Get a 7-day free trial and 50% off Blinkist Annual Premium by clicking here: www.blinkist.com/casualhistorian. This offer is valid only until May 29th, 2023.
Its time mass education of American and western citizens was initiated leading to knowledge of how rapacious economic sanctions against Zimbabwe by western powers have decimated Zimbabwe back into the economic stone age ....
After going from a Gaddafi video to a Rhodesia video, I can only conclude that Causal Historian is determined to trigger the entire political spectrum.
Yeah, but they got their lands back. Things would not be the way that they are if the whites gave them the same education as everyone else. Separate but equal never worked.
I am Rhodesian and was born in '79. My family are beekeepers, tended to farms and owned a meadery. My father had a Master's degree in entomology while I have a Bachelor's degree in the same field. My father introduced beekeeping to the local cotton farms and demonstrated that not only did quantity increase but quality along with it. My father then made mead(honeywine) with his harvests(which is always shared with the farm owners) and exported it to South Africa. Now the government is spending $3.5 billion USD to bring us farmers back. I am my father's heir, so I was offered $6.5 million USD and 83 acres of land to return and teach apiculture.
My cousin was offered something as well but not as extravagant as yours. My cousin was offered land for free where he could farm. However whatever profit he made 10% was to be given to the land owner. The land owner was given the farm as most were and neglected it so bad it was unrecognizable. They used the land for cattle, it was a desert. It is now a profitable farm. The people who live on the farm apparently do not want to learn how to farm. They have 450 hectares of land.
$6.5 million USD plus 83 acres doesn't sound true to me!!! Maybe you must look again at the papers you have because I know the govt is bankrupt so where does it get all that money. Neither have I heard of it in the news or as rumours!! I know of good and capable Black farmers who have gone bust because of lack of funds to run the farms. The problem is caused by the fact that those Blacks who were "given" the farm neither have title deeds nor leases which makes it impossible for them to get bank loans to finance their initial investments.
Why did Rhodesia declare independence". Because South Africa's Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd advised Ian Smith to settle with Britain, but South Africa would support Ian Smith if he declared independence. Verwoerd himself was slain by one of the servants the next year in 1966.
Verwoerd himself was supposed to make a major Policy Speech to the rest of the world on the very afternoon that he was killed....nobody will ever know what he was going to say because that speech kinda 'blew away in the wind'.........................conveniently ???
Speaking as a white Zimbabwean of British stock, I congratulate you on how well and accurate your video was presented. Unfortunately, it was a sad piece of history that we all wish we could have done better. Rhodesia was one of the best run and successful nations in Earth's history with a great leader and government, a successful economy and good, kind people of both British ( as well as other Europeans ) and Africans. However, our government was too strict on the racial policy. While I believe the Western powers had a negative agenda on controlling our country's resources, we should have integrated Africans into our government with equal freedoms sooner, thus preventing the Bush War. All we need now is forgiveness, compassion for both our sides, peace, friendship and loving-kindness. The past is long dead. We need to move forward and work together to build a new, better country out of the ashes.
The fact of the matter is that you can't live around a population with an average IQ of 70. That's why Rhodesia and South Africa have failed, not because of their "racial policy". Things only got much much worse after they dropped the apartheid policies.
They gave Rhodesia to the hands of Mugabe who took it to the ruins .. if they had still gone with Ian Smith post transition , Zimbabwe would have on a growth path unmatched in the southern hemisphere .
What was not touched on in this video is just how complicated the tribal system was. There were four main tribes, the Shona being by far the largest in population and covering the largest land area and from which Mugabe hailed. The second most powerful were the Matabele (Ndebele) of whom Nkomo was their leader, lived in the surrounding territory of Bulawayo, Rhodesia's 2nd largest city. All 4 major tribes spoke different languages which also caused certain barriers and their history, before white settlement was not, dare I say, based on "Love thy neighbour." Mzilikazi, a Zulu warrior commander much revered in Shaka's army took his forces north after shafting Shaka for whatever reason. (Most likely stealing cattle). He didn't under estimate Shaka's wrath and thus employed a total scorched earth policy in his wake so that Shaka could not follow him and exact retribution. Upon arriving in Bulawayo, Mzilikazi found a very placid, peaceful Shona people, slaughtered them all and founded his new seat of power, Matabeleland. For a long time he waged war against the Shona, stealing their villages and livestock and expanding his sphere of influence. It is true that British colonial rule wherever they went around the world, just like other countries in Europe, used and abused the native peoples but to be fair to Rhodes, he did put a halt to Matabele incursions and broker an uneasy peace between the the tribes So it not surprising that Nkomo (who considered himself a direct descendant of Mzilikazi whether true or not) was ever going to ally with Mugabe and why Nkomo chose Soviet Union whilst Mugabe chose China, two mega powers that weren't friends either and both of which also had their eyes set on Africa as Great Britain, Belgium, France and Portugal were being forced out. Ian Smith might have been a naive politician but I do believe he tried to be the best statesman he could be for the country that was considered the bread basket of Africa. It is also worth noting that one of the first things Mugabe did upon coming to power was for all intents and purposes the mass genocide of the Ndelebe people, thus ensuring no opposition for his foreseeable future.
Tribalism was not an issue. The British tried to make it an issue by dividing and conquering but it cannot be identified as the cause for political complication and intrigue. Indeed ZanuPF has Zezuru and Ndebele working together. BTW, Shona is a language, not a tribe. Zezurus are the main anchor Shona speaking tribe. Karangas, Manyikas, Ungwes and Kore Kores are other Shona speaking peoples. The narrative that Mugabe killed Ndebeles wholesale is not correct. He was pre-empting a military coup that was well known at that time. Be that as it may, in post colonial African politics, everyone is committing crimes against humanity. The losers have an advantage as plaintiffs. Winners can't go around claiming that the losers were committing crimes against humanity without looking stupid. In fact, Robert Mugabe & co wanted Ian Smith tried for crimes against humanity and Ian smith was more than willing to face the charges as long as the same standard was applied to all. The initiative died!
@@mosheyisraeli6871 To say Thousands of innocent civilians living in rural Matabeleland in the south were involved in an uprising - is false. The thousands of peasants butchered were simple unarmed ndebele tribespeople living in African rural villages. They were massacred by the Mugabe government's specially trained (by North Korea) called *Five Brigade* . They were ruthless and indiscriminately burnt villages & murdered the indigenous people ONLY because they belonged to the Ndebele tribe (Joshua Nkomo, Mugabe's political rival's tribe) backed by the Russians. The Rhodesia/Zimbawean situation was complicated at so many levels.
@mosheyisraeli6871 You most definitely have your head buried in the sand. There was indeed a serious tribal issue between the two main tribes The Shona & the Ndebele, why do you think Joshua Knomo *leader of the ndebeles* , escaped to UK, he feared for his life. Remember what was said at the time *Cut off the head of a snake & that's the end of it* . The voting was on tribal lines, and believe me, the ndebeles knew that they were discriminated against & tried to defend themselves against a ruthless cruel Shona Zanupf government. You must be shona & a Zanupf member wearing blinkers. Please acknowledge thIs *FACT* & move on. I lived through it all in Matabeland even though I'm neither ndebele or shona.
@@patthompson8591no you're wrong but tribal issue began when the Europeans accosted the land and made a tribal issue due to the land and the soil being fertile and then wanting to control all aspects of products that would have been grown there and sold as Lawrence really because in the beginning there was no there was no snuffing no trading going on and they had a railroad system that they had made specifically to gain natural resources now when you have a tribal difference it is usually occurred or acquired by war or some kind of a treaty amongst the captors canes or tribal leaders the only people that created a disaster within the nation of these people were the white people that Europeans because they wanted to make it seem like they were affirm for one group of people when really they weren't affirm for anybody that was native to that country they were only affirm for their selves and that's why they kept begging more and more Europeans to come and live there they were even offering to pay their debt, so that they could somewhat outnumber the natives that live there the same thing they did in the antebellum slavery era where blacks outnumber the whites and so what they did was they started labeling other people from different countries that looked like white people such as the Italian in the Irish that were never considered human beings prior to them being outnumbered by the African-Americans and label them Europeans and label them white so that they could have an ally to form against African-Americans and this is the same thing they did in Africa the only difference is is they had a great white people to keep their Superior and their white supremacy going because these were not native countries to white people so you are wrong there, they created the white people that Europeans created a problem between the different sectors and between the different tribes okay constantly it costing them with lies and constantly trying to see who would of fluently allow them to do whatever in the weaker tribe was the tribe that they would act or pretend that they were on their side okay and it's always been that way white people have created some of the worst wars in Africa for the simplest things such as farmland or animals grazing it's ridiculous
A big salute to you for including contemporary published quotes. This hugely adds to contextualising and revealing the thinking behind hugely wrong headed political and business decisions.
In Portuguese colonial Mozambique we appreciated very much important rich products and very good meat South Rhodesians produced and exported to us. Now it is Zimbabwe and it is kaput ...
Well when you build a system like Portugal and the uk did in Southern Africa, did you really think anything good would come? Thats why Portugal was the last in line for everything in Western Europe, had the highest illiteracy in the western world into the 1970s. Should’ve invested more into Portugal and not Africa 😅
@@Jkejhjklmg1485the portuguese were dealing with a dictatorship the same way the people of mozambique were, in 1970 Portugal had the same literacy rate that Mozambique has in 2024 lol, (70/80%). stop acting like this dude made decisions 💀
@@Jkejhjklmg1485Good things did come from the systems set up by Europeans (except Belgium). The good things stopped once that system went away. This is not an opinion, it’s observable fact.
