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Military History (African Studies)

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  1. Introduction
  2.  
  3. Until fairly recently, most African military history was portrayed in terms of antithetical stereotypes. Until about the mid-20th century, Western observers often described a “dark continent” of incessant conflict waged by savage warriors. The independence era brought radically different perspectives, however, as Africanist scholars, seeking to refute allegations of rampant violence, often depicted African warfare as harmlessly ritualistic. For many years, while informed reconstructions of African social, economic, environmental, and gender history appeared, the scholarly attention paid to African military history was generally sparse and superficial. To many, African military studies were deemed politically incorrect, and few Africanists could be considered (or indeed would consider themselves) military historians. From about 1965 to 1980, there was a brief surge in academic interest in military history, during which some studies still regarded as pioneering classics were written. Many of those focused on the 19th century, and especially on resistance to imperial conquest. But in certain parts of the continent, notably North Africa, African military history was written not just by Africanist scholars but by classicists who examined it within the context of the ancient Mediterranean world, and Islamic and European historians who viewed it in terms of comparative global themes: struggles for religious ascendancy, the spread of gunpowder weapons, and the Military Revolution. As burgeoning conflict beset the continent in the post-independence era, attention to military studies increased, often with the goal of effecting conflict resolution. From the 1990s, as horrific “ragged” warfare became ever more prevalent, a veritable flood of investigations appeared, most written by social scientists rather than historians. Also, to an extent far beyond other sub-fields, African military history often has been written not for an academic readership but for varied audiences. Much of this historical writing has taken the form of popular history aimed at general readers or military buffs, and other studies have been written for specialized audiences such as professional soldiers, war gamers, or students of uniformology. While academics have typically denigrated such works, some popular histories have represented important milestones in the evolution of African military historiography and have immensely impacted wider perceptions of African warfare. What many would deem the minutiae of military costume or the intricacies of combat performance sometimes hold valuable keys to understanding broader aspects of African military culture and ethos. This article strives to reflect the rich, diverse historiography of African military history by providing the reader with a wide range of studies chosen to enhance an appreciation of this vast and complex topic. It is also hoped that the bibliography will help the reader to appreciate that the study of Africa’s military heritage, far from being aberrant or irrelevant, in fact illuminates a vital, ongoing thread of the African historical experience.
  4.  
  5. General Overviews
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  7. Not surprisingly, most of the relatively few general surveys of a topic as vast as African military history are limited in spatial and/or chronological scope. Thus, Uzoigwe 1977 is concerned only with precolonial sub-Saharan Africa, Smith 1989 with just precolonial West Africa and Lamphear 2003 with sub-Saharan Africa through the post-independence era. Edgerton 2002 includes North Africa but his coverage is only from 1791 onward. A rare effort to examine the entire continent from early times to the present is Reid 2012. A fundamental concern of these sources is to identify essential characteristics of African warfare and to establish basic themes in African military history.
  8.  
  9. Edgerton, Robert B. Africa’s Armies from Honor to Infamy. Boulder, CO: Westview, 2002.
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  11. Unlike most other treatments, it argues that there was sharp discontinuity between traditional African conflict and that of the post-independence era.
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  13. Lamphear, John. “Sub-Saharan African Warfare.” In War in the Modern World Since 1815. Edited by Jeremy Black, 169–191. New York: Routledge, 2003.
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  15. Provides a broad overview of African military history together with a discussion of historiography. Also emphasizes logistics and argues that low-intensity “raiding war” that involves civilians as much as military forces, typified African warfare in past and current conflicts.
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  17. Reid, Richard J. Warfare in African History. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
  18. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139043090Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  19. Based on themes proposed by earlier treatments, this book provides an ambitious survey of warfare throughout much of Africa. It interprets recent African conflict in terms of the deeper historical past, emphasizes how warfare fundamentally shaped African states, and contains a thoughtful conclusion that is certain to spark debates.
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  21. Smith, Robert. Warfare and Diplomacy in Pre-Colonial West Africa. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989.
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  23. Originally published in 1976, this book examines West African military activity up to the late 19th century and is regarded as a pioneering milestone in African military history scholarship. It downplays the influences of outside forces and stresses African initiative.
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  25. Uzoigwe, Godfrey N. “The Warrior and the State in Precolonial Africa.” Journal of Asian and African Studies 12.1 (1977): 20–47.
  26. DOI: 10.1177/002190967701200103Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  27. Critically surveys major works in African military history published up to that time and advances fundamental notions about African warfare that would shape subsequent discourses.
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  29. Edited Collections
  30.  
  31. Some of the most significant contributions to African military history have taken the form of collections of essays that reflect a sense of inherent diversity. Ogot 1972 was published in the belief that a historical appreciation of precolonial and colonial African warfare was necessary to understand the ever-increasing role of the military in post-independence politics. Although most of the contributors to Mazrui 1977 were social scientists, they discuss aspects of African military culture of prime interest to historians. Fukui and Turton 1979, Fukui and Markakis 1994, and Kurimoto and Simonse 1998 were all products of important military symposia held in Osaka, Japan, again attended largely by social scientists but with an agenda that included topics vital to African military history. Laband 2007 studies the impact of warfare on various civilian populations throughout sub-Saharan Africa over five centuries of conflict and discusses mechanisms by which the terrible effects of violence might be mitigated. Crummey 1986 broadens the investigation of African conflict to include a variety of other forms of violence.
  32.  
  33. Crummey, Donald, ed. Banditry, Rebellion and Social Protest in Africa. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1986.
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  35. This collection of twelve essays stemming from a University of Illinois conference broadly examines African violence, ranging from criminality, to banditry, to resistance. It demonstrates that studies of extra-military activity, an increasingly important sub-field of military history, can contribute much to understanding warfare. It also underscores that in studying African armed conflict it is impossible to make any clear distinction between “violence” (waged against non-military elements) and “warfare” (waged between armies).
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  37. Fukui, Katsuyoshi, and John Markakis, eds. Ethnicity and conflict in the Horn of Africa. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1994.
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  39. The product of the second Japanese symposium, these essays expand and elaborate on issues introduced at the earlier conference, though an additional focus is on how ethnicity underpins warfare in a wide region of northeastern Africa. Again, although many contributors were anthropologists, historical concerns are evident.
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  41. Fukui, Katsuyoshi, and David Turton, eds. Senri Ethnological Studies no. 3: Warfare Among East African Herders. Osaka, Japan: National Museum of Ethnology, 1979.
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  43. The product of the first in a series of important Japanese symposia, this study helped to dispel stereotypical notions of belligerent warrior herdsmen and investigated the connection between warfare and age organization. Although the contributors were social anthropologists, many essays are infused with significant historical content.
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  45. Kurimoto, Eisei, and Simon Simonse, eds. Conflict, Age and Power in North East Africa. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1998.
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  47. A major focus in this product of the third symposium is the role of age-systems both in traditional warfare and in contemporary conflicts. In addition to tracing the legacy of precolonial military structures, several essays provide points of reference for understanding the complex post-independence warfare of the region.
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  49. Laband, John, ed. The Daily Lives of Civilians in Wartime Africa: From Slavery Days to Rwandan Genocide. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2007.
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  51. Unlike most studies in which civilian populations remain anonymous background entities, this important edited collection by nine leading scholars focuses on the horrific effects warfare has had on such populations over a period of 500 years.
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  53. Mazrui, Ali A., ed. The Warrior Tradition in Modern Africa. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1977.
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  55. Many of these essays demonstrate the perpetuation of traditional military values into the post- independence era, and a focus on notions of masculinity in warfare would inform debates and discussions for many years to come.
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  57. Ogot, Bethwell A., ed. War and Society in Africa: Ten Studies. London: Frank Cass, 1972.
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  59. A diverse collection of essays on East, Central, and South Africa focusing mainly on the late 19th and early 20th centuries, it was the product of a conference in Nairobi in 1969. Several essays would become the bases for ongoing discourses in African military history.
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  61. Primary Materials
  62.  
  63. In those large sections of Africa with extra-literate traditions, there were few written primary materials until relatively modern times. Written expression, both in a few indigenous languages and in languages from the outside, did exist in parts of northern and northeastern Africa from ancient times, however; and then, from the early centuries AD written documentation, notably in Arabic and Portuguese, became even more common in those regions and in some coastal areas of sub-Saharan Africa, too. Some of this documentation concerned military matters, as shown by Huntingford 1965. With the imperial conquest of Africa in the 19th century, a flood of materials relating to warfare in Africa appeared. Many of these were eyewitness accounts by colonial adventurers, administrators, missionaries, and military officers: even though these accounts may have suffered from typical prejudices and misinformation, they still contained invaluable glimpses of African military activity. Typical of these are Stanley 2006 and Churchill 2013. Reitz 2010 provides a firsthand account of the second Anglo-Boer War. The Maji Maji Research Project 1968 Collected Papers, contains oral recollections of resistance to German conquest in East Africa from an African perspective. In the post-independence period firsthand accounts of varying quality and value, by participants in contemporary conflicts, were written (see Staunton 1991 and Beah 2007).
  64.  
  65. Beah, Ishmael. Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. New York: Sarah Crichton, 2007.
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  67. Although child soldiers have become a common phenomenon in contemporary African conflicts, this is a rare first-hand account by one of them of his combat experiences in Sierra Leone.
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  69. Churchill, Winston. The River War: An Account of the Reconquest of the Sudan. New York: Skyhorse, 2013.
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  71. Originally published in 1899, this is the firsthand account by the future British prime minister, then a young cavalry officer, of the British victory over the Mahdist state in the Sudan in 1898. Typically prejudicial, it still gives a useful military history of the campaign.
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  73. Huntingford, G. W. B., ed. and trans. The Glorious Victories of Amda Seyon. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965.
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  75. This careful translation of a contemporary Amharic source gives a fascinating look at 14th-century Ethiopian military campaigns. Several translated soldiers’ songs and an introductory section provide added dimensions.
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  77. Maji Maji Research Project 1968 Collected Papers. University College, Dar-es-Salaam, Department of History, 1969.
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  79. A collection of oral testimonies, many by actual participants, regarding the Maji Maji Rebellion of 1905–1907 in Tanzania. Conducted, transcribed, and translated by a team of university researchers, this work embodies a rare and important African point of view.
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  81. Reitz, Deneys. Commando: A Boer Journal of the Boer War. Whitefish, MT: Kessinger, 2010.
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  83. An account by a Boer boy-soldier of his service throughout the entire war, including his recollections of fighting as a “bitter-ender” guerrilla fighter during the last stages.
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  85. Stanley, Henry Morton. Cooomasse and Magdala: The Story of Two British Campaigns in Africa. Uckfield, UK: Naval and Military Press, 2006.
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  87. This eyewitness history of British campaigns of conquest against Ethiopia in 1868 and Asante in 1873–1874 was originally published in 1874. Accompanying both expeditions as a war correspondent, Stanley wrote vivid (if prejudiced) accounts.
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  89. Staunton, Irene, ed. Mothers of the Revolution: The War Experiences of Thirty Zimbabwean Women. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991.
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  91. This collection of eyewitness testimonies of the experiences and activities of women during the Zimbabwean war of independence provides a unique female perspective on the war.
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  93. Bibliographies
  94.  
  95. There are a number of useful bibliographies of African military studies; however, as one would expect of a subject so vast, most selectively concentrate on some particular aspect. Thus, while Smaldone 1979 approaches the subject fairly broadly, Lamphear 2007 focuses only on precolonial sub-Saharan Africa. Mampilly 2013 looks at post-independence sub-Saharan civil wars, Jefremovas 2000 studies genocidal conflict in two particular nations. Van Hartesveldt 2002 and Corfield 2008 are on particular wars, while Raugh 2008 is on an individual colonial campaign and Battle of Adwa on a specific battle. Most also provide investigations of historiography to compliment bibliographic listings.
  96.  
  97. Battle of Adwa.
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  99. A well-designed website to supplement Jonas, The Battle of Adwa. African Victory in the Age of Empire (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011). It contains a complete research bibliography of published and archival sources. (See also Resistance in Eastern Africa).
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  101. Corfield, Justin. The First World War in Africa: A Bibliography. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 2008.
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  103. Complimented by an intricate system of cross-referencing, this book lists over two thousand sources of all types.
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  105. Jefremovas, Villia. “Treacherous Waters: The Politics of History and the Politics of Genocide in Rwanda and Burundi.” Africa 70.2 (2000): 298–308.
  106. DOI: 10.3366/afr.2000.70.2.298Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  107. A review article critically assessing several key sources on the horrendous Rwanda-Burundi conflict, it contrasts those which are empirically based with those based on rumor. It insists that high standards of scholarly analysis must prevail even when dealing with emotive issues such as genocidal conflict.
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  109. Lamphear, John, ed. African Military History. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2007.
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  111. Provides an in-depth essay on African military historiography as an introduction to a collection of twenty-two previously published articles, and lists over three hundred published sources on precolonial sub-Saharan African military history.
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  113. Mampilly, Zachariah. “Civil War in Sub-Saharan Africa.” In Oxford Bibliographies: Political Science, 2013.
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  115. Most of the listed entries are by social scientists, though many have significant relevance to African military history. By subscription only.
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  117. Raugh, Harold C. British Military Operations in Egypt and the Sudan: A Selected Bibliography. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 2008.
