Portugal holds on to its colonies

so I've been reading up on the Portuguese Colonial War, and what I'm reading states that in Angola & Mozambique the Portuguese, by 1974, had almost won, they controlled all cities towns and villages and the war was reduced to sporadic independentist guerrilla operations against the Portuguese in non-urbanized countryside, only in Guinea was the war really still going on, my question is A) is that true? and B) if this is true what would it look like if Portugal held on to the colonies after 1974? could they break Guinea?
 
The Portuguese were dead tired of sending their men ti fight in African conflicts, and a victory would be hollow, since the conflict would restart soon afterwards anyway. However keeping smaller colonies like Sao Tomé and Principe should be possible.
 
I think out of all of the territories the easiest to hold would have been Angola. Firstly because there were three ethnic based independence groups that spent more time fighting with each other than they did against the Portuguese, by 1973 there were four (since the MPLA split in two). By that time most of the fighting was occurring in Zaire.
Secondly, it was the most economically valuable and with the rise in oil prices after 1973, the royalty payments would have covered the entire defence budget for 1974.

To keep the Portuguese colonies the 1974 revolution needs to butterflied away and to do this you need a much more effective leader after Salazar. Marcello Caetano was too much of a technocrat that was hated by both the far right and far left in Portugal. To the right he was too liberal and to the right he was just a puppet of Salazar's cronies. As a consequence he alienated everyone and was unable to build a solid base to effectively govern.

Whoever ruled Portugal would have to take the following steps

1. Get rid of Portuguese Guinea at all costs.
It was a worthless colony and was eating nearly half of the defence budget. The PAIGC was a well organized force and was able to occupy 2/3 of the territory by 1973. Also, unlike in Angola and Mozambique where 50% of the troops were African by 1973, in Guinea they were only 15% of the total. Ending the war here would have freed up 30% of the metropolitan troops in Africa that could have been better deployed in Mozambique. Also, it may have kept General Spinola from being so dissatisfied with the course of the war, as he was in charge of Portuguese Guinea in 1973.

2. Actively encourage greater Portuguese and Cape Verdean settlement in the colonies as Mussolini had done in the Italian colonies.
Although it was encouraged to some extent, most of the settlers in Angola and Mozambique came voluntarily paying their own passage. In fact going to Africa up until the mid-1960s was often a costly and onerous process since it required obtaining a sponsorship of someone already living in the colonies to guarantee work. Though a net of around 250,000 Portuguese settlers went to Angola from 1960-1974, the Portuguese government was ambivalent about encouraging mass migration to the colonies. In contrast over 1 million Portuguese left for France and West Germany during the same period. The main reason was most settlers who went to Africa were permanent and only 17% sent remittances back to Portugal. In contrast, 92% of emigrants to other destinations sent remittances and most emigrants leaving for western Europe were leaving with the intent of eventually returning. These remittances along with tourism provided an important source of foreign exchange after the 1960s.

3. Accept great South African and Rhodesian military assistance.
Pretoria had repeatedly offered Portugal military assistance as they saw Angola and especially Mozambique as buffers to their own security. However, the Portuguese government was loathe to accept South African assistance on the grounds that they found apartheid abhorrent and preferred to keep South African involvement to a minimum. Mostly, they feared that Angola and Mozambique would become South African puppets rather than Portuguese provinces. This was a mistake because the SADF were much more better equipped and a few battalions in Northern Mozambique would have been able to repel FRELIMO by 1971.

4. Replace the military leadership in Mozambique.
In Angola the Portuguese leadership effectively used African commandos known as the "flechas" against the MPLA. These commandos were bushmen and former guerrillas who were working in conjunction with the Portuguese secret police. They were considered among the best troops the Portuguese had in Angola and it was thanks to them that the war was effectively won by 1972. Also the Portuguese leaders in Angola were able to co-opt UNITA into a cease fire so they would attack the MPLA rather than the Portuguese. By contrast, in Mozambique the troops were led by an old general who tried to fight the war as if it were a conventional war. Although by 1973 over half of the Portuguese troops in Mozambique were local recruits, few were commandos.

