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way of thinking, if the wave of 'the
future in Africa is Communist total–
itarianism, then the U.S. must ad–
just to this "reality" and make the
most ofit.
Sorne of America's top represen–
tatives have already said that they
are not alarmed about Russians and
Cubans in Africa (they may even
bring "stability"). They claim that
any new Marxist states can be "won
over" to friendship with the United
States.
Is this the future the United
States is seriously cbnsidering for
South Africa as well? Not exactly.
The United States, despite its "no–
fear-of-Communism" rhetoric
(which is primarily a justification for
its inactivity elsewhere in Africa),
would prefer
not
to see a Commu–
nist regime sitting on top of a trea–
sure house ofworld minerals so vital
for Westem industry and sitting as–
tride the great Cape sea route which
funnels much of the Middle East's
oil to Europe and North America.
But Washington wants desper–
ately to appease the Third World in
its call for ousting the present Pre–
toria govemment. Yet the U.S. can't
have its cake and eat it too. For
"one man, one vote," American–
style, would convulse the country
into political and economic chaos. A
Mozambique-style Marxist regime,
or worse yet, a new ldi Amin of the
South, would emerge from the ashes
of what had been Africa's most
highly developed society- "Africa's
p.owerhouse," as it has been called:
the nation that many others in the
continent depend upon for their
own economic well-being (even
sorne of those who excoriate Pre–
toria the loudest).
How utterly unmindful the
United States seems to be of con-
' temporary Africa's agonies-witness
Angola, Mozambique, Uganda and
now the cruel fate of the people of
Ethiopia, crushed under the weight
of one of history's most sanguine
Communist pogroms.
Are six million people-South Af–
rica's Whites and the top layers of
its Asians, Coloureds and Blacks,
who provide the motive power for
elevating the co.untry's great mass of
underdeveloped peoples-expend–
able for America's newly perceived
long-term interest, couched
in
terms
42
of a vague política! principie (ma–
jority rule) extant nowhere else in
Africa?
According to pne of South Af–
rica's leading economists, Dr. S.
J. Terreblanche, a
verligte
("enlight–
ened" or liberal) Afrikaner, a lead–
ing expert on his nation's 2'h million
Coloured people, and a man whom
I had the pleasure of meeting in his
borne severa! months back: "South
Africa with its one-quarter modem
people and three-quarters under–
developed peoples, does not have
the level of civilisation, economic
basis or leve! of development to ac–
commodate a democracy of one
man, one vote for the entire popu–
lation. lf this
is
forced on us, then
political instability and economic
disintegration is our fate."
Double Standards
Not without reason, leading South
Africans accuse the United States of
applying double standards and of
caving
in
to Third World pressure,
making a complete mockery of its
professed aim of human rights.
In bis remarkable new book,
South Africa: Sharp Dissection,
noted heart surgeon Dr. Christiaan
Bamard writes: "In no other respect
is the application of double stan–
dards and the politics of hypocrisy
so blatant as in the insistence by the
United Nations, and others, on the
principie of 'majority rule'-iil select
countries only.. . .
"1 am the last person to deny the
existence of racialism and political
intolerance in my country," he con–
tinues. "1 have often taken a stand
for racial justice and tolerance in
South Africa. But there must be
something radically wrong with
what is called world opinion, with
the policymakers in the civilised
governments of the West, with the
planning aod operations of the
United Nations, when double stan–
dards of suéh gross dimensions are
applied against a single country–
South Africa. . ..
"l would point out that discrimi–
nation, whether on a radical or any
other basis is very much a part of
human nature. lo fact, it can be de–
scribed as an illness that afflicts all
human societies."
Thi's world-fa,mous medica! spe–
cialist tben asks: "How much politi-
cal freedom is there in Africa today?
How much is left of human rights?
How much human suffering is there
among the millions of ordinary
people because of the insistence on
one man, one vote? Emergent Af–
rica is choked with political dictator–
ships; its jails are full of political
prisoners; bestia:! rule is backed by
guns; there is política! intolerance
and human misery and suffering
through starvation and death be–
cause of the política! fabric that has
been woven in this most unhappy of
continents. Is South ;\frica really ex–
pected to exchange its admittedly
imperfect society for the horrors of a
one man, one vote situation which
will inevitably tum into a one man,
one vote, once only situation?"
Pretoria's new foreign minister
and its former ambassador to the
U.S., Roelof Botha, adds:
"lt
is the
height of immorality to demand
from someone else something one is
not prepared to accept for oneself.
. "1 have often invited Americans
to indicate to me which govern–
mental system in Africa they would
be prepared to accept for America
itself. 1 am still waiting for a reply."
South Africans are not going to
meekly self-destruct in order to sat–
isfy the United States and the rest of
the world. Bamard wams: "Let
those states in Africa who give
faunching pads to the Communists
and let those in the Western world
who would be our friends know that
South Africa will not commit na–
tional suicide. Those who wish to
push South Africa to the brink must
not be surprised if their extremist
threat to the very existence of the
South African society evokes the ul–
timate defence as made possible by
its nuclear capacity."
Nevertheless, even in view of such
grave potential danger, America's
selective moralists push on, seem–
ingly oblivious to how frightfully
dangerous the future could be, not
only for Africa but for America as
well.
U.S. State Department advisors
have ignored perhaps the soundest
piece of advice ever given with re–
gard to the proper approach to
South Africa. In his rema.rkably in–
cisive book
A Very Strange Society,
Pulitzer-Prize winning author Allen
Drury
(Advise and Consent)
wrote,
The
PLAIN TRUTH August-September 1977