adminAT the height of the liberation war, when darkness was amass and liberation seemed to be a far-fetched idea, Jason Moyo and others travelled to Vietnam. Their mission was to try to understand how the Vietnamese, the VIETCONG guerillas and the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) in particular were winning a war against the United States of America and their allies.
The Vietnamese were viewed as a wretched bunch of peasants with support from a socialist formation against the USA but with often surprising lethargy from the East European bloc when it came to delivering the final blow to imperialism in their war for independence. They were, however, making unexplainable gains in the warfront against a superior enemy. Where was the source of strength on their onward march? I think Jason Moyo was right to travel there and spend some time with General Vo Giap Nguyen, who quickly shared the following observations. In my paraphrase after some research:
1 The Politburo of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, (USSR) was concerned about facilitating a worldwide workers revolution and the writings of Marx, Angels, Lenin and forth confirm this.
2 In that battle of materialism, the players were the workers versus the capitalists and the majority of the population in then Rhodesia were not workers but peasants just like the people of Vietnam.
3 General Vo Giap Nguyen then saw that the peasants, the poor people of the world, could not be represented sufficiently by those fighting for the rights of workers in industrial settings. Neither could they be fully represented by those fighting for the rights of industrialists in a country where there is no industry.
4 The countries that have a peasant majority must find a way to navigate this difficult world policy for their own needs because none of the world powers really care about their fate beyond securing their own long term goals.
5 The VIETCONG and the NVA were defeating a super power with little help other than from a fellow peasant country, China and some interesting military academic observations from the USSR, completely fascinated about how Comrade Vo was winning the war, and provided lots of weapons anyway.
General Vo then told the ZAPU/ZIPRA delegation that the experience of the Vietnamese people was that, regardless of academic military strategy, which separates warfare into asymmetrical and symmetrical warfare (guerillas and regular forces), with a boundary into which kind of warfare you could afford, or even allowed to prosecute, the Vietnam people had developed a continuum in this area. There has to be a time when the war progresses beyond the limited wishes of the sponsors. “The war must progress to the point that the sponsors are as uncomfortable as your opponents in their view of you. True negotiations can then happen in a global world. There was definitely a need to demonstrate a battlefield capability to get the attention of both. Regardless of the political and military support that you may get, in battle, it is only your blood that is shed at the front”.
I will now paraphrase General Vo’s parting words:
“The war for Zimbabwe will not be won by guerillas. Guerillas can only harass the enemy and gain ground, transiently. Elements of regular military warfare have to be introduced behind the guerilla forces. This is in order to demonstrate to the enemy that the peasant is now fighting in a new theatre, as well as to the sponsor that a higher level of a relationship is necessary so that the liberation movement is taken seriously by military men. Negotiations will then ensue but what comes after that?”
What comes after that is ceasefire and political independence AND a repeat of a similar war, in a different theatre and on different terms. No guns. What comes after that is democracy bedevilled by the continuing interest of the same global powers. The newly independent country then enters a new global economic test tube.
The next relevant comment that General Vo made in his many writings was that the next war requires the introduction of equitable civil administration, economic stability and the betterment of the material conditions of the people so that they realise the gains of being independent.
General Vo said, “That war is the longer one”.
Zimbabwe was won by the liberation movements organising for a transition from guerilla warfare to soldiers who could hold ground and create the conditions for a looming military defeat of the enemy. We all know about how ZIPRA introduced regular warfare and began to attack regular encampments of Rhodesian defence forces and national strategic equipment. We know that the Rhodesians realised that ZANLA could not be defeated by regular forces after testing the will of ZANLA to fight at the battle of Monte Casino, at great cost of men and equipment. The enemy was so overcome that a political negotiation averted the inevitable, the famous prediction by the Rhodesian Central Intelligence Organisation when they reclassified the war from “Difficult war to a Sure lose.”
So I respect the efforts of General Vo in explaining how we could win the war, but more importantly now, what comes after political victory. We have enjoyed political victory for 34 years but as we sit and watch the political drama unfolding in the so-called opposition parties in Zimbabwe, one wonders what they are thinking. Have they forgotten that while they were listening to Joshua Nkomo, Robert Mugabe, ZIPRA and ZANLA, explaining what will happen after independence, they now think that the second war, in fact the 3rd Chimurenga is a myth? That the liberation war ended 34 years ago? As long as they can remember “isotsha eliphethe umntwana and mushandira pamwe”, why are they working day and night to destabilise the economy? Specifically, why are they watching in glee as the people of Zimbabwe are struggling to win General Vo’s “long war”.
The long war is the economic war. It is set in a different battlefield that is global, unforgiving and winners play for keeps. The global players in this war, just like in the liberation war, don’t really care about your long term interests other than to provide material and philosophical guidance that serves their long term interests and some of yours. If you are to win the economic war, there will have to be unity of purpose from everyone in the country. That means there should not be anyone busy with sabotaging the efforts of Zimbabwe to win that war, especially unwittingly with the help of the same characters who fought us in the last war!
Unfortunately and with the help of people that want to roll back the territorial gains of our independence, you authored the strategy of sanctions in order to put this country on its knees. The economy is in immense difficulty. The liberation movement transformed its guerillas into regular troops in order to hold ground, brought political negotiations, ceasefire, independence and started prosecuting the longer economic war. This war required the economic emancipation of the people and started with transfer of the country’s resources to its people. The sanctions that you authored are diametrically opposed to this war and if you have any conscience, you should regret the day, 14 years ago, when you began to bankrupt your kith and kin unwittingly through your support for sanctions.
Even as you are severally and collectively the beneficiaries of, both, independence and the land reform programme, there is some embarrassment that is due to you. My aim is not to ask you to join us, the Zimbabwean people, in the long war but to ask you if you are patriots. The people of Zimbabwe are prosecuting the turning point strategy in the economic war and it is called the Zimbabwe Agenda for Sustainable Socio- Economic Transformation (Zim Asset). It is the introduction of regular economic warfare after the guerillas won the ground and after our regular security services held the ground. Without regard to where you are in your democratic right to organise politics of your choice, I think you need to ask yourselves the following questions:
1 Are you organising to regroup into formations that continue to ask us to leave our ground that we captured so dearly after the guerillas won it? Do you want to dismantle the regular security forces that we so expensively created in order to hold this ground for 34 years now? I am referring to your proposed security sector reforms.
2 Are you regrouping in order to continue with your ill-fated sanctions that have brought untold suffering and therefore opposed to the long economic war?
If you are still not convinced to leave your retrogressive ways, you are against the military gains that brought independence, for you want to roll those gains back. You are opposed to Zim Asset and even your own economic revival plan! I find it a bit odd that you may therefore consider yourselves to be patriots.
On 18 April 1980, Bob Marley said “. . . Soon we will find out who is a real revolutionary”. It is 34 years later and we now know that if you are unwilling to stand up and say no to sanctions and no to dismantling our security forces, you are not a patriot. Soon the people of Zimbabwe will judge you as the weakest link in the chain that binds this country together. Those of you that have a conscience will desert the failed 14-year-old counter revolutionary experiment and join us as we fight the long economic war. We the people of Zimbabwe have found out who is the real revolutionary and we definitely have an idea who isn’t.
Dr Gatsha Mazithulela is a struggling farmer who is working to make Zim Asset a success. His wish is to see the dismantling of economic sanctions and the unfavourable country rating that is derived from the ‘‘targeted sanctions’’ against President Mugabe. The sanctions must be removed unconditionally. He observes that nobody will lend any money to children when the head of the family is being sold out by some of his younger brothers.
Online Reporter
Bongani Ndlovu