5. Build a refinery to process Angolan oil earlier to reduce dependency on Iraqi oil.
As late as the early 1970s metropolitan Portugal was importing the bulk of its oil from the Middle East, even though Angola was pumping out more than twice as much as was consumed in all of the Portuguese empire. It was not until 1973 that work began on a refinery at Sines that was able to refine Angolan crude. This made it so the Portuguese government tried hard not to offend the Arab block. This meant that the Portuguese refused to recognize Israel, a potentially valuable ally.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
No matter what the Portuguese would have wanted, the only pieces of land they could hope to keep were the Islands, Sao Tome, Principe, Cape Verde; the rest would have gone pretty much no matter what. The UN was absolutely dead set on decolonisation and Portugal's "but it's a province like any other" was convincing no one.
 
It's near implausible to have them keep their colonies. You can sure delay it by pumping it immigration into these colonies, not that many people would want to go die in the tropics.
 
No matter what the Portuguese would have wanted, the only pieces of land they could hope to keep were the Islands, Sao Tome, Principe, Cape Verde; the rest would have gone pretty much no matter what. The UN was absolutely dead set on decolonisation and Portugal's "but it's a province like any other" was convincing no one.

Yes and no, I think they could have held out until the end of the cold war. One has to remember that Portugal was a NATO member and that the US, Britain and France were permanent members of the UN security council and constantly vetoed resolutions against Portugal that were too harsh. Portugal had threatened to quit NATO and terminate the US lease on the Lajes base in the Azores if its NATO allies played hard ball, so it did have some leverage. During the Yom Kippur War in 1973 Portugal was the only U.S. ally that allowed its territory to be used as a refueling stop for equipment to Israel. Below is an Israeli assesment of the situation.

"The 1973 war caused many countries to retreat. Terrified by the Arab oil boycott, France, Great Britain, Italy, Germany, and Spain turned their backs on Israel and the United States, refusing permission for USAF crews to land on or fly over their territories. If Portugal had not assented to the use of the Azores as a staging base, Israel would have lost both the war and negotiations that followed. However, the United States of America did, and continues, to defend Israel, but now strives also to support Palestine as well, toward peaceful coexistence and cooperation in the future."

The Nixon administration recognized the importance of Portugal and Kissinger thankful to Marcello Caetano after 1973 and promised to support Portugal's position in Africa and furnish F-5s as well as red eye missiles to Portugal in return for its assistance. France too offered in late 1973 to sell Portugal Mirage IIIs to be based in Cape Verde saying that if the Portuguese wished to use them in Guinea that was their business. I think the government could have definitely continued its course had the junior officers not rebelled.

Also, why didn't you mention Timor? They never rebelled against Portuguese rule and they were long considered one of the most loyal "overseas provinces". A few years ago there was a poll where over 1/4 of Timorese polled said they would like to be part an autonomous region of Portugal. If anything, I think they'd be more likely than anywhere else in the former empire to remain Portuguese.
 
Portugla could try to keep Brazil as a UNited Kingdon,giving the brazilians representative in the parliment and having the king in Lisbon and tthe heir in RIo de Janeiro.I might had been possible.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
Yes and no, I think they could have held out until the end of the cold war. One has to remember that Portugal was a NATO member and that the US, Britain and France were permanent members of the UN security council and constantly vetoed resolutions against Portugal that were too harsh. Portugal had threatened to quit NATO and terminate the US lease on the Lajes base in the Azores if its NATO allies played hard ball, so it did have some leverage. During the Yom Kippur War in 1973 Portugal was the only U.S. ally that allowed its territory to be used as a refueling stop for equipment to Israel. Below is an Israeli assesment of the situation.

"The 1973 war caused many countries to retreat. Terrified by the Arab oil boycott, France, Great Britain, Italy, Germany, and Spain turned their backs on Israel and the United States, refusing permission for USAF crews to land on or fly over their territories. If Portugal had not assented to the use of the Azores as a staging base, Israel would have lost both the war and negotiations that followed. However, the United States of America did, and continues, to defend Israel, but now strives also to support Palestine as well, toward peaceful coexistence and cooperation in the future."

