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Mozambican War of Independence Page

International Consciousness and Support

Main article: Cold War (1962–1979) § The Third World and nonalignment in the 1960s and 1970s

Leaders of the Mozambican independence movement were educated abroad and thus brought a focus on the transnational to their liberation efforts. Marcelino dos Santos, the movement's unofficial diplomat, took the lead on a lot of the international networking between the movement and other countries that provided aid. They read Mao's works and thus adopted Maoist and Marxist-Leninist ideology at an early stage, even though the group's Marxist-Leninist affiliations were not made official until 1977. As such, approach to the war for independence was rooted in understanding of international liberation struggles, especially those by countries that would later align themselves with Marx-Leninism or communism. FRELIMO's fighting strategy was inspired by anti-colonial wars and other guerilla campaigns in China, Vietnam and Algeria.

FRELIMO was recognized early on by the Organization of African Unity (OAU), a group founded by Kwame Nkrumah and other African leaders, focused on eradicating colonialism and neocolonialism from the African continent. The OAU provided funds in support of the independence fight.

Such support from other free nations on the African continent was crucial to the war effort. FRELIMO, and other Mozambican liberation groups that preceded it, were based in Tanzania because the character of Portuguese colonization under the Estado Novo was so repressive that it was near impossible for such resistance movements to begin and flourish in Mozambique proper. When Tanzania gained independence in 1961, President Julius Nyerere permitted liberation movements in exile, including FRELIMO, to have the country as their base of operations. On the African continent, FRELIMO received support from Tanzania, Algeria, and Egypt, among other free nations.

During the Cold War, and particularly in the late 1950s, the Soviet Union and People's Republic of China adopted a strategy of destabilization of Western powers by disrupting their hold on African colonies. Nikita Khrushchev, in particular, viewed the 'underdeveloped third of mankind' as a means to weaken the West. For the Soviets, Africa represented a chance to create a rift between western powers and their colonial assets, and create pro-communist states in Africa with which to foster future relations. Prior to the formation of FRELIMO, the Soviet position regarding the nationalist movements in Mozambique was confused. There were multiple independence movements, and they had no sure knowledge that any would succeed.

The liberation movement's largely Marxist-Leninist principles and the eastern bloc's strategy of destabilization made Mozambican alliance with other left nations of the world seem like a foregone conclusion. Nationalist groups in Mozambique, like those across Africa during the period, did receive training and equipment from the Soviet Union. But leaders of the movement for independence also wanted to balance their support. As such, they lobbied for and received support from both eastern bloc and non-aligned nations upon its consolidation into FRELIMO. The movement was even initially supported by the U.S. government. In 1963, Mondlane met with Kennedy administration officials who later provided a $60,000 CIA subsidy in support of the movement. The Kennedy administration, however, rejected his request for military aid and by 1968 the Johnson administration severed all financial ties.

Eduardo Mondlane's successor, future President of Mozambique, Samora Machel, acknowledged assistance from both Moscow and Peking, describing them as "the only ones who will really help us. They have fought armed struggles, and whatever they have learned that is relevant to Mozambique we will use." Guerrillas received training in subversion and political warfare as well as military aid, specifically shipments of 122mm artillery rockets in 1972, with 1600 advisors from Russia, Cuba and East Germany. Chinese military instructors also trained soldiers in Tanzania.

Cuba's relationship with the Mozambican liberation movement was somewhat more fraught than that which FRELIMO fostered with the Soviet Union and China. Cuba's had a similar interest in African wars for liberation as a potential locus for the spread of the ideology of the Cuban Revolution. The Cubans identified Mozambique's war for liberation as one of the most important ones occurring in Africa at the time. But Cuba's efforts to make connection with FRELIMO were frustrated almost from the outset. In 1965, Mondlane met with Argentine marxist revolutionary Che Guevara in Dar es Salaam to discuss potential collaboration. The meeting ended acrimoniously when Guevara called into question the reports of FRELIMO's prowess, which it had greatly exaggerated in the press. Cubans also tried to convince FRELIMO to agree to train their guerillas in Zaire, which Mondlane refused. Eventually, these initial disagreements were resolved and Cubans agreed to train FRELIMO guerillas in Cuba and continued to provide weapons, food, and uniforms for the movement. The island also acted as a conduit for communication between Mozambique and its fellow Portuguese colony Angola, and Latin American nations in the thrall of their own revolutionary movements such as Peru, Venezuela, Colombia, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala.

