Herero Wars
Herero Wars | |||||||
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Part of the Scramble for Africa | |||||||
German troops in combat with the Herero in a painting by Richard Knötel. | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Herero, Namaqua, and other Namibians | |||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Theodor Leutwein Lothar von Trotha |
Samuel Maharero Hendrik Witbooi † | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
Initial strength: ~2,000[1] | Herero: 10,000[2] | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
| As many as 65–70,000 including civilians[3] |
The Herero Wars were a series of colonial wars between the German Empire and the Herero people of German South West Africa (present-day Namibia). They took place between 1904 and 1908.
Background
Pre-colonial South-West Africa
The Hereros were cattle grazers, occupying most of central and northern South West Africa. Under the leadership of
German colonization
In the early 1880s, the German statesman
Whilst Rhenish missionaries, traders, and other Europeans had been present in the territory since the 1830s, it was only with the advent of Germany's claim to South-West Africa that German settlement of the territory began in earnest. By 1903 there were roughly 4,682 European settlers in the protectorate of whom nearly 3,000 were Germans, most of them in the towns of Lüderitz, Swakopmund, and Windhoek. The advent of large-scale German settlement also brought about changes in the treatment of the native Herero and Nama peoples by Europeans, with native people facing increased legal discrimination and expropriation of land for the use of European settlers.[5]
Rebellion
In 1903, some of the Khoi and Herero tribes rose in revolt and about 120-150 German settlers were killed, with many victims of the uprising tortured and mutilated before death.[6] Troops were sent from Germany to re-establish order but only dispersed the rebels, led by Chief Samuel Maharero. In a famous letter to Hendrik Witbooi, the Namaqua chief, Maharero sought to organize his rebellion against the Germans while building alliances with the other tribes, exclaiming Let us die fighting![7] The Herero led a guerrilla campaign, conducting fast hit and run operations then melting back into the terrain they knew well, preventing the Germans from gaining an advantage with their modern artillery and machine-guns. However a conclusive battle was fought on 11 August 1904, at the Battle of Waterberg in the Waterberg Mountains. Chief Maharero believed his six to one advantage over the Germans would allow him to win in a final showdown. The Germans had time to bring forward their artillery and heavy weapons. Both sides took heavy losses, but the Herero were scattered and defeated.[8]
In October 1904, General
It took the Germans until 1908 to re-establish authority over the territory. By that time tens of thousands of Africans (estimates range from 34,000 to 110,000) had been either killed[9][10]: 296 [11][12][13][14] or died of thirst while fleeing. 65,000 of 80,000 Hereros and at least 10,000 of 20,000 Nama died as a result of the conflict.[15]
At the height of the campaign, some 19,000 German troops were involved.[citation needed]
At about the same time, diamonds were discovered in the territory, which briefly greatly boosted its prosperity.[importance?]
Aftermath
In 1915, during World War I, South African forces occupied it in the so-called South West Africa Campaign, and SW Africa officially became a mandate of South Africa in 1920.[16]
On 16 August 2004, 100 years after the war, the German government officially apologised for the atrocities.[17] "We Germans accept our historic and moral responsibility and the guilt incurred by Germans at that time," said Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul, Germany's development aid minister. In addition, she admitted that the massacres were equivalent to genocide.[18]
Not until 2015 did the German government admit that the massacres were equivalent to genocide and again apologised in 2016. The Herero are suing the German government in a class action lawsuit.[19] In 2021, Germany announced that they would repay Namibia €1.1 billion.[20]
In literature
The Herero Wars and the massacres are both depicted in a chapter of the 1963 novel V. by Thomas Pynchon. The tragic story of the Herero and Namaqua Genocide also appears in Pynchon's 1973 novel Gravity's Rainbow.
The heavy toll of the Herero and Namaqua Genocide on individual lives and the fabric of Herero culture is seen in the 2013 historical novel Mama Namibia by Mari Serebrov.[21]
The war and the massacres are both significantly featured in The Glamour of Prospecting,[22] a contemporary account by Frederick Cornell of his attempts to prospect for diamonds in the region. In the book, he describes his first-hand accounts of witnessing the concentration camp on Shark Island amongst other aspects of the conflict.
See also
- Herero and Namaqua genocide
Comparable events in other countries
References
- ^ Bridgman 1981, p. 112.
- ^ Bridgman 1981, p. 87.
- ^ a b Bridgman 1981, p. 164.
- ^ a b Bridgman 1981, pp. 36–41.
- ISBN 978-1906791964. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
- )
- ISBN 0852557493, p. 156
- ^ Robert Gaudi (2017). "7: Hereroland". African Kaiser. Penguin.
- ISBN 978-0-31336-256-9
- ISBN 978-1-84545-452-4
- ISBN 1-8454-5452-9
- ISBN 978-0-47209-682-4
- ISBN 3-7637-5852-6.
- ISBN 978-1-42948-147-2
- ^ Herero und Nama verklagen Deutschland wegen Kolonialverbrechen 06.01.2017, FOCUS Magazine
- ^ "Namibia | South African History Online". sahistory.org.za. Retrieved 11 November 2019.
- ^ Onishi, Norimitsu (29 December 2016). "Germany Grapples With Its African Genocide". The New York Times.
- ^ "German minister says sorry for genocide in Namibia" (15 August 2004) The Guardian
- ^ Christoph Schult und Christoph Titz (6 January 2017). "Herero und Nama verklagen Deutschland" Der Spiegel
- ^ Oltermann, Philip (28 May 2021). "Germany agrees to pay Namibia €1.1bn over historical Herero-Nama genocide". The Guardian.
- ^ Serebrov, Mari (2013) Mama Namibia. Windhoek, Namibia: Wordweaver Publishing House
- ^ Frederick Carruthers Cornell (1920). The Glamour of Prospecting: Wanderings of a South African Prospector in Search of Copper, Gold, Emeralds, and Diamonds. London, England: London, T.F. Unwin Ltd.
- ^ Hull, Isabel V. (2005) Absolute Destruction: Military Culture and the Practices of War in Imperial Germany, p. 30, Cornell University
- ^ Lahti, Jane (2019) The American West and the World: Transnational and Comparative Perspectives, p. 162, Routledge
Further reading
- Bridgman, Jon (1981). The Revolt of the Hereros. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-04113-4.
- Alnæs, Kirsten (1989). "Living with the past: The Songs of the Herero in Botswana". Africa: Journal of the International African Institute. 59 (3). Cambridge University Press: 267–299. S2CID 143939978.