The Nixon administration recognized the importance of Portugal and Kissinger thankful to Marcello Caetano after 1973 and promised to support Portugal's position in Africa and furnish F-5s as well as red eye missiles to Portugal in return for its assistance. France too offered in late 1973 to sell Portugal Mirage IIIs to be based in Cape Verde saying that if the Portuguese wished to use them in Guinea that was their business. I think the government could have definitely continued its course had the junior officers not rebelled.

Also, why didn't you mention Timor? They never rebelled against Portuguese rule and they were long considered one of the most loyal "overseas provinces". A few years ago there was a poll where over 1/4 of Timorese polled said they would like to be part an autonomous region of Portugal. If anything, I think they'd be more likely than anywhere else in the former empire to remain Portuguese.

I didn,t mention Timor for the same reason I didn't mention Goa; the more the Portuguese try to keep the colonies, the more likely it is that India and Indonesia just walk over and the rest of the world turns a blind eye, just like it did IOTL; especially when Indonesia was an american ally. Also Rhodesian and South African assistance ensures that when Smith and Apartheid crack apart they'll lose them and be treated as a third pariah state.

As for Brazil, Portugal squandered it in 1820 when the Cortes tried to abolish the kingdom of Brazil; it backfired. And by this point, it was already pretty clear that it wouldn't be "Portugal keeps Brazil", but that Brazil would end up being an american empire with an european province.
 
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MacCaulay

Banned
3. Accept great South African and Rhodesian military assistance.
Pretoria had repeatedly offered Portugal military assistance as they saw Angola and especially Mozambique as buffers to their own security. However, the Portuguese government was loathe to accept South African assistance on the grounds that they found apartheid abhorrent and preferred to keep South African involvement to a minimum. Mostly, they feared that Angola and Mozambique would become South African puppets rather than Portuguese provinces. This was a mistake because the SADF were much more better equipped and a few battalions in Northern Mozambique would have been able to repel FRELIMO by 1971.


My thoughts exactly. Lord knows the South Africans demonstrated an amazing ability to go into Angola in force after the Portuguese left, it'd be almost limitless what 44 Battalion could do with friendly bases and readily actionable intelligence on the ground.
 
It's near implausible to have them keep their colonies. You can sure delay it by pumping it immigration into these colonies, not that many people would want to go die in the tropics.

Actually, much of Angola is fairly temperate since its on a plateau. Much of the Niassa, Manica and Tete provinces of Mozambique are as well. I'm not sure what you mean by to go die in the tropics, by the 1960s most settlers lived modern lives and many had air conditioning. The study I reference below goes so far as to say that the perception in Portugal as well as in Portuguese Africa was that the quality of life (for Europeans) was much higher in Angola and Mozambique than in metropolitan Portugal at the time.

Also, there was research done among Portuguese emigrants that many would have preferred to go to Portuguese Africa but they did not have the funds to buy passage to Africa. So most chose to go to France instead. Despite this, emigration to Angola and Mozambique during the 1961-1973 period increased and more Portuguese went to Africa during that period than to the U.S., Canada and Brazil combined. Below is a study of those who left for Africa during that period and returned.

http://www.aps.pt/vicongresso/pdfs/150.pdf

Most of the Portuguese who went to Angola and Mozambique settled in the larger cities in towns where the war was thought of as something distant that didn't concern them. Below are videos showing the lives of settlers in the 1970s. These were hardly tropical backwaters from the nineteenth century.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiheHNbUpmA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVtYlkMokJg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vud47jE9ipk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7lYeYoJ9_Q

Interestingly enough although Portugal is much wealthier today than it was in 1974, there were 25,000 Portuguese who emigrated to Angola last year due to the job opportunities. In fact, Portuguese emigration to Africa is once occurring in large numbers.
 

archaeogeek

Banned
Actually, much of Angola is fairly temperate since its on a plateau. Much of the Niassa, Manica and Tete provinces of Mozambique are as well. I'm not sure what you mean by to go die in the tropics, by the 1960s most settlers lived modern lives and many had air conditioning. The study I reference below goes so far as to say that the perception in Portugal as well as in Portuguese Africa was that the quality of life (for Europeans) was much higher in Angola and Mozambique than in metropolitan Portugal at the time.

