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A Response to Trade Unionist Perspective on the Future of the Armaments Industry in South Africa
While appreciating the view of a trade unionist in matters of defence as well as the defence industry, one aspect in particular provokes some comment.
The author suggests that both the defence force and the armaments industry should open up for unionization in these words:
Members of the forces should retain as many as possible of the normal human and trade union rights compatible with their positions. (p 10)
What one finds unacceptable in this proposition is that Fanaroff appears to apply the industrial notion of unionization to a key and strategic area, i.e. the armed forces, without due allowance for the complexity, national security and sensitivity distinguishing the armed forces from industry in general.
A generalization of this nature raises two questions whose validity holds for now as with the new and democratized national defence force.
Firstly, are we to subject the defence force to the push-pull adversarialism that characterize our industrial relations? Secondly, and as a consequence of the former, are we, in order 'to map out a clear path for the future', to place the armed forces squarely at the door-step of 'ransom' through possible threats of industrial action and thereby threaten our own national security?
A guiding principle of utmost importance in as far as the military is concerned is that it should always be above party politics or sectional interests. By virtue of its nature as an instrument of coercion in the hands of the State, the defence force must be demarcated from industry in general by its functioning and purpose.
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