The Rhodesian Bush War, also called the Second as well as the Zimbabwe War of Liberation, was a civil conflict from July 1964 to December 1979 in the
unrecognised country of
Rhodesia
Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of S ...
(later
Zimbabwe-Rhodesia
Zimbabwe Rhodesia (), alternatively known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, also informally known as Zimbabwe or Rhodesia, and sometimes as Rhobabwe, was a short-lived sovereign state that existed from 1 June to 12 December 1979. Zimbabwe Rhodesia was p ...
).
The conflict pitted three forces against one another: the Rhodesian white minority-led government of
Ian Smith
Ian Douglas Smith (8 April 1919 – 20 November 2007) was a Rhodesian politician, farmer, and fighter pilot who served as Prime Minister of Rhodesia (known as Southern Rhodesia until October 1964 and now known as Zimbabwe) from 1964 to ...
(later the Zimbabwe-Rhodesian government of Bishop
Abel Muzorewa
Abel Tendekayi Muzorewa (14 April 1925 – 8 April 2010), also commonly referred to as Bishop Muzorewa, was a Zimbabwean bishop and politician who served as the first and only Prime Minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia from the Internal Settlement to ...
); the
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), a militant African nationalist organisation that participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhod ...
, the military wing of
Robert Mugabe
Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...
's
Zimbabwe African National Union
The Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) was a militant organisation that fought against white minority rule in Rhodesia, formed as a split from the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU). ZANU split in 1975 into wings loyal to Robert Muga ...
; and the
Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army
Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), a Marxist–Leninist political party in Rhodesia. It participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhodes ...
of
Joshua Nkomo
Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo (19 June 1917 – 1 July 1999) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and Matabeleland politician who served as Vice-President of Zimbabwe from 1990 until his death in 1999. He founded and led the Zimbabwe African People's ...
's
Zimbabwe African People's Union
The Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) is a Zimbabwean political party. It is a militant organization and political party that campaigned for majority rule in Rhodesia, from its founding in 1961 until 1980. In 1987, it merged with the Zimba ...
.
The war and its subsequent
Internal Settlement
The Internal Settlement was an agreement which was signed on 3 March 1978 between Prime Minister of Rhodesia Ian Smith and the moderate African nationalist leaders comprising Bishop Abel Muzorewa, Ndabaningi Sithole and Senator Chief Jeremiah Chi ...
, signed in 1978 by Smith and Muzorewa, led to the implementation of
universal suffrage
Universal suffrage (also called universal franchise, general suffrage, and common suffrage of the common man) gives the right to vote to all adult citizens, regardless of wealth, income, gender, social status, race, ethnicity, or political stanc ...
in June 1979 and the end of
white minority rule
In political science, minoritarianism (or minorityism) is a neologism for a political structure or process in which a minority segment of a population has a certain degree of primacy in that entity's decision making. Minoritarianism may be contr ...
in Rhodesia, which was renamed
Zimbabwe Rhodesia
Zimbabwe Rhodesia (), alternatively known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, also informally known as Zimbabwe or Rhodesia, and sometimes as Rhobabwe, was a short-lived sovereign state that existed from 1 June to 12 December 1979. Zimbabwe Rhodesia was p ...
under a black majority government. However, this new order failed to win international recognition and the war continued. Neither side achieved a military victory and a compromise was later reached.
Negotiations between the government of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, the government of the United Kingdom and Mugabe and Nkomo's united "
Patriotic Front" took place at
Lancaster House
Lancaster House (originally known as York House and then Stafford House) is a mansion in the St James's district in the West End of London. It is close to St James's Palace, and much of the site was once part of the palace complex. This ...
, London in December 1979, and the
Lancaster House Agreement
The Lancaster House Agreement, signed on 21 December 1979, declared a ceasefire, ending the Rhodesian Bush War; and directly led to Rhodesia achieving internationally recognised independence as Zimbabwe. It required the full resumption of d ...
was signed. The country returned temporarily to British control and
new elections were held under British and
Commonwealth
A commonwealth is a traditional English term for a political community founded for the common good. Historically, it has been synonymous with "republic". The noun "commonwealth", meaning "public welfare, general good or advantage", dates from the ...
supervision in March 1980. ZANU won the election and Mugabe became the first
Prime Minister of Zimbabwe
The prime minister of Zimbabwe was a political office in the government of Zimbabwe that existed on two occasions. The first person to hold the position was Robert Mugabe from 1980 to 1987 following independence from the United Kingdom. He to ...
on 18 April 1980, when the country achieved internationally recognised independence.
Background
The origin of the war in
Rhodesia
Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of S ...
can be traced to the conquest of the region by the
British South Africa Company
The British South Africa Company (BSAC or BSACo) was chartered in 1889 following the amalgamation of Cecil Rhodes' Central Search Association and the London-based Exploring Company Ltd, which had originally competed to capitalize on the expecte ...
in the late 19th century, and the dissent of native leaders who opposed foreign rule. Britons began settling in Southern Rhodesia in the 1890s, and while it was never accorded full
dominion
The term ''Dominion'' is used to refer to one of several self-governing nations of the British Empire.
"Dominion status" was first accorded to Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Newfoundland, South Africa, and the Irish Free State at the 1926 ...
status, these settlers effectively governed the country after 1923.
In his famous "
Wind of Change" speech,
UK Prime Minister
The prime minister of the United Kingdom is the head of government of the United Kingdom. The prime minister advises the sovereign on the exercise of much of the royal prerogative, chairs the Cabinet and selects its ministers. As modern pr ...
Harold Macmillan
Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, (10 February 1894 – 29 December 1986) was a British Conservative statesman and politician who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1957 to 1963. Caricatured as "Supermac", he ...
revealed Britain's new policy to only permit independence to its African colonies under majority rule. But many white Rhodesians were concerned that such immediate change would cause chaos
as had resulted in the former
Belgian Congo
The Belgian Congo (french: Congo belge, ; nl, Belgisch-Congo) was a Belgian colony in Central Africa from 1908 until independence in 1960. The former colony adopted its present name, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), in 1964.
Colo ...
after its independence in 1960.
Britain's unwillingness to compromise led to Rhodesia's
unilateral declaration of independence
A unilateral declaration of independence (UDI) is a formal process leading to the establishment of a new state by a subnational entity which declares itself independent and sovereign without a formal agreement with the state which it is secedi ...
(UDI) on 11 November 1965. Although Rhodesia had the private support of neighbouring South Africa and
Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...
, which still owned
Mozambique
Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...
, it never gained diplomatic recognition from any country.
Although the vote in Rhodesia was constitutionally open to all, regardless of race, property requirements left many blacks unable to participate. The new 1969 constitution reserved eight seats in the
66 seat parliament for "Non-Europeans" only, with a further eight reserved for tribal chiefs.
Amidst this backdrop,
African nationalists advocated armed struggle to bring about black rule, primarily denouncing the wealth disparity between the races. Two rival nationalist organisations emerged in August 1963: the
Zimbabwe African People's Union
The Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) is a Zimbabwean political party. It is a militant organization and political party that campaigned for majority rule in Rhodesia, from its founding in 1961 until 1980. In 1987, it merged with the Zimba ...
(ZAPU) and the
Zimbabwe African National Union
The Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) was a militant organisation that fought against white minority rule in Rhodesia, formed as a split from the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU). ZANU split in 1975 into wings loyal to Robert Muga ...
(ZANU), after disagreements about tactics, as well as tribalism and personality clashes. ZANU and its military wing
ZANLA
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), a militant African nationalist organisation that participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhode ...
were headed by
Robert Mugabe
Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...
and consisted primarily of
Shona
Shona often refers to:
* Shona people, a Southern African people
* Shona language, a Bantu language spoken by Shona people today
Shona may also refer to:
* ''Shona'' (album), 1994 album by New Zealand singer Shona Laing
* Shona (given name)
* S ...
tribes. ZAPU and its military wing
ZIPRA
Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), a Marxist–Leninist political party in Rhodesia. It participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhodes ...
consisted mainly of
Ndebele
Ndebele may refer to:
*Southern Ndebele people, located in South Africa
*Northern Ndebele people, located in Zimbabwe and Botswana
Languages
* Southern Ndebele language, the language of the South Ndebele
*Northern Ndebele language
Northern ...
under
Joshua Nkomo
Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo (19 June 1917 – 1 July 1999) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and Matabeleland politician who served as Vice-President of Zimbabwe from 1990 until his death in 1999. He founded and led the Zimbabwe African People's ...
.
Cold War politics
Cold War
The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
politics played into the conflict. The
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
supported ZIPRA and China supported ZANLA. Each group fought a separate war against the Rhodesian security forces, and the two groups sometimes fought against each other as well. In June 1979, the governments of
Cuba
Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...
and
Mozambique
Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...
offered direct military help to the
Patriotic Front, but Mugabe and Nkomo declined. Other foreign contributions included military officials from
North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu River, Y ...
, who taught Zimbabwean militants to use explosives and arms in a camp near
Pyongyang
Pyongyang (, , ) is the capital and largest city of North Korea, where it is known as the "Capital of the Revolution". Pyongyang is located on the Taedong River about upstream from its mouth on the Yellow Sea. According to the 2008 populatio ...
. By April 1979, 12,000 ZANLA guerrillas were training in
Tanzania
Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands and ...
,
Ethiopia
Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...
, and
Libya
Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to Egypt–Libya bo ...
while 9,500 of its 13,500 extant cadres operated in Rhodesia. South Africa clandestinely gave material and military support to the Rhodesian government.
Backed by proxy by the United States and its Western allies, the Rhodesian Front (RF) took an uncompromising position against the communist ideology of the ZIPRA and ZANLA.