Also, there was research done among Portuguese emigrants that many would have preferred to go to Portuguese Africa but they did not have the funds to buy passage to Africa. So most chose to go to France instead. Despite this, emigration to Angola and Mozambique during the 1961-1973 period increased and more Portuguese went to Africa during that period than to the U.S., Canada and Brazil combined. Below is a study of those who left for Africa during that period and returned.

http://www.aps.pt/vicongresso/pdfs/150.pdf

Most of the Portuguese who went to Angola and Mozambique settled in the larger cities in towns where the war was thought of as something distant that didn't concern them. Below are videos showing the lives of settlers in the 1970s. These were hardly tropical backwaters from the nineteenth century.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiheHNbUpmA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVtYlkMokJg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vud47jE9ipk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7lYeYoJ9_Q

Interestingly enough although Portugal is much wealthier today than it was in 1974, there were 25,000 Portuguese who emigrated to Angola last year due to the job opportunities. In fact, Portuguese emigration to Africa is once occurring in large numbers.

Where does Portugal find the money to move around a significant group of settlers? Also France tried it with Algeria and failed, that was a great power. Portugal was a 3rd rate power ruled by a tinpot dictator trying to hold onto colonies almost as big as Algeria.
 
I didn,t mention Timor for the same reason I didn't mention Goa; the more the Portuguese try to keep the colonies, the more likely it is that India and Indonesia just walk over and the rest of the world turns a blind eye, just like it did IOTL;


You do know that Indonesia and Portugal had good relations up until 1974. In contrast Portugal and India which had tense relations after 1951, and in 1954 India occupied the exclaves of Dadra and Nagar Haveli.

The president of Indonesia even paid a state visit and visited Salazar. The only reason Indonesia invaded in December of 1975 was because it became clear that the Portuguese were willing to abandon any colony to a Communist group as they had done in every single one of their African colonies. The Indonesians had not only tolerated Portuguese Timor they even assisted in providing assistance to the Portuguese navy in 1972 during a search and rescue operation.

While we cannot predict what would have happened I cannot see the Indonesians invading Timor for no reason whatsoever. In 1975 they had a reason because it looked almost certain that East Timor would become a Communist regime.
 
Where does Portugal find the money to move around a significant group of settlers? Also France tried it with Algeria and failed, that was a great power. Portugal was a 3rd rate power ruled by a tinpot dictator trying to hold onto colonies almost as big as Algeria.


Although it was a third rate power, Portugal did have over $2 billion of gold reserves in 1973. The constitution of 1933 made it so that by law Portugal could never have a budget deficit. Salazar was paranoid about the country being at the hand of foreign creditors and he made sure the country could finance its imports for years without additional foreign exchange if necessary. Finally, despite the war the Portuguese economy (and that of its colonies) was growing faster than at any time in its history. Between 1960 and 1973 the Portuguese economy grew at an annual rate of 6.9%.

http://analisesocial.ics.ul.pt/documentos/1223475624P7mTE0cw8Lu53HY1.pdf

The government did build agricultural settlements in the 1950s and until the 1970s, the most famous being Cela in Angola. Below are pictures.

http://www.sanzalangola.com/galeria/albuo44?&page=1

The problem with the agricultural settlements is that they cost around $10,000 per family and many of the families preferred to move to the cities rather than farm. TAP the national airline had 14 longhaul jets in 1974 (4 747s and 10 707s) and the government could have simply paid for passages to Africa. Also, the oil royalties being paid to Portugal were well over $100 million per annum in the 1960s, a figure that would quadruple by 1972. Part of the revenue could have easily paid for poorer settlers and their families.

I think the comparison with France in Algeria is an incorrect one to make since in Algeria the settlers on average only earned 80% of what they did in metropolitan France. Also, immigration of Europeans to Algeria was nil after 1920. By 1954 79% of all Europeans in Algeria were Algerian born.