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  119. A remarkably thorough guide to the wide variety of sources pertaining to major Victorian military campaigns in northern Africa, this is an invaluable source for novice students and specialists alike.
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  121. Smaldone, Joseph P. “Bibliographic Sources for African Military Studies.” A Current Bibliography of African Affairs 11 (1979): 101–109.
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  123. This is an updated version of earlier contributions published in 1971, 1976, and 1977. It provides an overview of key sources that existed at the time, suggests a topical organization, and identifies what was at the time a brief growing interest in African military studies.
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  125. van Hartesveldt, Fred R. The Boer War: Historiography and Annotated Bibliography. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2002.
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  127. A comprehensive bibliography of works relating to the military history of the war, complimented by a significant review of its historiography.
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  129. Journals
  130.  
  131. Except for a few local publications, there are no academic journals devoted solely to African military history, and journals of world military history tend to contain disappointingly little on Africa. Still, a number of major African journals that publish current research on various topics regularly do contain articles on military history, notably the Journal of African History and the International Journal of African Historical Studies, together with Cahiers d’études africaines. African Affairs, the African Studies Review, and the Journal of Modern African Studies all publish articles, mainly by social scientists, on military topics, especially recent and current conflicts. The Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria is a local journal that publishes many articles on military topics, while Scientia Militaria: The South African Journal of Military Studies, another local publication, has a rare, specifically military focus.
  132.  
  133. African Affairs.
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  135. This highly regarded journal has been published by the British Royal Africa Society for over a century. Interdisciplinary in nature, this focuses on current sub-Saharan African politics and international relations and often includes investigations of military topics.
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  137. African Studies Review.
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  139. Preceded by the African Studies Bulletin (1958–1970), this is the scholarly journal of the African Studies Association. It covers a broad range of disciplines and subjects and examines current military developments.
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  141. Cahiers d’études africaines.
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  143. Publishes a wide range of articles in French and in English on Africa and the African diaspora, especially on history and anthropology, and includes military topics.
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  145. International Journal of African Historical Studies.
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  147. Growing out of African Historical Studies (1968–1971), it often includes military topics among its wide-ranging articles on African history.
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  149. Journal of African History.
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  151. One of the earliest Africanist periodicals, and has occasionally devoted special issues to military topics and often contains essays on current military research.
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  153. Journal of Modern African Studies.
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  155. Intended for general readers as well as academics, its focus is mainly on current issues in African politics and society. It offers non-partisan investigations of contemporary African military developments.
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  157. Journal of the Historical Society of Nigeria.
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  159. Although its publication by the University of Ibadan was interrupted by unrest and government crackdowns, this periodical has a long tradition of publishing articles focusing on military topics.
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  161. Scientia Militaria: South African Journal of Military Studies.
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  163. Of several South African journals focusing on military topics, this is the most scholarly. It sometimes has special issues on military themes. Articles are published in English and in Afrikaans and focus largely on subjects related to the South African military.
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  165. African Military Culture
  166.  
  167. The following sub-sections provide an understanding of African modes and ideologies of warfare: the vital underpinnings of African military history.
  168.  
  169. Material Culture
  170.  
  171. The material culture of African warfare has received considerable attention over the years. Of special interest to Africanists has been the impact of firearms, which will be treated here in a separate category. There also have been perceptive investigations of the relationship between technology and the evolution of politico-military structures including Goody 1971, which set the tone for many subsequent studies. Modifying Goody’s ideas, Law 1980 is a masterful study of the impact of horses on African warfare. Because horses were rare in much of sub-Saharan Africa, most African armies were composed exclusively of infantry. One region in which cavalry did play a significant role, however, was the Sudanic belt of west Africa, and it is on this region that Law focuses his attention. Of the numerous studies of traditional African weaponry, Spring 1993 is the most ambitious and Larick 1985 one of the most perceptive. Although intended for military buffs, there are many other excellent studies of material culture, including Morris 1967, Summers and Pagden 1970, Knight 1989, and Peers 2003.
  172.  
  173. Goody, Jack. Technology, Tradition and the State in Africa. London: Cambridge University Press, 1971.
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  175. Written at a time when technological determinism was in vogue, Goody made interesting speculations regarding correlations between the possession of firearms and cavalry and political centralization. While many conclusions have been challenged over the years, the book has sparked important debates and discussions, some of which still continue.
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  177. Knight, Ian. Color Plates by Richard Scollins. Queen Victoria’s Enemies (2): Northern Africa. London: Osprey, 1989.
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  179. Useful and informative in its own right, this book is included here also to introduce readers to the excellent Osprey military publications, mainly designed for military buffs. The Men-at arms Series, comprising hundreds of titles, includes dozens of titles on various African topics. All contain information on weaponry, costume, organization, and command, as well as historical narratives and intricately researched color plates. The title in question covers mainly 19th-century Ethiopian, Asante, and Mahdist armies.
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  181. Larick, Roy. “Spears, Style and Time among Maa-Speaking Pastoralists.” Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 4 (1985): 206–220.
  182. DOI: 10.1016/0278-4165(85)90003-0Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  183. With a penetrating analysis of Maasai symbolism, this article reveals the deep cultural significance of weaponry. This extraordinary essay has important implications for wider studies of technology and warfare across Africa.
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  185. Law, Robin. The Horse in West Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980.
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  187. Building on several earlier contributions, this work still represents the definitive study of horses in the warfare of the Sudanic belt. It contains critical discussions of “slave-horse cycles” and the complex ways in which horse cultures intersected with social and military power.
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  189. Morris, Donald R. Illustrations by G. A. Embleton. “The Zulu Army.” Tradition: The Journal of the International Society of Military Collectors 23.4 (1967): 12–17, 33.
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  191. Aimed at collectors of militaria and students of uniformology, this surveys not only weaponry but also touches on many other aspects of the Zulu military system. The article contains an organizational table of Zulu regiments and detailed descriptions of their “uniforms” and is enhanced by excellent pen and ink illustrations.
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  193. Peers, Chris. Drawings by Ian Heath. Armies of the Nineteenth Century: Africa: East Africa. Nottingham, UK: Foundry, 2003.
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  195. Designed especially for war gamers, this is an overview of fighting men in East Africa, including warriors of dozens of indigenous societies, European imperialists, and African and Arab mercenaries. It is highlighted with 200 meticulously crafted black-and-white illustrations, plus regional and battlefield maps. An accompanying narrative gives a historical overview, and a bibliography lists key sources.
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  197. Spring, Christopher. African Arms and Armour. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1993.
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  199. Lavishly illustrated, this work is the best single study on African weaponry. It investigates the artistic aspects of weapons as well as their functionality and shows how tools of war reflect their wider cultures.
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  201. Summers, R., and C. W. Pagden. The Warriors. Cape Town: Books of Africa, 1970.
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  203. Based on archival data, collections of artifacts, and oral interviews, this book describes Ndebele weaponry, war dress, and regimental organization, together with a Eurocentric historical narrative. Features a fine set of color plates.
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  205. Firearms
  206.  
  207. The importation and use of firearms has received more attention than any other aspect of African military culture and so is treated as a separate sub-section here. The study of firearms in precolonial sub-Saharan Africa has generated far-ranging scholarly debates, including ones focused on “slave-gun cycles”: the relationship between firearms and the slave trade. Insight into these debates can be gleaned from Pilossof 2010, Journal of African History 1971, Smaldone 1972, and Berg 1985. Studies of the early impact of firearms in North Africa, such as Ayalon 1978 and Cook 1994, embody a rather different historiography intertwined with the “military revolution” debate of European military history. Many publications on African firearms in the post-independence period have centered on the international arms trade, Chew 2012, and Schroeder and Lamb 2006 being notable examples. Storey 2012 presents an intriguing broader view of the relationship between firearms and political, social and even ecological change in colonial South Africa based on extensive archival research.
  208.  
  209. Ayalon, David. Gunpowder and Firearms in the Mamluk Kingdom. Totawa, NJ: Frank Cass, 1978.
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  211. First published in 1958, this classic study of the modernization of warfare in early modern Egypt investigates the antagonism of elite Mamluk cavalry forces to the advent of firearms and traces the earliest foundations of slave musketeer units. Useful appendices deal with technological aspects of early gunpowder weapons.
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  213. Berg, Gerald M. “The Sacred Musket. Tactics, Technology and Power in Eighteenth-Century Madagascar.” Comparative Studies in Society and History 27 (1985): 261–279.
  214. DOI: 10.1017/S001041750001135XSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  215. This article argues against the concept of a “slave-gun cycle” in Madagascar and that firearms enhanced military power there. A nuanced examination holds that guns, as essentially ritual tools, were imbued with deep sacredness. It gives profound insight to African concepts of warfare in 18th-century Madagascar.
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  217. Chew, Emrys. Arming the Periphery: The Arms Trade in the Indian Ocean 1780–1914. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012.
  218. DOI: 10.1057/9781137006608Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  219. This is a fascinating study of arms trade with eastern Africa into the early 20th century that assesses the effect of European arms blockades and the role of firearms in both resisting and facilitating European conquest. It also provides vital background to the evolution of the European arms industry and to the technological development of the weapons themselves. It is an excellent basis for understanding the current African arms trade.
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  221. Cook, Weston F., Jr. The Hundred Years War for Morocco: Gunpowder and Military Revolution in the Early Modern Muslim World. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1994.
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  223. It argues that Morocco countered European and Ottoman Turkish threats by staging its own military revolution based on the adoption of firearms. It suggests that this revolution transformed sociopolitical and religious structures, as well as the army, and it gives interesting comparative insights into the wider “military revolution” thesis itself.
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  225. Journal of African History. “Papers on Firearms in Sub-Saharan Africa, I.” 12.2 (1971): 173–254.
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  227. These collected papers were the product of a significant seminar on firearms held at the University of London from 1967 to 1971. They include seminal essays on African military history. A majority agree that firearms made a relatively slight early impact on most African societies.
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  229. Journal of African History. “Papers on Firearms in Sub-Saharan Africa, II.” 12.4 (1971): 517–577.
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  231. More collected papers from the University of London seminar, including more seminal essays, which again suggest that firearms made only a slight early impact.
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  233. Pilossof, Rory. “‘Guns Don’t Colonise People. . .’: The Role and Use of Firearms in Pre-Colonial and Colonial Africa.” Kronos 36.1 (2010): 266–277.
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  235. This review article gives a succinct investigation of the lively historiography that has defined studies of the early importation and use of firearms in Africa. In addition to their use in warfare, it examines their non-military use, and identifies aspects of the topic still needing additional research.
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  237. Schroeder, Matt, and Guy Lamb. “Illicit Arms Trade in Africa.” African Analyst Quarterly 3 (2006): 69–78.
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  239. Although only a brief study, this is nonetheless one of the best examinations of illegal arms trafficking in Africa, a difficult area of investigation. It offers sensible strategies for controlling the trade.
  240. Find this resource:
  241. Smaldone, Joseph P. “Firearms in the Central Sudan: A Revaluation.” Journal of African History 13.4 (1972): 591–607.
  242. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700011956Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  243. In contrast to many of the papers in the Journal of African History special sections just mentioned, this article embraces technological determinism by arguing that firearms produced revolutionary changes to politico-military structures in the western Sudanic belt. (See also Smaldone 2008, cited under North and West Africa.)
  244. Find this resource:
  245. Storey, William. Guns, Race and Power in Colonial South Africa. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
  246. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  247. Proposes a close relationship between firearms technology and politics in South Africa from the 17th through the 19th century and argues that guns underpinned the rise of racial discrimination in the region. It includes discussions of the trade in firearms, their technological development, and their use in hunting as well as military activity.
  248. Find this resource:
  249. Strategic Culture
  250.  
  251. In addition to understanding the material culture of warfare, it is vital to appreciate its “strategic culture,” which includes such things as morale, discipline, and cohesion, all of which stem from deeply rooted social patterns and cosmologies. Fisher 1971, Lan 1985, and Waller 1995 all explore the intimate relationship between African warfare and religious structures. Johnson 1981 examines the complexity of an African military ethos and how it has been misunderstood by outsiders. Saul 1998 investigates how sociopolitical structures can shape military organization, while Redmond 1976 tackles the difficult question of the transmission of military influences. By the use of creative and sophisticated historical methodologies, Kenny 1979 and Harms 1983 offer rare views of the nature of African conflict “from within.”
  252.  
  253. Fisher, Humphrey J. “Prayer and Military Activity in the History of Muslim Africa South of the Sahara.” Journal of African History 12.3 (1971): 391–406.
  254. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700010847Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  255. This essay shows how prayer often decisively underpinned the discipline and morale of Muslim African armies and how it was integral from the beginning to the end of a military campaign.
  256. Find this resource:
  257. Harms, Robert W. “The Wars of August: Diagonal Narrative in African History.” American Historical Review 88 (1983): 809–834.
  258. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  259. Through the use of sophisticated methodological approaches, this article reconstructs a nuanced picture of 19th-century conflicts among extra-literate societies in the Congo basin.
  260. Find this resource:
  261. Johnson, Douglas. “The Fighting Nuer: Primary Sources and the Origins of a Stereotype.” Africa 51.1 (1981): 508–527.
  262. DOI: 10.2307/1158952Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  263. Early observers, misunderstanding the complex military ethos of the Nuer of the southern Sudan, perpetuated images of a ferocious, bellicose people typical of the portrayals used by European colonialists to justify African “pacification.”
