BBC ON THIS DAY | 11 | 1975: Divided Angola gets independence 1975: Divided Angola gets independence The southern African state of Angola has gained its independence from former colonial power Portugal. The leader of one of the country's rival factions, Dr Agostinho Neto, of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), has been proclaimed the country's first president. In the capital, Luanda, huge crowds cheered and soldiers fired shots into the air as the new country's flag was raised at midnight. However, the main groups vying for power held separate independence ceremonies. The MPLA held a huge ceremony at a stadium in the capital, Luanda, attended by a representative from the Soviet Union. 'Slave pool' In a speech, Dr Neto was critical of the Portuguese for not recognising the MPLA as the "sole legitimate representative" of the Angolan people. Meanwhile, the rival Union for the Total Independence of Angola (Unita) announced it had joined forces with another liberation movement to form a national council which would act as Angola's government. Angola's independence ends nearly 500 years of Portuguese rule.

Initially the Portuguese used Angola as a "slave pool" for its more lucrative colony in Brazil and mined Angola's precious gemstones and metals. Resistance to Portuguese rule was widespread by the mid-20th century but was complicated by clashes between the various African communities. HISTORY OF ANGOLA HISTORY OF ANGOLA Enjoy the Famous Daily Angola and slaves: 15th-19th century Little is known about the early history of the Angola region, stretching south from the mouth of the Congo. The inhabitants are living a neolithic existence until the arrival of Bantu migrants from the north, bringing iron technology in the first millennium AD. When the Portuguese begin trading on the west coast of Africa, in the 15th century, they concentrate their energies on Guinea and Angola. Hoping at first for gold, they soon find that slaves are the most valuable commodity available here for export. But the Portuguese never establish much more than a foothold in either place. In Guinea rival Europeans grab much of the trade, while local African rulers confine the Portuguese to the area around Bissau. Thousands of miles down the coast, in Angola, the Portuguese find it even harder to consolidate their early advantage against encroachments by Dutch, British and French rivals.

Nevertheless the fortified towns of Luanda (established in 1587 with 400 Portuguese settlers) and Benguela (a fort from 1587, a town from 1617) remain almost continuously in Portuguese hands. As in Guinea , the slave trade becomes the basis of the local economy - with raids carried ever further inland to procure captives. More than a million men, women and children are shipped from here across the Atlantic. In this region, unlike Guinea, the trade remains largely in Portuguese hands. Nearly all the slaves are destined for Brazil . During the 19th century the western embargo on the slave trade brings to an end Angola's main export. The shipping of slaves from Angola is banned in 1836, but slavery remains legal in the Portuguese empire until 1875. So an attempt is made in Angola to make productive use of slaves who can no longer be sold abroad. Grants of land are made in regions inland from Luanda. Plantations are established, with coffee, cotton and sugar as the main crops. But this encroachment leads to continual outbreaks of warfare with local rulers of the Kongo, Mbundu and Ovambo peoples.

Angola is a most unsettled region when the European scramble for Africa begins in the 1880s. It remains so in most subsequent periods. Colonial period: 1885-1975 Portugal's colonial claim to the region is recognized by the other European powers during the 1880s, and the boundaries of Portuguese Angola are agreed by negotiation in Europe in 1891. At the time Portugal is in effective control of only a small part of the area thus theoretically enclosed. But work is already under way to open up the interior. Construction of a railway from Luanda to Malanje, in the fertile highlands, is started in 1885. Work begins in 1902 on a commercially more significant line from Benguela all the way inland to the Katanga region, aiming to provide access to the sea for the richest mining district of the Belgian Congo . The line reaches the Congo border in 1928. By this time the regime in Portugal has been through two violent transitions, from monarchy to republic in 1910 and then to a military dictatorship after a coup in 1926.

The effect of these changes in Angola is a tightening of Portuguese control. In the early years of the colony there has been a continuation of the almost endemic warfare between the Portuguese and the various African rulers of the region. Now a systematic campaign of conquest is undertaken. One by one the local kingdoms are overwhelmed and abolished. By the 1920s almost the whole of Angola is under control. There is no longer slavery, but the plantations are worked on a system of forced African labour. In the 1950s and 1960s three rival guerrilla groups are formed to fight for Angolan independence. The first is the MPLA or Movimento Popular de Libertaçcão de Angola (Popular Liberation Movement of Angola), founded in 1956 by members of the banned Portuguese Communist party and supported by the USSR. In the following year the FNLA or Frente Nacional de Libertação de Angola (National Front for the Liberation of Angola) is set up with aid from the USA. And in 1966 UNITA or União Nacional para a Independencia Total de Angola (National Union for the Total Independence of Angola) is established. UNITA has little foreign aid but considerable tribal allegiance in southern Angola.

Portugal's terminal problems in Angola are not directly caused by any of these guerrilla groups. It is a rebellion of workers, undergoing forced labour in coffee and cotton plantations in the north, which first plunges the country into chaos in 1961. The government in Lisbon responds vigorously. Large numbers of troops are sent to the colony. The emigration of Portuguese peasants to Angola, to be settled on African farms, is greatly accelerated. Reforms are introduced (improvements in the provision of education and health, and the ending of forced labour) in a belated attempt to appease the African population. The unrest gives the guerrilla groups their opportunity. Throughout the 1960s and into the 1970s they are actively engaged in a campaign of violence against the colonial power. But they are equally active in fighting among themselves. Civil war accompanies the anti-colonial war. As a result Angola is ill-equipped to respond positively in the aftermath of a 1974 coup in Portugal . This event, largely prompted by the dire situation in Portugal's three rebellious African colonies, brings to a sudden end the country's long-established right-wing dicatatorship.

The change of regime in Lisbon has immediate consequences in Africa. The new government in Lisbon is disinclined to prop up Portugal's collapsing and by now very expensive empire. All the Portuguese colonies in Africa are rapidly granted their independence. Portuguese Guinea is the first, in September 1974. Portuguese East Africa follows in June 1975, taking the new name Mozambique. The republic of Cape Verde is established in July. And Angola, in the middle of civil war, becomes independent in November 1975. Independence: from1975 During 1975, before the official Portuguese withdrawal, the civil war in Angola intensifies. In fighting for control of the capital city, Luanda, the MPLA succeeds in driving out both its rivals. UNITA, which claims to enjoy wider popular support than the other groups, argues that Portugal must fulfil its last colonial duty and supervise elections. But the Portuguese, eager to leave as quickly as possible, abandon the country without formally handing over control to any succeeding government. The MPLA, in possession of the capital and with guaranteed support from the USSR and Cuba, declares itself the government of independent Angola.

Agostinho Neto, a distinguished poet who has led the MPLA since 1962, becomes president. UNITA and the FNLA set up a rival government in the mountainous region of Huambo, inland from Benguela. Here they enlist the support of South African forces in neighbouring Namibia to oust the Marxist MPLA. The conflict in Angola thus becomes an extension of the Cold War. The United States sends funds to UNITA and the FNLA and encourages South African involvement. The USSR provides similar support to the MPLA, while president Castro, eager to spread communism in Africa, sends large contingents of Cuban troops to Angola. As early as November 1975 South African and Cuban troops clash in a battle at Ebo, with victory on this occasion going decisively to the Cubans. South Africa's involvement increases over the years because of the situation in neighbouring Namibia, where the insurgent group SWAPO receives support from Angola's MPLA. From South Africa's point of view, maintaining control in Namibia and fighting communism in Angola become one and the same cause. But in 1988 exhaustion leads to a pact with Cuba. Both sides will withdraw their troops from Angola.

