MAP

Dynamo, but Evil

The surrounding of the 1st Brigade left Spínola with a concerning situation. He rallied his navy, such as it existed now, and commandeered numerous civilian transport and fishing boats around the city. This small fleet traveled along the coast until it reached Quisanga, where 1st Brigade had made its stand against FRELIMO. With the support of the Mozambican Air Force, the frigates and planes fixed FRELIMO’s forces in place with air assaults and naval attacks while the transports pulled in closer to the coast. Throughout the following night, the 1st Brigade loaded onto the ships and slipped out to sea.

1st Brigade traveled by ship from Quisanga to Nacala, where they disembarked and were resupplied just to be thrown back into the action with the intention of joining the effort to retake Nampula from EXTRACA.

Ending the Siege of Tete

Several months after the protracted EXTRACA assault on Tete began, something curious happened as, from their position high in the mountains, the isolated RENAMO brigade descended to join the fray. They had doubled in number, though-- another brigade had joined them from who-knows-where, and suddenly EXTRACA found themselves pinched between Spínola’s forces in the south and RENAMO in the north.

EXTRACA’s commanders on the ground withdrew from the urban fighting over the Revuboe River, a tributary to the Condedezi and both tributaries to the Zambezi River. RENAMO all but controlled the entire Tete Province, now, but EXTRACA still held the border with Malawi and a long stretch of the north bank of the Zambezi. They extended their lines and settled in for a defense of the mountainous region beyond the Revuboe, and dispatched their recent FRELIMO converts to Cana-Cana to hold open a link to the units in the south.

A Bridge Too Close

Dona Ana Railway Bridge was constructed in the 1910s by the British as a way to link coal mines in Nyasaland, now Malawi, with the coast. It crossed the Zambezi River at Mutarara and is the longest railway bridge in Africa and one of three most-reliable passages over the Zambezi River-- the other two being a bridge in Tete and a regular ferry in Caia, both controlled by Spínola’s forces.

Dona Ana Bridge, however, sat squarely in front of EXTRACA and they took advantage to force a crossing.

Outnumbering the hastily-raised settler battalion on the far end of the bridge, they began their crossing in the night. Only as they neared the south bank did they start to receive sporadic fire from the other side, and they returned a similarly poorly-aimed barrage of rifle fire. After a certain amount of advance they realized they could safely lower themselves into the brush and begin a broader advance, and at this point the Beira Battalion was beaten.

Well over two hundred fighters slowly assembled in the woods while a performative struggle was put up by men trying to complete a crossing of the bridge. When the time was right the rest of the unit emerged, attacking the settlers and sending them running along the railroad tracks. They established a defensive line 20kms to the south, but the damage was done.

On the other side of the salient, the newly-arrived EXTRACA Tete Brigade took up positions opposite Tembe-Tembe, with its ferry secured on the far side of the Shire River. These marshes, named by David Livingstone the Elephant Marshes, were treacherous to navigate and they had no intention of trying to march through them. They resolved to cross at Tembe-Tembe or a point to the south.

A subterfuge was planned out, utilizing the superior numbers of the EXTRACA men. Well aware they were being watched, they dispatched a regiment-strength unit to visibly march south, lighting fires every night and so on. The poorly-trained settler troops opposing them stretched out in an effort to cover their side of the river, leaving them exposed.

Several nights in, EXTRACA sent a few teams of men across the Shire in kayaks and other small boats they borrowed from locals. They located around half the guards in the night and silenced them before staging an ultimately successful effort to seize the ferry and take it across the river. The noise alerted the settlers though, and the crossing by the EXTRACA brigade became very bloody. EXTRACA did force a way over the river, but with the loss of around 100 men as they crossed on the slow and exposed ferry under fire. The settlers had it, then, and heavily outnumbered began to fall back towards friendly forces.

