Cuban Exiles in Zaire.

[Stan]

Secret Cuban documents on history of Africa involvement

National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 67

Washington D.C.: The National Security Archive today posted a selection of secret Cuban government documents detailing Cuba's policy and involvement in Africa in the 1960s and 1970s. The records are a sample of dozens of internal reports, memorandum and communications obtained by Piero Gleijeses, a historian at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, for his new book, Conflicting Missions: Havana, Washington, and Africa, 1959-1976 (The University of North Carolina Press).

In this first account of Cuba's policy in Africa based on documentary evidence, Gleijeses describes and analyzes Castro's dramatic dispatch of 30,000 Cubans to Angola in 1975-76, and he traces the roots of this policy—from Havana's assistance to the Algerian rebels fighting France in 1961 to the secret war between Havana and Washington in Zaire in 1964-65 and Cuba's decisive contribution to Guinea-Bissau's war of independence from 1966-1974.

"Conflicting Missions is above all the story of a contest, staged in Africa, between Cuba and the United States," according to its author, which started in Zaire in 1964-65 and culminated in a major Cold War confrontation in Angola in 1975-76. Using Cuban and US documents, as well as the semi-official history of South Africa's 1975 covert operation in Angola (available only in Afrikaans), this book is the first to present the internationalized Angolan conflict from three sides—Cuba and the MPLA, the United States and the covert CIA operation codenamed IAFEATURE and South Africa, whose secret incursion prompted Castro's decision to commit Cuban troops.

Tons of intriguing links at GWU.EDU

[cuba]

Thanks you for the information.

You wrote:The Cuban ground troops had a greater effect.

But I thought the cubans in Zaire were only pilots.

What did the cuban troops do in Zaire?

How many cubans were in Zaire?

[Tom Odom]

Cuba

Some 200 ground troops as the 2 books I gave you links to say.

Tom

[cuba]

Hi Mr Odom:

Have you read the book of John Stockwell about the angolan operation in 1976.

Did he mention the zairian army in his book?

I heard there were british mercenaries with FNLA in 1976.Their chief was Callan.The bristish mercenaries were defeated by cubans and MPLA.

Do you know how many bristish mercenaries were in Angola in 1975-76?

[Tom Odom]

Yes I have read Stockwell on Angola

Ibid.; Colin Legum, "Zaire," in Africa Contemporary Record: Annual Survey and Documents 1976-1977, vol. 9 (New York: Africana Publishing Co., 1977), B534-35 (hereafter referred to as ACR 76-77. For a firsthand account of the CIA operation to funnel money and supplies to support this war, see John Stockwell, In Search of Enemies: A CIA Story (New York: W. W. Norton, 1978). For a firsthand account of two mercenaries involved with the operation, see Chris Dempster and Dave Tomkins, Fire Power (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1980).

That's why I have it in my endnotes for the Shaba II book.

Let's talk rules of engagement here, Cuba. I appreciate that you are a student and that you have an interest in the area of Africa I served in and wrote about. I am flattered that you ask questions.

But if you want help, then you have to read what is offered. Most of the questions you have asked have been in the 2 books I suggested that you read. You have continued to ask questions indicating that at best you have scanned what I gave you.

I don't know how your professors react to this approach but here is mine. Read the books. Then ask questions. Otherwise don't ask me to answer questions I answered in the two books you have yet to read.

Tom

[cuba]

Hi Tom,How are you?

I read you article:

http://cgsc.leavenworth.army.mil/car...dom2/odom2.asp

After the collapse of the Simba Rebellion and subsequent mercenary revolts, Belgium nearly lost its predominance in the Congo's mining industry.

So We can say that Simba rebellion was totally defeated by ANC and Tshombe.

But you wrote this:

Notwithstanding this declaration, the rebels continued fighting in scattered areas over the next decade.

I thought Simbas were totally defeated in 1965.

[Tom Odom]

After the collapse of the Simba Rebellion and subsequent mercenary revolts, Belgium nearly lost its predominance in the Congo's mining industry.

So We can say that Simba rebellion was totally defeated by ANC and Tshombe.

No we cannot; you said that.

Notwithstanding this declaration, the rebels continued fighting in scattered areas over the next decade.

I thought Simbas were totally defeated in 1965.

The rebellion as a movement was defeated. elements of it survived and in fact are still present in the current Congo.