The Bush administration has taken steps in Angola to expunge one of the last vestiges of Cold War thinking from its foreign policy. Secretary of State James A. Baker III wrote to Jonas Savimbi, leader of the Angolan opposition movement UNITA, which has been U.S.-supported for years, demanding an explanation for charges of human rights violations and murder. That action moved the United States, for the first time in three decades of covert intervention in Angola, into a position of neutrality.
Mr. Savimbi wrote a seven-page response to Mr. Baker in which he confirmed that the two most prominent UNITA leaders of the younger generation, Tito Chingunji and Wilson dos Santos, and their wives and children were murdered by UNITA members. While he acknowledged that, as UNITA leader, he bears a "moral responsibility," Mr. Savimbi claimed that he had no hand in the deaths and did not even know about them until many months after they occurred. Tomorrow, Assistant Secretary of State Herman Cohen will meet Mr. Savimbi in Luanda to convey the administration's "deep distress" over the acknowledged deaths.
During the Reagan administration, congressional and public support for supplying several hundred million dollars of covert aid to UNITA was obtained by portraying Mr. Savimbi as a champion of freedom and democracy. The recent defection of two of UNITA's top leaders, along with the party's admission of the murders and human rights violations, have suddenly altered Washington's view of Angola's political landscape.
Relations between Washington and UNITA are now at an all-time low. Even many of the party's most staunch supporters are calling for an independent investigation of the reported killings and human rights violations. Rep. Dan Burton, an Indiana Republican whose performance during a hearing last month prompted an Angolan diplomat to characterize him as a "ventriloquist for UNITA in Congress," is in the forefront of those demanding an investigation. Similar demands have been raised in the Senate by Dennis DeConcini of Arizona, who has been among UNITA's strongest Democratic supporters in Congress. And the State Department, a strong defender of UNITA in the past, is demanding "a full investigation and public disclosure . . . and confirmation that those found responsible will be held accountable." It is as though Humpty Dumpty fell off the wall, and nobody is offering to help put him back together again.
The general reaction to the revelations about internatal UNITA activities is one of total surprise. How could so many people have been so naive? What we are witnessing is the correction of Cold War images and policies which were based more on hyperbole than reality. Not all UNITA supporters went as far as Howard Phillips, chairman of the Conservative Caucus, who wrote in 1989 that "if he were constitutionally eligible, Jonas Savimbi would be my candidate for president of the United States." But Mr. Savimbi and UNITA were painted larger than life to justify American covert support.
The United States has been involved, off and on, in covert military activities in Angola for more than three decades. The recipients of its aid have embarrassed the United States through their behavior on and off the battlefield: first the Portuguese, then the FNLA (National Front for the Liberation of Angola, another guerrilla movement), then UNITA. The State Department has received credible reports on murder, torture and other human rights violations within UNITA for years. The standard response was to raise questions about the charges because of the lack of corroborating evidence.
One main reason for the lack of evidence is that most of what the U.S. government knows about UNITA comes from UNITA itself.
If it was not convenient to acknowledge human rights problems in UNITA while the United States was supplying it with covert military aid, the situation changed dramatically last May when UNITA and the governing MPLA (from the Portuguese initials for the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola) signed a peace treaty in Lisbon that established a cease-fire and procedures for a democratic election this fall. The Unites States still maintained a partisan pro-UNITA posture following the peace accord on the grounds that it was necessary to help "level the playing field." Given the Angolan government's access to money and media, the justification for the policy was cogent, but the policy was poorly executed. Most of the "electoral aid" was channeled through a covert program, opening up much speculation on the amount and nature of the support.
One cause of the difficulties that have arisen between UNITA and Washington is that the United States apparently has higher standards and expectations for its former guerrilla clients once they enter the political arena. The contras in Nicaragua never adjusted to the changed criteria, and UNITA cannot be expected to adapt easily either. The clients may even be bitter. Qualities which were once admired are now cause for reproach. For example, Mr. Savimbi's total control over UNITA was often viewed as a positive by Washington, because he was able to make snap decisions and guarantee that they would be implemented.
Today, Americans expect exemplary democratic behavior from Mr. Savimbi and his UNITA colleagues, but the historical record of guerrillas successfully making the transition from an authoritarian military posture to democratic politics is not encouraging.
The movements that took over in China, Cuba, Algeria, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, Vietnam, Cambodia and Nicaragua each promised to create new, more democratic, societies, but none succeeded. More promising are the examples in Namibia and Zimbabwe, but it is worth noting in both cases that the former guerrillas are ruling as part of coalitions, which may have tempered non-democratic tendencies.
Concern about authoritarian tendencies in UNITA in the past has not been limited to MPLA supporters. Radek Sikorski ended his account of traveling with UNITA in the National Review (Aug. 18, 1989) with the comment that "we can certainly admire Savimbi's energy, charisma and craftiness. But let us have no illusions." Mr. Sikorski worried whether after almost 30 years of "his autocratic grip" as "near-absolute leader of his party," Jonas Savimbi was "the man to lead the nation to full freedom."
The article prompted many letters attacking Mr. Sikorski's prognosis, to which he replied, "Let us by all means back Savimbi for as long as it suits us. But he is no more a democrat than Mao or Castro, and no amount of his rhetoric will alter the fact that he runs autocratically a highly centralized, Leninist organization."
Mr. Savimbi alleges in his letter to Mr. Baker that Tito Chingunji and Wilson dos Santos tried to overthrow him as part of a plot involving the CIA. To assert that the CIA, which has been his biggest benefactor in recent years, plotted against him amounts to burning most bridges with Washington. According to one State Department official, "Either Savimbi is totally paranoid or he takes us for complete fools. Or both."
He undoubtedly calculates that at this stage of the election process, he no longer needs the United States. Moreover, as he stated in a news conference a week ago, the election will not be held in Washington or Lisbon but in Angola -- where he is confident of winning.
Mr. Savimbi may be correct in his assessment that the Angolan peasantry, who will hold the balance of power in the election at the end of September, will not react as strongly to human rights violations as Washington. But neither Mr. Savimbi nor Secretary Baker nor anyone else really knows how Angolans will vote when they get the chance. More certain, however, is that the Bush administration has now adopted a neutral posture in Angola, thus positioning itself to work with whichever party wins the election.
Gerald Bender is a professor in the School of International Relations at the University of Southern California. He visits Angola frequently, most recently last month.