Angola Rebels Claim Biggest Victory Yet

Angola’s rightist rebels said Thursday that they have won their biggest victory yet, routing a Soviet-led, Cuban-supported government offensive.

Jonas Savimbi, president of the pro-Western National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, said he believes that the “decisive character” of his guerrillas’ victory will force the country’s Marxist government into negotiations on sharing power.

Savimbi told newsmen at his headquarters in Jamba in southeastern Angola that American arms, notably Stinger anti-aircraft missiles, have contributed significantly to the guerrillas’ success in defeating the three-month government campaign, which involved an estimated 18,000 men and about $1 billion worth of Soviet weapons.

But Gen. Magnus Malan, the South African defense minister, said in Pretoria that were it not for the intervention of his troops in the last week, Savimbi’s guerrillas would have been defeated--and the strategic balance changed throughout southern Africa.

Pretoria was forced into what Malan called “a clear-cut decision: accept the defeat of Dr. Savimbi or halt Russian aggression” ultimately aimed at South Africa.

If UNITA, as Savimbi’s group is known, were defeated, Malan said, South Africa’s own security would be threatened. Thus, Pretoria committed its troops against what military sources here describe as a Soviet-commanded, Cuban-supported Angolan task force that threatened to break through UNITA lines and drive toward Jamba.

“South Africa’s decision to act against the Russian- and Cuban-controlled offensive against UNITA was taken in the full knowledge of and with recognition of the responsibility involved in respect of the sacrifices that would be required,” Malan said.

But Savimbi, while acknowledging material support from South Africa, strongly denied that South African troops were involved, on the ground or in the air.

Hurt and bewildered by Pretoria’s assertions that his rebels had been saved from defeat by South African soldiers, Savimbi said that perhaps Malan and Gen. Jannie Geldenhuys, chief of the South African military, want the glory of the victory for themselves.

“I have to say that (South African) troops and air power were never involved,” he told newsmen flown to Jamba. “We got other forms of support that I cannot elaborate on, but that support was at the request of UNITA.”

Savimbi said that the guerrillas killed 2,000 government soldiers and wounded 5,000, while themselves losing only 155 killed and 662 wounded. He described the battle as the biggest in the guerrillas’ 12-year bush war against Marxist rule in Angola.

The American anti-aircraft missiles, part of a controversial Reagan Administration arms package for the Angolan rebels, apparently played a significant role.

“In five (missiles), I got five planes down,” Savimbi said, displaying two Cuban pilots whose plane was brought down by a Stinger. “That support was crucial.”

But UNITA’s celebration of victory was upset by Pretoria’s assertions, after weeks of denial of any South African involvement, that it intervened to prevent a Soviet-Cuban victory that would have placed “the whole of southern Africa” under “Russian domination.”

Although Savimbi’s guerrillas had defeated the government offensive in a three-month series of battles that ended near Mavinga in Cuando Cubango province, Malan said, the Soviet general commanding the campaign had regrouped his forces and strengthened them with Cuban units and Soviet personnel.

As the principal backer of the Marxist regime in Luanda, the Soviet Union “either had to stand by and witness the defeat of the (government) forces, using Russian weapons, or it had, in desperation, to become actively involved,” Malan said. “The present Cuban-Russian offensive indicates it opted for the latter course.”

“This, in turn, forced South Africa into a clear-cut decision: accept the defeat of Dr. Savimbi or halt Russian aggression.”

Describing the battle in which four South African soldiers were killed Monday, a military spokesman in Pretoria gave few details but said “an (Angolan government) brigade supported by Cubans with tanks, artillery, anti-aircraft weapons, ground-to-air missiles and aircraft was successfully forced to withdraw from its position.”

“A number of (enemy) tanks, armored cars, anti-aircraft weapons and logistics vehicles were destroyed during the action,” he added.

Angola said on Thursday that 230 South African soldiers were killed in the fighting and that 16 planes were shot down.

UNITA and the government’s Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, or MPLA, both fought guerrilla wars against Portuguese rule of Angola. But shortly after independence in 1975, the MPLA seized total power with the backing of Cuban troops and Soviet military aid, ousting Savimbi’s forces, which had South African and, for a time, American support.

The Marxist government today has the support of about 37,000 Cuban troops and technicians in the country as well as about 1,000 Soviet military advisers. South Africa continues to back UNITA, and the United States resumed limited military assistance in 1986.