The 15 new states are: Russia Estonia Latvia In Angola a war of succession followed, with three rival nationalist parties fighting for power. The Americans and the British feared the permanent Soviet domination of eastern Europe and the threat of Soviet-influenced communist parties coming to power in the democracies of western Europe. On the other hand, both ideology and realpolitik led the Soviet Union to support those who fought for independence. Southeast Asia. Oxford Bibliographies Online is available by subscription and perpetual access to institutions. One way by which the Soviets could win friends in the continent, as well as spread the Marxist-Leninist gospel among its future leaders, was to offer scholarships for Africans to study at universities in the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries. "The Soviet Union and Angola.". Fidel Castro referred to the ties of blood and history that linked the two nations a large percentage of the enslaved Africans brought to the island to work on coffee and sugar plantations hailed from Angola. 2d ed. ", Alvin Z. Rubinstein, "Lumumba University-Assessment.". But perhaps the most under-covered chapter in this history is how pivotal the Cuban intervention in Angola was, in bringing about the end of apartheid rule in South Africa. The way forward for Africa in the aftermath of the Cold War - the decades-long struggle for supremacy between communist Soviet Union and capitalist US - was uncertain. Orwell understood it as a nuclear stalemate between super-states: each possessed weapons of mass destruction and was capable of annihilating the other. Thus, the superpowers were very much responsible for the emergence of communist orientations in some African nationalist movements. This meant, at least from the public pronouncement of leaders, their commitment to egalitarianism. The Soviet Union and Cuba provided weapons and training camps for African National Congress guerrillas fighting black oppression by the apartheid government. Pretoria severed diplomatic ties with Moscow in 1956, because of its support for the SACP. Had the West offered assistance, there would have been much less need to look to Moscow. [5] In the early 1960s the KGB and the GRU began focusing more intelligence operations on Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Russian commentators turned scornful of the Ethiopian regime. Underlying this common policy was the cynical maxim reputedly uttered by US president Franklin D Roosevelt about Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza Garca, but equally applicable to any of the rivals chosen African despots He may be a son of a bitch, but hes our son of a bitch.. Spread of Communism Birth of the USA American Constitution American Independence War Causes of the American Revolution Democratic Republican Party General Thomas Gage biography Intolerable Acts Loyalists Powers of the President Quebec Act Seven Years' War Stamp Act Tea Party Cold War Battle of Dien Bien Phu Brezhnev Doctrine Brezhnev Era South African white politicians routinely denounced the ANC as a devious communist plot to overthrow the government. However President John F. Kennedy and his Peace Corps director Sargent Shriver tried even harder than Khrushchev. [12] Operating independently from the Kremlin, Fidel Castro turned Algeria into Cuba's first and closest ally in Africa between 1961 and 1965. Washington followed suit. New York: Africana, 1986. ", Gary D. Payton, "The Soviet-Ethiopian Liaison: Airlift and Beyond. At this point, the United States was in a quandary. By 1948 Soviet-sponsored and -directed communists had consolidated their control of the governments of eastern and central Europe and suppressed all noncommunist political activity. Idahosa, P.L.E. The Populist Dimension to African Political Thought: Critical Essays in Reconstruction and Retrieval. First it wanted a lasting presence on the continent, including port facilities in the Indian Ocean. The Cuban missile crisis showed that neither the United States nor the Soviet Union were ready to use nuclear weapons for fear of the others retaliation (and thus of mutual atomic annihilation). USSR retreat from Afghanistan and stop funding communist militias in Africa. Malcolm Rifkind writes the Eastern superpower lacks the ideological grounding to cause international tensions akin to the Soviet Union. After South Africa became a republic in 1961 and was expelled from the Commonwealth of Nations, relations were very cold. For example, after the Algerian revolution began in November 1954, the Soviets hesitated for more than two years before sending weapons to the rebels for fear of antagonizing the French government. Second it wanted to gain a voice in African affairs, primarily by supporting local communist parties, and providing economic and military aid to the governments. We were given two uniforms, one for classes and one for working in the fields, Mixinge recalls. The Cold War had solidified by 194748, when U.S. aid provided under the Marshall Plan to western Europe had brought those countries under American influence and the Soviets had installed openly communist regimes in eastern Europe. France persuaded a sceptical Washington that it was fighting communist-backed insurgents in Algeria; the result was that Sikorsky helicopters, manufactured in the United States and intended for Nato service, were used to hunt down Algerian guerrillas. Historically, communism on the continent was strongest in Egypt, Sudan, Algeria, and South Africa, which had significant European settlement, but such ideas remained foreign to the African masses until the principles of Marxism-Leninism became popular among intellectuals around the time of World War I ( Drew 2014 ). Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. Welcomed by President John F Kennedy in 1963, Mobutu was Americas man. The years following the end of the Second World War saw both the start of the Cold War between the west and the eastern bloc, and the break-up of empires as colonies across Africa and Asia strove for independence. According to Marxist theory, in its most advanced form, communism involves state control by the working class. Still, India was the largest and most vocal Third World country not embedded in the emerging Cold War alliance structure, with Nehru the champion of anti-imperialism and neutralism (Barnes, 2013b . Communist societies believed in redistributing wealth (taking from the rich and giving to the poor) and promoted workers and state-run economies. Ideology and Development. LGBTI Minorities and Queer Politics in Eastern and Souther Maasai and Maa-Speaking Peoples of East Africa, The, Modern African Literature in European Languages, Northeastern African States, c. 1000 BCE-1800 CE, Political Science and the Study of Africa, Postcolonial Sub-Saharan African Politics, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Africa, Social and Cultural Anthropology and the Study of Africa, States of the Zimbabwe Plateau and Zambezi Valley, Swahili City-States of the East African Coast. London: Zed, 1986. After rejecting a Soviet proposal for a four-nation Marxist-Leninist confederation, the Somali government launched an offensive in July 1977 with the intent of capturing Ethiopias Ogaden region, starting the Ogaden War. Moscow extended $100 million and credits to buy Soviet exports, while China provided $50 million in credits. From the 1960s, cinema was one of the most important aspects of the alliances between Cuba, the USSR and African liberation movements. By 1948 the Soviets had installed left-wing governments in the countries of eastern Europe that had been liberated by the Red Army. America did likewise. Soviet and Warsaw Pact aircraft, arms and advisors were flown in to prop up his government. The Soviet Union agreed to fund its new ally and hoped that Ethiopia and Somalia could form a communist federation. United States intervention in Angola was heavily shaped by several factors. Its definition varied from place to place and person to person. In the late 1970s, Cold War confrontations really flared in southern Africa, but also picked up steam in the Americas. Castros commitment to Angola was integral to a strategy that would extend the struggle for independence to neighbouring South West Africa (later Namibia) and Rhodesia (today, Zimbabwe). (2009) 7#5 pp 1259-1268. But he also accepted Soviet weaponry for his army. But could they deliver a golden age for their followers? Soon after, Mixinge became one of the tens of thousands of Africans to travel to Cuba for schooling. The Cold War, however, also pushed US policymakers in the opposite direction. Please select which sections you would like to print: Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. A large number of foreign countries at least 36 according to Edward George intervened in a significant way in Angolas civil war, which did not end until 2002. The Second World War had given enormous impetus to the embryonic nationalist movements in British and French colonies. The Soviet Union collapsed in late 1991, giving rise to 15 newly independent nations, including a Russia with an anticommunist leader. However, at least up to this moment in history, nowhere in Africa have there been political and economic systems based solely on communist principles, nor has there ever been a strictly working-class revolution. South Africa, along with Egypt, were the first two countries on the continent to give rise to Communist parties - both in the 1920's. On May 27, 1971, a friendship treaty was signed between the two countries, but relations were nevertheless declining. $39.00 + $28.00 shipping. In sub-Saharan Africa the colonial powers faced no major challenges until the late 1950s. He did not return for 14 years. Communist parties in these colonies were constantly under pressure by either the colonial government or a white-dominated regime. under Major Ngouabi. [28], President John F. Kennedy eagerly sought to establish good relations with newly independent African nations in the wake of Krushchev's 1961 speech that proclaimed the USSR's intention to intervene in anticolonial struggles around the world. The South African government's stand found support in the Portuguese colonial regimes of Angola and Mozambique, which hung on until 1975, and the white government of Ian Smith in Rhodesia (modern Zimbabwe), which only yielded to majority rule in 1980. was similarly supported In Kenyas villages, for example, young demobbed soldiers expressed their new confidence by scoffing at their chiefs and tribal elders. Although The success of International Communism in gaining nine stooge states in Africa by the beginning of 1967 is near spectacular if two factors are borne in mind. October 02 1958 October 02 The Cold War comes to Africa, as