JOHANNESBURG—Deadly clashes in a balmy, rundown mining town in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (Congo) have confirmed what defense experts have known for a long time: South Africa’s army, once the continent’s most respected fighting force and backed by its own military-industrial complex, is in shambles.
The reputation of the South African National Defense Force (SANDF) is smothered under the mud and blood and shattered concrete, melted inside smoldering buildings and burnt-out armored vehicles, in the streets of Goma, Congo, near the Rwanda border.
