Blowback - S6 Episode 4 - "Zulu & Foxbat"

Episode Date: January 5, 2026

South Africa invades. Cuba intervenes. Angola becomes independent. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

When Bill Colby, the CIA director, went to brief the National Security Council in the White House the first time on this, his briefing was literally, gentlemen, this is a map of Africa. And here is Angola. Now, in Angola, we have three factions. There's the MPLA, they're the bad guys. The FNLA, they're the good guys. And there's Unita and Jonas Savimbi, we don't know too well. And that was to get the National Security Council involved in this thing. It's not so sad.

Welcome to blowback. I'm Brendan James. I'm Noah Coleman. And this is Season 6, Episode 4, Zulu and Foxbat. Last episode, an uprising in 1961 kicked off the colonial war in Angola, Portugal's Army versus Native Nationalists. which stretched from the early 1960s into the mid-70s. Angolanes were sick of living in an apartheid system, working in a barely disguised forced labor system,

and watching other African countries win their independence in real time. After a series of violent uprisings against the colonial authority, Portugal firebombed Angolan's from the air and patrolled the roads and streets on the ground. slowly but surely indigenous fighters learned the tactics of guerrilla war and began making a dent in the Portuguese army. But just as vicious as the war itself were the internal rivalries within the liberation movement. Holden Roberto, with his ties to Zaire, China, and the United States, was a veteran guerrilla leader, though his group, the FNLA, increasingly was viewed as compromised and corrupt. The MPLA, backed by the Soviet Union and the socialist bloc, was gaining momentum as a fighting force, but remained plagued by internal power struggles, and a reputation for mainly appealing to the city dwellers in the capital, Luanda.

And Unita, the youngest group, run by the brilliant tactician Jonas Savimbi, was gaining prominence, enjoying major support from the Ovimboondu peoples of the country's south. Even after the death of Portugal's dictator, Antonio Salazar, a renewed Portuguese offensive, not only in Angola, but also its other colonies, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau, indicated perhaps Portugal had the wherewithal to fight its colonial war for as long as it took. That is, until the spring of 1974. This was May Day in Lisbon.

One week after the regime of Marcelo Keitano was destroyed, destroyed in a military coup, an infectiously happy people celebrated the restoration of freedoms taken from them almost 50 years ago. Now that they have the right to assemble and to demonstrate, the people of Lisbon seem determined to exercise it as often as possible. On April 25, 1974, Portugal's Estado Novo, the dictatorship, founded by the late Antonio Salazar, fell to a military coup. Though the takeover was mostly bloodless, it shocked the war. world, not to mention many in Portugal and its colonies. But it didn't shock everyone. Quote, it was well-informed, though secretive bankers, writes historian David Birmingham, who predicted the fall of the dictatorship, while both Western and Eastern intelligence agencies, as well as

Portugal's own security services, were completely oblivious to any change in the air. carnations were in season, and as the old government crumbled, the bright red flowers could be seen protruding from the guns of the rebellious soldiers in Lisbon. They became the symbol of Portugal's transition to democracy, the so-called carnation revolution. 200,000 people took to the streets, strewing red carnations and dancing with the troops. A blaring chorus of car horns clashed with the chant, a united, people will never be defeated. Censorship was at an end,

freedom of speech restored, elections promised, and most important of all, the end of Portugal's colonial wars in Africa seemed at last to be an attainable goal. A military council held power for a period, then a provisional government, all with preparations for a free election

as exiled leadership, including communists and socialists, returned to Portugal. If the domestic consequences, of the Carnation Revolution were democratic. The consequences abroad were, at long last, to do with decolonization. The young guns in the military who joined the revolution, quote, had decided that they were not going to win lucrative benefits from the colonial war in the way their elders had done

in the 1960s. Simultaneously, Portugal's leading industrialists came to the realization that their Lisbon enterprises would face a better future in democratic Europe than in colonial Africa. Businesses also resented the everlasting burden of war taxes, end quote. The Armed Forces Movement, the name of the military junta, hoped to bring about an orderly disengagement from Africa. In Guinea-Bissau, negotiations were conducted relatively swiftly. A statement issued by the Armed Forces Movement in the country declared, we Portuguese military troops who were sent to a war that we did not understand or support

have in our hands a unique opportunity to repair the crimes of fascism and colonialism, to set up the basis for a new and fraternal cooperation, which mean the peoples of Portugal and Guinea. And by September, Guinea-Bissau was recognized as an independent republic. Portugal's other colonies, Mozambique and Angola, were a different story. But at first, a similar pathway to independence did seem possible. In Angola, a four-way interim government was set up between the MPLA, Roberto's FNLA, and Jonas Savimbi's Unita.

But behind the scenes, it was clear the chances for a unified Angolan government were slim. At the moment of the Carnation Revolution, Holden-Roberto's FNLA was arguably still the strongest Angolan faction fighting for independence, and the socialist MPLA knew it. Jonas Savimbi remained a wildcard, as he'd been during the colonial era when he partnered up with the Portuguese colonizers. So from the very start of Portugal's exit, the prospects for a peaceful transition in Angola were poor. Historian Martin Meredith writes that the post-war situation was already lurching toward a major disaster. Quote, as the Portuguese administration there disintegrated,

the three rival nationalist factions competed for power, transforming a colonial war into a civil war, causing the flight of the entire white population and drawing the Soviet Union and the United States into a perilous confrontation by proxy. Three months after the Carnation Revolution of 19th, 74, Augustino Netto, Holden-Roberto, and Jonas Savimbi met in Zaire, swearing that they would work together to negotiate Portugal's exit from Angola. Despite the photo-up, it did not take long for cracks

in this facade to show. By November 74, the capital city of Luanda was a powder keg. In the city, writes Birmingham, the FNLA had been amassing stocks of weapons, which could easily be transported from Zaire and assembling men. Meanwhile, the MPLA established its headquarters in the city, with crowds cheering when Nettos' right-hand man, Lucio Lara, arrived in the capital. Shortly afterward, the U.S. Consul General in Luanda reported the first violent outburst in the city, which left 50 dead and 100 wounded. As he cabled to Kissinger on November 13th, a siege complex began to take over Luanda in the past two days, and many people are hoarding food and supplies, end quote. The FNLA was already creeping up on MPLA territory, and the Zaire

factor was key. Quote, Zaire's president, Mobutu, had been a long-time supporter of Roberto, writes historian Natalia Telepneva. And soon after the revolution in Portugal, he began to build up the FNLA's military wing with the support of Chinese instructors, end quote. Netto, meanwhile, knew that he only had so much time before hostilities broke out with Holden Roberto. He needed to get the Soviets back in his corner. Moscow had suspended aid to the MPLA months earlier, suspecting Netto couldn't keep his organization's house in order. Too much squabbling. So in September of 74, Netto hosted his own conference in which the MPLA elected a new Politburo and rebooted its military wing.

