- ','-- NUMBER 132 25 CENTS ,:~~, )(·523 DECEMBER 1985/JANUARY 1986 U.S./South Africa: Anti-Soviet Partners ; I~ , rOODS elen , I , Smash Apartheid! For Workers Revolution! Washington has again mage it crystal --crear rhatmsoutlfern Africaifscnosen partner is the white supremacist apart­ heid police state. As Pretoria launched its most recent invasion of Angola, the U.S. rulers have put "destabilization" of the nationalist MPLA (Popular Move~ ment for the Liberation of Angola) high on their anti-Soviet hit list. Central to U.S. policy is "pressuring" the black Angolan government into committing suicide by getting rid of the 25,000- 30,000 Cuban troops whose presence is global litmus test of loyalty to President key to repelling the apartheid army and Reagan's staunch anti-communism." its Angolan henchmen in Jonas Savim­ Dotting the i's and crossmg the t's, bi's UN IT A contra force. Joining forces Soviet-backed Conservative Caucus chairman Howard with U N ITA and white mercenaries Cuban troops (above) defend Phillips exclaimed, "If that means from the U.S. and Britain. the South aligning ourselves with South Africa, African army attacked black Angola Angola against South African better with them than with the Soviets" last month, backed up by aerial bom­ army (left) and (New York Times, 16 December 1985). bardments of oil tanks, railway lines, local contra But the Republican right has farfrom schools, factories and farms. forces. On December 20, 4,000 South Afri­ cornered the market on Angola; "liber­ can troops crossed into Angola from Na­ al" Democrats such as Claude Pepper mibia while another 4,000 were massed (whose Florida constituency contains a just south of the border. Pretoria claims lot of anti-Castro Cuban gusanos) have this invasion is aimed at guerrilla bases pushed for "overt" aid to the UNITA within Angola of the South West African South African/ U.S. racist axis. mercenary Trevor Edwards, who fought contras. For now, Reagan's administra­ People's Organization (SW APO) which December's invasion takes place in in Angola alongside the South Africans tion prefers "covert" support (to the is fighting to free Namibia from South the context of apartheid's bloody re­ and UNITA: tune of $15 million so far). It's the African occupation. But this invasion­ pression of the continuing black revolt "Our main job is to take an area and bipartisan anti-Soviet war drive in living at home as well as its general policy of clear it. We sweep through it and we kill color. the third in a year-is no doubt designed everything in front of us, cattle, goats, to divert pressure from the anti-UNITA terrorizing the bordering black African people, everything. We are out to stop The Soviet Union's planned, collec­ offensive. It is an escalation of South countries. On the same. day the troops SWAPO .... tivized economic system-an achieve­ African attacks on Angola which began entered Angola, a South African raiding "Sometimes we take the locals for ment of the workers revolution of when the former Portuguese colony party crossed into Lesotho and mur­ questioning. It's rough. We just beat 1917-evokes the implacable hostility them, cut them, burn them. As soon as won independence ten years ago. The dered nine South African political we're finished with them, we kill them." of imperialism despite the bureaucratic Soviet-supplied Cuban troops are there refugees. Four black women and three -quoted in Richard Leonard, political counterrevolution under Stal­ today for the same reason the heroic black men were massacred at a Christ­ South Africa at War (1983) in. It is an unintended acknowledg­ expeditionary force was initially de­ mas party, a coloured (mixed-race) man This is the CIA's type of "freedom ment of the remaining power of the ployed in 1975-76 when they smashed and his white wife were killed in their fighter." South Africa frequently re­ Russian October Revolution that the South Africa's CIA-backed invasion: to home. Pretoria denied responsibility, minds the U.S. of its strategic role as the imperialists see behind every struggle hold the apartheid regime at bay and while the apartheid regime's "State anti-Soviet gendarme of the region. And for social justice and national liberation prevent Angola from becoming a Security Council" issued a warning here, the likes of dragon lady Jeane on the planet the hand of the USSR. gigantic bantustan. M PLA president aimed particularly at Lesotho, Zim­ Kirkpatrick, Jack Kemp and their The S(jvie~w'orkers state continues to dos Santos has recently reaffirmed that babwe, Botswana, Mozambique, Zam­ acolytes in the College RepUblicans seek be the military-industrial powerhouse of the Cubans who have irrigated Angolan bia and Swaziland that "'all the peoples to bolster Pretoria's "respectability" by the non-capitalist world, forced by the "soil with their blood" will remain and of southern Africa will pay a heavy emphasizing its role as a bulwark U.S. war drive from time to time to Cuba's Fidel