Guinea gains its independence The former French colony of Guinea declares its independence on October 2, 1958, with Sekou Toure as. Socialism in Sub-Sahara Africa: A New Assessment. The first appearances of communist ideas in Africa were introduced by European workers in newly industrializing colonies with a significant concentration of settlers. The United States treated Angola and Mozambique as strategic assets, arming the 200,000 Portuguese conscripts who fought a long-running war against local nationalist insurgents with an imported arsenal including napalm and defoliants. It is easy to romanticise the historic friendships that the USSR, Cuba and Yugoslavia offered African liberation movements and governments, as Calvert 22s Red Africa season seems to, especially with so much information about the era still locked in archives. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. . Updates? Elsewhere, this spilled over into anger. In 1945, Africa was controlled by the friends and clients of the United StatesBritain, France, Portugal, Belgium, and Spain. In the event, Reagan did not need to commit his country to support South Africas last stand; events inside the Soviet Union were now dictating the outcome of the Cold War in Africa. Drew provides an excellent account of the development of both the Algerian and South African Communist parties over time. His corruption, like that of so many others of his kind, weakened economies and stifled growth. Joseph Stalin had a fleeting interest in claiming the former Italian colony of Tripolitania in modern-day Libya, but the NATO containment policy blocked those efforts. The USA have a story of backup Coup d'tat in the countries of Latin America, support for anti-communist dictatorships such as Indonesia or Phillipines and millitary invasions as in Vietnam. They skewed the complex processes of decolonisation, and snuffed out many of the fledgling democracies that emerged in the late 1950s and early 1960s. The list of external actors also includes the other Scandinavian countries, Yugoslavia, Moscows Eastern European clients, Egypt, and the Peoples Republic of China. Friedland, William H., and Carl G. Rosberg Jr., eds. The onset of the Cold War added a sense of urgency. The Cold War was heavily felt was in South Africa. Under the glare of international public opinion, colonial rule could be justified only through economic aid to uplift the natives, and this would add to the financial burden on the metropoles. Afterwards, US secretary of state John Foster Dulles concluded that it was now imperative for America to fill the vacuum of power which the British filled for a century. Many members of the Non-Aligned Movement (which brought together governments and liberation movements from across the Global South) saw both Soviet and Cuban intervention as another form of colonialism, a sentiment echoed in some accounts from Angola at the time. Rosberg, Carl, and Thomas Callaghy, eds. Nelson Mandela: a symbol of the struggle against racism. Above all, it is the USA that most profits from the war. Their thought also considered the critical need to control capital without being exploited by it. It will not include, therefore, one of Africas greatest human dramas, the Nigerian civil war (19671970), because the two superpowers supported the federal government in Lagos. He moved in Americas direction, used its cash to pay his soldiers, deployed them to expel the Soviets and detained Lumumba, who was murdered soon afterwards. But the significance of this in domestic politics was only felt after the Second World War. Algeria became a leader of the Non-Aligned Movement, and largely targeted its rhetoric towards the United States, rather than France. to the Soviet National Anthem Throughout the Cold War the United States and the Soviet Union avoided direct military confrontation in Europe and engaged in actual combat operations only to keep allies from defecting to the other side or to overthrow them after they had done so. Robert A. Scalapino, "Sino-Soviet Competition in Africa", Alessandro Iandolo, "The rise and fall of the Soviet Model of Development in West Africa, 195764. ", Gebru Tareke, "The Ethiopia-Somalia war of 1977 revisited. Our Own Special Brand of Socialism: Algeria and the Contest of Modernities in the 1960s., Desai, Ram. Why was the Cuban missile crisis such an important event in the Cold War? This was prudent: at this stage there was no knowing who would win the Cold War. He went into exile, followed by 1,000 of his Soviet advisors. That did not happen, and instead the Soviets emphasized identifying likely allies and giving them financial aid and munitions, as well as credits to purchase from the Soviet bloc. In 1986 Mikhail Gorbachev rejected the idea of a revolutionary takeover of the South African government, and advocated a negotiated settlement. At another level the anti-capitalist, socialist outlook at the heart of (1985). But Nasser was an ideal ally in Khrushchevs new policy of challenging the west in Africa. Based on multi-sited archival research and memoirs, this article shows how Africans forged and used new routes to gain access to higher education denied to them in their territories of origin, and in this way also shaped scholarship policies across the globe. Young, Crawford. GOVERNMENTS WHICH RECEIVED DIPLOMATIC OR MILITARY SUPPORT FROM THE SOVIET for the very few. The internecine