South Africa will also pull out of Namibia . This leaves Angola's civil war as an internal affair. The FNLA has by the late 1980s declined in importance. The rivals now are the MPLA, led by José dos Santos since the death of Neto in 1979; and UNITA, still under the control of its founder, Jonas Savimbi. From 1989 there are several attempts by the two men to achieve a ceasefire. A solution is made easier when the MPLA decides to give up Marxism-Leninism and the one-party state. An agreement is reached in 1991 on a new constitution, the merging of the two rival armies and the holding of multiparty elections. The elections duly take place in 1992 and the MPLA beats UNITA into second place. Savimbi refuses to accept this result. Civil war breaks out again, even more violently than before. During two years of fighting, it is calculated that some two million people are driven from their homes (20% of the population). More than 20 million land mines are planted by the warring factions.

In November 1994, under UN mediation in Lusaka, a somewhat shaky peace is agreed. It involves the gradual demobilization of UNITA's forces and the participation of UNITA in government as a political party, with Savimbi as vice-president of the nation. However progress is far from convincing. The demobilization soon falls behind schedule. Savimbi reconsiders his decision to serve as vice-president. And UNITA proves reluctant to relinquish control over regions which include Angola's valuable diamond mines. (Of the nation's two main sources of wealth, oil has been exclusively in MPLA hands while diamonds have funded UNITA). All trace of agreement ends in December 1998, with a return to full-scale civil war. During 1999 UNITA wins control of some 75% of the countryside, forcing terrified peasants into government-held cities where starvation and illness threaten the lives of hundreds of thousands. The UN World Food Programme desperately tries to truck in emergency supplies along roads mined and ambushed by UNITA forces. Meanwhile the rest of the world hardly notices, with Kosovo exhausting the available supply of compassion.

No country in the world has had such a continuously appalling start to independence as Angola, potentially so prosperous from its natural resources but suffering from lethal self-inflicted wounds. Angola from past to present | Conciliation Resources Angola from past to present Angola from past to present From military peace to social justice? The Angolan peace process Publication date: David Birmingham When Angola achieved independence in 1975, a war was raging between competing national liberation movements and their foreign backers. Guus Meijer and David Birmingham revisit Angola’s colonial period and the independence struggle that followed and ask how the resulting social and economic divisions shaped and were manipulated by the warring parties. The article describes the introduction of authoritarian one-party rule under the MPLA and the impact of natural resource development and international and regional powers on the conflict. Tracing the conflict up to the signing of the Luena Memorandum, the authors conclude that Angola’s peace remains incomplete and that the country faces many challenges in achieving social and democratic reconstruction.

Read full article Angola from past to present On 11 November 1975, the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) declared Angola's independence and installed Agostinho Neto as its first President in the former Portuguese colony's capital at Luanda. This outcome had long seemed uncertain and indeed even unlikely; the MPLA had not only had to deal with its own serious internal troubles and disaffections, but had also had to take on the Portuguese colonial army and the two rival armed movements, each backed by powerful allies. Holden Roberto's National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) had initially been the most powerful of the three competing national liberation movements and in the autumn of 1975 it came close to capturing Luanda from the north, backed by a heavily armed force supplied by President Mobuto Sese Seko of Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo). In the south, two armoured columns of a South African invasion force, acting in military coordination with the Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), led by Jonas Savimbi, almost reached Luanda before they were stopped by Cuban troops which had been rushed to the assistance of the MPLA.

The independent Angolan state was thus born out of turmoil and violence and amid serious national, regional and global rivalries. This heritage with its deep historical roots was to influence the unfolding of events for a long time. Angola, like most African countries, grew out of a conglomerate of peoples and groups each with its own distinct history and traditions. Gradually small local nations and states came into contact with each other and historical developments drove them to share a common destiny under increasing Portuguese influence. Long before the arrival of the Portuguese, Bantu-speaking communities had established a farming economy over most of the territory. They had absorbed many of the scattered Khoisan-speaking populations and developed a successful pastoral dimension to their agriculture as well as building up trading economies. One of the most successfully diverse market centres became the town of M'banza Kongo around which the Kongo kingdom evolved. Further east the concept of state formation related to the political ideology of the Lunda peoples while in the south later kingdoms took shape in the highlands of the Ovimbundu people.

Angola under Portuguese rule Although the first Portuguese traders, explorers and soldiers set foot on this part of the African coast from 1483, modern colonisation of the whole territory was only formalised four centuries later after the Berlin Conference of 1884-85. Wide stretches of Angola experienced colonial rule for less than a century, and even after 1900 armed revolts broke out and resistance movements sprang up as among the Ovimbundu and the Bakongo from 1913, until the last northern resistance was put down in 1917. During its century of overrule the colonial regime left crucial marks on Angolan society. Its discriminatory legislation, particularly the Statute of the Portuguese Natives of the Provinces of Angola, Mozambique, and Guinea, separated the indigenous population from a tiny elite of 'civilised' individuals (or assimilados) who enjoyed some of the rights of Portuguese citizens. In 1961, after the start of an armed liberation struggle, the statute was revoked but the changes were only cosmetic. The Portuguese policy of racial and cultural discrimination had a profound and lasting impact on the later social and political development of Angola as an independent country.

Social divisions created by colonialism continued to exercise a strong influence on the relationships between groups and on the attitudes of individuals. Racial mistrust manifested itself in the conflicts between as well as the tensions within the liberation movements. Deeply entrenched suspicion played a decisive role in Angola's recent political history. The conflicting interests of rural dwellers and people living in urban centres are in part another source of tension which independent Angola inherited from the colonial state. Portugal, like the other colonial powers, was primarily interested in extracting riches from its colonies, through taxation, forced labour and the compulsory cultivation of marketable crops such as cotton. Under the guise of a 'civilising mission', the colonial state was heavily influenced by its own distinctive variety of Catholic fundamentalism, invented by the semi-fascist dictator António Salazar. An ideology developed under the banner of luso-tropicalism, a supposedly specific Portuguese way of harmonising Portuguese manners with the customs of peoples in the tropics. In Angola economic extraction was later supplemented by migrant influences when Portugal needed to dispose of excess population. In the 1950s and 1960s Angola received many thousands of poor white peasants and entrepreneurial settlers from Portugal.

They created a colony of European descent which, although smaller than the Portuguese communities in France or Brazil, was larger than the rival colonial one in Mozambique. During the colonial period, and particularly under the corporatist 'New State' and its colonial charters perfected by Salazar when he graduated from finance minister to Prime Minister in 1932, Angola's political and economic developments were crucially linked to the motherland. In 1969 Marcelo Caetano succeeded Salazar as Prime Minister and continued to insulate Portugal's colonies, and especially the crown jewel that was Angola, from the winds of change that blew concepts of independence over Africa in the 1960s. Instead of preparing for independence, as the other colonial powers had reluctantly done after the Second World War, Portugal tried to strengthen its imperial grip. As a weak state, politically isolated and economically backward, Portugal resorted to special measures to hold on to its colonies and in 1954 it euphemistically renamed them 'overseas provinces' in an attempt to avoid the attentions of United Nations inspectors. Economically, both Portugal and Angola were always at the mercy of trends and developments in the wider global economy, determined by powers beyond their control.

It had been the world economic crisis of the 1930s which had led to the impoverishment of Portugal and to the crystallisation of Salazar's authoritarian regime. In the 1950s, when Portugal aspired to become a member of the United Nations and yet keep its colonies, it was agricultural crises and opportunities that caused impending upheavals. The relative poverty of the southern highlands and the boom in coffee prices in the north drove thousands of Ovimbundu peasants to become migrant workers on the coffee estates. There they were subjected to humiliation by white colonists and to resentment by the Bakongo who lived there. Continuous rivalries between various elites have played an important role in Angola's recent history. The FNLA embodied the aspirations of the northern elite focused on Kinshasa but with some cultural links with the old Kongo kingdom. The MPLA had its heartland in the territory of the Mbundu people of the Luanda hinterland but included many groups in the urban centres including some who descended from the old assimilated families of black Angolans and others who were the mixed-race children of modern colonisation.

