HISTORY PAPER 1 GRADE 12 ADDENDUM - NSC PAST PAPERS AND MEMOS NOVEMBER 2017
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GRADE 12
NATIONAL SENIOR CERTIFICATE
ADDENDUM
NOVEMBER 2017
QUESTION 1: HOW DID THE DEPLOYMENT OF SOVIET MISSILES IN CUBA INTENSIFY COLD WAR TENSIONS BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND THE SOVIET UNION?
SOURCE 1A
The source below outlines Fidel Castro's negotiations with Nikita Khrushchev about the deployment of missiles in Cuba.
| By 1962 Castro's Cuba was well established as an enemy of the United States. Two years earlier the Eisenhower administration had hired members of the Mafia to assassinate Castro and had begun training anti-Castro Cuban exiles for an invasion of their homeland. The Kennedy administration inherited the project that led to the Bay of Pigs. After this misbegotten [bad] affair, the Kennedy administration sponsored a CIA campaign of harassment and sabotage [of Castro and his supporters]. Castro, again not unreasonably, turned to the Soviet Union as Cuba's protector. He hoped, through a proclamation or an alliance or Soviet conventional military aid, to deter [discourage] American aggression. He did not request, nor did he want, nuclear missiles. This was Khrushchev's idea. 'When Castro and I talked about the problem,' Khrushchev recalled in his memoirs, 'we argued and argued. Our argument was very heated. But, in the end, Fidel agreed with me.' Castro reluctantly accepted nuclear missiles, as he later said, 'not in order to ensure our own defence, but primarily to strengthen socialism on the international plane [level]'. He then asked Khrushchev to go public when he delivered the missiles. 'Why do it secretly as if we had no right to do it?' After all, the Soviet Union had every right under international law to send the missiles and Cuba had every right to receive them. 'I warned Nikita that secrecy would hand the imperialists the advantage.' Fortunately for the imperialists Khrushchev did not follow Castro's advice. Had he done so, it would have been far harder to force the missiles out. Khrushchev's secrecy played into Kennedy's hands. |
SOURCE 1B
This aerial photograph was taken by Major Heyser from an American U-2 spy plane on 14 October 1962. The labelling in the photograph below was added by the American intelligence service (CIA).
SOURCE 1C
The source below is a transcript of a televised speech that President Kennedy delivered to the American nation on 22 October 1962. It outlines the steps that Kennedy intended to take against the deployment of Soviet missiles in Cuba.
| Acting in the defence of our own security and of the entire Western Hemisphere, I have directed that the following initial steps be taken immediately: First: To halt this offensive [invasive] build-up, a strict quarantine [blockade] on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being initiated. All ships of any kind bound for Cuba, from whatever nation or port will, if found to contain cargoes of offensive weapons, be turned back … Second: I have directed the continued and increased close surveillance of Cuba and its military build-up … I have directed the Armed Forces to prepare for any eventualities [possibilities] … Third: It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States, requiring a full retaliatory [avenging] response upon the Soviet Union ... Sixth: … Our resolution will call for the prompt dismantling and withdrawal of all offensive weapons in Cuba, under the supervision of United Nations observers, before the quarantine can be lifted. Seventh and finally: I call upon Chairman Khrushchev to halt and eliminate this clandestine [secret], reckless and provocative [confrontational] threat to world peace and to stabilise relations between our two nations. I call upon him further to abandon this course of world domination … and withdrawing these weapons from Cuba by refraining from any action which will widen or deepen the present crisis and then participating in a search for peaceful and permanent solutions. |
SOURCE 1D
The source below is part of a letter that Nikita Khrushchev (Soviet President) wrote to John F Kennedy (US President) on 26 October 1962. Khrushchev stated that he was prepared to withdraw missiles from Cuba on condition that the United States of America stopped the blockade of Soviet missiles to Cuba.