  264. Find this resource:
  265. Kenny, Michael G. “The Wasaki War: An Oral Narrative of Southwestern Kenya.” Anthropos 74 (1979): 864–880.
  266. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  267. Through a creative and meticulous analysis of oral tradition gathered from lineage-based societies near Lake Victoria, Kenny shows how military organization and metaphysics are closely intertwined. Provides a fascinating “insiders” glimpse of the mode of warfare practiced in this part of Africa.
  268. Find this resource:
  269. Lan, David. Guns and Rain: Guerrillas and Spirit Mediums in Zimbabwe. London: James Currey, 1985.
  270. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  271. Demonstrates the importance of traditional religion in African warfare, both in the past and on into recent times. It also explores the dynamics of peasant support for guerrilla fighters during Zimbabwe’s struggle for independence.
  272. Find this resource:
  273. Redmond, Patrick M. “Some Results of Military Contacts between the Ngoni and their Neighbours in Nineteenth Century Southern East Africa.” Transafrican Journal of History 5.1 (1976): 74–97.
  274. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  275. Shows how economic, political, and cultural factors determined to what extent, if at all, neighboring peoples tried to imitate the sophisticated military structures and martial outlooks of the Ngoni, and under what circumstances amalgamation with them might occur.
  276. Find this resource:
  277. Saul, Mahir. “The War Houses of the Watara in West African History.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 31.3 (1998): 537–570.
  278. DOI: 10.2307/221475Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  279. In a complex sociopolitical environment, non-centralized war bands composed of war leaders and their clients in Burkina Faso formed military units similar to caravan “partnerships” to reap the economic benefits of raiding.
  280. Find this resource:
  281. Waller, Richard. “Kindongoi’s Kin: Prophecy and Power in Maasailand.” In Revealing Prophets: Prophecy in Eastern African History. Edited by David M. Anderson and Douglas H. Johnson, 128–164. London: James Currey, 1995.
  282. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  283. Chronicles the means by which the Loonkidongi family used their religious status as prophets to unify Maasai fighting men into powerful military forces that assured Maasai dominance throughout a wide stretch of East Africa.
  284. Find this resource:
  285. Gender
  286.  
  287. In warfare, combat roles have overwhelmingly been filled by men, at least in part because of men’s perceived need to protect norms of masculinity, which is a prime motivation for participation in conflict. Mazrui 1977 and Swart 1998 investigate how such notions have led to participation in African warfare. And yet, all warfare involves both sexes. If frequently women appear in war in mundane yet essential “supporting” roles, there are also exceptional instances of women warriors and commanders excelling in every aspect of the craft of war. Law 1993 and Bay 1998 both examine one of the few genuine examples in military history of women as elite warriors in 19th-century Dahomey. Miller 1975 and Thornton 1991 debate questions of legitimacy dealing with an extraordinary warrior queen in 17th-century Angola, while Behrend 1999 investigates another extraordinary female commander from 20th-century Uganda. On another level, war frequently displays a grim interplay of violence and sexuality, all too often expressed in terms of sexual brutality of the sort Women’s Bodies as Battleground: Sexual Violence Against Women and Girls During the War in the Democratic of the Congo describes related to recent civil wars in the Congo.
  288.  
  289. Bay, Edna G. Wives of the Leopard: Gender, Culture and Politics in the Kingdom of Dahomey. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 1998.
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  291. Using oral traditions and written from a Dahomian point of view, this expands in some ways on Law 1993 by broadening the political analysis. It argues that as the state declined, so too did opportunities for women as warriors and political functionaries.
  292. Find this resource:
  293. Behrend, Heike. Alice Lakwena and the Holy Spirits. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1999.
  294. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  295. A study of an extraordinary woman who led the Holy Spirit Mobile Forces in guerrilla campaigns of 1986–1987 in Uganda. It examines the infusion of traditional religion and Christianity into the ideology of a guerrilla army, and how Alice was able to transform her role as spirit medium into that of military commander.
  296. Find this resource:
  297. Law, Robin. “The Amazons of Dahomey.” Paideuma 39 (1993): 245–260.
  298. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  299. Traces the evolution of the Amazons as a fighting unit and discusses their specific military actions. It argues that despite compiling an admirable military record, empowerment was gained only through subservience to the male king and that their acceptance as elite warriors rested on their “rebirth” as men.
  300. Find this resource:
  301. Mazrui, Ali A., ed. The Warrior Tradition in Modern Africa. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1977.
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  303. Many of these essays were concerned with showing the perpetuation of traditional military values into the post-independence era, and a focus on notions of masculinity would inform debates and discussions for many years to come.
  304. Find this resource:
  305. Miller, Joseph C. “Nzinga of Matamba in New Perspective.” Journal of African History 16.2 (1975): 201–216.
  306. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700001122Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  307. Although Nzinga was successful as a military innovator, army commander, diplomat, and politician, this article argues that her gender led to lifelong legitimacy problems.
  308. Find this resource:
  309. Swart, Sandra. “‘A Boer and his gun and His wife are three things always together’: Republican masculinity and the 1914 rebellion.” Journal of Southern African Studies 24.4 (1998): 737–751.
  310. DOI: 10.1080/03057079808708599Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  311. Argues that participation in the Boer rebellion of 1914 was brought on at least in part by fears over the loss of masculinity after an earlier Boer defeat in the Anglo-Boer War.
  312. Find this resource:
  313. Thornton, John K. “Legitimacy and Political Power: Queen Njinga 1624–1663.” Journal of African History 32.1 (1991): 25–40.
  314. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700025329Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  315. In response to Miller, Thornton suggests that concepts of legitimacy in 17th-century Angola were complex and that Njinga (a variation of the spelling of “Nzinga”) figuratively “became male” to rule effectively.
  316. Find this resource:
  317. Women’s Bodies as Battleground: Sexual Violence Against Women and Girls During the War in the Democratic of the Congo.
  318. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  319. This is an online report sponsored by Réseau des Femmes pour un Dévelopment Associatif, Réseau des Femmes pour la Défense des Droits et la Paix, International Alert, 2005. It gives a detailed examination of sexual violence against civilians by private armies and militias during Congo civil wars. The graphic depictions are based on testimonies of over five hundred victims. Edited by Marie Claire Omayondo Ohamba, Jean Berckmans, Bahanga Muhingwa, and Barnabé Mulyumba Wa Mamba.
  320. Find this resource:
  321. African Warfare Before 1800
  322.  
  323. Largely because of the paucity of source material, there are comparatively few studies of African military history before 1800, and almost all are focused on those parts of the continent where early written documentation existed. This section is divided into three sub-sections, each focused on a particular geographical region where significant research on early African military history has been possible: northern Africa, Atlantic Africa, and eastern and southern Africa.
  324.  
  325. Warfare in Northern Africa
  326.  
  327. Ancient African military history is confined to North Africa. Our earliest glimpses of it are of ancient Egypt, for which Spalinger 2005 is an excellent source. Carthage is another militarized ancient North African state for which we have considerable information, though mainly from a Roman point of view. A rare North African perspective is offered by Lancel 1999. Beginning in the 7th century, the Arab conquest of North Africa and the subsequent spread of Islam throughout that region and southward into the Sudanic belt saw the rise of powerful Muslim military dynasties and states. Notable studies of early Islamic African military history throughout those regions include Popovic 1999, McDougall 1985, Waterson 2007, Kaba 1981, and Tinniswood 2010. This last source examines one of the few African naval powers: the Barbary corsairs of Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, and Morocco who attacked European shipping throughout the Mediterranean, raided coastal settlements in Europe, and repulsed European expeditions.
  328.  
  329. Kaba, Lansiné. “Archers, Musketeers and Mosquitoes: The Moroccan Invasion of the Sudan and Songhay Resistance (1591–1612).” Journal of African History 22.4 (1981): 457–475.
  330. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700019861Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  331. This essay reassesses the role of firearms in the Moroccan victory over Songhay and focuses attention on Songhay’s subsequent guerrilla warfare. It shows why Morocco was unable to solidify its hold over the western Sudanic belt. (See also Cook 1994, cited under Firearms.)
  332. Find this resource:
  333. Lancel, Serge. Hannibal. Translated by Antonia Nevill. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 1999.
  334. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  335. Originally published in French in 1995, this biography of Hannibal critically examines him as a military commander and gives a detailed investigation of the Second Punic War. Unlike most studies, it adopts a Cartaginian/Numidian perspective, free of the usual Roman biases.
  336. Find this resource:
  337. McDougall, E. Ann. “The View From Awdaghast: War, Trade and Social Change in the Southwestern Sahara from the Eighth to the Fifteenth Century.” Journal of African History 26.1 (1985): 275–301.
  338. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  339. Analyzes symbiotic processes of destruction and accumulation between herdsmen and cultivators in the southern Sahara. It shows that slave trading from the Sudanic empire of Ghana to North Africa was rooted in warfare.
  340. Find this resource:
  341. Popovic, Alexander. Revolt of African Slaves in Iraq in the 3rd/9th Century. Princeton, NJ: Marcus Wiener, 1999.
  342. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  343. Originally published in French in 1976, this pioneering work gives an excellent military account of this, the first rebellion of the African diaspora, and one of the most important instances of resistance in world history.
  344. Find this resource:
  345. Spalinger, Anthony J. War in Ancient Egypt. Ancient World at War Series. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005.
  346. DOI: 10.1002/9780470774861Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  347. A complete study of warfare in the New Kingdom from the XVII dynasty, with a special concentration on logistics, it includes discussions of key battles and campaigns and contains helpful maps, illustrations, and informative excursuses.
  348. Find this resource:
  349. Tinniswood, Adrian. Pirates of Barbary: Corsairs, conquests and captivity in the seventeenth century Mediterranean. New York: Riverhead, 2010.
  350. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  351. Except along parts of the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean coasts, African naval forces were rare. This study of the Barbary corsairs of North Africa interprets their conflicts with Europeans both as a clash of civilizations (a sort of “sea-jihad”) and as a commercial rivalry. Also includes informed investigations of privateering and piracy.
  352. Find this resource:
  353. Waterson, James. Knights of Islam: The Wars of the Mamluks. London: Greenhill, 2007.
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  355. This is a thorough investigation the Mamluk military system of Egypt from its conception in the 13th century to its eventual decline in the 16th century. A fine treatment of this extraordinary military force composed of slave-soldier cavalrymen, it is enhanced by excellent illustrations. (See also Ayalon 1978, cited under Firearms)
  356. Find this resource:
  357. Warfare in Atlantic Africa
  358.  
  359. The appearance of Portuguese, Dutch, English, French, and other entrepreneurs on the Atlantic coasts from the 15th century led to dramatic proliferations of conflict in those regions, much of it accompanying the burgeoning trade in slaves. The best general overview is Thornton 1999. Much debate has focused on links between the slave trade, the expansion of military activity, and transformations of military structures throughout the region. Lovejoy 2012 provides an excellent summary of those debates. Curtin 1975, Law 1977, Law 1991, and Klein 1990 all investigate upper regions of the coast and parts of the interior, while Birmingham 1966 deals with lower regions focused on Angola. (See also Miller 1975 and Thornton 1991, both cited under Gender.)
  360.  
  361. Birmingham, David. Trade and Conquest in Angola: The Mbundu and their Neighbours and the Portuguese. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1966.
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  363. Although dated, this is still the standard account of the Portuguese conquest of Angola. It critically examines links between economic and military structures, incursions by mobile, militarized Imbangala invaders, the downfall of the Kongo kingdom and the emergence of the Lunda empire.
  364. Find this resource:
  365. Curtin, Philip. Economic Change in Precolonial Africa: Senegambia in the Slave Trade. 2 vols. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1975.
  366. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  367. Examines upheavals caused by slave-raiding in an area impacted by both the Atlantic and trans-Saharan slave trades. It explores the relationship between warfare and states, arguing against the concept of “gun-slave cycles” there.
  368. Find this resource:
  369. Klein, Martin A. “The Impact of the Atlantic Slave Trade on the Societies of the Societies of the Western Sudan.” Social Science History 14 (1990): 2231–2253.
  370. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  371. A thoughtful analysis of military aspects of the slave trade in areas inland from the coast with a focus on the emergence of warrior states and their slave-raiding armies.
  372. Find this resource:
  373. Law, Robin. The Oyo Empire c. 1600–1836: A West African Imperialism in the Era of the Atlantic Slave Trade. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977.
  374. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  375. A stimulating study by a leading West African military historian that describes how imported horses were used to form slave-raiding cavalry forces. It argues that the Atlantic slave trade stimulated local production.
  376. Find this resource:
  377. Law, Robin. The Slave Coast of West Africa 1550–1750: The Impact of the Slave Trade on an African Society. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.
  378. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  379. Expanding on an earlier essay, this definitive study of the role of violence in the expansion of the slave trade puts the military rise of Dahomey into a wider West African context.
  380. Find this resource:
  381. Lovejoy, Paul. Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
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  383. The third edition of a work originally published in 1983, this gives a broad overview of slavery and the slave trade throughout the entire continent but with an emphasis on Atlantic Africa. It provides a clear overview of debates concerning military aspects of the slave trade and argues for a direct link between slaving activities and militarization.
  384. Find this resource:
  385. Thornton, John K. Warfare in Atlantic Africa 1500–1800. London: University College London Press, 1999.
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  387. This useful overview is written mainly from an African perspective. It argues that African states had greater military strength than usually suggested and that European superiority has been exaggerated. It provides a thorough analysis of African armies in the wider context of global military history.
