threat and they were scary times. Sadly, both sides used smaller less 'important' countries to fight their wars in, it's just that some like Vietnam and Korea got all the press as the US was active there. The UK and Commonwealth did it's bit in Malaya, and other parts of Asia and Africa, but where's the Hollywood blockbusters on that?

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Yes, and I think I'm right in saying that most historians now think the Domino theory was complete rubbish, and in a lot of its application was neocolonial and led to the wholly unnecessary death of millions of people. Some places Western intervention seemed to have made a useful difference - I don't think many people in South Korea wish they were living North of the border - but in a lot of places it's pretty obvious that politics were being used to prop up racist, colonialist regimes.

  • The successive Vietnam wars were characterised by indigenous, nationalist movements (the Viet Minh, later the Viet Cong) brutally suppressed by the colonial power they were trying to evict (France, then the US-backed Government).
  • The Bush War was characterised by indigenous, nationalist movements (ZANU and ZAPU) brutally suppressed by the colonial power they were trying to evict (Britain, then Rhodesia's settler-dominated Government).
  • The Angolan War of Independence was characterised by indigenous, nationalist movements (UNITA, MPLA and FNLA) brutally suppressed by the colonial power they were trying to evict (Portugal).
  • The Mozambican War of Independence was characterised by indigenous, nationalist movements (FRELIMO et al.) brutally suppressed by the colonial power they were trying to evict (Portugal).
  • The Namibian War of Independence was characterised by indigenous, nationalist movements (SWAPO et al.) brutally suppressed by the colonial power they were trying to evict (South Africa's settler-dominated Government).
  • The end of apartheid was characterised by indigenous, nationalist movements (ANC et al.) brutally suppressed by the colonial power they were trying to evict (South Africa's settler-dominated Government).

I'm not saying that some of these movements weren't funded and supplied by Communist powers (notably China and the USSR), but that doesn't make the cause they were fighting against any less wrong.

 

There are international volunteers who ended up on the right side of history - the International Brigades in Spain and the 1st American Volunteer Group, for example - and there are international volunteers who ended up on the wrong side of history, like SS Division Wiking. I think those who volunteered to prop up the Rhodesian regime - regardless of their reasons - are in the latter camp.

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CBA to get into the very  nuanced politics - I'm talking about perception, so when I say "indoors" I mean you'd be nuts to wear it in public. Taking the explanation at face value - that is really, really niche humour that 99% percent of people will not understand. The Hitler world tour t-shirt is outrageous enough to be an obvious joke. They (general public) are more likely to associate Rhodesian with at the very least, high racial tensions, the word xenophobia is self-explanatory (yes I do know what it means!), and the skull is reminiscent of the SS! 

 

So I disagree with you when you say it has "nothing" to do with racism.. it's got a bit to do with racism, at least.

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No offence, I understand where you're coming from, but no, I don't think it is racist. PLease don't confuse Rhodesia with South |Africa and it's apartheid regime, of which I was dead against. Pretty much all Rhody farmers looked after their black workers and schooled their kids and provided medical help. They weren't slaves but employees. And many helped fight Mugabe and his thugs, mainly because of opposing tribalism. When uncle Bob took over, the first people he took action on weren't whitey but the opposing tribes, which is pretty much the story behind all African independance stories, followed by greed, cronyism and corruption. Show me one African country that actually improved after independance? I'm not saying colonialism is a good thing at all, but the single biggest factor in African and asian and Middle Eastern political problems is the way we Europeans carved up the countries with artificial borders that took no regard of tribal districts or territories and the rivalries that go with it. So once law and order were replaced by independant corruption, things got pretty hairy to say the least!    

 

I totally understand and respect what you're saying, but very few people I have ever spoke to knew about Rhodesia and the war, apart from a few vets and disposessed refugees who no longer have the country they grew up in, my long dead grandmother for one.

 

B)

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I'm not saying that some of these movements weren't funded and supplied by Communist powers (notably China and the USSR), but that doesn't make the cause they were fighting against any less wrong.

 

There are international volunteers who ended up on the right side of history - the International Brigades in Spain and the 1st American Volunteer Group, for example - and there are international volunteers who ended up on the wrong side of history, like SS Division Wiking. I think those who volunteered to prop up the Rhodesian regime - regardless of their reasons - are in the latter camp.

 

 

 It's true that a lot of the Americans who joined the Rhodesian Army did so because they were war junkies going cold turkey after Vietnam ground to a halt. Also a lot of the British and ANZAC SAS who joined up did so for combat experience. I doubt if many at all joined up to help prop up Smith and Co, although I have read accounts of many, mainly Brits, who did just that. The right and wrong side of history is purely subjective. I'm sure the Chinese (my father in law for one) who helped the Vietminh  to overthrow the South truly  believed that they were on the right side, as did the many many southerners who welcomed the Americans, Koreans, Aussies and others who came to their defence. Malaysia was 'overthrown' by the Chinese minority (with help from their Communist Chinese backers) but it was the Malays who betrayed and backstabbed them once independance had been granted, and they had done sod all for the cause and now treat the Chinese malays (who have been there since 1400s) as second class. Was what the Rhody government did any different than what the Americans did- declare independance from their colonial masters? Except they didn't then try to brutally wipe out their indiginous peoples.... Remember, that white Rhodies weren't the colonial masters- that was the UK- the Rhodys were all African, black or white or somewhere in between and the Rhody government was fighting for it's independence too. I totally agree that the Rhody government wasn't perfect but they were on the right path until the UK government sailed them down the river. Things would have turned out a lot different if Uncle Bob hadn't taken over and singlehandedly destroyed one of the richest and greatest countrys in Africa. That's my opinion and I respect that yours might be different. :)

 

Anyway, here's a picture of a kitten to lighten things up a bit.

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Sorry but caught up with this thread after a bit of an absence (which included spending 4 months in Africa, inc Zimbabwe)

 

Just gonna point that over 80% of Rhodesia's standing Army were black.. in a country where whites, not blacks, were conscripted meaning that all the blacks who faught again the communists were Volunteers!

 

Also in 1979 universal sufferage was granted under the new name of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia with a Black head of government, but because that wasn't Bob they carried on the fight.

Both ZANU and ZAPU had plans to kill off the other after the civil war just Mugabe's 20,000 attempted genocide was somewhat more successful than Nkomo's attempts. Which shows neither were interested in "black nationalism" which had already been achieved under Zimbabwe-Rhodesia but their own greed and power

 

Anyone who says people have more freedom in Zimbabwe than in Rhodesia is either a member of ZANU or completely delusional 

 

But anyway - TIA

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Can't remember if his is real or repro. I want to say real but I'm not 100%

 

And the shorts are British OG lightweight shorts which have been tailored up.

I'm planning the same with a pair of trousers despite having just got some original Rhodie Green PT shorts :)

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