South African Air Force

The South African Air Force, usually shortened to SAAF, is the air warfare branch of the South African National Defence Force and is headquartered in Pretoria. It was established on 1 February 1920, which makes it the second-oldest independent air force in the world after the British Royal Air Force. The SAAF served in the Second World War and the Korean War, and from 1966 it gave heavy air support during the Border War in Angola, South-West Africa and Rhodesia. As that conflict escalated it grew into one of the largest and most capable air forces in Africa and fought engagements against Angolan aircraft in the late 1980s to hold tactical air superiority. By 1990 it operated more than 800 aircraft. After the war, the end of apartheid, the lifting of sanctions and economic limits led to deep cuts, with over 400 aircraft retired and more than a dozen squadrons and two air bases closed. It still guards national airspace and provides air defence, air mobility, maritime patrol and combat support.