Hi all,
I am a new member but have been looking at the different topics for some time now.
I am very impressed by the amount of knowledge displayed by the members here. I like to see the different discussions and the comments.
I would like to hear some comments on a topic I have been thinking about.
PS: I am in South Africa.
I have written a book (waiting to get published) on a hypothetical nuclear war in Southern Africa in the 1980's.
This thread might be a topic for "what if" but it is less "what if" than a fair evaluation of current SA politics.
My thread:
One of the things the NP government was rather good at was divide and rule.
PW Botha, despite all his faults" was probably more realistic than most. He could see that apartheid was coming to an end, but I don't think he really grasped how to get it killed off.
FW de Klerk was a member of the security council and must have been deeply involved in signing off on different "actions", like the killing of Dave Webster, etc.
If PW Botha's goal was to prolong apartheid or if he just wanted to diminish ANC's influence, I think there was one option open to him:
Let Mandela out in 1985! Just liek that. Let him out, tell him to go home, tell him to do wahtever he woud liek to do, But deny him a passport!
Tambo sitting in London and Lusaka and Mandela in JoBurg would have created two centres of power.
Would Tambo just have handed over to Mandela? Would Mandela have demanded the presidency of ANC? Would we have seen more conflicts between the "exiles" and the one's who never left SA?
Could ANC have fractured in late 1980's? Would we still have had the elction in 1994? or later or earlier?
Would SA have experienced some sort of civil war between factions of ANC?
Was it a realistic option for PW Botha?
Ivan
PS: Please go easy on it. It is my first post!
I am a new member but have been looking at the different topics for some time now.
I am very impressed by the amount of knowledge displayed by the members here. I like to see the different discussions and the comments.
I would like to hear some comments on a topic I have been thinking about.
PS: I am in South Africa.
I have written a book (waiting to get published) on a hypothetical nuclear war in Southern Africa in the 1980's.
This thread might be a topic for "what if" but it is less "what if" than a fair evaluation of current SA politics.
My thread:
One of the things the NP government was rather good at was divide and rule.
PW Botha, despite all his faults" was probably more realistic than most. He could see that apartheid was coming to an end, but I don't think he really grasped how to get it killed off.
FW de Klerk was a member of the security council and must have been deeply involved in signing off on different "actions", like the killing of Dave Webster, etc.
If PW Botha's goal was to prolong apartheid or if he just wanted to diminish ANC's influence, I think there was one option open to him:
Let Mandela out in 1985! Just liek that. Let him out, tell him to go home, tell him to do wahtever he woud liek to do, But deny him a passport!
Tambo sitting in London and Lusaka and Mandela in JoBurg would have created two centres of power.
Would Tambo just have handed over to Mandela? Would Mandela have demanded the presidency of ANC? Would we have seen more conflicts between the "exiles" and the one's who never left SA?
Could ANC have fractured in late 1980's? Would we still have had the elction in 1994? or later or earlier?
Would SA have experienced some sort of civil war between factions of ANC?
Was it a realistic option for PW Botha?
Ivan
PS: Please go easy on it. It is my first post!