THE FOURTH DIMENSION. The Untold Story of Military Health in South Africa

The Fourth Dimension, The untold story of military health in South Africa.

Publ. SA Military Health Service of the Department of South Africa 

2009. Hard cover with dust cover. 771 pages. Very good condition. Over 1kg.

The Fourth Dimension – the untold story of military health in South Africa is a magisterial study of the subject just published by the South African Military Health Service. A weighty tome of just less than 800 pages, it is the most comprehensive study of military health ever attempted in South Africa.

As such it records matters military medical reaching back to the turn of the 20th Century, with a look at the health support available to forces then engaged on both sides of the Anglo Boer War. Detailed and richly illustrated with what must be very rare photographs – the reviewer confesses to not having seen most – the story moves via the World Wars and Korea to the modern era.

Captured also is the post-war growth of the health component of the SA Defence Force from a branch of the SA Army – the South African Medical Corps – to a fully fledged fourth service and its role in the Namibian-Angolan border war of 1966-1989. A full section – with reminiscences – are included regarding the medical services of the Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda and Ciskei medical services before their integration into the South African National Defence Force in April 1994.

Given extensive treatment is the health services of the African National Congress and Pan Africanist Congress of Azania while in exile. Again, this is unique, readable material not published before. Also recorded for the first time is the struggle against apartheid in the health environment inside South Africa from the 1960s to 1994 – the medical side of the mass democratic movement. Also covered is white resistance to conscription (the End Conscription Campaign), the United Democratic Front and state reaction.

The last three chapters deal with the integration of various antagonistic factions into a new SANDF - and for health professionals, a new SA Medical Service, later renamed the SAMHS; the deployment of this new service onto the regional and international stage; and finally a bold look into the future.

Military health has here been given a comprehensive, fair and balanced treatment with substantial volumes of new information added to the narrative. “The Fourth Dimension – the untold story of military health in South Africa” sets a high standard and one hopes the other services and divisions of the SANDF, if not the organisation itself, will follow suit.


The Fourth Dimension – the untold story of military health in South Africa
Col Ricky Naidoo (Editor-in-Chief)
South African Military Health Service
Department of Defence
Pretoria
2009