ANGOLA REBEL CHIEF TO RECEIVE U.S. PRAISE, AND POSSIBLY AID

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000201660080-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 19, 2010
• Sequence Number: 80
• Publication Date: January 26, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Approved For Release 2010/07/19: CIA-RDP90-00552R000201660080-0
. ~~wArM* ` 1 V
WASHINGTON POST
26 January 1986
Angola.. Re.. Chief to Receive
U.S. Praise, and Possibly Aid
Savimbi Arriving, for Busy Two, Week. Niit?-
W. hiq PaR
In what is beco nng a crescendo
to the acrimont madebate over U.S.
policy toward Anp.Ia, Washington,
is preparing to pllaay host for two
weeks to the man who stands in the
center of the controversy-a burly,
bearded guerrilla chieftain of con-
siderable charm named Jonas Mal-
heiro Savimbi.
Heralded by President Reagan as
an exemplary "freedom fighter" and
embraced by conservatives as "the
Che Guevara of the right," Savimbi
is vilified as a "terrorist" by the So-
viet and Cuban-backed Marxist gov-
ernment he has fought for a decade.
To most of black Africa, he is a
"stooge" of South Africa's white
rulers.
Whatever he is, Savimbi is about
to officially and publicly receive the
blessings of the administration-in-
cluding the personal benediction of
President Reagan and Secretary of
State George P. Shultz, who will
heap praise on the Angolan rebel as
the leader of a grand anticommunist
crusade.
Conservative groups, such as the
Heritage Foundation, the American
Conservative Union and the Amer-
ican Security Council, are orches-
trating a welcome for Savimbi un-
like anything Washington has ever
seen for an African guerrilla leader.
After his arrival Tuesday, Savimbi
will use his appearances before the
groups and elsewhere as a platform
from which to launch his plea for
military and nonmilitary assistance
from the United States.
Black, Manafort, Stone and Kelly,
a public relations and lobbying firm
with a $600,000 contract to repre-
sent Savnnbi's UNITA group, is
JONAS SAVIMBI
... "Che Guevara of the right"
helping to stage-manage much of
the visit with a goal of exposing him
to "all segments' of the U.S. foreign
policy community, a spokesman for
the firm said. It has arranged a
whirlwind schedule of government
and congressional appointments, as
well as media and think tank ap-
pearances.
Savimbi is already assured a Sun-
day night segment on CBS' "60
Minutes;" followed by appearances
on ABC's "Nightline" and PBS'
"MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour," as
well a possible cover story in Time
magazine. He is giving the keynote
speech at the Washington banquet
of the American Conservative
Union : one night after Reagan ad-
dressep the group.
Virt$aily every East Coast think
tank from the Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace in Washing-
ton to the Council on Foreign Re-
lations in New York has scheduled
seminars, meetings or chats with
Savimbi.
As an indication of Savimbi's as-
cent to the top of the administra-
tion's foreign policy agenda, the
UNITA leader is scheduled to give
the National Security Council staff a
private briefing on the battlefield
status of his guerrilla war; he also
will make a closed-door speech to
State Department officials.
The questions of whether
Savimbi will receive U.S. aid and
whether it will be delivered overtly
or covertly remain undecided and
hotly debated. The White House
has submitted to the House and
Senate Intelligence Committees an
initial plan for $10 million to $15
[ni hion in covert mi tar aid to
funneled to Savinibi through the
Central Intelligence Agency.
Savimbi's supporters in Con-
gress, however, want to turn the
administration's Proposal from a
covert to an overt program, partly
because they object to to L;LFV3
surretitious involvement in ' d
World co icts and partly because
they favor a larger appropriation to
Savimbi than that proposed in the
administrations covert Man.
Leading the pro-Savimbi cam-
paign in the House has been Rep.
Mark D. Siljander, a conservative
Republican from Michigan, who has
gathered 109 cosponsors for a bill
that would provide Savimbi's Na-
tional Union for the Total Indepen-
dence of Angola (UNITA) with $27
million in open military assistance.
In the Senate, Malcolm Wallop
(R-Wyo.) on Dec. 10 introduced an
amendment cosponsored with 12
colleagues that would have author-
ized $50 million in military and oth-
er assistance to Savimbi, although
the measure died for procedural
reasons.
On the same day, three key Sen-
ate members tried to pass a reso-
lution of support for Savimbi intend-
ed to lead to an aid program.
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Senate Maiority Leader Rnhert L
aate EalliffnAblitim
,
p
vored em idm "material al assi
ante to S~avim i6' early this yearn it
negotiations with URTT-A2nd cnn-
tinuedto prepare a new offensive
a ainns the guerrillas. The reso ti
tion' was defeated 39 to 58.
Both supporters and opponents of
aid to Savimbi seem to agree on one
thing, however. a decision to sup-
port him will have repercussions on
U.S. foreign policy far beyond An-
gola. Advocates say it will send a
strong message to Moscow of U.S.
resolve to "roll back" communism
by aiding guerrillas fighting Soviet
client states. In this context, they
see the U.S. commitment as a cru-
cial test of the so-called Reagan
Doctrine.
Opponents of aid to Savimbi ar-
gue that direct U.S. involvement in
his struggle will draw the United
States into a damaging alliance with
South Africa, now UNITA's chief
backer, and make the U.S. role of a
neutral mediator in the region's
disputes impossible.
In November, 101 House mem-
bers wrote President Reagan ex-
pressing strong opposition to re-
newed U.S. involvement in the An-
Selm on Intelh na
onsom i
WHO -
s
golan conflict and urging him not to
aid Savimbi. "U.S. involvement in
this conflict, whether direct or in-
direct, covert or overt, would dam-
age our relations with governments
throughout Africa and undermine
fundamental U.S. policy objectives
in southern Africa," they said.
Far from promoting national rec-
onciliation or a withdrawal of the
estimated 35,000 Cuban troops sta-
tioned in Angola, the opponents ar-
gue, U.S. aid to UNITA is certain to
escalate the war, increase the So-
viet and Cuban commitment to the
Angolan government and doom
hopes for settlement of the inter-
locking disputes setting South Af-
rica against its black neighbors.
Both sides also tend to agree that
a decision to aid Savimbi will ring
the death knell for the administra-
tion's 6-year-old policy toward
southern Africa of "constructive
engagement," one that has sought
to rely on quiet diplomacy to nudge.
South Africa toward reform of its
apartheid system and lessen ten-
sions between it and black Africa.
. Assistant Secretary of State
Chester A. Crocker, architect of the
"constructive engagement" policy,
has just returned from a new round
of talks with Angolan and South Af-
rican officials in the search for a
negotiated end to southern Africa's
problems. His trip is widely re-
garded as the last U.S. attempt at a
breakthrough before providing
Savimbi with some form of aid.
Crocker has given no public indica-
tion he achieved any progress.
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