In Search of Enemies - A CIA Story - John Stockwell

Roberto
and harassed all present, white and black alike. He did more talking
than listening, and often interrupted people, leaving them frustrated.
Then we were rolling down the asphalt road through the Angolan
bush.
I stood with my head and shoulders through the sun roof of the
minibus to photograph the terrain through which we were passing.
It was open, dry, and reasonably even. Sixty percent was covered
with meter-high grass over low rollin·g ridges and slopes, with scatterings
of thorn, fig, wild olive, and cedar trees, which clustered into
small forests. Occasional, paunchy, sentinel baobab trees made the
terrain unforgettably African. Coastal, woody savannah, I believed
it would be called; ideal for the movements of a battalion reinforced
with light armor, permitting high mobility as well as good cover. Of
course, this type of war would be fought mostly up and down the
roads. We were on a reasonably good, narrow asphalt road designed
to carry the five-ton Mercedes and Berliet trucks which had kept the
Angolan coffee business and provincial economy rolling.
We crossed two small bridges over dry swales which would be easy
to detour around except perhaps during a heavy rain. Another bridge
spanned a deep creek bed with steep, rough sides. An abutment had
been partially blown by an MPLA mine but was stil1 solid enough
for single-axle trucks and even armored vehicles no larger than the
small Panhards. Such streams could pose serious problems if a span
were completely blown. True, a U.S. Army engineer company could
bridge it in two hours, but the FNLA would have no such capacity,
nor would it be within the scope of our program to ship them
adequate materials.
All road junctions and small bridges were manned by two or three
soldiers carrying rifles, who peered at the vehicle vacantly and then
brought up something resembling a salute when they saw Roberto
inside. On one occasion he got out of the VW to give a befuddled
young man a lecture and demonstration of the proper position of
attention and salute.
As we drove on, Roberto gave me a shopping list of things they
needed. He kept returning to uniforms and boots for fifteen thousand
men.
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} must have uniforms to make them feel like soldiers," he said.
"And boots. If I can give them boots they will fight for me."
No one in Roberto's army was receiving regular pay or allow-