  388. Find this resource:
  389. Warfare in Eastern and Southern Africa
  390.  
  391. In the Horn of Africa, endemic conflict between the Christian Solomonic dynasty of highland Ethiopia and Muslim states of the lowlands spanned several centuries. Huntingford 1965 provides a contemporary view of that warfare as waged in the 14th century. Stretching southward from the Horn, Islamicized Swahili city-states of the East African coast were linked to the wider Indian Ocean world through commerce. Documents contained in Freeman-Grenville 1962 give glimpses of conflicts there from the early centuries AD, and Strandes 1989 studies the Portuguese conquest of the region. In southern Africa, Boer settlers steadily encroached on Khoisan lands as they pushed northward from the Cape. Marks 1972 examines the resulting constant low-level conflict thus generated.
  392.  
  393. Freeman-Grenville, G. S. P., ed. The East African Coast: Select Documents from the First Century to the Early Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon, 1962.
  394. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  395. This is a collection of excerpts from many different documents on the East African coast, including a number that describe the early warfare of the Swhahili city states.
  396. Find this resource:
  397. Huntingford, G. W. B., ed. and trans. The Glorious Victories of Amda Seyon. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1965.
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  399. This translation of a contemporary Amharic source gives a fascinating look at 14th-century Ethiopian military campaigns. Several translated soldiers’ songs and a helpful introductory section provide added dimensions.
  400. Find this resource:
  401. Marks, Shula. “Khoisan Resistance to the Dutch in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.” Journal of African History 13.1 (1972): 55–80.
  402. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700000268Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  403. Revising standard images of Khoi and San resistance to Boer dispossession, this study demonstrates that responses were complex and also traces the erosion of ethnic identity in the face of both European and Bantu intrusion.
  404. Find this resource:
  405. Strandes, Justus. Translated by Jean Wallworth. Edited with topographical notes by J. S. Kirkman. The Portuguese Period in East Africa. Nairobi, Kenya: East African Literature Bureau, 1989.
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  407. Originally published in German in 1899, this classic text, while subjected to critical revisions over the years, still represents a useful overview of the Portuguese conquest of the eastern African coast from the 16th through the 18th centuries. Based on extensive use of original Portuguese documents, this contains fascinating military detail and provides a gripping, lively narrative, albeit from a Lusitanian perspective.
  408. Find this resource:
  409. Transformations of African Warfare in the 19th Century
  410.  
  411. Nineteenth-century African military history is far richer and more voluminous than that of earlier periods. This is due in part to the huge body of written documentation that accompanied the European penetration and occupation of the continent and to a larger and more reliable corpus of collected oral tradition. Many observers have detected dramatic enlargements of military activity, the advent of more efficient military organization, and expansions of military professionalism in many parts of the continent during this century. Taken together with the adoption of vast amounts of more sophisticated military hardware, profound economic changes, and the spread of deep religious and ideological fervor, these things combined to produce what some have termed a 19th-century “military revolution” throughout much of Africa. This section has been divided into three sub-sections that deal with the century before the European conquest, each dealing with military transformations in a particular geographical region.
  412.  
  413. Southern Africa
  414.  
  415. Familiarity with the 19th-century military history of southern Africa greatly surpasses that of any other part of the continent. This is due to the fascination generated by a number of studies focusing on the Zulu military state and its founder, Shaka. Until about 1990, most works depicted Shaka as a strategic and tactical genius who transformed Zulu military structures, causing dramatic expansions against neighboring communities in a process dubbed the mfecane, or “the crushing.” By the late 1980s, however, revisionist historians were beginning to challenge such views, producing one of the major controversies of African military history. Ritter 1995 helped create the archetypal older view of Shaka, while Morris 1998 presented a popular and hugely influential overview of Zulu history. Omer-Cooper 1966 gave the standard early scholarly version of the mfecane. Spear 1972 investigated expansions that went well beyond South Africa into parts of Central and East Africa. Hamilton 1998, Wylie 2006, and Gump 1990 presented revised views of Shaka and the Zulu, while Etherington 2001 critically assessed both the mfecane, and another major South African expansion, the Boer’s Great Trek onto the Highveldt.
  416.  
  417. Etherington, Norman. The Great Treks: The Transformation of Southern Africa 1815–1854. New York: Longman, 2001.
  418. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  419. This is a critical and polemic comparative examination of both the mfecane and the Great Trek as icons, respectively, of Zulu and Afrikaner national identities. It provides an excellent overview of the debates concerning Zulu military expansion.
  420. Find this resource:
  421. Gump, James. The Formation of the Zulu Kingdom. Lewiston, NY, and San Francisco: Mellen Research University Press, EM Texts, 1990.
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  423. It gives one of the earliest revisionist assessments of the expansion of the Zulu and of Shaka as a military innovator and commander. It establishes a wider regional context by considering parallel developments among neighboring kingdoms.
  424. Find this resource:
  425. Hamilton, Carolyn. Terrific Majesty: The Power of Shaka. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998.
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  427. Examines how powerful images of Shaka have been constructed over time by black and white observers alike. It manages to establish some middle ground between earlier “Shaka-centric” views of and some of the later more extreme revisionist treatments.
  428. Find this resource:
  429. Morris, Donald R. The Washing of the Spears: A History of the Rise of the Zulu Nation Under Shaka and Its Fall in the Zulu War of 1879. Boston: De Capo, 1998.
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  431. This classic, stirrring study by a journalist is one of the most widely read works on African military history ever produced. Originally published in 1958, it has been overtaken by subsequent research but remains popular with general readers. It has served as the basis for a popular understanding of Zulu warfare for many years.
  432. Find this resource:
  433. Omer-Cooper, J. D. The Zulu Aftermath. London: Longman, 1966.
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  435. This scholarly interpretation examines Zulu expansions without reference to external factors. Highly influential, it was essentially responsible for introducing concepts of the mfecane and provided a standard picture of an irresistible Zulu military machine.
  436. Find this resource:
  437. Ritter, E. A. Shaka Zulu. New York: Penguin, 1995.
  438. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  439. Originally published in 1955, this classic treatment of Shaka presents him as both a military genius and a psychotic killer. It set the template for subsequent studies until the late 1980s and has remained influential even after revisionist assaults. It is a notable example of the “great man” approach to military history.
  440. Find this resource:
  441. Spear, Thomas T. Zwagendaba’s Ngoni 1821–1890. Madison: African Studies Program, University of Wisconsin, 1972.
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  443. Written at a time when older views of the mfecane were still prevalent, this study nonetheless presents the best overall picture of the northern migrations of the Nguni-speaking Bantu to whom the Zulu belonged. It gives a clear picture of complex processes of migration and military expansion.
  444. Find this resource:
  445. Wylie, Dan. Myth of Iron: Shaka in History. Scottsville, South Africa: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 2006.
  446. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  447. This scholarly “anti-biography” of Shaka methodically dismantles myths about him. Giving careful attention to the military aspects of Shaka’s career, it presents a picture of a commander quite dissimilar from those in many earlier sources.
  448. Find this resource:
  449. North and West Africa
  450.  
  451. In North Africa military transformation often took the form of the conscious emulation of European models. One of the most dramatic examples was the “modernization” of the Egyptian army by the revolutionary state-builder Muhammed Ali, as examined by Fahmy 2002. In the Sudanic region of West Africa and in some areas closer to the coast, militant Islam, taking the form of wide-spread jihads, underlay sweeping changes to military structures. Smaldone 2008 investigates such processes in the most notable of the jihads, while Roberts 1987 and Barry 1998 are concerned with both religious and commercial impacts in two other regions. Shifting commercial patterns, in some places due to the abolition of the slave trade, also ushered in politico-economic changes that would drive military innovation and enlargements of conflict in other areas, including the Yoruba city-states, as treated by Ajayi and Smith 1971, and the Asante kingdom, as investigated by Wilks 1989. (See also Law 1993 and Bay 1998, both cited under Gender.)
  452.  
  453. Ajayi, J. F. Ade, and Robert Smith. Yoruba Warfare in the Nineteenth Century. London: Longman, 1971.
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  455. Successors to the collapsed Oyo Empire, the Yoruba city-states have received considerable attention from historians, much of it unfortunately uneven. Originally published in 1964, this work is still regarded as a pioneering contribution to African military history, as it examines the 19th-century evolution of formidable Yoruba military structures.
  456. Find this resource:
  457. Barry, Boubacar. Translated by Ayi Kwea Armath. Senegambia and the Atlantic Slave Trade. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
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  459. Originally published in French 1988, this is a sweeping study of the region’s changing economic, political, and military patterns in the face of clashes between traditional and Islamic ideologies and the pressures generated by slave trading and European intrusion.
  460. Find this resource:
  461. Fahmy, Khalid. All the Pasha’s Men: Mehmed Ali, His Army, and the Making of Modern Egypt. Cairo, Egypt: American University in Cairo Press, 2002.
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  463. Originally published in 1997, this important study examines Muhammad Ali (as his name is more usually spelled) as a military innovator and modernizer, and gives a meticulously detailed picture of the army’s foundation, training, discipline, combat performance and even the daily life of the troops. It contains a critical assessment of how military innovation, based on Western patterns, created the modern state.
  464. Find this resource:
  465. Roberts, Richard. Warriors, Merchants and Slaves: The state and the economy in the middle Niger valley 1700–1914. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1987.
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  467. Containing critiques of earlier works including Goody and Smaldone, this study’s empirical investigations of the warfare of the region’s warrior states focuses on “razzia [raiding] war.” Argues that warfare here had productive as well as destructive aspects.
  468. Find this resource:
  469. Smaldone, Joseph P. Warfare in the Sokoto Caliphate: Historical and Sociological Perspectives. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
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  471. Originally published in 1977, this path-breaking book deals with the military aspects of one of the most important Islamic revolutions in African history. Using a social science methodology, it argues that cavalry and firearms were responsible for structural transformations that allowed the emergence of a feudal, bureaucratic state. It also includes a nuanced examination of impact of firearms in a broad social context.
  472. Find this resource:
  473. Wilks, Ivor. Asante in the Nineteenth Century: The Structure and Evolution of a Political Order. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
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  475. Originally published in 1975, this broad and masterful history of Asante shows how it balanced economic and military concerns during its dramatic transformation into one of West Africa’s most powerful military powers. It covers the Asante army in depth and provides an excellent background to the Anglo-Asante War.
  476. Find this resource:
  477. Eastern Africa
  478.  
  479. In eastern Africa, the development of long-distance trade helped drive many military transformations. Often, charismatic leaders sought to use military power to gain commercial domination, as they sometimes employed rootless young men as new and effective sorts of soldiers. Bennett 1971 and Shorter 1968 investigate especially good examples of such processes by which Mirambo and Nyungu-ya-Mawe created dynamic, though short-lived, military states. Waller looks at another example of the mobilization of young men, in this case by Maasai religious functionaries (see also Waller 1995 and Redmond 1976, both cited under Strategic Culture). Religious factors were also behind military transformations in Ethiopia, in this instance a growing sense of Christian nationalism, as depicted by Dunn 1994. Also investigating the Ethiopian military, Caulk 1978 underscores the inherent and continuing fragility of African logistical systems, even in the face of other sweeping military changes. Reid 2007 gives a broad overview of eastern Africa and advances key themes that define military transformation throughout the region (see also Peers 2003, cited under Material Culture).
  480.  
  481. Bennett, Norman R. Mirambo of Tanzania. New York: Oxford University Press, 1971.
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  483. Long considered one of the finest biographies on an African military leader, this book examines Mirambo’s creation of an empire based on a well-drilled, well-disciplined army with which he gained control of long-distance trade routes.
  484. Find this resource:
  485. Caulk, Richard. “Armies as Predators: Soldiers and Peasants in Ethiopia c. 1850–1935.” International Journal of African Historical Studies 11.3 (1978): 457–493.
  486. DOI: 10.2307/217313Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  487. This important article addresses a vital and too often neglected aspect of African military history: logistics. With special attention to the supply system of the Ethiopian army through a series of 19th- and 20th-century transformations, this study demonstrates that despite “modernization” in many areas, logistics remained dangerously underdeveloped.
  488. Find this resource:
  489. Dunn, John. “‘For God, Emperor, Country!’ The Evolution of Ethiopia’s Nineteenth Century Army.” War in History 1 (1994): 278–299.
  490. DOI: 10.1177/096834459400100303Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  491. A rare example of an article on African military history written primarily for an audience of military historians rather than Africanists. Shows how a growing sense of Christian nationalism underpinned military transformations and state expansion. It treats in some detail many aspects of the army’s evolution.
  492. Find this resource:
  493. Reid, Richard. War in Pre-Colonial Eastern Africa. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2007.
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  495. This book explores the nature of warfare throughout a wide swath of eastern Africa, with a focus on three states: Ethiopia, Buganda, and Mirambo’s Nyamwezi empire. Demonstrates how conflict encouraged political growth and also considers diplomacy, tactical evolution, gender, and the employment of firearms.
  496. Find this resource:
  497. Shorter, Alward. “Nyungu-ya-Mawe and the Ruga Ruga.” Journal of African History 9.2 (1968): 235–259.
  498. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700008859Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  499. This contemporary of Mirambo provides another example of a charismatic military leader who consolidated political power through military means to achieve commercial domination. This article examines his construction of a mercenary army composed of musket-wielding, rootless youths called ruga ruga to conquer much of south-central Tanzania.