I went there when it was still Rhodesia in 1973.We were flying with South African Airways London to Johannesburg and the plane,a Boeing 747, refueled in Las Palmas and then Salisbury, Rhodesia.SAA couldn't fly over most African countries so went down the coast to what was then South West Africa and cut inland.The name Rhodesia lives on in the dog, the Rhodesian Ridgeback which is sort of like a Great Dane type dog.
So when half of world protested South African apartheid and banned south africa. You chose to support that regime by flying by its airlines. Or may be you did not care.
@@KumarNikhils African airlines flew into South Africa and there were plenty of African countries doing a roaring trade with SA. The number of black African countries in the region with a thriving democracy was zero. Who was protesting that most Africans in black Africa had no vote? Nobody.
@@tigershoot Our _(German)_ companies loved the financial climate in South Africa. Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz had huge automobile plants in South Africa, were they manufactured their right-steered cars. Dozens of German companies had their African seat in South Africa, because of it's halfway politically stable and financially stable environment. It was also the by far most developed place in sub-saharan Africa. Most of the sanctions and trade embargos were only about military goods/weapons. This is why to this day, SA has the largest defense industry in Africa. All Western countries made big business in SA. Even fast food companies like Kentucky Fried Chicken, which can be found all over the country. But also tech companies like IBM or GE, all had their African headquarters in South Africa. The sanctions didn't affect them at all! If you were White and skilled, it was probably the best country to live on earth.
I'm a Zimbabwean, and I'd be very happy to help you with pronunciation of our names, because it's driving me nuts: Sithole is pronounced Si-TO-le Nkomo was from the Nde-BE-le nation (I hardly recognised what you said), and there were a few others. I find this a shame as I think that you did a really good documentary about a history that I think is too often cherry-picked to shore up people's ideology. So well done for that.
My father was Rhodesian/South African and I am American. I found the video painfully American. I also found myself cringing everytime he said "South Rhodesia". It was also outrageous that he said Godfrey Huggins was the architect of "South Rhodesian apartheid" - obviously there was racial discrimination in Southern Rhodesia and in Rhodesia after UDI, but it was never apartheid. Ridiculous conflation.
Thank you for making such in depth videos about relatively hard to learn of or obscure moments in our recent past, Most people don't even know what Rhodesia was let alone the history of it. Your series on Lebanon was one of the greatest binges I went on for history videos, I just want to say thanks and I look forward to the quality content you've made.
It would be quite easy to swap the names and events from Rhodesia to the United States in this video. The War of Independence was America's UDI.The white settlers there did the same or worse to obtain native lands, and even lands from their southern neighbours, and even tried it on with Canada. The Reservations were their equivalent to Homelands. The main difference is always a matter of numbers in the end. The lesson perhaps is that every group, tribe, nation whatever gas to look out for its own interests - nobody else gives a damn.31:51
This is History that the "1st world" doesn't want anyone to know. Said "1st world" were as insane then as they very obviously are now. Back then they hid it well, but Rhodesia knew they were insane, so they had to destroy us in a way that suited their narrative.
A very well made informative video of how the political landscape looked like up until Rhodesian Independence. As I have a bit of prior knowledge into the matter. This was the best video on the subject so far. Well done! New subscribe!
@@kaimarlaiva2891 he’s prolly gonna say something racist I mean he goes on and on about “minority rule bad, but says “they were minority ruled in the end….” Despite those regions currently being ruled mostly by natives. He forgot to switch codes, because he talks about minorities relating to the US, and now Estonia, but never actually explaining who is the “minority”
Zimbabwe is winning! In Hanke's Annual Misery Index for 2023, it came in number one as the country in which the people are the most miserable. It bested some strong competition from Venezuela, Syria, Lebanon and Sudan.
They have that tyrant mugabe to thank for that, once he and his party took back control from whites ( rightly so in reality) he just destroyed every aspect of the country from its economy to its infrastructure, stole all of its wealth while the people starved, he handed control of once white run farms to his cohorts who couldnt run a tap ...and the 'breadbasket of africa' is once again...destitute, bankrupt and completely ruined...just like south africa etc etc....why ???....
@@ayodejiolowokere1076we’re not upset with Rhodesia not existing anymore. We’re upset at the fact that wimpy ass Europeans decided to give away entire countries to communist racists who were more racist than the Whites in Rhodesia. And now Zimbabwe is one of the most racist places on Earth. All because Europe allowed it to happen.
As a black Rhodesian/Zimbwean myself, I believe you made a very good documentary of what happened. However, portraying it as a racial issue is unfair and incorrect. Ian Smith was not a racist, nor was his government. The issues were resources, land and elevating the African onto the world platform. He was much more progressive than the British were and he wanted to develop a multiracial society through evolution, not revolution. Unfortunately, he was sideswiped by the Civil Rights movement in the US which forced the world into looking at everything as a racial issue. Ian Smith had set out to correct the mistakes of the British but there had to be a context and pretext. They vilified him for it. African Nationalism was cooked up in the cocktail parties and academic institutions of Eastern Europe. It was nothing more than Marxism with a black face, the Africans bought it and Africa is still suffering from it to this day. The people who did not want to see Ian Smith succeed are the same who do not want to see Africa progress to this day. Africa is very rich but the people are amongst the poorest, by design. Ian Smith saw this long ago and was bent on developing a boutique African country that could succeed. I am surprised they didn't kill him.
Don’t blame the Civil Rights movement in America for whatever your country went through. We fought for rights we deserved and needed, and God blessed us, and there was nothing Communist about our movement. And ALL of what Dr. king did was nonviolent and patterned after Jesus. A few Whites were also tired of seeing innocent Blacks lynched and beaten for no reason, and they marched with us. I’ve never heard anyone with an ounce of sense blame the nonviolent Civil Rights movement for anything in Africa, except maybe some very racist people or an extremely ignorant Black Rhodesian person like you. Stop your lies against Dr King to uplift your beloved White leader, who wanted nothing to do with Blacks like you! I’m sure you can still find somewhere in the world that has an all-white government to tell you what to do!
Being from Nyasaland myself, this just paints a very colorful picture of how things were like. The book excerpts just whetting my appetite for which books to read. Your research is better than nothing I have ever come across. Keep on doing the great work.
I'm guessing that you don't speak English natively so the use of "your research is better than nothing I have ever come across" it means it's the worst you've ever seen. If you mean to say it's very good like it seems the correcting would be to replace the "nothing" which means no things with "anything" which means any things. I don't mean to be rude, as someone who is also learning a language I thought it'd be helpful.
@@bodhinorris2735 Thanks for pointing that out. Of course I don't speak English natively...but am learning too..I think it's the primary language I use for thinking. Haha. To make such a semantic error, am ashamed of myself.
@@theshirehighlander7292 Your English is still very good man, I'm learning German and I'm atrocious(very bad) at it myself and German is an extremely closely related language to English and is easy for us English speakers to learn comparatively(in comparison to other similar situations/things). Your English is very understandable, even if "whetting(this word specifically meaning to Sharpen a blade and is very rarely used) my appetite" is a a little archaic(meaning something very old/outdated) phrase. Good luck on your English learning and you've got reason to be proud of your progress so far.
@@bodhinorris2735 haha instead of "whetting my appetite" what is the contemporary phrase I should have used? Nyasaland (Malawi) was an old protectorate of Britain and we tend to use the style of our old masters the Scottish. I suppose I have to pick up a Grammar text book and just go through it so I can polish up my English. German has got to be hard. I think they strongly pronounce the syllables. You can't speak it on an empty stomach 😂
@@theshirehighlander7292 @theshirehighlander7292 @theshirehighlander7292 it works, it just sounds kind of odd and archaic. That might just be because of dialect differences. I'm an American who speaks in west coast(like California area) accent/vocabulary (mixed heavily with others because I moved states/countries often as a child since I grew up in the military) so I might be biased away from tendencies from the British Isles. I personally would say something "got(or "made" which would me more commonly used) me interested in". The word which there is also somewhat irregular because it's more of a question word like "what" or "where" so it's a little hard for me to tell if you meant those books specifically(which would be my guess) or books about the topic as a whole. If you mean the books the experts are from specifically I would personally say "those" and if you mean books like it as a whole I would say "books like them" or just "more"(that's more loose ended so I'd guess it'd be harder for someone to use consistently). Also in this context the to read is somewhat redundant because there isn't much else you would do with them in the context and would probably make it seem like you are not a native speaker but when learning a new language avoiding redundancies is very hard(at least for me) and there's nothing wrong with sounding like a non native speaker as long as you get the point across and only a small amount assholes would judge someone for it. Keep in mind that is me nitpicking (just looking for tiny insignificant problems that don't matter much, I think it comes from how monkeys pick bugs off each other). Trust me, I'm the lucky one in language difficulty. German is the closest major language to English and both are in the Germanic language family. The majority of common use words and grammar are mostly the same or derivative from each other or their shared parent language. They both were the same language even until a German ethno-linguistic group called the Saxons conquered England and it drifted over time, still being mostly mutually intelligible until Danish vikings who were giving land in France as a bribe conquered England afterwards and made the language more French. The English language has a weird history 😂. You're English is very good and all the things I pointed out are extremely minor. Also I might just me a little off from the specific dialect you are trying to learn so all I can give you is my input as someone with a mostly west coast dialect. Not that they can't understand each other, I and most others can almost always clearly understand even the strongest Scottish or southern(search American bible belt region and lt will probably come up but "the south" or "southern" in an American context almost only ever applies to the southeast not including the bottom 3/4 of Florida) which are generally considered the hardest for everyone else from who I've talked to. Your English is great and I wish you the best of luck dude.
