Lecture 22, March 28th: Political Violence P2

1980s: The struggle intensifies

• 1980-85: Spectacular MK operations against oil refineries, power plants, military bases

• 1983: Rise of United Democratic Front (UDF) protest movement in South Africa, launching demonstrations and labour strikes

• 1985-89: UDF protests and MK attacks make South Africa increasingly “ungovernable”; regime responds by escalating violence

The armed struggle in South Africa heats up

  • Oil refinery burns after MK attack, June 1981

  • MK guerrillas at a base in Angola, c.1985

MK attacks in South Africa, 1980s

  • Increased throughout decade, peaking in 1988 at 249

Apartheid and the international state system

• The UK had a keen economic and strategic interest in its former colony

• Western governments had long maintained economic investments in resource-rich South Africa

• During the Cold War, NATO countries cultivated strong ties with the apartheid regime

• The US, UK, France, West Germany, and Italy sold South Africa weapons and kept apartheid afloat via trade and loans

Apartheid counterinsurgency

• As Portugal lost its colonies, many Special Forces personnel joined the Rhodesians; after Rhodesia fell, they joined South African forces

• The apartheid security forces monitored African communities closely using “Joint Management System”

• They used death squads to assassinate both violent and non- violent insurgents

• Extensive recruitment of African spies within the ANC and MK

• African rebels captured and “turned” into colonial special forces

(“askaris”)

Two notable apartheid political assassinations

  • ANC security officer Joe Gqabi, assassinated 31 July 1981

  • Harare ANC leader Ruth First, assassinated 17 August 1982, Maputo

Notorious apartheid death squad leaders

  • Dirk Coetzee

  • Eugene De Kock

‘Black on black’ violence: a key apartheid strategy

• Most black South Africans supported the ANC or other anti-apartheid movements

• Some clung to narrow “tribal” African nationalism

• The regime seized the opportunity to turn ethnic Zulus against the ANC, and against ethnic Xhosas

• 1986: South Africa secretly trained 206 Zulu impis (warriors) in Namibia’s Caprivi Strip

• They formed the nucleus of the Zulu-nationalist Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP)

• 1987-94: IFP militants waged war against ANC loyalists, killing thousands

• IFP leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi recruited by CIA in 1973

The face of black on black violence

  • Inkatha Freedom Party leader

  • Mangosuthu Buthelezi Buthelezi

Negotiations and violence

• 2 Feb. 1990: National Party under Pres. FW De Klerk unbans ANC, starts repealing apartheid laws, releases Mandela and others from prison; negotiated transition begins

• 1990-94: Most violent period in South African history, with 16,000 killed (more than in entire previous decade)

• Most of this violence is attributable to the “Third Force”- apartheid Special Forces operating undercover

• Widespread massacres of blacks on trains, at taxi stands, in homes, at bars; IFP militants attack ANC loyalists

• National Party denies responsibility, but police appear complicit

Suspicions about regime complicity in 1992 Boipatong massacre of 39 by “Third Force”

MK commander Chris Hani

ANC’s Mandela and NP’s De Klerk win Nobel Peace Prize, 1993

Last bastion of colonialism falls: South Africa’s first free-and-fair elections, 27/4/1994

‘Total Strategy’ in historical perspective

• Outsourcing violence and coercion; plausible deniability; and “black-on-black” violence, were key apartheid strategies

• Post-apartheid legacies of domestic and regional insecurity, poverty, and violence

Persistent questions:

• Who ordered Third Force violence?

• Who killed Chris Hani?

• Which ANC members spied for the regime?