His rivals, such as Daniel Chupenda, meanwhile, weren't even in Angola. They were guests of President Mobutu in Zaire. And Neto's actions impressed the new left-leaning provisional government in Lisbon. In fact, in early November, revolutionary Portuguese troops assisted the MPLA in entering the oil-rich province of Cabinda to drive out an anti-MPLA leader. Netto had managed to present himself as a statesman approved by the new progressive forces in Lisbon. Now, his party could argue to one Soviet diplomat that Roberto and the FNLA were stuges of

Mobutu, who was, quote, attracted to the smell of Angolan oil. The breakdown of support for each faction went beyond just town and country. There was an ethnic dimension. Roberto's FNLA had wide support among the largely Bokongo ethnic group in the north of Angola. The MPLA had strong allegiance in Luanda, the capital,

as well as among the Kimbundu ethnic group around the capital, and Jonas Savimbi's Unita, though at this point a smaller fighting force commanded serious potential in the south among the Ovumbundu ethnic group. Historian Piero Glahesus,

also told us that Savimbi took the initiative and got in touch with South Africa about joining forces against the MPLA. In late 74, probably in late 74 or very early 75, so the South African garment is contacted by Savinbi through a certain number of right-wing Portuguese officers. And Savimbi offers the cooperation with South Africa. and what she offers to the South Africans is to help them against an Amidian guerrilla, Swapo, who were operating in the south of Angola, at their bases in the south of Angola.

And so you have, in early 75, the beginning of a connivance between South Africa and Savimbi, in which the suitor is Savimbi. It is Savimbi who starts the context. If Holden-Roberto still enjoyed the reputation as Angola's most successful warlord, Augustinion Netto had an obvious advantage of his own. He had his arms around the capital. And it was clear the MPLA intended to keep it that way.

Quote, the MPLA began to make headway mobilizing popular support, mainly in the urban centers, writes Martin Meredith. Quote, Luanda, the capital, and the key to any bid for power, was regarded from the outset as an MPLA stronghold. In January 1975, Augustino Netto, Holden Roberto, and Jonas Savimbi smiled at each other in Alvor, Portugal. These men, along with the new Portuguese government, signed in agreement.

that produced a timetable for Angolan independence. Independence Day was set for November 11, 1975. Before that date, the three parties were to run candidates in a free election and also organize a military force as Portugal made its exit. However, notes Telapneva, quote, The Alvore Agreement did not limit the number of troops, the liberation movements were allowed to maintain outside the joint military force. In addition, MPLA, FNLA, and UNITA were allowed to maintain their separate barracks

and installations in the city. As a result, the MPLA and FNLA continued to increase their number of loyal soldiers in Luanda, end quote. On January 25th, the FNLA kidnapped what they called an MPLA symbol. who was working at a local radio station. Street fights broke out again just a few days later. Things were getting so hot that when a Soviet mission visited the country, quote, they decided to hide their real identities, registering at their hotel as, quote, experts in citrus fruit. It was the threat of Zaire's intervention on behalf of Roberto that really kicked the

MPLA into gear. By spring, occasional shooting among FNLA and MPLA supporters became common. April rang with machine gunfire in the Luanda slums. May brought more blood. Other eastern bloc countries began to follow the Soviets and Czechs in supporting the MPLA. Quote, Poland promised to provide five million Zlati in equipment, writes Telapneva. The largest provider of humanitarian aid was the German Democratic Republic, East

Germany, which sent four ships with food, medicine, textiles, and clothing. for the MPLA between January and June 75." The two superpowers were watching closely. How would the USSR, which had recently suspended aid to the MPLA, approach the escalating situation? The Soviets were conservative and hoped for some kind of reconciliation between the three competing Angolan factions. And despite their reservations, it appears that after Netto's charm offensive in Portugal,

The USSR was persuaded that he had what it took to lead progressive forces in Angola. Quote, Augustino Netto lobbied the Soviets, arguing his close connections to the new government in Portugal, made him the clear candidate for the top job in independent Angola, writes Telapneva. The Soviets decided to restore military support for the MPLA. But what about the United States? From the jump, Washington had a more or less accurate understanding of Portugal's disengagement from Africa. In particular, D.C. was paying attention to the potential ramifications for the U.S. and the Cold War. And while the Carnation Revolution unfolded across two presidencies,

Richard Nixon's and Gerald Ford's, there was one constant in Washington. Henry Kissinger, Secretary of State. There has been a great deal of speculation tied to a possible trip of the president to Europe. We still, of course, plan this trip, but its exact date will have to be determined by the pace of our preparations. The virtually bloodless coup that toppled the government, he told Nixon, in a memo days after the April 74 coup, quote, was triggered by Lisbon's African policies and the divisions within the military to which they gave rise, end quote.

In other words, Kissinger understood that Portugal's colonies were the reason why the dictatorship fell. The revolution in Portugal and its retreat from Africa left Kissinger feeling cold-blooded. He told Nixon that the revolution, quote, could possibly provide some near-term benefits for the United States, For example, a possible lessening or end to Portuguese pressure for U.S. weapons to use in the African territories, end quote. But upon seeing the socialist character of Portugal's revolution, Kissinger and Allied powers in Western Europe got worried.

