Nancy Mitchell Jimmy Carter in Africa: Race and the Cold War Washington, DC

Abstract

Reviewed by : Robert Anthony Waters Jr, Ohio Northern University r-waters@onu.eduHistorian Nancy Mitchell has written a very good book about Jimmy and the Cold War in Africa, focusing on his response to crises in White-minority-ruled Rhodesia and the Horn of Africa. The width and depth of her research is a model that diplomatic historians should aspire to achieve, her writing flows, and she places Carter's Africa policy within the larger context of US foreign policy and politics. At times she provides an hour-by-hour account of events, and the pace rarely drags. Despite these strengths, the book is ultimately unsuccessful because Mitchell is trapped in the anti-Cold War paradigm that dominates US diplomatic history.In Southern Africa, Mitchell claims for the mantle of true foreign policy realist: he assessed Rhodesia as a potential Cold War hot spot, but also made a careful study of the African context, giving his policy nuance and suppleness. Mitchell praises for his refusal to lift sanctions even after the White-minority government turned over a large share of power to nationalist Black leaders who opposed the Marxist guerillas, arguing that without the guerillas, the civil war would have continued and probably led to Cuban and Soviet intervention. She concludes: Carter ... had to ... claim the moral high ground but not end up on the same side as the (670). In other words, he could not allow his support for peace and Black-majority rule to end in Soviet and Cuban intervention and regional war. Only a negotiated involving all parties could prevent that outcome.Mitchell argues that in the Horn, behaved as a traditional Cold Warrior. When Somalia expelled the Soviet Union, moved to fill the vacuum in exchange for use of the strategic port at Berbera. Implicit in the bargain, the United States would ensure that weapons flowed to Somalia as it prepared to invade and annex Ethiopia's Somali-majority Ogaden region. Mitchell portrays this as an example of the reflexive amoral Great Power Diplomacy that Henry Kissinger had practised in Africa during the Gerald Ford administration: secretive, unconcerned about African norms such as the inviolability of colonial borders, and focused purely on the Cold War without concern for the Africans themselves. It was exactly the kind of foreign policy that had renounced in his campaign for president.Carter's policy in the Horn lacked nuance and true realism, Mitchell argues, because the opportunity was unexpected. Somalia expelled the Soviets just when his new administration had its hands full with momentous policy changes vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, the Mideast, the Panama Canal, and Rhodesia. With little time to do his normally exhaustive due diligence, Carter's instinct was to better the US strategic position without concern about antagonizing African leaders or violating his own commitment to rein in international arms sales. The Horn Crisis shows that, contra his conservative critics, in his heart Jimmy was a Cold Warrior.Mitchell's conclusions about both crises are questionable.In Rhodesia, Mitchell is simply wrong that the United States could not accept a that left the United States on the same side as the Soviets. In fact, the British believed that would be the optimal outcome. Their candidate to rule Zimbabwe was Soviet-supported guerilla leader Joshua Nkomo, whom they considered the most talented and flexible of the colony's leaders. They saw the other guerilla chief, Chinese-supported Robert Mugabe, as an overly doctrinaire and inflexible Marxist. Mitchell shows that Nkomo was close to joining an internal settlement that would have left out Mugabe. Had joined the British, he could have induced Nkomo to make peace and form an electoral coalition with the leading opponent of guerilla war, Bishop Abel Muzorewa, a match that would have given the internal solution Nkomo's prestige as a freedom fighter while bringing together Nkomo's minority Ndebele tribe and Muzorewa's majority Shona. …