As well as the other comments criticising the accents used for the Rhodesians, we should add the hilarious use of a Northern (Liverpudlian?) accent for the words of the ultra-posh Harold Macmillan.
@@nigelnyoni8265 You're probably right - it didn't sound to me like a full-on Scouse accent. But I am from the Deep South West, and did my degree at York, so my assessment is likely to be flawed!
I was born in Southern Rhodesia in 1958. I grew up there and remember standing for the Green and White (the Rhodesian flag) after independence in 1965. We never had apartheid in Rhodesia. That was South Africa. The Rhodesian Army was mainly made up of loyal (non communist) Africans. I fought in the RLI right up to 1980.
"... We never had apartheid in Rhodesia. ..." So what do you call a system which had signs - "Whites only" on toilets in Salisbury, in waiting rooms at train and bus stations, in schools, bars and restaurants, different entrances in the same shop, whites being served 1st, et, etc!! Which Rhodesia were you born in? Maybe you were too young to notice and it seemed NORMAL for you! It was only in the 1970s that things started to change albeit slowly!!
You Rhodesians deceived yourselves and continue to deceive yourselves.Do you KNOW how many Blacks knew back then about what communism was all about. BTW most Blacks in Smith's army hardly had passed their primary school education. Most of those who had higher education had been FORCED through "call-up" to join. Let me remind you of the protests by Black pupils in secondary schools ("O" Level and "A" Levels), Colleges and university who tore up and burnt call-up papers. (I was one of them)!
Love your videos, always incredibly informative without ever being boring. Also you can see your health and fitness effort is paying dividends, looking great.
My answer: UDI occurred because the UK insisted on immediate NIBMAR instead of independence alongside an established, mutually agreed to timetable, of perhaps 10-20 years.
Actually, most Rhodesians were not interested in black majority rule within 10 or 20 years. In a referendum in 1969 they voted against ever having black majority rule. Instead, they voted in favour of eventual power sharing with 50 seats in parliament for whites and 50 seats for blacks. Ian Smith's statement in 1976 that he did not believe in black majority rule ever in Rhodesia, not in a thousand years, was in line with the 1969 constitution. Moreover, in 1976 a young member of one of Rhodesia's whites-only regiments, the RLI, said that he was fighting to keep Rhodesia white: th-cam.com/video/0S2NKlMW0vc/w-d-xo.html
@glendodds3824 I agree. I have seen that video. There may not have been a timetable that Prime Minister Smith and RF leadership would agree to. I still believe that the UK government was too inflexible in its position and that inflexibility may have strengthened RF's position and allowed it to continually win support electorally.
@@SerialChiller1000 Yes. It was unreasonable of the British Government to expect Rhodesians to accept immediate majority rule, especially as Rhodesians were well aware that Belgians had been massacred in the Belgian Congo only a few years earlier, in 1960. In my previous comment, I should have mentioned that in 1961 Rhodesians had voted in favour of moving towards eventual black rule, a position which of course changed in 1969. I suspect that some of the Rhodesians who voted in 1961did so in bad faith in the hope that Britain would agree to grant Rhodesia independence. What is certain, is that in 1962 Rhodesians voted into power a new right wing party, the Rhodesian Front (led by Winston Field) and one of the key principles of the RF was a commitment to the continuance of racial segregation.
@@yansideabacoa6257 because wearing a bias on your sleeve doesn't bring back the dead, so what's the point if not empty virtue signalling? it would be like telling the history of Genghis Khan and making sure to grandstand about how genocide and war were bad and then expecting applause or something. it'd just be kind of asinine.
The Unilateral Declaration of Independence was a pivotal event in British history and was to have very far-reaching repercussions. The black-governed member nations of the Commonwealth wanted Britain to intervene and take over governing Rhodesia, whereas the white-governed member nations opposed any intervention by Britain. This caused a division along racial lines within the Commonwealth and effectively scuppered any chance of it becoming an economic force that could rival those of The USA and Europe. As a result, Britain began considering membership of the European Common Market, and we all know how that turned out. By the way, Sithole is pronounced 'sit-oll-éh' not 'sith-oll'
There was never any chance of a commonwealth market anyway. Britain's attempts at imperial preference were legion and so were their failures. It's interesting to me that Australia, Canada, etc, were willing to go to war on Britain's behalf but consistently refused to join any common market schemes.
I must commend you on your video it was well edited and accurate. Loved your narration. Just to add myself I am from Zimbabwe and of British heritage. No longer live in Zimbabwe as most white Zimbabweans these days. We are all scattered across the world soon to be forgotten about in a generation or two. No hard feelings its just life. I will have to say Ian Smith had a great idea of wanting to gradually integrate blacks into society once their education was up to par, quote from him "I would like to see a evolution and not a revolution". For a very long time blacks did not want schooling like whites had. They wanted their tribes and the leaders of the tribes wanted to control the tribes. Ian Smith respected that and gradually as time was moving tribes started adopting schools provided by the white man and we saw blacks starting to become more and more articulate. The start of evolution was happening as predicted. However a few radical blacks did not want whites in power at all. There was a war between the Shona and Matabele where is saw a massive genocide yes a genocide of Matabele people from Mugabe as the Matabele did not want to stand with Mugabe. This was a message to anyone who stood against Mugabe would die. Hence when elections came about where black people could vote there was such a massive imbalance in votes. People were too scared to vote against Mugabe, he continued this tactic until the day he was unable to take office and died many years later. Unfortunately revolution occurred as Ian Smith predicted would be a tragedy and the country declined rapidly. I have left out a lot but just getting that off my chest.
Good evening, sir! I was born in 1986, in the USSR and lived there for more then 30 years. I left Russia in 2020, because it turned to a fascist trash bin. My beloved wife, all our four kids and me know about Rhodesia, and our grandkids would also know about this country - I shall do everything to ensure that. That struggle shall never be forgotten, the sacrifice of Ian Smith and the rest Rhodesians too. Just as the lies, hypocrisy and treachery "of certain governments". A strange feeling growing by the time passing: I'm not Rhodesian, but "no other land will do" anymore...
This both felt very sanitized in regards to the true nature of the violence the state used to maintain minority rule, yet still probably one of the most reasonably honest Rhodesia documentaries on YT. Usually it's a terrible production value holocaust snuff film, or a slickly produced complete revisionist history. I look forward to checking out some of your other videos.
@@klown463 that really isn't saying much considering how little actual input any singular sub-millionaire citizen has in the process of the US government via the electoral process nowadays
Many Rhodesians went to Mozambique for holidays when it was Portuguese. The most popular destination was the coastal city of Beira but Paradise Island and the capital, Lourenco Marques, (further down the coast) were also popular. Moreover, a lot of South Africans also had holidays in the country. Furthermore, from late 1968 onward members of the Rhodesian security forces fought beside the Portuguese in Mozambique against communist-backed black nationalists, a state of affairs which lasted until a change of government occurred in Portugal in April 1974.
In Portuguese colonial Mozambique we appreciated very much important rich and very good meat South Rhodesians produced and exported to us. Now it is Zimbabwe and it is kaput ...
Rhodesian security fought side-by-side with the Portuguese and what native what nationality were they were they the native people of the country or were they the Europeans that were you know not native to the country that far I'm confused
@@SomasAcademy oh no I'm not attacking you, it's just an interesting accent even if alot of it sounded honestly more South African than white Rhodesian. Like if you watch videos of them talk they talk weird, like a hybrid between proper formal English and South African
@@Gallalad1 No worries, I didn't take it as an attack lol. But yeah, I listened to some videos of Rhodesians to prepare, there's a lot of variation in their accents (some sound super British and some are way more Afrikaner), so I just shot for something in that range for the Declaration of Independence, and did my best impression of Ian Smith for his lines.
@@SomasAcademy One of them I watch, Five Romeo Romeo, almost sounded Indian. Made me wonder if the Indian accent is some kind of flash-frozen Victorian era English and if the Rhodies had it in common.
@@ingold1470 I also noticed some similarities between some Rhodesian and Indian accents, I'd guess that it's because both are hybrid accents that combine aspects from old fashioned English with non-English accents that have a few similar features, like rolled r's and aspirated t's.
Rhodesia’s declaration of independence mirrors the United States in more ways than one. It was born from a settler population that were more fanatical in their colonialism than their mother country and would take any measure to maintain what they saw was their fundamental right and even divine destiny. One of the major catalysts for the American Revolution was the proclamation of 1763 which limited settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains, which many colonists viewed as an infringement by the British government on their “right” to settle all lands from the Atlantic to the Pacific (their “Manifest Destiny”). Likewise, it seems Rhodesia’s declaration was in response to the British government infringing on their “right” to maintain a de facto racial hierarchy. Of course in both instances the British government only undertook such measures for their own benefit or to save face, as westward settler encroachments in North America brought Britain into frequent and costly conflicts with indigenous peoples, while the Wilson administration’s insistence on majority rule was likely due solely to minority rule’s growing political untenability and association with Apartheid South Africa.