  500. Find this resource:
  501. Waller, Richard. “The Lords of East Africa.” PhD diss., Cambridge University, 1979.
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  503. This fine study of military evolution among a decentralized people demonstrates that some of the best sources on the Maasai have never been published. It shows how families of prophets used their positions of religious leadership to transform militarized age-sets into efficient military units.
  504. Find this resource:
  505. Imperial Conquest and African Resistance
  506.  
  507. African armed struggles against European partition and conquest in the late 19th and early 20th centuries have received much historical attention. Until about the mid-20th century, these conflicts tended to be depicted from a Eurocentric perspective as “pacification” operations (see Stanley 2006 and Churchill 2013, both cited under Primary Materials), but from the 1960s African points of view began to predominate, picturing them as wars of “resistance.” Of the relatively few general works offering broad surveys of imperial conquest and African resistance, one of the most useful is Vandervort 1998, while Whitehouse and Dennis 1987 investigates the military intricacies of colonial campaigns. Each strives to present information from both the imperialist and African sides. Abbink, et al. 2003 offers new perspectives and suggests additional areas of investigation for the study of conquest and resistance.
  508.  
  509. Abbink, Jon, M. E. de Brujin, and K. Van Waleraven, eds. Rethinking Resistance: Revolt and Violence in African History. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2003.
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  511. This collection of thirteen essays, written mainly by social scientists, comprises studies of resistance, colonial conquest, and military mutinies over a wide chronological span. A strong historical dimension is evident in most of them. It poses fundamentally important questions about the roots, motives, and the very nature of armed resistance in Africa.
  512. Find this resource:
  513. Vandervort, Bruce. Wars of Imperial Conquest in Africa 1830–1914. Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1998.
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  515. This ambitious survey examines all the European colonial powers and many of the Africans who resisted them. It seeks to balance imperial and indigenous points of view and to establish a comparative analysis. It also investigates the extent to which the legacy of conquest and resistance has shaped modern African identities.
  516. Find this resource:
  517. Whitehouse, Howard, and Peter Dennis. Battle in Africa 1879–1914. Mandfield, UK: Fieldbooks, 1987.
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  519. Written for military buffs, this book strives to present a balanced examination of both imperial and African military systems. It provides a unique and vivid analysis of colonial campaigns: from the initial planning of strategy and mobilization of troops, to the fate of the wounded after combat. It is enhanced by many charts, diagrams, and the well-researched drawings of Peter Dennis.
  520. Find this resource:
  521. Resistance Leaders
  522.  
  523. Some of the finest studies of African resistance focus on its leaders. For many of them, their careers illustrate a strong continuity from earlier 19th-century wars against indigenous rivals. Robinson 1985, Marcus 1995, Redmayne 1968, and Knight 1999 all provide particularly good examples of such continuity. Religion often served as a powerful tool to mobilize African resistance, as is examined by Marcus 1995, Person 1968, Kiser 2008, and Sheik-Abdil 1999. Warfare was not the only response leaders could make to counter-colonial domination. Leaders who used effective diplomatic tactics in addition to armed resistance are depicted in several of these sources, but especially in Thompson 1975.
  524.  
  525. Kiser, John W. Commander of the Faithful: Life and Times of Emir Abd el-Kadir. Rhinebeck, NY: Monkfish, 2008.
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  527. This compulsively readable account of the heroic commander of Algerian resistance to the French in the earlier 19th century, paints a picture of a military commander adept at the tactics of raiding war. Sometimes verging on hagiography, this book portrays him as one of the most genuinely devout and noble of African resistance leaders.
  528. Find this resource:
  529. Knight, Ian. Great Zulu Commanders. London: Arms and Armour, 1999.
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  531. Although essentially a popular narrative history of nearly unbroken resistance that spanned much of Zulu history, this study, based on careful research, considers not only familiar leaders such as Shaka and Cetswayo, but eight other commanders who led Zulu military forces before, during, and after the Anglo-Zulu War.
  532. Find this resource:
  533. Marcus, Harold G. The Life and Times of Menelik II: Ethiopia 1844–1913. Trenton, NJ: Red Sea Press, 1995.
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  535. Originally published in 1975, this classic investigation chronicles the military career of the only African leader to defeat a European invasion. It pays close attention to Menelik’s consolidation of power in earlier conflicts with African rivals, to his military innovations, and to his use of religion to instill a strong Christian nationalism.
  536. Find this resource:
  537. Person, Yves. Samori: Une révolution dyula, Mémoire de l’Istitut Fondamental d’Afrique Noire No. 80. 3 vols. Dakar, Senegal: Institut Fondamental d’Afrique Noire, 1968.
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  539. Based on oral traditions collected from over eight hundred informants, this monumental work investigates Samori’s rise to power and his expansions against neighboring peoples. It also considers his creation of an army of riflemen and cavalry, his extraordinary diplomatic skills, his audacious war of maneuver, and his use of Islam in achieving wide military success against African and French adversaries.
  540. Find this resource:
  541. Redmayne, Alison. “Mkwawa and the Hehe Wars.” Journal of African History 9.3 (1968): 409–436.
  542. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700008653Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  543. Examines Mkwawa’s military career, showing how he overcame rivals to gain the chiefship of the Hehe, warred successfully against neighboring peoples, raided caravan routes, effected military innovation, and more closely unified his people. It also describes his conflicts with the Germans in which he used conventional warfare and guerrilla tactics.
  544. Find this resource:
  545. Robinson, David. The Holy War of Umar Tal: The Western Sahara in the Mid-Nineteenth Century. Oxford: Clarendon, 1985.
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  547. Although the charismatic Al Hadj Umar Tal is venerated by the people of Senegal as a heroic leader of resistance to French conquest, most of his military actions were jihads against non-Muslim and co-religionist neighbors at whose hands he was finally defeated and killed. This fine biography gives a good military analysis of his campaigns and contains a useful bibliography.
  548. Find this resource:
  549. Sheik-Abdil, Abdi. Divine Madness: Mohammed Abdulle Hassan (1956–1920). London: Zed Books, 1999.
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  551. Denigrated by his European enemies as the “Mad Mullah,” this study by a Somali author undertakes impartially to reexamine this complex warrior-poet. Concentrating on the remarkable longevity of his “dervish” army’s resistance, the book presents a picture of an inspired commander who was at once a shrewd tyrant and committed nationalist.
  552. Find this resource:
  553. Thompson, Leonard M. Survival in Two Worlds: Moshoeshoe of Lesotho, 1786–1870. Oxford: Clarendon, 1975.
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  555. He created a mobile, effective cavalry army equipped with rifles, which he led successfully against African and European enemies and never suffered a major military defeat. This adulatory examination presents Moshoeshoe as a master of diplomacy who preserved the cultural independence of his people in the face of substantial European pressures.
  556. Find this resource:
  557. Resistance in Southern and Central Africa
  558.  
  559. Largely because of a best-selling popular treatment, Morris 1998, the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879 is the most widely known instance of African resistance anywhere on the continent. Guy 1999 provides a scholarly analysis of the war and its aftermath, while Laband 1992 represents the most definitive recent study (see also Morris 1967, cited under Material Culture). The lesser-known resistance of another South African people, the Xhosa, is the subject of Peires 1981. Ranger 1967 examines the Chimurenga War in southern Rhodesia and in the process inaugurates one of the most important debates in the historiography of African resistance (see also Summers and Pagden 1970, cited under Material Culture). Isaacman and Isaacman 1976 provides the most complete investigation of African responses in the Zambesi Valley of Central Africa. Contributing to another contentious debate concerning African resistance, Zimmer and Zeller 2007 and Sarkin 2011 examine genocidal German colonial campaigns in South West Africa.
  560.  
  561. Guy, Jeff. The Destruction of the Zulu Kingdom: The Civil War in Zululand 1879–1884. Scottsville, South Africa: University of KwaZulu-Natal Press, 1999.
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  563. Originally published in 1979, this was the first (and in many ways still the best) scholarly treatment of Zulu resistance. Written from a Zulu perspective, it argues that the destruction of the Zulu kingdom actually took place after its defeat in 1879. It gives a fine military analysis of the post-1879 civil war and of subsequent Zulu rebellions.
  564. Find this resource:
  565. Isaacman, Alan F., and Barbara Isaacman. The Tradition of Resistance in Mozambique: The Zambesi Valley, 1850–1921. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976.
  566. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  567. Chronicles the Portuguese use of African mercenary armies to subdue African opposition in the Zambesi Valley. It also examines the aftermath of initial African defeats, culminating in the Barue Rebellion of 1917.
  568. Find this resource:
  569. Laband, John. Kingdom in Crisis: The Zulu Response to the British Invasion of 1879. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 1992.
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  571. Carefully synthesizing a vast body of recent research, this examination by a prolific contemporary student of South African warfare provides the best and most accessible recent treatment of the Anglo-Zulu War. Unlike most earlier sources, battles are presented from a Zulu point of view.
  572. Find this resource:
  573. Morris, Donald R. The Washing of the Spears: A History of the Rise of the Zulu Nation Under Shaka and Its Fall in the Zulu War of 1879. Boston: De Capo, 1998.
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  575. This riveting classic study, written by a journalist, is one of the most widely read works on African military history. Originally published in 1958, it has been overtaken by subsequent research but remains popular with general readers. It has served as the basis for a popular understanding of Zulu warfare for many years and kindled a wide interest in the Anglo-Zulu War.
  576. Find this resource:
  577. Peires, Jeff. House of Phalo: A History of the Xhosa People in the Days of Their Independence. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981.
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  579. Relying on oral tradition, this study is written from a Xhosa perspective. It plays close attention to military aspects of the formation of the state and examines the evolution of Xhosa fighting techniques and technologies in wars against colonial onslaughts.
  580. Find this resource:
  581. Ranger, T. O. Revolt in Southern Rhodesia, 1896–97: A Study of African Resistance. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1967.
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  583. This monumental study of Ndebele and Shona resistance in Southern Rhodesia argues that unity was derived from the leadership of spirit mediums, and in this and several other writings, suggests a powerful connection between resistance and later mass nationalism. The book had a profound impact on African nationalist leaders and Africanist scholars alike. Although many arguments were subsequently challenged, it is still regarded as an iconic contribution to the study of African resistance.
  584. Find this resource:
  585. Sarkin, Jeremy. Germany’s Genocide of the Herero: Kaiser Wilhelm II, His General, His Settlers, His Soldiers. Woodbridge, UK: James Currey, 2011.
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  587. First published in 2010, this study dismisses arguments that the genocidal suppression of Herero and Nama resistance was simply the work of a “rogue general,” as some had alleged but stemmed from a deep racist ideology implicit in visions of a “New Germany.” It also contains a military analysis of German combat operations.
  588. Find this resource:
  589. Zimmer, Jurgen, and Joachim Zeller, eds. Genocide in German South West Africa: The Colonial War of 1904–1908 and Its Aftermath. London: Merlin, 2007.
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  591. This well-integrated collection of essays explores how German colonialists employed scorched-earth policies, concentration camps, and mass deportations to subdue Herero (and later Nama) resistance, resulting in genocidal consequences. It argues that this early example of genocide directly foreshadowed the war crimes of Hitler’s Third Reich and helped fuel subsequent debates concerning links between Namibian genocide and the Nazi holocaust.
  592. Find this resource:
  593. Resistance in Eastern Africa
  594.  
  595. In the historiography of resistance a major debate concerns the widespread Maji Maji Rebellion in German East Africa. Iliffe 1967 presents the older, orthodox view, which owes much to the writings of Ranger (see Resistance in Southern and Central Africa), to the unity derived from prophetic leadership and to a movement with important nationalist implications. From this version would stem the “Dar-es-Salaam School” of historical interpretation. Giblin and Monson 2010 presents updated interpretations (see also Maji Maji Research Project 1968 Collected Papers, cited under Primary Materials) On another topic, Uzoigwe 1968 examines the creation of one of the most notable “new model” armies of the 19th-century military revolution by the gifted Ugandan warrior-king, Kabalega of Bunyoro (see Eastern Africa). Low 1975 analyzes the creation of such forces throughout eastern Africa, with a special focus on interlacustrine Uganda. Lamphear 1992 is a study of the long resistance of decentralized Turkana in the northern deserts of Kenya, demonstrating that while the resistance of nomadic pastoralists exhibits some unique features, it resembles that of other societies in many key aspects. Waller 1976 also examines a pastoral people who, like many other societies, chose to ally themselves militarily with the colonialists rather than resisting them. Twaddle 1993 likewise presents a study of an astute military commander and politician who facilitated colonial expansion. Jonas 2011 investigates the sole example of Africans prevailing over the imperial invaders: Ethiopia’s victory over the Italians.
  596.  
  597. Giblin, James, and Jamie Monson, eds. Maji Maji: Lifting the Face of War. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2010.
  598. DOI: 10.1163/ej.9789004183421.i-325Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  599. Realizing that Iliffe’s and Gwassa’s rendering of Maji Maji tended to cloud unresolved complexities of the war, scholars questioned their interpretations. Many of the contributors to this important collection present revised views suggesting that Maji Maji was the product of local tensions and the continuation of earlier intersocietal conflicts rather than a grand, unified rebellion against the colonial order.
