AHC: Portuguese East Africa pulls a Rhodesia...

[Shurik]

Not sure of the earlier population percentages, but in 1970, there were 300,000 Portuguese living in Mozambique / Portuguese East Africa making up a bit over three and a half percent of the population. Portuguese Angola was even higher, with 400,000 “Europeans” living there as opposed to 5.9m Africans (over six and a half percent).

For comparison, Rhodesian never had more than a 5% White population, and South Africa topped out at 16% early in the 20th century.
(going off Wiki here...)

For the record, I do NOT advocate minority rule as it existed in Southern Africa, and especially the racially based and segregated systems as they existed. That both these policies fell was a good thing. Rather I am interested in this for the same reasons people are interested in victorious Nazi scenarios: purely from a theoretical viewpoint.

However, I was thinking the other day that one of the primary reasons the apartheid states of Rhodesia and South Africa gave up those policies was due to outside influences (Soviet assistance in Rhodesia, and the collapse thereof for South Africa).

And so I began wondering: what if the Soviet Union hadn't been able to gain the political foothold it did OTL in Angola and Mozambique: vastly relieving the (regional) political and military pressure on Rhodesia and South Africa (including Namibia at this point)?
If Angola and Mozambique hadn't fallen to Soviet influence, instead retaining a White Minority rule style govt... might there have been enough of a “critial mass” of apartheid states in southern Africa for them to continue until the present despite international condemnation?

Therefore, in addition to the question above, the challenge is to have Angola and/or Mozambique pull a Rhodesia and attempt to go it alone as a(n) apartheid state(s) with a POD no earlier than 1961.
A lot happened in '61, (the Bhotelho Moniz Coup, the Santa Maria Hijacking and the US backed UPA initiating guerrilla warfare out of Congo-Leopoldville to name some of the bigger events) hence I thought it a good place to start.

One major hurdle to overcome is the very different status of Angolan and Mozambique within the Portuguese sphere as a de-jure part of Portugal itself, rather than colonial status as Rhodesia had under the British.

Obrigado!

 

[Dunois]

The idea is nice and there is some definite potential. Nevertheless the nature of the white populations in Rhodesia and Mozambique/Angola was vastly different.

A significant proportion of the white Rhodesian population, was born in Rhodesia and could trace back its ancestry down a few generations of white Rhodesians. By comparison, this had never been the case in Angola and Mozambique to the same extent. The white populations before the 1930s were negligible percentage wise then, in absolute numbers it only started expanding from the 1950s and especially 1960s onwards.

There were also a lot more farmers and planters in Rhodesia compared to Angola and Mozambique were the bulk of the Portuguese population was concentrated in large cities like Lurenço Marques, Luanda, Beira or Benguela. You need a lot more farmers/planters who stand to lose a lot more if indepence happens for a UDI to happen. Even better if these have a good chunk of political power in their own hands as well.

 

[Paul V McNutt]

In Rhodesia, a parliament elected by white voters declared independence.I assume there were no elected officials in the Portugese colonies. So the White minority had no voice.

 

[Shurik]

Granted, and you bring up a good point: the vast majority of Portugese in these areas were first generation "African".
On the other hand, they also have the authoritarian dictatorship back in Lisbon (Estado Novo) regime to try and break away from. But then again, they remain very economically reliant on Portugal...
But they were leaving Portugal for a reason...

Hence the challance.

EDIT...

In Rhodesia, a parliament elected by white voters declared independence.I assume there were no elected officials in the Portugese colonies. So the White minority had no voice.

Correct. Ang and Moz were considered integral to Portugal, hence they were governed from Lisbon as the rest of the country was. In saying they "pull a Rhodesia", I suppose the analogy isn't entirely correct. It would more closely be related to a Civil War or Cecession(sp)...
But the point being that they break away from Lisbon based rule in favor of self governance (via what ever means).

 

[azander12]

Maybe the leftist military government of the Carnation Revolution goes authoritarian and attempts to violently purge Portugal and the colonies of any Estado Novo officials and sympathizers. These sympathizers manage to take control of Angola, and set up a Portuguese 'government-in-exile" in the colony, recognized by the West as the legitimate regime of Portugal. They might get significant support from the West in fighting rebels and Communists, and could remain in power for quite a while (if they had South African and American support).

 

[Dunois]

Maybe the leftist military government of the Carnation Revolution goes authoritarian and attempts to violently purge Portugal and the colonies of any Estado Novo officials and sympathizers. These sympathizers manage to take control of Angola, and set up a Portuguese 'government-in-exile" in the colony, recognized by the West as the legitimate regime of Portugal. They might get significant support from the West in fighting rebels and Communists, and could remain in power for quite a while (if they had South African and American support).

