The total onslaught and the total strategy : adaptations to the security intelligence decision-making structures under P.W. Botha's administration
In the years after Mr P W Botha became Prime Minister of South Africa, it became generally noticed that the military as an ins ti tu ti on had become a more important actor within the central decision-making structures. While this excited a great deal of contemporary comment, few appreciated that this represented not necessarily a formal coup, but rather the culmination of a meticulously planned counter-revolutionary strategy - the response of the Botha government to a perceived "total onslaught". This study traces the rise of the "total onslaught" rhetoric and links it to changes which occurred in the security intelligence apparatus. It describes the structure of the National Security Management System (NSMS) in detail, and it advances various arguments in an attempt to assess the significance of the changes which have occurred in the decision-making structures, as well as the efficacy and durability of the NSMS. The study concludes that, because of the dedication of its proponents and because of its efficiency, the NSMS may afford the regime a breathing-space, but that ultimately the international environment, and internal demographic and economic pressures are such as to make the degenerative collapse of the regime a more likely long-term scenario.
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