COMPULSORY SERVICE

Waikato Independent, Volume XXXIX, Issue 3598, 26 August 1939, Page 7

COMPULSORY SERVICE

SOUTH AFRICAN TRADITION BURGHER COMMANDOES All ..able-bodied South Africans can be called upon, without any legislative preliminary, for military service. The bother over conscription in Great Britain has been regarded with mild astonishment byj South Africans, who have alwayes been accustomed to the idea of compulsory national service. ' Every white South African,, boy must, on reaching the age of 17 years, register for military training, and every white citizen between 17 and 60 years can be called upon to serve in defence of his country in any part of South Africa whether within, or outside the Union. *" The liability to render national service is part and parcel of South African 'national life. Nobody thinks of it as conscription, but it carries the same compulsion. The practice, significantly enough, was inherited-from the freedom-loving republics of the Transvaal and the Free State, whose citizens, from 16 to 60 years, could at any time be called on. by proclamation to serve the State. The law said 16 to 60 years, but boys of 14 years and greybeards of 70 years also counted it a duty to shoulder arms for their country. Although every white man is liable to undergo a course of peace training, not all who register on reaching military age are posted to the active citizen forces. A quota of recruits is required annually*, for each of the seven commands into which the Union defence system is divided for administrative purposes, and there are always more than enough volunteers to keep the various citizen regiments at their full strength. But the young men not required for active citizens force training are not lightly permitted .{to slip through the net. They are posted to defence rifle associations, and must fire annually a prescribed course of musketry. The rifle associations are popular and largely sporting in character, but include some of the best fighting material in the Union. They are the nucleus of the voluntary "burgher" (citizen) commandoes of the rural areas, famed for their mobility, knowledge of the ountry , and marksmanship.

The, burgher commandoes have a proud and acknowledged place in South Africa's defence scheme. They can be mobilised with 24 hours, and, lightly equipped after . the old republican mobilisation style, with "horse, rifle, and mouth provision for three days," they can move and strike rapidly if need be. Men trained in the citizen forces and burgher commandoes form the citizen force reserve, but South Africa also thinks in terms of a national reserve which comprises all those citizens who, not being members of any section of the forces, are liable to render service in time of war. When the national reserve register was opened the Union's Prime Minister and the deputy Prime Minister, both veteran generals of the Anglo-Boar War of 1899-1902, gave the country a lead by being among the first to register.