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Apartheid army forced gay
soldiers into sex change
operations
A new report uncovers a secret SADF
project to 'cure' homosexuals by giving
them sex changes, Paul Kirk reports.
Sex-change operations, medical torture and
chemical castration were perpetrated on national
servicemen in a bizarre programme to cure
"deviants" during the apartheid era.
To this day dozens of victims of the programme
are crippled and disfigured, stranded halfway
between male and female by incomplete
sex-change operations performed by the South
African Defence Force (SADF).
Many more are sterile after being chemically
castrated. A number of the victims have
committed suicide.
The exact number of conscripts who were
involved is not certain, but surgeons told the Mail
& Guardian that about 50 sex-change operations
were performed a year between 1971 and 1989.
The number of victims, gay rights campaigners
say, could have been hundreds. The National
Coalition for Gay and Lesbian Equality (NCGLE)
is trying to calculate the exact number of those
involved in the operations.
In what was a top-secret project during the
apartheid years, psychiatrists assisted by
chaplains scoured each intake of national
servicemen, hunting for suspected
homosexuals.
Those identified as homosexuals were quietly
separated from their comrades and sent to ward
22 of Voortrekkerhoogte military hospital for
screening and a programme of "rehabilitation".
Some of those who could not be "cured" with
drugs or psychiatry were given sex-change
operations or were chemically castrated.
These details have emerged from an M&G
investigation and from a report commissioned in
part by the Medical Research Council (MRC).
At the time the experiments were conducted,
the chief psychiatrist at Voortrekkerhoogte was
Aubrey Levine, one-time head of psychiatry at
the University of the Orange Free State. Levine
was reportedly interested in "aversion therapy"
and applied it to the "deviants" he collected.
A percentage of those homosexuals that could
not be "reformed" were offered sex-change
operations. Many of these procedures were not
completed, leaving a number of mutilated
conscripts to fend for themselves.
A recent study entitled The Aversion Project:
Human Rights Abuses of Gays and Lesbians
in the South African Defence Force by
Health Workers during the Apartheid Era
documents the process in great detail.
The study, which has yet to be made public,
was conducted on behalf of the Gay and
Lesbian Archives, the Health and Human Rights
Project and the MRC, as well as the NCGLE. It
fleetingly mentions army sex-change operations.
The report goes on to explain why the
sex-change operations were embraced with
such vigour: "The medical profession is reputed
for pathologising any form of behaviour. For
example, it is known that the military has a
history of doing sex-change operations - many
sex changes were done in military hospitals.
One has to ask to what extent this was
experimental. Although in any medical
advancement there is always a cutting edge of
experimentation, in total institutions there is a
captive audience. The question then reverts to
one of 'informed consent' and whether the
choices people are given are limited because
they cannot say 'no'."
The victims were all conscripts.
Security at ward 22 was tight and few secrets
emerged. However, at least one death was
reported entirely due to the refusal of medical
staff to render assistance to a conscript who
had taken an overdose of drugs in an attempt to
kill himself.
This death is documented in the Aversion
Project report and also in the Health and Human
Rights Project's submission to the Truth and
Reconciliation Commission (TRC).
Surgeons who served under the SADF confirmed
that a number of patients died on the operating
table while having their sex changed. The actual
causes of their death were never made public.
The number of deaths, the sources say, was
probably very low.
The operations were performed at a number of
military hospitals around the country. One victim
contacted by the M&G was operated on at
Voortrekkerhoogte, while in another case the
bulk of the operation was performed at the
Tempe military hospital.
According to gay rights activists and victims of
the operations, those given the operations were
told to keep quiet about them and encouraged to
set up a new circle of friends. They were offered
a completely new identity.
One victim of chemical castration, a former
national serviceman by the name of Jean
Erasmus, took his own life last year after
contacting Joanne Muller, at the time a
representative of Amnesty International in
Pretoria.
Erasmus had been in touch with Muller for some
years and had carefully documented his
maltreatment at the hands of Levine.
Muller told the M&G that Erasmus apparently
committed suicide after giving shocking details
of his maltreatment to her. Erasmus claimed
that, among other things, he had been forced to
participate in the gang rape of Angolan women.
Erasmus also told Muller that servicemen were
forced to take large amounts of hormone drugs
in an effort to "cure" them.
Levine's other tool in his crusade against
"deviants" was electric-shock treatment, a name
by which he refuses to call his treatment. It was
a crucial element in what he termed "aversion
therapy".
Although research has shown Levine's
psychiatrists did not personally conduct
sex-change operations - they were not qualified
surgeons - he and his team allegedly referred
conscripts who could not be "cured" of their
homosexuality to army surgeons who would
perform the operations.
