While South Africa was becoming increasingly unpopular with its neighbors and starting a counterinsurgency war against SWAPO/PLAN in South West Africa the Portuguese colonial power in Angola was under question.
Portugal had three colonies in Africa at the time, Angola, Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique.
The conquest of the Angolan territory had only been finally accomplished in 1920 and 40 years later the 5 million strong local population wanted this land back and their colonial masters gone.
Eventually 5 nationalist and separatist forces would rise in various areas of the country trying to oust the Portuguese.
- UPA/FNLA (National Liberation Front of Angola)
- MPLA (People's Movement of Liberation of Angola)
- UNITA (Union for the Total Independence of Angola)
- FLEC (Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda)
- RDL (Eastern Revolt)
The former Belgian Congo and northern neighbor of Angola becomes independent in 1960, as the Republic of the Congo Immediately after independence, a number of violent disturbances occur leading to the Congo Crisis.
John F. Kennedy is inaugurated as President of the United States on the 20 January 1961. His Administration starts to support the African nationalists movements, with the objective of neutralizing the increasing Soviet influence in Africa. Regarding Angola, the United States starts to give direct support to the UPA and assumes an hostile attitude against Portugal, forbidding it to use American weapons in Africa.
In 1964, Northern Rhodesia becomes independent as Zambia, under the leadership of Kenneth Kaunda. From then on, Angola becomes almost surrounded by countries with regimes hostile to Portugal, the exception being South West Africa.
With SWAPO using the newly independent Zambia as its springboard into SWA. South Africa naturally feared that if Angola fell into Marxist hands the insurgency springboard would simply move closer.
Meanwhile wholesale atrocities had been committed in Angola at the commencement of the War.
On 15 March, the Union of Peoples of Angola (UPA), under the leadership of Holden Roberto, launched an incursion into northern Angola from its base in the Congo-Léopoldville (ex-Belgian Congo), leading 4000 to 5000 militants. His forces took farms, government outposts, and trading centers, killing and mutilating officials and civilians, most of them Ovimbundu "contract workers" from the Central Highlands. It was the start of the Angolan War of Independence and of the wider Portuguese Overseas War. UPA militants stormed the Angolan districts of Zaire, Uíge, Cuanza Norte and Luanda, massacring the civilian population during their advance, killing 1,000 whites and 6,000 blacks (women and children included of both white European and black African descent). Besides the killing of people, the UPA militants destructed the infrastructures they found on their way, including houses, farms, roads and bridges, creating a general chaos and panic. The terrified populations took refuge in the forests or fled to nearby regions and to Congo-Léopoldville.
The Portuguese response was as atrocious.
In the first year of the war 20,000 to 30,000 Angolan civilians were killed by Portuguese forces and between 400,000 and 500,000 refugees went to Zaïre. UPA militants joined pro-independence refugees and continued to launch attacks from across the border in Zaire, creating more refugees and terror among local communities. A UPA patrol took 21 MPLA militants prisoners and then executed them on 9 October 1961 in the Ferreira incident, sparking further violence between the two sides.The United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 163, calling on Portugal to desist from repressive measures against the Angolan people.
The US was supplying weapons and ammunition to the UPA to counter the Marxist threat. The UPA later merged with the Democratic Party of Angola to form the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA). Savimbi (a key name to remember) later secured Chinese support for the FNLA.
Savimbi left the FNLA in 1964 and founded UNITA.
UNITA had its main base in distant south-eastern Angolan provinces, where the Portuguese and FNLA influence were for all practical purposes very low, and where there was no guerrilla war at all. UNITA was from the beginning far better organized and disciplined than either the MPLA or the FNLA. Its fighters also showed a much better understanding of guerrilla operations.
During the late 1960s the FNLA and MPLA fought each other as much as they did the Portuguese, with MPLA forces assisting the Portuguese in finding FNLA hideouts.
By the mid 70's as the marxist belligerents the MPLA was getting funding from both China and the Soviet Union.