One of the main differences between the 2 situations is that the UK didn't have a strong leader to respond to the demands of the Colonists in a way that actually addressed them instead of dismissing them entirely, while with Rhodesia, you had Harold Wilson who was much more active and participatory in the fate of the colonies than his Tory counterparts, his only difference being that he saw both Colonists the Natives on the same level as human beings, while the Colonists viewed the Natives as a lower-group and fundamentally disagreed with the change in this establishment that had, under the Tories, let them do as they wish instead of applying the same rules and principles to all they "governed" over.
@@RoshanKumar-br6op There really was no solution in either situation that would satisfy the fanaticism of the settler population other than full capitulation to their demands. The British objection to further westward expansion by the American colonists wasn’t the expansion itself, but the fact that it triggered reprisals and wars with Indians into which they were inevitably drawn in, which became increasingly expensive. The Proclamation of 1763 was intended merely to slow this for the sake of the Empire’s coffers and nothing more, but even this momentary pause in genocide was deemed unacceptable. Likewise, British opposition to minority rule in its African colonies was only due to its growing political untenability, but white Rhodesians were so intent on maintaining their racial hierarchy that they were more willing to make themselves a pariah state and wage a guerrilla war than accept even the most milquetoast compromise with their mother country.
"The biggest supporter of the natives rights, aside from the natives themselves, was the British government." ... So that's not great. That's _not_ great.
@@jahnkaplank8626I don't think Britain caused all of Africa's issues. Especially in the last 50-75 years. People like you don't even consider French, Belgium Portugal and Italy ext
Funny how they never tried for all those decades… and then when the writing was on the wall they were suddenly ok with working and living with the Zimbabweans. If they had done that 30 years sooner and integrated EVERYONE into the country then Rhodesia could possibly still be a thing.
Or at the very least, the economic heights of the 80s would continue. And Zimbabwean politicians as a whole would have higher standards of accountability.
Even if they had met the demands of the British government, it wouldn’t have been enough to placate the revolutionaries. The war with its inevitable outcome was unavoidable.
there is a tragic irony with Garfield Todd in that while at the time, the Reactionary Colonists probably thought he would "destroy Rhodesia," the ensuing blood shed out of their stubbornness for the impossible preservation of the past ultimately led to a greater and more complete obliteration of Rhodesia from existence than anything Todd could have done by giving the natives actual representation in government.
Zimbabwe would have been a better country in a hole if they were never colonized from the beginning if the power leaders would have got together and initiated a form a militia group of all natives to Zimbabwe and also if the leaders were not corrupt and forced foreigners to pay a heavy price for raw materials that were coming out of Zimbabwe you would have had a beautiful country that was built on the wealth of foreign Nations but because the corruption and because of the Europeans constantly invading and forcing their way into a lot of these African countries and forcing other countries not to work with countries without their hand it made it very difficult
@user-hr6uk7mn5o. African countries were created by those super powers and not Africans. A pen on the map after discussions created African countries which before then was nothing but minor tribal collective if at all. The problem wasn't the white feeling above the African, but the African unwilling to remove themselves from tribal loyalty for the betterment of the country created. Tribal mentality and communist affiliations destroyed Africa.
8:10 "right wing when it comes to race and left wing when it comes to economics"... Just like that little German party from the 1930s that will remain unmentioned. Same was true of South Africa's _National Party_ .
It is so funny to listen to Americans making videos about Africa! Too ignorant to realise that Africans are not just "black", but actually divided into nation which differ from each other the way Germans differ from French and these differences matter. In Rhodesia, the Shona which were led by Robert Mugabe were actually a minority and the Matabeles, led by Joshua Nkomo were the majority and actually supported the Ian Smith government in establishing a sustainable independent state. Mugabe however, sold the copper mining rights as well as diamond mining rights in exchange for foreign intervention to secure his hold on power. Trying to explain the world in terms of how Americans see it, is totally different to how the world realy is.
I don't think you gotta worry about hearing whatever you just said we never heard of this at all. I'm sure 95% of your commentators Feel the same dude but I'm not disrespectful. It's really an interesting video.
That usually happens with most countries when you give power to people not ready for it. It happened in all the other African colonies too. You can see that Smith had a point and was genuinely trying to stop Rhodesia going the same way. He knew the locals needed more time to get a level of political development (you can't teach 2,000 years of it within a few years) where they could.
Hi, I am white and have lived many years in Africa including Rhodesia when it was called that. You failed to mention Chief Lobengula! You failed to mention that Rhodes had tried and failed several times to gain a mining concession so he sent Moffat tosign the 'treaty of friendship' which prevented Lobengula from doing business with anybody but the British and then later there was the Rudd Concession which gave unlimited mining rights to the British - Lobengula was tricked into signing this because he had verbally only agreed to a limited concession for 10 persons. So thereafter, with the mining rights came all the other rights and effectively Lobengula's lands were ANNEXED or rather, STOLEN. You should have mentioned this in your video!
@@andrewtully3622 He doesn’t say anything about not talking about the founding of Rhodesia, he says he’s not going to talk about Cecil Rhodes and then goes on to talk about him … he should have provided context!
@@famdegroot1988 Eh, I'm not certain the context for how Rhodesia was founded is important for the causes of Rhodesian Independence. Foundation, definitely, but this video is not about that.
@@andrewtully3622 I think you miss my point: I am looking for objective and balanced reporting. The first 1’20” covers Cecil Rhodes to the point he was put in charge of Southern Rhodesia by the Crown. There is not one mention of Lobengula nor the Rudd Concession. This concession was used as a pretext for British military action against Lobengula's forces during the First Matabele War, leading to the eventual defeat of the Ndebele kingdom. Is this not important historical information? At least he should have mentioned that Rhodes pursued a policy of "imperialism by conquest," seeking to expand British control over Southern Africa. Is that not more important and relevant than mentioning that Rhodes supported educational institutions in England???!
@@famdegroot1988 It's an interesting point. I wouldn't go so far to say the foundation of Rhodesia has NOTHING to do with independence, but I do think it (and the pre British history of the area) has a very minor role when the topic is about Rhodesian independence (as opposed to Rhodesian foundation). Again, omitting the concessions and annexation aren't unfair to us viewers, simply extra information as to the focal point of the video. Hope that makes sense!
Thanks for making this video mate, looking forward to the next one! I find Rhodesia 20th century to be fascinatingly odd, particularly in contrast to the happenings in the rest of the World concurrently. I'm Australian and from a historical learning perspective (especially in School) we tend to be a bit sheltered from things like, happening to another Commonwealth nation no less! Looking forward to the rest of this series 😊
Please read Ian Smith’s book “The Great Betrayal”. It was a very eye opening account on how that part of the continent was developed and eventually discarded.
If you had watched the video the whole way through, or looked at my sources listed in the description, you would see nearly half the quotes were from Smith's memoirs.
@@CasualHistorian Hi. I have watched your video in its entirety and enjoyed doing so. Moreover, I was born and bred in Salisbury and my father served in the Rhodesian Air Force. Ian Smith's book is very interesting but, sadly, like a lot of Rhodesian books it waters down the importance of race in Rhodesia and scapegoats South Africans for apartheid. Another example is 'Wings of Destruction' by one of my father's former colleagues, Peter Petter-Bowyer. Peter says that Rhodesians despised apartheid and had an entirely different outlook to South Africans but, as you are well aware, that claim can easily be blown out of the water. Rhodesia did have better race relations than South Africa and blacks had more rights but, contrary to what a lot of Rhodesians say, it was the Portuguese in Angola and Mozambique who had the highest levels of racial integration. For example, the following footage from October 1973 shows a black teacher in Angola's capital with a multi-racial class at a time when all government schools in Rhodesia were segregated. th-cam.com/video/Az9O2wVF30s/w-d-xo.html
Absolutely fantastic! I've always been fascinated by Rhodesia and various other transitions from colonial era rule. Thanks Casual Dude! Oh yeah and.. subscribed!
Fuck that, its not ‘badass’ to enforce a racist Apartheid regime. Ian Smith should have fucking died in WW2 and the world would have been a better place.
I enjoyed this video because I remember all this happening. Just a small point though, Sir Alex Douglas-Home’s name is pronounced Hume not Home. The Humes are an old family in Scotland and some spell the name Home and others Hume. Just one of those Scottish quirks! Otherwise an enjoyable and informative video.
There wasn't much of a chance for much to happen. Malawi and Zambia realizing what would happen with white minority rule hightailed it out of the union fast.
Get a 7-day free trial and 50% off Blinkist Annual Premium by clicking here: www.blinkist.com/casualhistorian. This offer is valid only until May 29th, 2023.
Its time mass education of American and western citizens was initiated leading to knowledge of how rapacious economic sanctions against Zimbabwe by western powers have decimated Zimbabwe back into the economic stone age ....
After going from a Gaddafi video to a Rhodesia video, I can only conclude that Causal Historian is determined to trigger the entire political spectrum.
