What was the original strategic need? Surely there was no sense to build their own deterrence against e.g. the Soviets, and their neighbours were hardly that much of a military threat. So why did the South Africans decide they wanted nukes?
There is some discussion of this previously here and here and here. The short answer is that the Afrikaner government felt constantly besieged and almost always isolated (and yes, against their neighbors, but especially if their neighbors were being backed by the Soviets or the Chinese), and their weapons program evolved out of their mining industry in a way that never had a direct strategic articulation about the circumstances or even enemy they would use the weapons about. This is probably part of why they were able to get rid of them; it turned out that the weapons didn't really play a huge role in their national security, and by the end of the Afrikaner regime were seen more as liabilities than necessities.