Ian Smith
Ian Douglas Smith (8 April 1919 – 20 November 2007) was a Rhodesian politician, farmer, and fighter pilot who served as Prime Minister of Rhodesia (known as Southern Rhodesia until October 1964 and now known as Zimbabwe) from 1964 to ...
further expounded this by portraying the conflict as primarily anti-communist in nature. The Rhodesian whites, and a percentage of blacks, viewed the British demand for majority rule as a direct attack on their way of life. Having previously witnessed the
Mau Mau Rebellion
The Mau Mau rebellion (1952–1960), also known as the Mau Mau uprising, Mau Mau revolt or Kenya Emergency, was a war in the British Kenya Colony (1920–1963) between the Kenya Land and Freedom Army (KLFA), also known as the ''Mau Mau'', ...
, Rhodesians refused to allow the majority-rule policy to come into effect. Much of the Rhodesian economy as well as the land was controlled by white Rhodesians, and, fearing total confiscation by either the ZIPRA or ZANLA, the RF elected to hold onto unofficial minority-rule. In ignoring other contributing factors to the conflict, Smith and the RF were able to strengthen ties with the West, but Britain remained neutral. The division between the communists and anti-communists caused the fighting to spill over the Rhodesian borders. Neighbouring African nations, supported primarily by North Korea, China, and the Soviet Union, used communist material support to begin launching guerrilla attacks on the RF.
The United States took the official position that it would not recognise Rhodesia as an independent state, but some American soldiers who had seen combat in Vietnam joined the Rhodesian Front. The RF created advertising campaigns in order to attract soldiers from Western countries, and the RF amassed a force of nearly 1,400 soldiers who were highly trained in special forces and guerrilla warfare, bringing the total RF military force to over 10,000 men. Some of the professional American soldiers entering the RF directly into the force became de facto members of the Rhodesian government.
The Soviet Union became involved in the Rhodesian Bush War to combat the push from the anti-communist West and to challenge the Chinese presence in the region. Soviet military technology quickly appeared in the Zimbabwean countryside and by 1979 ZIPRA were utilizing SAM weaponry to target Rhodesian civilian assets and Viscount aircraft. Just as they had done in various other African countries and conflicts, the Russians supported opposition forces with weapons and training. In addition to the physical assistance, Moscow launched a propaganda campaign exaggerating British involvement in the conflict in order to boost support for intervention. The Soviets were large suppliers of munitions and training, but refused to directly enter the conflict. The Chinese, on the other hand, were limited in their abilities to offer tangible aid to the ZANLA. Chinese influence throughout the conflict was primarily focused on small scale sabotage efforts and anti-western propaganda.
Inevitably, the Bush War occurred within the context of regional Cold War in Africa, and became embroiled in conflicts in several neighbouring countries. Such conflicts included the
Angolan War of Independence
The Angolan War of Independence (; 1961–1974), called in Angola the ("Armed Struggle of National Liberation"), began as an uprising against forced cultivation of cotton, and it became a multi-faction struggle for the control of Portugal ...
(1961–1975) and
Angolan Civil War
The Angolan Civil War ( pt, Guerra Civil Angolana) was a civil war in Angola, beginning in 1975 and continuing, with interludes, until 2002. The war immediately began after Angola became independent from Portugal in November 1975. The war was ...
(1975–2002), the
Mozambican War of Independence
The Mozambican War of Independence ( pt, Guerra da Independência de Moçambique, 'War of Independence of Mozambique') was an armed conflict between the guerrilla forces of the Mozambique Liberation Front or FRELIMO () and Portugal. The wa ...
(1964–1974) and
Mozambican Civil War
The Mozambican Civil War ( pt, Guerra Civil Moçambicana) was a civil war fought in Mozambique from 1977 to 1992. Like many regional African conflicts during the late twentieth century, the Mozambican Civil War possessed local dynamics but was a ...
(1977–1992), the
South African Border War
The South African Border War, also known as the Namibian War of Independence, and sometimes denoted in South Africa as the Angolan Bush War, was a largely asymmetric conflict that occurred in Namibia (then South West Africa), Zambia, and Angol ...
(1966–1989), and the
Shaba I
Shaba I was a conflict in Zaire's Shaba (Katanga) Province lasting from March 8 to May 26, 1977. The conflict began when the Front for the National Liberation of the Congo (FNLC), a group of about 2,000 Katangan Congolese soldiers who were vete ...
(1977) and
Shaba II
Shaba II was a brief conflict fought in the Zairean province of Shaba (now Katanga) in 1978. The conflict broke out on 11 May 1978 after 6,500 rebels from the Congolese National Liberation Front (FNLC), a Katangese separatist militia, crossed t ...
(1978) conflicts.
Perceptions
The conflict was seen by the nationalist groups and the UK government of the time as a war of national and racial liberation. The Rhodesian government saw the conflict as a fight between one part of the country's population (the Whites) on behalf of the whole population (including the Black majority) against several externally financed parties made up of predominantly Black
radicals and communists. The Nationalists considered their country occupied and dominated by a foreign power, namely Britain, since 1890.
The British government, in the person of the
governor
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
, had indirectly ruled the country from 1923, when it took over from the
British South Africa Company
The British South Africa Company (BSAC or BSACo) was chartered in 1889 following the amalgamation of Cecil Rhodes' Central Search Association and the London-based Exploring Company Ltd, which had originally competed to capitalize on the expecte ...
and granted
self-governing status to a locally elected government, made up predominantly of Whites. Ian Smith's
Rhodesian Front
The Rhodesian Front was a right-wing conservative political party in Southern Rhodesia, subsequently known as Rhodesia. It was the last ruling party of Southern Rhodesia prior to that country's unilateral declaration of independence, and the rul ...
party was elected to power in 1962 and
unilaterally declared independence on 11 November 1965 to preserve what it saw as the self-government it had possessed since 1923.
The Rhodesian government contended that it was defending Western values, Christianity, the
rule of law
The rule of law is the political philosophy that all citizens and institutions within a country, state, or community are accountable to the same laws, including lawmakers and leaders. The rule of law is defined in the ''Encyclopedia Britannica ...
and democracy by fighting Communists, but it was unwilling to compromise on most political, economic and social inequalities. The Smith administration claimed that the legitimate voice of the black Shona and Ndebele population were the traditional chiefs, not the ZANU and ZAPU nationalists, whom it regarded as dangerous, violent usurpers.
In 1978–1979, the Smith administration tried to blunt the power of the nationalist cause by acceding to an "Internal Settlement" which ended minority rule, changed the name of the country to
Zimbabwe-Rhodesia
Zimbabwe Rhodesia (), alternatively known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, also informally known as Zimbabwe or Rhodesia, and sometimes as Rhobabwe, was a short-lived sovereign state that existed from 1 June to 12 December 1979. Zimbabwe Rhodesia was p ...
, and arranged multiracial elections, which were
held in 1979 and won by Bishop
Abel Muzorewa
Abel Tendekayi Muzorewa (14 April 1925 – 8 April 2010), also commonly referred to as Bishop Muzorewa, was a Zimbabwean bishop and politician who served as the first and only Prime Minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia from the Internal Settlement to ...
, who became the country's first Black head of government. Unsatisfied with this and spurred on by Britain's refusal to recognise the new order, the nationalist forces persisted.
The war ended when, at the behest of both South Africa (its major supporter) and the United States, the Zimbabwe-Rhodesian government ceded power to Britain in the
Lancaster House Agreement
The Lancaster House Agreement, signed on 21 December 1979, declared a ceasefire, ending the Rhodesian Bush War; and directly led to Rhodesia achieving internationally recognised independence as Zimbabwe. It required the full resumption of d ...
in December 1979. The UK Government held
another election in 1980 to form a new government. The election was won by ZANU. The new government, headed by
Robert Mugabe
Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...
, was recognised internationally, and the country was renamed
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and Mozam ...
.
Belligerents
Rhodesian Security Forces
![Rhodesian African Rifles, Lake Kariba, December 1976, 3](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/Rhodesian_African_Rifles%2C_Lake_Kariba%2C_December_1976%2C_3.png)
Despite the effect of economic and diplomatic sanctions, Rhodesia developed and maintained a powerful and professional military. In June 1977, ''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, to ...
'' magazine reported that "man for man, the Rhodesian army ranks among the world's finest fighting units."
The army was always relatively small, just 3,400 regular troops in 1970.
By 1978–79 it had grown to some 10,800 regulars nominally supported by about 40,000 reservists – although by the last year of the war, perhaps as few as 15,000 were available for active service. While the regular army consisted of a professional core of white soldiers (and some units, such as the
Rhodesian SAS
The Rhodesian Special Air Service or Rhodesian SAS was a Rhodesian special forces unit. It comprised:
*C Squadron, Special Air Service Regiment (Malayan Emergency (1951–1953)
*"C" Squadron (Rhodesian) Special Air Service (1961–1978)
*1 (Rho ...
and the
Rhodesian Light Infantry
The 1st Battalion, Rhodesian Light Infantry (1RLI), commonly The Rhodesian Light Infantry (RLI), was a regiment formed in 1961 at Brady Barracks (Bulawayo, Southern Rhodesia) as a light infantry unit within the army of the Federation of Rhodesia ...
, were all-white), by 1978–1979 the rest was majority black.
