Page 310 - Conflitti Militari e Popolazioni Civili - Tomo II

812 XXXIV Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

Hardly had there been any other field of GDR military politics and NVA history which
was surrounded by so many speculations, rumors and exaggerations as the coverage of NVA
activities in the Third World. The numbers provided in western press reports of the 1970s and
1980s ranged from 3,000 to 30,000 East German soldiers serving in Africa alone .
2
A headline of the daily newspaper Die Welt read in February 1979:
“GDR takes over the military role of Cuba”, then followed a list to confirm this statement:
Angola is reported to host a GDR parachute regiment, engineer and armored units as well as
a fighter air wing: in total 7,000 servicemen . In December 1979 Die Welt saw a “bloody
3
trail” of the GDR in Africa . Other publications alleged that NVA officers even participated
4
in and “commanded” the bloodbath of Munhava against RENAMO fighters in Mozambique
in 1979 . In July 1978, the Berlin newspaper Tagesspiegel announced: “GDR paratroopers
5
reported to plan an attack on Namibia” and in February 1979 “5,000 East German merce-
6
naries stationed in Angola” .
7
A cartoon of 1979 titled “Heia Safari” shows how the Berliner Morgenpost imagined the
operation of the GDR army in Africa .
8
the lurid Western reports were in sharp contrast to the secretive silence maintained in the
GDR. The systemic secrecy of the GDR military made it easy for hearsay to spread. To this
day, there is still much rumor and myths surrounding NVA activities in Southern Africa.
In an article for an anthology on NATO history Christopher Coker wrote even as late as
2001 in all seriousness “Given its military strength, the chief actor [of the Warsaw Pact in Af-
rica] was the GDR“ . In 1982, the GDR, namely its Minister of Defense, allegedly planned
9
and coordinated a large-scale operation together with Cuba, Angola and Mozambique. It was
planned to fly Cuban troops from Angola to Mozambique and replace them with East Ger-
man soldiers. However, South Africa is said to have thwarted the plan in advance .
10
But, let me be clear: this support should not be underestimated. Military aid was massive.
It goes back to the time before Mozambique gained independence in 1975, i.e. as early as
the late 1960s.
Until 1967, East Berlin had always declined requests for weapons. A “highly confidential”
internal memo of November 1964 read: “In the previous months, the following liberation
movements requested from us weapons or military equipment or, since they knew that we
declined such deliveries as a matter of principle, wanted to probe whether we have changed

Afrika-Korps“.
2 „Honeckers Afrika-Korps ist 30.000 Mann stark“, in: Die Welt, 12.02.1980.
3 „Die `DDR` übernimmt die militärische Rolle Kubas“, in: Die Welt, 28.02.1979.
4 „Bundeskanzler Helmut Schmidt darf zur Blutspur der `DDR` nicht länger schweigen“, in: Welt am Sonn-
tag, 16.12.1979.
5 Reported in: Löwis of Menar, Militärisches Engagement, pp. 132-134; Löwis of Menar, Solidarität und
Subversion; Löwis of Menar, DDR und Afrika, p. 226; Löwis of Menar, DDR und Dritte Welt, p. 123-140.
6 „DDR-Fallschirmjäger sollen Angriff auf Namibia planen“, in: Der Tagesspiegel, 04.07.1978.
7 „DDR stellt neues Afrikakorps, ein Regiment des Fallschirmjägerverbands Willy Sänger von Äthiopien nach
Angola verlegt, 5000 ostdeutsche Söldner in Angola stationiert“, in: Der Tagesspiegel, 08.02.1979.
8 „Ost-Berlins Arm in Afrika reicht immer weiter“, in: Berliner Morgenpost, 23.06.1979.
9 Coker, NATO and Africa, p. 167.
10 Coker, NATO and Africa, pp. 167-169