  600. Find this resource:
  601. Iliffe, John. “The Organization of the Maji Maji Rebellion.” Journal of African History 8.3 (1967): 495–512.
  602. DOI: 10.1017/S0021853700007982Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  603. In this and other writings, and in the works of his colleague, Gilbert Gwassa (see Ogot 1972, cited under Edited Collections for a chapter by Gwassa), the orthodox version of Maji Maji was established. It also stimulated the ambitious Maji Maji Research Project with its remarkable collection of testimony regarding the Maji Maji war. (See also Primary Materials.)
  604. Find this resource:
  605. Jonas, Raymond Anthony, ed. The Battle of Adwa: African Victory in the Age of Empire. Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 2011.
  606. DOI: 10.4159/harvard.9780674062795Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  607. This is a compilation of nine essays dealing with Menelik II’s decisive victory over the Italians to preserve Ethiopian independence. Provides a remarkably complete treatment of the battle itself and touches on related concerns. It puts the battle into the wider contexts of Ethiopian historical experience and includes theoretical discussions of African armed resistance. A supplementary website contains a great deal of additional information (see Battle of Adwa, cited under Bibliographies).
  608. Find this resource:
  609. Lamphear, John. The Scattering Time: Turkana responses to colonial rule. Oxford: Clarendon, 1992.
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  611. This study of Turkana resistance shows how they created a “new model” army and relied on the strategic direction of religious leaders in combating British and Ethiopian imperial advances. Also includes a military analysis of why African societies resorted to armed resistance in the first place.
  612. Find this resource:
  613. Low, D. A. “Warbands and Ground Level Imperialism in Uganda.” Historical Studies 16.65 (1975): 584–597.
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  615. This excellent article succinctly examines the phenomenon of “new model” armies created during Africa’s 19th-century military revolution. Concludes that despite their increased professionalism, they were no match for the “newer model” armies of invading colonial forces, thus providing a convincing explanation for the near universality of European military success during the conquest of Africa.
  616. Find this resource:
  617. Twaddle, Michael. Kakungulu and the Creation of Uganda, 1869–1928. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1993.
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  619. This fine study of a controversial figure involved in the British conquest of Uganda reveals much about the question of African “collaboration” and “sub-imperialism.” Examines the motives of gifted and innovative military commander Kakungulu in undertaking the conquest of much of Uganda with his own forces on behalf of the British administration.
  620. Find this resource:
  621. Uzoigwe, G. N. “Kabalega’s Abarasura: The Military Factor in Bunyoro.” In Proceedings of the University of East Africa Social Science Conference, 303–320. Nairobi, Kenya: East African Publishing House, 1968.
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  623. This work is a study of the modernization of the Nyoro Army by its innovative leader, Kabalega. It demonstrates how he transformed his royal bodyguard, the abarasura, into a well-drilled standing force equipped with rifles, to which were added a variety of foreign mercenary warriors. It examines how these forces were able to hold the imperial advance at bay for nearly thirty years.
  624. Find this resource:
  625. Waller, Richard. “The Maasai and the British 1895–1905: The Origins of an Alliance.” Journal of African History 17.4 (1976): 529–553.
  626. DOI: 10.1017/S002185370001505XSave Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  627. Explores the formation of a military alliance between the Maasai, one of the most proficient East African military powers, and the British colonial administration. Sheds light on the question of African military “collaboration” and provides a case study of the widespread practice of employing “tribal levies” as irregular military forces by the imperial powers.
  628. Find this resource:
  629. Resistance in West and Northern Africa
  630.  
  631. Many of the studies of resistance in these areas see the Islamic religion as a vital underpinning. Notable are several chapters in Crowder 1978, Kanya-Forstner 1969, Marjomaa 1998, Saul and Royer 2002, Woolman 1968, Brower 2009, and Zulfo 1980. In addition, Crowder 1978 discusses the historiography of resistance and was written partly to redress a perceived lack of attention to resistance in West Africa in comparison to work done in central and eastern Africa, while Zulfo 1980 provides a valuable battle narratives.
  632.  
  633. Brower, Benjamin Claude. A Desert Named Peace: The violence of France’s empire in the Algerian Sahara, 1844–1902. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009.
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  635. This is a study of the controversial French conquest of the Sahara. It investigates French brutality in subduing the resistance of desert peoples and tries to determine the causes of violence in the region. It radically reassesses indigenous Tuareg tribes, seeing them as products of “colonial imagination,” and provides good background to the Algerian Revolution.
  636. Find this resource:
  637. Crowder, Michael, ed. West African Resistance: The military response to colonial occupation. London: Hutchinson, 1978.
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  639. Several of the contributions to this book still stand as seminal analyses of West African military history and effectively counter any suggestion that the partition of the area was peaceful. Most contain substantial examinations of West African armies, strategic concepts, weaponry, and generalship (see also Wilks 1989, cited under North and West Africa).
  640. Find this resource:
  641. Kanya-Forstner, A. S. The Conquest of the Western Sudan: A Study in French Military Imperialism. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1969.
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  643. A number of important studies of the European conquest of West Africa did, in fact, precede the Crowder collection, notably this one. Regarded as a classic treatment, it is most essentially a study of colonial policy based on French archival sources, although it does also have significant military content.
  644. Find this resource:
  645. Marjomaa, Risto. War on the Savanna: The military collapse of the Sokoto Caliphate under the invasion of the British Empire, 1897–1903. Series Humamiora, no. 295. Helsinki: Finnish Academy of Science and Letters, 1998.
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  647. Based largely on archival materials, this study examines the comparatively easy British victory over the powerful Sokoto state, which it attributes to the Caliphate’s inability to effect necessary military adaptations.
  648. Find this resource:
  649. Saul, Mahir, and Patrick Royer. West African Challenge to Empire: Culture and History in Volta-Beni Anticolonial War (Western African Studies). Woodbridge, UK: James Currey, 2002.
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  651. This is a military history of one of the largest, though little-known, wars of resistance anywhere in Africa. It pays close attention to the composition of the armies of both sides and to combat operations. Employing a combination of historical and anthropological methodologies and based on extensive fieldwork, it emphasizes the sophistication African forces had achieved by 1915.
  652. Find this resource:
  653. Woolman, David S. Rebels in the Rift: Abd El Krim and the Rif Rebellion. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1968.
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  655. A detailed account of Moroccan resistance to the Spanish and French led by the able military commander Abd al-Karim from 1921 to 1926, it depicts a brutal war that foreshadowed later wars of liberation, pitching a poorly armed guerrilla army against ruthless colonial forces equipped with the overwhelming military technology, including air power.
  656. Find this resource:
  657. Zulfo, Ismat Hasan. Translated by Peter Clark. Karari: The Sudanese Account of the Battle of Omdurman. London: Frederick Warne, 1980.
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  659. First published in Arabic in 1973 by a Sudanese army officer, this was the first attempt to describe the Battle of Omdurman, the decisive British victory in the conquest of the Mahdist state, from a Sudanese point of view. Its descriptions of the Mahdist army and of the battle itself, stand in sharp contrast to the standard British accounts.
  660. Find this resource:
  661. Colonial Armies
  662.  
  663. As the imperial conquest progressed, the colonial powers all formed armies of cooperating African troops upon whose shoulders most of the actual subjugation of resisting African societies rested. As African resistance was defeated and colonial administrations established, such troops were organized into regular regiments, formed along European lines. From the beginning, there was a tendency to recruit soldiers from perceived “martial races,” and so armies often took on particular ethnic identities. Together with police forces that often played paramilitary roles, the troops became a colony’s only officially sanctioned armed forces, though they usually functioned merely as gendarmaries entrusted with internal security. Segregated from the rest of colonial society and kept strictly apolitical, they were also imbued with a sense of professional superiority. Their officers often mistook their discipline and esprit de corps for a deep loyalty to the colonial order. Moyse-Bartlett 1956, and Clayton and Killingray 1989 present studies of colonial forces from the “top down,” paying scant attention to the African rank and file. The investigations of Echenberg 1991, Parsons 1999, and Mann 2001, by contrast, are concerned with the social histories of the common soldiers and the ambiguity of their positions in the colonial order. Miller 2009 examines the diversity of colonial military forces: European and African, regular and irregular alike (see also Waller 1976, cited under Resistance in Eastern Africa).
  664.  
  665. Clayton, Anthony, and David Killingray. Khaki and Blue: Military and Police in British Colonial Africa. Monographs in International Studies, Africa Series Number 51. Athens: Ohio University Center for International Studies, 1989.
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  667. Deals not only with British colonial military forces in West, Central and East Africa but also explores the paramilitary role of police forces. Based on surveys conducted with former British officers, it contains glimpses of social history and considers recruitment and post-independence Africanization of the officer corps, though again there is not much from the perspective of the rank and file.
  668. Find this resource:
  669. Echenberg, Myron. Colonial Conscripts: The Tirailleurs Sénégalais in French West Africa, 1857–1960. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1991.
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  671. Tracing the social history of conscripts drafted into the French colonial army, this landmark study investigates how the troops reconciled their ambiguous roles in the colonial order. Winner of the prestigious Herskovits Prize, it demonstrated that military history could be employed to examine other aspects of colonial society.
  672. Find this resource:
  673. Mann, Eric J. Mikono ya damu: African Mercenaries and the Politics of Conflict in German East Africa 1888–1904. New York: Peter Lang International, 2001.
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  675. Studies the creation of colonial military culture in German East Africa. Focusing on the recruitment of mercenary troops, it investigates the formation of Schutztruppe forces and also provides a good overview of the German imperial conquest of the region.
  676. Find this resource:
  677. Miller, Stephen M., ed. Soldiers and Settlers in Africa 1850–1918. Boston: Brill, 2009.
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  679. Focusing on southern Africa, this compilation of essays seeks to rectify what is perceived as a neglected part of the region’s colonial military history. Especially focusing on the personal experiences of soldiers, the chapters examine European troops, African regular troops in colonial service, and irregular African levies.
  680. Find this resource:
  681. Moyse-Bartlett, H. The King’s African Rifles: A Study in the Military History of East and Central Africa, 1890–1945. Aldershot, UK: Gale and Polden, 1956.
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  683. Widely regarded as one of the best regimental histories even written, this book meticulously describes the formation, organization, consolidation, and expansion of the KAR. It provides a vivid history of the KAR’s many operations against indigenous peoples and its service in the First and Second World Wars. It contains little of the African voice, however.
  684. Find this resource:
  685. Parsons, Timothy H. The African Rank and File: Social Implications of Colonial Military Service in the King’s African Rifles, 1902–1964. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1999.
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  687. Blending military and social history, Parsons explores the intermediary role played by KAR troops in the British colonial regime and how they were able to exploit that role to enhance their social positions.
  688. Find this resource:
  689. Anglo-Boer Wars
  690.  
  691. Long regarded as an important point of transition in world military history, the Second Boer War taught valuable lessons regarding guerrilla and counter-insurgency conflict and led to sweeping reforms in the British Army (see Reitz 2010, cited under Primary Materials). Interest in the war has resulted in a huge body of published material (see Van Hartesveldt 2002, cited under Bibliographies). Initially regarded as a “white man’s war,” subsequent research such as Warwick 1983, has revealed significant black involvement. Aspects of the war remain controversial, such as British concentration camps to incarcerate Boer civilians and the widespread destruction of personal property. Packenham 2001 remains the standard account of the war, although it should be balanced with more recent treatments such as Nasson 2011 and Smurthwaite 2002. Because of its much shorter duration and far fewer combatants, the First Boer War has received far less attention. Laband 2005 provides one of the best overviews.
  692.  
  693. Laband, John. The Transvaal Rebellion: The First Boer War, 1880–1881. New York: Routledge, 2005.
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  695. An exciting narrative and crisp analysis makes this one of the best treatments of the First Boer War. It also provides excellent background to the subsequent war.
  696. Find this resource:
  697. Nasson, Bill. The War for South Africa: The Anglo-Boer War 1899–1902. Cape Town: NB, 2011.
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  699. This new version of a history originally published in 1999 stands as one of the finest, most up-to-date treatments of the war, containing a broad and thoughtful analysis of recent historiography.
  700. Find this resource:
  701. Packenham, Thomas. The Boer War. New York: Avon, 2001.
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  703. Originally published in 1979, this monumental military history boasts a vivid, well-written narrative. Based on the careful use of archival materials and giving a balanced examination of both sides, it remains a standard source although overtaken in some areas by subsequent research.
  704. Find this resource:
  705. Smurthwaite, David. The Boer War 1899–1902. London: Octopus, 2002.
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  707. First published in 1999, this book takes a novel approach to the war by including many extracts from the contemporary letters, diaries, and journals of men and women who were involved in the war. This combined with over two hundred contemporary photographs, provides an extraordinary sense of immersion into the conflict. A succinct narrative deals with a host of military concerns.
  708. Find this resource:
  709. Warwick, Peter. Black People and the South African War, 1899–1902. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983.
  710. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511523908Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  711. This book dispels the myth of the Boer War as a “white man’s war.” It argues that both sides employed substantial numbers of Africans in non-combatant support roles, and (especially for the British) as armed allies. Its main intention is to assess the impacts of the war on the region’s entire population.
  712. Find this resource:
  713. First World War
  714.  