As we've seen, the Azores Air Base was an essential piece of U.S. nuclear deterrence in Europe, as one American diplomat later phrased it. There was a lot of unrest in Portugal, and the feeling was that Portugal might be the first NATO country to go communist. It was clear that Henry Kissinger felt that the situation was that Portugal was at least a pre-communist state. It was not until after Nixon left office, however, and was replaced by Gerald Ford that American policy coered. For Kissinger, writes historian Piero Glehessus. Portugal became an obsession while its colonies remained on the back burner, end quote. And working through the 40 committee, the all-powerful cross-branch group set up by Kissinger to coordinate foreign policy, we heard about it last in Cambodia and Vietnam, Kissinger tried to use the 40 committee

to launch covert operations in Portugal against the communists. But the idea of covert ops in Western Europe lost steam. On America's domestic front, the disgrace of Watergate, the hearings that resulted from it, not to mention the Church Committee in the Senate, which was exposing the malfeasance of U.S. covert operations across the world, all of this was drawing public attention to the underhanded methods Kissinger was after. Furthermore, in Portugal, the Americans were deploying a rather atypical tactic in their toolbox, backing the moderate socialists to box out the communists in the elections, and it was working.

And lastly, it was also becoming clear that Portugal's African territories would be a locus of Cold War action. In the fall of 74, the CIA upped its payments to Holden Roberto to $10,000 a month. But with the signing of the Alvore agreement in January of 75, it was dawning on Washington that it might need to take a heavier hand in Southern Africa, Angola especially.

About a week after the Alvore agreement was signed, CIA director William Colby told the 40 committee he had received, quote, some very disturbing intelligence about Soviet support for the MPLA. Consequently, in an almost careless spasm, as Glehessus puts it, The committee decided to double down on Roberto and the FNLA,

awarding him $300,000. Though Jonas Savimbi and Unita came up for discussion, one source later told Glehesis that Savimbi didn't get a proposed $100,000 because, quote, probably Kissinger had heard of Roberto before, but he had never heard of Savimby. This splurge to Roberto did not mean that the U.S. had an Angola policy, say. Even as the FNLA ramped up attacks on Netto's organization in the spring,

American attention was focused on the collapse in Saigon and the emerging chaos in Cambodia. Quote, by the spring of 75, writes Plehasis. Mobutu's Zaire was doing its best to help Roberto, but Washington had done virtually nothing. Because Mobutu's corrupt state in Zaire was teetering, the latest problem being a collapse in the price of copper. Zayers' dictator was growing impatient with Kissinger's lack of support. And so, he issued statements of solidarity with enemies of America, like North Korea and the Palestine Liberation Organization, even going so far as to claim the CIA was planning a coup against him. It wasn't. Mobutu simply knew what he saw, a rising MPLA in Angola, now supported by the

Soviet Union, and he was trying to get Washington's attention. It worked. In late June, Kissinger, feeling that another crisis with an American ally in Africa was unacceptable, urged President Ford at an NSC meeting to approve a $50 million aid package for Mobutu. Per Glehesas, quote, the meeting took place under twin shadows. Mobutu's situation was deteriorating, while nettoes and the MPLAs were improving. End quote. In July, after the British and French had already done so, the U.S. decided to put covert ops back on the menu. The MPLA was gaining strength. Now, Roberto and Jonas Savimbi would get support. At a July 14th meeting, for which there is no declassified record, the 40 committee voted in favor of the covert action.

followed by the president's formal consent a couple days later. The budget so far was approved for $25 million, a number that would get much, much larger. And the operation was dubbed IA feature. Simply put, American policy governed by the near-omipotent Henry Kissinger was to back the enemies of the MPLA and hope for a pro-Western regime in Angola. We have an unusual and vivid record of America's covert operation in Angola in 1975 from the inside. When the dust settled on the op three years later in 1978, a CIA officer named John Stockwell,

who had been the chief of the agency's Angola Task Force, published a tell-all memoir titled In Search of Enemies. Stockwell is the highest-ranking CIA officer ever to publish such an unauthorized account. And it is an important record of events that have a weak paper trail. Here is Stockwell, in his own words, in a CNN documentary from years back.

Bill Colby, the CIA director, went to brief the National Security Council in the White House the first time on this. His briefing was literally, gentlemen, this is a map of Africa. And here is Angola. Now, in Angola, we have three, factions. There's the MPLA, they're the bad guys. The FNLA, they're the good guys. And there's

Unita and Jonas Savimbi we don't know too well. And that was to get the National Security Council involved in this thing. Returning to Langley in 75 after serving in Vietnam, where we heard from him briefly last season, Stockwell was immediately roped into the Angola Op. Quote, the Soviets are screwing around in Angola, and the agency is supposed to stop them, the head of all Africa operations told him. We are putting together a program to support Savimbi and Roberto. This is big, the biggest thing in Africa division since the Congo. Stockwell, who was nursing some existential concerns about the CIA after his time in Southeast Asia, began assembling a team whom he lists in his book by pseudonym. Nick was a special

forces veteran who had served in Vietnam. Quote, he had worked 16 hours a day and stayed out of trouble, writes Stockwell. Savimbi should take to him. Nick was a rugby enthusiast, and Savimbi had played second row while a student in Portugal. Another paramilitary expert was Arnie, a barrel-shaped Philadelphia native, who wore an 18-inch jungle knife to agency lectures as a trainee. Arnie had, quote, a humorously strange mind and would say stuff like,

like, next time that long-winded bastard lectures us, I'm going to slip some copper sulfate in his drawers, and quote. Handling propaganda was Bubba. Stockwell calls him, quote, a short, cherubic, and energetic officer whose mission in life was to apply his irrepressible mind toward the harassment of the Soviets throughout Africa. This is one psych operation I'm going to enjoy, Bubba told Stockwell when learning of the mission. We'll call it IA. Phoenix. You know, the bird that keeps burning itself and rising up from the ashes, like the F&A coming back from its defeats.

Aye, Phoenix, I like that. Stockwell stared at Bubba in disbelief. Phoenix had been the kryptonim for the agency's terrorist program in Vietnam. There was one woman on the Angola Task Force, Brenda, an Africa analyst with an academic background. But there would be no African Americans. Stockwell's boss felt we had to be very careful about letting blacks into the program because of the South African involvement. After picking the team, Stockwell's first job was to go visit the men who would actually be receiving CIA money. Flying through Kinshasa, the capital of Zaire.