conflicts within Mozambique, Angola and the DRC, which had been stoked by Cold War powers, were now gathering a momentum of their own. Omissions? Since most nations in Europe, Latin America, and Asia had already chosen sides, Kennedy and Krushchev both looked to Africa as the next Cold War battleground. The Cold War began after the surrender of Nazi Germany in 1945, when the uneasy alliance between the United States and Great Britain on the one hand and the Soviet Union on the other started to fall apart. Fear of Communism haunted the white minority government of South Africa from the 1950's to the collapse of single party rule in Eastern Europe in 1989. There was no great Soviet strategy for taking over Africa, and generally the Soviet Union was under informed about history, political structures and the needs of the countries it supported. Anti-Communism informed almost every aspect of the South African government's foreign policy and much of its domestic policy. Gorbachevs reforms meanwhile weakened his own communist party and allowed power to shift to the constituent governments of the Soviet bloc. African elites who were exposed to socialist ideas either in the workplace or through the writings of theorists such as Karl Marx and V.I. Lenin and were attracted by the notions of social equality, mutual respect, and the sharing of labor. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1964. Expand or collapse the "in this article" section, Communism, Marxist-Leninism, and Socialism in Africa, African Nationalist Movements and Communism, Marxism-Leninism and Crafting a Path to Liberation, Early African Postcolonial States and Liberation Movements and Socialism, Expand or collapse the "related articles" section, Expand or collapse the "forthcoming articles" section, Art, Art History, and the Study of Africa, British Colonial Rule in Sub-Saharan Africa, Development of Early Farming and Pastoralism, Early States And State Formation In Africa, Eastern Africa and the South Asian Diaspora, Great Lakes States of Eastern Africa, The, Health, Medicine, and the Study of Africa, Historiography and Methods of African History, Indian Ocean and Middle Eastern Slave Trades, Kongo and the Coastal States of West Central Africa. Washington feared that the metropoles intransigence would open the door to Soviet meddling. When it was published, this book was considered perhaps the most authoritative analysis on African socialism. US-backed rebels came to Cuban shores in what became a high-profile embarrassment for the US known as the "Bay of Pigs." Outside of China and the USSR, Cubaan island about the size of Floridawas perhaps the most influential communist nation during the Cold War. Perhaps the most influential anticolonial thinker of the time was Frantz Fanon, a professional psychiatrist and philosopher. The Cold War was waged on political, economic, and propaganda fronts and had only limited recourse to weapons. Ginor, Isabella, and Gideon Remez. There was alarm in Washington, where CIA director Allen Dulles suspected that Lumumba was a Castro or worse, and the CIA moved in, supplied with dollars and a hitman instructed to assassinate Lumumba with poisoned toothpaste. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1987. this page. changed sides to become violently anti-Soviet. Almost 450,000 Cubans served in Angola between 1975 and 1991, according to historian Edward George, not only in the military but also as much-needed doctors, teachers and technicians. He emphasised that these links placed a burden of debt upon Cubans that they were duty-bound to repay., young members of guerrilla movements such as, Jean Luc Godard went to Maputo at the request of FRELIMO during this time as well. First published in the early 1980s, this book is essential reading for those interested in identifying why the most orthodox Afro-Marxist regimes of the time chose development strategies rooted in scientific socialism, or variants of Marxism-Leninism. In the liberation struggles, film was a tool not only to document ongoing struggles and spread propaganda, but to inspire a sense of post-colonial, national identity. [1] It did not appear right for revolution because it was almost entirely controlled by European imperial powers, with the peasantry under the political control of tribal leaders, and low levels of proletarian consciousness in the small working-class. In 1975, when the Portuguese made a clumsy exit from Angola, the MPLA was already embroiled in a war against two rival movements (the FNLA and UNITA), funded by the CIA, Zaire (now known as the Democratic Republic of Congo), and the South African apartheid regime none of whom were keen to see an African, Marxist party take power in oil-rich Angola. The United States threw its weight behind the rival party, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), in co-operation with South Africa. For more information or to contact an Oxford Sales Representative click here. They had tried to achieve their goals of majority rule through peaceful means and failed. A unified military organization among the Soviet-bloc countries, the Warsaw Pact, was formed in 1955; and West Germany was admitted into NATO that same year. UNION. [16], Facing enormous turmoil in the newly independent Republic of the Congo (Lopoldville), Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, the charismatic leader of the Mouvement