This is actually a very interesting scenario and I believe that something like this does happens in one of the board TL, I have a feeling it may be fight and be right by EdT. Just replace the Estado Novo by the Royalists and the Revolutionaries by the Republicans.

If half the Portuguese living in Mozambique relocate to Angola and say a few hundred thousands of Portuguese from the mainland are forced to flee. This Portugal-Angola could end up with a white population of around one milion. More if they manage to take the Azores and Madeira with them.

Eventually though, the gargantuan task of integrating the African population into the political and economic life of Portugal-Angola will have to begin. At the very least in the coutryside since a prosperous black peasant class would do wonders in stabilising the country and quelling the independence movement. If the Portugueses are bright they might even co-opt some of the more moderate anti communist rebel leaders into joining up with them.

 

[azander12]

This is actually a very interesting scenario and I believe that something like this does happens in one of the board TL, I have a feeling it may be fight and be right by EdT. Just replace the Estado Novo by the Royalists and the Revolutionaries by the Republicans.

If half the Portuguese living in Mozambique relocate to Angola and say a few hundred thousands of Portuguese from the mainland are forced to flee. This Portugal-Angola could end up with a white population of around one milion. More if they manage to take the Azores and Madeira with them.

Eventually though, the gargantuan task of integrating the African population into the political and economic life of Portugal-Angola will have to begin. At the very least in the coutryside since a prosperous black peasant class would do wonders in stabilising the country and quelling the independence movement. If the Portugueses are bright they might even co-opt some of the more moderate anti communist rebel leaders into joining up with them.

That would extremely interesting. Imagine an anti-Communist coalition, maybe with some form of neo-Integralist fascism at its ideological core. Qualifications to vote might include literacy in Portuguese, which would put prosperous black peasants and many urban dwellers on the voting roles, while still keeping whites as a near-majority and dominant class. Portugal-Angola might also attract some immigrants, maybe people fleeing the Dirty Wars in South America (especially Brazil).

 

[Imperatore]

Maybe the leftist military government of the Carnation Revolution goes authoritarian and attempts to violently purge Portugal and the colonies of any Estado Novo officials and sympathizers. These sympathizers manage to take control of Angola, and set up a Portuguese 'government-in-exile" in the colony, recognized by the West as the legitimate regime of Portugal. They might get significant support from the West in fighting rebels and Communists, and could remain in power for quite a while (if they had South African and American support).

But many in the MFA (the organization of the armed forces that did the coup d'etat), did try to go authoritarian, install a soviet like regime, such as Vasco Gonçalves.
The problem is that one needs to butterfly the democratic opposition inside the MFA, and from the main parties such as PS and PSD (at the time it was PPD).
Because the main opposition to such authoritarian leftist force were never the officials of the prior regime, they never constituted a big enough force. The period of PREC (1974-76) is mainly a fight between a authoritarian left line and a democratic one.

The attempts of general Spinola never had any major impact, and one can argue that he wasn't realy in line with the regime in its last years.
For that to happen you need to get a way of having a force of loyalists to the olf regime, that could be a force to reckon with. You need Marcelo Caetano to ensure loyalty in the armed forces, so that a situation like the hot summer of 75 does ends up in a war, but between revolutionaries and people of the establishment, that could force Caetano to flee to Angola (though his priorities would always be Azores, and then maybe Brazil).
And to set up a government in Angola that functioned like the rule of minority one still has the problem of the ongoing inssurection. The situation would be weird. Basiclly there had been a coup, because the army was dissatisfied with the ongoing fight against guerrillas in the overseas provinces, Portugal is no longer safe due to the revolutionaries, and the government flees to the source of the problem, and establishes a government there without the full support of the men that were trying to control the guerrillas and just made a coup.

Maybe I'm too stuck to a dogmatic vision of history, but i find it very hard for that to happen. The Soviet Union and continental China were still supporting the groups. And there were few with the capacity to install such regimes. Kauzla de Arriaga maybe, but he was in Mozambique.

 

[Arachnid]

Maybe have a different policy under the dictatorship so that Angola and Mozambique are never integrated into Portugal but are normal Colonies with appointed Governors responsible to Lisbon. Then when the Carnation Revolution comes the Governor decides to stop listening to Lisbon.

 

[Alien and Sedition Bat]

The only way any of this could work would be by the Europeans in Angola setting up a kind of city-state that functions as the Hong Kong for a black majority country, and, unlike Hong Kong, has an army strong enough to prevail over its neighbor in spite of the disparity in population. It wouldn't work if they had within their borders a huge exploited black population without rights. Or if they relied on black "guest workers" to do the working while they, the whites, sat around. If the Portuguese in Mozambique moved to Angola then there might be a population critical mass. I doubt the Portuguese would have been capable of this unless you plant a POD way, way back in their history.

