by Ian Smith
I sent a message to Vorster suggesting a meeting, in the hope that he was genuinely concerned over the dangerous situation in which he had landed us, and would have some constructive thoughts as to how to help. Arrangements were made and I travelled to Cape Town on 9 February. Vorster commiserated with us and reassured me that he was in communication with the British and Americans, urging them to get the Pretoria agreement back on the track. There was a new British Foreign Secretary, Dr David Owen and, Vorster said, the South Africans believed he was an improvement on his predecessor, the late Anthony Crosland. This was typical diplomacy and wishful thinking. I told him of the deteriorating confidence in Rhodesia, and in particular of the potential drain from our security forces. Accordingly, I said, it was my intention once again to commence working with our internal black leaders in the hope that we could make progress towards a settlement. Anything he could do, I said, to prevent outside interference, which in the past had always prejudiced our efforts, would be welcome. He indicated that he had got the message, and would do his best to convey it to the British and Americans. Because it would have been tactless and damaging to our cause, I refrained from mentioning that the South Africans were the main culprits in the affair!
When dealing with African politicians, infinite patience is a sine qua non. They go back for consultation, to the most basic level, time and time again. This is part of tribal culture and tradition, whereby the Chief never makes a major decision until he is satisfied that he is representing the views of his people — in keeping with the best traditions of democracy. The disadvant age is that a weak leader tends to become a follower, even an appeaser, and shirks the responsibility of convincing his people that while a tough decision may not be the most palatable at that time, it is in their long-term interests. I had numerous discussions with Muzorewa, Nkomo and Sithole, and we were making progress. I held meetings with Vorster and he was supportive of what we were doing. Then he and I met Owen, the new British Foreign Secretary, in Cape Town on 13 April. The meeting was reasonable, but it was difficult to tie Owen down to specifics — he was obviously keeping his options open, anticipating communication with his American counterpart, Cyrus Vance of the Carter administration.
In the middle of 1977, Vorster visited Europe and met US Vice-President Walter Mondale, who arrogantly attempted to bully Vorster into pressurising Rhodesia to accept conditions we had mutually agreed were unacceptable and would play into the hands of the communists. Fortunately, Vorster resented this attempt to intimidate him, and they parted company on a sour note, with a resultant increase in South African sympathy for Rhodesia, a clear bonus for us.
The new South African Foreign Minister, Pik Botha, who had left us with anything but a favourable impression at the Pretoria meeting with Kissinger, had received an invitation to London to meet Owen and Vance, and asked to see me en route on 4 August. Botha informed me that the South Africans were still disenchanted with American intentions as a result of Mondale’s offensive attitude to Vorster, and they considered Owen ineffective. Another factor assisting us was the attempt by America and Britain to pressurise South Africa into making additional concessions on South West Africa. The South Africans resented this interference in their internal affairs and the ill-advised Anglo-American incursion into the Rhodesian scene resulted in a beneficial ripple effect in our direction. Botha assured me that Vance and Owen were going to be on the receiving end of a positive message to distance themselves from South African affairs, about which they were dismally ignorant. He would be advising them to concentrate their energies on the Soviets’ dreadful record of injustice and violation of human rights, not only in their own country, but in many other parts of the world which they had subjugated. This was in keeping with sentiments which I had often expressed to Vorster, and accordingly received my strong approval. I requested that he use every opportunity to impress upon them my desire to abide by the Anglo-American agreement signed in Pretoria last year, which they were, apparently, attempting to derail. Did the British and Americans not accept that they were honour-bound to bring Nyerere and Kaunda and the others back to their commitment? I asked. Botha was in full agreement, and we parted on a happy note. My hope, as I noted at the time, was that the South Africans would not allow themselves to be enticed away by the perfidious tactics of British diplomacy — after all, they had fallen for these on a number of previous occasions.
Earlier in the year, twelve of my MPs had defected — and not surprisingly, they became known as the ‘Dirty Dozen’. They complained that government was not adhering to party principles and election promises, and they were not prepared to accept that we had been forced into this situation by the South African government. Moreover, they claimed, if the South African government were pressurising us, we should confront them publicly and South Africans would support us. They were conveniently overlooking, however, the fact that history proved clearly that no such thing would happen. The twelve were not thinking clearly. They were ruled by emotion rather than reality. The general consensus within the party was that we were well rid of them, for they were reactionaries attempting to put the clock back, and were thus a destabilising element within our organisation. They were not prepared to accept the party’s challenge to go back to their electorate for confirmation of their actions, but showed a preference for retaining their seats in Parliament and exercising power without responsibility. Not only were their views unlikely to promote racial harmony, but our public in general were concerned as to whether they would influence our government’s thinking. In order to ascertain where we stood with the electorate, I came to the reluctant decision to hold a general election. There was no doubt in my mind that Rhodesians would have no truck with the devious scheming of the twelve dissidents, but there was no other way of proving this point. A premature general election had a destabilising effect on a country and was a waste of taxpayers’ money, but the antics of these twelve MPs was contrary to our accepted philosophy and was prejudicing our efforts towards settlement. One way or other the air had to be cleared.