During the late 1960s the USSR also became involved in the war in Angola, albeit almost exclusively via the MPLA. While the FNLA received only very limited arms shipments from the USA, and the UNITA was getting hardly any support from outside the country, the Marxist MPLA developed very close relations with Moscow and was soon to start receiving significant shipments of arms via Tanzania and Zambia.
In 1969 the MPLA agreed with the USSR that in exchange for arms and supplies delivered to it the Soviets would – upon independence – be granted rights for establishing military bases in the country. Consequently, by the early 1970s, the MPLA developed into the strongest Angolan anti-colonial movement and the most powerful political party.
By Katangais, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link
It was into this mess that South Africa plunged assisting the Portuguese by attacking both the MPLA and UNITA.
This was formalised into the Alcora Exercise a secret military alliance between South Africa, Portugal and Rhodesia, between 1970 and 1974.
Rhodesia and South Africa initially limited their participation to shipments of arms and supplies. However, by 1968 the South Africans began providing Alouette III helicopters with crews to the Portuguese Air Force (FAP), and finally several companies of South African Defence Forces (SADF) infantry who were deployed in southern and central Angola.
Finally, there were reports that a number of Rhodesian pilots were recruited to fly FAP helicopters. However, when the first Portuguese unit was equipped with Aerospatiale Puma helicopters, in 1969, its crews were almost exclusively South Africans. Rhodesian pilots were considered too valuable by the Royal Rhodesian Air Force (RRAF) to be deployed in support of the Portuguese.
Changes in government in Portugal in April 1974 via the Carnation Revolution resulted in governmental changes in policy for Angola. The Alvor Agreement, signed January 1975, would grant Angola independence from Portugal on November 11 1975.
This signaled the end of the Angolan War of independence but the beginning of the Angolan Civil War as the nationalist and independence movements now more viciously turned on each other, fighting over the prize.
South Africa was left with no more Portuguese secret alliance and an Angola ready to welcome SWAPO and PLAN. It's Portuguese buffer to the north had fallen and Mozambique to the east with it.
Quoted parts from relevant Wikipedia pages
Other posts in this series
The piece of the cold war nobody told you about - Africa's forgotten war
The air battles
The SA Fighter Aircraft
The SA Bomber Aircraft
The conflicts deep roots and start
Regional Tensions
Great info, from your posts I feel you are a history buff, or a history teacher. I feel you can always learn from history, as humans tend to make the same mistakes. Like in Ecclesiastes there is nothing new under the sun.
no this was just an interest, but true about history repeating
This is a really cool series of articles that you have going.
Really good information there about africa, thx. May I ask you, where you get the information regarding the africa war?
Every white South African schoolboy before 1990 knew they were going to get a letter from the government "requesting their participation" I did some reading etc. before and after responding to their "request".
Ok thx, keep posting about that @gavvet. It is important to let the world know about this injustice
Some months ago I was in Cuba. Talked to informed Cubans. I came to know that the participation of Cuba in the wars in Angola was unwanted by Russia! Funny thing. Cuban men went to die in Angola, and they did so forcing themselves to Russians, that did not want them there. Funny things happened in recent history, particularly in Africa.
War are always the dull part of any country and when talking about africa it's pretty bad that why people fight for something and who literally wins in any war
The answer is no one ! People are killing humanity
But thank you so much @gavvet for sharing such valuable imformation with us.
Steem on
I love these posts! Great stuff. Lekker
Great to see the sheer power some of these colonies and groups can have despite the lack of firepower compared to the superior arms of the Portuguese Military.
Vietnam and this event show how sometimes it is not purely about raw fire power.
Terrain fights back too... as the Soviets found out in Afghanistan.
Regretfully I was a part of that war... thankfully I was not a statistic of that war :)
Most of us old ballies were in some way or another.
Gerçekten harika bir konuya değindiniz.Çok teşekkürler.Afrika ülkesinin soğuk savaş dönemlerinde birçok sorunlara maruz kalması üzücü bir durum oluştu.
While these places are rich with gold and diamonds war will never end.. as simple as that
plenty pretty blood diamonds from South West Africa and Angola on many brides fingers.