UNITA became the expression of a third political tradition and embodied the economic aspirations of the Ovimbundu and their merchant leaders on the southern planalto. To a large extent the ethnic identification of these movements has come about as a result of conscious political manoeuvring by each leadership rather than as a genuine expression of popular sentiment and aspiration. Over time the social and political factors of identity and cohesion have become real. Angola's historical society can be characterised by a tiny semi-urbanised elite of Portuguese-speaking 'creole' families – many black, some of mixed race, some Catholic and others Protestant, some old-established and others cosmopolitan – who are distinguished from the broad population of black African peasants and farm workers. Until the nineteenth century the great creole merchants and the rural princes dealt in captive slaves, most of whom were exported to Brazil or to the African islands. The black aristocracy and the creole bourgeoisie thrived on the profits of overseas trade and lived in style, consuming large quantities of imported alcoholic beverages and wearing fashionable European costumes. In the early twentieth century, however, their social and economic position was eroded by an influx of petty merchants and bureaucrats from Portugal, who wished to grasp the commercial and employment opportunities created by a new colonial order.

Although effective occupation only had a relatively short duration and elements of pre-colonial continuity persisted, colonialism nevertheless brought major social changes in urbanisation, in formal education, in religious practice, in farming techniques and in commercial linkages. These changes affected all sections of society and all parts of the country, albeit to an uneven and variable degree. There is a tendency noted above to view Angolan society, and indeed other African societies, as fundamentally split between a 'modern' sector, influenced by 'Western' (or European) values, and a 'traditional' one governed by pre-modern systems of unchanging norms and historic ritual practices. Such views, expressed in political and public discourse, tend to over-simplify the socio-cultural base of both the MPLA and UNITA when in fact each had to manage its relations with appropriate 'traditional authorities'. Angola presents a rich variety of influences and mixtures all deeply marked by the colonial experience as well as by the so-called Afro-Stalinism of the post-independence years. 'Traditional' concepts are now being transformed to adapt to the challenges of life in the present and the future.

There is no part of Angola, however remote, and no sector of Angolan society, however 'traditional', which is not in some way linked to the 'modern' world of a globalised economy and its culture and communication systems. The struggle for national liberation While colonial rule never went unresisted, a more focused armed struggle for independence only started in 1961, after the Portuguese had bloodily repressed a mass protest against colonial conditions in the north. Hundreds of white planters and traders (estimates vary between 250 and 1,000) and thousands of black farm workers were killed, and many more fled the country, forming a fertile recruiting ground for an emerging anti-colonial cause. nationalist political activity and resistance occurred initially under the banner of the Union of the Peoples of Angola (UPA), a predecessor of the FNLA. In Luanda and the coastal cities much older associations had long expressed the nationalist sentiment of Angola's African population.

This urban-based nationalism also incorporated assimilados and mestiços of Luanda and Benguela who had organised the Angolan League in the 1910s and the Let's Discover Angola (Vamos Descobrir Angola) movement in the 1940s under leaders such as Viriato da Cruz who later became founders of the MPLA. The 1960s saw a major military and political confrontation between the Portuguese colonial regime and Angolan nationalism. The country also experienced the early manifestation of divisions within the nationalist movement that were to mark political life in Angola for many years. The protagonists were the FNLA, the MPLA, which subsequently tried to claim responsibility for an attack on a Luanda prison on 4 February 1961, and UNITA which emerged in the mid 1960s. The date of the prison attack was later officially celebrated as the beginning of the armed struggle. The anti-colonial struggle launched in 1961 was fought with guerrilla tactics, gradually increasing in scope to reach from the north to the east of the country.

On the diplomatic front nationalists worked from bases in Leopoldville (now Kinshasa), Conakry and Brazzaville, as well as from Lisbon and Paris. The FNLA received political and military backing from African countries and from China and the US. In 1962 it formed a Revolutionary Government of Angola in Exile (GRAE) which the organisation of African Unity (OAU) initially recognised as the legitimate successor to colonial rule. Some African countries later transferred their allegiance to the MPLA which, though its military record was poor and its leadership continuously suffered from internal conflict, gradually outmanoeuvred its rivals politically and diplomatically to gain pre-eminence in 1975. The FNLA was no freer from internal dissent than the MPLA and in 1964 Jonas Savimbi left the 'government in exile' in which he had served as Minister for Foreign Affairs. He accused the FNLA leaders of being militarily ineffective and heavily dependent on the US. He also denounced nepotism and the authoritarian leadership of Holden Roberto. After visiting a number of mainly communist countries Savimbi founded UNITA in 1966.

By exploiting the feelings of exclusion in Angola's largest ethnic group, the Ovimbundu, Savimbi built up his own constituency in the centre and south of the country. Initially he conducted small guerrilla operations inside Angola before establishing a network of supporters abroad. None of the armed movements succeeded in effectively threatening the colonial state in Angola. The end of this 'first Angolan war' was brought about indirectly through domestic pressure in Portugal and the growing dissatisfaction of the Portuguese military fighting the colonial wars in Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau. In April 1974, junior officers belonging to the Movement of the Armed Forces (MFA) toppled the Salazar-Caetano regime in Portugal and began the process of decolonisation. In 1974, however, a frenzy of diplomatic and political activity at home and abroad mitigated against a negotiated independence. In 1975, as the will to retain imperial control over Angola dwindled, fighting broke out in many provinces of Angola and also in the capital, Luanda, where the armies of the MPLA, the FNLA and UNITA were intended to maintain the peace with joint patrols.

In January 1975, under heavy international pressure, the colonial power and the three movements had signed an agreement in Alvor, Portugal, providing for a transitional government, a constitution, elections and independence. This Alvor Accord soon collapsed, however, and the transitional government scarcely functioned. In the subsequent confrontations the FNLA received military support from Zaire with the backing of China and the US, while under Agostinho Neto the MPLA gained ground in particular in Luanda with support from the Soviet Union and from Cuban troops. On 11 November 1975 Angola became independent. The FNLA and UNITA were excluded from the city and from government and a socialist one-party regime was established which eventually gained international recognition, though not from the United States. Angola under one-party rule From 1975 until the late 1980s Angolan society was moulded along 'classical' Marxist-Leninist lines. A dominant, but increasingly corrupt state sector was controlled by the ruling party. Private business, with the exception of the activities of foreign oil companies, was restricted and organised religion, including the Catholic Church, which had held an official place under the colonial regime, was suppressed.

No freely organised 'civil society' emerged and the state controlled the media and mass organisations for youth, for women, for workers and for some of the professions. One event had a crucial impact on the political climate during Angola's socialist era: the failed coup attempt by Nito Alves and his followers on 27 May 1977. Alves was a minister in President Agostinho Neto's government but also had his own constituency of supporters in Luanda's musseques (slums). The nitista crisis was fuelled by personal ambitions but also by ideological battles within the ruling socialist camp. Some leaders were loyal to the 'bureaucratic' line practised in the USSR while others preferred a more 'revolutionary' Chinese approach. The coup itself was bloodily repressed and it is alleged that thousands of supposed sympathisers were jailed or killed in the following days, weeks and months. The episode had a profound effect on the President, and his regime became ever more authoritarian and repressive. Angola's population lost its innocence and henceforth lived in fear.

