In practical terms the matter of a power vacuum tended to affect Mozambique less than it did Angola. There was no doubt that FRELIMO would assume power in Mozambique, and with the Castroesque Samora Machel at the helm of government, its Marxist orientation was also never in doubt. In Angola, on the other hand, the future remained to be settled, be it by negotiation or war, with the latter being the preferred option of each faction if the former failed. With understandable pragmatism, all sides tended to settle on the notion that an expanded war in the region was not only inevitable but in some ways desirable too. (Holden Roberto, leader of the FNLA and a brother-in-law of Zaire’s Mobuto, retained the position, rhetorically at least, that his ambition extended no further than an independent baKongo homeland in the north of Angola.)
Of the two superpowers it was the Soviet Union which was quicker off the mark, arriving in the region ahead of the United States with its support of the MPLA, the most left-leaning of all three of the Angolan revolutionary movements and the one centred on the capital Luanda, which tended to give it the best chance of ultimately seizing power.
The United States, extremely gun-shy in the aftermath of events in Vietnam, was very reluctant to commit troops to southern Africa and felt more inclined to solicit the help of South Africa, an ideological if not a political ally, in influencing events on the ground to the benefit of the West. At the time this was music to South African ears and, although militarily not quite as muscular as it would later become, the South African government felt confident that something practical could be achieved. This, in simple terms, was the backdrop to Operation Savannah, the first unequivocal plunge by the South African military establishment into war in Angola.
US diplomat and Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs from 1981 to 1989, Chester Crocker, defined the situation on the ground extremely well as Angola began to count down the days to the agreed date of independence from Portugal.
By November 11, 1975, the date of independence, Angola had been effectively thrown to the wolves and a feeding frenzy was underway. Cuban, South African and Zairean combat troops had intervened directly. Mercenaries, advisers and air force and armour crews were engaged from such countries as Algeria, Britain, China, Cuba, France, the Netherlands, Portugal, South Africa, West Germany, the Soviet Union and the United States. Arms and financial support came principally from France, the United States, China, Czechoslovakia, Cuba, Belgium, Nigeria, South Africa, Saudi Arabia and the USSR. The interventions came from land, sea and air; Angola’s notional ‘territorial integrity’ was violated from the Atlantic and from facilities in Zaire, Congo, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Zambia and South Africancontrolled Namibia.[7]
The rationale behind the South African decision to get involved in this Gordian knot to the extent that it was not obvious lies beyond the scope of this narrative. Suffice to say that in early August 1975, at a time more or less corresponding with the arrival in Angola of several thousand Cuban troops, MPLA forces aggressively began to move southward along the coast, in due course threatening the Ruacana–Calueque hydroelectric complex, a joint Angolan–South African venture and a vital water-supply project for the arid and underdeveloped Owamboland region of South West Africa. Part of the facility was inside Angola and, once South African technical staff began to be menaced, the SADF responded by moving 50 kilometres in-country and forcefully occupying the town of Calueque.
This was in early August 1975. At midnight on 15 October the SADF Task Force Zulu, the first of a number of battle groups that would in due course become involved, and comprising Alpha and Bravo groups, crossed from South West Africa into Cuando Cubango, Angola, ostensibly in support of the pro-West FNLA and UNITA, but in effect to roll back the significant territorial advances being made by the MPLA and, moreover, to attempt to affect the outcome of the internal power struggle in the country prior to the date of independence. The decision was made to some extent in spite of deep misgivings felt by Prime Minister John Vorster – or this is at least what was widely reported – but based also on considerable pressure being applied to South Africa from such friendly African governments as Côte d’Ivoire, Zaire and Zambia, and an ‘understanding’ on the matter reached with the United States.[8]
By any standards the advance of the combined South African force northward into Angola ranks as one of the great epics of mobile warfare in Africa, not dissimilar to the comprehensive Allied rout of the Italians in Somalia and Ethiopia during the East Africa Campaign of the Second World War, during which, incidentally, large numbers of South African troops and armoured and air force assets also took part. An ambulating and apparently unstoppable two-pronged advance saw the South Africans move north over vast swathes of Angolan territory, mounted in many instances in an assortment of requisitioned refugee transports, Eland armoured cars, Unimogs and Land Rovers, and aside from a handful of stirring actions, encountering very little organized resistance. In 33 days the SADF advanced an extraordinary 3,159 kilometres, engaging in 30 attacks and 21 skirmishes, killing a conservative tally of 210 enemy troops, wounding a further 96 and securing some 56 captures, weighed against the loss of five South African soldiers and 41 wounded. This, bearing in mind that most fighting men involved were irregulars, was an astonishing achievement.[9]
The SAAF played a very limited role in the operation. Apart from a long-range Canberra bombing sortie, flown to support elements of the FNLA under Holden Roberto during an ill-advised attempt to capture Luanda from the north on the eve of the national independence – the disastrous Battle of Quifangondo – the distances were found to be too great for the deployment of useful offensive operations in support of ground troops. Instead Cessna 185 aircraft were used in a light communication role and, of course, the ubiquitous Puma helicopter was consistently deployed in battlefield support, with one ship being recorded lost, taken down on 22 December 1975 by anti-aircraft artillery originating from a hillside some 18 kilometres northwest of Cela in the Cuanza Sul Province. In this instance, the pilot and crew effected a successful forced landing after which, some 50 kilometres ahead of the SADF farthest north, evaded capture for 22 hours before finding their way back to safety.
Such was not the case a few weeks earlier when a C-185 spotter aircraft was shot down over Ebo, also in the Cuanza Sul Province, during the tense battle for that town. Two pilots and an air observer were killed in what transpired as the first de facto defeat of the advance. Despite many efforts in the aftermath of this incident, the remains of the three aircrew have never been recovered.
The area in which the SAAF provided invaluable support was in air transport and resupply. Here the heavy lifting was undertaken mainly by the pilots and crews of 28 Squadron, shuttling the squadron fleet of ever-dependable C-160 Transall and C-130 Hercules transporters back and forth from Angolan airstrips, carrying personnel, ammunition, rations and casualty evacuations. At one point it was recorded that the transport fleet was operating out of the Cela airfield more or less on a 24-hour basis, with one crew registering over 100 hours of flight time over a 12-day period, significantly more than the legal limit.
7
Crocker, Chester.
8
Both Alpha and Bravo comprised companies of indigenous troops, in the first instance drawn from elements of the FLNA inducted into the SADF, and in the second by Angolan Bushmen who had suffered significant attrition at the hands of each of the Angolan warring parties at one time or other, and who were at the very least an enigmatic force in the conflict.
9
Stiff, Peter.