By contrast, army reserves were largely white, and toward the end of the war were increasingly called up to deal with the growing insurgency. The regular army was supported by the paramilitary
British South Africa Police
The British South Africa Police (BSAP) was, for most of its existence, the police force of Rhodesia (renamed Zimbabwe in 1980). It was formed as a paramilitary force of mounted infantrymen in 1889 by Cecil Rhodes' British South Africa Company, from ...
of about 8,000 to 11,000 men (the majority of whom were black) and 19,000 to 35,000 police reservists (which, like their army counterparts, were largely white). The police reserves acted as a type of home guard.
The war saw the extensive operation of Rhodesian regulars as well as
special forces
Special forces and special operations forces (SOF) are military units trained to conduct special operations. NATO has defined special operations as "military activities conducted by specially designated, organized, selected, trained and equip ...
units such as the
Selous Scouts
The Selous Scouts was a special forces unit of the Rhodesian Army that operated during the Rhodesian Bush War from 1973 until the reconstitution of the country as Zimbabwe in 1980. It was mainly responsible for infiltrating the black majority p ...
and the
Rhodesian SAS
The Rhodesian Special Air Service or Rhodesian SAS was a Rhodesian special forces unit. It comprised:
*C Squadron, Special Air Service Regiment (Malayan Emergency (1951–1953)
*"C" Squadron (Rhodesian) Special Air Service (1961–1978)
*1 (Rho ...
. The
Rhodesian Army
The Rhodesian Security Forces were the military forces of the Rhodesian government. The Rhodesian Security Forces consisted of a ground force (the Rhodesian Army), the Rhodesian Air Force, the British South Africa Police, and various personnel ...
fought bitterly against the black nationalist guerrillas. The Rhodesian Army also comprised mostly black regiments such as the
Rhodesian African Rifles
The Rhodesian African Rifles (RAR) was a regiment of the Rhodesian Army. The ranks of the RAR were recruited from the black African population, although officers were generally from the white population. The regiment was formed in May 1940 in the ...
. As the war went on, the frequent call-up of reservists was increasingly used to supplement the professional soldiers and the many
volunteers from overseas.
By 1978, all white men up to the age of 60 were subject to periodic call-up to the army; younger men up to 35 might expect to spend alternating blocks of six weeks in the army and at home. Many of the overseas volunteers came from Britain, Ireland, South Africa, Portugal, Hong Kong, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States with the latter three being held in high regard for their recent
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
experience.
Considering the
arms embargo
An arms embargo is a restriction or a set of sanctions that applies either solely to weaponry or also to "dual-use technology." An arms embargo may serve one or more purposes:
* to signal disapproval of the behavior of a certain actor
* to maintain ...
, the Rhodesian Army was well-equipped. The standard infantry weapon was the Belgian
FN FAL
The FAL (a French acronym for (English: "Light Automatic Rifle")), is a battle rifle designed in Belgium by Dieudonné Saive and manufactured by FN Herstal (simply known as FN).
During the Cold War the FAL was adopted by many countries of th ...
rifle as produced in South Africa under license as the R1 rifle and supplemented by the
H&K G3
The Heckler & Koch G3 (''Gewehr'' 3) is a 7.62×51mm NATO, select-fire battle rifle developed in the 1950s by the German armament manufacturer Heckler & Koch (H&K) in collaboration with the Spanish state-owned design and development agency CET ...
rifle that came from Portuguese forces. However, other weapons such as the British L1A1 ('SLR') variant of the FAL and the older British
Lee–Enfield
The Lee–Enfield or Enfield is a bolt-action, magazine-fed repeating rifle that served as the main firearm of the military forces of the British Empire and Commonwealth during the first half of the 20th century, and was the British Army's st ...
bolt-action
Bolt-action is a type of manual firearm action that is operated by ''directly'' manipulating the bolt via a bolt handle, which is most commonly placed on the right-hand side of the weapon (as most users are right-handed).
Most bolt-action ...
rifle were used by reservists and the
British South Africa Police
The British South Africa Police (BSAP) was, for most of its existence, the police force of Rhodesia (renamed Zimbabwe in 1980). It was formed as a paramilitary force of mounted infantrymen in 1889 by Cecil Rhodes' British South Africa Company, from ...
. Other weapons included the
Bren LMG in both .303" and 7.62mm NATO,
Sten
The STEN (or Sten gun) is a family of British submachine guns chambered in 9×19mm which were used extensively by British and Commonwealth forces throughout World War II and the Korean War. They had a simple design and very low production cost ...
SMG,
Uzi
The Uzi (; he, עוזי, Ūzi; officially cased as UZI) is a family of Israeli open-bolt, blowback-operated submachine guns and machine pistols first designed by Major Uziel "Uzi" Gal in the late 1940s, shortly after the establishment of the ...
,
Browning Hi-Power
The Browning Hi-Power is a single-action, semi-automatic pistol available in the 9×19mm Parabellum and .40 S&W calibers. It was based on a design by American firearms inventor John Browning, and completed by Dieudonné Saive at FN Herstal. ...
pistol, Colt
M16 rifle
The M16 rifle (officially designated Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16) is a family of military rifles adapted from the ArmaLite AR-15 rifle for the United States military. The original M16 rifle was a 5.56×45mm automatic rifle with a 20-roun ...
(very late in the war),
FN MAG
The FN MAG is a Belgian 7.62 mm general-purpose machine gun, designed in the early 1950s at Fabrique Nationale (FN) by Ernest Vervier. It has been used by more than 80 countries and it has been made under licence in several countries, inc ...
(FN MAG58) general-purpose machine-gun,
81 mm mortar
An 81 mm mortar is a medium-weight mortar. It is a smooth-bore, muzzle-loading, high-angle-of-fire weapon used for long-range indirect fire support to light infantry, air assault, and airborne units across the entire front of a battalion zone of ...
, and
Claymore
A claymore (; from gd, claidheamh- mòr, "great sword") is either the Scottish variant of the late medieval two-handed sword or the Scottish variant of the basket-hilted sword. The former is characterised as having a cross hilt of forward-sl ...
mines. After
UDI Udi may refer to:
Places
* Udi, Enugu, a local government areas and city in Nigeria
* Udi, a place in the Etawah district of Uttar Pradesh, India
People
* Udi Gal (born 1979), Israeli Olympic sailor
* Udi Vaks (born 1979), Israeli Olympic judoka
...
, Rhodesia was heavily reliant on South African and domestically produced weapons and equipment, as well as international smuggling operations, commonly referred to as "sanction-busting". South Africa provided extensive support to Rhodesia in the form of a Lend / Lease program and both the official and unofficial support of many branches of the South African armed forces.
The
Rhodesian Air Force
The Rhodesian Air Force (RhAF) was an air force based in Salisbury (now Harare) which represented several entities under various names between 1935 and 1980: originally serving the British self-governing colony of Southern Rhodesia, it was the ...
(RhAF) operated a variety of equipment and carried out numerous roles, with air power providing the Rhodesians with a significant advantage over their guerrilla enemy. The fleet consisted mainly of British aircraft and largely obsolete aircraft, such as the
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
vintage
Douglas Dakota
The Douglas C-47 Skytrain or Dakota ( RAF, RAAF, RCAF, RNZAF, and SAAF designation) is a military transport aircraft developed from the civilian Douglas DC-3 airliner. It was used extensively by the Allies during World War II and remained in ...
transport aircraft and the British
de Havilland Vampire
The de Havilland Vampire is a British jet fighter which was developed and manufactured by the de Havilland, de Havilland Aircraft Company. It was the second jet fighter to be operated by the Royal Air Force, RAF, after the Gloster Meteor, and ...
. The arms embargo caused a lack of spare parts from external suppliers and RhAF had to find alternative means to keep its aircraft flying. The larger South African Air Force provided extensive training, aircraft and aircrews in support of RhAF operations from 1966. The Rhodesians also used more modern types of aircraft like the
Hawker Hunter
The Hawker Hunter is a transonic British jet-powered fighter aircraft that was developed by Hawker Aircraft for the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It was designed to take advantage of the newly developed Rolls-R ...
and
Canberra
Canberra ( )
is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...
bombers, the
Cessna Skymaster
The Cessna Skymaster is an American twin-engine civil utility aircraft built in a push-pull configuration. Its engines are mounted in the nose and rear of its pod-style fuselage. Twin booms extend aft of the wings to the vertical stabilizers, ...
as well as
Aérospatiale Alouette III
The Aérospatiale Alouette III (, ''Lark''; company designations SA 316 and SA 319) is a single-engine, light utility helicopter developed by France, French aircraft company Sud Aviation. During its production life, it proved to be a relatively p ...
(SA316) helicopters until they were supplemented by the
Agusta Bell 205. Very late in the war, the Rhodesian forces were able to smuggle and use a few Agusta Bell
UH-1 Iroquois
The Bell UH-1 Iroquois (nicknamed "Huey") is a utility military helicopter designed and produced by the American aerospace company Bell Helicopter. It is the first member of the prolific Huey family, as well as the first turbine-powered helico ...
helicopters.
At the beginning of the first war, much of Rhodesia's military hardware was of British and
Commonwealth
A commonwealth is a traditional English term for a political community founded for the common good. Historically, it has been synonymous with "republic". The noun "commonwealth", meaning "public welfare, general good or advantage", dates from the ...
origin, but during the course of the conflict, new equipment such as
Eland armoured cars were procured from South Africa. Several Polish-made
T-55
The T-54 and T-55 tanks are a series of Soviet main battle tanks introduced in the years following the Second World War. The first T-54 prototype was completed at Nizhny Tagil by the end of 1945.Steven Zaloga, T-54 and T-55 Main Battle Tanks ...
tanks destined for
Idi Amin
Idi Amin Dada Oumee (, ; 16 August 2003) was a Ugandan military officer and politician who served as the third president of Uganda from 1971 to 1979. He ruled as a military dictator and is considered one of the most brutal despots in modern w ...
