Category: Mercenaries

Coup leader and French mercenary Bob Denard (right), leading his Comorian counterpart Combo. In the early 1960s the former Belgian Congo came apart at the seams. UN-backed Congolese troops battled the forces of the breakaway region of Katanga, which in turn was supported by hundreds of foreign mercenaries. Among the pro-Katanga fighters was a tall, […]

During the Congo Crisis Mike Hoare organised and led two separate mercenary groups: * 1960–1961. Major Mike Hoare’s first mercenary action was in Katanga, a province trying to break away from the newly independent Congo. The unit was called “4 Commando”. During this time he married Phyllis Simms, an airline stewardess. * 1964. Congolese Prime […]

Private U. S.-based security firm involved in military security operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. Blackwater USA (known as Blackwater Worldwide since October 2007) is one of a number of private security firms hired by the U. S. government to aid in security operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. The company was founded in 1997 by Erik […]

Mercenaries have earned a dubious name for themselves throughout history; their object, as a rule, has been to obtain maximum pay for minimum risks, with the result that those hiring them rarely get value for money. Mercenaries, usually white and recruited from the former colonial powers, became familiar and generally despised figures in Africa during […]

“Commando Kivu,” a unit fighting Simba rebels in the area along the west side of Lake Kivu, just across from Rwanda. Another photo (right) appears to show Robert Denard himself (center) in 1965. Colonel Denard. In his autobiography Corsaire de la République (“Pirate of the Republic”), Denard gave his assessment of the situation in the […]

BEGINNING OF THE END By the late 1980s, the world balance of power was changing. The Soviet Union was disintegrating, and along with it, Cuba’s capacity to continue its commitment to the MPLA. Throughout the 1980s, the MPLA grew weaker as the UNITA grew stronger, in large measure due to UNITA’s support from South Africa […]

Battle of Halmyros, a battle between the lightly armed but battle-hardened Almogavars of the infamous Catalan Company and the French Knights of the Duchy of Athens.  By Darren Tan Scots in Swedish Thirty Years’ War service. Swiss mercenaries and landsknechte engaged in a push of pike (engraving by Hans Holbein the Younger, early 16th century) […]

During the Burgundian Wars (1474–1477) in France, Charles the Bold, the expansionist and ambitious Duke of Burgundy, who had already been defeated three times in battle, came to a sorry end. These wars were a struggle between the Dukes of Burgundy and the Kings of France. They showed that cavalry was not of much use […]

Niccolo di Bernardo dei Machiavelli Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527), the Italian Renaissance figure whose name is still cited frequently today by scholars, politicians, and debaters alike, had negative views on mercenaries. The son of a legal official, Machiavelli had a good grasp of Latin and the Italian classics when he entered government service in 1494 as […]

Mercenaries have earned a dubious name for themselves throughout history; their object, as a rule, has been to obtain maximum pay for minimum risks, with the result that those hiring them rarely get value for money. Mercenaries, usually white and recruited from the former colonial powers, became familiar and generally despised figures in Africa during […]