Stockwell checked out Holden Roberto and the FNLA, first thing he did. Visiting FNLA headquarters in the bush, Stockwell met Robert. face to face, quote, he was trailed by four aides and staffers. We rose to meet them, taller than the others and wearing an exquisitely tailored Zaireian bush jacket. Roberto was a dominant but rebarbative figure. His mouth turned slightly down in an expression of permanent disapproval. His negative impact was compounded by small, darkly tinted glasses, which he never took off. I could sense no warmth. Although he addressed. me politely enough, Bubba would have some difficulty producing a sympathetic propaganda photo.

Roberto said he had 30,000. I had trouble counting 30, badly armed, disorganized, kind of rabble kind of troops. And he was a cocktail party cowboy. It's been his whole career politicking in Kinshasa. He knew nothing of military operations or logistics or organization. Stockwell's impression of Roberto's forces was bad, malnourished soldiers, disorganized leaders, and a lot of dishonesty, confirmed by a visit to the FNLA Front in Northern Engle. Although Roberto claimed that 2,000 troops were under his command fighting the MPLA there, and had claimed furthermore that Stockwell would be visiting the site of an FNLA victory, none of this appeared true.

Stockwell saw a few craters from mortar fire and bullet holes on buildings, evidence of a skirmish, not a battle. And what's more, quote, the MPLA had fled without making a serious effort at defense, and the damage had been done by rampaging FNLA forces as they swept through unopposed, end quote. His side was always the bloodiest, the most violent. They went down and promptly killed 15 MPLAS. PLA political activist. And from that time on, it was all cast, you know, the fate of Angola was cast, it was written in blood. Next up for Stockwell was visiting Savimbi and the Unita frontlines in Angola's south, where, quote, it was immediately clear that Uniteda was an organization of a very different caliber than the FNLA, end quote. Firstly, Stockwell was flown to meet

Savimbi in a Lear jet flown by a British pilot. Quote, we understood it was the gift of a London-Rodesian investment company which was betting on Savimbi to win the war. Special access to Angolan minerals would be prize a plenty. An ideal gift, the little jet gave Savimbi long legs across Africa, end quote. Just a year earlier, Yenita had only a reported 1,500 trained soldiers, writes Telapneva. Its strength so far had come from its collaboration with the Portuguese to, quote, wipe out the MPLA in Southeast Angola in 72. Viewing Savimbi close up, John Stockwell now understood that he and Unita were by far the stronger

candidate than Roberto and his group, both larger in numbers and led by a better political organization. And Savimbi himself was a savvy operator, as Stockwell saw it. Quote, he had no profound ideology. He was neither Marxist nor capitalist, nor even a black revolutionary. He was an Angolan patriot, fighting for the freedom of the Ovimbundu people. He had accepted North Korean training for his men and Chinese money and arms. He liked Americans. If South Africa would give him the help he needed, he would accept, end quote. Going back to Washington in the late summer of 75, Stockwell now understood who exactly the U.S. was backing.

On the one hand, there was the weak, corrupt, and thoroughly known quantity, Holden-Roberto. And on the other, the upstart Savimbi, about whom much less was known, but who seemed to want nothing more than to win. Back in D.C., it would now be Stockwell's job to support these Angolan's. That would involve sending guns, printing propaganda, recruiting mercenaries, and eventually working with other foreign players, especially white South Africa. A quarter of a million whites are trying to leave Angola for Portugal

before the November independence, and today the Portuguese government hurried up their evacuation by air. But many who don't want to wait are trying to leave by sea, moving to the coast and long convoys. In July, 1975, the dream of a United Angola evaporated. MPLA troops summoned from guerrilla camps in the remote east and exile abroad, converged on Luanda, writes Birmingham. Quote, in the ensuing week of violence, the Luanda returnees were supported by irregular militias mobilized by the local party leadership,

which had been organizing activist cells of people power in the city. The MPLA armed supporters in Luanda's shanty towns, adds Meredith, and recruited a force of about 4,000 Katangis fighters. These were exiles from Mobutu's Zaire, who harbored an abiding hatred of Mobutu. Within days, the four-way power-sharing executive, which was established as Angola's interim government fell apart. The armies and politicians of both the northern FNLA and the southern Unita were driven out of Luanda,

leaving the MPLA in control. Quote, strengthened by the influx of Russian weapons and supported by the Katangis, writes Meredith, the MPLA drove the FNLA and Unita out of Luanda in July and gained tentative control of the other major towns, including the ports of Lubito, Bengela, and Mocha Mocometes. It also held the Cabinda exclave where the oil fields lay. The transitional government duly collapsed. From then on, the government of Luanda, with Portuguese consent, remained effectively in the hands of the MPLA.

Up until now, Jonas Savimbi had been angling, as usual, for whose coattails to ride. He'd been playing the role of a squeaky clean patriot whose only desire was for unity. But in fact, he was studying which side, the MPLA or the FNLA, could serve his own interests best. Quote, Savimbi's initial inclination, as a one-time admirer of Mao Zedong, was to accept the advice of the radical Portuguese soldiers and join forces with the MPLA. He soon realized, however, that neither South Africa nor the U.S. was likely to take. tolerate the advent of a Maoist or Marxist regime in independent Angola. Savimbi would soon find a very different partner, one that suited the Americans just fine.

