After Operation Savannah had failed to prevent the ascension of the MPLA in Angola, the South African political leadership generally accepted that reversing that verdict by force was unrealistic. At the same time, Vorster and Botha had recognised that a total military defeat of PLAN was elusive without the impossible corollary of a victory over the combined FAPLA-PLAN alliance in Angola. Some hardliners in their respective administrations wanted South Africa's full military weight behind Savimbi to help him extinguish the MPLA government, while others favoured simply using it to wage a limited containment exercise against PLAN. An offensive strategy which offered the chance to aggressively attack Angola by land, sea, and air and focus directly on the MPLA's centres of power was never discussed and became more remote as time went on. In its place, therefore, the other popular option was promulgated, which was to focus chiefly on fighting PLAN, the primary threat within the geographical limits of South West Africa proper, and attempting to intimidate Angola in the form of punitive cross-border raids, thus assuming an essentially defensive posture.