I've recently been reading up on infamous Ugandan leader Idi Amin. (Excuse the Wikipedia link, it's included for those who may not know of Amin but want a brief overview.)
In biographic depictions of Amin there are descriptions of his personal life, including his five wives and ~40 children. His fifth wife, Sarah Kyolaba, is often cited as having the nickname of 'Suicide Sarah' 1 2 3 4.
The nickname is explained as being derived from the military band she was a dancer for, variously: the 'Revolutionary Suicide Mechanised Regiment Band' or the 'Suicide Mechanized Jazz Band'.
However, I can't find an explanation of the band or regiment itself. Was it a military unit tasked with suicide missions; was it the name of the band; was it fictional; is the name a mistranslation? Any help or recommended reading would be appreciated.
The so-called 'Suicide Regiment' was contemporary claimed by sources to be an elite formation of the Ugandan Army. Based in Masaka, the unit was more formally known as the Masaka Mechanized Specialist Reconnaissance Regiment, even though what exactly its informal name isn't 100 % certain. Some sources give it as being the Revolutionary Suicide Specialist Mechanised Regiment. Other sources name it as the Suicide Mechanized Specialist Reconnaissance Regiment or simply the Suicide Reconnaissance Regiment; some sources doesn't mention the 'suicide' or reconnaissance part at all.
Whatever the name and nickname was in the end, it was not supposed to be a military unit that exclusively dealt in suicide missions. Instead, it functioned as one of the spearheads of the Ugandan army. However, I need to emphasize the fact that it was one of the several mechanized reconnaissance regiment in the Ugandan Army, all which are called 'elite' or 'crack' formations in contemporary sources. For example, during the Uganda-Tanzania War in 1978, the Masaka 'Suicide' Regiment and the Simba Regiment were both used to invade Tanzania. Other important and similar formations included the Malire Regiment, which famously mutinied and tried to oust Idi Amin in 1978.