The time had come for white South Africa to begin its own project in Angola. As we saw last episode, the South Africans already occupied Namibia, the black majority nations sitting between South Africa and Angola. There, they faced a troublesome nationalist movement, which, like the MPLA, was also armed by the socialist bloc. And the South Africans were already working with another former Portuguese colony, Mozambique. There, in Mozambique, writes Meredith, quote, they had quickly established an amicable working relationship with the new government, even though it came to power as a revolutionary party proclaiming Marxist politics, end quote. But in the case of Angola, like the Americans, the South African saw a specter of genuine communism,

something that would threaten everything the apartheid regime was working for in the region. So said South African defense minister Magnus Milan in an interview with the BBC years later. Communism, as far as South Africa was concerned, was a real threat. A threat in the sense of dictating, taking over the whole of the whole of the whole of the whole of, the country. And we couldn't have that situation here in South Africa, that they could come through and instigate and plant the ideology of Marxism. What did the white government in Pretoria want? To control Southern Africa, either directly through occupation as in Namibia or through cooperative black regimes, as in Mozambique. If a group like the FNLA or Jonas Savimbi's organization won power,

in Angola, that cooperation could work. But if the MPLA won, the South Africans would be stuck with a vocally anti-apartheid black government supported by the anti-apartheid socialist bloc, who are also welcoming Namibian nationalists into their territory, which could be used to launch attacks on the white occupation in Namibia. As early as February 1975, writes Telepneva, the South African Defense Forces and Boss, their Bureau of State Security, made the first overtures to the FNLA and United. Roberto Savimbi and former MPLA leader Daniel Chippenda all promised that they would refuse to allow the Namibian fighters to establish bases in Angola, in exchange for South Africa. support. In July, as the Americans began their secret operation, the South Africans also moved in.

Jonas Savimbi, beloved Angolan Patriot, had found his new partner and patron in the apartheid regime. Quote, at secret meetings with Roberto and Savimbi, South African officials agreed to support the FNLA and Unita with arms and training, and to launch an invasion from Namibia, disguising it as a mercenary operation. As we've seen, Savimbi didn't care who he had to pair up with, be it the Portuguese, then the Americans, or apartheid South Africa.

He had by now decided his greatest enemy was the MPLA. It was an obstacle to his own leadership, and therefore a threat to Angolan's everywhere. He later said of his collaboration with apartheid South Africa, quote, If you are a drowning man in a crocodile infested river, and you've just gone under for the third time, you don't question who is pulling you to the bank until you are safely on it. South Africa entered the war, writes the celebrated novelist Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, quote, watching the United States program closely and hoping for a nod of recognizing,

and camaraderie. Thus, writes Stockwell, quote, without any memos being written at CIA headquarters saying, let's coordinate with the South Africans, coordination was affected at all CIA levels, and the South Africans escalated their involvement

in step with our own. In July of 75, the South African Prime Minister, Vorster, approved 20 million RAND worth of weapons and other material for the enemies of the MPLA. Then in August, the South African Defense Forces, or the SADF, slipped into Angola to seize the Kaleweke Dam, citing security concerns.

Quote, this move led to the entrenchment of the South African Army in southern Angola, writes Tel Abneva. In September, the SADF started training Jonas Savimbi's forces, and Daniel Chappendez branch of the FNLA. Though it often goes unmentioned, this August incursion was really South Africa's tollhold in Angola. It was a pretext to the oncoming invasion. And soon MPLA troops would report they'd come into contact with South African forces working with their enemies in the South. Quote, they took care to mask their identity and avoid a world outcry at the site of Afrikaner's soldiers appearing to spread apartheid.

Portugal took over the administration of its colony, Angola, tonight, saying the three groups fighting for control of the colony had left it without a functioning government. There was supposed to be a transitional government for the time between now and independence for Angola in November, but the fighting there destroyed it. Augustin Yonetto and his comrades spent the summer fending off the FNLA and Unita. They retained their hold on the Luanda area and the Cabinda enclave, still the key to holding power. They were hoping to hold out till November when the Portuguese were finally gone and independence was official. But the MPLA knew their enemies were multiplying.

Neto grew yet closer to the socialist bloc, which in turn divided up the labor to support Angola. The Soviets offered additional military assistance, while Poland, agreed to provide uniforms, communications, and medicine, writes to help Neva. Quote, Bulgaria allocated weapons and a one-off payment to the MPLA. The most generous contribution came from the GDR, East Germany, which approved the delivery of $2 million worth of military aid to the MPLA in September, and quote. But surely the most significant aid and the most important turn in our story would come from Havana.

As we saw last episode, Revolutionary Cuba had provided advisors for the MPLA since 1965. The relationship had had its peaks and valleys, but in May 1975, Netto had no hesitation in requesting that Cuba send advisors, 230 of whom arrived in Angola in June. By the end of the year, there would be thousands of Cuban combat troops.

It is unlikely, writes Gabriel Garcia-Marquez, that even the Cubans had foreseen that their solidarity aid to the Angolan people would reach such proportions. It had been clear to them right from the start, however, that the action had to be swift, decisive, and at all costs, successful. Cuba had in fact been slow to respond to events there, as Telepneva, and Piero Glahesa cites several reasons for the delayed engagement. For one thing, Fido Castro might have been unwilling to jeopardize a chance of rapprochement with the United States.

But in early August, after Cuban talks with the Angolans, quote, Castro proposed dispatching weapons and 480 instructors who would train MPLA military units at four training centers inside Angola, end quote. Portugal had no problem with Castro's move, and, according to historian, Od Arn Westod, the Cuban leader also sought Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev's support, quote, asking for transport assistance and the use of Soviet staff officers to help with planning military operations. In his account of what the Cubans called Operation Carlotta, the massive aid campaign for Angola, Marquez writes. When the Cubans received Neto's appeal, they did not limit themselves to strict fulfillment

of its points. They decided to send at once a contingent of 480 specialists who in the space of six months would set up four training centers and organize 16 infantry battalions and 25 mortar batteries and anti-aircraft machine gun emplacements. These were supplemented with a team of doctors, 115 vehicles, and a suitable communications network. By that time, Holden Roberto's troops were so close to Luanda that a Cuban artillery instructor at Indalatando, who was giving his students one of their first lessons, could actually see the mercenaries armored cars advancing. End quote.

What was the Cuban rationale for involvement in Angola? In some ways, it mirrored the American one. Quote, the United States was just emerging from the Vietnam-Daboard. and the Watergate scandal with a president whom no one had elected. The CIA was a prisoner of Congress and stood deeply compromised in the eyes of public opinion. The U.S. government had to avoid appearing as the ally of racist South Africa in front of both the majority of African countries and the black population of the United States itself. Cubans could safely rely on the solidarity and material aid of the Soviet Union and other socialist countries. even though they were also aware of the possible implications of the operation for the policy of peaceful coexistence and international detente, end quote.