March of the Tete Regiment

Unopposed, the EXTRACA Tete Regiment crossed west, marching in broad daylight as far as Maringué without firing a shot. The people of Maringué were largely farmers, largely illiterate, and were precisely the sort of people who had always been the strongest supporters of EXTRACA. The Tete Regiment’s ranks swelled, even to the point they needed to send for more weapons from the base at Mutarara to arm them. This slowed their progress, and several days on Spínola’s forces arrived to check their advance in force. The ensuing fight left numerous EXTRACA men dead and they were put on the defensive, scattering into the countryside to continue their people’s war.

What About FRELIMO?

FRELIMO was having a rough time, with the persistent theft of their many, many guns and weapons and EXTRACA’s thorough penetration of their territory. They likewise were having trouble replenishing their ranks as the fighting went on. A new regiment was raised from the liberated northern territories, but they could not overcome the fact that they had suffered terrible losses at the hands of the Portuguese and were cornered into the most sparsely populated regions of Mozambique. Some joked that if more Russian or Chinese advisors arrived their army would start to look as white as Spínola’s, a sort of dark humor to match these dark times.

EXTRACA’s wildfire success in taking Nampula left them with a far brighter reputation than FRELIMO, and with that came quite a few more recruits than FRELIMO was getting. EXTRACA’s numbers had doubled, tripled in the past years while FRELIMO was simply trying to return to where they were before the Portuguese had nearly destroyed them. Something had to be done. Something had to change.

Effectively they had three full-strength brigades to utilize in an attack. 1st Brigade, marching south from newly-liberated Quisanga. 3rd Brigade, at present occupying the lands south of Cuamba. The Lichinga Brigade, at present occupying the lands east of Cuamba. Between the two disparate forces was a broad 300km stretch of EXTRACA-dominated land, making reunion next to impossible without fighting through hostile territory.

An ambitious plan was therefore developed-- a greater envelopment of all of Spínola’s forces in the north, a massive pincer that would strike towards Pebane from north and west, utilizing all the forces they could muster. The date was set at the first of April, 1972.

Things immediately took a turn for the worse. Bizarrely, the Pemba Force-- formerly deserters-- had declared an allegiance to RENAMO and come out of their defenses to attack the FRELIMO 1st Brigade on the road. These attacks were costly, pushing back the start time for the eastern thrust by several days-- though word did not reach the western brigades in time to stop their attacks.

Fortunately, their offensives started out better. FRELIMO 3rd Brigade deftly drove the settlers assembled to oppose them back, taking Rogone after several days of rather light fighting. They encountered difficulties when counterattacks from the north and south bogged them down. Further north, the Lichinga Brigade was given pause at Entre-Rois, where the settlers held them at the far side of a road bridge and frustrated efforts to cross the river by boat. The holding action and the arrival of the Spínola 1st Brigade at Nampula allowed for the dispatch of the all-Muslim Angoche Battalion to reinforce Entre-Rois, making a crossing all but impossible. The Lichinga Brigade suspended its efforts and reevaluated while the Angoche Battalion redeployed to the south in an effort to head off future efforts.

3rd Brigade kept driving the Errego Settlers back until they lodged into a mountain pass south of Mauaia. At a switchback they dug in, making further advance by the elements of 3rd Brigade giving chase almost impossible without great losses. The rest of 3rd Brigade remained at the Rogone crossroads, fighting off attacks from the north.

Finally the 1st Brigade arrived at the Lurio and made preparations to force an immediate crossing. They were supplemented by the remnants of the 2nd “Brigade” and opposed by the 2nd-3rd Amalgamated Brigade, survivors of the northern pocket. Consistent air support hampered their efforts and caused casualties even before the attack began, and the riverbed of the Lurio left broad, open ground across which they could only run if they accepted the severe casualties it would incur. They attempted to force their way across the bridge at Namapa, but to no avail.

A suspicious halt in EXTRACA attacks during this window also allowed the focusing of additional resources on the defeat of the FRELIMO effort to cross the river, leaving 1st Brigade to absorb the 2nd to reconstitute its losses and settling in.

The Main Event

Nampula, the so-called “Capital of the North”, had fallen to EXTRACA late in 1971-- though not with an intact airstrip owing to the efforts of the defenders. Even so, it was an enormous propaganda victory and by far the brightest feather in EXTRACA’s cap as they perpetrated their people’s war against… everyone else.

