TIME MARCH 20 1978 RE EXTERNAL RAID

From a hidden position on the southern shore of the Zambezi River, Rhodesian soldiers near the town of Kanyemba last week saw about 100 armed guerrillas in camouflage fatigues, paddling in rubber boats across the river—the border between Zambia and Rhodesia. The Rhodesians opened fire, and Canberra and Hawker Hunter jets soon joined the battle. So began Rhodesia's first admitted "external" (i.e., incursion) into Zambian territory—a two-day raid that destroyed an arms cache and a command camp of Joshua Nkomo's 8,000-man guerrilla army. Rhodesia announced that the "self-defense" raid—"It was a beautiful op, smooth as butter," said one officer in Salisbury—killed 38 guerrillas at the cost of one white Rhodesian trooper. Insisting that industrial targets had been hit as well, Zambia announced it would seek U.N. condemnation of the raid.

Critics of Prime Minister Ian Smith cited the bloody incident as proof that his announced plan to bring majority rule to Rhodesia by next year would lead to escalation, rather than cessation, of the five-year-old guerrilla war. Smith's "internal settlement," negotiated with three moderate black nationalists, excludes Patriotic Front Leaders Nkomo and Robert Mugabe, who flew to New York last week to address a session of the U.N. Security Council on Rhodesia that had been requested by 49 African nations. "We would do anything to block the Smith settlement here," said Tanzania's U.N. Ambassador Salim A. Salim, "because otherwise it would have to be blocked militarily on the scene." British intelligence analysts say that two Cuban regiments, as well as 200 Soviet tanks and 20 crated MiG-21 fighters, are now positioned in Mozambique, Mugabe's main base of operations. Nkomo last week denied that he had invited Cuban advisers to join his Zambian-based guerrillas. But his strong supporter, Zambia's moderately pro-Western President Kenneth Kaunda, has threatened that he might request Soviet and Cuban aid to defend his country from Rhodesian attacks. On the other hand, TIME Nairobi Bureau Chief David Wood reported, a Soviet diplomat in Lusaka, Zambia's capital, argues that a Cuban intervention is unlikely, since it would almost certainly provoke South African reinforcement of Smith's forces.

Smith's agreement with the country's moderate black leaders—Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Chief Jeremiah Chirau and the Rev. Ndabaningi Sithole—envisions a transitional period of evolution toward majority rule during which whites (who number about 264,000 in Rhodesia's population of 7 million) would be guaranteed 28 of 100 parliamentary seats for at least ten years. The present Rhodesian Parliament, which is totally dominated by whites, would have to approve any new constitution. During an interim period, expected to begin within a matter of weeks, Smith will share executive authority with the three black leaders and will have veto power, in effect, since decisions made by the four must be unanimous.