Angola: Deadly Rite of the Rainy Season

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But the Administration shows no signs of giving ground: according to one U.S. official, "We have stated our terms for facilitating an agreement, and those terms are not about to change."

Those who have sought to break the deadlock have indeed been repulsed as firmly as those who made it. Two weeks ago, 13 U.N. Security Council members unanimously condemned the South African offensive (only the U.S. and Great Britain abstained). "South Africa is sick and tired of the hypocrisy of that Council and its members," said South African Foreign Minister Roelof ("Pik") Botha in reply. The Soviet Union took the unusual measure of approaching South Africa diplomatically to warn it against destabilizing the Angolan regime. Responding to both intrusions, the Durban-based Sunday Tribune editorialized, "Go to hell!"

But such fighting words may belie flagging spirits. Initially. South Africa justified its offensive by citing the U.S. invasion of Grenada last October (a disingenuous comparison, if only because South Africa's control of Namibia is in direct defiance of a U.N. ruling). Then it resolved to impose a Grenadian-style ban on press coverage of the assault. As a result, said Philip Myburgh, spokesman for the opposition Progressive Federal Party, the operation was attended by "an atmosphere of secrecy and suspicion."

Many South Africans are growing restive as each year their government claims to have crippled SWAPO, and each year SWAPO shows it is not crippled. Asked the moderate Rand Daily Mail last week: "What is it all for?" The editorial went on to point out that South African aggression justifies, and even necessitates, the Cuban presence in Angola. The public's concern was increased when government authorities talked of sending tanks and armor into Angola following attacks on aircraft by Soviet-made SAM8 and SAM9 missiles. "The South Africans," says one U.S. diplomat, "have started to ask themselves how long it can go on, how high will be the price."

Angola has been spending at least 40% of its foreign-currency earnings on military equipment and watching its foreign debt soar to more than $2.5 billion. Prices go up and stores close down. The Cuban presence has not only drained money but also discouraged the flow of aid from the West. Yet the government knows that in the Cubans' absence, it would become difficult indeed to resist enemy raids and replace South African rule in Namibia. In the meantime, more and more Angolans have taken to dodging the draft. Throughout southern Angola, buildings, railways and dams are in ruins as a result of UNITA attacks.

Though both sides are worn down, the fighting drags on. South Africa still refuses to acknowledge, let alone encounter, spokesmen from SWAPO. Even if cease-fire talks could take place, they would not address the trickiest issue in the whole equation: the Cubans. For a breakthrough to occur, says a U.S. diplomat, "there would have to be an awful lot of common sense and logic. So far that has not been the case."

—By Pico Iyer. Reported by Marsh Clark/Mupa and Johanna McGeary/Washington