The ZIPRA Invasion of Rhodesia, 1979...

MacCaulay

Banned
...from The Rhodesian War: A Military History by Paul L. Moorcraft and Peter McLaughlin:

ZIPRA was vitiated by a long-standing debate on military strategy. It was not a sudden Moscow diktat wich created the most secret ZIPRA plan: Operation Zero Hour. This envisaged a co-ordinated general offensive on several fronts simultaneously. Five regular battalions with artillery support were to seize bridgeheads in the northern front at Kenyemba, Chirundu and Kariba to enable ZIPRA troops to cross with armour and artillery. At the same time attacks were to be mounted on the airfields at Kariba, Victoria Falls and Wankie, which would be secured to enable the transfer of ZIPRA MiGs from Angola. The principal objective was to enable regular troops to seize and hold the strategic rear bases along the border in support of the offensive to be launched from within Rhodesia.

As the offensive moved in-country, guerilla units already in place would sabotage transport links to undermine the Rhodesian counter-offensive, which would be further slowed by urban warfare. Zero Hour was planned for the start of the 1979 rainy season, October or November. Far from encouraging this plan, the Soviets refused to release ZIPRA pilots in training in the USSR. Rhodesian raids on the army being assembled on the Zambian border delayed Zero Hour, which was ultimately aborted by the Lancaster House talks.
So...let's suppose that internal Rhodesian or external South African political pressure (as it had before) puts Ian Smith in a position where he doesn't let the SAS or RLI raid the army forming on the border, though the military is aware they're there.

October 1979, ZIPRA invades Rhodesia. What happens?

(I've got my own opinion, but before I voice it I'll throw it open to the floor)
 
October 1979.... if I'm not high on some thing, Rhodesia is gone, its Zimbabwe Rhodesia with Bishop Abel Muzorewa as Prime Minster, Ian Smith is a minister without portfolio.
 

MacCaulay

Banned
October 1979.... if I'm not high on some thing, Rhodesia is gone, its Zimbabwe Rhodesia with Bishop Abel Muzorewa as Prime Minster, Ian Smith is a minister without portfolio.

Well, it says it was planned for the start of the rainy season. "October or November." I do believe you might be right, though.
 
Black Angel is correct, but assume this goes ahead anyways.

The ZIPRA forces and the Rhodesians would be at each others' throats immediately, starting with the RhAF fighting with the MiGs. The Rhodesians would get SADF help - bank on it - because a Soviet-backed government with a halfway potent military on South Africa's northern border is a direct and obvious threat, in Pretoria's mind.
 
This would be rather interesting - I've often wondered what would happen if ZIPRA used its regular forces in this way.

I really don't see how the Rhodesians would be able to deal with this easily without help, or whether that help could come soon enough. They did not have a lot of heavy equipment, their forces were COIN focused and their bases were reasonably exposed. So if ZIPRA managed to pull off even half of what they planned, that would be a pretty heavy body blow to Rhodesia's already stretched forces.

What would happen next I wonder. Would a SA intervention be able to push ZIPRA out? What would be happening out east with ZANLA? All of Rhodesia's forces, right down to the territorial level would need to be used against ZIPRA, but ZANLA would not just lie back and wait. It could even end up in a brutal land grab between the two
 
err you are trying to make out that ZIPRA could have mounted a successful coordinated invasion? Any idea how poor their command and control was? Their technical ability to coordinate their actions and operations and the levels of tehnical ability needed to maintain a mechanised force-a war is won by superior logistics? ZIPRA would have lost-badly. There would have been pre-emptive actions cutting bridges, communications and troop build ups by the RhAF and SAS. RLI would have been launched in lightning disruptive actions further seeding confusion. Selos Scouts would infiltrate front line ZIPRA units and start dissension. And whats ZANLA up to in all this????
 
They would not need to be super effective to cause trouble. Rhodesia's armed forces are so stretched already that even a series of botched big attacks on border settlements and bases would be enough to challenge their ability to keep it together elsewhere.

Then there is the general point that the Rhodesian state was already badly stretched as well - emigration was high, debt was high etc. Large areas of the country were out of the effective control of the state and in the control of the guerilla forces. So a large scale conventional attack against towns or bases could be the straw that broke the camel's back, so far as the white/urban population is concerned
 
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MacCaulay

Banned
err you are trying to make out that ZIPRA could have mounted a successful coordinated invasion? Any idea how poor their command and control was?

Quite to the contrary, ZIPRA was showing immense patience in it's training: they were willing to wait for the long haul and switched over from the "commando" to "guerilla" style of war in the late-60s/early-70s before ZANU wanted to admit that it wasn't working.

Their technical ability to coordinate their actions and operations and the levels of tehnical ability needed to maintain a mechanised force-a war is won by superior logistics? ZIPRA would have lost-badly. There would have been pre-emptive actions cutting bridges, communications and troop build ups by the RhAF and SAS.

Kind of like I pointed out there was in OTL? ;)

And if you'll notice, it's not like Rhodesia had the political capital to launch raids all the time. Around political summits, they were sometimes put in odd constraints by South African or Western politicians.



