The Last of Africa's Cold War Conflicts

The Last of Africa's Cold War Conflicts PDF

Author: Al J. Venter

Publisher: Pen and Sword Military

Published: 2020-05-30

Total Pages: 295

ISBN-13: 152677299X

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This detailed combat history sheds light on the significant yet overlooked guerilla campaigns in what would become Angola and Guinea-Bissou. Portugal was the first European country to colonize Africa. It was also the last to leave, almost five centuries later. During what Lisbon called its “civilizing mission” the Portuguese weathered numerous insurrections, but none as severe as the guerrilla war first launched in Angola in 1961 and two years later in Portuguese Guinea. Both the Soviets and the Cubans believed that because the tiny colony of Guinea had no resources, Lisbon would soon capitulate. But the 11-year struggle became the empire’s most strenuous attempt to retain colonial power. Though it was overshadowed by the conflict in Vietnam, the Soviet-led guerrilla campaign in Portuguese Guinea set the scene for the wars that followed in Rhodesia and present-day Namibia.

Post-Cold War Conflicts in Africa

Post-Cold War Conflicts in Africa PDF

Author: Augustine C Ohanwe

Publisher: Adonis & Abbey Publishers Ltd

Published: 2009-07-31

Total Pages: 249

ISBN-13: 1912234742

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During the Cold War ideological and politico-military rivalries mostly dictated the actions of the competing blocs, including their involvement in foreign conflicts. In Africa for instance, the East-West rivalry of the time not only fuelled conflicts but also appeared to undermine the use of diplomacy as a tool for peacemaking and conflict resolution. With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the demise of the Soviet Union however, there was a transformation of the conflict arena in the continent, which presented new opportunities and threats. This therefore raises a fundamental question of how the end of the Cold War has affected the character of conflicts and their successful management in Africa. Using Liberia and Somalia as case studies, Post-Cold War Conflicts in Africa analyses how the post Cold War conflicts in these two countries and their management differed from what they would have been during the Cold War era. It shows for instance that while in Liberia the major powers appeared content to cede the management of the conflict to the sub-regional group, ECOMOG, in Somalia, the conflict appeared to be turned into an arena for simple military experiment without any of the old Cold War ideological rivalries playing any role in its trajectory or management. The book argues that the end of the Cold War offers an opportunity for the successful use of a new approach to conflict management in the continent, which would be anchored on traditional African diplomacy. This new approach would involve a triumvirate of eminent men and women from the continent, regional peacekeeping forces, and the warring factions themselves working in concert to replace the rifle with 'talking till every one agrees'

War and Conflict in Africa

War and Conflict in Africa PDF

Author: Paul D. Williams

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2016-06-23

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 1509509089

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After the Cold War, Africa earned the dubious distinction of being the world's most bloody continent. But how can we explain this proliferation of armed conflicts? What caused them and what were their main characteristics? And what did the world's governments do to stop them? In this fully revised and updated second edition of his popular text, Paul Williams offers an in-depth and wide-ranging assessment of more than six hundred armed conflicts which took place in Africa from 1990 to the present day - from the continental catastrophe in the Great Lakes region to the sprawling conflicts across the Sahel and the web of wars in the Horn of Africa. Taking a broad comparative approach to examine the political contexts in which these wars occurred, he explores the major patterns of organized violence, the key ingredients that provoked them and the major international responses undertaken to deliver lasting peace. Part I, Contexts provides an overview of the most important attempts to measure the number, scale and location of Africa's armed conflicts and provides a conceptual and political sketch of the terrain of struggle upon which these wars were waged. Part II, Ingredients analyses the role of five widely debated features of Africa's wars: the dynamics of neopatrimonial systems of governance; the construction and manipulation of ethnic identities; questions of sovereignty and self-determination; as well as the impact of natural resources and religion. Part III, Responses, discusses four major international reactions to Africa's wars: attempts to build a new institutional architecture to help promote peace and security on the continent; this architecture's two main policy instruments, peacemaking initiatives and peace operations; and efforts to develop the continent. War and Conflict in Africa will be essential reading for all students of international peace and security studies as well as Africa's international relations.

