Balthazar Johannes Vorster

Born Dec. 13, 1915, in Jamestown, Cape Province. State figure of the Republic of South Africa.

Vorster is a lawyer by education. During World War II, he advocated collaboration with fascist Germany, for which he was imprisoned in a camp for pro-fascist sympathizers from 1942 to 1944. From 1961 to 1966 he was minister of justice, police, and prisons in the government of H. Verwoerd. From 1966 to 1978 he was prime minister and leader of the Nationalist Party. The policy of the Vorster government was aimed at further strengthening apartheid, continuing the illegal occupation of the territory of Namibia, and subjugating a number of young African states to the influence of the Republic of South Africa. In 1975–76 the Vorster government sanctioned the armed incursion of South African troops into the territory of the People’s Republic of Angola; the incursion ended in complete failure.