The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale

Continental unity was only possible with national liberation. A major landmark in this struggle was the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale, which marked the beginning of the end of minority rule in Southern Africa, the dismantling of the apartheid system and the total liberation of Africa from European occupation. On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of this crucial battle, Dennis Laumann explains its significance.

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THIS year marks the 25th anniversary of a key event in the struggle for African liberation from European colonial rule: the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale. In that remote town in southern Angola in March 1988, the army of apartheid South Africa was defeated by a Pan-Africanist alliance that included tens of thousands of Cuban volunteers. Their victory forced South Africa's racist rulers to enter into negotiations that led to the unbanning of anti-apartheid organisations, the release of Nelson Mandela, the independence of Namibia, and ultimately freedom for South Africa. Although prevailing historical narratives about the end of apartheid ignore the significance of this epic battle, its central role has been emphasised by Mandela himself.

The Battle of Cuito Cuanavale marked the culmination of more than a decade of South Africa's war against Angola. In the months leading up to Angola's independence from Portugal on 11 November 1975, the South African Defence Forces (SADF), with covert assistance from the United States, invaded Angola to prevent the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) from assuming power. The apartheid regime was threatened by the prospect of another free African nation, espousing socialism no less, on its borders since South Africa occupied neighbouring South-West Africa (present-day Namibia).

At the time, the South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO) waged an armed struggle for independence in Namibia while in South Africa the mass anti-apartheid movement kept the regime on the defensive. Clearly, South Africa's white minority rulers felt under siege, though somewhat emboldened by support from the United States.

Closely observing events from across the Atlantic, the Cuban government unilaterally (in other words, without the knowledge of the Soviet Union) decided to defend Angola's sovereignty after the MPLA leadership requested help from Havana. As the SADF pushed through the Angolan interior towards the capital of Luanda, Cuba launched Operation Carlota, named in honour of an African woman who led a slave rebellion in 19th-century Cuba. Thousands of Cuban soldiers along with vital military equipment were transported on improvised merchant vessels and passenger planes from the Caribbean to Central Africa, a reversal of the voyages of the ships that carried Angolans to slavery in Cuba in prior centuries. By late March 1976, the allied MPLA and Cuban fighters successfully drove the SADF out of Angola into South-West Africa, a shocking defeat for the apartheid regime and an inspiration to South African youth who led the historic Soweto Uprising in June that same year.

Over the next decade, South Africa's racist rulers sought to destabilise Angola mainly through support of its proxy UNITA (the Portuguese acronym for the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola). Together with the United States through its Central Intelligence Agency, the SADF trained and armed UNITA and coordinated its campaign of terror against the Angolan people. Whenever the Angolan military, assisted by Soviet and Cuban advisers, struck against UNITA, the SADF carried out air strikes and ground invasions to protect its Angolan mercenaries. As a result, two southern Angolan provinces were effectively occupied by the SADF, thus extending the apartheid system from South Africa through South-West Africa into Angola.

In July 1987, the Angolan army advanced on UNITA's camps in southeastern Angola. On the verge of being crushed, UNITA was rescued by the South Africans, who attacked from their bases in South-West Africa that October. The situation quickly turned dire for the Angolan military, which retreated into a defensive position at Cuito Cuanavale. Once again, Cuba quickly answered the call for aid and resumed direct combat operations in Angola, dispatching tens of thousands of volunteer troops and its most critical and advanced arms to southern Angola. The ensuing battle grouped together all the main protagonists in the Angolan war: the armies of liberation - Angola, Cuba, and SWAPO (with members of the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa serving in intelligence capacities) - against the forces of imperialism, South Africa and UNITA, backed by the United States.

The SADF repeatedly tried to capture Cuito Cuanavale in early 1988 but were successfully repelled. While the battle raged, the allied Cuban, Angolan, and Namibian forces, their MiG 23s assuring air superiority, launched a counter-offensive towards the west, advancing on Namibia, liberating the South African-occupied provinces of Angola, and forcing the SADF to retreat from their positions. After failing to take Cuito Cuanavale, losing the territory it occupied, suffering heavy losses, and facing growing resistance to the war amongst its base of white minority supporters at home, the SADF announced its withdrawal from Angola in April 1988. The following month, the apartheid regime agreed to negotiations which took place throughout the year with Angola and Cuba on one side of the table and South Africa and the United States on the other. The rest, as they say, is history: the ANC along with its main ally the South African Communist Party (SACP) were unbanned on 2 February 1990; Mandela was released from prison on 9 February; and Namibia regained its independence on 21 March.

While the apartheid regime tried to spin its defeat in Angola as a tactical retreat - and even a win - newspapers in South Africa and the United States depicted the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale as a victory for the Angolan/Cuban/Namibian alliance. More recently, former SADF commanders have acknowledged they were humiliatingly defeated and outwitted by their opponents, signalling out the brilliance of Fidel Castro, who directed his troops in a command room across the ocean in Cuba. To those who fought against the apartheid regime, there never was any doubt who won the battle. As ANC/SACP leader Ronnie Kasrils recently argued in a 25th anniversary assessment, '. . . the acid test [of the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale] is the outcome - which was the end of apartheid'.

Significance

It is imperative that scholars and activists reassert the importance of the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale not only for the sake of historical accuracy but also to honour the memory of those who fought and died for the liberation of southern Africa. Cuito Cuanavale was the largest military confrontation on African soil since the Second World War Allies-Axis battles in North Africa. It marked the beginning of the end of white minority domination in southern Africa, the dismantling of the apartheid system, and the total liberation of Africa from European occupation. It shattered the myth of white supremacy that was the ideological foundation of the apartheid regime and the entire European colonial project. It was a profound demonstration of Pan-Africanism, what scholars lately call 'reverse diaspora', as over 50,000 Cubans returned to the land of their ancestry to rid the continent of racist rule. Finally, it was a testament to internationalist solidarity as revolutionary Cuba, always cognizant of the historic debt it owes Africa, sent its best forces and materials to fight against apartheid, leaving itself vulnerable to attack by the United States while expecting and receiving absolutely nothing in return for its sacrifices.

In a speech to tens of thousands in the Cuban city of Matanzas in July 1991, Mandela praised the contributions of Cuba to African liberation, declaring:

'We have long wanted to visit your country and express the many feelings that we have about the Cuban revolution, about the role of Cuba in Africa, southern Africa, and the world.

'The Cuban people hold a special place in the hearts of the people of Africa. The Cuban internationalists have made a contribution to African independence, freedom, and justice, unparalleled for its principled and selfless character . . .

'Your crushing defeat of the racist army at Cuito Cuanavale was a victory for the whole of Africa!'

Today, visitors to Freedom Park in Pretoria will see included on the list of anti-apartheid martyrs the names of the over 2,000 Cubans who lost their lives in Angola. There is no greater authority than those who suffered under apartheid, including Mandela himself, on the question of the significance of the Battle of Cuito Cuanavale.                                           

Dennis Laumann is Associate Professor of African History at the University of Memphis in the US and author of Colonial Africa, 1884-1994 (Oxford University Press, 2013). This article is reproduced from African Agenda (Vol. 16, No. 2).

*Third World Resurgence No. 278, October 2013, pp 11-12