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Moscow's professed goal is
victory
o
ver "imperialism"
worldwide. Yet in Africa and
elsewhere, the Unlted States,
Britain and other free world
nations seem confused and
divided, havlng no overa/1
policy to counter Moscow's
global strategy.
T
be Soviet Union, aided by
Cuba, is mounting a major
campaign to cballenge the in-
.:
fiuence of the United States and the ..
~
West throughout sub-Sabaran Af- ....
rica.
~
ti
The catalyst for the growing Red
thrust was the victory
for
Marxist
forces in Angola in 1975-a victory
gained by default when the West
threw in the towel just when it had
the battle won.
Now the scene of Soviet pressure
has sbifted to other vulnerable
fronts.
Zaire Next for "Liberatlon"?
In early March an invasion force–
perhaps 5,000 strong-poured over
the border from Angola into the
mineral-rich Shaba province of
neighboring za·ire, formerly the Bel–
gian Congo. United States sources
said the invaders were remnants of
units that in the early I960s had
fought for the secession
of Shaba (then known
as Katanga province)
from the Congo. Za"ire's
government news
agency further claimed
tbat tbe invaders were
"led by mercenaries
from across the Atlan-
tic"-an obvious reference to Cuban
troops which helped the Marxist
MPLA (Popular Movement for the
Liberation of Angola) forces win in
Angola's civil war and are still there,
15,000 strong.
In Washington, Secretary of State
Cyrus Vanee said loss of the copper
fields of Shaba would badly hurt
Za"ire's economy and deal a "very
serious blow" to the nation's pro–
Westem govemment, Washington's
chief ally in black Africa. lt is no
secret tbat Za"ire, wbicb had backed
the "wrong side" in Angola's civil
4
New Headache
for
the West:
Flghtlng In Zaire
HOW
AMERICA
IS
LOSING
by
Gene H. Hogberg
war, has been earmarked for Com–
omunist "liberation."
The Za"ire invasion coincided with
the visit of Fidel Castro to the East
African states of Somalia, Ethiopia
and Tanzania. The Cuban Jeader's
visit, in tum, preceded by one week
a swing through Tanzania, Zambia
and Mozambique by Soviet Presi–
dent Nikolai Podgorny. The twin
sojourns represented, according to a
UPI source, "the most visible and
dramatic Communist challenge m
the area in many years."
"Unrelentlng Struggle"
Most Americans, it would appear,
have forgotten, or, in the case of
younger Americans, have never
really known, that a war is in
progress around the world ; not a
bot war, not even a 1950s-style cold
war, but a war nevertheless. It is an
ideological war, a war for men's
minds, a contest ofwills.
This struggle pitting the two su–
perpowers, the United States and
the Soviet Union- each representing
the apex of two opposing political
philosophies- proceeds despite the
policy of detente. For Soviet
strategy operates, as always, from
the policy of "unrelenting struggle
against the U.S. at all times and in
all places and with all means
short
of direct military attack ..
.
[and] on
the premise that whatever hurts the
U.S. helps the U.S.S.R. and what–
ever helps the U.S.S.R.
hurts the U.S." (F01-
ward to
Soviet Shadow
Over Africa,
published
by the Center for Ad–
vanced lnternat ional
Studies, University of
Miami, Coral Gables,
Florida; emphasis ours
throughout article.)
That detente in no way encum–
bers the world struggle between
capitalism and "socialism" (Com–
munism) is asserted and reasserted
almost daily by authorities in
Moscow in public speeches, in edi–
torials in
Pravda
(the Communist
Party newspaper), and in journals
and books detailing Soviet world
strategy.
Leonid Brezhnev,secretary-generalof
the Communist Party, told delegates
to the 25th Soviet Party Congress
which met last year
in
Moscow that,
The
PLAIN TRUTH May 1977