Early efforts focus on Africa as the main object of imperial expansion despite its relative...

Early efforts focus on Africa as the main object of imperial expansion despite its relative unimportance to Britain’s economy.

Br. Prime min., Benjamin Disraeli proposes imperial expansion which will:

Several problems for Britain after 1870:

FC. 122 EUROPEAN IMPERIAL EXPANSION INTO AFRICA (c.1870-1914)German unific. & Balkan turmoil upset balance of power (FC.119)

Spread of Ind. Rev. outside

Britain (FC.116)

Social changes brought by Ind..

Rev. (FC.113)

Improvements in milit. tech.

(FC.117)

Vaccines vs. trop. diseases

(FC.117)

When new lands to colonize are gone Rising tensions in Eur. helps lead to WWI (FC.126)

WWII Eur. weak & natives use Eur.

tech. & ideas of to win indep.

(FC.151)

Protect Br’s econ. interests overseas

Provide new mkts. & resources

Tensions b/w Br & Boers Boer War Br.

takes S. Afr.

Leopold II of Belgium seizes & mercilessly exploits the Congo

Br. conquers Sudan to keep it from

blocking Nile R.

Scramble for colonies by other Eur. powers who want to keep up w/Britain Most of Africa carved up into colonies by 1914

Brit. seizes Egypt to guard its interests in Suez Canal

Henry Stanley’s travel account Interest in Afr.

Br. conquers Zulus in S. Afr to protect Dutch Boers

Enhance Britain’s internat’l prestige

Hard to compete vs cheap labor & newer factories

Brit. feels powerless to stop these changes &

econ. depression in 1873

More complex soc Harder to unite politically

Arbitrary borders drawn w/o respect for tribal divisions splits some tribes while throwing

others together

Benefits of Eur. Civ. (schools, RR’s, etc.) offset by suffering &

humiliation caused by European rule

Other politicians, not wanting to lose popularity, also support imperialism

1870-1920s: Colonies run more by private investors than Eur. govt’s:

Colon. powers cut involvement in Afr. colon’s (c.1920-45)

Rising desire & expectations for indep., but Eur. powers renew interest in Afr. Col’s “2nd Colon. Invasion” (1945-60) :

New African nations face severe problems largely as legacy of colonialism:

Eur’s (c.1870-1914)Break up some tribes & throw other previously hostile ones together (FC.122)

FC 151. COLONIAL AND POST COLONIAL AFRICA (c.1870-2000)

Post WWI slump Mkts & prices for Afr. Goods fall (FC.131)

WWII (FC.136)

Col. Schools indoctrinate Afr’s w/Chr. & Eur. ideologies

Misrule & outside contact Drastic pop. decl. (e.g., flu pandemic in 1918)

Col. Gov’s use“indirect rule” through local tribal chiefs

Eur. govt’s cut budgets for Afr. Colon.admin’s

Sell off many colon. Assets to pay war debts

White settlers seize more lands & est. Apartheid in S. Africa Uprisings

Overbearing state intervention in Afr. econ’s: More intensive agr. & irrig

Programs that are over-managed & inappropriate for Afr. conditions Eur. countries give up on them Most col’s get ind. in 1960s but according to arbitrary Eur. boundaries that divide some tribes & throw previously hostile ones together

WWI involves Afr. troops Rising discontent (FC.127)

Trend toward socialistic managed econ’s (FC.138)

Post war econ. boom for Afr. products(FC.138)

Missionary soc’s close many schools & churches

White settlers are subsidized & take land from Afr. farmers

WWII (FC.136)

Scares off new foreign investors

W. corp’s still own Afr. resources No $ for Afr ec’s

Old colon. bound’s No nat’l cohesionCorrupt dictators

Soc. stability disrupted by pop. explos., diseases like AIDS & moderniz. w/nothing to replace trad. tribal structures & values

Deteriorating envir. Famines

Wars and genocide






WWII (FC.136)














WWII (FC.136)










WWII (FC.136)






WWII (FC.136)











WWII (FC.136)

Viewing Khrushchev & the Soviet leadership as revisionists going soft on capitalism, Mao tried to claim leadership of the world communist revolution in the undeveloped nations of Africa & Asia.

