But the Egyptian Army’s experience of operating in distant Arab countries was an unhappy one, and the bulk of their forces remained at first in the traditional deployment areas — Sinai, the Canal, the Western Desert, the Red Sea, and Southern and Central Districts. The Field Force was organized into three armies, all stationed on Egyptian soil, one east, one west, one south.
Saudi Arabia, with her small population, had a small army — a mere five brigades, three of which were already deployed in Jordan, Syria and the Lebanon as part of the Geneva Conference arrangements; the rest, together with the National Guard, Frontier Force and Coastguard would be adequate for internal security and for looking after sea and air bases but little more.
Kuwait’s efficient little army of about one division supported by some forty fighter aircraft and thirty patrol boats had neither the logistic resources nor the inclination to venture much beyond its frontiers.
The Libyan Army of 20,000 had more than enough to do keeping an eye on its own people.
To this prospect, the Soviet Union had little to add. Her sea and air bases in Eritrea, Socotra, Djibuti, Port Sudan, Suez, Jed-dah, Berbera, Mogadishu, Kismayu and Dhahran were manned by some 50,000 armed technicians; her air forces including transports amounted to about 500 aircraft of all types; her naval strength in the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean was not great. For the Soviet Union it would be a matter of hanging on to what she had got rather than reaching out for more. If, however, the Soviet Union appeared to be adopting a defensive strategy in the Middle East, the same could not be said of Southern Africa, for here she had powerful and more adventurous allies.
It had been laid down by the High Command of the Confederation of Africa South People’s Army that the invasion of South Africa should be carried out from all four front-line states: Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique. Largely because of the difficulties of supporting logistically any more sophisticated operations of war, the forces from Botswana and Zimbabwe would be essentially operating as guerrillas, though on a very large scale. The two main thrusts would come from Namibia and Mozambique, with the backing of west and east coast ports, air bases, better equipped armies both in combat and logistic units, and the opportunity for seaborne support. From Mozambique forces amounting to nearly 30,000 would take part, made up in the first place of the recently reconstituted Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) army, now swelled by more Makonde troops from the Mozambique United Front (FUMO). Second was the Somali contingent, a mechanized brigade with tanks, APC and guns. Third, there were the main regular forces of Zimbabwe, a strong brigade, to which Tanzania had added two battalions. The Cuban force amounted to no fewer than 10,000, and it was the Cubans who were charged with directing the operation, though under the nominal leadership of a Mozambique guerrilla general, the new strong-arm ally of FUMO’s head. General Chinde Inhambane (it was of course a nom de guerre) was a man who loved the petty details of military administration, who would have made a respectable quartermaster in a Stores Depot. He now determined to be not only commander-in-chief but also his own principal logistics adviser, with subsequently dire results for the whole expedition. The plan of campaign decided on by him and his Cuban advisers was nothing if not bold — an assault on the Transvaal aimed at Pretoria and Johannesburg, with a substantial diversionary push into Natal.
The expeditions from Zimbabwe itself and from Botswana were to be essentially huge distractions for the South African security forces, to whom the excellent communications southwards from Mbizi and Gaborone were important. As Botswana had so few men to spare, Namibia was to draft in a force of 20,000 guerrillas. The Zimbabwe force would be about the same size.
The other main operation would be the SWAPO, Angolan, Cuban and Nigerian attack from Namibia. One force was to head for Prieska, the other for Cape Town and Simonstown. The Nigerians had provided 30,000 men, the Cubans 10,000, the Angolan and SWAPO armies numbered 50,000 together — all in all a force not dissimilar in total to the eastern armies invading from Mozambique. Soviet ‘advisers’ and technicians were much in evidence.
What sort of enemy would these various contingents be likely to meet? In the first place there was South Africa’s regular army, swelled by former Rhodesians and refugees from Namibia — with a growing number of volunteers from Australasia — to a force of 90,000. A US naval force at sea, even if no US formations were involved in the fighting on land, would in effect be holding the ring. Behind the regular South African army there was the Volkssturm, 200,000 strong, confident, well-trained and utterly dedicated to the idea of winning, or dying — a hard nut for CASPA to crack.
There was some convergence of views, but far more divergence, between those variously involved on either side as to what the whole thing would be about. Over-simplified, it was this. The United States wanted to hang on to what she regarded as two of her strategic interests: Middle Eastern oil and the ability to bring tankers and other shipping round the Cape. For the USSR the requirement was to keep a grip on Southern Africa, which would give her dominance of the sea routes, and to control the Middle East and its oil. Those involved there had other ideas. The black African nations wanted to destroy the white hold on South Africa and have it for themselves, its riches, its land, its influence, its strategic potential. The white South Africans were equally intent on keeping what they had. Neither cared greatly for the broader issues beyond their own horizons. In the Middle East, Iran was concerned to preserve her own integrity and influence, an influence extending to southern Arabia; the smaller states simply wanted to continue with their well-endowed development; the new UAR wished to become the centre and controller of the whole Arab world. For the time being the convergences of policy were sufficient to allow these sets of allies to work together. Their divergences would become more apparent as operations developed.
Policy is one thing, method another. The United States’ concept of how to maintain her foothold in Africa and support her allies in the Middle East was clear, simple and within her capacity. It had four main features: first, to break Soviet air and sea power in those areas whose strategic control was necessary to the United States; second, to provide those elements of defensive power which her allies in the Middle East did not possess themselves and without which they would be unable to employ effectually the military power they did possess; third, to keep these allies supplied logistically and to give further training to their armed forces when practicable; fourth, to keep US forces out of the land fighting in Southern Africa except in so far as the security of Simonstown demanded.
Everything the United States hoped to do depended on winning the war at sea, which itself demanded ascendancy in the air. The course of the battle for the Atlantic has been traced in Chapter 17. What matters here is its outcome. The Soviet Navy’s defeat had two important effects on the battle in Africa. First, the severance of maritime connection with the Caribbean meant that no Jamaican or Cuban reinforcements or supplies could come by sea to West Africa. Second, the blockade of West Africa from Conakry to Walvis Bay ensured that no support could come by sea to the belligerent countries from anywhere else. The battle for the Indian Ocean had been less intense and less costly than the battle for the Atlantic, but it had been important. The United States Navy now had a strong presence along the east coast of Africa from Mombasa to Port Elizabeth and in the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf, and superiority in the Indian Ocean as a whole. The Red Sea remained under Soviet domination; so did the Eastern Mediterranean.