The very first contingent of Cubans arrived, unsure of whether they'd be stopped by Portugal. They weren't. Quote, dressed in holiday clothing with no military insignia and carrying briefcases with their own ordinary passports, they had the look of healthy tourists roasted by the Caribbean sun. Thus, their cover of civilian holiday makers must have come as no surprise to them. But inside their cases were machine guns, and the cargo hold of the aircraft was filled not with holiday gear, but with a large load of light artillery, personal firearms, 375-millimeter guns, and 3.82-millimeter mortars. The only modification to the plane was a floor hatch that enabled the weapons to be removed via the passenger cabin in case of emergency.

Most of the Cuban instructors had arrived in Luanda by the end of September. When they did get to the field after this rather exhausting journey, they had to spring right into action. Havana had placed selection standards as to who could volunteer to go, but some were so enthusiastic or moved by the conflict in Angola that there were numerous cases where volunteers managed to slip through the application criteria entirely. There was, Marquez writes, quote, the qualified engineer, for example, who passed himself off as a truck driver, or the high

official who successfully posed as a mechanic, or the woman who was very nearly accepted as a private soldier. One boy left without his father's permission, only to meet him later in Angola, since he too had gone without telling his family. In contrast, one 20-year-old sergeant could in no way gained the necessary authorization and had to put up with an affront to his machismo when his journalist mother and doctor fiance were sent out. A number of common prisoners begged to be selected, but none of them were even considered. End quote. Filmmaker Nagash Abder Ramon interviewed Cubans deployed to Angola for his short film Cuba in Africa. And he told us about one not-so political basis for why one particular Cuban went to Angola.

You know, I don't want to say that everybody was unanimous, by the way, in this, you know, there were people who did not really know the full story. I'll tell you there was a soldier who was 17 when he went there. And I say, why did you go there? He said, I just want to see a new country. I mean, he was not ideological. He was a young kid. He said, you know, it would be nice to see a new country, but that was a tough thing he went to.

No Cuban was forced to go, though those who refused ended up being exposed to public scorn and private contempt. But Marquez writes, there can be no doubt that the immense majority left for Angola filled with the conviction that they were performing an act of political solidarity, and with the same consciousness and bravery that marked the route of the Bay of Pigs invasion 15 years earlier, end quote. over 10,000 miles away from where that invasion took place, the Cubans and the CIA would now meet again on the battlefields of Angola. Good evening. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said today, yes, there is firm evidence that Russia is supporting the communists in Portugal, trying to subvert the revolution there, but he would not say what evidence?

That in a short answer to a question in Birmingham, Alabama, where Kisinger made an aggressive speech warning Russia to keep its hands out of Portugal. Arthur Lord reports. In a bonus episode from our second season, I spoke to Oscar Aram Masoliva, Cuba's one-time ambassador to Angola. I asked him why he felt the United States was so interested in working with South Africa and Zaire's dictator Mobutu to sabotage the MPLA in Angola. My perception is that the United States and the racist regime in Pletorian consider the employee to be a Marxist movement closely linked to the Soviet Union.

That was a danger to their geostrategic interest in the region and Africa as a whole. or the Angolan oil, the diamonds, the United States did not want to lose it. And on the other hand, I think that President Mobutu of Sair also had a lot of influence in that process since he and his godson, Holden Roberto, were fighting. to seize power in Luanda for economic, political, and security reasons. A very strong coalition of some Western countries and others was formed to prevent in that context the MPDA from coming to power. By the autumn of 1975, the CIA's Angola operation was

in full swing. The agency had placed its paramilitary experts on the ground with the FNLA and Unita, a direct involvement of Americans that was supposed to be against the rules. And so-called foreign military advisors, aka French and Portuguese mercenaries, were hired and dispatched. And a miniature air force composed mostly of planes either stolen from Luanda or borrowed from big corporations friendly to the FNLA, like the Diamond Syndicate De Beers. On the propaganda front, both the FNLA and UnitedA, with the help from Bubba and the CIA's New York station, were getting attention from the Western press. In the end, this actually created a mild headache. Stockwell had to send a cable to New York, quote, reminding them that

lobbying in the United States by CIA agents was not permitted, end quote. The agency's secret war, whose costs would rise above an estimated $50 million by the end of the year, had mostly remained a secret. But Stockwell knew that the cover story could not hold. When the FNLA retreated from a battle in September 75, quote, it left behind crates of munitions which bore fresh U.S. Air Force shipping labels. A front-page story in the New York Times, a couple weeks later, reported the CIA's involvement in Portugal and Angola to the tune of several million dollars a month. The secret was getting less secret all the time. In an interview with the Chicago Sun Times, President Ford had embarrassingly not denied that the agency was

involved. From the start of the Angola Task Force, Stockwell had had doubts about Washington's commitment to the operation. He suspected that in the age of detente and arms reductions and Vietnam and Watergate, fighting in Angola wasn't really about stopping the MPLA or its allies. It was instead Kissinger's and the 40 committee's way of showing that in the age of detente and arms reductions and Vietnam and so forth, the U.S. could still give the commies a bloody nose. This may not have been the plan from the start, but a transcript of a September meeting of the 40 committee shows the exact moment when Henry Kissinger realized the MPLA had taken too much of a lead in Angola. After remarking that, I don't think revolutionary war is our specialty,

Kissinger told the group, we've blown it, basically, end quote. Covert operations, mercenaries, plausible denialability. Perhaps the Americans' hearts weren't really in the Angolan campaign. White South Africa, on the other hand, was ready to jump right in. The government of South Africa said today it is sending more of its troops into Angola. On October 14, 1975, White South Africa launched Operation Savannah, the invasion of Angola. The two most powerful prongs of the invasion were Task Force Zulu and Task Force Foxbat. Zulu was a force of about 1,000 men, including Chependa's FNLA and Angolan soldiers who had fought with the Portuguese during the anti-colonial wars.