“Awakened peoples, you will certainly attain the ultimate victory.” (1963)







WWII (FC.136)













WWII (FC.136)







WWII (FC.136)














WWII (FC.136)

1950-591960-69After 1970

Before 1950Decolonization








WWII (FC.136)














WWII (FC.136)




Traditional ethnic boundaries of Africa








WWII (FC.136)














WWII (FC.136)











WWII (FC.136)














WWII (FC.136)





Wars and genocide








WWII (FC.136)














WWII (FC.136)

Scares off new foreign investors





Wars and genocide

African wars & their duration since independence

African governments & their duration

African genocide: Biafra

Biafra: a microcosm of post-colonial Africa.

While it’s dangerous to generalize about Africa based on one or two examples, what happened in Nigeria in the 1960s reflects to a large extent problems that affected the continent as a whole. Nigeria, like most sub-Saharan colonies that became “nations”, was an artificial construct made up of a random collection of peoples who happened to live within the conveniently marked boundaries established by the colonial power, in this case Britain. Whatever ethnic divisions existed during the colonial period were overshadowed by the common desire for independence according to whatever boundaries that might mean.Below: Nigerians celebrate their newly won independence in 1960

The Nigeria that won its independence in 1960 was a very loosely federated collection of three main ethnic areas consisting of the Muslim Hausa and Fulani in the north, the Yoruba in the southwest, and the Ibo in the oil-rich southeast. Probably because of oil, the British had developed the southeast more. As a result, the Ibo were better educated, holding positions as merchants, teachers, and soldiers who were scattered across Nigeria in their various trades. To other ethnic groups, they represented Nigerian nationalism and modernization. Being the upper class, they were also widely resented by other groups as being part of a conspiracy to make Nigeria a nation in their image and for their benefit.

Given the ramshackle nature of Nigeria, its experiment with democracy collapsed in 1966 in a series of three military coups, the first two headed by Ibo officers, the last one by major general Yakubu Gawon, who was not Ibo. This last coup helped trigger an anti-Ibo vendetta across the nation. In the north, the poorer Hausa turned on their Ibo neighbors, slaughtering 40,000 of them. One eye-witness, Olu Oguibe, saw “whole families set ablaze by their neighbours in the middle of the night, children hacked to death in their sleep, women violated by men who only the previous day would have doffed their hats to them,…some men burnt at the stake, some decapitated, others hounded through the streets and stoned, while their adversaries gambled for their clothes.” To the Western press and public, ignoring and/or ignorant of the colonial forces that set these events into motion, these massacres were just proof of African savagery.

Meanwhile, some two million other Ibo fled to their native lands in the southeast, and a Colonel Emeka Ojukwu unilaterally declared the southeast as the independent nation of Biafra. Gawon wasn’t about to let an oil rich area such as that break away, so he invaded. The Biafrans were able to defeat Gawon’s forces, but not before they had damaged much of the country’s agriculture. Therefore, Gawon decided to starve Biafra into submission by seizing the delta of the Niger River & cutting off vital supplies inland.

What starvation and Gawon’s soldiers didn’t accomplish, other ethnic groups did while the soldiers watched them massacre the Ibo population.

In December 1968, the Red Cross reported that 14,000 Biafrans, mostly women and children, were dying each day.

The outside world wringed its hands in horror, but did nothing to help. Britain, which got 10% of its oil from Biafra, supported Gawon and supplied him with weapons to secure their oil supply. France, under the pretext of humanitarianism, supported Biafra hoping the breakup of Nigeria would help its smaller former colonies in the region. Both sides hired professional mercenaries, mainly from Europe, who also committed atrocities under the cover of it being war. All these measures did nothing but prolong Biafra’s agony.

In January 1970 Biafran resistance finally collapsed, by which time two million Biafrans had starved to death.

The Angolan Civil War (1975-2002)

Sometimes, newly formed African nations also got caught up in the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union. Angola was one such country. As a Portuguese colony on the southwest coast of Africa, Angola gained its independence in 1975, one of the last African colonies to do so. Almost immediately a three-way struggle broke out between with the U.S.-backed National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FLNA), the Cuban backed Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), and the South African supported Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA). Being in the aftermath of Vietnam, Congress wasn’t about to pour money and resources into another war, so the Cubans succeeded in defeating both UNITA and the FLNA.

