3 South Africa and the World Campaign

In September 1979, in what was known as the Vela Incident, it was suspected that a nuclear test took place in the South African territory of the Prince Edward Islands, providing evidence that the country was secretly developing nuclear weapons. During the apartheid era (1948–1994), however, anti-nuclear activism within South Africa was incredibly difficult, as the regime did not tolerate public demonstrations against the state or its (secret) nuclear weapons programme. One rare exception was a small protest organised in Cape Town in 1983. A group of five protesters wore gas masks and carried a fake coffin through Greenmarket Square to protest the construction of a nuclear power station in Koeberg, outside of Cape Town, partially due to fears that this would contribute to the regime’s nuclear weapons programme. Within minutes, however, the demonstration was forcibly ended by the police and most participants arrested. Figure 3 shows this rare example of anti-nuclear protest within South Africa.

Figure 3 An anti-nuclear protest in Greenmarket Square, Cape Town, 1983.

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Figure 3 An anti-nuclear protest in Greenmarket Square, Cape Town, 1983.

Given the challenges of anti-nuclear activism within the country, international and transnational activism became crucial to opposing South Africa’s nuclear weapons programme. Significant activism against the apartheid regime took place internationally, and so too did activism against the regime’s nuclear weapons.

The Anti-Apartheid Movement (AAM) was an organisation created in 1959 to oppose South Africa’s racist regime. In 1979, the AAM launched the World Campaign Against Military and Nuclear Collaboration with South Africa, which worked with partners around the world to dissuade governments from providing South Africa with weapons or technologies that could be used for its nuclear weapons programme. It also ran a targeted campaign against what it called ‘the apartheid bomb’, seeking to raise awareness and to mobilise international action against Pretoria.

Activity 2

Watch this extract of a speech by interview with Abdul Minty, who set up and led the World Campaign Against Military and Nuclear Collaboration with South Africa. In this speech, recorded in 2023, he explains his activities in the aftermath of the 1979 Vela Incident. Then answer the questions below.

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Transcript

ABDUL MINTY

Well, first of all, the Vela incident itself was showing that, confirming again what we had been saying. Remember, many Western countries were not supporting us, were against us, were attacking us, and so on. And then, when this kind of information came out, they couldn’t attack us in the same way. And they didn’t. And we then built up more support in those countries and political parties, trade unions, churches, and so on. So we all realise the danger of the apartheid law clearly. Vela confirmed that what we believed for long and said so-- that we were right. People said we were not right. We were wrong. South Africa was only-- I was told by numerous foreign ministers, France, Germany, and Italy, that South Africa is only interested in peaceful nuisance. And so when this happened, we had to take a wider context and say, look, South Africa relies on police and military. And South Africa, at that time, 1980, didn’t have enough money for defence. So a defence force that has to rely on mirage planes that are very old would not be a very secure defence force. And so we had already stopped many aircraft going to South Africa. South Africa later made a copy of the mirage with the help from the French. But that was different to the original old ones. So we argued that if we effectively stopped all arms to South Africa, the regime will collapse. Many people challenged us. It can’t be true. How can a whole regime collapse? We said because it relies on the police and the military as its main instrument of government. And that is what it does in the neighbourhood as well. And so we need all-round sanctions if we can. But if an effective arms embargo is implemented, we didn’t mention nuclear in that context, you can collapse the apartheid regime because it will have no capacity to fight these wars. And it was involved in a number of wars in the region. So this is what one of the things we said. We had some other experiences, which I think is important to mention. You see, in our work, we’d hear from somebody who works in a factory in Britain or Germany that South Africa has ordered X, Y, Z, and this is a military item. We would have to decide whether we go public with that. But we also had to do our research because our credibility would be involved. So we’ve got a lot of false information as well. One was even a printed letterhead of an American company claiming that that letter was supposed to be a letter to a South African military, telling them, we will supply you with these things. Others were, we will look into this for you. Different kinds of material. We didn’t publish any of that. But they were all--

SPEAKER

Dissident?