Qaddafi had sympathy for the Irish
British over estimated Africans ability, adopting European and newly introduced international laws
@@19ate4 the mistake they made was expecting us to adopt they’re ways🤷🏾♂️
@@19ate4 British Parliament did everything they could do to undermine Smith's Government.
It doesn’t take much to trigger white supremacists
@@princeofafricaradio9042"their" not they're which is a contraction of "they are"
It's nice to see that Zimbabwe manage to move past it's bad history, now everyone's a trillionaire
low blow gabriel…
Yeah, but they got their lands back. Things would not be the way that they are if the whites gave them the same education as everyone else. Separate but equal never worked.
@@WhoElseLikesPortalWhy lie? The truth is so much more painful.
It has not moved , u think its a jok3 right ? All u toubobs wanna do is harass us and humiliate , u thunk our continent is yours .
blacks truly are the greatest in all aspects of economics, politics, and sound rational decision making.
Oh boy get ready for the comments
Either anti colonial or white nationalist. Rare if neither
Dear God here come the racist rhodieboos.
(Both Zimbabwe and Rhodesia suck a$$)
It's fine to piss off Nazis.
@@jtgdI’ll be your token white nationalist
@@jtgd should add colonial settlerist in there
Ian Smith and Robert Mugabe both went to universities in South Africa because at the time there was no university in Southern Rhodesia.
Mugabe had university education?! The more you know...
@@MegrelMamba Robert Mugabe was quite well educated with an MSc and LLM among other qualifications.
@@MegrelMambaumm have you heard him talking ? He was well educated with several degrees
@@MegrelMambahe got three degrees while in prison. His education probably equaled someone like Jacob Rees Mogg
@@MegrelMambahe got three degrees while in prison. His education probably equaled someone like Jacob Rees Mogg
I am Rhodesian and was born in '79. My family are beekeepers, tended to farms and owned a meadery. My father had a Master's degree in entomology while I have a Bachelor's degree in the same field. My father introduced beekeeping to the local cotton farms and demonstrated that not only did quantity increase but quality along with it. My father then made mead(honeywine) with his harvests(which is always shared with the farm owners) and exported it to South Africa. Now the government is spending $3.5 billion USD to bring us farmers back. I am my father's heir, so I was offered $6.5 million USD and 83 acres of land to return and teach apiculture.
My cousin was offered something as well but not as extravagant as yours. My cousin was offered land for free where he could farm. However whatever profit he made 10% was to be given to the land owner. The land owner was given the farm as most were and neglected it so bad it was unrecognizable. They used the land for cattle, it was a desert. It is now a profitable farm. The people who live on the farm apparently do not want to learn how to farm. They have 450 hectares of land.
$6.5 million USD plus 83 acres doesn't sound true to me!!! Maybe you must look again at the papers you have because I know the govt is bankrupt so where does it get all that money. Neither have I heard of it in the news or as rumours!!
I know of good and capable Black farmers who have gone bust because of lack of funds to run the farms. The problem is caused by the fact that those Blacks who were "given" the farm neither have title deeds nor leases which makes it impossible for them to get bank loans to finance their initial investments.
@LittleDolfie No, it is much too dangerous.
@@jamesforrester6941 You can look it up yourself. The Zimbabwe government is offering billions of dollars for us farmers to return.
I would think carefully about that offer.
Fun fact, when I recorded that Garfield Todd quote I was somewhat sick, so I sound awful. I now regret not finding time to redo it.
You did fine! Couldn't even hear it, wouldn't have known had I not read this.
I thought it was acting for more effort lol
Why did Rhodesia declare independence". Because South Africa's Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd advised Ian Smith to settle with Britain, but South Africa would support Ian Smith if he declared independence. Verwoerd himself was slain by one of the servants the next year in 1966.
He was killed by a Greek national Chafetas in Parliament. Chafetas was a steward in the African parliament.
Verwoerd himself was supposed to make a major Policy Speech to the rest of the world on the
very afternoon that he was killed....nobody will ever know what he was going to say because
that speech kinda 'blew away in the wind'.........................conveniently ???
Speaking as a white Zimbabwean of British stock, I congratulate you on how well and accurate your video was presented. Unfortunately, it was a sad piece of history that we all wish we could have done better. Rhodesia was one of the best run and successful nations in Earth's history with a great leader and government, a successful economy and good, kind people of both British ( as well as other Europeans ) and Africans. However, our government was too strict on the racial policy. While I believe the Western powers had a negative agenda on controlling our country's resources, we should have integrated Africans into our government with equal freedoms sooner, thus preventing the Bush War. All we need now is forgiveness, compassion for both our sides, peace, friendship and loving-kindness. The past is long dead. We need to move forward and work together to build a new, better country out of the ashes.
Such powerful words. I feel the same. I love Zimbabwe and I love the memories. I love the people and I will always cherish this country in my heart.
@@ferwallace1903 🙌🏻🙏🏻👍🏻😊💚🕊💯
Powerful words? Are you kidding you British ruin everything you touch.
The fact of the matter is that you can't live around a population with an average IQ of 70. That's why Rhodesia and South Africa have failed, not because of their "racial policy". Things only got much much worse after they dropped the apartheid policies.
@@wnathanielw No your just being racist lmao and supporting an apartheid government.
They gave Rhodesia to the hands of Mugabe who took it to the ruins .. if they had still gone with Ian Smith post transition , Zimbabwe would have on a growth path unmatched in the southern hemisphere .
and they did the same thing in South Africa...
the ANC has ruined it.
Better free then under thumbs of evil europeans ( referenced by history which is a undisputed statement and fact )
@@jahnkaplank8626 Keep dreaming Africa is ours ✊🏾😂
You cannot ignore the damages done by the sanctions placed on them designed to make them fail.
The Indigenous people got back the land that’s all that matters
What was not touched on in this video is just how complicated the tribal system was. There were four main tribes, the Shona being by far the largest in population and covering the largest land area and from which Mugabe hailed. The second most powerful were the Matabele (Ndebele) of whom Nkomo was their leader, lived in the surrounding territory of Bulawayo, Rhodesia's 2nd largest city. All 4 major tribes spoke different languages which also caused certain barriers and their history, before white settlement was not, dare I say, based on "Love thy neighbour."
Mzilikazi, a Zulu warrior commander much revered in Shaka's army took his forces north after shafting Shaka for whatever reason. (Most likely stealing cattle). He didn't under estimate Shaka's wrath and thus employed a total scorched earth policy in his wake so that Shaka could not follow him and exact retribution. Upon arriving in Bulawayo, Mzilikazi found a very placid, peaceful Shona people, slaughtered them all and founded his new seat of power, Matabeleland. For a long time he waged war against the Shona, stealing their villages and livestock and expanding his sphere of influence.
It is true that British colonial rule wherever they went around the world, just like other countries in Europe, used and abused the native peoples but to be fair to Rhodes, he did put a halt to Matabele incursions and broker an uneasy peace between the the tribes
So it not surprising that Nkomo (who considered himself a direct descendant of Mzilikazi whether true or not) was ever going to ally with Mugabe and why Nkomo chose Soviet Union whilst Mugabe chose China, two mega powers that weren't friends either and both of which also had their eyes set on Africa as Great Britain, Belgium, France and Portugal were being forced out.
Ian Smith might have been a naive politician but I do believe he tried to be the best statesman he could be for the country that was considered the bread basket of Africa.
It is also worth noting that one of the first things Mugabe did upon coming to power was for all intents and purposes the mass genocide of the Ndelebe people, thus ensuring no opposition for his foreseeable future.
Very interesting so why doesn't anyone tell these things
Tribalism was not an issue. The British tried to make it an issue by dividing and conquering but it cannot be identified as the cause for political complication and intrigue. Indeed ZanuPF has Zezuru and Ndebele working together. BTW, Shona is a language, not a tribe. Zezurus are the main anchor Shona speaking tribe. Karangas, Manyikas, Ungwes and Kore Kores are other Shona speaking peoples. The narrative that Mugabe killed Ndebeles wholesale is not correct. He was pre-empting a military coup that was well known at that time. Be that as it may, in post colonial African politics, everyone is committing crimes against humanity. The losers have an advantage as plaintiffs. Winners can't go around claiming that the losers were committing crimes against humanity without looking stupid. In fact, Robert Mugabe & co wanted Ian Smith tried for crimes against humanity and Ian smith was more than willing to face the charges as long as the same standard was applied to all. The initiative died!
@@mosheyisraeli6871
To say Thousands of innocent civilians living in rural Matabeleland in the south were involved in an uprising - is false. The thousands of peasants butchered were simple unarmed ndebele tribespeople living in African rural villages. They were massacred by the Mugabe government's specially trained (by North Korea) called *Five Brigade* . They were ruthless and indiscriminately burnt villages & murdered the indigenous people ONLY because they belonged to the Ndebele tribe (Joshua Nkomo, Mugabe's political rival's tribe) backed by the Russians.
The Rhodesia/Zimbawean situation was complicated at so many levels.
@mosheyisraeli6871
You most definitely have your head buried in the sand. There was indeed a serious tribal issue between the two main tribes The Shona & the Ndebele, why do you think Joshua Knomo *leader of the ndebeles* , escaped to UK, he feared for his life. Remember what was said at the time *Cut off the head of a snake & that's the end of it* . The voting was on tribal lines, and believe me, the ndebeles knew that they were discriminated against & tried to defend themselves against a ruthless cruel Shona Zanupf government.