All this settled nothing, as civil war resumed, the MPLA being backed by the Soviets and Cubans and funded by control of Angola’s oil fields, the opposition, UNITA, backed by the U.S. and South Africa and using the country’s diamond fields to pay for its war.

Since oil and diamonds represent an estimated $2 billion in revenue per year for Angola, funneling these huge financial resources to buy weapons meant both sides were well-armed and able to continue the civil war for years. Oftentimes, the pattern in these wars was for the side that was losing to wage a guerilla war until it was rearmed and able to go back on the offensive. Therefore, as long as there was a market for oil and diamonds, both sides could fight almost indefinitely. Meanwhile, American corporations such as Chase Manhattan Bank and Gulf Oil continued business as usual.

In addition, between 5,000 and 8,000 underage girls had been forced into marriage by UNITA militants. Reportedly, they would be sent out to find food and, if they failed to bring back enough, they didn’t eat. UNITA leaders were also rewarded for victories by being given women for sexual services and abuse. One girl from Uganda was kidnapped and given to a man in Sudan who had just murdered his wife.

By the official end of the war in 2002, half a million Angolans were dead, 4.28 million more (one-third of its population) were refugees, and preventable diseases were still killing one child every three minutes.

Miss Landmine of Angola is one of the more unusual beauty queen titles in the world. Contestants are women who have lost legs to some of the 15,000,000 landmines planted in Angola during its civil war. A total of 86,000 Angolans were casualties of landmines in the civil war, while only 43,000 had been removed by 2008, the rest probably not being gone until around 2020. Meanwhile every year 400 more local are wounded or killed by hidden mines, many of them children who can be especially heedless of these hidden deathtraps.

Trouble in the Congo(1960-Now)

For decades, the Belgian Congo had served as the poster child of how bad colonial rule could be. Even after replacing the notoriously vicious rule of Leopold II with its own in 1908, the Belgian government’s rule proved little better. For one thing, it was a great place to go on safari and kill animals.

By 1960, the Belgians, like other colonial powers, were tired of ruling African colonies and were ready to give up the Congo politically, while maintaining ownership of key assets in the country.

This would require a stable native regime to protect those assets. However, the Congo was a big country with a large number of tribal and ethnic groups whose only unifying factor was being under, and wanting to put and end to, Belgian rule. Once that was gone, the country would disintegrate, which was fine with the Belgians as long as things didn’t get so out of hand they were a threat to their economic interests. If that happened, they would have to send in Belgian troops to “protect” the Congolese from themselves.

The one party with any hope of national appeal was the Movement National Congolais (MNC), since it drew its support from the large urban population that had flocked to the cities since 1940 and had lost many or most of their old tribal ties. In the first election, the MNC won 33 of 137 seats in the parliament, hardly a majority, but making it the single biggest party in the Congo.

Its leader was the handsome, intelligent, and charismatic Patrice Lumumba, who had personally suffered a lot under Belgian rule and was determined to create a nation out of this disparate collection of tribes and ethnic groups. He was also quite outspoken in his criticism of colonial rule, which raised red flags among the Belgians who feared he would cut them off from plundering the Congo’s riches. At the same time, he was raising even redder flags among the Americans because of his frequent use of the term socialism in relation to his ambitions for the Congo and Africa overall. As a result, the Soviet Union was favorable to Lumumba’s regime,, which made him all the more frightening to the United States.

In addition, Lumumba was a very appealing leader to the emerging Civil Rights Movement in the U.S., even meeting with Malcolm X, which also made the authorities nervous. As Eisenhower privately expressed it, he wished Lumumba would fall into a river of alligators. Therefore, from the very start, Lumumba had three powerful sets of enemies: the Belgians, the Americans, and the various tribes that wanted to keep local power for themselves. One of the most serious threats came from the rich mining district of Katanga, which, with Western support/control, declared itself an independent country. Below: Mercenaries fighting for Katanga.

