CARTER'S EVIDENCE ON CUBA'S ROLE IN ZAIRE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP81M00980R000600230037-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 24, 2004
• Sequence Number: 37
• Publication Date: June 2, 1978
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For Release 2004/07/08
WASHINGT
.?oweland Evans and Robert Novak I I 1 PAS
.T(,,-er's Evidence on Cuba s Role in Zaire 1 h
htercepred coded messages to Fidel
CasLo's Arica corps in Angola "cover-
;ng a Der,od of several days" before the
invasion of Zaire's Shaba province
make up art of the evidence to sup-
port Pr" ..tent Carter's charge of
u ban c )mplicity in the invasion.
i1 addition, the CIA has possession of
"human intelligence" reports-possibly
from Cana, possibly from Angolan sour?
ces--that ?c;rroborate the intercepts.
That background explains Carter's
cold anger in totally disregarding
Castro's ?ersonal protestation of inno-
cence in a Carter-Castro confrontation
that may have wide-ranging interna-
tional impact.
Challenged by Sen. George McGov-
ern (D-S.D.) to prove his accusation
against Castro, Carter ordered CIA Di-
rector Stansfield Turner to begin testi-
mony on Capitol Hill before the Senate
and House Intelligence committees,
probably next week. ?
Turner labors under a heavy burden
of responsibility to protect American
intelligence agents and sources. A leak
from a member of Congress could de-
stroy sources and cost lives.
The necessity for protecting sources,
then, could leave the president open to
renewed challenges from McGovern
-t.nd other congressmen: Supply proof
positive that Castro was lying when he
denied any Cuban role. That does not
disturb Carter. He is certain that Con-
gress will take his word over Castro's or
Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei.
Gromyko, who infuriated the president
with his May 27 statement on the White
House lawn that Carter's information-
was faulty.
Indeed, evidence now being collected
to prove the complicity of Moscow,
Havana and other Soviet satellites in
the murderous rampage of the Angola-
based Shaba invasion force leaves no
possibility of doubt. A central element
has been Soviet use of communist East
Germany.
In his hard-hitting "Meet the Press"
appearance on May 28, Zbigniew Brze-
zinski fingered the East Germans, but
only obliquely. In fact, the record of
East Germany as a chief Soviet agent in
Africa is just now becoming clear.
Moscow assigned East Germany the
-principal communist coordinating role
for intelligence and "security matters"
in Ethiopia, Mozambique, Angola and
several others states targeted by ? the
Soviet Union. A special secretariat to
handle that task, and oversee supplies
of arms, was created in the early 1970s
under East Germany's deputy foreign
trade minister. In those Soviet-targeted
countries, East Germany is credited
with having more on-the-scene agents
than any country except the S--;.
'Union itself. .
Special targets are the "liberatiot:"'
armies now poised outside Rhodesia's
frontiers under Robert Mugabe and
Joshu: Nkomo and the "National P ,o-
ples' Armies" of Angola, Ethiopia wid
.Mozambique.
Early this month, in a speech in
Addis Ababa, Lt. Col. Haile-Marian
Mengistu, the Ethiopian strongrn.:n.
boasted that "progressive comrad:ls'
from East Germany "live with us, ; iaht
with us and die with us." When ne
speech was broadcast later in Engl,sh.
that phrase was deleted. One year t ,ar-
tier, a Western European intelligt r(,e
service reported the capture of three
East German soldiers in the Zairian
town of Mutshatsha during the first
(1977) Angola-based incursion into
Zaire.
With such a wealth of evidence at his
disposal, Carter's charge of non-African
communist complicity in the 1978 inva-
sion of Zaire is beyond dispute. But ad-
ding to the White House use of harsh
rhetoric is the president's anger at the
Cuban denials that led McGovern to
demand that the president, in effect,
"prove it."
Carter was made to look ridiculous
when he volunteered on Feb. 16, 1977,
that he had received "information
from indirect sources" that Castro had
"promised" to remove his Africa corps
;.then numbering about 15,000) from An-
gola. Instead of withdrawal. the force
has been increased.
.Tiat was a repeat of history. Henry
;issinger, as secretary of t tate, in-
iormed the world on May 26, 1976, that
Castro had told then-Swedish Prime
Minister Olaf Palme in a letter that he
would withdraw 200 Cubans a week
from Angola. The letter indicated that
Castro would send no Cuban troops
elsewhere in Africa, adding, "I do not
wish to become the crusa'.icr of the
20th century."
In May 1977 Castro told interviewer
Barbara Walters he would send neither
advisers nor troops to Ethiopia, where
today some 17,000 Cuban troops are in
res, fence.
.-,eai..st that record, Carter and Brze-
,tnsl., were not impressed on May 18
,ien Castro summoned U.S. diplomat
v:e F. Lane in Havana to deny any
Lu>>a:' role in the invasion of Zaire.
Castro';: i, , Ord is not highly regarded in
the White louse.
How the CIA will handle the evi-
dence in supposedly confidential brief-
ings on Capitol Hill is not }et known.
`or can it yet be known where the bold
?hetoric from the White House about
communist marauders in Africa will fi-
nally lead. What is clear is one fact:
.;ammv Carter knows he has been lied
to.
1978, Field Enterprises, Inc.
Approved For Release 2004/07/08 : CIA-RDP81 M00980R000600230037-1