You must be shona & a Zanupf member wearing blinkers.
Please acknowledge thIs *FACT* & move on. I lived through it all in Matabeland even though I'm neither ndebele or shona.
@@patthompson8591no you're wrong but tribal issue began when the Europeans accosted the land and made a tribal issue due to the land and the soil being fertile and then wanting to control all aspects of products that would have been grown there and sold as Lawrence really because in the beginning there was no there was no snuffing no trading going on and they had a railroad system that they had made specifically to gain natural resources now when you have a tribal difference it is usually occurred or acquired by war or some kind of a treaty amongst the captors canes or tribal leaders the only people that created a disaster within the nation of these people were the white people that Europeans because they wanted to make it seem like they were affirm for one group of people when really they weren't affirm for anybody that was native to that country they were only affirm for their selves and that's why they kept begging more and more Europeans to come and live there they were even offering to pay their debt, so that they could somewhat outnumber the natives that live there the same thing they did in the antebellum slavery era where blacks outnumber the whites and so what they did was they started labeling other people from different countries that looked like white people such as the Italian in the Irish that were never considered human beings prior to them being outnumbered by the African-Americans and label them Europeans and label them white so that they could have an ally to form against African-Americans and this is the same thing they did in Africa the only difference is is they had a great white people to keep their Superior and their white supremacy going because these were not native countries to white people so you are wrong there, they created the white people that Europeans created a problem between the different sectors and between the different tribes okay constantly it costing them with lies and constantly trying to see who would of fluently allow them to do whatever in the weaker tribe was the tribe that they would act or pretend that they were on their side okay and it's always been that way white people have created some of the worst wars in Africa for the simplest things such as farmland or animals grazing it's ridiculous
A big salute to you for including contemporary published quotes. This hugely adds to contextualising and revealing the thinking behind hugely wrong headed political and business decisions.
In Portuguese colonial Mozambique we appreciated very much important rich products and very good meat South Rhodesians produced and exported to us. Now it is Zimbabwe and it is kaput ...
Well when you build a system like Portugal and the uk did in Southern Africa, did you really think anything good would come? Thats why Portugal was the last in line for everything in Western Europe, had the highest illiteracy in the western world into the 1970s. Should’ve invested more into Portugal and not Africa 😅
@@Jkejhjklmg1485the portuguese were dealing with a dictatorship the same way the people of mozambique were, in 1970 Portugal had the same literacy rate that Mozambique has in 2024 lol, (70/80%). stop acting like this dude made decisions 💀
Portuguese should've invested in Portugal,and not stealing resources in África
Whites know how to farm and run nations.
@@Jkejhjklmg1485Good things did come from the systems set up by Europeans (except Belgium). The good things stopped once that system went away. This is not an opinion, it’s observable fact.
I went there when it was still Rhodesia in 1973.We were flying with South African Airways London to Johannesburg and the plane,a Boeing 747, refueled in Las Palmas and then Salisbury, Rhodesia.SAA couldn't fly over most African countries so went down the coast to what was then South West Africa and cut inland.The name Rhodesia lives on in the dog, the Rhodesian Ridgeback which is sort of like a Great Dane type dog.
Yes it's a famed breed. Very courageous.
So when half of world protested South African apartheid and banned south africa. You chose to support that regime by flying by its airlines.
Or may be you did not care.
@@KumarNikhils African airlines flew into South Africa and there were plenty of African countries doing a roaring trade with SA. The number of black African countries in the region with a thriving democracy was zero. Who was protesting that most Africans in black Africa had no vote? Nobody.
@@tigershoot Our _(German)_ companies loved the financial climate in South Africa. Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz had huge automobile plants in South Africa, were they manufactured their right-steered cars.
Dozens of German companies had their African seat in South Africa, because of it's halfway politically stable and financially stable environment. It was also the by far most developed place in sub-saharan Africa.
Most of the sanctions and trade embargos were only about military goods/weapons. This is why to this day, SA has the largest defense industry in Africa.
All Western countries made big business in SA. Even fast food companies like Kentucky Fried Chicken, which can be found all over the country. But also tech companies like IBM or GE, all had their African headquarters in South Africa. The sanctions didn't affect them at all!
If you were White and skilled, it was probably the best country to live on earth.
@@KumarNikhils there is it, the person who listens to main stream media talking points
I'm a Zimbabwean, and I'd be very happy to help you with pronunciation of our names, because it's driving me nuts:
Sithole is pronounced Si-TO-le
Nkomo was from the Nde-BE-le nation (I hardly recognised what you said), and there were a few others.
I find this a shame as I think that you did a really good documentary about a history that I think is too often cherry-picked to shore up people's ideology. So well done for that.
Thank you!
My father was Rhodesian/South African and I am American. I found the video painfully American.
I also found myself cringing everytime he said "South Rhodesia". It was also outrageous that he said Godfrey Huggins was the architect of "South Rhodesian apartheid" - obviously there was racial discrimination in Southern Rhodesia and in Rhodesia after UDI, but it was never apartheid. Ridiculous conflation.
Also that attempt at a Rhodesian/Zimbabwean accent at 17:05 had me laughing out loud.
Are you kidding the oldest city in the world is Zimbabwe... The stone walls outdate the the stone construction in kemit or Nubia....
@@MichaelScreamMachineEvans that's incorrect sir, but I'm also unsure who you were responding to.
Thank you for making such in depth videos about relatively hard to learn of or obscure moments in our recent past,
Most people don't even know what Rhodesia was let alone the history of it.
Your series on Lebanon was one of the greatest binges I went on for history videos, I just want to say thanks and I look forward to the quality content you've made.
Rhodesia was one of the most based countries that ever existed till it wasnt. RIP
Most people do know, maybe not in the US but certainly where I live.
@@MFTH-cam683 I'm speaking as an American; we barely teach our own history let alone world history.
It would be quite easy to swap the names and events from Rhodesia to the United States in this video. The War of Independence was America's UDI.The white settlers there did the same or worse to obtain native lands, and even lands from their southern neighbours, and even tried it on with Canada. The Reservations were their equivalent to Homelands. The main difference is always a matter of numbers in the end. The lesson perhaps is that every group, tribe, nation whatever gas to look out for its own interests - nobody else gives a damn.31:51
This is History that the "1st world" doesn't want anyone to know. Said "1st world" were as insane then as they very obviously are now. Back then they hid it well, but Rhodesia knew they were insane, so they had to destroy us in a way that suited their narrative.
Thank you for covering this
That was so incredibly informative. Thank you!
A very well made informative video of how the political landscape looked like up until Rhodesian Independence. As I have a bit of prior knowledge into the matter. This was the best video on the subject so far. Well done! New subscribe!
As an Estonian who has no stake in any of this or no history in racial inequality, but cultural one... Great video
I'm not sure the difference is as big as you think
Your country will basically meet the same fate as Rhodesia within the century
@@klown463 😱 omg... But, but how?
@@kaimarlaiva2891 he’s prolly gonna say something racist
I mean he goes on and on about “minority rule bad, but says “they were minority ruled in the end….” Despite those regions currently being ruled mostly by natives.
He forgot to switch codes, because he talks about minorities relating to the US, and now Estonia, but never actually explaining who is the “minority”
@@kaimarlaiva2891 He probably meant immigration. Look at Britain today. London is NOT an English city. Birmingham and Luton will follow.
Zimbabwe is winning! In Hanke's Annual Misery Index for 2023, it came in number one as the country in which the people are the most miserable. It bested some strong competition from Venezuela, Syria, Lebanon and Sudan.
They have that tyrant mugabe to thank for that, once he and his party took back control from whites ( rightly so in reality) he just destroyed every aspect of the country from its economy to its infrastructure, stole all of its wealth while the people starved, he handed control of once white run farms to his cohorts who couldnt run a tap ...and the 'breadbasket of africa' is once again...destitute, bankrupt and completely ruined...just like south africa etc etc....why ???....
British life is no better
So true, dah don’t dance much anymore .
It's so amusing how upset some people are at a white supremacist state collapsing.
@@ayodejiolowokere1076we’re not upset with Rhodesia not existing anymore. We’re upset at the fact that wimpy ass Europeans decided to give away entire countries to communist racists who were more racist than the Whites in Rhodesia. And now Zimbabwe is one of the most racist places on Earth. All because Europe allowed it to happen.
As a black Rhodesian/Zimbwean myself, I believe you made a very good documentary of what happened. However, portraying it as a racial issue is unfair and incorrect. Ian Smith was not a racist, nor was his government. The issues were resources, land and elevating the African onto the world platform. He was much more progressive than the British were and he wanted to develop a multiracial society through evolution, not revolution. Unfortunately, he was sideswiped by the Civil Rights movement in the US which forced the world into looking at everything as a racial issue. Ian Smith had set out to correct the mistakes of the British but there had to be a context and pretext. They vilified him for it. African Nationalism was cooked up in the cocktail parties and academic institutions of Eastern Europe. It was nothing more than Marxism with a black face, the Africans bought it and Africa is still suffering from it to this day. The people who did not want to see Ian Smith succeed are the same who do not want to see Africa progress to this day. Africa is very rich but the people are amongst the poorest, by design. Ian Smith saw this long ago and was bent on developing a boutique African country that could succeed. I am surprised they didn't kill him.