The NCGLE is still fighting to have at least one
of the army's sex-change victim's operations
completed. Representatives of the coalition said
other victims had made private arrangements for
the completion of the operations, while the army
had agreed to finish off others.
It was not only male conscripts who were
targeted - the army also weeded out suspected
lesbians from the armed forces and gave them
the same treatment.
One of these victims, who was born a female,
confirmed this week she had joined the defence
force, had been identified by Levine as a
homosexual and offered a sex-change operation.
This procedure was started - but stopped
halfway when the programme was terminated.
The victim has both sets of sex organs, and like
several other victims has been attempting to
have the army finish the operation for some
time. Her efforts have as yet been futile.
The Aversion Project report quotes Trudie
Grobler, an intern psychologist in the psychiatric
unit at 1 Military hospital who was forced to
observe an aversion therapy session under
Levine's guidance. A woman - a suspected
lesbian - was subjected to such severe electric
shocks that her shoes flew off her feet.
Speaking in Afrikaans, Grobler is quoted as
saying: "I know that he did aversion therapy with
gay men. And I do not know of a case where it
was a success. You know that he showed the
gay boys men and then shocked them. Then he
showed them women. I presume that the same
strength, method and everything was given to
the woman. It was traumatic. I could not believe
how her body could handle it."
Erasmus, who was chemically castrated, is also
mentioned in the study - at the time he was still
alive and was called "Neil" to protect his
identity. Neil, although he knew he had been
chemically castrated, did not know what other
drugs he had been given. He suffered severe
depression and other mental ailments.
The report notes: "As a result of the research
process, Neil has touched the core of his anger
and humiliation. He decided to explore litigation.
Assisted by a psychiatrist, a psychologist, an
internist and a human rights lawyer, they tried to
find out exactly what treatment he was given. He
was given no information at the time of
treatment, and it appears that all records of his
treatment have been destroyed. The doctor who
treated him pleaded amnesia, so without
evidence the case could not proceed. What are
the possibilities of other compassionate doctors
trying to reverse the treatment, when no records
were kept?"
Erasmus is quoted as saying: "It is my personal
wish that if I could have my way, to have him
scrapped off the roll, even if it is symbolic as
he's at the end of his career. But I would like to,
if I could achieve anything, I would like ... if I
could sue this man, I would sue him for every
cent he's got - if I could."
The psychiatrist he refers to is not Levine, but
another doctor currently practising in the Cape
and whose name is known to the M&G.
In a submission to the TRC, the Health and
Human Rights Project detailed Levine's shock
therapy - but not the sex-change programme.
Levine - with a number of other doctors - was
served notice that he had been named as a
possible violator of human rights, but by that
time he had fled to Canada to escape South
Africa's high crime rate.
He did not apply for amnesty, nor was he
granted amnesty - meaning he may be
prosecuted for his apartheid-era activities.
However the truth commission made no effort to
serve Levine with a subpoena.
Levine said this week that at no time was
electric shock treatment given under his care.
Speaking from his office in the University of
Calgary, Levine said: "Nobody was given electric
shock treatment by me. We did not practise
Russian communist-style torture. What we
practised was aversion therapy. We caused
slight - very slight - discomfort in the arm by
contracting the muscles using an electronic
device. Some people used elastic bands to
shock patients. Nobody was hurt and nobody
was ever held against their will. At no time were
patients forced to submit to treatment."
Levine also emphatically denied any gender
reassignment operations were performed by the
military. He claimed that the political
atmosphere at the time was such that
reassignment surgery was simply not tolerated
or even considered.
He also emphatically denied that truth drugs
were ever administered. Said Levine:
"Narco-analysis was used, I give you that, but it
was used in very isolated cases and only to help
treat post-traumatic stress. Narco analysis was
used to help get victims to talk about the trauma
they suffered."
Levine, who works in the forensic department of
the University of Calgary, lamented that he was
driven from South Africa by the high crime rate.
The final straw, he said, was when his daughter
was held hostage during an armed robbery at
his Johannesburg home.
Said Levine: "I want to reiterate, nobody was
held against his or her will. We did not keep
human guinea pigs like Russian communists,
we only had patients who wanted to be cured
and were there voluntarily. But anyway I have no
doubt the Mail & Guardian will distort all of this."
South African National Defence Force (SANDF)
representative Major Louis Kirstein said Levine
had resigned from the military some time ago
and that the present head of psychiatry at 1
Military hospital had no knowledge of Levine's
activities, nor did present staff at the hospital.
Kirstein said: "The South African military health
service is more than willing to investigate or
assist any investigation into the alleged actions
by Dr Levine in the past. The SANDF is bound
by the constitution and will not tolerate, condone
or conceal any alleged infringements of the
constitution by its members. Furthermore the
SANDF is an equal-opportunity employer and
does not discriminate against any person on
grounds of race, gender, religion or sexual
persuasion.