Subsequent wars By the end of the 1970s, UNITA took over from the FNLA as the main civil war opponent of the MPLA government. A rapprochement had been achieved between the MPLA and President Mobutu of Zaire. The FNLA's cadres, led by Mobutu's protégé Holden Roberto, were gradually integrated into Angolan society as the free-market acolytes of the one-party state. The FNLA army, once a foreign-armed force with thousands of recruits, disintegrated without being formally disarmed or demobilised. Agostinho Neto died of cancer in 1979 and was succeeded as President by José Eduardo dos Santos, a young petroleum engineer trained in the Soviet Union. By this time the superpower conflict in Vietnam had ended and Angola became the seat of a new war by proxy between the United States and the Soviet Union. Each side was not so much defending a specific interest in Angola as playing out geo-political rivalry. The regional allies of the US continued to be Zaire and South Africa, while Congo-Brazzaville aligned itself with the Soviet Union.

Cuba stepped up both military and civilian support to the MPLA government and contributed significantly to the rehabilitation of social sectors such as health and education. Diamonds, and more especially oil, provided the MPLA with the necessary revenue to function as a government. Foreign income also funded the lifestyle of the ruling elite and financed the ongoing war against UNITA. During the war years economic links between the coastal cities and the agrarian hinterland weakened almost to the point of extinction. Sometimes backed by South African forces, UNITA spasmodically occupied parts of the country, which became inaccessible to both government and merchants. The cities, especially Luanda, survived on imported food rather than home produce. Consumer goods were paid for by oil royalties. The neglected countryside was left to its own subsistence strategies. Over the years many people fleeing the war migrated to the towns. The lack of opportunities in the rural areas made prospects in the urban centres seem more attractive despite the poverty of the great slums. The city of Luanda grew to an estimated population of four million. The 'second Angolan war' reached its peak in the mid-1980s.

One of its enduring ironies concerned the dollar income generated by American oil companies, which paid for Cuban troops to protect the Angolan government and its oil installations from attacks by South African forces working for UNITA and partly financed by the US. In this phase of the war the battle for the small but strategic town of Cuito Cuanavale was a turning point. In 1987-88, South African and UNITA forces were pushed back by MPLA and Cuban troops after a long siege. The South Africans conceded that no military solution to the security of their northern border was possible and they started to explore political alternatives. The ensuing peace initiatives, orchestrated by a Troika of Portugal, America and Russia, finally resulted in the Bicesse Accords of May 1991 between the MPLA and UNITA. The peace was followed by the holding under UN auspices of Angola's first and only general election. Savimbi expected to gain power through the ballot box in September 1992. When he failed to do so he rejected the voting results and returned to war. The 'third Angolan war' was even more brutal than its predecessors.

Whole cities were reduced to ruins, hundreds of thousands of people were killed or died from war-related deprivation and disease, and millions were displaced, some for the second or even the third time. Extended talks in Lusaka finally resulted in another peace agreement, the Lusaka Protocol, signed in October 1994, but even then the war was not over. Despite international sanctions against UNITA's supply networks, Savimbi was reluctant to surrender the military option. After four years of neither peace nor war, the war erupted again with full ferocity in December 1998. The Angolan government, on paper a 'government of national unity and reconciliation' in which some UNITA dissident politicians participated under MPLA domination, pursued an offensive that culminated in the assassination of Jonas Savimbi in February 2002. On 4 April 2002, the Luena Memorandum marked the end of four decades of war and the ultimate defeat of UNITA. In October 2002, UNITA declared itself a fully disarmed and democratic political party and UN sanctions against it were lifted.

Peace has characterised mainland Angola since April 2002, but in Cabinda, the enclave between the two Congo republics which accounts for sixty per cent of Angola's oil production, a war has continued unabated. The government has tried to replicate the strategy of scorched earth and starvation that had proved successful against UNITA. Many Cabindans nevertheless still support the rival movements demanding independence. The Angolan government, determined to preserve major economic assets, could never offer more than some form of provincial autonomy for the enclave. In October 2002, a major offensive against the Liberation Front of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC) led to serious accusations of human rights abuses. Towards the end of 2003, after some FLEC defeats and defections, the Luanda government signalled that it was prepared to talk peace or even consider a referendum. So far, however, the silencing of the guns in mainland Angola has not reached Cabinda and the conflict remains unresolved. Peace in Angola remains incomplete. The physical and psychological scars of war are still evident. The democratic deficit has not been remedied. The regime is still marked by its predatory history.

OPEC : Angola Angola Angola's Independence Day 11 November Located on the Atlantic coast in the southern part of Africa, the Republic of Angola is the second largest oil producer in Africa. It has a population of over 25.7 million and is bordered by Zambia to the east, Namibia to the south and the Democratic Republic of Congo to the north. Its capital city is Luanda and the national currency is the kwanza. Portuguese is its official language, but Bantu and other African languages are also spoken. Angola gained independence from Portugal in 1975. Angola’s impressive economic growth rate is being driven by its oil sector. Oil production and its supporting activities contribute about 45 per cent of the nation’s gross domestic product and over 95 per cent of exports. Angola’s President is HE Dr. José Eduardo dos Santos. The country joined OPEC in 2007. Did you know? Angola’s most important river is the Cuanza, from which the country’s currency derives its name. Angola first produced oil from the Benfica oilfield in the Cuanza Basin in 1955.

Below data covers 2015 Angolan War of Independence (Guerra do Ultramar/Guerra Colonial) | the Polynational War Memorial Portugal , Angola Published prior to 2013 | Altered: 2014-03-17 16:34:03 Portugal had had a presence in Angola for almost 500 years, with full control of the country for half a century. Angola was a colony, although Portuguese colonialism was of a softer variety than that practised by other European powers, such as Great Britain. The 1933 Portuguese Colonial Act recognized the supremacy of Portuguese over native people, and, even if locals could pursue all studies including university, the de facto situation was of clear disadvantage. Beginning in the 1950s, many Portuguese people settled in Angola, encouraged by the authoritarian government of Salazar. In that time period, several groups pushing for independence from Portugal were formed. The Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) were a front representing the tribal powers and intelligentsia in the Kumbundu and Luanda.

They had economic ties to several eastern europe countries, including the Soviet Union, as well as Zambia, and had the support of the Portuguese Communist Party. The National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA), led by Holden Roberto, were another front with a power base in the north and ties to the United States and Algeria. They were formed in 1962 by a combination of two smaller congo nationalist groups, the UPA and the PDA. The FNLA received funding from the Organization of African Unity and Zaire. The National Union for Total Independence of Angola (UNITA) was another communist front based in the centre of the country. Founded in 1966 by Jonas Savimbi, an ex-FNLA leader, its base of support was Ovimbudu, Chokwe, and Ovambo tribes. UNITA initially had little foreign aid, enjoying only small assistance from China, but later on gained the support of South Africa. *** Source: excerpt from article in the open dictionary Wikipedia. Read Article SOURCES: FATALITY DATA Angola: History History History History until Independence The first inhabitants of the area that is now Angola are thought to have been members of the hunter-gatherer Khoisan group.

Bantu-speaking peoples from West Africa arrived in the region in the 13th cent., partially displacing the Khoisan and establishing a number of powerful kingdoms. The Portuguese first explored coastal Angola in the late 15th cent., and except for a short occupation (1641–48) by the Dutch, it was under Portugal's control until they left the country late in the 20th cent. Although they failed to discover the gold and other precious metals they were seeking, the Portuguese found in Angola an excellent source of slaves for their colony in Brazil. Portuguese colonization of Angola began in 1575, when a permanent base was established at Luanda. By this time the Mbundu kingdom had established itself in central Angola. After several attempts at subjugation, Portuguese troops finally broke the back of the kingdom in 1902, when the Bié Plateau was captured. Construction of the Benguela railroad followed, and white settlers arrived in the Angolan highlands. The modern development of Angola began only after World War II. In 1951 the colony was designated an overseas province, and Portugal initiated plans to develop industries and hydroelectric power.