In contrast, over 100,000 Portuguese were emigrating each year in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Part of my family lived in Angola and others lived in the U.S. the perception was that in Angola life was better.

Also, in Algeria most of the population is Arab, they speak a single language, share a single religion and are somewhat educated. In Angola and Mozambique you have dozens of ethnic groups who often hate each other, it's no coincidence that both countries were plunged into civil war after independence. Also, fewer than 90% of the Africans can read or write so they are essentially a much more easy population group to control.

Finally, unlike in Algeria you never saw urban violence in Angola or Mozambique. There were no bombs going off in cafes or in city streets. The settlers were unaffected by the war. Also, unlike Algeria the vast majority of the settlers were urban dwellers in Angola and Mozambique, meaning they were not interacting with landless peasants. The guerrilla movements in Angola operated in the remote sections bordering the Congo and later Zambia. In Mozambique they operated on the Tanzanian border and the border with Zambia after 1969. Hence, making the comparison to North Africa is a poor one at best.
 

abc123

Banned
Although it was a third rate power, Portugal did have over $2 billion of gold reserves in 1973. The constitution of 1933 made it so that by law Portugal could never have a budget deficit. Salazar was paranoid about the country being at the hand of foreign creditors and he made sure the country could finance its imports for years without additional foreign exchange if necessary. Finally, despite the war the Portuguese economy (and that of its colonies) was growing faster than at any time in its history. Between 1960 and 1973 the Portuguese economy grew at an annual rate of 6.9%.

http://analisesocial.ics.ul.pt/documentos/1223475624P7mTE0cw8Lu53HY1.pdf

The government did build agricultural settlements in the 1950s and until the 1970s, the most famous being Cela in Angola. Below are pictures.

http://www.sanzalangola.com/galeria/albuo44?&page=1

The problem with the agricultural settlements is that they cost around $10,000 per family and many of the families preferred to move to the cities rather than farm. TAP the national airline had 14 longhaul jets in 1974 (4 747s and 10 707s) and the government could have simply paid for passages to Africa. Also, the oil royalties being paid to Portugal were well over $100 million per annum in the 1960s, a figure that would quadruple by 1972. Part of the revenue could have easily paid for poorer settlers and their families.

I think the comparison with France in Algeria is an incorrect one to make since in Algeria the settlers on average only earned 80% of what they did in metropolitan France. Also, immigration of Europeans to Algeria was nil after 1920. By 1954 79% of all Europeans in Algeria were Algerian born.

In contrast, over 100,000 Portuguese were emigrating each year in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Part of my family lived in Angola and others lived in the U.S. the perception was that in Angola life was better.

Also, in Algeria most of the population is Arab, they speak a single language, share a single religion and are somewhat educated. In Angola and Mozambique you have dozens of ethnic groups who often hate each other, it's no coincidence that both countries were plunged into civil war after independence. Also, fewer than 90% of the Africans can read or write so they are essentially a much more easy population group to control.

Finally, unlike in Algeria you never saw urban violence in Angola or Mozambique. There were no bombs going off in cafes or in city streets. The settlers were unaffected by the war. Also, unlike Algeria the vast majority of the settlers were urban dwellers in Angola and Mozambique, meaning they were not interacting with landless peasants. The guerrilla movements in Angola operated in the remote sections bordering the Congo and later Zambia. In Mozambique they operated on the Tanzanian border and the border with Zambia after 1969. Hence, making the comparison to North Africa is a poor one at best.

Guys thanks for the informations. I recently have started a similar thread, but I didn't had all this informations.
;)
 
I think out of all of the territories the easiest to hold would have been Angola. Firstly because there were three ethnic based independence groups that spent more time fighting with each other than they did against the Portuguese, by 1973 there were four (since the MPLA split in two). By that time most of the fighting was occurring in Zaire.