's regime in Uganda were diverted to Rhodesia by the South Africans, in the last year of the war. The Rhodesians also produced a wide range of wheeled
mine-proofed armoured vehicles, often using Mercedes
Unimog
The Unimog (, ) is a range of multi-purpose tractors, trucks and lorries that has been produced by Boehringer from 1948 until 1951, and by Daimler Truck (formerly Daimler-Benz, DaimlerChrysler and Daimler AG) since 1951. In the United States and ...
,
Land Rover
Land Rover is a British brand of predominantly four-wheel drive, off-road capable vehicles, owned by multinational car manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover (JLR), since 2008 a subsidiary of India's Tata Motors. JLR currently builds Land Rovers ...
and
Bedford
Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population of the Bedford built-up area (including Biddenham and Kempston) was 106,940, making it the second-largest settlement in Bedfordshire, behind Luton, whilst ...
truck components, including unlicensed copies of the
Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes-Benz (), commonly referred to as Mercedes and sometimes as Benz, is a German luxury and commercial vehicle automotive brand established in 1926. Mercedes-Benz AG (a Mercedes-Benz Group subsidiary established in 2019) is headquartere ...
UR-416.
During the course of the war, most white citizens carried personal weapons, and it was not unusual to see white housewives carrying
submachine gun
A submachine gun (SMG) is a magazine-fed, automatic carbine designed to fire handgun cartridges. The term "submachine gun" was coined by John T. Thompson, the inventor of the Thompson submachine gun, to describe its design concept as an autom ...
s. A
siege mentality
In sociology, siege mentality is a shared feeling of victimization and defensiveness—a term derived from the actual experience of military defences of real sieges. It is a collective state of mind in which a group of people believe themselves c ...
set in and all civilian transport had to be escorted in convoys for safety against ambushes. Farms and villages in rural areas were frequently attacked by guerrillas.
The Rhodesian government divided the country into eight geographical operational areas: North West Border (Operation Ranger), Eastern Border (Operation Thrasher), North East Border (Operation Hurricane), South East Border (Operation Repulse), Midlands (Operation Grapple), Kariba (Operation Splinter), Matabeleland (Operation Tangent),
Salisbury
Salisbury ( ) is a cathedral city in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers Avon, Nadder and Bourne. The city is approximately from Southampton and from Bath.
Salisbury is in the southeast of Wil ...
and District ("SALOPS").
African nationalist guerrilla forces
The two major armed groups campaigning against
Ian Smith
Ian Douglas Smith (8 April 1919 – 20 November 2007) was a Rhodesian politician, farmer, and fighter pilot who served as Prime Minister of Rhodesia (known as Southern Rhodesia until October 1964 and now known as Zimbabwe) from 1964 to ...
's government were the
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), a militant African nationalist organisation that participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhod ...
(ZANLA), the armed wing of the
Zimbabwe African National Union
The Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) was a militant organisation that fought against white minority rule in Rhodesia, formed as a split from the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU). ZANU split in 1975 into wings loyal to Robert Muga ...
(ZANU), and the
Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army
Zimbabwe People's Revolutionary Army (ZIPRA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU), a Marxist–Leninist political party in Rhodesia. It participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhodes ...
(ZIPRA), the armed wing of the
Zimbabwe African People's Union
The Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) is a Zimbabwean political party. It is a militant organization and political party that campaigned for majority rule in Rhodesia, from its founding in 1961 until 1980. In 1987, it merged with the Zimba ...
(ZAPU). The fighting was largely rural, as the two rival movements tried to win peasant support and to recruit fighters while attacking the local government administration and white civilians. To ensure local domination, ZANLA and ZIPRA sometimes fought against each other as well as against the security forces.
ZANLA
ZANLA was the armed wing of ZANU. The organisation also had strong links with
Mozambique
Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...
's independence movement,
FRELIMO
FRELIMO (; from the Portuguese , ) is a democratic socialist political party in Mozambique. It is the dominant party in Mozambique and has won a majority of the seats in the Assembly of the Republic in every election since the country's first ...
. ZANLA, in the end, was present on a more or less permanent basis in over half the country, as evidenced by the location of the demobilisation bases at the end of the war, which were in every province except
Matabeleland North
Matabeleland North is a Provinces of Zimbabwe, province in western Zimbabwe. With a population of 749,017 as of the Zimbabwean census, 2012, 2012 census, it is the country's second-least populous province, after Matabeleland South Province, Matab ...
. In addition, they were fighting a civil war against ZIPRA, despite the formation of a joint front by their political parties after 1978. It was ZANLA's intention to occupy the ground, supplant the administration in rural areas, and then mount the final conventional campaign. ZANLA concentrated on the politicisation of the rural areas using force, persuasion, ties of kinship and collaboration with spirit mediums.
ZANLA tried to paralyse the Rhodesian effort and economy by planting Soviet anti-tank
land mine
A land mine is an explosive device concealed under or on the ground and designed to destroy or disable enemy targets, ranging from combatants to vehicles and tanks, as they pass over or near it. Such a device is typically detonated automati ...
s on the roads. From 1972 to 1980 there were 2,504 vehicle detonations of land mines (mainly Soviet TM46s), killing 632 people and injuring 4,410. Mining of roads increased 33.7% from 1978 (894 mines or 2.44 mines were detonated or recovered per day) to 1979 (2,089 mines or 5.72 mines a day).
[ See her]
www.jrtwood.com
for confirmation of authorship.
In response, the Rhodesians co-operated with the South Africans to develop a range of mine protected vehicles. They began by replacing air in tyres with water which absorbed some of the blast and reduced the heat of the explosion. Initially, they protected the bodies with steel deflector plates, sandbags and mine conveyor belting. Later, purpose built vehicles with V shaped blast hulls dispersed the blast and deaths in such vehicles became unusual events.
ZIPRA
ZIPRA was the anti-government force based around the
Ndebele
Ndebele may refer to:
*Southern Ndebele people, located in South Africa
*Northern Ndebele people, located in Zimbabwe and Botswana
Languages
* Southern Ndebele language, the language of the South Ndebele
*Northern Ndebele language
Northern ...
ethnicity, led by
Joshua Nkomo
Joshua Mqabuko Nyongolo Nkomo (19 June 1917 – 1 July 1999) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and Matabeleland politician who served as Vice-President of Zimbabwe from 1990 until his death in 1999. He founded and led the Zimbabwe African People's ...
, and the ZAPU political organisation. In contrast to ZANLA's
Mozambique
Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...
links, Nkomo's ZIPRA was more oriented towards
Zambia
Zambia (), officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern and East Africa, although it is typically referred to as being in Southern Africa at its most cent ...
for local bases. However, this was not always with full Zambian government support: by 1979, the combined forces based in Zambia of ZIPRA, (the armed wing of the
African National Congress
The African National Congress (ANC) is a Social democracy, social-democratic political party in Republic of South Africa, South Africa. A liberation movement known for its opposition to apartheid, it has governed the country since 1994, when ...
of South Africa) and South-West African
SWAPO
The South West Africa People's Organisation (, SWAPO; af, Suidwes-Afrikaanse Volks Organisasie, SWAVO; german: Südwestafrikanische Volksorganisation, SWAVO), officially known as the SWAPO Party of Namibia, is a political party and former ind ...
fighters were a major threat to Zambia's internal security. Because
ZAPU
The Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) is a Zimbabwean political party. It is a militant organization and political party that campaigned for majority rule in Rhodesia, from its founding in 1961 until 1980. In 1987, it merged with the Zimba ...
's political strategy relied more heavily on negotiations than armed force, ZIPRA grew slower and less elaborately than ZANLA, but by 1979 it had an estimated 20,000 combatants, almost all based in camps around Lusaka, Zambia.
ZIPRA was responsible for two attacks on civilian
Air Rhodesia
Air Rhodesia was the national airline of Rhodesia. Its head office was located on the property of Salisbury Airport in Salisbury.
The airline was formed as a subsidiary of Central African Airways (CAA) in June 1964, but became an independent corp ...
Viscount aeroplanes,
on 3 September 1978 and
12 February 1979. Using
SA-7
The 9K32 Strela-2 (russian: Cтрела, "arrow"; NATO reporting name SA-7 Grail) is a light-weight, shoulder-fired, surface-to-air missile (or MANPADS) system. It is designed to target aircraft at low altitudes with passive infrared homing gui ...
surface-to-air missiles, the guerrillas shot down each plane during its ascent from Kariba Airport.
[ ZIPRA took advice from its Soviet instructors in formulating its vision and strategy of popular revolution. About 1,400 Soviet, 700 East German and 500 Cuban instructors were deployed to the area.]
On the advice of the Soviets, ZIPRA built up its conventional forces, and motorised with Soviet armoured vehicles and a number of small aeroplanes, in Zambia. ZIPRA's (i.e. ZAPU's) intention was to allow ZANLA to bring the Rhodesian forces to the point of defeat, and then take the victory from the much lighter forces of ZANLA and the essentially defeated Rhodesians. ZIPRA kept a light presence within Rhodesia, reconnoitring, keeping contact with the peasants and sometimes skirmishing with ZANLA.
ZIPRA's conventional threat partly distracted Rhodesian forces from fighting ZANLA. By the late 1970s, ZIPRA had developed a strategy known as ''Storming the Heavens'' to launch a conventional invasion from Zambia, supported by a limited number of armoured vehicles and light aircraft. An operation by the Rhodesian armed forces to destroy a ZIPRA base near Livingstone in Zambia was never launched.
