South Africa and Instability in Southern Africa

Terrorism and the political use of violence are not necessarily synonymous. Terrorism is the use of violence for the primary purpose of creating a general atmosphere of fear and alarm. Thus, a terrorist organization does not limit its tactical use of violence to military and other such strategic targets but will additionally direct its violent tactics against the public at large. If employed by a government, the objective of such a use of terror can be to create submission to a repressive status quo. If used by an anti-governmental group, the objective may be to create a situation of instability in order to facilitate the overthrow of the existing government. In southern Africa, anti-governmental organizations operating in Mozambique, Angola, and Zimbabwe depend on financial and military assistance from the South African regime which utilizes these organizations as one component of its strategy to destabilize the governments of the former countries. This article demonstrates that (1) these anti-governmental organizations, such as União Nacional de Indepêndencia Total de Angola (UNITA) and the Movimento de Resistência Nacional de Moçambique, by their tactics, conform to the definition of a terrorist organization; (2) these anti-governmental organizations could not survive without their linkages to the South African regime; and (3) the South African regime's objective in promoting these anti-governmental organizations is to attempt to continue the status quo inside South Africa.