The Sunday News
Pathisa Nyathi
THE year 1979 was critical in Zapu’s programme of action in so far as the liberation movement’s agenda for the liberation of Zimbabwe was concerned. As far back as 1976 the Turning Point Strategy (TPS) had been conceived, nurtured and developed in the intervening years.
Appropriate measures had been taken to transform the guerrilla war into a regular one. Appropriate training in various military fields was initiated both on the African continent itself and friendly overseas countries.
As far back as 1977 Zapu started sending large numbers of recruits to Boma and Luso in Angola, a former Portuguese colony which, together with Mozambique, had gained political independence two years earlier, in 1975. More cadres undertook training in Libya, Ethiopia and Zambia among other countries on the African continent. The main thrust was training of personnel that was going to transform guerrilla-trained cadres to become members of a regular army which, it was envisaged, was going to dislodge the Rhodesian Security Forces (RSF) who had the upper hand on account of their recourse to conventional war strategies and combat tactics.
We saw in an earlier article that there were cadres that undertook training in military intelligence and also doubled up as political commissars who undertook training in Dresden in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). It was these specially tasked cadres who were infiltrated into Rhodesia to link up with guerrillas operating within the country’s operational areas with a view to raise their morale and prepare them for transformation into regular army personnel.
In this article we shall trace military training for similar purposes in the Soviet Union. That specialised military training was to avail cadres with requisite knowledge and skills whose task it was to transform already trained guerrillas into a regular army. As pointed out, their counterparts visited guerrillas inside Rhodesia on the same mission. Some of these specially trained cadres were to undertake the transformative mission within Zambia where more guerrillas were to be similarly transformed. These were to beef up the burgeoning numbers of conventionally trained personnel from Angola and Zambia in particular.
The one group that was earmarked for this transformative role flew from Lusaka in February 1977. Some of the members of the unit which was bound for the Soviet Union had already undertaken military training in Zambia. Now they were set to do specialised training in readiness for the implementation of the Turning Point Strategy which had been scheduled for execution in December 1979. From Lusaka the contingent flew via Canada, Addis Ababa, Budapest and finally flew Moscow in the Soviet Union.
From Moscow they took a connecting flight to the city of Simferopol where they attended the Simferopol Military Academy. The weather in Ukraine where Simferopol was located was extremely cold. It was very harsh to the people coming out of Africa where light clothes were the typical attire given the welcoming African climate. However, the Soviets were aware of the plight of the new arrivals from Africa. In about 5 hours they were provided with warm overcoats that were suited to the harsh climate.
The Simferopol Military Academy hosted cadres from several movements/countries: Mozambique, Angola, the South African ANC, SWAPO of Namibia, Lebanon, Guinea Bissau, the PLO and Zapu. The Military Academy provided specialised training in various fields. In addition to one’s area of specialisation there were common subjects that all cadres had to do: Russian Language, Political Education which gave emphasis to Marxist Communist Philosophy, guerrilla warfare administration, first aid, Combined all-arms combat (conventional), communication, motorised and mechanised fighting units, military engineering, military intelligence and unarmed combat.
The language of instruction was Russian. As a result, during instruction, instructors had to have at all times, interpreters. It turned out that instructors and interpreters were members of the KGB (Committee of State Security), the security organ of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). The daily programme of training was packed, starting at 5.30 am every day with some road run. After that recruits took a bath which was followed by breakfast. Next came a session of political information during which news of the day was analysed and interpreted. Formal classes then commenced and lasted till lunch time after which came some siesta.
There were more classes in the afternoon lasting till supper time. At 7.00 pm there was the second session of political information which also included news analysis and interpretation. From 8.00 pm there were classes which took learners to the end of day, save when the class undertook some field trips in which case the day’s activities ended at midnight. The course included several excursions to several parts of the Republic.
The last two weeks of the course were spent at Odessa, a sea port on the shores of the Black Sea. There the recruits were exposed to practical lessons, in particular battle assimilation(manoeuvres). The rigorous training ended with a pass out parade which was attended by the Party Representative in Moscow. Tshinga Embassy Dube had been the Party Representative in Moscow and only went back to Lusaka as Chief of Communications in 1978 following the death of Zvafa Moyo during Rhodesian Security Forces’ cross-border raids on Freedom Camp (FC) and other Zapu/ZPRA camps in October 1978.
The 1978 cross-border raids led to the relocation of numerous Zapu/ZPRA facilities to the north west in the hope Rhodesians would not take their nefarious activities that far.
They did, especially in the period following the commencement of the Lancaster House Talks in London in the month of September 1979 after Zapu had scheduled December 1979 as the time for the implementation of the Turning Point Strategy. Both Zapu/ZPRA and the Soviet Union were engaged in the final push. Some units from the conventional brigades had already been infiltrated into Rhodesia. The one case in point is the unit led by Smile Madubeko Moyo which went to Tsholotsho and finally got to Madlambudzi where Assembly Point Lima was established.
The Lancaster House Talks had been, by that time, successfully concluded and a ceasefire effected in December 1979. The Turning Point Strategy had been overtaken by events. The Soviets had been thwarted in the hot cold war which pitted the West versus the East in the cut throat competition which was about accessing vast economic resources, markets and political influence in the geopolitically important southern African region.
However, in the next installation we shall look at goings on in the north western region of Zambia, Solwezi, where the 1978 raids saw more Zapu/ZPRA facilities relocating to. The contingent of cadres trained at Simferopol, some of them at least, were deployed in that region where a lot of intrigue was taking place, all initiated by Rhodesians and their accomplices to create confusion within ZPRA forces with the aim of applying brakes to the pace that the war was gathering and, more importantly to ensure the Soviets would not emerge the winners if Zapu/ZPRA’s Turning Point Strategy saw light of day.