Although the Portuguese professed the aim of a multiracial society of equals in Angola, most Africans still suffered repression. Inspired by nationalist movements elsewhere, the native Angolans rose in revolt in 1961. When the uprising was quelled by the Portuguese army, many fled to Congo (Kinshasa) and other neighboring countries. In 1962 a group of refugees in the Congo, led by Holden Roberto, organized the Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA). It maintained supply and training bases in the Congo, waged guerrilla warfare in Angola, and, while developing contacts with both Western and Communist nations, obtained its chief support from the Organization of African Unity (OAU). Angola's liberation movement comprised two other guerrilla groups as well. The Marxist-influenced Movimento Popular de Libertação de Angola (MPLA), founded in 1956, had its headquarters in Zambia and was most active among educated Angolan Africans and mestiços living abroad. The MPLA led the struggle for Angolan independence. The third rival group was the União Nacional para a Independência Total de Angola (UNITA), which was established in 1966 under the leadership of Jonas Savimbi .

As a result of the guerrilla warfare, Portugal was forced to keep more than 50,000 troops in Angola by the early 1970s. In 1972 the heads of the FNLA and MPLA assumed joint leadership of a newly formed Supreme Council for the Liberation of Angola, but their military forces did not merge. That same year the Portuguese national assembly changed Angola's status from an overseas province to an "autonomous state" with authority over internal affairs; Portugal was to retain responsibility for defense and foreign relations. Elections were held for a legislative assembly in 1973. In Apr., 1974, the Portuguese government was overthrown in a military uprising. In May of that year the new government proclaimed a truce with the guerrillas in an effort to promote peace talks. Later in the year Portugal seemed intent on granting Angola independence; however, the situation was complicated by the large number of Portuguese and other Europeans (estimated at 500,000) resident there, by continued conflict among the African liberation movements, and by the desire of some Cabindans for their oil-rich region to become independent as a separate.

Postcolonial History Portugal granted Angola independence in 1975 and the MPLA assumed control of the government in Luanda; Agostinho Neto became president. The FNLA and UNITA, however, proclaimed a coaliton government in Nova Lisboa (now Huambo), but by early 1976 the MPLA had gained control of the whole country. Most of the European population fled the political and economic upheaval that followed independence, taking their investments and technical expertise with them. When Neto died in 1979, José Eduardo dos Santos succeeded him as president. In the 1970s and 80s the MPLA government received large amounts of aid from Cuba and the Soviet Union, while the United States supported first the FNLA and then UNITA. In Cabinda, independence forces that had fought against the Portuguese now fought against the Angolan government. Although the FNLA faded in importance, UNITA obtained the support of South Africa, which was mounting its own campaigns against the Southwest Africa People's Organization (SWAPO), a Namibian liberation group based in Angola.

In the late 1980s the United States provided military aid to UNITA and demanded the withdrawal of Cuban troops and an end to Soviet assistance. As a result of negotiations among Angola, South Africa, Cuba, and the United States, the withdrawal of Cuban troops began in 1989. Also in the late 1980s, Marxist Angola implemented programs of privatization under President dos Santos. A cease-fire between the ruling MPLA and UNITA was reached in 1991, and the government agreed to make Angola a multiparty state. However, when dos Santos won UN-supervised elections held in Sept., 1992, UNITA leader Jonas Savimbi charged fraud and refused to accept the results. In Nov., 1992, bitter fighting broke out between rebel UNITA troops and government forces, destroying many cities and much of the country's infrastructure. Despite initial victories that gave UNITA control of some two thirds of Angola, the MPLA eventually gained the upper hand in the renewed warfare. In Nov., 1994, with UNITA on the verge of defeat, dos Santos and Savimbi signed the Lusaka protocol, a new agreement on ending the conflict.

The two sides committed to the integration of several thousand UNITA troops into the government armed forces as well as the demobilization of thousands more from both sides. UN peacekeeping troops began arriving in June, 1995, to supervise the process. Troop integration, however, was suspended in 1996, and UNITA's demobilization efforts lagged. A new government of national unity was formed in 1997, including several UNITA deputies; Savimbi had declined a vice presidency in 1996. With renewed fighting in 1998, Angola's ruling MPLA put the country's coalition government on hold, saying that UNITA had failed to meet its peace-treaty obligations. It suspended all UNITA representatives from parliament and declared that it would no longer deal with Savimbi, instead recognizing a splinter group, UNITA Renovada. In 1999 the United Nations voted to pull out all remaining troops stationed in the country, while continuing humanitarian relief work with over a million refugees.

UNITA was able to finance its activities, including an estimated 30,000 troops stationed in neighboring Zambia and Congo (Kinshasa), with some $500 million a year in diamond revenues from mines it controlled in the country's northeast. Fighting continued, with Angola's army inflicting several defeats on UNITA beginning in late 1999, weakening UNITA's still sizable forces. International restrictions (2001) on sales of diamonds not certfied as coming from legitimate sources also hurt UNITA, and the death of Savimbi in battle in 2002 was a severe blow to the rebels, who subsequently signed a cease-fire agreement and demobilized. UNITA subsequently reconstituted itself as a political party. Also in 2002 Angolan government forces gained the upper hand against Cabindan separatists; a peace agreement for the province was signed in 2006. As many as one million people died in the Angolan civil war, and the country's infrastructure was slow to recover from the effects of the fighting.

Parliamentary elections scheduled for 2007 were postponed late in 2006 until mid-2008, and the presidential election was then set for 2009. In Mar., 2007, there was an apparent attack on the leader of UNITA, Isaias Samakuva; UNITA accused the government of trying to assassinate him. When the parliamentary elections were finally held in Sept., 2008, they were marred by procedural irregulaties and difficulties but were otherwise generally transparent, and the MPLA won a landslide victory, with more than 80% of the vote. In 2009 the presidential election (scheduled for Sept., 2009) was again postponed; a new constitution approved by the National Assembly in Jan., 2010, abolished direct election for the president. In the legislative elections of Aug., 2012, the MPLA won 72% of the vote, which thus resulted in the election of dos Santos as president. UNITA and other opposition parties unsuccessfully challenged the result in the courts.

Sections in this article: Angolan War of Independence | Military Wiki | Fandom powered by Wikia Angolan War of Independence Part of the Portuguese Colonial War Portuguese troops on patrol in Angola Date February 4, 1961 – April 25, 1974 (cease fire) November 11, 1975 (independence) Alvor Agreement Angolan independence in 1975, start of the Angolan Civil War .

[1] Belligerents Francisco da Costa Gomes Strength 90,000 65,000 Casualties and losses 50,000+ killed 2,991 killed (1,526 KIA & 1,465 non-combat related) [20] 4,684 with permanent deficiency (physical or psychological) 30,000-50,000 killed [21] Mozambique (1964–74) The Angolan War of Independence (1961–1974) began as an uprising against forced cotton cultivation, and became a multi-faction struggle for the control of Portugal's Overseas Province of Angola among three nationalist movements and a separatist movement. [22] The war ended when a leftist military coup in Lisbon in April 1974 overthrew Portugal's Estado Novo regime, and the new regime immediately stopped all military action in the African colonies, declaring its intention to grant them independence without delay.