The ZAPU/ZIPRA strategy for taking over Zimbabwe proved unsuccessful. In any event, the transfer of power to black nationalists took place not by the military take-over expected by ZAPU/ZIPRA, but by a peaceful and internationally supervised election. Rhodesia reverted to British rule as the colony of Southern Rhodesia (the UK had never recognised Rhodesia's declaration of independence,) and a general election took place in early 1980, supervised by British and other international forces.
Robert Mugabe (of ZANLA/ZANU) won this election, because he was the only major competitor of the majority ethnicity, Shona. Once in power, Mugabe was internationally recognised as Zimbabwe's leader and was installed as head of government, and had the backing of the overwhelming majority ethnic group. He was therefore able to quickly and irreversibly consolidate his power, forcing ZAPU, and therefore ZIPRA which was ZAPU's army, to give up hope of taking over the country in the place of ZANU/ZANLA.
Pre-war events
Civil disobedience (1957–1964)
In September 1956, bus fares in Salisbury
Salisbury ( ) is a cathedral city in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers Avon, Nadder and Bourne. The city is approximately from Southampton and from Bath.
Salisbury is in the southeast of Wil ...
were raised so high that workers were spending 18% to 30% of their earnings on transportation. In response, the City Youth League boycotted the United Transport Company's buses and succeeded in preventing the price change. On 12 September 1957 members of the Youth League and the defunct ANC formed the Southern Rhodesia African National Congress, led by Joshua Nkomo. The Edgar Whitehead, Whitehead administration banned the SRANC in 1959 and arrested 307 leaders, excluding Nkomo who was out of the country, on 29 February in Operation Sunrise.
Nkomo, Mugabe, Herbert Chitepo, and Ndabaningi Sithole established the National Democratic Party in January 1960. Nkomo became its leader in October. An NDP delegation headed by Nkomo attended the constitutional conference in January 1961. While Nkomo initially supported the constitution, he reversed his position after other NDP leaders disagreed. The government banned the NDP in December 1961 and arrested NDP leaders, excluding Nkomo who, again, was out of the country. Nkomo formed the Zimbabwe African People's Union
The Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU) is a Zimbabwean political party. It is a militant organization and political party that campaigned for majority rule in Rhodesia, from its founding in 1961 until 1980. In 1987, it merged with the Zimba ...
which the Whitehead administration banned in September 1962.
The United Federal Party (UFP) had been in power since 1934, earning it the nickname of "the establishment", and roughly represented Southern Rhodesian commercial and major agricultural interests. The UFP contested the Southern Rhodesian general election, 1962, 1962 general election on a ticket of racial "partnership", whereby blacks and whites would work together. All ethnically discriminatory legislation would be immediately repealed, including the Land Apportionment Act, which defined certain areas of the land as eligible for purchase only by blacks, others as exclusively for whites, and others as open for all races.
About 45% of the country was split in this way; another 45% comprised reserved Tribal Trust Lands (TTL), which housed tribesmen, and gave local chiefs and headmen a degree of self-government in a similar manner to American Indian reservations. The remainder was national land. The country had originally been split up in this way during the early days of white immigration to prevent the new arrivals from using their superior finances to buy all of the land in the country.
The UFP proposed to repeal the black and white purchase areas, but keep the Tribal Trust and national lands. It also committed to general black advancement. These proposals proved largely repugnant to the mostly white electorate, which feared that premature black ascendancy would threaten Rhodesia's economic prosperity and security, as well as their own personal affairs.
Most turned away from the ruling UFP party, causing it to lose in the 1962 election to the newly formed Rhodesian Front
The Rhodesian Front was a right-wing conservative political party in Southern Rhodesia, subsequently known as Rhodesia. It was the last ruling party of Southern Rhodesia prior to that country's unilateral declaration of independence, and the rul ...
(RF), a conservative party opposed to any immediate shift to black rule. Winston Field and Ian Smith
Ian Douglas Smith (8 April 1919 – 20 November 2007) was a Rhodesian politician, farmer, and fighter pilot who served as Prime Minister of Rhodesia (known as Southern Rhodesia until October 1964 and now known as Zimbabwe) from 1964 to ...
became Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, respectively. Nkomo, legally barred from forming a new party, moved ZAPU's headquarters to Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
In July 1963, Nkomo suspended Ndabaningi Sithole, Robert Mugabe
Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...
, Leopold Takawira, and Washington Malianga for their opposition to his continued leadership of ZAPU. On 8 August, they announced the establishment of the Zimbabwe African National Union
The Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) was a militant organisation that fought against white minority rule in Rhodesia, formed as a split from the Zimbabwe African People's Union (ZAPU). ZANU split in 1975 into wings loyal to Robert Muga ...
. ZANU members formed a militant wing, the Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), a militant African nationalist organisation that participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhod ...
, and sent ZANLA members to the People's Republic of China for training.
Course of the war
First phase (1964–1972)
On 4 July 1964, ZANU insurgents ambushed and murdered a white foreman from Silverstreams Wattle Company, Pieter Johan Andries (Andrew) Oberholzer. The killing had a lasting effect on the small, close-knit white community. The Smith administration detained ZANU and ZAPU leaders in August 1964. The major leaders imprisoned were Ndabaningi Sithole, Leopold Takawira, Edgar Tekere, Enos Nkala and Maurice Nyagumbo. The remaining military leaders of the ZANLA Dare ReChimurenga were Josiah Tongogara and the barrister Herbert Chitepo. Operating from bases in Zambia
Zambia (), officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern and East Africa, although it is typically referred to as being in Southern Africa at its most cent ...
and later from Mozambique
Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...
, militants began launching attacks against Rhodesia.
The conflict intensified after Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence (Rhodesia), Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) from Britain on 11 November 1965. International sanctions, Sanctions (embargo) were imposed by Britain and endorsed by member states of the United Nations. The embargo meant that Rhodesia was hampered by a lack of modern equipment but it used other means to receive vital war supplies such as Petroleum, oil, munitions, and arms via the apartheid government of South Africa and Portugal. War material was also obtained through elaborate international smuggling schemes through Portuguese Mozambique, domestic production, and captured infiltrating enemy combatants.
Five months later, on 28 April 1966, the Rhodesian Security Forces engaged militants in Sinoia, during the Battle of Sinoia, first major engagement of the war. Seven ZANLA men were killed, and in retaliation the survivors killed two civilians at their farm near Hartley three weeks later.
During Portuguese rule of Mozambique, until 1974–1975, Rhodesia was able to defend its border with Zambia relatively easily and prevent many guerrilla incursions. It set up a strong defense along the Zambezi River running from Lake Kariba to the Mozambique border. Here 30-man camps were established at 8-kilometre intervals supported by mobile rapid reaction units. From 1966 to 1970, these defences accounted for 175 insurgents killed for the loss of 14 defenders. The conflict continued at a low level until 21 December 1972 when ZANLA conducted the attack on Altena Farm in north-east Rhodesia. In response, the Rhodesians moved to attack nationalists in their foreign camps and staging areas before they could infiltrate into Rhodesia.
Secret cross-border operations by the Rhodesian Special Air Service, Special Air Service began in the mid-1960s, with Rhodesian Security Forces already engaging in hot pursuits into Mozambique. However, three weeks after the attack on Altena Farm, ZANLA killed two civilians and abducted a third into Mozambique and then Tanzania. In response, SAS troops were inserted into Mozambique with the approval of the Portuguese administration, in the first officially sanctioned external operation. The Rhodesian government began authorising an increasing number of external operations.
In the first phase of the conflict (until the end of 1972), Rhodesia's political and military position was strong. Nationalist guerrillas did not make serious inroads. In the early 1970s, the two main nationalist groups faced serious internal divisions, aid from the Organisation of African Unity was temporarily suspended in 1971, and 129 nationalists were expelled from Zambia after they were alleged to have plotted against President Kenneth Kaunda.
Britain's efforts to isolate Rhodesia economically had not produced major compromises by the Smith Government. Indeed, late in 1971 the British and Rhodesian Governments had negotiated a compromise political settlement which would have bowed to the Smith Government's agenda of postponing majority rule into the indefinite future. Nevertheless, when it was found that such a delayed approach to majority rule was unacceptable to most of Rhodesia's African population, the deal fell apart.
In 1971, Rhodesia joined Alcora Exercise, a secret defensive alliance for Southern Africa, formalised in 1970 by Portugal and South Africa. Alcora formalised and deepened the political and military co-operation between the three countries against the revolutionary insurgency in Rhodesia, Angola, Mozambique and South West Africa and against the hostile neighbouring countries.
However, the end of Portuguese rule in Mozambique created new military and political pressures on the Rhodesian Government to accept the principle of immediate majority rule.
Second phase (1972–1979)
The black nationalists continued to operate from secluded bases in neighbouring Zambia
Zambia (), officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern and East Africa, although it is typically referred to as being in Southern Africa at its most cent ...
and from FRELIMO
FRELIMO (; from the Portuguese , ) is a democratic socialist political party in Mozambique. It is the dominant party in Mozambique and has won a majority of the seats in the Assembly of the Republic in every election since the country's first ...
-controlled areas in the Portuguese colony of Mozambique
Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...
, making periodic raids into Rhodesia
Rhodesia (, ), officially from 1970 the Republic of Rhodesia, was an unrecognised state in Southern Africa from 1965 to 1979, equivalent in territory to modern Zimbabwe. Rhodesia was the ''de facto'' successor state to the British colony of S ...
. By 1973, guerrilla activity was increasing in the aftermath of the Altena Farm raid, particularly in the northeast part of the country where portions of the African population were evacuated from border areas, and compulsory military service for whites was extended to one year. As the war intensified, conscription was raised to men between the ages of 38 and 50, though this was modified in 1977. No white male 17-year-olds were allowed to leave the country.