It largely came down to a race to see who could get to Lumumba first. After Eisenhower stunned his staff by essentially putting out a contract on Lumumba’s life, the CIA sent an agent to Africa to poison Lumumba’s toothbrush. However, the Belgian’s had the inner track, even beating Lumumba’s dentist to the punch by arresting and torturing him in unsuccessful attempts to break his spirit. On January 18, 1961, a Congolese firing squad executed the deposed leader in the presence of four Belgian officers in Katanga. Later his grave was dug up and his body hacked to pieces that were then dissolved in sulfuric acid to erase any trace his existence.

In the aftermath, Joseph Mobutu, who had the army’s support, eventually seized power, presiding over a thirty-two year reign of terror (1965-97) that did keep the Congo under control with strong American support. In the eyes of many, the Congo reverted back to the status of a colony, more specifically an American one.

In 1970, Mobutu did win election as president with 98.3% of the vote on a single party ballot by a margin of 10,131,699 to 157. The next year he renamed his country Zaire, banned the use of European names or attire, making all men wear a Mao-inspired tunic, the abacost. He also assumed a new name and title: Mobutu Sese Seko Nkuku Ngbendu Wa Za Banga, meaning "The all-powerful warrior who, because of his endurance and inflexible will to win, goes from conquest to conquest, leaving fire in his wake."

For his personality cult, the TV News would start with an image of him flying down from heaven through the clouds. While the nation’s infrastructure rotted and public service workers went unpaid, Mobutu stole an estimated $5 billion, stashing it in Swiss banks for safekeeping. He also owned a fleet of Mercedes Benzes and would privately charter a Concorde jet for shopping sprees in Paris.

The end of the Cold War in 1991 reduced Mobutu’s value to the West. That plus growing economic problems led to growing opposition against his rule. What did him in, however, was support for the Rwandan Hutus and their attempted genocide in 1994 of the Tutsis, many of whom had fled as refugees to eastern Zaire. In 1996, when he ordered the Tutsis to leave Zaire under penalty of death, they rose up against him in the first Congo War. With support from Uganda, Rwanda, and many locals, they took Kinshaha in 1997, overthrowing Mobutu (who was ailing with cancer), and renaming Zaire the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Unfortunately, the Congo’s problems were far from over.

The new leader of the DRC, Laurent-Désiré Kabila, proved to be nearly as corrupt as Mobutu, and the Second Congo War (1998-2003) quickly followed the first.

This conflict, also called Africa’s World War and the Great War of Africa, which directly involved eight African nations and twenty-five other armed groups, was the deadliest war since World War II, killing 5.4 million people, mostly from disease and starvation, and displaced millions more as refugees. Even after the war was officially over, an estimated 1,000 people a day were still dying from hunger and disease.

Blood Diamonds

What prolonged this war and made it so catastrophic, along with other wars in Sierra Leone and Angola, were what has been referred to as blood or conflict diamonds, although other minerals have been involved as well, notably gold, and coltan (an ingredient crucial for producing cell phones, DVD players, and other electronic goods.

Collectively, both warlords and rebels in these conflicts have made billions in sales of these diamonds, which both fund their struggles and lead to more fighting to control the sources of the diamonds. Civil wars in these countries have cost an estimated 3.7 million lives and may have been funded by the rock sitting on your ring.

With virtually no central authority, the Congo became a battleground between various neighbors and factions, some supporting Kabila’s government (Namibia, Zimbabwe, Angola, Chad, Congolese militias from the Mai Mai community, and Hutu militias opposed to the Tutsi dominated regime in Rwanda), and others opposing it (the Movement for the Liberation of Congo (MLC), the Rally for Congolese Democracy (RCD), Uganda, Burundi, and Tutsi dominated Rwanda along with Tutsi militias.

The Rwandan presence especially complicated the situation. In 1994, eastern Congo was home to thousands of Tutsi refugees fleeing the genocide being carried out by their Hutu rivals. Then the Tutsis regained power and Hutus fled to the Congo. The Tutsi regime had also supported Kabila in the First Congo War, but had a falling out with him afterwards. Therefore, Rwandan and Tutsi militias were operating in eastern Congo, treating it as occupied territory and alienating its people.

