Needed: A Divine Force

THE CONGO

A band of Simbas lay in ambush along the road leading into Poko, a small missionary town in the rebel re doubt of the upper Congo. Through "the jungle telephone," an advancing column of white mercenaries learned of the trap, cut through the bush and entered the town from the rear. As their skirmish line entered Poko, the whites were surprised to see the Simbas rush toward them jubilantly, their right arms raised in the rebel salute and shouting the rebel yell of "Mai Mulele!" It did not take the mercenaries long to realize that the Simbas took them for Russians, come to fight on their side. The Simbas' disappointment was short lived: the mercenaries gunned them down to a man.

But help was indeed on its way to the Congo's rebels -and some of it from Russia.

Rebel Airlift. Last week into Khartoum, capital of the Sudan, winged planeload after planeload of arms and ammunition bound for the Congo from Ghana, Algeria and Egypt. Secrecy hung thick as a cloud of Sudanese flies around the British-built Comets and Russian turboprop AN-12s as they transshipped their cargoes to smaller aircraft. Although the Sudanese government cynically claimed that the tarpaulin-covered crates carried nothing more dangerous than "medical supplies," they must have been the world's heaviest bandages.

After transfer at Khartoum, the guns were flown on to Juba, capital of Sudan's Equatoria province, then loaded onto captured trucks and Land-Rovers for a jouncing ride over jungle tracks to the Congo border 150 miles away.

With them, said Washington, went at least 40 Algerians, presumably military advisers to Rebel President Christophe Gbenye's wild-eyed warriors. Sensing a chance to make a few easy points with African leaders. Moscow announced that it would replenish any supplies that had been sent to the rebels. Moreover, Algiers' Boufarik airbase was aswarm with Russian technicians and aviators, many of whom no doubt were flying the Juba run, since Algerian pilots have not yet had time to check out in the Soviet-built AN-12s.

Peace Is Something Else. The rebels were also getting help in the United Nations (see above). Congolese Premier Moise Tshombe himself stayed away--largely at the urging of the U.S., which did not want the U.N. debate complicated further by Tshombe's presence, which would inevitably antagonize the other Africans. Instead, Tshombe flew into Rome for a 20-minute audience with Pope Paul VI, was greeted by turbulent Red-led riots and rotten eggs. He had better luck in conversations with Italian officials and businessmen, who seemed ready to expand trade with the Congo. "The Congo will soon know peace," he predicted with his unquenchably optimistic grin. "But a durable peace cannot be achieved with arms alone. It needs a divine force. That is why I came to see the Pope and ask him to pray for our country."

The prayers he got, but peace is something else again in a war where cruelty is common to both sides. Last week thousands of Congolese suspected of rebel sympathies were herded into the Stanleyville stadium and tried "by acclamation." Those found guilty were taken to the Congo's banks and either shot, or thrown in, to be eaten by crocodiles. But the Simbas still took the palm for bloodthirstiness. In one town they raped 19 nuns, including a 60-year-old Dutch sister, then hacked to death an American, Sister Marie Antoinette, before the others' eyes. In Isangi, six Belgians were devoured not by crocodiles but by cannibals.

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