ABDUL MINTY

Yes, aimed to discredit us. But what is important to remember at that time, is very difficult to convey today, at that time, if we were found to have one bit of inaccurate information, our entire credibility would crumble on everything. That was the amount of hostility we had from the West. Total. So we had to be very careful and to know what was planted, what was unreliable, and where it was deliberately intended to damage our reputation. And yet, we couldn’t lose a chance if something was being supplied to expose it and to stop it. It was a very, very difficult period. But at least the anti-apartheid movement and others connected with us trusted me with it, that I could make these judgements. So we checked things when it came and didn’t come and didn’t extend on things that were not really worth doing. Now you see, in 87, when we had the Commonwealth Committee on Sanctions, Canada was the chairman. So the Canadian foreign minister invited me, and met me, and I gave evidence to him. And I said to him that if you are able to have an effective arms embargo, the apartheid regime will end. And he looked at me in astonishment, can’t be wrong. ‘Are you sure?’ ‘Yes, I'm sure.’ So then he had 12 officials. He had invited me to Canada to give information on the arms embargo. And he said I could bring 12 officials. I only had one secretary working in my office, so I couldn’t bring 12. There’s only me and no 12 people who can come. So he confronted me with 12 officials. We went through a lot of issues. We were able to tighten various aspects of the Canadian embargo, which was not being effective. But we got across this thing. And then he was very interested in developing this idea that had put forward or elaborating further on it that if you had an arms embargo, you could actually cripple the apartheid regime. And so this gave us a lot of credibility that we could actually put things across. And in the end, if you look at 1990, this is actually what happened. South Africa lost, decided that either it had a hot war in the region which it couldn’t win in South Africa, or it gave up apartheid and decided to give up apartheid. So it was an analysis at the time which people didn’t want to believe, but later on, it was found that we were not very far from the mark.

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1. What did the World Campaign do with the information it received regarding South African military and nuclear activities?
2. According to Minty, why was an arms embargo so important?

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Discussion

1. The World Campaign received numerous reports of various military and nuclear developments in South Africa. Yet many of these were false, and some were even planted by those hostile to the Anti-Apartheid Movement’s work. Minty and his colleagues had to assess each claim and only publicise accounts that they believed to be true. Ultimately, this proved successful, and the World Campaign was able to build up considerable credibility by revealing developments which proved to be accurate while avoiding making false claims.
2. The apartheid regime rested on police and military force, making its defence budget unsustainably large. Minty argued that if an effective arms embargo against South Africa were implemented, the apartheid regime itself would collapse. As this embargo was put in place increasingly effectively in the 1980s, Minty argues this resulted in the end of the apartheid regime and the transition to democracy in South Africa in the 1990s.

As part of the World Campaign, the AAM collaborated with national anti-nuclear organisations to oppose South Africa’s nuclear weapons. In the UK, the CND, which was mainly focused on preventing the deployment of Cruise missiles in the country and the government’s acquisition of the Trident system, organised joint events with the AAM and the World Campaign against the ‘apartheid bomb’. You can see a poster from one such event, organised in Exeter, England, in 1982, in Figure 4.

Figure 4 Poster advertising an event co-organised by the Anti-Apartheid Movement and the CND in Exeter, England, in June 1982.

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A poster with the following text: South Africa’s nuclear bomb apartheid and the threat to peace.

Figure 4 Poster advertising an event co-organised by the Anti-Apartheid Movement and the CND in Exeter, England, in June 1982.

The World Campaign continued its work throughout the 1980s. In 1989, the South African leader F.W. de Klerk cancelled the country’s nuclear weapons programme. South Africa became the first – and to date the only – country to have developed its own nuclear weapons and then to unilaterally dismantle them. Since then, successive South African governments have been active in supporting nuclear disarmament, playing a key role in establishing the African Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (also known as the Treaty of Pelindaba) in 1996, and signing the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) in 2017.