In 2001, president Laurent Kabila was assassinated and succeeded by his son Joseph. Over the next year he negotiated the withdrawal of Rwandan forces from the eastern Congo, while a multi-national agreement, the Pretoria Accord, arranged for a ceasefire and transitional government under Joseph Kabila until general elections in 2006. There were thirty-three candidates for president, reflecting the still fragmented nature of the country. It came down to a turbulent runoff election between Kabila and Jean-Pierre Bemba. Kabila won and was sworn in as president in December 2006.

Mercenaries in the African Wars“Roland was a warrior from the Land of the Midnight Sun

With a Thompson gun for hire, fighting to be doneThe deal was made in Denmark on a dark and stormy day

So he set out for Biafra to join the bloody frayFrom ’66’ and ’7 they fought the Congo war

With their fingers on their triggers knee deep in goreDays and nights they battled the Bantu to their knees

The killed to earn their living and to help out the Congolese”--Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner by Warren Zevon

Much of the most intense fighting in African wars of this era was done and led by Western mercenaries. While some were excellent soldiers devotedly followed by their men, others typically were deserters, men dishonorably discharged from other armies, ex-convicts, or men with no other prospects and looking for adventure. Of course, war is a risky two-way street, as Belgian mercenary, Marc Goosens (below), found out in Biafra in 1968.

All too often they were, sadistic psychopaths who killed indiscriminately just for kicks. Of course, war is a risky two-way street, as Belgian mercenary, Marc Goosens (below), found out in Biafra in 1968.

One exception to this profile was the German, Rolf Steiner. Born in 1933, he fought as a Hitler Youth during the last desperate days of the Third Reich. Apparently a sucker for lost causes, he fought in the French Foreign Legion at Dienbienphu in Vietnam in 1954 and later in Algeria. When he heard about Biafra, he signed on there and served there with distinction but took no pay because he believed in the cause.

After that, he organized Anya-nya Christian forces in the Sudan (yet another losing cause). He was later arrested in Kampala, Uganda, flown to Khartoum, Sudan, where he was imprisoned, beaten and sadistically tortured for three years, before he was finally released thanks to pressure by the West German government. In the 1970s he wrote an autobiography, appropriately entitled The Last Adventurer.

Unfortunately, he was the exception to the rule.

Much more typical was Costas Georgiou (alias "Colonel Callan") (1951 – 10 July 1976), a Greek Cypriot mercenary who was tried and executed for war crimes in the war for Angolan independence. He served with distinction in the British army in Northern Ireland, although he supposedly fired 26 shots into the crowd on Bloody Sunday when a number of civilians were killed. Although not charged with that, he was court-martialed, convicted, and dishonorably discharged for robbing a post office.

From Britain, he went to Africa. Although he never officially rose above the rank of corporal or had any officer’s in the British army, he was able to pass himself off as “Colonel Tony Callan” in the wilder, less structured, environment of Africa’s post colonial wars. He adopted the name Callan from a fictional espionage agent and signed on with the U.S.-backed National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FLNA) to fight the more heavily armed Cuban forces supporting the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA).

Callan and his small band of comrades fought well, but were heavily outgunned, defeated, captured, and then tried for war crimes by the victorious MPLA. More specifically, he was accused of executing fourteen of his own men (Angolans) after, in the confusion of combat, they accidentally fired on their own trucks. He was also charged with shooting villagers who resisted his men plundering their homes, and torturing civilians for information.

As a CIA agent John Stockwell, described Callan "He turned a couple of incidents around very dramatically and we were very impressed. And then almost instantly it turned out he was humiliating Zairian paracommando leaders. He would strip their clothes off and have them beaten publicly. He was executing people."

Callan was also wanted by Scotland Yard for executing several British mercenaries in Angola. Callan was convicted and executed in 1976 along with three others, one of them an American who had been in the field for only three days and claimed he had never fired a shot. His main crime had been advertising his services in Soldier of Fortune magazine.

Child soldiers

Child soldiers are another issue still plaguing Africa. While this is a worldwide problem, it is especially prevalent in Africa with an estimated 120,000 children serving in government and/or rebel forces in Algeria, Angola, Burundi, Congo-Brazzaville, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Sudan and Uganda.

Who are these children and how are they recruited?