National Congolais, reacted by calling for assistance from the Soviet Union. "The explosion of African studies in the Soviet Union. Cold War priorities dictated events in southern Africa, too. The action by Britain and France, following Nassers nationalisation of the Suez Canal in July, was ostensibly launched to halt fighting between Egypt and Israel, which had invaded the Sinai Peninsula a week earlier. After 1962, it fought hard to prevent communist China from developing its own countervailing presence. [10], As early as the 1930s, the Algerian Communist Party made up an important faction of the Algerian nationalist movement; however it supported France in the growing unrest, and was forced to dissolve in 1956. In 1991, USSR implode and the 15 republics become independent states, marking therefore the end of the cold war. The Cold War had two sides, the United States, and the Soviet Union, both of these countries took measures, including giving money, fighting proxy wars, building a wall, or building missiles to fight for their ideals. By 1965, Cuba became a fully communist country and developed close ties to the Soviet Union. During this trip he famously, The Soviet Union, too, played an important role in the development of African cinema, training. At the same time, what they liked about Soviet-style socialism was not so much the notion of a proletarian revolution, but rather of the need for the role a disciplined vanguard party. [3], After 1953, the continent underwent a rapid process of decolonization, whereby nearly all the colonies became independent nations. Both of these regional conflicts continued into the 1980s. The Soviets exploited such reactions, offering sympathy and friendship, and accusing the imperialists of slyly seeking to retain their power to exploit their subjects. In March 1976 Egypt abrogated the friendship treaty. This book presents an analysis of the scope and quality of a select number of African states that came to espouse Marxism-Leninism or scientific socialism during their heyday. NATO has renewed itself and re-united This book critically examines the relationship of the post-independence African state, popular classes, and development. MI5 monitored nationalist movements, and trembled whenever it believed these movements might be penetrated by Soviet agents. This period also coincided with the time of the Cold War . Nkrumah was a pan-Africanist the goals of an independent and united Africa took precedence over the socialist revolution. [11], By the 1960s both the Soviets and the Chinese were angling for Algerian attention. Africa: Problems in the Transition to Socialism. The so-called "Casablanca" group (Ghana, Guinea, Mali, Egypt, and Morocco) call themselves "neutralists," but one at least among themGuineahas sought and received bigger and better aid from the East than from the West. The USSR used its fleet of Antonov An-12 and Antonov An-22 air transports, as well as cargo vessels, to ship a billion dollars in fighter-bombers, tanks, artillery, and ammunition in a very short time. Picture Information. The Cuban camp was the brightest and cleanest place in the neighbourhood, and they were known as being hardworking, friendly, fair and fun. [8] Moscow also expected that the Soviet model of industrialization and nationalization would prove attractive, but that approach did not resonate with the nationalistic forces, which were black based on the small middle class and were socializing the means of production. This changed after 1945. The chapters in this book offer analyses of the socialist strategies of African liberation movements that assumed control of independent governments and common problems they have faced in the process of transitioning from colonial domination. human resources had been so ruthlessly exploited for the sake of profit Please subscribe or login. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, 2004. * Somalia * SOVIET SUPPORT Indeed the Kremlin at first assumed that the Russian model of socialized development would prove attractive to Africans eager to modernize. Red Africa: From a generation of cinematographers to the end of apartheid Africa, Cuba and the Soviet Union. Moscow said it proved that a backward society could become revolutionary by adopting a Leninist system. ", Harry Brind, "Soviet policy in the Horn of Africa. Throughout the ferocious Algerian War of Independence in the 1950s, Moscow provided military, technical and material assistance to the FLN, and trained hundreds of its military leaders in the USSR. The South African government's stand found support in the Portuguese colonial regimes of Angola and Mozambique, which hung on until 1975, and the white government of Ian Smith in Rhodesia (modern Zimbabwe), which only yielded to majority rule in 1980.All these regimes equated political opposition with a desire to overthrow capitalism and nationalise the private sector. The Soviet Union began to establish left-wing governments in the countries of eastern Europe, determined to safeguard against a possible renewed threat from Germany. The defeat fatally undermined the apartheid regime, and Nelson Mandela would declare: We are deeply indebted to the Cuban people for the selfless contribution they made to the anti-colonial and anti-apartheid struggle in our region we will never forget those who stood by us in the darkest years of our struggle against apartheid..