Operation Savannah (Angola) - Military Intervention

Military Intervention

South African involvement in Angola, part of what it termed the Border War, started in 1966 when SWAPO, a "liberation" force of Southwest Africa, began killing South Africans in that district. At that time SWAPO had its bases in Ovamboland and Zambia.

With the loss of the Portuguese as an ally and the possibility of leftist pro-SWAPO, anti-apartheid rule in the two former colonies (Angola and Mozambique), the apartheid regime would lose the remaining sections of its valued "cordon sanitaire" (buffer zone) between itself and hostile black Africa. SWAPO would have a safe haven from which to operate in Angola, and South Africa was confronted not only with the issue of another hostile government in the region but also of having to cross another border in pursuit of SWAPO.

The Angolan Civil War became a major Cold War conflict. The South Africans continued to aid UNITA, operate in and occupy parts of Southern Angola and Cubans remained stationed in the country. The USSR supplied weapons to Angola. The United States officially ended direct assistance to UNITA by the Clark Amendment but it was continued secretly and later again officially during the Reagan administration. The PRC withdrew its military advisers from Zaire, ending assistance for the FNLA.