Many are orphans, their parents being killed in the wars in which they are now forced to take part. Others are kidnapped from their families. Every afternoon during Uganda’s civil war, children would flock in from surrounding villages to the cities to escape “recruiters,” spending the nights in makeshift shelters or on the streets and returning home in the morning.

Once captured, young recruits would be transformed into desensitized killers by forcing them to kill other children while being plied with drugs and alcohol to further distort their thinking. In one case, a sixteen-year old girl ,under threat of death, was forced to kill a boy from her village with a stick. In Algeria, a young woman and the sole survivor of the massacre of her village, watched as a bunch of boys, probably no older than twelve, decapitated a girl and played catch with her head.

Of course, at such a young age these children could not mentally or psychologically appreciate the finality of their actions. By the time they were old enough, it was usually too late. Children unable to keep up or stay healthy, along with those trying to escape or fight back, would be killed. Even those successfully escaping the warlords might still be executed if captured by the government for their previous role in the revolt. In January 1995 the Ugandan government executed five children on those charges.

Colombia (P,O)Mexico (P,O)Peru (O)

Russia (O)Turkey (O)Yugoslavia (P,O)

Algeria (P,O)Angola (G,O)Burundi (G,O)Chad (G)(G,O)Eritrea (G)Ethiopia (G)Rwanda (G,O)Sierra Leone (G,P,O)Somalia (all groups)Sudan (G,P,O)Uganda (G,O)Republic of Congo (G,O)Dem. Rep. of the Congo

Iran (G,O)Iraq (G,O)Israel and Occupied Territories (G,O)Lebanon (O)

Afghanistan (all groups)India (P,O)Indonesia (P,O)Myanmar (G,O)Nepal (O)Pakistan (O)Philippines (O)Solomon Islands (O)Sri Lanka (O)East Timor (P,O)Tajikistan (OPapua New Guinea (O)Uzbekistan (O)

U.N. List of Countries with Child Soldiers Fighting in Recent and Ongoing Conflicts(G: government armed forces, P: paramilitaries, O: armed opposition groups)

Rape as a Weapon

In eastern Congo, the total breakdown of order after Mobutu’s death led to increasingly unrestrained violence, especially gang raping by soldiers from all sides, although Hutu militia were considered the worst. Although both physically and psychologically crippling to the women, it was aimed as much against their husbands and families who were forced to watch these atrocities while helpless to do anything about it, thus breaking any spirit of resistance.

By 2003, an estimated two-thirds of the fighters were infected with HIV/AIDS, while between 19 and 30 percent of the victims were also infected. In addition, half of the victims had also contracted syphilis, which makes them more vulnerable to HIV/AIDS. Along with the demographic, nearly genocidal effects of this epidemic, there were also severe cultural repercussions, because African men are expected to repudiate women who have been “unfaithful”, which includes being raped. Thus the whole family, especially the woman, was shamed by this act.

All this affected the economy as well, in particular the agriculture. Many people have abandoned the villages and fields for the relative safety of the cities. At first, people could hide at night and work their fields during the day. But as violence became more prevalent, marauders got bolder and were carrying out rapes in broad daylight. In response, women, who do the farming, would band together for safety in numbers and focus on just one person’s land. Unfortunately, this took more land out of cultivation and reduced food supplies even more. That in turn reduced how much soldiers could plunder, thus making their raids more violent and frequent.

The result was malnutrition, starvation, and disease.

Transboundary basins in Africa

FC. 151A DESERTIFICATION IN NIGERIA & CENTRAL AFRICA

Extreme variabilityProne to droughtArid-Semi-arid

Climate

Liable to salinity & alkalizationLooseSandy

Soils

Topography prone to erosion

Savannah & steppe vegetation

Reduced river flow & lower ground water levels

Dest. of habitat Loss of biodiversity Soil erosion

Desertification & other environmental effects:

Human practices Strain on ecosystem

Slash & burn agriculture

Unbridled use of groundwater

Overgrazing of livestock

Poor irrigation practices

Poor forest management

Conflicts over resource use

Socio-economic effects:Migration

Conflicts

Decline in cash crops for export

Hunger and poverty

Early efforts focus on Africa as the main object of imperial expansion despite its relative...

Documents

Transcript of Early efforts focus on Africa as the main object of imperial expansion despite its relative...