I would tend to agree with you on that one, Ivan. It is worth noting, however, that the western half of SA (i.e. most of the Cape Province) has a quite small black population, and that didn't really start to grow until people started migrating to the Cape looking for jobs in the 1980s. IMO if they had split it up for that the whites kept the important areas (the Johannesburg-Pretoria area, Pietersburg, the mining complexes around there, the East Rand and southern suburbs of Joburg including Vereeniging and Vanderbijlpark) and gave up much of the rest of the Transvaal and Natal, the new black states would probably have been economically viable. But as you point out, politically many of the Afrikaners would have gone crazy.
As for South Africa and Iraq, you're forgetting that Saddam, while he was focusing on Iran, was also looking at building WMDs. The Israelis were afraid of him, too, and it is well known that the Israelis were observing the mayhem from the Iranian side - they say Saddam as more dangerous than Khomeini, which considering Khomeini's rhetoric says a lot. Israel killed Gerald Bull (nobody has proven they did it, but who else would have?) because he was building a supergun for Saddam, and they bombed Iraq's nuclear reactor (after making extensive attempts to sabotage it before it was built) because they feared Saddam having an A-bomb. South Africa wasn't particularly rich in the 1980s, which means getting stuff from Saddam would likely mean technological help of some sort - and providing that to him would make Jerusalem extremely POed. You can't work with both if you are a nation in South Africa's position.
As for South Africa and Iraq, you're forgetting that Saddam, while he was focusing on Iran, was also looking at building WMDs. The Israelis were afraid of him, too, and it is well known that the Israelis were observing the mayhem from the Iranian side - they say Saddam as more dangerous than Khomeini, which considering Khomeini's rhetoric says a lot. Israel killed Gerald Bull (nobody has proven they did it, but who else would have?) because he was building a supergun for Saddam, and they bombed Iraq's nuclear reactor (after making extensive attempts to sabotage it before it was built) because they feared Saddam having an A-bomb. South Africa wasn't particularly rich in the 1980s, which means getting stuff from Saddam would likely mean technological help of some sort - and providing that to him would make Jerusalem extremely POed. You can't work with both if you are a nation in South Africa's position.