South African Union Defence Force

The Union Defence Force was established on July 1, 1912 under General Jan Smuts, South Africa's first Minister of Defence, following the 1910 creation of the Union of South Africa, unifying the separate military structures of the four founding provinces under the Defence Act of 1912 into a single system combining a small Permanent Force of professional soldiers, an Active Citizen Force of part-time conscripts, coastal defenses and naval reserves, headquartered in Pretoria; by 1922 the Permanent Force had expanded to include staff corps, artillery, engineering, medical and air force components. In the First World War the force invaded German South-West Africa, fought in the East African campaign against German colonial forces, and deployed the 1st South African Infantry Brigade to France, suffering heavy losses at the 1916 Battle of Delville Wood, with more than 250,000 South Africans of all races volunteering to serve between 1914 and 1918 and over 7,000 killed. In the Second World War the Union Defence Force fought across North Africa, Italy and East Africa, defeating Italian forces there in 1940 and 1941 and taking part in the liberation of Madagascar, drawing on roughly 334,000 South African servicemen of whom nearly 9,000 were killed in action. The Union Defence Force was reorganized and renamed the South African Defence Force in 1957, closing a forty-five-year history as South Africa's national military under its founding name.