Regiment Vaalriver

Regiment Vaalrivier
Active 1 January 1960 -
Country  South Africa
Allegiance
Branch
Type Reserve Air Defence Artillery
Part of
Garrison/HQ Vereeniging
Motto(s)
Insignia
Collar Badge Bursting grenade with seven flames
Beret Colour Oxford Blue
Battery emblems
Beret bar circa 1992

Regiment Vaalrivier is a reserve force regiment of the South African Army Air Defence Artillery Formation.

History

Regiment Vaalrivier [1] was established on 1 January 1960 as one of the Afrikaans medium anti-aircraft units. The unit was headquartered at Vereeniging.

Border War

Regiment Vaalrivier provided air defence in the Border War from 1976 to 1984 as part of 7 South African Infantry Division.

Equipment and Operations

Regiment Vaalwater was initially armed with 35mm Oerlikon and 40mm Bofors units. By 1975 The Regiment only had three batteries of 35mm of 12 guns per battery. Regiment Vaalwater provided air defence artillery for the border war in 1976 to 1980, stationing batteries at Grootfontein, Rundu, Ondwanga, Ruacana and Oshakati and once again Ruacana in 1980. By 1984 forward, the Regiment was involved in cross border operations as well.

Amalgamation

In 1997 members of Regiment Overvaal were amalgamated into the Regiment.

Migration

Regiment Vaalwater moved to Apex Base in Brakpan in 2008, but eventually was transferred to Kimberly.

Regimental Symbols

Previous Insignia

Battle honours

Freedom of the City

Regiment Vaalrivier received the Freedom of Vereeniging on 27 April 1963 and the Freedom of Vanderbijlpark on 31 October 1970.

References

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/22/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.