| … You have been worried over our assisting Cuba with arms designed to strengthen its defensive potential because Cuba, no matter what weapons it had, could not compare with you … Our intention has been and is to help Cuba, and no one can challenge the humanity of our motives aimed at allowing Cuba to live peacefully and develop as its people desire. You want to relieve your country from danger and this is understandable. You are worried over Cuba. You say that it worries you because it lies at a distance of ninety miles across the sea from the shores of the Unites States. However, Turkey lies next to us. Our sentinels [guards] are pacing up and down and are watching each other. Do you believe that you have the right to demand security for your country and the removal of such weapons that you qualify as offensive, while not recognising this right for us? You have stationed devastating rocket weapons, which you call offensive, in Turkey literally next to us … This is why I make this proposal: We agree to move those weapons from Cuba which you regard as offensive weapons. We agree to do this and to state this commitment in the United Nations … The United States, on its part, bearing in mind the anxiety and concern of the Soviet state, will evacuate its analogous [similar] weapons from Turkey. … the Soviet government gives a solemn pledge to respect the integrity of the frontiers and the sovereignty of Turkey, not to intervene in its domestic affairs, not to invade Turkey, nor to make available its territory as a place d'armes [military base] for such invasion, and also will restrain those who would think of launching an aggression against Turkey from Soviet territory … |
QUESTION 2:
WHY DID CUBA BECOME INVOLVED IN THE ANGOLAN CIVIL WAR IN 1975?
SOURCE 2A
The source below highlights how various Angolan liberation movements were assisted by foreign powers after the collapse of the Alvor Agreement.
| … Attempts by the Portuguese government to assist with Angola's independence were made through the Alvor Agreement in January 1975. … a coalition government by leading political role-players was given the responsibility of governing Angola from 31 January 1975 until independence on 11 November 1975. Both the Alvor Agreement and the coalition government had been strongly endorsed [supported], particularly by other African states through the OAU (Organisation of African Unity) but without results. Heavy fighting broke out among the three former liberation movements (MPLA, FNLA and UNITA) in July 1975, and the coalition government collapsed … As the conflict escalated, each movement turned to its old allies from the struggle for independence for military hardware and personnel. During the transitional period, foreign powers became increasingly involved in the situation in Angola, rapidly expanding into an East-West power struggle and an extension of the Cold War … The question of 'who came first' has been the subject of much debate. It is clear that Cuba had been involved in Angola through its support for the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) since the early 1960s, and that the Soviet Union had also supported the MPLA. |
SOURCE 2B
The source below is an extract from a letter dated 26 January 1975. It was written by the leader of the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), Agostinho Neto, while visiting Dar es Salaam. It was sent to the Cuban government requesting military assistance.
Dar es Salaam, 26 January 1975
We also urge the Communist Party of Cuba to use its influence with other countries that are its friends and allies, especially from the Socialist camp, so that they can grant useful and timely aid to our movement, which is the only guarantee of a democratic and progressive Angola in the future. |
Related Items
SOURCE 2C
Below is an extract from a speech delivered by the Cuban Prime Minister, Fidel Castro, in Havana on 19 April 1976. He outlines the reasons for Cuba's assistance to the MPLA.
| On 5 November 1975, at the request of the MPLA, the leadership of our party decided to send with great urgency a battalion [division] of regular troops and anti-tank weapons to help the Angolan patriots resist the invasion of the South African racists. This was the first Cuban troop unit sent to Angola … Cuba alone bears the responsibility of taking that decision. The USSR had always helped the people of the Portuguese colonies in their struggle for independence, provided besieged [surrounded] Angola with basic military equipment and collaborated [cooperated] with us when imperialism had cut off practically all our air routes to Africa. But it never requested that a single Cuban be sent to that country. The USSR is extraordinarily respectful and careful in its relations with Cuba. A decision of that nature could only be made by our own party. Ford and Kissinger lie to the people of the United States and to world public opinion when they try to place the responsibility for Cuba's action in solidarity with Angola on the Soviet Union. |
SOURCE 2D
The American cartoon below depicts the involvement of the Soviet Union and Cuba in Angola after 1975.
QUESTION 3:
HOW DID THE BLACK POWER MOVEMENT MOBILISE AFRICAN AMERICANS DURING THE 1960s?
SOURCE 3A
The extract below outlines Stokely Carmichael's explanation regarding the philosophy of Black Power.