Unfortunately yes.. compare it with bitcoin, most people compare it with ransomware. So how do we know in the future that your bitcoin was collected by pirates. That should be solved in order for big adoption.
Nice comparison
Thx,
Don t be pessimistic
IM not my friend but it's the reality
War seems to be the common thing that humans always get involved in. Its unfortunate the human race can not escape this.
I remember in the 70's listening to shortwave radio and always wondering what Cubans were doing in Angola.
Ironic how America and the defunct USSR were influencing this war in Southern Africa. Thanks for posting
Thanks for the educating post!
very informative thanks for sharing it with us ,never knew about this earlier.
It's great to learn some African history. This part of the world was heavily neglected in my school curriculum.
I always found it interesting that JFK supported the various movements in Africa to thwart Soviet encroachment in the area. I was unaware that they told Portugal they could not use American weapons on the continent. But it makes sense . . .
America seems to always have its hands in the meddling. Most other countries supported one side or the other - I highly doubt that command to the PAF was anything more than a publicity stunt! During the Cold War, all sides cared only about making money from used ammunition and weapons.
They obviously couldn't appear to sell weapons to both enemies and promote the use, so they go with the saner, more friendly ally and say "hey, please don't use those guns on the poor bushmen..." YEAH RIGHT
Yea, sadly you are right. And that foreign policy strategy hasn't changed. Arming rebels on the down low while publicly coming out against them? This has been happening for years.
And yet the US armed and backed the ones that committed the first atrocities...
JFK was good to Africa, help many of the African states to become free from the hands of their colonial masters. Also initiated the move to send Financial aids to Africa.
...and made some of us Highly Indebted(HIPC) beggar states ever since
very informative post love to history news and politics news.
What about Algerian Independence war?
Celebrating 55th year of independence tomorrow July 5th!!!
Check out my latest post for more info about this day that made history in Africa and around the world! https://steemit.com/algeria/@lodbryce/tomorrow-july-5th-algeria-is-celebrating-the-55th-year-of-independence-so-proud-of-my-country-freeafrica
Very good article, I see that you dedicated a lot of time to this post, excellent
A very informative post about Africa... Will be waiting for your next post.
peace for all of the world
its my dream
boo!
Great article.
Congratulations!
Wow! Your article is great.. Kindly follow back i'm a minnow that needs some big fin to support
Very good history. It will be teaching for many people.
I will remember Cold War.
thank you for sharing
Nice history post
Nice post...thank you so much sharing your valuble knowledge and memiries about the cold war with other steemians...
this is a great post I learned a lot thanks for sharing and keep on posting ;)
Thanks for info of this part of the history.
Great historical post. I got many information of Africa. Thank u for shearing this post
Very informative post
Thanks for sharing buddy.
Interesting article, great work:)
Follow , Upvote and resteem
upvote this post then comment your post link which you want should I upvote it
If you not following me you should follow me then do it
https://steemit.com/upvote/@crypto-booster/upvoting-started-followers
Oooh!!! It is amazing post that elaborate about real history of Africa...
Keep it up...
War are always the dull part of any country and when talking about africa it's pretty bad that why people fight for something and who literally wins in any war
The answer is no one ! People are killing humanity
But thank you so much @gavvet for sharing such valuable imformation with us.
Steem on
Very good article!
Keep up the history lessons and you will get my upvotes everytime!
Africa has a turmoil history.. and great potential ahead, if they know how to unite their power.
The Angolan war is a very good example not only of the typical African conflict of the second half of the twentieth century, but also one of the examples of the "proxywar" that was between the US and the USSR for control of the Third World countries - those that recently acquired Independence (or fought for it), and therefore could become either outposts of the free world or bastion of socialism.
It's really hard to understand correctly, i hope i did! Because i'm not really into history or war.
I love post like this about history, thanks for sharing, interesting stuff!
sometime we can't do it, but it is happening...
Glad to know the history!
Good post Boss, this is really helpful, thank you. I resteemed so this can help more people.
Good post... i will be looking forward to some researched interesting post on Africa from you :)
hallo , friend
goot end nice post you
Thank you so much for the info ! Thank you so much for your effort !!