With revolutionary fervor, the EXTRACA recruiters had raised the population to defend their city against Spínola’s clique and the reactionaries in RENAMO, with no friendly mention of FRELIMO either. They would need them, as Spínola reacted quickly and with strength. Several battalions of settlers and a month later the 1st Brigade arrived around the city, effectively laying siege to it. Further north, one regiment-sized unit of EXTRACA held open the long, 125km path from the Lurio to Nampula.

It was a convenient place to attack, cutting the neck of the EXTRACA salient and trapping their forces in Nampula. So the plan was, though frustrated by FRELIMO’s attacks to the east and west causing a reshuffle in forces.

For much of the war thus far, EXTRACA had operated with significant initiative imparted to local commanders. The decentralization had allowed the organization to seem to constantly be on the offensive, striking and striking again in all directions and with uncanny accuracy. The truth was less organized: local commanders saw opportunity and struck, each saw themselves as a rising star and pushed their bands of soldiers to propel their star higher still. The effect was a series of constant offensives targeted at locally weak points. Centralization, at this stage, was deemed detrimental.

Hence, seeing an opportunity to relieve Nampula, the commander of the Maua Brigade struck south towards Alupa, occupied by the 4th Brigade. This attack had the effect of spoiling Spínola’s own attack on the Nampula salient, though only by days. The days proved critical, however, as it gave the less experienced Nampula Brigade time to march to the aid of the beleaguered Mecuburi Regiment, attacked by forces three times their strength. The more even fight saw an exceedingly narrow path held open, but Spínola’s forces eventually wrapped around north of Mecuburi and cut that off too.

Whatever deleterious effect this would’ve had on a standard army, the EXTRACA forces managed to live off the kindness of the Mozambican people for the time being. Their greatest concerns were ammunition and weapons, no longer being shuttled through with regularity, but fallen reactionaries helped to supplement that. Each dead soldier of Spínola armed another EXTRACA soldier.

The fighting in Nampula was fierce, but the reactionaries were tired in the case of the 1st Brigade or inexperienced in the case of the settlers. EXTRACA’s people were motivated, well supported by the population, but also inexperienced. The fighting took place on the streets, with citizens providing important intelligence to EXTRACA and misleading Spínola’s men. Numerous traps were laid and sprung this way until the settlers began shooting citizens who attempted to do so, which solved the trap problem but simultaneously galvanized the population totally against them.

The year saw great privation in the city, but it held strong against Spínola.

Later in the year the siege was broken as the Nampula Brigade finally drove a wedge between Spínola’s formations where they’d cut off the salient. With the restoration of a supply route to Nampula, more guns stolen from FRELIMO and ammunition that had been sitting, backlogged, in a growing depot in Nanripo filtered through.

In October the Nacala Settler Regiment finally gave up the ghost and withdrew to its start positions east of Mecuburi. Fighting in the west continued, but news of this had an unexpected consequence-- the last major holdout of “renegades” in Montepuez had a mutiny, with the common soldiers overthrowing the “warlords” and declaring support for EXTRACA, who they viewed as the new dominant force for the liberation of Mozambique. Unfortunately, with no officers they had little in the way of direction and remained behind their fortification in Montepuez, waiting for someone from EXTRACA to tell them what to do-- sure to be a long wait, owing to the organization's decentralized structure.

The year ended with a hero in Nampula, a skillful tactician named Emanuel Freire, emerging as the closest thing to a leader for EXTRACA. His steady leadership in the pocket and the union of the forces therein under his own “command” had placed him as among the most powerful figures in an organization deliberately lacking such figures. Freire, styled by his brothers in arms “General Freire”, ended the year by recalling the Nampula Brigade-- now with several months’ experience-- to the city whose name they carried and launched an attack to expand their grasp to the surroundings of the city. Largely successful, if only because Spínola’s forces gave ground, the attack only helped to build General Freire’s reputation.