No the reference to "gun smuggling" is to the Basque troubles in Northern Spain , late 70's and the reference to "from Africa the winds they talk of change is coming" and " the hands that set the farms alight" is to the Rhodesian bush war, in what is now Zimbabwe, also in the late 70's. Makes sense. Al Stewart wrote the song in 1976. All about the dying days of colonialism in Africa.
No the reference to "gun smuggling" is to the Basque troubles in Northern Spain , late 70's and the reference to "from Africa the winds they talk of change is coming" and " the hands that set the farms alight" is to the Rhodesian bush war, in what is now Zimbabwe, also in the late 70's. Makes sense. Al Stewart wrote the song in 1976. All about the dying days of colonialism in Africa.