 

[azander12]

The only way any of this could work would be by the Europeans in Angola setting up a kind of city-state that functions as the Hong Kong for a black majority country, and, unlike Hong Kong, has an army strong enough to prevail over its neighbor in spite of the disparity in population. It wouldn't work if they had within their borders a huge exploited black population without rights. Or if they relied on black "guest workers" to do the working while they, the whites, sat around. If the Portuguese in Mozambique moved to Angola then there might be a population critical mass. I doubt the Portuguese would have been capable of this unless you plant a POD way, way back in their history.

If the Mozambican Portuguese had moved to Angola, they would be close to having a million people, which would be... maybe 10% of the population? That, combined with encouraging non-African immigration and integrating prosperous, anti-Communist blacks into the ruling structure (allowing them to serve in the military in ranks as high as NCOs, allowing them limited membership in the ruling political establishment and bureaucracy), with the eventual promise of full equality, and they would have been able to hold on. Once oil in Cabinda is discovered, their economy will boom. The Americans will support them as anti-Communists, and they will find very close allies in South Africa and Rhodesia, as well as in the Latin American military juntas of the time.

 

[Shurik]

Ok, based on what I'm hearing, let me try this scenario:

Rather than all Portuguese colonies being given provincial status in '51, they're given something halfway there: with a colonial style local government, but for economic and other purposes, they enjoy the same benefits as a province of Portugal proper.

Next, let's say word of Robert Holden's staging in Congo-Leopold somehow leaks out, and Portuguese troops somehow manage to either conduct a cross-border first strike, or at least are better prepared and Holden is killed. With stronger local leadership (resultant from the quasi-colonial/provincial status), authorities wake up to the upcoming storm, are able to prepare; leading to the war not going quite so badly for the military up into the '70's.

The Carnation Revolution kicks off per OTL, but with the military not having gotten quite so beat-up in the Colonial War more officers are loyal to the Estado Regime. This way, things still go the way of OTL, but rather than being simply wiped out, the Estado regime is able to beat a retreat to Angola.

In Mozambique, they go independent, while Angola refuses to and is propped up by the evacuated loyalists who fled Portugal in addition to having a quasi-independent government in place already.
Portuguese in Mozambique flee to Angola rather than Portugal as its much closer, and from their point of view (big chunk of the military deployed to Africa), stand well ready to re-take Lisbon. Of course, this wouldn't happen, but hey: perceptions and all...

So, we have perhaps half the military (those deployed to Mozambique and Angola plus loyalist elements), the vast bulk of the Portuguese Mozambique population, and the bulk of the Estado regime now located in Angola.

With a govt on the ground well aware of the racial issues, the Estado regime (in exile) sees the light, and a gradual de-facto-ing of the de-jure rights allotted to the Black population begins.

With a large concentrating of military forces in Angola, dramatic increasing of the Portuguese population, and easing of conditions for the Black population, the rebellions begin to suffer from decreased popular support...

Through the gradual relaxing of the African's situation, and an increasingly moderate government relations with South Africa improve further, as well as with Rhodesia...

Oil in Angola sees them able to draw in foreign currency despite international sanctions (as is happening with Iran) resulting in a far more stable economic situation.

South Africa never gets drawing into the border war: retaining (relatively) easy control of Namibia. Mozambique still goes Commie, and Rhodesia gets drawn into the same war: albeit with only one front, and the support of both Estado Angola and South Africa. Perhaps either of those two could actually become militarily involved. If it could be dragged out until the Soviet Union collapses 10 years later (a long stretch?), support for that front dries up, and Rhodesia survives with both them and SA taking the hint from Angola and gradually easing apartheid policies...

Very big picture there, but thoughts?

 

[nwanda]

[QUOTE\] In all honesty, in doing a course on this I really don't think getting a UDI situation in Portugal's African colonies is feasible under (or immediately after) the New State. Perhaps under a politically stronger Republic, but given its chronic economic weaknesses, this might even require a pre-1900 POD.[/QUOTE]

I would agree that a Smith style UDI in the Portugese colonies is a stretch. However, there was a movement in 74/75, encouraged by Rhodesia Central Intelligence Organisation, IIRC, for the white Portugese in southern Mozambique, to seize power and create an entirely new state consisting of the the southern provinces only. The northern provinces would have been left to the tender mercies of Frelimo. The envisaged rump Mozambique was contingent to both South Africa and Rhodesia; It had a high concentration of whites, centred on then Lourenco Marques; It had what infrastructure the Portugese empire had bothered with, and it had the military.

Angola would have collapsed anyway, it is just to vast to be controlled from Luanda by a minority. The whites from there would in all likelihood have fled to Mozambique, thereby strengthening that state.

You then end up with a triple entente; Rhodesia gains free access to a close port, which it lost in 75; The war in Rhodesia and South Africa is cooled down by the buffer Mozambique, and all three can draw on the industrial heartland of South Africa.