US Foreign Policy and the End of the Cold War in Africa

US Foreign Policy and the End of the Cold War in Africa PDF

Author: Flavia Gasbarri

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2020-05-07

Total Pages: 195

ISBN-13: 1000071588

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This book investigates the end of the Cold War in Africa and its impact on post-Cold War US foreign policy in the continent. The fall of the Berlin Wall is widely considered the end of the Cold War; however, it documents just one of the many "ends", since the Cold War was a global conflict. This book looks at one of the most neglected extra-European battlegrounds, the African continent, and explores how American foreign policy developed in this region between the late 1980s and the early 1990s. Drawing on a wide range of recently disclosed documents, the book shows that the Cold War in Africa ended in 1988, preceding the fall of the Berlin Wall. It also reveals how, since then, some of the most controversial and inconsistent episodes of post-Cold War US foreign policy in Africa have been deeply rooted in the unique process whereby American rivalry with the USSR found its end in the continent. The book challenges the traditional narrative by presenting an original perspective on the study of the end of the Cold War and provides new insights into the shaping of US foreign policy during the so-called ‘unipolar moment’. This book will be of much interest to students of Cold War history, US foreign policy, African politics and international relations.

The Oxford Handbook of the Cold War

The Oxford Handbook of the Cold War PDF

Author: Richard H. Immerman

Publisher: OUP Oxford

Published: 2013-01-31

Total Pages: 680

ISBN-13: 0191643629

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The Oxford Handbook of the Cold War offers a broad reassessment of the period war based on new conceptual frameworks developed in the field of international history. Nearing the 25th anniversary of its end, the cold war now emerges as a distinct period in twentieth-century history, yet one which should be evaluated within the broader context of global political, economic, social, and cultural developments. The editors have brought together leading scholars in cold war history to offer a new assessment of the state of the field and identify fundamental questions for future research. The individual chapters in this volume evaluate both the extent and the limits of the cold war's reach in world history. They call into question orthodox ways of ordering the chronology of the cold war and also present new insights into the global dimension of the conflict. Even though each essay offers a unique perspective, together they show the interconnectedness between cold war and national and transnational developments, including long-standing conflicts that preceded the cold war and persisted after its end, or global transformations in areas such as human rights or economic and cultural globalization. Because of its broad mandate, the volume is structured not along conventional chronological lines, but thematically, offering essays on conceptual frameworks, regional perspectives, cold war instruments and cold war challenges. The result is a rich and diverse accounting of the ways in which the cold war should be positioned within the broader context of world history.

Foreign Intervention in Africa

Foreign Intervention in Africa PDF

Author: Elizabeth Schmidt

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2013-03-25

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 0521882389

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This book chronicles foreign political and military interventions in Africa from 1956 to 2010, helping readers understand the historical roots of Africa's problems.

Africa: War and Conflict in the Twentieth Century

Africa: War and Conflict in the Twentieth Century PDF

Author: Timothy Stapleton

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2018-05-11

Total Pages: 351

ISBN-13: 1351104667

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This book examines the causes, course and consequences of warfare in twentieth century Africa, a period which spanned colonial rebellions, both World Wars, and the decolonization process. Timothy Stapleton contextualizes the essential debates and controversies surrounding African conflict in the twentieth century while providing insightful introductions to such conflicts as: African rebellions against colonial regimes in the early twentieth century, including the rebellion and infamous genocide of the Herero and Nama people in present-day Namibia; The African fronts of World War I and World War II, and the involvement of colonized African peoples in these global conflicts; Conflict surrounding the widespread decolonization of Africa in the 1950s and 1960s; Rebellion and civil war in Africa during the Cold War, when American and Soviet elements often intervened in efforts to turn African battlegrounds into Cold War proxy conflicts; The Second Congo Civil War, which is arguably the bloodiest conflict in any region since World War II; Supported by a glossary, a who’s who of key figures, a timeline of major events, a rich bibliography, and a set of documents which highlight the themes of the book, Africa: War and Conflict in the Twentieth Century is the best available resource for students and scholars seeking an introduction to violent conflict in recent African history.

