Word: unita
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...troubles, predictions of UNlTA's imminent collapse are exaggerated," reported Hillenbrand. "But the outlook is not bright. An estimated 100,000 members of the Ovimbundu tribe, who make up most of UNITA's support, have already fled into the bush to avoid the fighting. At his front-line rallies, Savimbi urged others to follow. After eight years in the bush as a guerrilla fighter against the Portuguese, he professed not to see any problem with this. 'Mao taught us that a peasant revolution can be successful, but the people have to be willing to suffer,' said...
...bush could lead to a new Biafra, with thousands of deaths by starvation. That could be avoided by a political settlement, for which Savimbi is eager. He admitted that he would even accept Agostinho Neto as President of a coalition government, although only if the M.P.L.A. leader gave UNITA an important role. Neto, said Savimbi, is not a true African: if he were, he would understand that the leadership of an African nation requires compromise. 'You never have everybody with you,' he added. 'You must be flexible in your principles to allow for varying opinion...
...Moreover, South African troops and logistic support have been withdrawn. The full extent of South African assistance may never be known. Before the pullback, South Africans kept popping up in the strangest places, on the remotest roads. Last week it was different. 'You see,' quipped a UNITA guide on a walk through the railroad junction of Lumege, 'there are no white Angolans up here.' As it happened, if the 'white Angolans'-UNlTA's euphemism for the South Africans-had been around, Lumege might not have fallen the next...
Some Western officials, in fact, believe that the South African withdrawal-and UNITA's ouster of Western journalists from its territory-may be designed to mask continued South African involvement. The suspected strategy would entail a forward movement of detachments of South African soldiers camouflaged as mercenaries. Their job would be to stiffen the UNITA resistance and provide a holding and screening force to cover the re-entry of South African army regulars into the battle...
...UNITA is getting other help as well. American advisers have been seen discreetly circulating around Silva Pôrto. About 1,000 mercenaries, recruited in the U.S., Britain, Portugal and France, also landed in Zaïre last week to report for duty. Even Michael ("Mad Mike") Hoare, legendary leader of the Congo mercenaries in the mid-1960s, appeared to be gearing up for action. From Johannesburg, he sent an "alert notice" to members of the Wild Geese Club, composed of Congo veterans. Hoare said he was offering his services to Zaïre's President Mobutu Sese Seko...