It was a guerrilla war in which the Portuguese Armed Forces waged a counter-insurgency campaign against armed groups mostly dispersed across sparsely populated areas of the vast Angolan countryside. [23] Many atrocities were committed by all forces involved in the conflict. In Angola, after the Portuguese had stopped the war, an armed conflict broke out among the nationalist movements. This war formally came to an end in January 1975 when the Portuguese government, the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola ( UNITA ), the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola ( MPLA ), and the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) signed the Alvor Agreement , Contents Main articles: History of Angola and Portuguese West Africa In 1482, Kingdom of Portugal 's caravels commanded by Portuguese navigator Diogo Cão arrived in the Kingdom of Congo . Other expeditions followed, and close relations were soon established between the two kingdoms. The Portuguese brought firearms, many other technological advances, and a new religion, Christianity. In return, the King of the Congo offered slaves, ivory and minerals. Portuguese discoverer Paulo Dias de Novais founded Luanda in 1575 as São Paulo da Assunção de Loanda.

Novais occupied a strip of land with a hundred families of colonists and four hundred soldiers, and established a fortified settlement. The Portuguese crown granted Luanda the status of city in 1605. Several other settlements, forts and ports were founded and maintained by the Portuguese. Benguela , a Portuguese fort from 1587, a town from 1617, was another important early settlement founded and ruled by Portugal. [24] [25] The early period of Portuguese incursion was punctuated by a series of wars, treaties and disputes with local African rulers, particularly Nzinga Mbandi , who resisted Portugal with great determination. The conquest of the territory of contemporary Angola started only in the 19th century and was not concluded before the 1920s. Angola had the status of a Portuguese colony from 1655 until the Assembly of the Republic passed a law giving all Portuguese colonies provincial status on 11 June 1951. [24] [25] Civil disobedience (1948–1959) Overseas Province of Angola 's coat of arms until 1975.

The Portuguese Colonial Act , passed on 13 June 1933 recognized the supremacy of the Portuguese over native people, and even if the natives could pursue all studies including university, the de facto situation was of clear disadvantage due to deep cultural and social differences between most of the traditional indigenous communities or tribes and the ethnic Portuguese who used to live in the littoral of Angola. Viriato da Cruz and others formed the Movement of Young Intellectuals , an organization that promoted Angolan culture, in 1948. Nationalists sent a letter to the United Nations calling for Angola to be given protectorate status under UN supervision. In the 1950s a new wave of Portuguese settlement in all of Portuguese Africa , including the overseas province of Angola, was encouraged by the ruling government of António de Oliveira Salazar . [26] A new law passed in the Portuguese Assembleia da República giving all Portuguese colonies provincial status on 11 June 1951. By this law the Portuguese territory of Angola started to be officially called Província de Angola – Province of Angola.

[24] [25] In 1953 Angolan separatists founded the Party of the United Struggle for Africans in Angola (PLUA), the first political party to advocate Angolan independence from Portugal. In 1954, Congolese-Angolan nationalists formed the Union of Peoples of Northern Angola, which advocated the independence of the historical Kingdom of Congo, which included other territories outside the Portuguese overseas province of Angola. [27] During 1955, Mário Pinto de Andrade and his brother Joaquim formed the Angolan Communist Party (PCA). In December 1956 PLUA merged with the PCA to form the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola ( MPLA ). The MPLA, led by da Cruz, Mário Andrade, Ilidio Machado , and Lúcio Lara , derived support from the Ambundu and in Luanda.

[28] [29] [30] [31] 1960s Main articles: 1960s in Angola and Portuguese Colonial War On 3 January 1961 Angolan peasants in the region of Baixa de Cassanje , Malanje , boycotted the Cotonang's cotton fields where they worked, demanding better working conditions and higher wages. Cotonang was a company owned by Portuguese, British and German investors. Challenging the authorities, the peasants burned their identification cards and attacked Portuguese traders. This was known as the Baixa de Cassanje revolt . By 4 February the Portuguese military responded to the rebellion by bombing villages in the area, allegedly using napalm , killing between 400 and 7,000 indigenous Africans. [32] [33] On the same day, 50 independentist militants in Luanda stormed a police station and São Paulo prison, killing seven policemen. Forty of the MPLA attackers were killed, and none of the prisoners were freed.

The government held a funeral for the deceased police officers on 5 February, during which the Portuguese citizens committed random acts of violence against the ethnic black majority living in Luanda's slums (musseques). [34] Separatist militants attacked a second prison on 10 February and the Portuguese reaction was equally brutal. “ The Portuguese vengeance was awesome. The police helped civilian vigilantes organize nightly slaughters in the Luanda slums. The whites hauled Africans from their flimsy one-room huts, shot them and left their bodies in the streets. A Methodist missionary... testified that he personally knew of the deaths of almost three hundred. ” —John Marcum [35] On 15 March, the Union of Peoples of Angola (UPA), under the leadership of Holden Roberto , launched an incursion into Angola from its base in Zaïre , leading 4000 to 5000 militants. His forces took farms, government outposts, and trading centers, killing officials and civilians, most of them Ovimbundu "contract workers" from the Central Highlands.

[36] The UPA entered northern Angola and proceeded to massacre the civilian population killing 1,000 whites and 6,000 blacks (women and children included of both white European and black African descent) [37] through cross-border attacks - it was the start of the Portuguese Colonial War. [31] [38] [39] [40] The Portuguese regrouped and took control of Pedra Verde, the UPA's last base in northern Angola, on 20 September. In the first year of the war 20,0000 to 30,000 Angolan civilians [21] [41] were killed by Portuguese forces and between 400,000 and 500,000 refugees went to Zaire. UPA militants joined pro-independence refugees and continued to launch attacks from across the border in Zaire, creating more refugees and terror among local communities. [31] [39] A UPA patrol took 21 MPLA militants prisoner and then executed them on 9 October 1961 in the Ferreira incident, sparking further violence between the two groups.

[39] The United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 163 , calling on Portugal to desist from repressive measures against the Angolan people. [42] Roberto merged the UPA with the Democratic Party of Angola to form the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) in March 1962. A few weeks later he established the Revolutionary Government of Angola in Exile (GRAE) on March 27, appointing Jonas Savimbi to the position of Foreign Minister . Roberto established a political alliance with Zairian President Mobutu Sese Seko by divorcing his wife and marrying a woman from Mobutu's wife's village. [43] [44] Roberto visited Israel and received aid from the Israeli government from 1963 to 1969. [45] [46] The MPLA held a party congress in Leopoldville during 1962. Viriato da Cruz , found to be slow, negligent, and adverse to planning, and was replaced by Agostinho Neto .

In addition to the change in leadership the MPLA adopted and reaffirmed its policies for an independent Angola: [28] Democracy National liberation of the entire colony. No foreign military bases in Angola. Savimbi left the FNLA in 1964 and founded UNITA in response to Roberto's unwillingness to spread the war outside the traditional Kingdom of Kongo . [47] Neto met Marxist leader Che Guevara in 1965 and soon received funding from the governments of Cuba, German Democratic Republic , and the Soviet Union . [48] In May 1966 Daniel Chipenda , then a member of MPLA, established the Eastern Front, significantly expanding the MPLA's reach in Angola. When the EF collapsed, Chipenda and Neto each blamed the other's factions. [39] UNITA carried out its first attack on 25 December 1966, preventing trains from passing through the Benguela railway at Teixeira de Sousa on the border with Zambia. UNITA derailed the railway twice in 1967, angering the Zambian government which exported copper through the railway.

President Kenneth Kaunda responded by kicking UNITA's 500 fighters out of Zambia. Savimbi moved to Cairo, Egypt where he lived for a year. He secretly entered Angola through Zambia and worked with the Portuguese military against the MPLA. [28] [48] UNITA had its main base in distant south-eastern Angolan provinces, where the Portuguese and FNLA influence were for all practical purposes very low, and where there was no guerrilla war at all. UNITA was from the beginning far better organized and disciplined than either the MPLA or the FNLA.[ citation needed ] Its fighters also showed a much better understanding of guerrilla operations[ citation needed ]. They were especially active along the Benguela railway, repeatedly causing damage to the Portuguese, and to the Republic of Congo and Zambia, both of which used the railway for transportation of their exports to Angolan ports. During the late 1960s the FNLA and MPLA fought each other as much as they did the Portuguese with MPLA forces assisting the Portuguese in finding FNLA hideouts.