| The concept of Black Power … is a call for black people in this country to unite, to recognise their heritage, to build a sense of community. It is a call for black people to begin to define their own goals, to lead their own organisations and to support those organisations … Black Power therefore calls for black people to consolidate [unite] behind their own, so that they can bargain from a position of strength ... The ultimate values and goals are not domination or exploitation of other groups, but rather an effective share in the total power of the society … One of the tragedies of the struggle against racism is that up to this point, there has been no national organisation that could speak to the growing militancy of young black people in the urban ghettos and the Black Belt South (areas in the south of America which were predominantly occupied by African Americans). There has been only a 'civil rights' movement, whose tone of voice was adapted to an audience of middle-class whites. It served as a sort of buffer [barrier] zone between that audience and angry young blacks. It claimed to speak for the needs of a community, but it did not speak in the tone of that community. None of its so-called leaders could go into a rioting community and be listened to. 'Integration' as a goal today speaks to the problem of blackness, not only in an unrealistic way, but also in a despicable [shameful] way. It is based on complete acceptance of the fact that in order to have a decent house or education, black people must move into a white neighbourhood or send their children to a white school. This reinforces, among both black and white, the idea that 'white' is automatically superior and 'black' is by definition inferior. For this reason, 'integration' is a subterfuge [strategy] for the maintenance of white supremacy. |
SOURCE 3B
Below is an extract from Malcolm X's speech 'The Ballot or the Bullet', which he delivered in Detroit on 12 April 1964. It outlines the need for African Americans to take up arms to fight for their freedom.
| … We're all in the same bag, in the same boat. We suffer political oppression, economic exploitation and social degradation [humiliation], all of them from the same enemy. The government has failed us, you can't deny that. Anytime you live in the twentieth century, 1964 and you're walking around here singing 'We Shall Overcome', the government has failed us. This is part of what's wrong with you, you do too much singing. Today it's time to stop singing and start swinging [fighting]. You can't sing up on freedom, but you can swing up on some freedom. Cassius Clay [Muhammad Ali] can sing, but singing didn't help him to become the heavy-weight champion of the world, swinging helped him become the heavy-weight champion. This government has failed us, the government itself has failed us and the white liberals who have been posing as our friends have failed us. And once we see that all these sources to which we've turned have failed, we stop turning to them and turn to ourselves. We need a self-help programme, a do-it-yourself philosophy [thinking], a do-it-right-now philosophy, an it's-already-too-late philosophy. This is what you and I need …, and the only way we are going to solve our problem is with a self-help programme. Before we can get a self-help programme started, we have to have a self-start philosophy. |
SOURCE 3C
The photograph below shows two African American women who received food parcels from the Black Panther Party.
SOURCE 3D
The source below explains how the US federal agents tried to destabilise the Black Panther Party.
| In attacking the Black Panthers as enemies of the state, federal agents sought to repress [limit] not just the Party as an organisation, but the political possibility it represented. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Counterintelligence Programme (COINTELPRO) sought to vilify [belittle] the Black Panthers and 'prevent [the Party and similar] Black Nationalist groups and leaders from gaining respectability by discrediting them'. FBI director, J Edgar Hoover, emphasised time and again in different ways that 'one of our primary aims in counterintelligence, as it concerns the BPP (Black Panther Party), is to keep this group isolated from the moderate black and white community which may support it'. Federal agents sought 'to create factionalism [division]' among Party leaders and between the Panthers and other black political organisations. FBI operatives forged documents and paid provocateurs [people who were paid to create instability within the Black Panther Party] to promote violent conflicts between Black Panther leaders as well as between the Party and other black nationalist organisations, and congratulated themselves when these conflicts yielded [led to] the killing of members of the Panthers. And COINTELPRO sought to lead the Party into unsupportable action, 'creating opposition to the BPP on the part of the majority of the residents of the ghetto areas'. For example, on the government payroll they supplied explosives to Black Panther members and sought to incite [provoke] them to blow up public buildings and they promoted kangaroo courts encouraging Panther members to torture suspected informants. |
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Visual sources and other historical evidence were taken from the following:
Burnet, A (ed.). 2013. Chambers Book of Great Speeches (Chambers Harrap)
Castro, F. 1981. Fidel Castro Speeches: Cuba's International Foreign Policy 1975–1980 (Pathfinder)
http://cartoonmuseum.eu/en/cartoons/ussr-cuba-angola/
http://cdn.history.com/sites/2/2015/07/hith-cuban-missile-crii.jpg
http://inthesetimes.com/article/15949/how_the_fbi_conspired_to_destroy_the_black_panther party
http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/cold.war/episodes/17/documents/angola/
https://americaradioworks.publicradio.org
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/17/d6/84/17d684cef3691bcba2674fcb6dc 68250.jpg]
Kennedy, RF. 1971. Thirteen Days – A Memoir of the Cuban Missile (WW Norton & Company)
Ture, K and Hamilton, CV. 1967. Black Power – The Politics of Liberation (Vintage)
Tvedten, I. 1997. Angola. Struggle for Peace and Reconstruction (Westview Press)