Secondly, it was the most economically valuable and with the rise in oil prices after 1973, the royalty payments would have covered the entire defence budget for 1974.
They don't even have to hold onto Angola just hold on to Cabinda instead. From what I can tell until the Treaty of Alvor Cabinda wasn't actually fully a part of the Angolan colony, although they did share a governor who resided in Angola as it was the larger of the two. Cut off the much larger and troublesome Angola and keep the smaller and more defensible Cabinda and exploit their massive oil reserves and it should give Portugal's economy a real boost, the freed up manpower and extra cash will also help them keep other colonies they want to.
 
To hold its colonies, Portugal should encourage its citizens more to settle in Angola and Mozambique and transform the demographics to the extent that the native populations will be assimilated to Portuguese culture and more difficult to revolt. Portugal should encourage more foreign investment in their productive colonies of Angola, Cape Verde and Mozambique.
 
To hold its colonies, Portugal should encourage its citizens more to settle in Angola and Mozambique and transform the demographics to the extent that the native populations will be assimilated to Portuguese culture and more difficult to revolt. Portugal should encourage more foreign investment in their productive colonies of Angola, Cape Verde and Mozambique.

Until around 1950, the Salazar government was ambivalent about settling large numbers of Europeans in Africa for several reasons. Above all else, Salazar feared that the Europeans would become numerous enough to form their own government and declare independence from Portugal. It was obvious to that Portugal needed colonies more than the colonists needed Portugal, so he did everything to keep the settlers under tight control. Also, before 1961 he naively assumed that the Africans would never revolt. He feared the European settlers more than the natives.

The second reason that emigration was initially limited was that most Portuguese emigrants were poor and unskilled. It was feared that they would migrate to the cities and compete with the natives and mestiços for unskilled jobs and foment racial tension. This in fact did occur as many of the new settlers went to cities such as Luanda and worked as drivers, construction or as maids. This did happen, though usually these settlers were able to ascend the social ladder and eventually become small business owners. As one of the studies I linked above shows the pattern of settling in Africa meant working for someone else and eventually working for your self.

Finally as I mentioned earlier, remittances from emigrants in Brazil and later Western Europe provided an important source of foreign exchange so his government really did not do much to steer emigration to Angola.

Despite this, beginning in the mid-1950s an increasing number of Portuguese went to Africa. During that decade more Portuguese settled in Angola and Mozambique than in Brazil (which up until then had been the destination of over 80% of Portuguese emigrants). Considering the fact that more than 1 million Portuguese emigrated abroad between 1961-1973 the colonies could have definitely absorbed a larger portion had their been paid passages.

Generally speaking the bulk of emigrants from Portugal came from the poorest regions of Northeastern Portugal. The majority of settlers to Angola came from these regions as well. A common perception in Portugal was it was very difficult to get a "carta de chamada" (literally translated calling card) that would authorise settlement in Angola or Mozambique. The high standard of living enjoyed by settlers was envied in Portugal itself and being able to go to Africa was often thought of as comparable to winning the lottery. To illustrate, in Mozambique there was on average 1 car for every 2 settlers by the 1950s, by contrast in Portugal only half of the population had running water in 1976.

Mozambique was perceived as being an even more difficult colony to emigrate to than Angola. The settlers in Mozambique were generally from central Portugal and the Porto region, they were better educated, wealthier and more cosmopolitan than those in Angola. However, most settlers lived south of the Zambezi in the port cities of Lourenço Marques and Beira. Northern Mozambique which had tremendous economic potential was all but ignored until the 1960s. The sparsely populated Niassa district had under 300,000 inhabitants in 1970 and the most temperate climate in Mozambique but only had around 3,000 Europeans at that time. Of these, the majority had arrived after 1966 when the government formed settlements such as "Nova Madeira" for farmers from Madeira. In 1973 a new settlement was started to host over one thousand Azorean families, it was of course abandoned the next year.

General Norton de Matos who had been Governor General of Angola between 1912-15 ran for president in 1949 in opposition to Salazar's candidate Marshall Carmona. However, he withdrew his candidacy due to rigging of the election. Norton de Matos was in favour of mass migration to the colonies and if he had won he would have dismissed Salazar and the course of Portuguese history could have been very different.
 
