re: #209 Charles Johnson

We’re still dealing with the long-term after-effects of anti-Communist paranoia - the US sowed a lot of seeds of distrust among oppressed people, not just in South Africa, because of the deals we made with truly horrible people.

Whether it was worth it or not is another question.

But in the cases of Angola and Mozambique it wasn’t paranoia, the post independence governments of both nations openly sided with the Soviet Union. That left South Africa with two nations in the Soviet bloc in its vicinity. South Africa also possesses mines for gold and diamonds that we did not want to fall under the control of Soviet-backed government.