The group was initially led by a small group of white South African officers. And Foxbat, meanwhile, was assembled from Yanita's men and the South African military instructors working out of Savimbi's headquarters in central Angola, writes Tel Abneva. Mobutu chipped in as well as FNLA and Zairean troops attacked from the north in a drive for Luanda. Zulu, a mechanized brigade of the SADF, accompanied by attack helicopters, burst into Angola from Namibia in the south. The task force rolled up the coast in a lightning advance. Zulu overran southern towns, racing toward the major ports of Bangalya and Lobito.

It was like a Sunday drive, writes Marquez. Quote, the South Africans played festive music on cassette decks fitted to their tanks, end quote. But it soon became clear that the MPLA had called in outside help. In retaliation for the South African invasion, Cuban commandos were sent down the road between Luanda and Lobito. to prevent the South African blitzkrieg from advancing further along the coast. The second South African column, Foxbat, took an inland route and drove much deeper into the country. That made it to the northern edge of the hinterlands around Luanda, but it stopped short because of the Cuban troops. Here too, the invaders were not quite prepared for what lay ahead.

Marquez writes, the leader of one mercenary column conducted operations, from a Honda sports car, seated beside a blonde film actress. The column moved forward with a holiday air, neglecting to send out advanced patrols, and it could not even have realized where the rocket came from that blew the car to pieces. All that was found in the woman's bag was an evening dress, a bikini, and an invitation card to the victory celebrations in Luanda that Holden Roberto had already prepared. Despite the setbacks, still the South Africans had pierced the heart of Angola. By the end of October, there were around 1,000 South African soldiers inside the country,

not counting the mercenaries or the Angolan collaborators of the FNLA and United. The U.S. role in this invasion remains murky. Quote, Kissinger always denied any knowledge of the intervention, but many early commentators believe he pushed for it via back-channel communications with Pretoria. Meredith reports that the South Africans, prompted by the CIA, quote, agreed to participate in a joint operation aimed at capturing Luanda for the FNLA before Independence Day in November. The Soviet role, by contrast, remains clear. Quote, in the aftermath of the South African invasion, the Soviets,

sped up their delivery of heavy weaponry to the MPLA. They also sent weapons experts to train Augustino Netto's military, end quote. The MPLA, now looking more and more like Angola's national government in the capital, had survived the Blitz of mid-October. But the MPLA's control extended little beyond Luanda and territory to the east, and inside the capital, people were getting scared. Netto had to strike back, hard. On November 2nd, nine days before independence,

the MPLA military and their Cuban comrades blasted the advancing South African column with heavy artillery fire. This was also the first time that Cubans fell in combat in Angola. And meanwhile, writes Dalapneva, Roberto's F&LA also intensified attacks on the outskirts of Luanda. The capital seemed within grasp. All this while Angola's Independence Day was fast approaching on the calendar, marked for November 11th.

Despite the South African invasion, despite the shades of civil war taking shape, some were still hoping for a happy ending. In fact, Moscow was still hoping for a last-minute accommodation among the three nationalist movements, writes Telepneva. And they weren't alone for hoping this. Not only the Portuguese, but also Tanzania's Julius Nairi,

consistently pushed for Netto to come to some kind of agreement with his rivals, especially Sivimbi. As late as November 3rd, Nairi urged the Soviet ambassador to try to persuade the MPLA to include its rivals in the New Guinea. government. Others, such as leaders in the Republic of Congo, urged the MPLA and Moscow against compromise. One spokesman called Mobutu, partner of Washington and Pretoria, a gigantic snake, whose owners must be stopped from penetrating further into southwest Africa. And so, after much agonizing, the Soviets, picking who they hoped would be the winner, unilaterally recognized the

MPLA as the rulers of Angola. The Soviet representatives drove to Nettos' home to inform him personally. Quote, on Nettos' face, one of them remembered. Surprise, which turned to happiness, exhilaration. Finally, Nettos said, we have been understood. This way we will cooperate and fight together. The Cubans and other friends are helping us, but it was very difficult without the Soviet Union.

Now we will certainly win. Speaking of Havana, the Cubans in Angola said they were also making moves. They told the same Soviet officials that, quote, they were waiting for a special message from Havana about assistance to the MPLA and said that a battalion of Cuban special forces had already been dispatched to Luanda. The Cubans then handed over a list of weapons for him to request from Moscow as a matter of urgent. This was the moment, as Luanda hung in the balance, that the Cuban presence in Angola went from a detachment of military instructors to a full-on military commitment, thousands of combat troops.

After first deciding to send several hundred Cuban officers in early November, two days later, Fidel Castro relayed he wanted to dispatch over a thousand in November. and December. We already know that Castro's decision, writes Telapneva, took the Soviets by surprise. Still deliberating over whether a peaceful resolution among the Angolan's was possible, the KGB head, Yuri Andropov, and Minister of Defense Andre Gretschko, drafted an urgent letter to Castro in an attempt to dissuade him, quote, but it was too late. The Cuban troops had already departed from Havana.

Cuban diplomat Oscar Aramos Oliva told us his thoughts on the U.S. perception that Cuba was merely a puppet of the Soviet Union, an idea that was seriously discredited by Havana's action in Angola. I remember that when I was ambassador to the United Nations in 1984, some seniors, U.S. official said that Cuba was a proxy of the Soviet Union that showed enormous ignorance on Cuba and its leadership. We have always been motivated by the fact that our security and independence is also linked to the independence of other countries, especially on the developing countries, from colonial and neo-colonial domination. We have many points in which we coincide with these. Soviet Union in international matters, but others did not. And therefore, of course, we were trying to persuade them of the correctness of our visions. And the American line, that Cuba was,

and always has been, a puppet of the Soviet Union, a line that was still at this time sincerely believed at many levels in Washington, probably sounded very funny. in Moscow. But the Soviets, however disturbed by the Angolan War and Castro's escalation, stuck by the MPLA and the Cubans both. Quote, with only a few days to go before official independence, the MPLA and the Cubans prepared to defend the city against Roberto's forces, stationed only a few dozen kilometers north of Luanda, end quote. eager to reach Luanda in one last push before the Portuguese withdrawal, which was scheduled for the following day, Roberto took charge.