In April 1974, the left-wing Carnation Revolution in Portugal heralded the coming end of colonial rule in Mozambique. A transitional government was formed within months and Mozambique became independent under FRELIMO rule on 25 June 1975. Such events proved beneficial to ZANLA and disastrous for the Rhodesians, adding of hostile border. Indeed, with the demise of the Portuguese Empire, Ian Smith realised Rhodesia was surrounded on three sides by hostile nations and declared a formal state of emergency. Soon Mozambique closed its border, however Rhodesian forces continued to cross the border in "hot pursuit" raids, attacking the nationalists and their training camps, and engaged in skirmishes with Mozambican security forces.
By 1975–1976, it was clear that an indefinite postponement of majority rule, which had been the cornerstone of the Smith Government's strategy since UDI, was no longer viable. Even overt South African support for Rhodesia was waning. South Africa began scaling back economic assistance to Rhodesia, placed limits on the amount of fuel and munitions being supplied to the Rhodesian military, and withdrew the personnel and equipment they had previously provided to aid the war effort, including a border police unit that had been helping guard the Rhodesia-Zambia border.
In 1976, the length of active military service was extended to 18 months; this took effect immediately, with soldiers about to end their one-year service finding their active service extended. Even after discharge from regular service, white men entered the reserve forces, and were often called up for duty and subjected to long military service. In addition, Rhodesia recruited additional black men to volunteer for military service. Although some raised questions about their loyalty, the Rhodesian government stated that it had no doubts about their loyalty, and planned to train black officers. Legislation to conscript blacks was introduced and came in effect in 1979, but the response to call-ups was poor. Rhodesia also recruited foreign volunteers for service, with groups of foreigners who served in Rhodesia including the The Crippled Eagles, Crippled Eagles and 7 Independent Company (Rhodesia), 7 Independent Company.
Late in 1976, Ian Smith accepted the basic elements of the compromise proposals made by US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger to introduce majority rule within two years. The Smith Government then sought to negotiate an acceptable settlement with moderate black leaders, while retaining strong white influence in key areas. The Rhodesian military, in turn, aimed to erode the rising military strength of the ZANLA and ZIPRA to the greatest extent possible in order "buy time" for an acceptable political settlement to be reached.
Use of biological and chemical weapons
As the war continued to intensify, the Rhodesian Security Forces initiated a Chemical and Biological Weapons (CBW) programme to kill guerrillas both inside Rhodesia and in external camps in Zambia and Mozambique. The effort had three fronts. First, it aimed to eliminate guerrillas operating inside Rhodesia through contaminated supplies either provided by contact men, recovered from hidden caches, or stolen from rural stores.
Secondly, it aimed to contaminate water supplies along guerrilla infiltration routes into Rhodesia, forcing the guerrillas to either travel through arid regions to carry more water and less ammunition or travel through areas patrolled by the security forces. Finally, the Rhodesians sought to hit the guerrillas in their camps in Mozambique by poisoning food, beverages, and medicines.
The chemicals most used in the Rhodesian programme were parathion (an organophosphate insecticide) and Thallium poisoning, thallium (a heavy metal commonly found in rodenticide). Biological agents the Rhodesians selected for use also included ''Vibrio cholerae'' (causative agent of cholera) and possibly ''Bacillus anthracis'' (causative agent of anthrax). They also looked at using ''Rickettsia prowazekii'' (causative agent of epidemic typhus), and ''Salmonella typhi'' (causative agent of typhoid fever), and toxins—such as ricin and botulinum toxin.
Laying of minefields
Between 1976 and 1979 the Rhodesian Army laid extensive minefields along the country's eastern and northern borders to prevent infiltration and resupply of fighters based in Zambia and Mozambique. The mines were laid in dense patterns, one of which was known as the "Cordon Sanitaire" in six main districts and were estimated at independence to cover 511 sq km, later revised down to 310 sq km. The Zimbabwe Government estimated that the minefields contained 2.6 million anti-personnel landmines.
Nyadzonya raid
The Rhodesian Security Forces called up part-time soldiers on 2 May 1976 in preparation for a major counter-offensive. On 9 August 1976, Rhodesian Selous Scouts
The Selous Scouts was a special forces unit of the Rhodesian Army that operated during the Rhodesian Bush War from 1973 until the reconstitution of the country as Zimbabwe in 1980. It was mainly responsible for infiltrating the black majority p ...
aided by former ZANLA commander Morrison Nyathi attacked a ZANLA camp at Nyadzonya in Mozambique containing over 5,000 guerrillas and several hundred refugees. The Selous Scouts, who numbered 72, dressed in FRELIMO uniforms and disguised their vehicles, attaching FRELIMO licence plates and painting them in FRELIMO colours. White soldiers wore black ski masks. They crossed the unmanned border into Mozambique at 0005 hours on 9 August and drove through the early morning to the camp, passing several FRELIMO sentries who saluted them as they went by.
When they reached the ZANLA camp at 0825 hours the six ZANLA soldiers on duty allowed them to enter, and the Rhodesian vehicles moved in and took up prearranged positions around the edge of the parade ground, on which stood about 4,000 guerrillas. When all was ready a Rhodesian soldier took his vehicle loudspeaker and announced, in Shona, "", meaning "we have taken Zimbabwe", and Nyathi blew a whistle signalling the cadres to muster. The cadres began cheering and ran towards the vehicles, packing around them as more ran onto the parade ground from other areas of the camp.
The Rhodesians then opened fire and continued shooting until there was no movement on the parade ground, then they returned to Rhodesia. More than 300 ZANLA insurgents were reported killed by the Rhodesians, with four Selous Scouts lightly wounded. This figure is corroborated by ZANLA's official report, though publicly both ZANLA and ZIPRA claimed that Nyadzonya had been a refugee camp.
Later, on 7 October 1976, militants bombed a railroad bridge over Matetsi River when a train carrying ore passed over. Black nationalist guerrillas attacked a tea plantation and killed 27 black workers near the Mozambican border on 21 December 1976.
Escalation of the war (1977)
By 1977, the war had spread throughout Rhodesia. ZANLA continued to operate from Mozambique and remained dominant among the Mashona peoples in eastern and central Rhodesia. Meanwhile, ZIPRA remained active in the north and west, using bases in Zambia and Botswana, and were mainly supported by the Ndebele tribes. With this escalation came sophistication, organisation and modern weapons for the guerrillas, and although many were still untrained, an increasing number were trained in Communist bloc and other sympathetic countries.
Weapons fielded included TT pistols, PPSh-41 submachine guns, AK-47 & AKM assault rifles, SKS semi-automatic carbines, RPD machine gun, RPD and RPK light machine guns, as well as RPG-2 and RPG-7 rocket propelled grenade launchers and various Soviet grenades. The Rhodesians only discovered how well equipped the nationalists had become when raids on guerrilla base areas towards the end of the war revealed mortars, 12.7mm and 14.5mm heavy machine guns and even heavier calibre weapons such as 122mm multiple rocket launchers.
On 3 April 1977, General Peter Walls announced that the government would launch a campaign to win the "hearts and minds" of Rhodesia's black citizens. In May, Walls received reports of ZANLA
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), a militant African nationalist organisation that participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhode ...
forces massing in the city of Mapai, Mozambique, Mapai in Gaza Province, Mozambique. Prime Minister Smith gave Walls permission to destroy the base. Walls told the media the Rhodesian forces were changing tactics from contain and hold to search and destroy, "adopting hot pursuit when necessary."
On 30 May 1977, during Operation Aztec, 500 troops crossed the Mozambican border and travelled to Mapai, engaging the ZANLA
Zimbabwe African National Liberation Army (ZANLA) was the military wing of the Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU), a militant African nationalist organisation that participated in the Rhodesian Bush War against white minority rule of Rhode ...
forces with air cover from the Rhodesian Air Force and paratroopers in C-47 Dakotas. The Rhodesian government said the military killed 32 ZANLA fighters and lost one Rhodesian pilot. The Mozambican government disputed the number of casualties, saying it shot down three Rhodesian planes and a helicopter and took several thousand troops prisoner, all of which was denied by Minister of Combined Operations, Roger Hawkins.
Kurt Waldheim, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, condemned the incident on 1 June, and Walls announced a day later that the Rhodesian military would occupy Mapai, Mozambique, Mapai until they had eliminated ZANLA's presence. But the American, British, and Soviet governments also condemned the raid and Rhodesian forces later withdrew from the area. The United Nations Security Council denounced the incursion of the "illegal racist minority regime in Southern Rhodesia" in United Nations Security Council Resolution 411, Resolution 411, on 30 June 1977.
Militants Salisbury Woolworths bombing, bombed a Woolworths department store in Salisbury
Salisbury ( ) is a cathedral city in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers Avon, Nadder and Bourne. The city is approximately from Southampton and from Bath.
Salisbury is in the southeast of Wil ...
on 6 August 1977, killing 11 and injuring 70. They killed 16 black civilians in eastern Rhodesia on 21 August, burning their homes on a white-owned farm. In November 1977, in response to the buildup of ZANLA guerrillas in Mozambique, Rhodesian forces launched Operation Dingo, a pre-emptive combined arms surprise attack on guerrilla camps at Chimoio and Tembue in Mozambique. The attack was carried out over three days, from 23 to 25 November 1977. While these operations reportedly inflicted thousands of casualties on Robert Mugabe's ZANLA cadres, probably blunting guerrilla incursions in the months that followed, nevertheless a steady intensification of the insurgency continued through 1978.