The election took place on 31 August, and as had happened in all previous elections, the Rhodesian Front won all their seats. The twelve defectors, and others who were persuaded to join their ranks, found themselves on the receiving end of a positive rebuke. Not only did the result give us the strong mandate we were seeking for our internal policy, but it was an important ingredient as far as our negotiations were concerned. In my eve of poll address I said: ‘A strong vote of support will be a message to the British and US governments that the Rhodesian nation is determined and united; while we are prepared to negotiate a fair and just settlement, we will not participate in any plan which will lead to our own destruction.’
The result was also, we hoped, a message to the South African government who, according to Harold Hawkins, had been opposed to our holding a general election because anything which detracted from their plan was frowned upon.
I had visited Pretoria on 27 August, concerning the South Africans’ latest initiative. They had made a plan for Owen and Andrew Young, the American Ambassador to the United Nations, to visit them that week, and Owen and Young had indicated their willingness to travel to Salisbury for discussions with me as soon as our election was over. Both Vorster and Pik Botha stressed that they had made it clear to the British and Americans that their approach had to be realistic, otherwise the South Africans would not support it — they had had enough of being pushed around by these outsiders. My reply was to the effect that I would abide by my often repeated comment that an honest, constructive attempt to assist would be welcome, but as the South Africans knew, we were making progress, albeit slow, with our internal settlement, and this kind of intervention by outsiders, as we knew from past history, far from assisting, had always set matters back. I resisted saying, as I would have done in normal circumstances, that it would have been preferable if Vorster had consulted us before making his plan. In the discussion which followed with my cabinet colleagues, it was clear t
hat the South Africans were using Rhodesia as a foil to distract the British and Americans from the South West Africa issue.
Owen and Young arrived at 8 a.m. on 1 September, the day after our election. There were brief discussions. Then, at the main meeting an hour later, Owen presented their proposals. These went beyond what we had been led to expect in making concessions to the terrorists, and the meeting was aggravated by Owen’s arrogant and ill-mannered attitude, and his attempt on a couple of occasions to mislead. When I tripped him up, Young was obviously upset and, on one occasion, expressed his concern to Owen that he had not been correctly informed. In my minute after the meeting I wrote:
Owen is one of these petty, little men trying to fill a job which is too big for him, using an arrogant posture in the hope that this will impress his audience. By contrast Young appeared sincere, with a sense of humour and a streak of humanity. On a couple of occasions when Owen was prating over past happenings, Young expressed the view that there was no point in crying over spilt milk, we should concentrate on looking forward. As Owen drawled on with his sanctimonious utterings, Young was obviously bored stiff, and at one stage when Owen declared that the deal he was offering was firm and could not be altered, Young interjected saying that he believed we should show reason and be prepared to talk and negotiate. By the end of the meeting we had shot so many holes through Owen’s plan that he looked like a punctured tyre with hair dishevelled and bleary eyes, finally conceding that we should set up a bipartisan committee to deal with the problem.
The most surprising, indeed alarming aspect of the whole episode, was that at a press conference that afternoon Owen presented a paper which went much further than he had indicated at our morning meeting, virtually handing over complete control of government and army to the terrorists. To add insult to injury, the paper which he presented obviously could not have been prepared following our morning meeting, which dragged on until lunchtime. In fact, the British conceded that it had been prepared and printed in Britain before their departure. All of our Rhodesians associated with the exercise were taken aback. Jack Gaylard, who attended the briefing and saw the paper, spoke to Owen and his secretary indicating the irregularity and warned of the consequences if my first information came through the communications media. Owen agreed to phone me and explain and apologise — I am still awaiting the phone call! Our people who were liaising with the British team were informed that Andrew Young, who had become increasingly disenchanted with Owen’s general behaviour and obvious unhelpfulness, had expressed strong disapproval at this latest flagrant breach of decent and accepted standards. From that moment on their relations became more strained, and the joint exercise terminated.
I travelled down to Pretoria to consult Vorster on 12 September, taking with me David Smith and Jack Gaylard. He informed me that Andrew Young had told him that the Rhodesian problem had been wrongly assessed because Nyerere, on his recent visit to the USA, had succeeded in pulling the wool over Carter’s eyes, and ‘that’s what we are landed with when he insists on poking his nose into affairs over which he is completely ignorant’.
I had been led to believe that the meeting was between Vorster and myself, to enable us to go over recent happenings and think about the future. I was wrong, because the two Bothas (P.W., the Minister of Defence, and Pik, the Minister of Foreign Affairs), and Chris Heunis, the Minister of Economic Affairs, were ushered in, and it was obvious from the outset that they were working to a pre-arranged plan. Normally at these meetings the persons participating are predetermined, with equal numbers on either side, but I had been confronted with this kind of situation on previous occasions, so it was not all that surprising. Harold Hawkins was the one most concerned and incensed, because he had made the arrangements with Brand Fourie, the Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and had not been given this information. Hawkins subsequently informed us that Fourie assured him that he also had been kept in the dark, and was most apologetic.