Castro announced that he price' if they permit insurgents to lJse against "Soviet influence." Thus, Ango­ defend not only its own borders, but was ready and willing to send up to their territory" (New York Times, 21 la assumes importance as a proxy; the also to aid the just struggles of the 200,000 more troops if that's what it will December 1985). Wall Street Journal (25 November oppres~ed. Such is the case in Angola. take. We in the SYL hail the Cuban The methods of this state-sponsored 1985) put it: "Hard-liners see support . However; Soviet intervention is not troops defending Angola against the racist terror were described by British for Mr. Savimbi's 'freedom fighters' as a continued on page 2 2 YOUNG SPARTACUS "our own" racist rulers is a hard fight against the mobilization for anti-Soviet Angola ... Oakland Teachers Strike war. It was precisely on this issue that (cant inued from page.J) the once-sizable Maoist organizations everywhere -and always progressive. In which issued out of the radical student Africa, for instance, the Soviets also Shut the Schools D,own Tight! antiwar movement of the 1960s became back the bloody Mengistu regime in shipwrecked. Parroting China's opposi­ Ethiopia, thereby aiding Ethiopia's OAKLAND, January 7-Teachers school administration by keeping tion to Cuban troops in Angola, the brutal repression of the just national here voted overwhelmingly Sunday their children out of school. American Maoists found themselves in struggle of the Eritrean people. It will night to go on strike, after rejecting What is obvious in Oakland is that an objective bloc with the CIA and require a return to the road of Lenin the Oakland Unified School Dis­ educating its mostly black and His­ South Africa against black Angola. It and Trotsky-a proletarian political trict's insulting "final" offer of mi­ panic working-class students is not was much easier to wave Mao's "little revolution-to make the USSR a bea­ serly pay increases that would leave important to the District and city Red Book" than to fight anti-Sovietism con of world socialist revolution once Oakland teachers among the lowest administrations. In Reagan's Ameri­ in a society where it is pervasive. The agam. paid in California. This was the final ca education for youth, particularly anti-Soviet military alliance between the straw for teachers here, already angry for minorities trapped in inner-city Chinese Stalinists and U.S. imperialism Angolan Proxy War about the procrastination of the hellholes, has been cut below mini­ was sealed over Angola-Mao's China As the bourgeoisie is well aware, for union misleaders of the Oakland mal subsistence to help finance the actually provided military and technical them "the last CIA intervention in Education Association, who had anti-Soviet war drive. Just as Oak­ assistance to the South African-backed Angola's affairs, in 1975, was a disaster" kept them working without a con­ land's Highland Hospital "Butcher forces. (Wall Street Journal, II December tract since july. The District claims it Shop" is a dumping ground for the This gross betrayal finished off much 1985). This, along with queasiness in has no money, but was able to give its poorest and sickest people in the of the Maoist organizations; some sim­ some quarters about flaunting the very large, highly paid administrative county, so also do Oakland's public ply liquidated, others descended into domestically unpopular South African staff a hefty 14 percent raise last schools serve as a dumping ground weird irrelevance (e.g., Avakian's "Rev­ alliance, accounts for what liberal summer, while teachers face' over­ for its minority kids. What is needed olutionary Communist Party") and still opposition exists to backing the Ango­ crowded classrooms, a lack of sup­ in Oakland is a strong show of labor others flipped over to augmenting the lan contras. The Angolan MPLA came port personnel and textbooks, ,and solidarity-a walkout by the many ranks of mainline pro-Moscow Stalinist to power in 1976 after it and other substandard salaries. Thus far, the unions that work in the District-to reformism behind the campaign tables guerrilla forces militarily defeated the .strike has been effective-attendance effectively shut down the schools. To of a dwindling number of liberal Dem­ Portuguese colonialists. After the with­ at schools was down by over 75 date, only the Teamster truck drivers ocrats. Virulently anti-Soviet group­ drawal of the Portuguese military in percent on the first day of the strike, have voted to support the strike. For ings like the misnamed "League of 1975, a three-way civil war ensued as Oakland parents show support for mass picket lines! Victory to the Revolutionary Struggle" (aka "Unity") between the guerrilla nationalists of the the teachers and contempt for the Oaklarid Teachers strike! brazenly carried placards demanding MPLA, UNITAand the FNLA-onein "Soviet Union and Cuba Out of Ango­ which the toiling masses of Angola had la!" in 1976.