To disrupt FRELIMO's hold on Mozambique, the Rhodesian Central Intelligence Organisation helped to create and support an insurgency movement within Mozambique. This guerrilla group, known as RENAMO, battled with FRELIMO even as Rhodesian forces fought the ZANLA within Mozambique.
In May 1978, 50 civilians were killed in crossfire between Marxist militants and the Rhodesian military, the greatest number of civilians killed in an engagement until then. In July Patriotic Front members killed 39 black civilians and the Rhodesian government killed 106 militants. By mid-1978, black nationalist guerrillas had killed nearly 40 Christian missionaries. Seven white Catholic missionaries were killed by guerrillas at St. Paul's High School, Musami, St. Paul's Mission, Musami on 6 February 1977. In the single worst attack on missionaries, 12 British missionaries and their children were killed in the Vumba massacre on 23 June 1978.
On 4 November 1978, Walls said 2,000 Patriotic Front militants had been persuaded to defect and fight for the Rhodesian Army, Rhodesian Security Forces.
In December 1978, a ZANLA unit penetrated the outskirts of Salisbury and fired a volley of rockets and incendiary device rounds into the main oil storage depot. The storage tanks burned for five days, giving off a column of smoke that could be seen away. Half a million barrels of petroleum product—a quarter of Rhodesia's fuel—was destroyed.
In 1978, 450 ZANLA militants entered from Mozambique and attacked the town of Mutare, Umtali. At the time, ZANU said the militants were women, an unusual characteristic, but in 1996 Joyce Mujuru said the vast majority involved were men and ZANU concocted the story to make Western organisations believe women were involved in the fighting. In retaliation for these acts, the Rhodesian Air Force bombed guerrilla camps inside Mozambique, using 'fatigued' English Electric Canberra, Canberra B2 aircraft and Hawker Hunter
The Hawker Hunter is a transonic British jet-powered fighter aircraft that was developed by Hawker Aircraft for the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It was designed to take advantage of the newly developed Rolls-R ...
s – actively, but clandestinely, supported by several of the more capable Canberra B(I)12 aircraft of the South African Air Force. A number of joint-force bomber raids on guerrilla encampments and assembly areas in Mozambique and Zambia were mounted in 1978, and extensive air reconnaissance and surveillance of guerrilla encampments and logistical build-up was carried out by the South African Air Force on behalf of the RhAF.
Airliners shot down
Rhodesian external operations extended into Zambia after Nkomo's ZIPRA nationalists shot down two unarmed Vickers Viscount civilian airliners with Soviet-supplied SA-7 Grail, SA-7 heat-seeking missiles. Encamped beneath the path of ascent towards Salisbury from Kariba Airport, the ZIPRA cadres downed Air Rhodesia Flight 825 on 3 September 1978 and Air Rhodesia Flight 827 on 12 February 1979. In the first incident, eighteen civilians on board survived, and five of these went away to find water. Half an hour later nine ZIPRA fighters arrived, promising help; three of the thirteen survivors hid when they saw them. In the words of ''Time'' magazine, the ZIPRA cadres "herded together the ten people at the wreckage, robbed them of their valuables, and finally cut them down with automatic weapons fire". Nkomo claimed responsibility for the attack and spoke of it to the BBC in a way Rhodesians considered gloating. In the second attack all 59 people on board were killed in the crash.
In retaliation for the shooting down of Flight 825 in September 1978, Rhodesian Air Force Canberra bombers, Hunter fighter-bombers and helicopter gunships attacked the ZIPRA guerrilla base at Westlands farm near Lusaka in October 1978, warning Zambian forces by radio not to interfere.
The increased effectiveness of the bombing and follow-up 'air mobile' strikes using C-47 Skytrain, Dakota-dropped parachutists and helicopter 'air cav' techniques had a significant effect on the development of the conflict. As late as September 1979, despite the increased sophistication of guerrilla forces in Mozambique, a raid by Selous Scouts, with artillery and air support, on "New Chimoio" still reportedly resulted in heavy ZANLA casualties. However, a successful raid on the Rhodesian strategic fuel reserves in Salisbury
Salisbury ( ) is a cathedral city in Wiltshire, England with a population of 41,820, at the confluence of the rivers Avon, Nadder and Bourne. The city is approximately from Southampton and from Bath.
Salisbury is in the southeast of Wil ...
also underscored the importance of concluding a negotiated settlement and achieving international recognition before the war expanded further.
Military pressure
The larger problem was that by 1979, combined ZIPRA and ZANLA strength inside Rhodesia totalled at least 12,500 guerrillas and it was evident that insurgents were entering the country at a faster rate than the Rhodesian forces could kill or capture. In addition, 22,000 ZIPRA and 16,000 ZANLA fighters remained uncommitted outside the country. Joshua Nkomo's ZIPRA forces were preparing their forces in Zambia with the intent of confronting the Rhodesians through a conventional invasion. Whether such an invasion could have been successful in the short term against the well trained Rhodesian army and air force is questionable. However, what was clear was that the insurgency was growing in strength daily and the ability of the security forces to continue to control the entire country was coming under serious challenge.
By putting the civilian population at risk, ZIPRA and the ZANLA had been particularly effective in creating conditions that accelerated white emigration. This not only seriously undermined the morale of the white population, it was also gradually reducing the availability of trained reserves for the army and the police. The economy was also suffering badly from the war; the Rhodesian GDP consistently declined in the late 1970s.
Politically, the Rhodesians were therefore pinning all their hopes on the "internal" political settlement that had been negotiated with moderate black nationalist leaders in 1978 and its ability to achieve external recognition and support. This internal settlement led to the creation of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia
Zimbabwe Rhodesia (), alternatively known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, also informally known as Zimbabwe or Rhodesia, and sometimes as Rhobabwe, was a short-lived sovereign state that existed from 1 June to 12 December 1979. Zimbabwe Rhodesia was p ...
under a new constitution in 1979.
Resolution
Under the agreement of March 1978, the country was renamed Zimbabwe-Rhodesia
Zimbabwe Rhodesia (), alternatively known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, also informally known as Zimbabwe or Rhodesia, and sometimes as Rhobabwe, was a short-lived sovereign state that existed from 1 June to 12 December 1979. Zimbabwe Rhodesia was p ...
, and in the 1979 Zimbabwe Rhodesia general election, general election of 24 April 1979, Bishop Abel Muzorewa
Abel Tendekayi Muzorewa (14 April 1925 – 8 April 2010), also commonly referred to as Bishop Muzorewa, was a Zimbabwean bishop and politician who served as the first and only Prime Minister of Zimbabwe Rhodesia from the Internal Settlement to ...
became the country's first black prime minister. On 1 June 1979, Josiah Zion Gumede became President. The internal settlement left control of the military, police, civil service, and judiciary in white hands, and assured whites about one-third of the seats in parliament. It was essentially a power-sharing arrangement between whites and blacks. The factions led by Nkomo and Mugabe denounced the new government as a puppet of white Rhodesians and fighting continued. The hopes for recognition of the internal settlement, and of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, by the newly elected Conservative Party (UK), Conservative government of Margaret Thatcher did not materialise after the 1979 United Kingdom general election, latter's election in May 1979. Likewise, although the US Senate voted to lift sanctions against Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, the Carter administration also refused to recognise the internal settlement.
While Prime Minister Thatcher clearly sympathised with the internal settlement and thought of the ZANLA and ZIPRA leaders as terrorists, she was prepared to support a push for further compromise if it could end the fighting. Britain was also reluctant to recognise the internal settlement for fear of fracturing the unity of the Commonwealth
A commonwealth is a traditional English term for a political community founded for the common good. Historically, it has been synonymous with "republic". The noun "commonwealth", meaning "public welfare, general good or advantage", dates from the ...
. Thus later in 1979, the Thatcher government called a peace conference in London to which all nationalist leaders were invited.
The outcome of this conference would become known as the Lancaster House Agreement
The Lancaster House Agreement, signed on 21 December 1979, declared a ceasefire, ending the Rhodesian Bush War; and directly led to Rhodesia achieving internationally recognised independence as Zimbabwe. It required the full resumption of d ...
. During the conference, the Zimbabwe-Rhodesian Government accepted a watering down of the 1978 internal settlement while Mugabe and Nkomo agreed to end the war in exchange for new elections in which they could participate. The economic sanctions imposed on Rhodesia were lifted in late 1979, and the country reverted to temporary British rule until elections could be held. Under the Constitution of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia (Amendment) (No. 4) Act 1979 of 11 December 1979, the country formally reverted to its colonial status as Southern Rhodesia. The Zimbabwe-Rhodesian parliament voted itself out of power, and Christopher Soames, Baron Soames, Lord Soames was appointed by the British government to rule the country as Governor-Designate, arriving in Salisbury on 12 December to take over from President Gumede. On 21 December 1979, a cease-fire was announced. An election was scheduled for early 1980. The British Commonwealth deployed an observer force, the Commonwealth Monitoring Force, to the country for the transitional period. Britain contributed 800 soldiers and 300 Royal Air Force personnel, along with small naval and marine contingents. Australia, Fiji, Kenya, and New Zealand also contributed smaller numbers of troops. A nine-man British advance party arrived on 8 December to begin establishing a logistics base, and this was followed by the arrival of the main force shortly after.
The war would end in a military stalemate. However, the political compromise which was reached after combat ceased would work to the advantage of the black nationalists, especially those aligned with ZANU leader Robert Mugabe
Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...
. Mugabe himself stated in an interview published in the 28 April 1980 edition of the New York Times "We did not win a military victory... We reached a political settlement... A compromise."