Quote, the attack began with a bombing raid of Luanda, writes Telibneva. There were no casualties, and by the time the FNLA military column set out to march on Luanda, the MPLA had managed to reassemble their heavy artillery behind the hills, augmented by about 120 Cuban special forces. Then the MPLA unleashed heavy fire on the column. Holden Roberto was forced to retreat. A portrait of the anxious hours before Angolan independence from David Birmingham.

As the MPLA prepared to celebrate the arrival of freedom, excited but apprehensive citizens could hear Zairean guns pounding the northern city suburbs in support of the FNLA. Meanwhile to the south, Cuban guns, partly staffed by the militants of the MPLA, held at bay the blitzkrieg columns of South Africa's expeditionary force.

Offshore, Portugal's last Governor-General sailed away, declaring that sovereignty had been transferred to the people of Angola, end quote. Journalist Marga Holness reported crowds assembling on the streets

in the Capitol's stadium, soldiers firing rounds into the air in celebration as people raised Angola's new flag, in the eyes of the MPLA, at least, displaying a machete and a factory cog. Where were you on that November night in 1975 was a popular question for many, many years in Angola? It depended on which side you'd chosen in this heady mix of foreign invasion and civil war. The MPLA enjoyed the support of a great many Angolan's, some of whom flocked to join its volunteer army, reports Birmingham. Quote, others, however, both north and south, opposed the party's dominance in Luanda, and, helped by South African troops, established an alternative highland capital in Huambo,

unofficially known as the HQ of the Democratic Republic of Angola, end quote. This would be the genesis of Jonas Savimbi's pseudo-state. Angolan's and Cubans and the limited but committed Soviet advisors rang in Angolan independence in a tense but emotional moment of solidarity. We actually had a celebration party in the CIA headquarters in Washington. We expected the news by the end of the day that we would have captured Luanda. Back in Langley, according to John Stockwell, the CIA's Angolan Task Force chose to celebrate Independence Day, quote, with a late afternoon party, decorating its offices with crept paper and serving wine and cheese. When the clock struck midnight, sending Angola into official independence, the MPLA wasted no time.

emboldened by the incoming troops from Cuba, they lashed out at the FNLA, United and the white South Africans nibbling at the borders of the capital. Within weeks, the Cuban soldiers who'd been flown in during the last days of colonial rule were reinforced by a seaborne expeditionary army, which outnumbered the South African invading force. This Cuban contingent soon rose to 10,000 men, equipped with heavy long-range guns and armored person. personnel carriers, end quote. The Soviets sent more officers to Luanda, but as one remembered, quote, nobody was there to meet us. We had a feeling we'd be captured. For two hours, we were inside the plane. The engines were on, and we were ready to take off any minute. Once the Angolans managed to usher these Soviet advisors to headquarters, Telepneverites, the Soviets discovered

their general staff in Moscow had not sent enough provisions for their group. So, for the first three weeks, the Cubans shared their food with the Soviet experts. Neto and his commanders began their comeback with an attack on the north, at Team Mobutu, whose Zaireian forces were on loan to back up the FNLA. Here's how the Angolan's drove South Africa out. Telepnevah writes that on November 13th, the South Africa Zulu force took Novo Redondo, a city in west central Angola near the coast, pushing towards Port Amboim, a major port only 250 kilometers from Luanda. The Cuban force stopped Zulu in its tracks by blowing up a bridge on route.

The South Africans raced to plot a different course to Luanda, but by that point, MPLA Cuban forces had fortified positions on the coast. Things didn't go any better for Foxbat, as thousands more Cuban troops, troops and hundreds of tons of weapons supplies were flown in on a Soviet airlift, Foxbat petered out, and, lacking its own reliable supply line deep in Angola, faltered and hit reverse. In the six weeks between Angolan independence and the end of 1975, the MPLA and the Cubans had, with a razor-thin advantage, halted the advance of South Africa's military and its allies. Meanwhile, in the north, the MPLA's ninth brigade pushed Holden Roberto's forces beyond Cuxedo in the northwest, writes Talapneva.

On December 23rd, South Africa decided to withdraw its military from Angola. It no longer saw victory as an immediate possibility. If the Soviet Union continues actions such as Angola, we will, without any question, resist. And failure to resist can only lead other countries to conclude that their situation is becoming increasingly precarious. In Washington, Henry Kissinger raced to match the Cubans and the Soviets' commitment. As South Africa withdrew, his president, Gerald Ford, approved another $7 million for the CIA operation in Angola, bringing the total to over $30 million. Because in Angola, we are not talking about American participation. We are talking about giving military and financial assistance to people who are doing the fighting.

Yet, despite the U.S. contacts with South Africa, Roberto, Savimbi, and the foreign mercenaries, the anti-Nedno-Coalition had been woefully outmaneuvered in Angola, and fresh Cuban troops were piling in to the country. A dozen small rented planes flew consignments of weapons to the raw recruits of Wrights Birmingham. But attempts to stiffen America's allies proved to be another humiliating fiasco which further tarnished Washington's post-Vietnam reputation. Right after Vietnam, the American people in no way, and the Congress and the media,

would put up with the U.S. putting its forces in to control the outcome of a country, that none of us, none of the American people were interested in. In early December, Kissinger threw a Hail Mary, jetting around the world to gain commitments from the Chinese and the French. But on December 19th, Congress balked at providing any additional funding for covert operations in Angola. The fallout of U.S. wars in Vietnam and Cambodia, not to mention the Watergate scandal,

or the explosive findings of the Church Committee in Washington, it was all terrible timing for those seeking. American victories and Soviet defeats in Africa, least of all Henry Kissinger. But Washington would not abandon Angola. There was still the Safari Club. As would be done in Asia, the U.S. government approached the Shah of Iran, the Saudis, and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to provide additional resources for General Mobutu in Zaire. South Africa and its invasion were viewed with disgust in most of the world.

But South Africa was not finished with Angola, and neither was Washington, or Langley, for that matter. And neither were the guerrilla commanders, eyeing Luanda from their headquarters. And abroad, Angola was already becoming a new ideological front for observers and partisans of the Cold War. At the dawn of 1976, the lines were drawn, as one author put it, for a new war, both international and fratricidal. A war that would last for decades, until Jonas Savimby's death in 2002.