In Search of Enemies - A CIA Story - John Stockwell

[188) IN SEARCH OF ENEMIE S
South Africans had facilitated the agency's development of amercenary
army to suppress the Congo rebellion. BOSS, however, tolerates
little clandestine nonsense inside the country and the CIA had always
restricted its Pretoria station's activity to maintaining the liaison
with BOSS. That is, until 1974, when it yielded to intense pressures
in Washington and expanded the Pretoria station's
responsibilities to include covert operations to gather intelligence
about the South African nuclear project. In the summer of 1975
BOSS rolled up this effort and quietly expelled those CIA personnel
directly involved. The agency did not complain, as the effort was
acknowledged to have been clumsy and obvious. The agency continued
its cordial relationship with BOSS.
Thus, without any memos being written at CIA headquarters
saying "Let's coordinate with the South Africans," coordination was
effected at all CIA levels and the South Africans escalated their
involvement in step with our own.
The South African question led me into another confrontation
with Potts. South African racial policies had of course become a
hated symbol to blacks, civil libertarians, and world minorities-the
focal point of centuries-old resentment of racism, colonialism, and
white domination. Did Potts not see that the South Africans were
attempting to draw closer to the United States, in preparation for
future confrontations with the blacks in southern Africa? If he did,
he was not troubled by the prospect. Potts viewed South Africa
pragmatically, as a friend of the CIA and a potential ally of the
United States. After all, twenty major American companies have
interests in South Africa and the United States maintains a valuable
NASA tracking station not far from Pretoria. Eventually Potts concluded,
in one of our conversations, that blacks were "irrational" on
the subject of South Africa. This term caught on. It even crept into
the cable traffic when the South African presence became known and
the Nigerians, Tanzanians, and Ugandans reacted vigorously.
Escalation was a game the CIA and South Africa played very well
together. In October the South Africans requested, through the CIA
station chief in Pretoria, ammunition for their 155 mm. howitzers. It
was not clear whether they intended to use this ammunition in
Angola. At about the same time the CIA was seeking funds for
another shipload of arms and worrying about how to get those arms
into Angola efficiently. Our experience with the American Champion