[48] Race and Ethnicity in the Portuguese Armed Forces Edit From 1900 to the early 1950s the Portuguese maintained a separate colonial army in their African possessions, consisting mainly of a limited number of companies indigenous ("native companies"). Officers and senior NCOs were seconded from the metropolitan army, while junior NCOs were mainly drawn from Portuguese settlers resident in the overseas territories. The rank and file were a mixture of black African volunteers and white conscripts from the settler community doing their obligatory military service. Black assimiladeos were in theory also liable to conscription but in practice only a limited number were called on to serve. [49] With the change in official status of the African territories from "colonies" to "overseas provinces" in 1951, the colonial army lost its separate status and was integrated into the regular forces of Portugal itself. The basis of recruitment for the overseas units remained essentially unchanged. According to the Mozambican historian João Paulo Borges Coelho, [50] the Portuguese colonial army was segregated along terms of race and ethnicity.

Until 1960, there were three classes of soldiers: commissioned soldiers (European and African whites), overseas soldiers (black African "assimilados" or "civilizados"), and native soldiers (Africans who were part the indigenato regime). These categories were renamed to 1st, 2nd and 3rd class in 1960 - which effectively corresponded to the same classification. Later, although skin colour ceased to be an official discrimination, in practice the system changed little - although from the late 1960s onward blacks were admitted as ensigns (alferes), the lowest rank in the hierarchy of commissioned officers. [51] Numerically, black soldiers never amounted to more than 41% of the Colonial army, rising from just 18% at the outbreak of the war. Coelho noted that perceptions of African soldiers varied a good deal among senior Portuguese commanders during the conflict in Angola, Guinea and Mozambique. General Costa Gomes, perhaps the most successful counterinsurgency commander, sought good relations with local civilians and employed African units within the framework of an organized counter-insurgency plan.

General Spínola, by contrast, appealed for a more political and psycho-social use of African soldiers. General Kaúlza, the most conservative of the three, feared African forces outside his strict control and seems not to have progressed beyond his initial racist perception of the Africans as inferior beings. [51] Native African troops, although widely deployed were initially employed in subordinate roles as enlisted troops or noncommissioned officers. As the war went on, an increasing number of native Angolans rose to positions of command, though of junior rank. After 500 years of colonial occupation, not only had Portugal failed to produce any native black governors, headmasters, police inspectors, or professors, it had also failed to produce a single commander of senior commissioned rank in the overseas Army. Here Portuguese colonial administrators fell victim to the legacy of their own discriminatory and limited polices in education, which largely barred indigenous Angolans from an equal and adequate education until well after the outbreak of the insurgency.

By the early 1970s, the Portuguese authorities had fully perceived these flaws as wrong and contrary to their overseas ambitions in Portuguese Africa, and willingly accepted a true color blindness policy with more spending in education and training opportunities, which started to produce a larger number of black high ranked professionals, including military personnel[ citation needed ]. 1970–1975 Edit The MPLA began forming squadrons of 100 to 150 militants in 1971. These squadrons, armed with 60 mm and 81 mm mortars , attacked Portuguese outposts. The Portuguese conducted counter-insurgency sweeps against MPLA forces in 1972, destroying some MPLA camps. Additionally, the South African Defence Force engaged the MPLA forces in Moxico in February 1972, destroying the Communist presence. The Portuguese Armed Forces organized a successful campaign to control and pacify the entire Eastern Front (the Frente Leste ). Neto, defeated, retreated with 800 militants to the Republic of the Congo. Differing factions in the MPLA then jockeyed for power, until the Soviet Union allied with the Chipenda faction.

On 17 March 1,000 FNLA fighters mutinied in Kinkuzu, but the Zairian army put down the rebellion on behalf of Roberto. [52] 1973–1974 Edit In 1973 Chipenda left the MPLA, founding the Eastern Revolt with 1,500 former MPLA followers. Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere convinced the People's Republic of China , which had begun funding the MPLA in 1970, to ally with the FNLA against the MPLA in 1973. Roberto visited the PRC in December and secured Chinese support. The Soviet Union cut off aid to the MPLA completely in 1974 when Revolta Activa split off from the mainstream MPLA. In November the Soviet Union resumed aid to the MPLA after Neto reasserted his leadership. [39] [48] The combined forces of the MPLA, the UNITA, and the FNLA succeeded in their rebellion not because of their success in battle, but because of the Movimento das Forças Armadas ' coup in Portugal.

The MFA was an organisation of lower-ranked officers in the Portuguese Armed Forces which was responsible for the Carnation Revolution of 25 April 1974, which ended the Portuguese Colonial War and led to the independence of the Portuguese overseas territories. [23] [53] The MFA overthrew the Lisbon government in protest against the authoritarian political regime and the ongoing African colonial wars, specially the particularly demanding conflict in Portuguese Guinea. [54] The revolutionary Portuguese government removed the remaining elements of its colonial forces and agreed to a quick handover of power to the nationalist African movements. This put an immediate end to the independence war against Portugal, but opened the door for a bitter armed conflict among the independentist forces and their respectives allies. Holden Roberto , Agostinho Neto , and Jonas Savimbi met in Bukavu , Zaire in July and agreed to negotiate with the Portuguese as one political entity, but afterwards the fight broke out again. 1975 Edit The three party leaders met again in Mombasa, Kenya on 5 January 1975 and agreed to stop fighting each other, further outlining constitutional negotiations with the Portuguese.

They met for a third time, with Portuguese government officials, in Alvor, Portugal from 10 till 15 January. They signed on 15 January what became known as the Alvor Agreement , granting Angola independence on 11 November and establishing a transitional government. [55] The agreement ended the war for independence while marking the transition to civil war . The Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC) and Eastern Revolt never signed the agreement as they were excluded from negotiations. The coalition government established by the Alvor Agreement soon fell as nationalist factions, doubting one another's commitment to the peace process, tried to take control of the colony by force. [31] [55] The parties agreed to hold the first assembly elections in October 1975. From 31 January until independence a transitional government consisting of the Portuguese High Commissioner Rosa Coutinho and a Prime Ministerial Council would rule. The PMC consisted of three representatives, one from each Angolan party, and a rotating premiership among the representatives. Every decision required two-thirds majority support. The twelve ministries were divided equally among the Angolan parties and the Portuguese government: three ministries for each party.

Author Witney Wright Schneidman criticized this provision in Engaging Africa: Washington and the Fall of Portugal's Colonial Empire for ensuring a "virtual paralysis in executive authority". The Bureau of Intelligence and Research cautioned that an excessive desire to preserve the balance of power in the agreement hurt the transitional Angolan government's ability to function. [31] [55] [56] The Portuguese government's main goal in negotiations was preventing the mass emigration of white Angolans. Paradoxically, the agreement only allowed the MPLA, FNLA, and UNITA to nominate candidates to the first assembly elections, deliberately disenfranchising Bakongo , Cabindans, and whites. The Portuguese reasoned that white Angolans would have to join the separatist movements and the separatists would have to moderate their platforms to expand their political bases. [56] The agreement called for the integration of the militant wings of the Angolan parties into a new military, the Angolan Defense Forces . The ADF would have 48,000 active personnel, made up of 24,000 Portuguese and 8,000 MPLA, FNLA, and UNITA fighters respectively. Each party maintained separate barracks and outposts.

