Word: africans
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...weapon they wanted. Automatic rifles and endless rounds of ammunition, heavy artillery, mortars, rockets, grenade launchers, antiaircraft guns, Czechoslovak Delfin jets, Russian MIGs and Ilyushin 11-28 bombers?Nigeria ordered and got them all. The result was an unhappy precedent for Africa: the Nigerian conflict became the first African bush war fought with modern weapons...
...saturate Biafran positions with wanton bursts of 76- and 90-mm. artillery fire, move forward quickly, then dig in and wait for the artillery to catch up. Such tactics, or at least the attitude behind them, are not confined to Nigeria's federal troops; they are commonplace with most African armies. Moreover, federal commanders have built up an army to match the scale of their weapons orders ?almost a tenfold increase on their 8,000 regulars. Inevitably, the volunteers included unemployed youths and street-corner thugs who planned to serve most of their hitch looting towns and shaking down...
...stirring the world's conscience, Biafra's publicity has forced three of Nigeria's arms suppliers (Czechoslovakia, The Netherlands, Belgium) to cut off their shipments. It has also supported the diplomatic recognition of Biafra by four African nations (Gabon, Zambia. Tanzania, Ivory Coast). Eventually, if they can somehow hold out long enough, Biafrans may win a source of material help. They have lately found an influential friend in Charles de Gaulle, who has urged that the war be settled on the principle of "a people's right to self-determination...
...federal government bitterly admits that it has come out second best in the war of words. Nigerian Minister of Transport Joseph Tarka last week took pains to set one matter straight. "The Western press printed many pictures of the so-called rats sold in African markets for human consumption," he said. "I can tell you that the so-called rat is a real delicacy in our part of the world, and I'd rather eat your so-called rats than your damned frog's legs." Gowon, who has recently begun reading books about the American Civil War, seems resigned...
...absence of neighborly compassion among the tribes is a fact of African life. But the Nigerian government is caught in a special dilemma. If Biafra succeeds in its secession, a Nigerian federation will be doomed. On the other hand, if the Ibos are decimated and permanently embittered, the federation may be doomed in another way. Nigeria's rulers are talking unity, while at the same time conducting a form of tribal warfare that may make unity impossible at best and unnecessary at worst. By granting Ojukwu his demand for airborne relief, the Nigerians would show minimal concern for 8 million...