SOUTH AFRICA MAY BUY WARSHIPS FROM UNITED STATES

Grey River Argus, 18 August 1949, Page 5

SOUTH AFRICA MAY BUY WARSHIPS FROM UNITED STATES

(Rec. 9.30). WASHINGTON, Aug. 16. South Africa hoped to buy bombers and jet-fighter planes from the United States for training purposes, said Hon.-<Mr Francois Erasmus, the South African Defence Minister. He said that he would discuss the purchase of these aircraft and also of military and of naval equipment at meetings, to-day and to-morrow, with Mr Louis Johnson, the Defence Secretary of the United States, and with the Armed Service Chiefs. He said: "It is the policy of our Government to defend our own coast hne. and, for that, we will need equipment. Thus far, we have only a token naval force. We propose to start, in a small way, to build it up in the way that the other Dominions have done. You must have more than a token force if your policy is to defend a three thousand mile coast line”. Mr Erasmus said that South Africa contemplated no expansion in the strength of the other services, but it needed modern military equipment to bring them to th e peak of efficiency. His mission was one of investigation, to see what modern military equipment could be made available for the training of South Africans services.

He added: “Unfortunately, we are limited, by dollars, but we hope to obtain some material from the United States, which is pre-eminent in most of the branches of military equipment. Our forces cannot be large, so they must be good. Our endeavour is to have nothing secondrate about them”.