Vorster began by underlining the troubled times in which we were living, and the growing problems confronting all of us who lived in southern Africa. Then Pik Botha came in and spoke of the pressures that South Africa was being subjected to, even by their friends of the free world — foreign ministers, through constant repetition, can do this kind of thing in their sleep. Then it was P.W. Botha’s turn, and he simply spoke of the financial stringencies militating against their giving us additional assistance in the defence field. As on previous occasions, I felt he was a reluctant participant in what he was doing. Then Heunis, in his turn, talked about the oil embargo and the sanctions which could delay the completion of SASOL II, the second oil-from-coal plant. They needed about another two years and so must buy time, Heunis said.
A number of salient points immediately came to my mind, but I held myself in check as I had been warned by our finance ministry that they were in the middle of negotiating a loan. It had been three years previously, in October 1974, that Vorster had appealed to us to assist in his détente exercise, on the argument that they needed two more years before they would be self-sufficient. By contrast I could not help but think of the occasions recently when Vorster had told me that they no longer had any friends in the world, even the free world! Hence his new tactic of trying to convince his party of the need for South Africa to move away from their apartheid philosophy. The South African electorate, however, were being kept in the dark.
Once Heunis completed his talk, the next part of the orchestrated performance came into play. A secretary entered and handed a letter to Pik Botha, which he duly opened and read: a message from their Washington office, warning of the dire consequences if we did not succeed in bringing peace to our region. There was a small slip-up in the short discussion which followed, when Vorster referred to part of the message which Botha had omitted to read. It was obvious that they had already seen this message which had ‘suddenly’ arrived from Washington!
Vorster then solemnly made the main point, which appeared to be the reason for calling the meeting: he had to tell me that after serious and deep consideration the South African government had come to the conclusion, reluctantly, that Rhodesia had to accept a majority of black faces, not only in the Parliament, but also in the cabinet. He then paused and looked, as did the others, awaiting the impact of this thunderbolt upon me. My answer was simple and to the point: we had accepted that condition as part of the Anglo–American agreement, here in Pretoria last year, to which Vorster was also party, indeed a guarantor. Could he report any progress on its implementation? I added.
There was a deathly silence — and then Vorster replied that, regrettably, as we knew, the British and Americans had backed away from that under pressure from the OAU, and accordingly South Africa was supporting us in our efforts to bring about an internal settlement. I reminded them that we were in the midst of this exercise and that over the last couple of years our efforts had been bedevilled by outside interference, which had distracted the black leaders from the negotiating table. If it had not been for the fact that I was hamstrung because of their control of our lifeline, and their sensitivity to alternative suggestions, I could have quoted chapter and verse to prove that South Africa was the main culprit in this.
Vorster then said that the message he wished to pass on to me was that the South African government detected growing pressure from the rest of the world for Rhodesia to settle its problem, and that in these circumstances it was becoming more and more difficult for South Africa to go on supporting us. I could only repeat that we had settled the problem with the agreement made in Pretoria last year — why did he not throw that back in their faces? Were we not in danger of falling into the trap of joining Carter and Wilson in their appeasement of the communists? Did he recall telling me a couple of years ago on his return from a visit to Europe that it had been made clear to him that apartheid was the greatest evil in the world, even worse than communism, and South Africa had to face up to that? Did he believe this situation had changed? He replied: ‘One has to deal w
ith problems in life as they present themselves, and at this stage Rhodesia is the problem confronting us.’
He gave me an excellent opening to say: ‘Let me repeat what I have told you on a number of occasions, that the communists are experts at exploiting the domino principle, and if they succeed in eliminating Rhodesia, then the road will be clear for the next objective, which is RSA. However, rightly or wrongly we have embarked on a course for Rhodesia, and I do not see any way back. Our main concern is to succeed in making a plan with the moderate and responsible black people in our country, and thus avoid a communist takeover. And from our previous contacts with the South African government I believed they supported us in what we were doing. Do you wish us to change this direction?’
‘No,’ replied Vorster. They would continue to support us, but it was important for us to communicate like this, and the South Africans wished to apprise us of the seriousness of the situation, and the need for urgency.
As I made my note of the meeting on the flight back to Salisbury I felt, not for the first time, a surge of sadness at the insincerity of the whole thing. A lack of trust had grown between our two countries, where previously there had been understanding and a sense of mutual interests in the need to draw a line against the encroachment of communism down the African continent. Was it still our endeavour to preserve the Western civilisation which had been established in our part of the world? Added to that was the frustration at our impotence to stand up to the South Africans when they were pressurising us on to a course we knew was wrong, and at how easy it was for them. No one else in the world knew what was going on, not even the South African public, when supplies simply did not arrive.