Don’t blame the Civil Rights movement in America for whatever your country went through. We fought for rights we deserved and needed, and God blessed us, and there was nothing Communist about our movement. And ALL of what Dr. king did was nonviolent and patterned after Jesus. A few Whites were also tired of seeing innocent Blacks lynched and beaten for no reason, and they marched with us. I’ve never heard anyone with an ounce of sense blame the nonviolent Civil Rights movement for anything in Africa, except maybe some very racist people or an extremely ignorant Black Rhodesian person like you. Stop your lies against Dr King to uplift your beloved White leader, who wanted nothing to do with Blacks like you! I’m sure you can still find somewhere in the world that has an all-white government to tell you what to do!
Excellent comment 💯👌🏾🔥
Now this is the comment I was looking for. Thank you giving such an honest account
Fantastic comment
You all are welcome!! That guy’s ignorance is staggering!
Being from Nyasaland myself, this just paints a very colorful picture of how things were like. The book excerpts just whetting my appetite for which books to read. Your research is better than nothing I have ever come across. Keep on doing the great work.
I'm guessing that you don't speak English natively so the use of "your research is better than nothing I have ever come across" it means it's the worst you've ever seen. If you mean to say it's very good like it seems the correcting would be to replace the "nothing" which means no things with "anything" which means any things. I don't mean to be rude, as someone who is also learning a language I thought it'd be helpful.
@@bodhinorris2735 Thanks for pointing that out. Of course I don't speak English natively...but am learning too..I think it's the primary language I use for thinking. Haha. To make such a semantic error, am ashamed of myself.
@@theshirehighlander7292 Your English is still very good man, I'm learning German and I'm atrocious(very bad) at it myself and German is an extremely closely related language to English and is easy for us English speakers to learn comparatively(in comparison to other similar situations/things). Your English is very understandable, even if "whetting(this word specifically meaning to Sharpen a blade and is very rarely used) my appetite" is a a little archaic(meaning something very old/outdated) phrase. Good luck on your English learning and you've got reason to be proud of your progress so far.
@@bodhinorris2735 haha instead of "whetting my appetite" what is the contemporary phrase I should have used?
Nyasaland (Malawi) was an old protectorate of Britain and we tend to use the style of our old masters the Scottish. I suppose I have to pick up a Grammar text book and just go through it so I can polish up my English.
German has got to be hard. I think they strongly pronounce the syllables. You can't speak it on an empty stomach 😂
@@theshirehighlander7292 @theshirehighlander7292 @theshirehighlander7292 it works, it just sounds kind of odd and archaic. That might just be because of dialect differences. I'm an American who speaks in west coast(like California area) accent/vocabulary (mixed heavily with others because I moved states/countries often as a child since I grew up in the military) so I might be biased away from tendencies from the British Isles. I personally would say something "got(or "made" which would me more commonly used) me interested in". The word which there is also somewhat irregular because it's more of a question word like "what" or "where" so it's a little hard for me to tell if you meant those books specifically(which would be my guess) or books about the topic as a whole. If you mean the books the experts are from specifically I would personally say "those" and if you mean books like it as a whole I would say "books like them" or just "more"(that's more loose ended so I'd guess it'd be harder for someone to use consistently). Also in this context the to read is somewhat redundant because there isn't much else you would do with them in the context and would probably make it seem like you are not a native speaker but when learning a new language avoiding redundancies is very hard(at least for me) and there's nothing wrong with sounding like a non native speaker as long as you get the point across and only a small amount assholes would judge someone for it. Keep in mind that is me nitpicking (just looking for tiny insignificant problems that don't matter much, I think it comes from how monkeys pick bugs off each other). Trust me, I'm the lucky one in language difficulty. German is the closest major language to English and both are in the Germanic language family. The majority of common use words and grammar are mostly the same or derivative from each other or their shared parent language. They both were the same language even until a German ethno-linguistic group called the Saxons conquered England and it drifted over time, still being mostly mutually intelligible until Danish vikings who were giving land in France as a bribe conquered England afterwards and made the language more French. The English language has a weird history 😂. You're English is very good and all the things I pointed out are extremely minor. Also I might just me a little off from the specific dialect you are trying to learn so all I can give you is my input as someone with a mostly west coast dialect. Not that they can't understand each other, I and most others can almost always clearly understand even the strongest Scottish or southern(search American bible belt region and lt will probably come up but "the south" or "southern" in an American context almost only ever applies to the southeast not including the bottom 3/4 of Florida) which are generally considered the hardest for everyone else from who I've talked to. Your English is great and I wish you the best of luck dude.
As well as the other comments criticising the accents used for the Rhodesians, we should add the hilarious use of a Northern (Liverpudlian?) accent for the words of the ultra-posh Harold Macmillan.
I thought it was Mancunian. Reminds me of Gary Neville more so than A Scousey carragherish one
@@nigelnyoni8265 You're probably right - it didn't sound to me like a full-on Scouse accent. But I am from the Deep South West, and did my degree at York, so my assessment is likely to be flawed!
The imitation of Ian Smith's accent was ridiculous. And that of Joshua Nkomo undesirably comical.
The clarity here is mesmerizing.
I was born in Southern Rhodesia in 1958. I grew up there and remember standing for the Green and White (the Rhodesian flag) after independence in 1965. We never had apartheid in Rhodesia. That was South Africa. The Rhodesian Army was mainly made up of loyal (non communist) Africans. I fought in the RLI right up to 1980.
You're a good man. South Africa would've been lucky to have you nowadays, it's on its way out...
You should go to Hertfordshire and live there and build your Rhodesia. Not in Africa.set your UDI. In the new towns.
"... We never had apartheid in Rhodesia. ..." So what do you call a system which had signs - "Whites only" on toilets in Salisbury, in waiting rooms at train and bus stations, in schools, bars and restaurants, different entrances in the same shop, whites being served 1st, et, etc!! Which Rhodesia were you born in? Maybe you were too young to notice and it seemed NORMAL for you! It was only in the 1970s that things started to change albeit slowly!!
Wrong yes you did have apartheid laws
You Rhodesians deceived yourselves and continue to deceive yourselves.Do you KNOW how many Blacks knew back then about what communism was all about. BTW most Blacks in Smith's army hardly had passed their primary school education. Most of those who had higher education had been FORCED through "call-up" to join. Let me remind you of the protests by Black pupils in secondary schools ("O" Level and "A" Levels), Colleges and university who tore up and burnt call-up papers. (I was one of them)!
I've been interested in this topic for years now and I have to say this is a really good and well put together video
32:40 The attempt at a Rhodesian accent is just laughable.
Love your videos, always incredibly informative without ever being boring. Also you can see your health and fitness effort is paying dividends, looking great.
I've met Ian Smith and spoken with him and he sounded nothing like that ! 😅 That's not even close to his accent . He was an amazing man😢.
Even Joshua Nkomo's accent was just comical.
Think that’s the point
My answer: UDI occurred because the UK insisted on immediate NIBMAR instead of independence alongside an established, mutually agreed to timetable, of perhaps 10-20 years.
Agreed
Actually, most Rhodesians were not interested in black majority rule within 10 or 20 years. In a referendum in 1969 they voted against ever having black majority rule. Instead, they voted in favour of eventual power sharing with 50 seats in parliament for whites and 50 seats for blacks. Ian Smith's statement in 1976 that he did not believe in black majority rule ever in Rhodesia, not in a thousand years, was in line with the 1969 constitution. Moreover, in 1976 a young member of one of Rhodesia's whites-only regiments, the RLI, said that he was fighting to keep Rhodesia white: th-cam.com/video/0S2NKlMW0vc/w-d-xo.html
@glendodds3824 I agree. I have seen that video. There may not have been a timetable that Prime Minister Smith and RF leadership would agree to. I still believe that the UK government was too inflexible in its position and that inflexibility may have strengthened RF's position and allowed it to continually win support electorally.
@@SerialChiller1000 Yes. It was unreasonable of the British Government to expect Rhodesians to accept immediate majority rule, especially as Rhodesians were well aware that Belgians had been massacred in the Belgian Congo only a few years earlier, in 1960.
In my previous comment, I should have mentioned that in 1961 Rhodesians had voted in favour of moving towards eventual black rule, a position which of course changed in 1969. I suspect that some of the Rhodesians who voted in 1961did so in bad faith in the hope that Britain would agree to grant Rhodesia independence. What is certain, is that in 1962 Rhodesians voted into power a new right wing party, the Rhodesian Front (led by Winston Field) and one of the key principles of the RF was a commitment to the continuance of racial segregation.
Rubbish. The Rhodesians refused to discuss a timetable.
Stop making stuff up.
Excellent Video as usual. love your unbiased stance!
why are you celebrating a lack of bias on the topic of settler colonization, genocide and white supremacy
@@yansideabacoa6257 because wearing a bias on your sleeve doesn't bring back the dead, so what's the point if not empty virtue signalling? it would be like telling the history of Genghis Khan and making sure to grandstand about how genocide and war were bad and then expecting applause or something. it'd just be kind of asinine.
