Cuba, Africa, and Apartheid’s End: Africa’s Children Return! examines the historic dimensions of the Cuban Revolution’s solidarity with Africa through the lens of Cuba’s role in the battle of Cuito Cuanavale and the southern African national liberation and anti-colonial struggle more broadly.

Speaking together in Cuba in 1991, Mandela and Castro discuss the place in the history of Africa of Cuba and Angola's victory over the invading U.S.-backed South African army, and the resulting acceleration of the fight to bring down the racist apartheid system.

The post-1959 Cuban government’s engagement with Africa, which was led by its charismatic and revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro, had two connecting dimensions: military internationalism and humanitarian internationalism. While African states and societies benefited immensely from these engagements, it was Fidel Castro’s military assistance towards the decolonization of and the pushback of Apartheid South Africa that received the loudest attention and ovation in the developing world. Fidel Castro, this book argues, was never motivated by economic, selfish, or geopolitical considerations; but rather, by the altruism and the certainty of his worldview and by the historical connection between the peoples of Cuba and Africa. The principle of international solidary, socialism, and the emancipation of Africa was a much-desired aspiration and attainment. Beginning covertly in Algeria in 1961 and the Congo and Guinea-Bissau in 1964; and more conspicuously in Angola in 1975, Fidel Castro and his socialist government was at the forefront supporting liberation movements in their struggle against colonialism. Defining Castro’s engagement with Africa was his support for the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) against the United States-backed Apartheid South Africa, which supported the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).

Visions of Freedom: Havana, Washington, Pretoria, and the Struggle for Southern Africa, 1976-1991

In March 1988, the army of South Africa's apartheid regime was dealt a crushing defeat by Cuban, Angolan, and Namibian combatants at the battle of Cuito Cuanavale in Angola. That triumph, South Africa's future president Nelson Mandela proclaimed, marked "a milestone in the history of the struggle for southern African liberation." With the victory at Cuito Cuanavale, Angola's sovereignty was secured. Namibia's independence was won. The deepening revolutionary struggle in South Africa received a powerful boost. And the Cuban Revolution too was strengthened. Between 1975 and 1991 some 425,000 Cubans volunteered for duty in Angola in response to requests from the Angolan government to help defend the newly independent country against multiple invasions by South Africa's white-supremacist regime, backed by its allies in Washington and elsewhere. Here this history is told by those who lived it and made it. "...a strong addition to international history and studies collections."--Midwest Book Review "...scholars and general readers of twentieth-century African, Afro-Latino, and African American history will find this title a compelling and informative addition to an understudied chapter of the Cold War and its impact on Africa."--The Journal of African History "...an excellent read for both the academic and layperson."--African Studies Quarterly Includes photos, map, and glossary.

Beginning in 1975 an epic battle was waged for the future of southern Africa. The Angolan people had just thrown off 500 years of Portuguese colonial brutality. Now South Africa's white supremacist regime, spurred by Washington, had invaded Angola. Its goal: to impose a government beholden to Pretoria and imperialism. Angola's government appealed for help. The response of Cuba's leadership was immediate and decisive. A hard-fought war for freedom ended in 1988 at the battle of Cuito Cuanavale, with the crushing defeat of South Africa's army by Angolan, Cuban, and Namibian combatants. This is the story of Cuba's unparalleled contribution to the fight to free Africa from the scourge of apartheid. And how, in the doing, Cuba's socialist revolution also was strengthened. Harry Villegas is a brigadier general of Cuba's Revolutionary Armed Forces. He is known the world over as "Pombo," the nom de guerre given him by Ernesto Che Guevara, at whose side he worked and fought in Cuba, the Congo, and Bolivia.