That being said, I more or less agree with your thesis. My first thought when I read it was "So ZANLA wanted the Tet Offensive in 1979...that's a story I could write." It really sounded like they wanted to mobilize their entire machine, conventional and guerilla, and run it right into a Rhodesian wall to see if they could crack it.
 
I think any invasion like this, botched or otherwise would have a massive impact on the morale of the White population - now they, not just the farmers and outlying villages/small settlements would potentially be at risk.
 

MacCaulay

Banned
I think any invasion like this, botched or otherwise would have a massive impact on the morale of the White population - now they, not just the farmers and outlying villages/small settlements would potentially be at risk.

The entire country had been feeling the strain since the mid-70s: taxes had been going up, if you were under 30 you could expect to spend half the year in the bush fighting guerillas. By 1978, they'd even done a call up of men over 40.

In Salisbury (in 1978, I think) several guerillas actually rocketed the main oil terminal and set in fire for four days, which really brought the whole thing home to the cities. But the Rhodesian SWAT team had been fielded in the early '70s and was incredibly active.

One thing the oil terminal fire brought up in the book was that the Rhodesians really got slammed by the oil embargo: the Rhodesian economy actually posted annual growths of 4 percent or more until the oil embargo got imposed in the mid-70s. Then the price nearly quadrupled in the country. It's logical: what happened in America happened in Rhodesia, but worse because the country didn't really have a massive amount of financial reserves.
 
SA gets involved. What happens after that depends on how aggressively Botha wants to teach ZIPRA a lesson. But for the most part, ZIPRA gets its butt handed to it by SADF.
 
SA gets involved. What happens after that depends on how aggressively Botha wants to teach ZIPRA a lesson. But for the most part, ZIPRA gets its butt handed to it by SADF.

SA would get involved, but they would be providing support, not doing the fighting themselves. The SADF was pushing itself keeping up its fight in Angola, and the Rhodesians, given help from SA, could bust back the ZIPRA forces. If Botha wants to make a point, he'd send a bunch of supplies to the Rhodesians, particularly big-gunned armored cars like Elands, as well as plenty of diesel fuel and ammunition. There would be no talks with either ZANLA or ZIPRA, regardless of what the British wish for the situation - and they wouldn't blame the Rhodesians in those circumstances.

ZIPRA's nightmare - hell, the nightmare of all the Soviet allies in Africa, as well as the anti-apartheid forces - is that the full-scale invasion convinces white South Africans that no surrender is acceptable, no negotiations are going to fix it, hold on or die trying, in which case the Rhodesians would probably first shove the ZIPRA forces out, then plaster Zambia's armed forces with raids and attacks. If this goes into the heads of Botha and Smith and the whites of South Africa and Rhodesia, you can kiss the chances of a peaceful ending to apartheid goodbye, and one could see, considering Zambia's state in 1979-80, the Rhodesians making that a full-scale invasion, with the goal of completely eliminating the Zambian threat, and they would likely roll right over the Zambian armed forces. The Soviets won't directly intervene in that part of the world on any bet. The Cubans, sure, but where the Cubans show up the SADF follows, and if the Rhodesians do their worst and take over Zambia, with its copperbelt, they add a tool to their economic arsenal, and one could see Rhodesian coal mines send their coal to the synthetic crude plants at Secunda and Vereeniging, or even building a steel plant and then making their own armaments.

In short - nothing good would come of it, the worst potential is an absolute nightmare for the anti-apartheid forces.
 
With the possible exception of the Cubans (who weren't African), all of the African Soviet/Chinese satellite forces were a complete and utter joke. Look at the casualty ratios of Rhodesian/SADF forces compared to virtually any of their opponents.

The African bush fighters, in all of their endeavors against white minority-rule southern Africa, managed to make the Arab states look positively triumphant vs. Israel.
 

NothingNow

Banned
I'm seeing Cuito Canavale played out in reverse here, with the SADF and Cubans swapping positions and roles to some extent. The thing is, no matter how much aid South Africa gives, ZIPRA and the Cubans will win eventually.

Maybe Castro might get some credit as one of the Fathers of the modern Southern Africa this time. Either way, with ZIPRA in power, I don't see things getting as bad as they got IOTL.
 
To agree with everyone else here, in the short term the Rhodesians are going smash ZIPRA (the degree dependent on how much the SADF aid them) but white emigration and the Rhodesian financial crisis is only going to get worse, meaning that by the 1981 at the latest you see a change, however its won't be the reasonably orderly one of OTL.
Its going to be like Angola with the white population simply getting on planes overnight that means Zimbabwe is going to collapse much faster than OTL.
As to South Africa its might push the National Party to hold on for a bit longer but the end of the Cold War was the death knell. They could no longer claim they were holding back the Communist Tide and with that went a lot of the white populations motivation to bear the burden of apartheid.
 

