WASHINGTON STAR ARTICLE BY TOM WICKER 'LOOKING BACK ON ANGOLA'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP81M00980R000600050016-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 24, 2004
• Sequence Number: 16
• Publication Date: September 17, 1978
• Content Type: NSPR

ARTICLE ' E
$N.PAGE
roved For Release 2G i 1Qi1 0it l P81 M00980R0006
17 SEPTEMBER 1978
Tom Wicker
n'l ~= Qv~t
Looking back on Angola... ?
Former Secretary of State Henry Kis- states; and it would necessarily increase
singer recently deplored what he called the level of violence with no guarantee of
"the loss of nerve of the establishment accompanying success.. .
that ran foreign policy in the postwar The Task Force recommended, instead,
period and then conspicuously failed in "diplomatic In a "conversation" with Sen. diplomatic option" - intensiveprivate a efforts with Portugal, interested African
Daniel P. Moynihan transcribed for Public a governments and the Soviet Union to shift
Opinion magazine, Kissinger went on to the Angolan struggle from the military to
say:
In every confrontation (with the Soviet the political arena, where the task force
Union), we c could ont have had the upper believed the Roberto-Savimbi factions,
hand. rather than Soviet arms, -would- prove
-We-had them defeated in Angola and then dominant. But at the direction' of the Na-
wedefeated ourselves."- tional Security Council staff, the task force
Kissinger obviously was referring to - recommendation. was- presented:.,to - the
1975 when three Angolan forces were com NSC as only one of three options; the
peting for control after independence from others were a "hands-off" policy or. covert
'Portugal - the FNLA, led by. Holden milita
? Roberto and long supported by the United ry Davis -pe sed- his case wra - edact
B};ut in
States; UNITA, under the . direction - of Kissinger prr in esssed numerous his mn.
But in
Jonas Savimbi, which also received some the end the.
. president and the secretary
.'American backing in 1975; and the MPLA, chose covert intervention aention nd the t
anyway. -: first
led by Agostinho Neto and. armed by; the . $6 million in guns and cash for the Roberto
;Soviet Union. and Savimbi forces, then. $14. million,
The MPLA ultimately triumphed and finally $32 million before the Senate?called
organized the government in power today. a halt.
'But that came about only after powerful At that point, six months after the task-
:Cuban militaryintervention, which threw - force report, every one of its dire predic-
back a South African strike force support- tions as to the results of military. intervening Savimbi, and after the U.S. Senate on tion had come true. What might have hap-'
Dec. 19, 1975, approved - legislation pre- pened had the. diplomatic option been
venting further covert aid to any of the chosen will never be known, but Davis still
forces in Angola. , .... thinks "we would have done better at least
Is Kissinger . correct, then, that in to try that other course."
Angola the United States "defeated itself" - As for whether the intervention was a
in a battle it should have won? A remark- . major reason - for the later . arrival of
able article by Nathaniel Davis, the assist- Cuban troops in Angola,.Davis is-cautious;
ant secretary of state for African affairs in but he does observe.that major interven
1975, suggests that if so the reason was bad tions; by Zaire, Cuba and South Africa, all
policy choices by the Ford administration, - took place in the last half of'1975;-arid he
not a failure of American nerve. concludes that "the answer seems -to be
Writing in the current issue of Foreign - . that- the escalations- mutually- produced
Affairs, Davis offers strong evidence not t. counter-escalations:"::...:
only that at no point. did we- have the
Mr-LA, the Cubans or the Soviets de- By December 1975,.~in any. case, _when
feated" in Angola; but also that a 332. mil, the Ford. administration was calling for
lion CIA effort on. behalf of the Roberto further intervention and scolding Congress
and
avjmbi- forces. was?? un ertaken' by : --for its lack of resolution and nerve (which -
President Ford and Kissinger onl :after "Kissinger apparently still was-doing three
:strong vrarnin s nom.. Davis. an others . years dater in. the -Public; Opinion:.tran-
at it probably would not work and might :;::...script), it was clear,'Davis writes, that "a
_ :we ma a matters worse: ; . -' -, - :. . large and rapidly escalating military:and
-: Davis chaired.: of r example; a National financial commitment would- have been
,.;.Security Council task force on-Angola that..necessary to have any hope of blocking an
recommended on June 13-1975, against - . MPLA victory.
covert military intervention. Such a step. Six months earlier, he had'warned-Kis-
the:,report said, would commit U.S. re-;_ :: -singer that -"if we go-in, we - must go in
sources and prestige in a situation over.
_ quickly, massively and decisively enough
which the- nation had little control. and -.to avoid the tempting, gradual, mutual es-
where the outcome was doubtful; it would - calation that characterized Vietnam
cause increased involvement by the Soviet -"'But it was -just that "tempting"
Union in response; it would run a high risk ... ' course that Henry Kissinger-and Gerald
of exposure. with adverse effect on Ameri- ?: ? ? Ford tried to - follow. - that Congress
.can relations with the MPLA. in the event - , blocked; and for the lack of which Kissin-
that group should come to power. and with ? ? : - ger now complains that' "we defeated -
our
-
.
,: a,:. number of ,African and Third World selves" in Angola.
Approved For Release 2004/07/08 CIA-RDP81 M00980R000600050016-4