Every military decision required the unanimous consent of each party's headquarters and the joint military command. The Portuguese forces lacked equipment and commitment to the cause, while Angolan nationalists were antagonistic of each other and lacked training. [55] [56] The treaty, to which the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (FLEC) never agreed, described Cabinda as an "integral and inalienable part of Angola". Separatists viewed the agreement as a violation of Cabindan right to self-determination. [57] All three parties soon had forces greater in number than the Portuguese, endangering the colonial power's ability to keep the peace. Factional fighting renewed, reaching new heights as foreign supplies of arms increased. In February the Cuban government warned the Eastern Bloc that the Alvor Agreement would not succeed. By spring the African National Congress and the South West Africa People's Organization ( SWAPO ) were echoing Cuba's warning. [58] Leaders of the Organization of African Unity organized a peace conference moderated by Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta with the three leaders in Nakuru , Kenya in June.

The Angolan leaders issued the Nakuru Declaration on 21 June, [59] agreeing to abide by the provisions of the Alvor Agreement while acknowledging a mutual lack of trust which led to violence. In July fighting again broke out and the MPLA managed to force the FNLA out of Luanda; UNITA voluntarily withdrew from the capital to its stronghold in the south from where it also engaged in the struggle for the country. By August the MPLA had control of 11 of the 15 provincial capitals, including Cabina and Luanda. [60] South African forces invaded Angola on 23 October 1975, [61] covertly sending 1,500 to 2,000 troops from Namibia into southern Angola. FNLA-UNITA-South African forces took five provincial capitals, including Novo Redondo and Benguela in three weeks. On 10 November the Portuguese left Angola. Cuban-MPLA forces defeated South African-FNLA forces, maintaining control over Luanda. On 11 November Neto declared the independence of the People's Republic of Angola.

[55] The FNLA and UNITA responded by proclaiming their own government based in Huambo . [1] The South African Army retreated and, with the help of Cuban forces, the Angolan army retook most of the south in the beginning of 1976. Many analysts have blamed the transitional government in Portugal for the violence that followed the Alvor Agreement, criticiaing the lack of concern about internal Angolan security, and the favoritism towards the MPLA. High Commissioner Coutinho, one of the seven leaders of the National Salvation Junta , openly gave Portuguese military equipment to MPLA forces. [1] [55] [56] Edward Mulcahy , Acting Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs in the United States State Department, told Tom Killoran, the U.S. Consul General in Angola, to congratulate the PMC rather than the FNLA and UNITA on their own and Coutinho for Portugal's "untiring and protracted efforts" at a peace agreement. [56] [62] Secretary of State Henry Kissinger considered any government involving the pro-Soviet, communist MPLA, to be unacceptable and President Gerald Ford oversaw heightened aid to the FNLA.

[28] Battle of the Death Road Main article: Battle of Quifangondo An anti-Communist force made up of 1,500 FNLA fighters, 100 Portuguese Angolan soldiers, and two battalions of the Zairian army passed near the city of Quifangondo, only 30 km north of Luanda, at dawn on 10 November. The force, supported by South African aircraft and three 140 mm artillery pieces, [63] marched in a single line along the Bengo River to face an 800-strong Cuban force across the river. The Cubans and MPLA fighters bombarded the FNLA with mortar and 122 mm rockets, destroying most of the FNLA's armored cars and six Jeeps carrying antitank rockets in the first hour of fighting. [64] Witnesses estimated the Cuban-led force shot 2000 rockets at the FNLA. Cubans then drove forward, launching RPG-7 rocket grenades, shooting with anti-aircraft guns, killing hundreds.

The South Africans, with their aged World War II -era guns were powerless to intervene, and subsequently retreated via Ambrizete to SAS President Steyn, a South African navy frigate . The Cuba-MPLA victory in Nshila wa Lufu (Death Road), largely ended the FNLA's importance in the conflict. [64] Foreign influence Edit The situation of the Portuguese in their overseas province of Angola soon became a matter of concern for a number of foreign powers particularly her military allies in NATO . The USA, for example, was concerned with the possibility of a Marxist regime being established in Luanda. That is why it started supplying weapons and ammunition to the UPA, which meanwhile grew considerably and merged with the Democratic Party of Angola to form the FNLA. [65] The leaders of the FNLA were, however, not satisfied with the US support. Savimbi consequently established good connections with the People's Republic of China, from where even larger shipments started arriving. The USA granted the company Aero Associates, from Tucson, Arizona, the permission to sell seven Douglas B-26 Invader bombers to Portugal in early 1965, despite Portugal's concerns about their support for the Marxists from Cuba and the USSR .

The aircraft were flown to Africa by John Richard Hawke – reportedly a former Royal Air Force -pilot – who on the start of one of the flights to Angola flew so low over the White House, that the United States Air Force forced him to land and he was arrested. In May 1965 Hawke was indicted for illegally selling arms and supporting the Portuguese, but was imprisoned for less than a year. The B-26s were not to see deployment in Angola until several years later. [66] Rhodesia and South Africa Edit Aside from the USA, two other African nations became involved in this war as well. These were Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa, both of which were ruled by the white minority. Their regimes were both concerned about their own future in the case of a Portuguese defeat. Rhodesia and South Africa initially limited their participation on shipments of arms and supplies. However, by 1968 the South Africans began providing Alouette III helicopters with crews to the Portuguese Air Force (FAP), and finally several companies of South African Defence Forces (SADF) infantry who were deployed in southern and central Angola.

[67] However, contemporary reports about them guarding the iron mines of Cassinga were never confirmed. Finally, there were reports that a number of Rhodesian pilots were recruited to fly FAP helicopters. However, when the first Portuguese unit was equipped with Aerospatiale Puma helicopters, in 1969, its crews were almost exclusively South Africans. Rhodesian pilots were considered too valuable by the Royal Rhodesian Air Force (RRAF) to be deployed in support of the Portuguese. The SADF has had pilots and helicopters operating out of the Centro Conjunto de Apoio Aéreo (CCAA – Joint Air Support Centre), setting up in Cuito Cuanavale during 1968. USSR Edit During the late 1960s the USSR also became involved in the war in Angola, albeit almost exclusively via the MPLA. While the FNLA received only very limited arms shipments from the USA, and the UNITA was getting hardly any support from outside the country, the Marxist MPLA developed very close relations with Moscow and was soon to start receiving significant shipments of arms via Tanzania and Zambia.

[68] [69] In 1969 the MPLA agreed with the USSR that in exchange for arms and supplies delivered to it the Soviets would – upon independence – would be granted rights for establishing bases in the country. Consequently, by the early 1970s the MPLA developed into the strongest Angolan anti-colonial movement and the most powerful political party. Aftermath Edit As soon as the agreement between the MPLA and Portugal for the transfer of power became known to the public, a mass exodus began. Over 300,000 people left Angola by November, most of them evacuated aboard TAP Boeing 707 aircraft. The British Royal Air Force also lent a hand, sending Vickers VC10 airliners to evacuate about 6,000 additional refugees. At this stage, the Angolan Civil War had started and spread out across the newly independent country. The devastating civil war lasted several decades and claimed millions of lives and refugees in independent Angola. [70] In the wake of the conflict, Angola faced deterioration in central planning , economic development and growth, security, education and health system issues.

Like the other newly independent African territories involved in the Portuguese Colonial War , Angola's rank in the human development and GDP per capita world tables fell. After independence, economic and social recession, corruption, poverty , inequality and failed central planning eroded the initial revolutionary fervour. [71] [72] A level of economic development comparable to what had existed under Portuguese rule became a major goal for the governments of the independent territory. The sharp recession and the chaos in many areas of Angolan life eroded the initial impetus of nationalistic fervor. There were also eruptions of black racism in the former overseas province against white and mulatto Angolans. [73] See also

Question: From which country did Angola gain independence in 1975?
Answer: PORTUGAL