The sixties will be remembered as the decade of independence for most of Africa, independence won for the most part at the negotiating table. All too frequently the parties negotiating on behalf of African countries were a carefully cultivated elite who simply replaced the colonial administrators and set the stage for the growth of neocolonialism, coups, and counter coups. Unlike Britain and France, Portugal, until its 1974 revolution, refused to relinquish its colonies in Africa–Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, and Angola.

Guinea-Bissau, a small country on the west coast of Africa, had been a colony of Portugal for 500 years. For most of this period the relationship was one of trading. Portugal was not interested in political control so long as it had access to slaves and other goods. But with the “scramble for Africa” at the end of the nineteenth century, Portugal changed its attitude. Africa was being greedily divided up by the imperial powers and Portugal realized that unless it entrenched its presence and took political control, it might lose out altogether. With the coming to power of Salazar and a fascist dictatorship in Portugal in 1926, the control became both brutal and complete.

In 1956 the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC) was founded by Amilcar Cabral and a few country people. At first PAIGC's goal was to organize workers in the towns, hoping that through demonstrations and strikes they would convince the Portuguese to negotiate for independence. It soon became clear that this was not going to happen. Each demonstration was met with violence, until the 1959 massacre of fifty dockworkers holding a peaceful demonstration at Pidgiguiti. This was a turning point for PAIGC: they realized that independence could not be won without an armed struggle, one that had to be based on the mass participation of the people. They turned their focus to the countryside and to mobilizing the peasants, who represented 95 percent of the population.