  715. Colonial armies, especially those of Britain and France, were hugely expanded during the First World War and saw much combat experience. In the first war, East Africa (where British and Allied forces battled German schutztruppe) was the main theater of African combat. For their part, nearly 200,000 aggressively conscripted French West African tirailleurs served in the trenches of the Western Front, as did a contingent of South Africans. A good military overview of the war in Africa is Strachan 2004, while Anderson 2004 focuses on the East African campaign. Both are written from an essentially European point of view. The dominant military figure to emerge from the war in Africa was Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, the commander of German East African forces who waged a much-studied guerrilla campaign against superior Allied armies. Most treatments have revered him for gaining the loyalty of the schutztruppe, but a sharply revised assessment is presented by Schutte-Varendorff 2006. More strongly African points of view are contained in a 1978 special issue of the Journal of African Studies, in the account of service of Senegalese tirailleurs by Lunn 1999, in studies of South African participation in the war by Nasson 2007 and Grundlingh 1987, and in the examination of the British Carrier Corps in East Africa by Hodges 1999 (see also Corfield 2008, cited under Bibliographies, and Moyse-Bartlett 1956, cited under Colonial Armies).
  716.  
  717. Anderson, Ross. The Forgotten Front: The East African Campaign 1914–18. Stroud, UK: Tempus, 2004.
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  719. Written by a former soldier, this work is regarded as the fullest examination of the main campaign of the First World War in Africa. An old-style military history, it does consider to some extent the terrible impact of the campaign on African troops, laborers, and civilians. It makes excellent use of primary materials and provides information on military and colonial archives to aid future research.
  720. Find this resource:
  721. Grundlingh, Albert. Fighting Their Own War: South African Blacks and the First World War. Johannesburg: Raven, 1987.
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  723. This short but deeply researched work recounts the terrible treatment endured by the South African Native Labour Corps in France culminating in growing resistance and causing them eventually to be withdrawn from the campaign. It also examines how the experience contributed to escalating South African labor militancy after the war.
  724. Find this resource:
  725. Hodges, Geoffrey. Kariakor, the Carrier Corps: Military Labor in the East African Campaign, 1914–1918. Nairobi, Kenya: Nairobi University Press, 1999.
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  727. This revised edition adds considerable new information to a classic treatment. It details the neglect and exploitation suffered by this unit, which suffered more casualties in the campaign than all other British forces combined.
  728. Find this resource:
  729. Lunn, Joe H. Memoirs of the Malestrom: A Senegalese Oral History of the First World War. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1999.
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  731. As the title implies, this social history of French West African troops is based on collected oral rememberances of the war, as well as on archival sources. It deals broadly with the troops’ military experiences, from recruitment, to overseas service, to the transformations of their outlooks in the postwar period.
  732. Find this resource:
  733. Nasson, Bill. Springboks on the Somme: South Africa in the Great War, 1914–1918. Johannesburg: Penguin, 2007.
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  735. This lively account examines the experience of South African troops in both African and European campaigns. While most attention is focused on white South African combat soldiers, black members of the South African Native Labour Corps are also considered. The work is based partly on vivid oral histories, including an extraordinary account by an aged survivor of the fighting in France.
  736. Find this resource:
  737. Schutte-Varendorff, Uwe. Kolonialheld fur Kaiser und Führer: General von Lettow-Vorbeck—Eine Biographie. Berlin: Verlag, 2006.
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  739. This revisionist study dispels popular myths about Lettow-Vorbeck as a brilliant though sympathetic guerrilla commander who had the absolute devotion of his troops. Instead, we are presented with a racist whose operations were ruthlessly destructive and genocidal.
  740. Find this resource:
  741. Special Issue: Journal of African History. “World War I and Africa.” 19.1 (1978): 1–130.
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  743. Investigates social, economic, religious, and military aspects of the war. Several deal with the impact on a particular geographical region, while others provide broader surveys of the war, its repercussions, and aftermath.
  744. Find this resource:
  745. Strachan, Hew. The First World War in Africa. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
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  747. Widely regarded as the standard source, this sweeping account of the war employs the “classic” military history approach of focusing on commanders and battles rather than on the African rank and file. It does pay special attention to the medical and logistical problems of campaigning in Africa and puts military operations into a wider global context.
  748. Find this resource:
  749. Second World War
  750.  
  751. Even more African troops were mobilized for the Second World War, with British African forces serving in African campaigns, the Middle East, and Burma. South Africans served in Europe, as did large numbers of French African troops, many of whom became POWs. Taking an African perspective, the essays in the 1985 special issue of Journal of African History and Killingray and Rathbone 1986 investigate various aspects of the impact of the war on Africa, while Lawler 1992 concentrates on the war experiences of French African tirailleurs. Mockler 2002 investigates the Italian conquest of Ethiopia preceding the outbreak of the war and the East African campaign of 1940–1941 in which British troops helped end the Italian occupation. The pioneering work Jennings 2014 examines the experiences of Free French forces in French Equatorial Africa and Cameroon from 1941 to 1945. Mohamed 2000 investigates the mutiny of the British Somaliland Camel Corps toward the end of the war and its relationship to broader strands of political opposition in the region, while Killingray 2010 contributes to the wider debate concerning the role of ex-servicemen in nationalist movements of the postwar period (see also Moyse-Bartlett 1956, cited under Colonial Armies).
  752.  
  753. Jennings, Eric. La France Libre fut africaine. Paris: Perrin, 2014.
  754. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  755. Based on extensive archival research in several locations, this study emphasizes the centrality of parts of sub-Saharan Africa in the early operations of the Free French and examines the experiences of African rank and file in Free French forces.
  756. Find this resource:
  757. Killingray, David. Fighting for Britain. African Soldiers in the Second World War. Woodbridge, UK: James Currey, 2010.
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  759. This work questions the commonly held view that service in the Second World War radicalized returning African soldiers, causing them to play key roles in anticolonial political movements. Based largely on oral interviews and soldiers’ letters, it provides rich insight showing that individual reactions were varied and complex.
  760. Find this resource:
  761. Killingray, David, and Richard Rathbone, eds. Africa and the Second World War. New York: St. Martin’s, 1986.
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  763. The ten essays in this collection were the product of a further London symposium held in 1984. Again, a variety of topics are covered, though with a main focus on British territories. A central theme is that although colonial power was weakened by the war, many colonial states enjoyed renewed strength in the war’s aftermath.
  764. Find this resource:
  765. Lawler, Nancy. Soldiers of Misfortune: Ivorien Tirailleurs of World War II. Athens: Ohio University Press, 1992.
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  767. This study is based on extensive interviews with African veterans of the Second World War. The many topics investigated include conscription, conditions of service in both the Vichy and Free French armies, forced labor, and the plight of POWs. There are also poignant reflections by the ex-soldiers on their irrelevance in the modern Ivory Coast.
  768. Find this resource:
  769. Mockler, Anthony. Haile Selassie’s War. New York: Olive Branch, 2002.
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  771. A revised edition of a book originally published in 1984, this study is one of the first to treat both the fascist Italian conquest of Ethiopia in 1936 and the subsequent British east African campaign of 1940–1941. Written in a flowing narrative style, it also considers the determined guerrilla resistance of Ethiopian forces and examines Haile Selassie as a military leader.
  772. Find this resource:
  773. Mohamed, Jama. “The 1944 Somaliland Camel Corps Mutiny and Popular Politics.” History Journal Workshop 5.50 (2000): 93–113.
  774. DOI: 10.1093/hwj/2000.50.93Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  775. This study considers how soldiers’ grievances over wages and conditions of service became intertwined with wider Somali political demands. It argues that the disbanding of the corps as punishment for the mutiny only strengthened growing nationalist opposition.
  776. Find this resource:
  777. Special Issue: Journal of African History. “World War II and Africa.” 24.4 (1985): 287–408.
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  779. Stemming from a University of London symposium in 1977, the articles in this collection investigate effects of the war on Africans across the continent. Covered here are such topics as the impact of the war on colonial economies, the service of African troops overseas, and the use of propaganda in mobilizing the war effort.
  780. Find this resource:
  781. Wars of Liberation
  782.  
  783. The waning of the colonial era brought mainly peaceful transitions to independence for most African countries. In those with substantial white settler populations and in the Portuguese-ruled territories, however, independence was gained only through bitter wars of liberation. In all of these the freedom fighters employed guerrilla tactics to which the colonial administrations responded with counter-insurgency operations. All involved frequent atrocities, often against civilian populations. Davidson 1982 gives a valuable overview. Earliest was the unsuccessful Mau Mau insurrection in Kenya where the insurgents remained politically isolated and their guerrilla operations rudimentary. Many treatments of Mau Mau written before the mid-1960s focused on military operations, but were written from the perspective of the colonial administration. Later treatments adopted African viewpoints, but surprisingly few can be deemed military histories. A notable exception is Anderson 2005. Subsequent struggles in Algeria (Horne 2006), the Portuguese colonies (Weigert 2011), Southern Rhodesia (Moorcroft and McLaughlin 2008) and Namibia (Steenkamp 1989) revealed a growing sophistication in guerrilla tactics and weaponry. Ideological and international dimensions were also expanded: in Algeria there were Pan-Islamic implications, while the others were fought within the context of Cold War rivalries and featured active support, and even interventions, by outside powers. Domergue, et al. 2011 examines the little-known neo-colonial war waged by the French in Cameroon from the mid-1950s to the early 1970s. Both the terrible repression of French operations and the subsequent violence of pseudo-independent dictators against their own population are revealed.
  784.  
  785. Anderson, David. Histories of the Hanged: Britain’s dirty war in Kenya and the end of empire. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2005.
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  787. This is one of the relatively few modern treatments of the Mau Mau with substantial military content. Its main concern is to investigate the brutality of the British suppression of rebellion, and it deals with the trials of Mau Mau leaders and how the war has been memorialized, as well as with combat operations.
  788. Find this resource:
  789. Davidson, Basil. The People’s Cause: A History of Guerrillas in Africa. Harlow, UK: Longman, 1982.
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  791. Although it carries investigations only up to 1981, this study gives a valuable overview of African guerrilla warfare from the time of the initial European conquests through the liberation wars of the 1950s–1970s. It considers the evolution of the guerrillas’ weaponry, tactics, and motivations and offers case studies of guerrilla warfare in North Africa, the Congo, Eritrea, Zimbabwe, and the former Portuguese territories.
  792. Find this resource:
  793. Domergue, Manuel, Jacob Tatsitsa, and Thomas Deltombe. Kamerun! Un guerre cachée aux origines de la Francçafrique (1948–71). Paris: La Dévcouverte, 2011.
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  795. Through painstaking research involving oral interviews and combing through archival materials, this work reconstructs the history of an episode essentially obliterated from French colonial records: the horrific war of repression against the UPC opposition in Cameroon from 1955 to 1971. It also discusses the establishment of the neo-colonial “Françafrique” sphere of influence and the perpetuation of dictatorial rule after 1960.
  796. Find this resource:
  797. Horne, Alistair. A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954–1962. New York: Viking, 2006.
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  799. This classic study, originally published in 1977, is widely regarded as the definitive English-language history of the Algerian war for independence. Examining the war’s background, ideological dimensions, and the conflict itself, it provides a clear analysis of a complicated series of events. Its depictions of the war’s brutality are graphic.
  800. Find this resource:
  801. Moorcroft, Paul L., and Peter McLaughlin. The Rhodesian War: A Military History. Barnsley, UK: Pen and Sword Military, 2008.
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  803. A complete military history, giving balanced attention to the organization, weaponry, and tactics of both the guerrilla and counter-insurgency forces, it also deals with the historical roots of the conflict, its impacts on Rhodesian civilian society and its international dimensions (see also Staunton 1991, cited under Primary Materials and Lan 1985, cited under Strategic Culture).
  804. Find this resource:
  805. Steenkamp, William. South Africa’s Border War, 1966–1989. Gibraltar, UK: Ashanti, 1989.
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  807. Although presented from a white South African perspective, this well-designed coffee table volume features hundreds of combat photographs by A. J. Venter that bring a bitter conflict vividly alive. The photographs, together with a narrative by war correspondent Steenkamp, provide an overview of this long-running war that involved tens of thousands of Cuban troops, conventional as well as guerrilla phases, and the eventual spread of hostilities from Namibian and Angolan borderlands into neighboring countries.
  808. Find this resource:
  809. Weigert, Stephen L. Angola: A Modern Military History 1961–2002. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
  810. DOI: 10.1057/9780230337831Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  811. Of the many good treatments of conflicts in the former Portuguese colonies, this study of Angola contains one of the most thorough military analyses. It examines not only the war of liberation but also the subsequent civil war through 2002. It criticizes what it deems to have been too great a focus in other studies on particular military leaders, such as Jonas Savimbi.
  812. Find this resource:
  813. Post-Independence Conflict
  814.  
