Detente under pressure: What was the impact of intervention in Africa?

Ideology in the 1970s

In the 1970s Marxist-Leninism was highly appealing to many of the oppressed masses. Especially in parts of South-East Asia, Latin America, and Africa. The USA were backing unpleasant, oppressive regimes- Taiwan, South Korea, Chile, Guatemala, Nicaragua.

Anti-imperialism

The irony here is that both superpowers were supposed to be anti-imperialist. Reality was that both were rivals for global power and influence. So, despite the best efforts to keep detente going 'local wars' saw the USSR and the USA take opposing sides. By the mid 1970s these 'proxy wars' placed detente under huge pressure.

1975-6: Angola

Portugal had an internal revolution in 1974 which led to a rapid and hasty withdrawal from Angola (its Southern African colony). This led to clashed between competing movements within Angola. The Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) seized power in Luanda after independence from Portugal was finally granted in 1975 declaring the People's Republic of Angola in March. Troops sent to support the MPLA were Cuban (rather than Russian) but fought with military equipment supplied by the USSR.

Competing rival groups

Two rival guerrilla organisations emerged. UNITA- The National Union for the Total Independence of Angola. FNLA- The National Front for the Liberation of Angola. Both these groups derived the bulk of their military support from South Africa, although were still supplied with American military equipment.

The MPLA were securely in power by 1976- Impact on detente

Congress had pulled the plug on President Ford in 1976. They refused to grant $25 million to pay for arms for the American-backed forces (FNLA and UNITA)- fearing another Vietnam. Kissinger attacked Congress for missing a strategic opportunity to confront the Soviets. Opponents (in America) replied that the US should never have viewed an African Civil War as a Cold War conflict.

A T.P in the collapse of detente

In the longer term it was the Soviets that gained the least. Victory in Angola hardened the view in the US that the Soviets were exploiting the terms of detente and violating its terms. Helped turn US presidents Carter and Reagan against detente. Also encouraged a view in the Soviet Union that they could reshape the course of the 'Third World'.

British Somaliland- independence

In 1960, British Somaliland gained independence as the State of Somaliland. Five days later, on 1st July 1960, it voluntarily united with the Trust Territory of Somalia (former Italian Somaliland) to form the Somali Republic.

The Horn of Africa

From the later 1940s the USA utilised Ethiopia, which was ruled by the Emperor Haile Selassie, as a way of controlling events in the Horn of Africa. Ethiopia was awarded the Somali-populated territory of Ogaden. The USSR had responded to this extension of US influence by backing:

The Eritrean Liberation Front from 1961.

The radical nationalist regime of General Siyad Barre, in neighbouring Somalia, from 1969.

Matters became more complicated in September 1974, when a radical, pro-Soviet nationalist grouping, the Derg, took power in Ethiopia.

1977-78 The Ogaden War

The Ogaden War, was a Somali military offensive between July 1977 and March 1978 over the disputed Ethiopian region Ogaden starting the Somali invasion of Ethiopia. Ethiopia was led by Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam who had just established a Marxist-Leninist dictatorship. The Soviet Union found it was backing both sided in a war, so attempted to broker a ceasefire (which failed). The Soviets subsequently disowned Somalia and backed the Ethiopians (with the support of 15,000 Cuban troops) and sent 1500 military advisors and $7bn of military supplies.

Impact on detente

The brief war placed great pressure on detente as public opinion in the USA began to turn against detente. Washington propped up Somalia until 1989, reportedly at a cost of $100m per year. It was not at all clear what the Soviets gained by supporting the Ethiopians, apart from the thanks of a brutal dictatorship in an impoverished landlocked country with Fidel Castro. These events, did, however, further poison relations with the USA. However, they did little to alter the course of the Cold War.

Brzezinski and detente

Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter's NSA, began to speculate publicly that the Soviet behaviour in the Horn of Africa was undermining Congressional willingness to ratify a new agreement on SALT II, the lynchpin of detente. The Soviets could not understand why the US attached such importance to their intervention in the Horn and made no attempt to come to an understanding on the issue.