Inferno - Max Hastings [261]
In India, segregated brothels were established for the British Army’s black Africans, though one Catholic commanding officer’s scruples caused him to insist that his unit’s establishment should be closed down. In 1942, there was a mutiny in the 25th East African Brigade in East Africa: Gen. Sir William Platt reported “numerous incidents in almost all Somali units … refusals to obey orders, sit-down strikes, desertion with weapons, untrustworthiness as guards, collusive thefts, occasional stone-throwing and drawing of knives.” In India during 1944 there were clashes between black soldiers and civilians near the Ranchi rest camp in which six Indians were killed and several women raped.
The British drew comfort from the fact that these disturbances were less serious than a major mutiny by black French tirailleurs which took place at Thiaroye, near Dakar, that year, and uprisings by battalions of the Belgian Force Publique in the Congo. Commanders were dismayed, however, by the conduct of some colonial units on the battlefield, such as the King’s African Rifles battalion which broke and ran when first exposed to fire in Burma, and two battalions of the 11th East African Division which refused to cross the Chindwin River into Burma, saying, “We will do whatever we’re told to do, but we are not going any further.” Brig. G. H. Cree reported that, given the widespread grievances of the African formations, “We were lucky to have escaped with a few flare-ups instead of a more general revolt.”
It is important to view such remarks and incidents in the wider context: hundreds of thousands of African troops performed their duty as labourers or riflemen under fire with considerable courage and some effectiveness. But it seems foolish to romanticise their contribution. They had no stake in Allied victory, and most served as mercenaries, drawn from societies schooled to obey white masters. A Rhodesian officer recorded the burial of African battlefield dead in the unyielding stony soil of Somaliland:
Poor Corporal Atang, self-abnegation and retiring modesty were part of you in life … How it would distress you to know that your grave is giving such trouble and keeping weary men from rest … They lower him gently. The bloodstained blanket is thrust aside … Lastly there is Amadu, the Musselman [sic] who died clutching his beloved Bren gun. The sergeant major of D company and a group of co-religionists are there. Two descend into the grave, the body being passed to them from the stretcher, they lower it slowly to the bottom … In a high, resonant voice the chief mourner intones an old Arabic phrase, a prayer for the dead.
Here was a sentimental view of the contribution of colonial subjects, to be contrasted with that of the black South African Frank Sexwale, who called the conflict “a white man’s war, a British war. South Africa belonged to Britain; everything that the Afrikaaner did, he got the notion from the master, Britain.” Sexwale’s perception accurately reflected the indifference of almost all his black and coloured compatriots to the struggle, but he overlooked the complexities of white South African sentiment. Among Afrikaaners there was a long-standing pro-German tradition. Field Marshal Lord Smuts, South Africa’s prime minister and a close friend of Churchill’s, only narrowly defeated a 1939 parliamentary motion demanding his country’s neutrality. Having dragged South Africa into the war, Smuts ensured that it made a substantial contribution to the Allied cause. From beginning to end, however, he faced domestic opposition, and never dared to introduce conscription. White volunteers remained in limited supply, and towards the end of 1940, antiwar demonstrations