The Third World War

THE THIRD WORLD WAR Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith, once himself a first-rate player, is a rugby enthusiast. As guest of South African Prime Minister Balthazar J. Vorster in Pretoria the last weekend of July, he enjoyed watching South Africa’s top team trounce the visiting British Lions 19-6. But everyone knew that Mr. Smith—who had arrived in a military plane that also brought Rhodesia’s Minister of Justice, Law and Order and Minister of Defense. e and External Affairs—would be discussing a sport much rougher than rugby. This weekend gathering was a council of war. It marked the fact that the war for southern Africa has begun.

In Rhodesia itself the preliminary skirmishes started August 13 last year. Exile guerrillas belonging to the Zimbabwe African Peoples Union (ZAPU, the Rhodesian revolutionary organization) and the African National Congress (ANC, the South African revolutionary organization) made their way across the Zambezi into the Wankie area in northwestern Rhodesia. They held out for three weeks before the last were either killed, captured or driven back into Zambia.

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James Burnham

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THE THIRD WORLD WAR Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith, once himself a first-rate player, is a rugby enthusiast. As guest of South African Prime Minister Balthazar J. Vorster in Pretoria the last weekend of July, he enjoyed watching South Africa’s top team trounce the visiting British Lions 19-6. But everyone knew that Mr. Smith—who had arrived in a military plane that also brought Rhodesia’s Minister of Justice, Law and Order and Minister of Defense. e and External Affairs—would be discussing a sport much rougher than rugby. This weekend gathering was a council of war. It marked the fact that the war for southern Africa has begun.

In Rhodesia itself the preliminary skirmishes started August 13 last year. Exile guerrillas belonging to the Zimbabwe African Peoples Union (ZAPU, the Rhodesian revolutionary organization) and the African National Congress (ANC, the South African revolutionary organization) made their way across the Zambezi into the Wankie area in northwestern Rhodesia. They held out for three weeks before the last were either killed, captured or driven back into Zambia.