  815. Since the dawn of the “independence era,” endemic violence has plagued Africa; more conflict has occurred there than on any other continent. Over the first couple of decades relatively bloodless coups ousted civilian governments in many countries, replacing them with “khaki politicians.” There were also wars of secession, notably in the Congo, Ethiopia, and Nigeria. Wars between factions vying for economic or political domination were waged in Angola, Mozambique, Rwanda, Burundi, and elsewhere. There were even a few international conflicts, including wars fought by Ethiopia with Somalia and Eritrea and a Tanzanian invasion of Uganda. Some reflected Cold War rivalries and involved active interventions by various big powers. Many were low-intensity conflicts (LICs), involving guerrilla warfare. Some, however, were waged at least in part as conventional wars, including the Nigerian Civil War, Ethiopia’s international wars, and some phases the Angolan Civil War, and featured protracted campaigns, mechanized forces, and air power. From the 1990s, however, as a number of African states essentially collapsed and vast quantities of illicit arms flooded in, it was LICs that proliferated (see Mampilly 2013, cited under Bibliographies and Schroeder and Lamb 2006, cited under Firearms). Often waged by irregular private armies of entrepreneurial warlords, brutal, ragged wars were fought over basic resources. Guerrilla forces possessing, at best, murky ideologies, comprised child soldiers and subjected civilian populations to horrific violence, even genocide. Millions died; tens of millions were displaced. Some observers feeling that such violence did not qualify as “war,” dubbed it Africa’s “new barbarism.” Simultaneously, in many remote frontier areas, pastoral peoples, now armed with easily available small arms, engaged in “AK47 raiding” to capture cattle and other necessities, which, if bitter and constant, were often eclipsed by better-reported conflicts. This huge upsurge of violence has produced a barrage of published materials; there are far more treatments of warfare during this period than for all the previous eras combined. Because of the conflict’s chronological proximity, most investigation has been done by social scientists, many of whom have little interest in Africa’s past. A number of studies, however, stand as immensely important contributions to African military history, including several of the works listed here. Welch 1970, examining the early stages of the independence era when African warfare was still “conventional,” focuses on coups and the first military governments. As time passed, however, the proliferation of warfare made it difficult for even seasoned observers to sort it out. Clayton 1999 and Arnold 2009 provide schematic outlines to help readers in this difficult task. Boas and Dunn 2007 examines the most typical of combatants during this confusing period: the guerrilla fighter. Incorporating thoughtful historical analyses, both Williams 2011 and Reno 2011 focus on the most complex phase of all, the period of horrifically ragged LICs since 1990. Gregory 2000 examines the evolution of post-Cold War military policies toward Africa by outside powers, in this case the French.
  816.  
  817. Arnold, Guy. Historical Dictionary of Civil Wars in Africa. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow, 2009.
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  819. This is an updated edition of an indispensable work originally published in 1999. A remarkable survey, chronologically organized and cross-listed, it lists every war (and not just civil wars per se) that have occurred since independence. It also includes an introductory essay, a list of acronyms, biographical sketches of military commanders and politicians, and extensive information on topics ranging from child soldiers to foreign interventions.
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  821. Boas, Morten, and Kevin C. Dunn, eds. African Guerrillas: Raging against the machine. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2007.
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  823. Building on earlier work by Christopher Clapham, who also contributed the final essay to this collection, this update features case studies by social scientists of recent guerrilla warfare throughout the continent and offers a typology of guerrilla warfare. A main concern is to examine recent guerrilla attacks against the machinery of dysfunctional states.
  824. Find this resource:
  825. Clayton, Anthony. Frontiersmen: Warfare in Africa Since 1950. Philadelphia: University College London Press, 1999.
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  827. Valuable in helping readers sort out the wide range of nearly continuous conflict that has gone on in Africa since the mid-20th century, it examines wars of liberation, military interventions, civil wars, ethnic struggles, and international wars. A fundamental argument is that warfare in Africa south of the Sahara has been that of “frontiersmen” hoping to extend control over resources.
  828. Find this resource:
  829. Gregory, Shaun. “The French Military in Africa: Past and Present.” African Affairs 99.396 (2000): 435–438.
  830. DOI: 10.1093/afraf/99.396.435Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  831. This study examines both the events that led to changes in French military policy toward Africa from the mid-1990s, as well as the changes themselves involving proactive principles of Prévention and Projection.
  832. Find this resource:
  833. Reno, William. Warfare in Independent Africa. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011.
  834. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511993428Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  835. This is a major reworking of an earlier study of warlord politics that provides a deeper historical context to current conflict throughout Africa. Beginning with insurgencies in the 1950s, this work offers a broad array of case studies of the evolution of armed conflict since that time. It gives a penetrating analysis of a wide variety of struggles, including even election violence and the formation of youth gangs.
  836. Find this resource:
  837. Welch, Claude Emerson, ed. Soldier and the State in Africa: A comparative analysis of military intervention and political change. Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1970.
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  839. Military coups launched to bring about political change were still a relatively new phenomenon when this book first appeared, and so it was regarded as a pioneering investigation. It contains several case studies of particular coups and interesting appendices on the armed strength and military expenditures of independent African nations.
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  841. Williams, Paul D. War and Conflict in Africa. Malden, MA: Polity, 2011.
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  843. This work presents a clear overview of conflicts since 1990, together with a thoughtful analysis of their underlying causes. It gives a critical assessment of approaches to reconciling them, particularly interventionism.
  844. Find this resource:
  845. Various Case Studies
  846.  
  847. While LICs have predominated, there has been a wide variety of the types of conflict waged in Africa since independence. De St. Jorre 1972, Tareke 2009, and Minter 1994 all investigate wars that featured at least some elements of “conventional” war, and the last two also look at conflicts with important international implications. In a consideration of east African army mutinies, Parsons 2003 examines the wider question of why armed forces sometimes violently challenge civil authority in newly independent African states. Richards 1996 and Johnson 2011 examine conflicts in which guerrilla warfare predominated, and both offer highly nuanced investigations of the causes of the wars and motivations of the fighters (see also Beah 2007, cited under Primary Materials). Omara-Otunnu 1987 examines the remarkable range of wars that have taken place in one nation, Uganda, comprising virtually every type of conflict that has taken place in Africa since independence (see also Behrend 1999, cited under Gender). Finally, Gray, et al. 2003 examines the bitter, though often nearly “invisible” contemporary raiding of pastoral peoples.
  848.  
  849. De St. Jorre, John. The Brothers’ War: Biafra and Nigeria. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1972.
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  851. Although dated, this is still one of the most comprehensive military histories of the struggle for Biafra’s independence. Written by a journalist who actually witnessed the war from both sides, it provides an impartial examination of military operations, foreign intervention, and the terrible plight of the civilian population that suffered nearly a million casualties.
  852. Find this resource:
  853. Gray, Sandra, Mary Sundal, Brandi Wiebusch, Michael A. Little, Paul W. Leslie, and Ivy L. Pike. “Cattle Raiding, Cultural Survival and Adaptability of East African Pastoralists.” Current Anthropology 44.S5 (December 2003): S3–S30.
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  855. This cooperative research venture looks at the escalation of “AK47 raiding” among pastoralists in north East Africa since huge numbers of small arms flooded the area from the early 1970s. The study examines the broader impact on the populations of the region, whose very survival is at stake.
  856. Find this resource:
  857. Johnson, Douglas H. The Root Cause of Sudan’s Civil Wars. Rochester, NY: James Currey, 2011.
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  859. This important study, originally published in 2003, has been revised and expanded several times to provide an up-to-date history of the multiple conflicts that comprise the Sudan’s civil wars from 1942 to the early 21st century. Containing an analysis of the historical background, it explores factors that have exacerbated the conflicts, including religion, territorial aggrandizement, oil revenues, and humanitarian assistance.
  860. Find this resource:
  861. Minter, William. Apartheid’s Contras: An inquiry into the roots of war in Angola and Mozambique. Highlands, NJ: Zed Books, 1994.
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  863. This book’s main concern is to give a careful analysis of South Africa’s regional strategy of “contra” attacks against its former Portuguese-ruled neighbors. It also assesses the involvement of global external forces and strives for a dispassionate treatment of the fighting forces of both sides.
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  865. Omara-Otunnu, Amil. Politics and the Military in Uganda (1890–1985). New York: St. Martin’s, 1987.
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  867. This study assesses the impact that colonial recruitment of “martial races” had on the evolution and political involvement of Ugandan military forces up to 1985. It contains assessments of the 1964 East African Army mutinies, of the Amin military dictatorship, of Uganda’s war with Tanzania, and of the guerrilla warfare that followed. There is also a useful calendar of major events in Ugandan military history.
  868. Find this resource:
  869. Parsons, Timothy. The 1964 Army Mutinies and the Making of Modern East Africa. Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003.
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  871. This study of institutional unrest in newly independent nations demonstrates that the East African mutinies were grounded in surviving colonial military practices and that they highlighted problems of the integration of the army into postcolonial society.
  872. Find this resource:
  873. Richards, Paul. Fighting for the rain forest: War, youth & resources in Sierra Leone. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 1996.
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  875. Written as a rejoinder to observers who argue that Africa’s contemporary wars reflect a “new barbarism,” this book strives to understand the motives and frustrations of the youth of Sierra Leone who served as child soldiers. It seeks to establish the broader historical, cultural, and even environmental dimensions of the war.
  876. Find this resource:
  877. Tareke, Gebru. The Ethiopian Revolution: War in the Horn of Africa. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009.
  878. DOI: 10.12987/yale/9780300141634.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  879. This is an outstanding military history of conflict in the Horn over the last three decades of the 20th century. It gives a comprehensive examination of the region’s civil wars, guerrilla wars, conventional wars and international wars, while at the same time paying special attention to the common soldier. Its primary concern is to investigate the intricacies of strategic formulation, tactical methods, and actual combat: it is one of the few works to devote entire chapters to key battles.
  880. Find this resource:
  881. “Africa’s World War”
  882.  
  883. The Great Lakes region of central Africa, although rich in resources of all kinds, has been since independence the scene of some of the most terrible atrocities and bitterest fighting the world has ever seen, resulting in at least six million deaths. To a degree beyond the violence that has been common in other recent African conflicts, the violence here spread from country to country, eventually to involve nine of them, which constituted a veritable African world war. Verhaegen 1966–1969 and Lamarchand 2009 are concerned largely with the early stages of conflict. The former focuses on the Congo wars of secession and rebellion from 1959 to 1964: and while written mainly for specialists, this is readily accessible to novices as well. The latter gives a nuanced historical analysis of Rwandan genocide (see also Jefremovas 2000, cited under Bibliographies). Lanotte 2010 provides a broad chronological overview of the complicated conflicts waged in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) over the last four decades of the 20th century. Prunier 2009, Reyntjens 2009, and Stearns 2011 are three of the best sources on the evolution of conflict throughout the region. Each has its particular strengths: Prunier provides the broadest analysis, Reyntjens the most thorough investigation of Rwanda’s pivotal role, and Stearns the keenest examination of historical evolution. To gain the best understanding of this vastly important and complex vortex of African warfare, the three should be read together (see also Women’s Bodies as Battleground: Sexual Violence Against Women and Girls During the War in the Democratic of the Congo, cited under Gender).
  884.  
  885. Lamarchand, René. The Dynamics of Violence in Central Africa. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009.
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  887. This volume is actually a collection of Lamarchand’s previous studies of the region written between 2000 and 2006, with only one chapter being written especially for this volume. Still, it contains an excellent survey of the wide range of violence there, from hate crimes, to genocidal killing, to full-blown guerrilla warfare. Eschewing easy explanations, it dismantles popular myths concerning ethnicity in the region.
  888. Find this resource:
  889. Lanotte, Olivier. “Chronology of the Democratic Republic of Congo/Zaire 1960–97.” Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence: Chronological Indexes. 2010.
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  891. This essential source examines in chronological order the whole sweep of warfare in DRC from the crisis of 1960 through the ouster of Mobutu in 1997. It also contains a list of acronyms and a bibliography.
  892. Find this resource:
  893. Prunier, Gérard. Africa’s World War: Congo, the Rwandan genocide, and the making of a continental catastrophe. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
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  895. One of the most ambitious of a number of insightful treatments of war in the Great Lakes Region, this book traces the spread of conflict from the genocide in Rwanda into neighboring countries so as ultimately to involve the DRC, Burundi, Uganda, Sudan, Angola, Congo-Brazzaville, and Zimbabwe. It contains detailed examinations of military operations throughout the region and analyzes connections between them.
  896. Find this resource:
  897. Reyntjens, Filip. The Great African War: Congo and Regional Geopolotics, 1996–2006. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
  898. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511596698Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  899. With Prunier and Stearns, this is one of the best accounts of war in the Great Lakes region. It focuses on the warfare and incalculable suffering in Rwanda, Burundi, and eastern DCR between 1996 and 2006. It argues that even though it is a small country, Rwanda occupies the decisive strategic position in the region. It also undertakes to analyze “big power” involvement.
  900. Find this resource:
  901. Stearns, Jason K. Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The collapse of Congo and the great war in Africa. New York: Public Affairs, 2011.
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  903. Perhaps the best of all the examinations of warfare in the region, this employs a chronological approach, unlike Prunier and Reyntjens, that is more useful to historians. It contains an especially penetrating analysis of the two main DCR civil wars and pays close attention to the involvement of other states in the wider region including Uganda, Angola, and Zimbabwe. It sorts out the complexities of the conflict, revealing “wars within wars.”
  904. Find this resource:
  905. Verhaegen, Benoit. Rebellions au Congo. 2 vols. Brussels: Centre dr Recherche et d’information Socio-Politiques, 1966–1969.
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  907. The first volume of this impressive work examines the rebellion in four different regions, while the second focuses on Maniema Province. Based on interviews with participants and a huge body of documentary materials, it provides vital background to the subsequent conflicts in DRC and the surrounding areas.
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