Amongst non-aligned nations who provided FRELIMO with military and/or humanitarian support were Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands. FRELIMO also had a small but significant network of support based in Reggio Emilia, Italy.

I want to re-arrange this section to make Mozambicans the actors in it rather than some victims of a soviet scheme to destabilize the west. That certainly was apart of the support they recieved, but I'm planning to frame this section more around how FRELIMO's Marxist-Leninist stance made them open to international support from certain soviet governments but also support from other african countries (really just wanting Africans to be considered more active participants in their independence movements)

Aftermath

Samora Machel became Mozambique's first president. The Reverend Uria Simango, his wife, and other FRELIMO dissidents were arrested in 1975 and detained without trial.

Many Portuguese colonists were not typical settlers in Mozambique. While most European communities in Africa at the time—with the exception of Afrikaners—were established from the late nineteenth to early twentieth centuries, some white families and institutions in those territories still administered by Portugal had been entrenched for generations. About 300,000 white civilians left Mozambique in the first week or two of independence (in Europe they were popularly known as retornados). With the departure of Portuguese professionals and tradesmen, Mozambique lacked an educated workforce to maintain its infrastructure, and economic collapse loomed.

Advisors from communist countries were brought in by the FRELIMO regime. Within about two years, fighting resumed with the Mozambican Civil War against RENAMO insurgents supplied with Rhodesian and South African military support. The Soviet Union and Cuba continued to support the new FRELIMO government against counterrevolution in the years after 1975. The Unites States' Ford administration had rebuffed Samora Machel's desire to establish a trade relationship, effectively pushing Mozambique to align primarily with the eastern bloc. By 1981, there were 230 Soviet, close to 200 Cuban military and over 600 civilian Cuban advisers still in the country. Cuba's involvement in Mozambique was as part of a continuing effort to export the anti-imperialist ideology of the Cuban Revolution and forge desperately needed new allies. Cuba provided support to liberation movements and leftist governments in numerous African countries, including Angola, Ethiopia, Guinea-Bissau and Congo-Brazzaville. In 1978, Mozambique sent some of its youth to be educated in Cuban schools.

Industrial and social recession, corruption, poverty, inequality and failed central planning eroded the initial revolutionary fervour. Single party rule by FRELIMO also became increasingly authoritarian throughout the Civil War.

Mozambique's successful war for independence brought an end to the white-ruled cordon of nations separating Apartheid South Africa from the independent black-ruled nations of the continent. As a result, newly-independent nations such as Angola, Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of the Congo acted as stages for proxy battles between capitalist and communist nations attempting to proliferate their respective ideologies. Independent Mozambique, like Tanzania before it, served as a temporary base for African National Congress (ANC) operatives fighting to release South Africa from its white-led rule.

I expanded the "support from the soviet union" section to be an "international support and consciousness" section and better reflect the internationalism of the war effort. I also added more information to the aftermath section about the continued connection between free Mozambique and its eastern block allies, as well a some information about its larger place in 20th century African conflicts

Che Guevara

His experiences and studying of Marxism–Leninism led him to posit that the Third World's underdevelopment and dependence was an intrinsic result of imperialism, neocolonialism and monopoly capitalism, with the only remedy being proletarian internationalism and world revolution. Guevara left Cuba in 1965 to foment revolution abroad, first unsuccessfully in Congo-Kinshasa, then throughout the African continent with other Cuban advisors. Guevara worked in Algeria, Zaire, and Angola, as well as with African liberation movements in exile like the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) and Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Later he travelled to Bolivia to aid in revolution and there he was captured by CIA-assisted Bolivian forces and summarily executed.