During the Zimbabwean parliamentary election, 1980, election of 1980, there were accusations of voter intimidation by Mugabe's guerrilla cadres, sections of which were accused of not having assembled in the designated guerrilla assembly points as required under the Lancaster House Agreement, and the international observers as well as Lord Soames were accused of looking the other way. The Rhodesian military may have seriously considered a coup d'état in March 1980. This alleged coup was to consist of two stages: Operation Quartz, coordinated attacks on guerrilla assembly points within the country, and Operation Hectic, the assassination of Mugabe and his key aides.
However, even in the context of alleged voter intimidation by ZANLA elements, widespread support for Mugabe from large sections of the black population (in particular from the Shona people, Shona language group which made up the overwhelming majority of the country's population) could not be seriously disputed. Moreover, the clear absence of any external support for such a coup, and the inevitable conflagration that would have engulfed the country thereafter, scuttled the plan.
The election of early 1980 was won by Mugabe, who became prime minister after Zimbabwe African National Union - Patriotic Front, ZANU-PF received 63% of the vote. By 16 March 1980, all Commonwealth forces had departed, save for 40 infantry instructors who temporarily stayed behind to train the new nation's army.[ On 18 April 1980, interim British rule ended and the country was internationally recognised as independent. The colony of Southern Rhodesia was formally renamed Zimbabwe, and on 18 April 1982, the government changed the name of the country's capital from Salisbury to Harare.
]
Aftermath
According to Rhodesian government statistics, more than 20,000 were killed during the second war. From December 1972 to December 1979, 1,120 members of the Rhodesian security forces were killed, along with 10,050 guerrillas who were killed in Rhodesia, and an unknown number in Mozambique and Zambia, 7,790 black civilians, and 468 white civilians.[
After he assumed power, ]Robert Mugabe
Robert Gabriel Mugabe (; ; 21 February 1924 – 6 September 2019) was a Zimbabwean revolutionary and politician who served as Prime Minister of Zimbabwe from 1980 to 1987 and then as President from 1987 to 2017. He served as Leader of the ...
acted incrementally to consolidate his power, forming a coalition government with his ZAPU rivals and the white minority. The Rhodesian Army was merged with guerrilla forces to form the Zimbabwe Defence Forces, and the Rhodesian security forces were merged with ZANLA and ZIPRA forces. Joshua Nkomo was given a series of cabinet positions. The South African government recruited white Rhodesian Security Forces personnel in what was designated Operation Winter (South Africa), Operation Winter and around 5,000 took this up.
However, Mugabe was torn between keeping his coalition stable and pressures to meet the expectations of his followers for social change. Clashes between ZANLA and ZIPRA forces took place in 1980 and 1981. In February 1982, Mugabe fired Nkomo and two other ZAPU ministers from his cabinet, triggering bitter fighting between ZAPU supporters in Northern Ndebele language, Ndebele-speaking region of the country and the ruling ZANU. Between 1982 and 1985, the military crushed armed resistance from Ndebele groups in Matabeleland and the Midlands, Zimbabwe, Midlands in a military crackdown known as , a Shona term which translates roughly to mean "the early rain which washes away the chaff before the spring rains". The campaigns were also known as the Matabeleland Massacres.
The Zimbabwean military's North Korean-trained Zimbabwean Fifth Brigade, Fifth Brigade was deployed to Matabeleland to crush resistance. German journalist Shari Eppel estimates approximately 20,000 Matabele were murdered in these first years after the war; most of those killed were victims of public executions.
Violence between ZANLA and ZIPRA continued until 1987. In December 1987, the two groups reached an accord which saw them merge into one party known as ZANU PF, headed by Mugabe. Mugabe then became President and gained additional powers, as the office of Prime Minister was abolished.
Beyond Zimbabwe's borders, as a result of Rhodesian aid and support for RENAMO, the Rhodesian Bush War also helped influence the outbreak of the Mozambique Civil War, which lasted from 1977 until 1992 and claimed a million lives.
Historiography
Overview
Unlike many post-colonial African conflicts, the Second Rhodesian Bush War spawned an extensive written military historiography. Though the territory at the center of the conflict was known by four different names throughout the time of the war, historiography generally prefers to call the country "Rhodesia" or "Zimbabwe". Histories that use the former term often focus on the actions of white soldiers without much account of the conflict's political context, while many works that use the latter term frame the event as a victorious guerilla liberation war.
White Rhodesian narratives
Many Rhodesian veterans wrote memoirs about their service after the second Bush War, most of them emanating from soldiers who served in the RLI or Selous Scouts. These works were either self-published, published with vanity presses, or with specialized publishing houses. The memoirs published without editorial oversight often suffered from spelling errors and other mistakes, but tended to focus more on unit culture and non-military activities such as poaching, or "taming" captured African insurgents into domestic servants. Most of these books were released in Africa; few became commercial successes in the United Kingdom or the United States. Grouped together with fictional novels about the war, the memoirs are sometimes placed in a genre of "neo-Rhodesian" literature. Claims involving use of biological and chemical weapons by Rhodesian forces appeared only in post-war literature.
The first major Rhodesian memoir to be released was Reid-Daly's account of the Selous Scouts, ''Selous Scouts Top Secret War'', published by Galago—a publishing house run by Peter Stiff—in 1982. Galago continued to be a major publisher of these works. Publishing of these memoirs accelerated during Zimbabwe's economic decline in the 1990s. These works increasingly incorporated material from other memoirs and some secondary works, though they generally displayed little knowledge of ZANLA's or ZIPRA's version of events. Many also featured direct and indirect criticism of other soldiers and memoirists. Some of these disputes led to lawsuits. Land reform in Zimbabwe, Seizures of white-owned farms in the 2000s led to a massive growth in the literature. Revised editions of previous memoirs were also common. Chris Cocks' ''Fireforce'' was re-released by Galago and edited by Stiff. Stiff removed all references to drug use in the new edition, since he wanted to portray the RLI as heroes.
Zimbabwean nationalist discourse
Early literature on nationalist guerillas in Rhodesia tended to focus on ZANLA and ignore ZIPRA. Several autobiographies and memoirs were published by Zimbabwean nationalists in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Masipule Sithole, the younger brother of Ndabaningi, wrote ''Zimbabwe: Struggles within the Struggle'', which described conflicts between ZANU and ZAPU with an emphasis on ethnic disagreements. David Martin and Phyllis Johnson published ''The Struggle for Zimbabwe'' in 1981, which chronicled the formation and development of nationalist movements. It was printed with a favourable foreword by Mugabe and was wielded by the post-independent Zimbabwean government as evidence of the courage and sacrifices of ZANU and ZANLA, including incorporation into secondary school curriculum. The first major academic work covering the nationalist guerilla perspective of the war was Terence Ranger's ''Peasant Consciousness and Guerrilla War in Zimbabwe'', published in 1985. It focused on eastern Rhodesia and constituted a largely uncritical account of ZANLA activities in that area. The book did not address violence inflicted by ZANLA on African TTL residents and concluded that rural blacks were "united" in supporting the guerilla movement. Ranger later reflected that his work duplicated ZANU's nationalist rhetoric. Romanticised interpretations of the Zimbwabwean nationalist endeavor fell out of scholarly favour in the mid-1990s. Since then, more critical works of the nationalist movement have predominated, highlighting complexities in the war. More works focusing on ZIPRA have also been published, though the nature of differences between ZANLA
and ZIPRA as well as the geographical spread of the two guerrilla forces remains debated.
Critical analysis
In her 1992 book, ''Zimbabwe's Guerilla War'', political scientist Norma J. Kriger rejected "the existing portrait of ZANU's successful politicisation of the Zimbabwean countryside during the liberation war" and concluded that relations between nationalist guerillas and TTL villagers in Mutoko District were predominantly characterized by violence and coercion. She also wrote that insofar as peasants voluntarily collaborated with ZANLA, it was often in the hopes of using them to settle petty personal scores and protect their local interests. Historian Luise White wrote that the white Rhodesian war accounts did not present a unified and agreed telling of the conflict, and instead "struggled over what being a white Rhodesian meant, and what pasts and futures soldiers brought to the war". Reflecting on their truthfulness, White stated, "Many of the stories and events in these memoirs are not true, or at least not wholly accurate." Reid-Daly later testified during a lawsuit involving an authorship dispute that he had "exaggerated or embellished the true story" several times in ''Selous Scouts Top Secret War''. Many of these works maintained that the Rhodesian Army "won every battle but lost at the negotiating table" at Lancaster House. White criticized this view, writing, "First, there weren't really any battles, and second, while Rhodesian soldiers were not routed anywhere, they did not win any decisive victories either, especially during the mid-1970s when guerrilla forces were in disarray. In terms of strategy in the middle and late 1970s, it is not altogether clear that the Rhodesian state wanted victory more than it wanted a strong position from which to negotiate some kind of transition to majority rule." Academic M. T. Howard wrote that the portrayal of the Rhodesian Army as a nearly-invincible institution served both white Rhodesian and black Zimbabwean nationalist discourses; the former benefitted from showing a capable force which was never defeated in the field while the latter argued that their ultimate success was made more impressive.
See also
* History of the Rhodesian Light Infantry
* Military history of Africa
* Portuguese Colonial War
* Rhodesian Armoured Corps, Rhodesian Armoured Car Regiment
* Second Matabele War, officially known within Zimbabwe as the First ''Chimurenga''
* Rhodesia and weapons of mass destruction
* Security Force Auxiliaries
Notes and references
Notes
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Further reading
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{{Zimbabwe topics
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