The Last Hot Battle of the Cold War

The Last Hot Battle of the Cold War PDF

Author: Peter Polack

Publisher: Casemate Publishers

Published: 2013-12-13

Total Pages: 348

ISBN-13: 1612001963

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A fascinating chronicle of the Cold War battle where US and Soviet weapons, as well as Cuban and South African troops, took part in the Angolan Civil War. In the late 1980s, as America prepared to claim its victory in the Cold War over the Soviet Union, a bloody war still raged in Southern Africa, where proxy forces from both sides vied for control of Angola. The socialist Angolan government, stocked with Soviet weapons, had only to wipe out the resistance group UNITA, secretly supplied by the United States, in order to claim sovereignty. But as Angolan forces gained the upper hand, apartheid-era South Africa stepped in to protect its own interests. The white army crossing the border prompted the Angolans to call on their own foreign reinforcements—the army of Communist Cuba. Thus began the epic Battle of Cuito Cuanavale: an odd match-up of South African Boers against Castro’s armed forces. While South Africa was subject to an arms boycott since 1977, the Cuban and Angolan troops had the latest Soviet weapons. But UNITA had its secret US supply line, and the South Africans knew how to fight. As a case study of ferocious fighting between East and West, The Last Hot Battle of the Cold War unveils a remarkable episode in the endgame of the Cold War—one that is largely unknown to the American public.

The End of the Cold War and The Third World

The End of the Cold War and The Third World PDF

Author: Artemy Kalinovsky

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2011-04-19

Total Pages: 377

ISBN-13: 113672429X

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This book brings together recent research on the end of the Cold War in the Third World and engages with ongoing debates about regional conflicts, the role of great powers in the developing world, and the role of international actors in conflict resolution. Most of the recent scholarship on the end of the Cold War has focused on Europe or bilateral US-Soviet relations. By contrast, relatively little has been written on the end of the Cold War in the Third World: in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. How did the great transformation of the world in the late 1980s affect regional conflicts and client relationships? Who "won" and who "lost" in the Third World and why do so many Cold War-era problems remain unresolved? This book brings to light for the first time evidence from newly declassified archives in Russia, the United States, Eastern Europe, as well as from private collections, recent memoirs and interviews with key participants. It goes further than anything published so far in systematically explaining, both from the perspectives of the superpowers and the Third World countries, what the end of bipolarity meant not only for the underdeveloped periphery so long enmeshed in ideological, socio-political and military conflicts sponsored by Washington, Moscow or Beijing, but also for the broader patterns of international relations. This book will be of much interest to students of the Cold War, war and conflict studies, third world and development studies, international history, and IR in general.

The War for Africa

The War for Africa PDF

Author: Fred Bridgland

Publisher: Casemate Publishers

Published: 2017-06-19

Total Pages: 337

ISBN-13: 1612004938

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A “gripping” story of the Angolan Civil War and how it evolved into a Cold War struggle between superpowers (New York Journal of Books). Lasting over a quarter of a century, from 1975 to 2002, the Angolan Civil War began as a power struggle between two former liberation movements, the MPLA and UNITA—but became a Cold War struggle with involvement from the Soviet Union, Cuba, South Africa, and the United States. This book examines the height of the Cuban-South African fighting in Angola in 1987–88, when three thousand South African soldiers and about eight thousand UNITA guerrilla fighters fought in alliance against the Cubans and the armed forces of the Marxist MPLA government, a force of over fifty thousand men. Fred Bridgland pieced together the course of the war, fought in one of the world’s most remote and wild terrains, by interviewing the South Africans who fought it, and many of their stories are woven into the narrative. This classic account of a Cold War struggle and its momentous consequences for the participants and the continent now includes a new preface and epilogue. “Highlights just how much political and social considerations dictate the outcome of war . . . A highly detailed work of military history, The War for Africa can tell us a lot about the nature of counter-insurgency warfare and how small states can become contested battlegrounds between superpowers.” —New York Journal of Books