However, most of its attempts to spread Communism were initially focused on Europe and this did not prevent Lenin and Stalin from trying to force all the former territories of the Russian Empire into the Soviet Union.

Joseph Stalin had a fleeting interest in claiming the former Italian colony of Tripolitania in modern-day Libya, but the NATO containment policy blocked those efforts.

[4] Soviet leaders, beginning with Nikita Khrushchev, were excited by the enthusiastic young black Africans who first came to Moscow for a major youth festival in 1957.

Patrice Lumumba Peoples' Friendship University was established in Moscow in 1960 to provide higher education to students from developing countries.

Second it wanted to gain a voice in African affairs, primarily by supporting local communist parties, and providing economic and military aid to the governments.

The favorite technique therefore was to identify the Soviet Union with the rising tide of nationalism – to demonstrate that they in Moscow were engaged in a common struggle against Western imperialism.

[8] Moscow also expected that the Soviet model of industrialization and nationalization would prove attractive, but that approach did not resonate with the nationalistic forces, which were black based on the small middle class and were socializing the means of production.

The Soviet Union was the first country in the world to recognize the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic in 1962 by establishing diplomatic relations a few months before the official proclamation of its independence.

Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces soldiers, however did not engage in combat, and after the overthrow of Castro's friend Ben Bella, Cuba cut back its involvement.

The United States, Egypt, Belgium, and France supported Morocco, and Algeria was increasingly identified with the Soviet side of the Cold War.

[16] Facing enormous turmoil in the newly independent Republic of the Congo (Léopoldville), Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba, the charismatic leader of the Mouvement National Congolais, reacted by calling for assistance from the Soviet Union.

[17] The involvement of the Soviets split the Congolese government and led to an impasse between Lumumba and conservative President Joseph Kasa-Vubu, who was anti-communist.

President Kasa-Vubu used his command of the army to launch a coup d'état, expelling the Soviet advisors and establishing a new government under his own control.

A rival government, the "Free Republic of the Congo", was founded in the eastern city of Stanleyville by Lumumba supporters, led by Antoine Gizenga.

The Kremlin supported Gizenga, but did not want to take the international risks involved in delivering material aid to the blockaded Orientale Province.

[18] In the 1950s, Gamal Abdel Nasser began to follow an anti-imperialist policy that earned him enthusiastic support from the Communist government of the USSR.

[23] Soviet foreign policy in Somalia and Ethiopia was based on the Horn of Africa's strategic location for international trade and shipping as well as its military importance.

[28] President John F. Kennedy eagerly sought to establish good relations with newly independent African nations in the wake of Khrushchev's 1961 speech that proclaimed the USSR's intention to intervene in anticolonial struggles around the world.

Since most nations in Europe, Latin America, and Asia had already chosen sides, Kennedy and Khrushchev both looked to Africa as the next Cold War battleground.

Under the leadership of Ahmed Sékou Touré, the former French colony of Guinea in West Africa proclaimed its independence in 1958 and immediately sought foreign aid.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower was hostile to Touré, so the African nation quickly turned to the Soviet Union—making it the Kremlin's first success story in Africa.

[16] The South African government evoked the term rooi gevaar to refer the political and military threat posed by the Soviet Union's support for the guerrilla wings of anti-apartheid movements such as SWAPO and the ANC.