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Authors: Julian Rademeyer
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crossed into Zimbabwe on a mission to destroy forty diesel locomotives that Robert Mugabe’s ZANU-PF government had recently purchased. To ensure deniability for the South Africans, they were clad in old Rhodesian camouflage and carrying AK-47s, RPK machine guns, 60-mm mortars, RPG-7 rocket launchers, landmines, TNT and unmarked rat packs.
The mission was a disaster. Three ex-Rhodesian soldiers were killed in a contact with Zimbabwean National Army troops. The fifteen survivors cut and ran for the South African border, abandoning their kit and materiel. Mugabe said the incident was evidence of ‘South Africa’s programme of destabilisation’. SADF chief General Constand Viljoen denied any South African involvement, saying there were ‘no operations authorised in Zimbabwe’.
Meiring was later absorbed into the SADF. Some US reports around the time of his arrest erroneously suggested that he had joined 32 Battalion, the notorious ‘Buffalo Soldiers’, and had risen through the ranks to become the ‘second-highest ranking’ 32 Battalion officer stationed in Namibia. There are no records of Meiring ever having served in 32 Battalion. The unit’s founder, Colonel Jan Breytenbach, says he believes Meiring may have worked for Military Intelligence. It would have been ‘impossible for him, as a major, to be the second-most senior guy. A general has a shithouse full of colonels under him, and that’s before you even start getting to the majors.’
Initially, efforts to extradite the Meirings are a dismal failure. South African prosecutors fail ‘within a reasonable time’ to produce evidence to justify the extradition. The case is thrown out of court. The State launches a second extradition bid, but it will be seventeen long months before the end is in sight. On 18 May 1992, the US Department of the Interior and the USFWS issue a jubilant press release.
‘In a landmark action, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, in conjunction with the Justice Department and other Federal Agencies, has obtained theextradition of an accused wildlife smuggler from South Africa, the first extradition ever from a foreign country on wildlife-related charges.
‘Meiring is alleged to have used his official position … in South West Africa to acquire and transport rhinoceros horns, automatic weapons, and hand grenades, and smuggle them into the United States …’
USFWS director, John Turner, says, ‘The extradition is a sure sign the world is becoming a riskier place for those who smuggle endangered species and other protected wildlife.’
Meiring is escorted aboard an aircraft at Jan Smuts Airport in Johannesburg and flown to the US. He is arraigned days later in a Hartford courtroom. He agrees to take a plea. In exchange, prosecutors won’t push for the extradition of his wife, Pat, who is still in South Africa with their two children.
On 20 May 1992, Meiring pleads guilty to a charge of falsifying US customs documentation and admits to shipping three AK-47s to the US in packages marked ‘wood carvings’ and ‘brass candlesticks’. The extradition treaty between South Africa and the US makes no provision for charges of smuggling as a prosecutable offence. Meiring is sentenced to eight months in prison. The judge gives credit to Meiring for time spent behind bars in South Africa and the US and, on 24 July 1992, he is released from prison and deported.
Moulton got to know him fairly well in the time he was in jail. ‘He was a very nice gentleman,’ he recalls years later. ‘He did it, but as I understand it, in those days the military was quite underpaid. Just before he went back he asked me, “Rick, can you get me out of the prison and take me shopping? My children still think I’m on military manoeuvres.” They were used to him going away for long periods of time and, whenever he went away, he’d bring back gifts for his kids.’ Moulton couldn’t allow it. Instead, he bought a few things out of his own pocket,
The mission was a disaster. Three ex-Rhodesian soldiers were killed in a contact with Zimbabwean National Army troops. The fifteen survivors cut and ran for the South African border, abandoning their kit and materiel. Mugabe said the incident was evidence of ‘South Africa’s programme of destabilisation’. SADF chief General Constand Viljoen denied any South African involvement, saying there were ‘no operations authorised in Zimbabwe’.
Meiring was later absorbed into the SADF. Some US reports around the time of his arrest erroneously suggested that he had joined 32 Battalion, the notorious ‘Buffalo Soldiers’, and had risen through the ranks to become the ‘second-highest ranking’ 32 Battalion officer stationed in Namibia. There are no records of Meiring ever having served in 32 Battalion. The unit’s founder, Colonel Jan Breytenbach, says he believes Meiring may have worked for Military Intelligence. It would have been ‘impossible for him, as a major, to be the second-most senior guy. A general has a shithouse full of colonels under him, and that’s before you even start getting to the majors.’
Initially, efforts to extradite the Meirings are a dismal failure. South African prosecutors fail ‘within a reasonable time’ to produce evidence to justify the extradition. The case is thrown out of court. The State launches a second extradition bid, but it will be seventeen long months before the end is in sight. On 18 May 1992, the US Department of the Interior and the USFWS issue a jubilant press release.
‘In a landmark action, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, in conjunction with the Justice Department and other Federal Agencies, has obtained theextradition of an accused wildlife smuggler from South Africa, the first extradition ever from a foreign country on wildlife-related charges.
‘Meiring is alleged to have used his official position … in South West Africa to acquire and transport rhinoceros horns, automatic weapons, and hand grenades, and smuggle them into the United States …’
USFWS director, John Turner, says, ‘The extradition is a sure sign the world is becoming a riskier place for those who smuggle endangered species and other protected wildlife.’
Meiring is escorted aboard an aircraft at Jan Smuts Airport in Johannesburg and flown to the US. He is arraigned days later in a Hartford courtroom. He agrees to take a plea. In exchange, prosecutors won’t push for the extradition of his wife, Pat, who is still in South Africa with their two children.
On 20 May 1992, Meiring pleads guilty to a charge of falsifying US customs documentation and admits to shipping three AK-47s to the US in packages marked ‘wood carvings’ and ‘brass candlesticks’. The extradition treaty between South Africa and the US makes no provision for charges of smuggling as a prosecutable offence. Meiring is sentenced to eight months in prison. The judge gives credit to Meiring for time spent behind bars in South Africa and the US and, on 24 July 1992, he is released from prison and deported.
Moulton got to know him fairly well in the time he was in jail. ‘He was a very nice gentleman,’ he recalls years later. ‘He did it, but as I understand it, in those days the military was quite underpaid. Just before he went back he asked me, “Rick, can you get me out of the prison and take me shopping? My children still think I’m on military manoeuvres.” They were used to him going away for long periods of time and, whenever he went away, he’d bring back gifts for his kids.’ Moulton couldn’t allow it. Instead, he bought a few things out of his own pocket,
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