South African ground troops operating from the Caprivi area of northern Namibia mounted armed incursions into Zambia on at least two separate occasions during February and March 1982. These attacks, together with the violation of Zambian airspace early in the year by South African aircraft en route to bomb targets in eastern Angola are among the most recent in a history of South African aggression stretching back to Zambia's independence in 1964. This issue of FOCUS reviews recent trends and developments in Pretoria's policy of military destabilisation as it has affected Zambia, particularly since Zimbabwe's independence in April 1980.
South African aggression against Zambia has always involved a combination of direct military incursions, covert attacks and subversion, and economic destabilisation. Prior to Zimbabwe's independence, Pretoria had the further option of close collaboration with the forces of the Smith regime and of channelling attacks through them. Since 1980, most direct attacks have been launched from the Caprivi Strip, from where the most frequent and sustained form of aggression has been the planting of landmines over large areas of Zambia's Western province. In addition to causing loss of life, displacement of local villagers, and a decline in agricultural production, this tactic, according to recent evidence submitted by the Zambian government, has deterred Western European companies otherwise interested in prospecting for minerals in the area.
OPERATIONS FROM CAPRIVI
Zimbabwe's independence in fact prompted an immediate escalation in attacks from Caprivi when two battalions of South African troops equipped with tanks and armoured cars crossed into Zambia in April 1980. They subsequently divided into smaller units which continued to roam around south-western Zambia for much of the remainder of the year, mining roads, attacking villages and burning crops.
The South African strategy, familiar from southern Angola, of disrupting and ultimately destroying the economic infrastructure, became clearly apparent in July 1980 when the Zambian government declared the region a disaster area and widespread malnutrition was reported. In April 1981, thousands of Zambian nationals and Angolan refugees living in the Western province were reported to be starving because roads leading to the area had been extensively landmined by South African troops. This, combined with the effects of recent flooding in the area, had made travel other than by helicopter extremely hazardous and created serious hold-ups in the supply of clothes, food and medicine.
It would appear that South African ground forces are able to move across the Caprivi-Zambia border with relatively little hindrance. Parts of Zambia's Western province seem as a result to have become — if only temporarily — virtual 'no-go' zones — a situation not too dissimilar from that prevailing in southern Angola. South African aircraft flying from bases in Caprivi and elsewhere in Namibia have also violated Zambian airspace on numerous occasions.
OPERATION PROTEA
A number of fresh South African incursions into Zambia took place from the beginning of August 1981 onwards, apparently linked with the general upsurge in South African aggression in the region contingent on the invasion of southern Angola and 'Operation Protea'.
On 11 September 1981, with an estimated 11,000 South African troops actively deployed inside southern Angola, the Zambian government reported that South African soldiers equipped with small arms and four armoured cars had fired on Zambian military and civilian targets at Sesheke, from positions across the Zambezi River in the Caprivi Strip. Four South African fighter planes had meanwhile overflown the area. The attack was completely without provocation, the statement said, and Zambian forces had returned fire. The SADF denied the incident and said that the Zambians had fired first, at a South African observation post across the border from Sesheke.
South Africa has since been reported to have impounded the Katima Mulilo pontoon ferry across the Zambezi. At Kazangulu, the extreme eastern tip of Caprivi where four countries, Namibia, Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe, meet, the South Africans have established a military observation post on an island in the Zambezi near its confluence with the Chobe river. The emplacement on this 'no-man's island' is apparently serviced by South African forces based in Caprivi.
RECENT ATTACKS
In mid-February 1982 South African forces, including jets and helicopters, violated Zambian territory in the region of Kaungamarshi in the Western province. Mines were laid by South African troops.
A second incursion took place on 8 March, when a South African company supported by tanks and armoured cars were sighted by Zambian troops near Ngwazi Pool, Western province. The South Africans later withdrew into the Caprivi.
COVERT OPERATIONS
Evidence of covert activity in Zambia on the part of South African intelligence operatives and other agents, and by South African-supported dissidents, has recurred throughout Zambia's independence. Alleged South African spies have from time to time been brought before Zambian courts.
Following Zimbabwe's independence, South Africa appears to have stepped up its use of dissident forces against independent states throughout the southern African region, including Zambia. In October 1981, President Kaunda told the Commonwealth Summit in Melbourne that between 500 and 600 Zambian dissidents were being trained in South Africa for purposes of destabilisation. The total was later put at possibly twice this figure by Zambia's Secretary of State for Defence and Security, Grey Zulu.
The Zambian authorities have from time to time expressed their belief that South Africa and South African agents are partly responsible for the upsurge in violent crime and labour unrest which have particularly affected the capital, Lusaka, and the economically important Copper Belt in recent years. At the level of the state, evidence has been alleged of South African involvement in at least two conspiracies uncovered by the Zambian authorities since 1980.