NothingNow

Banned
To agree with everyone else here, in the short term the Rhodesians are going smash ZIPRA (the degree dependent on how much the SADF aid them) but white emigration and the Rhodesian financial crisis is only going to get worse, meaning that by the 1981 at the latest you see a change, however its won't be the reasonably orderly one of OTL.
Its going to be like Angola with the white population simply getting on planes overnight that means Zimbabwe is going to collapse much faster than OTL.
Actually, they really didn't have the resources to fight ZIPRA in a stand up war. Especially considering how heavily oriented the Rhodies were towards COIN operations instead of conventional warfare. IIRC ZIPRA actually had an armored force several times larger than that of the Rhodesians.

If anything happens, The South Africans and Cubans are getting involved. However, the question arises, Can the South Africans afford having a two front war at this point? The Cubans most certainly can, but that comes with the USSR giving you pretty much a blank check with these sorts of things.

Funnily enough, Cuba's got just the man for the job in General Arnaldo Ochoa, and a few units that could be quickly routed to the area. Admittedly, they're in need of rest after their deployment in the Ogaden war, but they're still some of the best troops on the continent at the moment.

Depending on how long this gets drawn out, we might see The Soviets (openly) and NATO (more clandestinely, probably through Israel,) send new equipment for testing. Seeing SADF Oilfants, Cheiftains and Pattons fighting Cuban and ZIPRA T-72s sort of gives me this childlike sense of glee.

The War in Angola certainly will be very different from IOTL.
 

MacCaulay

Banned
Actually, they really didn't have the resources to fight ZIPRA in a stand up war. Especially considering how heavily oriented the Rhodies were towards COIN operations instead of conventional warfare. IIRC ZIPRA actually had an armored force several times larger than that of the Rhodesians.


Oddly enough, according to The Rhodesian War: A Military History by Moorcraft, there is a bit of historical precedence that we can use to glean some information about this.
The Rhodesian Armoured Car Regiment seems to have been able to hand out amazing damage to enemy armour in battles like New Chimoio, where they took on Mozambican T-34/85s and T-55s. The SAS and Selous Scouts made an attack on the main ZANLA camp, and in so doing actually ran across a larger issue than they thought. It took them three days to destroy it in a battle that was very conventional, with airstrikes, AAA, infantry attacks, etc. This gave the Mozambican Army time to move armour in and attempt to push the Rhodesians out, which didn't work.

Apparently the Rhodesians responded with Elands (they didn't have the T-55s at this point, and they were never used in combat anyway) and managed to rout the armour that was deployed against them while their infantry and air force rooted out the defenses on the hill.

If anything happens, The South Africans and Cubans are getting involved. However, the question arises, Can the South Africans afford having a two front war at this point? The Cubans most certainly can, but that comes with the USSR giving you pretty much a blank check with these sorts of things.
I know that they had at least 7,000 men from the Recces, Police Forces, and random helicopter crews for the Alouettes in Rhodesia at any one time. Near the end, in 1980, they even had a battalion-sized battlegroup ready to move into Zimbabwe if something bad happened and a pro-Soviet government popped up in Harare.

Funnily enough, Cuba's got just the man for the job in General Arnaldo Ochoa, and a few units that could be quickly routed to the area. Admittedly, they're in need of rest after their deployment in the Ogaden war, but they're still some of the best troops on the continent at the moment.
That guy fucking ROCKS.

Depending on how long this gets drawn out, we might see The Soviets (openly) and NATO (more clandestinely, probably through Israel,) send new equipment for testing. Seeing SADF Oilfants, Cheiftains and Pattons fighting Cuban and ZIPRA T-72s sort of gives me this childlike sense of glee.

The War in Angola certainly will be very different from IOTL.
Marius is beta reading it right now, but in a couple of weeks I'm going to start posting The Soviet Invasion of Africa, 1987.
 
I guess I still don't see this being good for Rhodesia in anyway. One reason for this and I admittedly may be a little off base here, is that I see 1970s Rhodesia as essentially being two systems. The first being the white settler nation state, the second being the black nations. The two intersect at many points and the former controls the latter, but the the former is so small compared to the latter that its impact or penetration of the latter is necessarily shallow outside of the urban areas.

The settler nation being a collection of small urban communities with a couple of big towns, not cities. The larger urban areas being 1-50k in size (white population, as opposed to total, and admittedly I may be wrong so far as Salisbury is concerned), so very much like the rural NZ I grew up in. This is very different from W Europe* and maybe even the US. The population being very low and scattered.

On this assumption, I think that any kind of large formal action against the main settlements, even if ultimately unsuccessful would lead to a crisis of confidence that might lead to a mass exodus (as said by Aracanid). The population being as it is, even if 1/3 (as an example) leave we see a massive diminution of the population and therefore the nation state's ability to function. If you have a rural township of a thousand people and even a third leave the economic basis of that settlement fundamentally changes, almost to the point of viability (I have plenty of examples of such in my home area in NZ). If that happens over a very short period, so much more so


*Where one can travel in any direction and come across many large urban settlements. England for example is full of towns or cities of 30-200k size, each with their own often very long histories that have no profile outside of those who live near them, or in them. By comparison it is very rare to meet a NZer who cannot roughly identify most of the urban settlements over 10k, even if they've never been to them, or anywhere close.
 
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