{During the “Kagera Operation” that lasted 25 minutes, the Uganda Army used heavy artillery and aerial bombardment to defeat the Tanzanian army who had for 21 days occupied Ugandan territory.}
The retreating Tanzanian army could not defend their other tactical base inside Tanzania. The Ugandan forces followed them inside Tanzania and occupied a territory where they committed heinous crimes against innocent Tanzanians in revenge.
On November 1, 1978, having occupied the Tanzanian territory of approximately 1,870 Sq. km for a whole month, Amin through the Defence Council, issued a public announcement on Radio Uganda about the annexation of the Tanzanian territory.
“We inform the nation and the world at large that new Uganda/Tanzania border is now up to River Kagera [inside Tanzania]. The captured territory will be made a full district of Uganda soon, although the army occupies it temporally,” Amin’s statement read.
“All Tanzanians in the captured area up to River Kagera must know that they are under the direct rule of the Conqueror of the British Empire, Field Marshal Amin. However, they will be treated as brothers and sisters of the people of Uganda.”
Amin came under international pressure, especially from African countries, to withdraw from the occupied Tanzanian territory. Then Nigerian president Lt Gen Olusegun Obasanjo convinced Amin to withdraw his troops from Tanzania.
Earlier, Amin had vowed not to leave Tanzania until president Julius Nyerere writes a written assurance that he would never again invade Uganda, which Nyerere refused to do. Nonetheless, Uganda finally withdrew its troops on November 1, 1978.
Tanzania regroups
By attacking Tanzania, perhaps in self-defence, Amin had humiliated Nyerere and a military defeat was the equivalent Amin would get from Nyerere.
When Uganda withdrew its troops, it gave the Tanzanian army chance to regroup near the Ugandan border. For two months, Tanzanian forces reorganised as they prepared for war and on November 27, 1978, they re-attacked Uganda and overrun the Mutukula Post in Rakai District. The Mutukula II battle was the beginning of the war that deposed Amin.
{{Propaganda war}}
In war, propaganda is a must-employ tool. At the time, no one knew its effectiveness better than Nyerere and the Obote supporters who were in exile in Tanzania.
As a result, Nyerere offered 45 minutes on Radio Tanzania to air well-packaged propaganda in form of news, views and analysis in Luganda and Swahili. The late Sam Odaka, the former minister of Foreign Affairs before the January 1971 coup, was the show host. The programme that aired between 10:15pm to 11pm daily did a lot in breaking the morale of Ugandan soldiers.
Capt Taban Suleiman, a former soldier in the Uganda Army, told Sunday Monitor that propaganda was another tool used to demoralise and divide the army which eventually led to the loss of the war.
One of the lies used was that Amin was a cannibal who ate his own son called Moses. In late November 1978, Radio Tanzania claimed that the much feared General Staff Officer class one (GSO/I) in charge of training and operations, Brig Isaac Maliyamungu, had been dismissed and put under house arrest by Amin.
The radio also declared many senior officers missing in action or said they had crossed to what they called the “liberation army”. Indeed some crossed, including Capt Nkwanga.
While the propaganda worked, it also caused death to some officers such as Brig Yorokamu Tizihwayo, the brigade commander of the western command who was killed in Kasese on suspicion that he was in contact with the enemy (Fronasa) with intent to desert and join them. The show kept on until Kampala fell.
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