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Angola: Marxist Regime Under Attack
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10577 |
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CURRENT ISSUES
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| Issue
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2 / 1986 |
3,764 Words |
| Author
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J.A. Parker
J.A. Parker is president of the Lincoln Institute for Research
and Education in Washington D.C., and editor of the Lincoln
Review. He was director of President Reagan's transition team
of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission |
Since the end of World War II, Soviet-supported insurgencies have been successful in coming to power in many parts of the world - Cuba, Angola, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, among others.
One of the dramatic changes in recent days has been the growth of dynamic anti-Communist insurgency forces that are challenging the totalitarian governments that have been imposed upon their countries.
In no part of the world has the anti-Communist effort been as effective, or as likely to succeeded, as in Angola. Jonas Savimbi's UNITAS forces now control more than a third of the country. In fact, the Soviet Union has become so concerned about the possibility that its client, the MPLA regime in Luanda, would be overthrown that it has directly involved itself in the military effort to defeat UNITA.
More Arms from Soviet
In January 1984, Moscow issued a public warning against the provision of aid to UNITA by the United States or other Western countries. Then the Kremlin convened a conference with Cuban and Angolan representatives to discuss the "defenses, independence, and territorial integrity" of Angola. Dr. P. Vanneman, a specialist on southern Africa at the University of Arkansas, notes that:
Apparently the Soviet-Cuban-Angolan conference arrived at an agreement to increase Soviet surrogate involvement. Most importantly, the Angolans shed some of their reluctance to authorize Cubans and Soviets to pilot their combat aircraft. The very gradual, incremental provision of more sophisticated air cover and protection has been a hallmark of Soviet policy in Angola as it is in Syurai. Advanced SAM-6 antiaircraft missile and radar system first appeared in southern Angola in 1981. Moscow is now providing more pilots and is supplying the more advanced MiG-23 and Sukhoi fighters to supplement the MiG-21, which was the backbone of Angola's air force. Moscow has also supplied a number of Mi-24 helicopters, used so devastatingly in Afghanistan.
In the fall of 1985, United States intelligence sources reported that the MPLA government, under the battlefield direction of a Soviet general, had taken the offensive against UNITA - and threatened its long-term viability. Mikhail Gorbachev, it is generally believed, was testing United States intentions by taking control of the war. Moscow's goal, it seems, is twofold. On the one hand, it wants to
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