Sean Jacobs: Think you know US candidates' views on Africa?

Throughout the 1980s, the Reagan administration operated an open-door policy for African dictators and the racist apartheid regime in South Africa. Ronald Reagan's "constructive engagement" policy in Southern Africa viewed white South Africa as "a country that stood by us in every war we have ever fought, a country that strategically is essential to the free world in its production of minerals." His administration sponsored proxy wars by the apartheid government in Mozambique and Angola. The Angolan "rebel" leader Jonas Savimbi – whose insurgency left thousands dead or homeless – was a regular visitor to the US capital, Washington DC, posing with Reagan on the White House lawn and hobnobbing with congressional leaders. Nightline and 60 Minutes gave ample time to Savimbi. The kleptomaniac Zairian dictator Mobuto Sese Seko,... [read full story]