To hold its colonies, Portugal should encourage its citizens more to settle in Angola and Mozambique and transform the demographics to the extent that the native populations will be assimilated to Portuguese culture and more difficult to revolt. Portugal should encourage more foreign investment in their productive colonies of Angola, Cape Verde and Mozambique.

Portugal's economic growth was quite good in the 1960s, but it still lagged behind Europe's average, and as its been pointed out, life for European whites in Africa was usually quite good. (As true in Angola and Mozambique as it was/is in Rhodesia, Kenya, Namibia and South Africa.) If we are thinking long-term here, thinking exclusively of additional European immigration isn't gonna cut it - you need to improve the living standards of Africans, too. But with the post-WWII growth, this isn't all that hard, particularly with Angola's resource wealth. Mozambique is somewhat harder because it doesn't have the oil money, but both territories could have been net contributors to Portugal. They weren't because the Portuguese settlers didn't treat native Africans particularly well, and they got outright brutal during the war - bombing villages with napalm and lynching innocent blacks isn't doing anybody any favors - and that was in the first months of the war. Involving the SADF or Rhodesian Army in the colonial war is going to aggravate the racial problems - short term gain, long term loss.
 
Portugal's economic growth was quite good in the 1960s, but it still lagged behind Europe's average, and as its been pointed out, life for European whites in Africa was usually quite good. (As true in Angola and Mozambique as it was/is in Rhodesia, Kenya, Namibia and South Africa.) If we are thinking long-term here, thinking exclusively of additional European immigration isn't gonna cut it - you need to improve the living standards of Africans, too. But with the post-WWII growth, this isn't all that hard, particularly with Angola's resource wealth. Mozambique is somewhat harder because it doesn't have the oil money, but both territories could have been net contributors to Portugal. They weren't because the Portuguese settlers didn't treat native Africans particularly well, and they got outright brutal during the war - bombing villages with napalm and lynching innocent blacks isn't doing anybody any favors - and that was in the first months of the war. Involving the SADF or Rhodesian Army in the colonial war is going to aggravate the racial problems - short term gain, long term loss.

Portugal's rate of economic growth was higher than the European average, the problem was the country was so much poorer than its European peers. The average rate of growth for the per capita GDP was 6.9% annually between 1961-1973, only Greece (which was similarly poor) grew faster at 7.1%. The average rate for Western Europe during that period was 3.9%. In 1960 the per capita income was only 45% of western Europe, by 1973 it had risen to 65%. So despite the countries problems it was able to enjoy a fast rate of economic growth and foreign investment (sadly since 2001 Portugal has been going backwards and many people say the country needs a new Salazar).

As you mentioned the Europeans in most colonies enjoyed a higher standard of living that their European peers and this was certainly true. However, in Portuguese Africa a settler earned nearly 5 times as someone in Portugal. In Rhodesia the average Rhodesian earned 25% more than the average Englishman. So the gap was much larger, thus making Angola or Mozambique very attractive.

The Portuguese government did try to win the hearts and minds of the African population after 1961 by building schools, hospitals and clinics in more remote areas. One of the biggest successes was in encouraging independent African coffee farmers in Northern Angola. By 1974 they were growing over half of the coffee crop in the region and had average incomes that were quite high.

I mentioned South African assistance because this would have eased the burden on the Portuguese military. If a quicker military victory could have been achieved then it would have allowed the Portuguese government to focus exclusively on developing the territories. Also, I'm not sure how much effect the South Africans would have had on the racial policies if they were exclusively aiding Portugal militarily. The central government from Lisbon still made the rules and they were constantly making laws that at least gave the appearance of racial equality. This included promoting non-whites to political positions so that they could constantly show the outside world how Portugal was a land of racial harmony. For instance, by 1973 over half of the members of the legislative assembly of Mozambique were non-white. This was the doing of Lisbon, not the settlers. However, if the settlers with South African assistance become strong enough as a group to gain autonomy, I could see them not caring as much about window dressing (especially in Mozambique).
 
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