The minority states are in an inestimably better strategic position.

It would take little effort from all three to bring Zambia to its knees through closure of trade routes and targeted Green Leader type raids, and thereby eliminate it as a base for insurgency; The ANC does not gain a foothold in Zimbabwe, which it got in 1980, and the Namibian war can be resolved by following the Mozambican precedent and rationalising the borders - Abandon Owamboland and the northern areas to SWAPO and create a fourth state in the southern half.

Again here, the whites are concentrated around Windhoek and the mining hinterland of Swakopmund. The new borders are much more defensible, and Owamboland is out of the equation, and as it was the heart of SWAPO support, so is SWAPO.

Add to that the application of a scorched earth policy in the abandoned territories of SWA and Mozambique, and you leave a very weak front line alliance against a vastly strengthened minority bloc. A minority bloc which might choose to declare its nuclear status about now ....

It could have happened, and some of my sources indicate that it nearly did

 

[Julius Vogel]

I've often wondered if there was anyway to get a reasonable POD to carve off the city of Lourenço Marques/Maputo and the surrounding area (even just the Bay maybe). I guess an early British purchase from Portugal would be the least controversial, despite the fact it was unlikely.

However perhaps everything goes largely as OTL, but with slightly better Settler organisation in southern Mozambique and SA/Rhodesia infiltration, then post or during the revolutionary phase a new government, sort of like Somialiand declares for itself.

SA/Rhodesia support it economically and militarily etc for a while etc. Even if was a short lived creature, for several years, it could well add butterflies to at least Rhodesia's situation. Depending on how big this region was, it could have significant impact.

If it is largely just the Bay and city, then that is a valuable economic benefit to SA. If the declaring area is larger, stretching up to the Rhodesian border, then perhaps that could help undermine ZANU's infiltration, assuming the proto state is able to do much to stop them.

Then of course if this happens, does Rump Mozambique do anything rash relating to Cahora Bassa?

 

[nwanda]

I would postulate a rump state that does not neccersarily include Cabora Bassa except perhaps as an enclave, but does include the whole Rhodesia/ Mozambique border. From other posts and what numbers I have at hand here in the middle of the bush, we could, accepting the premise of my post, see 1 million minority in Mozambique, 250000 in Rhodesia and 5 million plus in SA. Given that a lot of SADF soldiers would have to learn Portugese quickly in order to provide a crdible military in Mozambique, at least intially, this could have far reaching consequences. The big question mark is the committment of the Portugese colons in Mozambique to the new state. I would venture that they might be more committed than what one might think, given that they would basically have nowhere to go
They would bring significant military equipment resources to the table, particularly helicopters, which are key to fire force COIN ops. All three states used the Alouette III, and Portugal and SA the Puma. The portugese had significant heavy lift in the form of Noratlas aircraft, as well as detachments of G91 fighter bombers and assorted other bits.

 

[Viriato]

By the time of independence around 1/3 of the Europeans in Mozambique were born in Mozambique, however most of these people were under the age of 20.

Prior to the revolution there were talks of partitioning Mozambique up. One of the proposals was to allow FRELIMO to form a new state called Mozambique in Cabo Delgado, Niassa and Mozambique. They were most active in the northern regions of Niassa and Cabo Delgado districts (provinces since 1975).

Zambézia would be turned into a separate state with its capital in Quelimane. Though the insurgency was never active here, this area could have been given to COREMO or RENAMO as a new state. In OTL pro-western RENAMO was most active here.

Mozambique South of the Zambezi would have stayed Portuguese (this includes the Cabora Bassa damn) as an autonomous state. Perhaps the Rhodesians would have been active in Northern Tete district to ward off incursions from Zambia. Perhaps this area could have declared UDI. If we really want to get creative Tete can be lumped together with the buffer state of Zambézia and have COREMO/RENAMO protect the area.

I attached a map of the European population in numbers and % by district from around 1970.

 

[miguelrj]

Thanks for the data, Viriato.

Albeit just a detail, it would be funny to see which name would such Southern Mozambican White state adopt.
Since it's based in Lourenço Marques (whose inhabitants are called Laurentinos), the Laurentine Republic would be an awesome name. (República) Laurentina.

"Don't cry for me Laurentina!"

 

[Arachnid]

"Don't cry for me Laurentina!"

That does sound pretty awesome.

 

[Viriato]

Incidentally there were revolts by the settler population in late 1974 after the Portuguese government announced it would grant independence to Mozambique and handover power to FRELIMO without elections. In September the radio station in the Lourenço Marques was occupied by a group of settlers. Also, around that time a new flag was hoisted by the settlers.

http://flagspot.net/images/m/mz^1974.gif

 

[Arachnid]

Do you know anywhere that I could read up on that?