@@ominousbiscuit you must be white
@@yansideabacoa6257completely ignorant and racist
@@ominousbiscuit cough cough white excuses cough cough
Hey man can I ask where you got the footage from 22:20 and some of the other Congo crisis footage? I know it says British Pathé but I can’t find it
Great video. Thank you. Who did Ian Smith’s voice? Sounds nothing like him…
Hey just found your channel, and wanted to say thank you for this historical analysis of a place that I have long neglected to study. 👍
The Unilateral Declaration of Independence was a pivotal event in British history and was to have very far-reaching repercussions. The black-governed member nations of the Commonwealth wanted Britain to intervene and take over governing Rhodesia, whereas the white-governed member nations opposed any intervention by Britain. This caused a division along racial lines within the Commonwealth and effectively scuppered any chance of it becoming an economic force that could rival those of The USA and Europe. As a result, Britain began considering membership of the European Common Market, and we all know how that turned out.
By the way, Sithole is pronounced 'sit-oll-éh' not 'sith-oll'
There was never any chance of a commonwealth market anyway. Britain's attempts at imperial preference were legion and so were their failures. It's interesting to me that Australia, Canada, etc, were willing to go to war on Britain's behalf but consistently refused to join any common market schemes.
@@cretansuperbos2121 New Zealand had quite tight economic ties with Britain and were rightly angered when we abandoned them to join the EU
Wherever the British 'colonized', pain and division followed.
I must commend you on your video it was well edited and accurate. Loved your narration. Just to add myself I am from Zimbabwe and of British heritage. No longer live in Zimbabwe as most white Zimbabweans these days. We are all scattered across the world soon to be forgotten about in a generation or two. No hard feelings its just life. I will have to say Ian Smith had a great idea of wanting to gradually integrate blacks into society once their education was up to par, quote from him "I would like to see a evolution and not a revolution". For a very long time blacks did not want schooling like whites had. They wanted their tribes and the leaders of the tribes wanted to control the tribes. Ian Smith respected that and gradually as time was moving tribes started adopting schools provided by the white man and we saw blacks starting to become more and more articulate. The start of evolution was happening as predicted. However a few radical blacks did not want whites in power at all. There was a war between the Shona and Matabele where is saw a massive genocide yes a genocide of Matabele people from Mugabe as the Matabele did not want to stand with Mugabe. This was a message to anyone who stood against Mugabe would die. Hence when elections came about where black people could vote there was such a massive imbalance in votes. People were too scared to vote against Mugabe, he continued this tactic until the day he was unable to take office and died many years later. Unfortunately revolution occurred as Ian Smith predicted would be a tragedy and the country declined rapidly. I have left out a lot but just getting that off my chest.
Good evening, sir!
I was born in 1986, in the USSR and lived there for more then 30 years. I left Russia in 2020, because it turned to a fascist trash bin. My beloved wife, all our four kids and me know about Rhodesia, and our grandkids would also know about this country - I shall do everything to ensure that. That struggle shall never be forgotten, the sacrifice of Ian Smith and the rest Rhodesians too. Just as the lies, hypocrisy and treachery "of certain governments".
A strange feeling growing by the time passing: I'm not Rhodesian, but "no other land will do" anymore...
And so goes as it goes.
Wow Casual Historian and Old Britannia in a crossover ep? Wow hope to see more, both of you guys are a breath of fresh air on YT
This both felt very sanitized in regards to the true nature of the violence the state used to maintain minority rule, yet still probably one of the most reasonably honest Rhodesia documentaries on YT.
Usually it's a terrible production value holocaust snuff film, or a slickly produced complete revisionist history.
I look forward to checking out some of your other videos.
Minority rule is so bad, that the US has it.
@@klown463 except every adult citizen, has voting power, so it’s not “rule by a minority”
@@jtgd Rhodesian blacks have the same voting power as American whites
@@klown463 that really isn't saying much considering how little actual input any singular sub-millionaire citizen has in the process of the US government via the electoral process nowadays
@@RoshanKumar-br6op so voting doesn’t matter?
You should have broke out the short shorts for this video.
Many Rhodesians went to Mozambique for holidays when it was Portuguese. The most popular destination was the coastal city of Beira but Paradise Island and the capital, Lourenco Marques, (further down the coast) were also popular. Moreover, a lot of South Africans also had holidays in the country.
Furthermore, from late 1968 onward members of the Rhodesian security forces fought beside the Portuguese in Mozambique against communist-backed black nationalists, a state of affairs which lasted until a change of government occurred in Portugal in April 1974.
Everyone is happy they all got their butts kicked and sent back to Europe.
In Portuguese colonial Mozambique we appreciated very much important rich and very good meat South Rhodesians produced and exported to us. Now it is Zimbabwe and it is kaput ...
Rhodesian security fought side-by-side with the Portuguese and what native what nationality were they were they the native people of the country or were they the Europeans that were you know not native to the country that far I'm confused
@@camloff yeah Fonseca, you getting that meat in your mouth us definitely worth the entire Native population living under almost apartheid.
Unfortunately south africa is headed down the Rhodesian path these days as well
No, the story of rhodesia begins with a land both fair and great c:
On the 11th of November an independent state
And racist.
@@SymphonyBrahms whats wrong with that?
@@CarolusR3xeverything. You lost lmao
And Zimbabwe is a decaying state@@skullingtonfx4441
Great History lesson on Rhodesia.
The Rhodesian accents done did give me a chuckle I won't lie.
I hope that's because I accurately captured the somewhat funny-sounding accent and not because I made them sound cartoonish lmao, did my best ;P
@@SomasAcademy oh no I'm not attacking you, it's just an interesting accent even if alot of it sounded honestly more South African than white Rhodesian. Like if you watch videos of them talk they talk weird, like a hybrid between proper formal English and South African
@@Gallalad1 No worries, I didn't take it as an attack lol. But yeah, I listened to some videos of Rhodesians to prepare, there's a lot of variation in their accents (some sound super British and some are way more Afrikaner), so I just shot for something in that range for the Declaration of Independence, and did my best impression of Ian Smith for his lines.
@@SomasAcademy One of them I watch, Five Romeo Romeo, almost sounded Indian. Made me wonder if the Indian accent is some kind of flash-frozen Victorian era English and if the Rhodies had it in common.
@@ingold1470 I also noticed some similarities between some Rhodesian and Indian accents, I'd guess that it's because both are hybrid accents that combine aspects from old fashioned English with non-English accents that have a few similar features, like rolled r's and aspirated t's.
Complex subject, clear narration. Thanks
Can you cover the rest of Rhodesia’s history up until it’s collapse? PLEAAASE
That's going to be hard: how can you speak the truth without being labelled 'racist'?
Dexter nailed the move ... What a great team,keep it up guys we love you❤
Rhodesia’s declaration of independence mirrors the United States in more ways than one. It was born from a settler population that were more fanatical in their colonialism than their mother country and would take any measure to maintain what they saw was their fundamental right and even divine destiny. One of the major catalysts for the American Revolution was the proclamation of 1763 which limited settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains, which many colonists viewed as an infringement by the British government on their “right” to settle all lands from the Atlantic to the Pacific (their “Manifest Destiny”). Likewise, it seems Rhodesia’s declaration was in response to the British government infringing on their “right” to maintain a de facto racial hierarchy. Of course in both instances the British government only undertook such measures for their own benefit or to save face, as westward settler encroachments in North America brought Britain into frequent and costly conflicts with indigenous peoples, while the Wilson administration’s insistence on majority rule was likely due solely to minority rule’s growing political untenability and association with Apartheid South Africa.
One of the main differences between the 2 situations is that the UK didn't have a strong leader to respond to the demands of the Colonists in a way that actually addressed them instead of dismissing them entirely, while with Rhodesia, you had Harold Wilson who was much more active and participatory in the fate of the colonies than his Tory counterparts, his only difference being that he saw both Colonists the Natives on the same level as human beings, while the Colonists viewed the Natives as a lower-group and fundamentally disagreed with the change in this establishment that had, under the Tories, let them do as they wish instead of applying the same rules and principles to all they "governed" over.
@@RoshanKumar-br6op There really was no solution in either situation that would satisfy the fanaticism of the settler population other than full capitulation to their demands. The British objection to further westward expansion by the American colonists wasn’t the expansion itself, but the fact that it triggered reprisals and wars with Indians into which they were inevitably drawn in, which became increasingly expensive. The Proclamation of 1763 was intended merely to slow this for the sake of the Empire’s coffers and nothing more, but even this momentary pause in genocide was deemed unacceptable. Likewise, British opposition to minority rule in its African colonies was only due to its growing political untenability, but white Rhodesians were so intent on maintaining their racial hierarchy that they were more willing to make themselves a pariah state and wage a guerrilla war than accept even the most milquetoast compromise with their mother country.
I don’t understand why it’s illegal to want to preserve yourself if you’re of European stock
@@MattieK09 Inbred.
@@MattieK09then they should have went back home
"Hue" in Vietnamese was pronounced "way" 50 years ago.
It's more like Hway. There's a sort of 'H' sound at the beginning. Great place to visit.
Sancho too
@@tigershoot even a bit more like hwhey
You are the definition of a true historian, G.
You are the definition of a true sheeple, g.
FYI - Home as in Douglas Home is actually pronounced Hume.
Mate that Ian smith impersonation was comical 😂. Great video keep up the good work 👍
I thought he was taking the piss
Well done!
Garfield Todd was right.
100%
This is an amazing channel - subscribed!
"The biggest supporter of the natives rights, aside from the natives themselves, was the British government."
...
So that's not great. That's _not_ great.
The Brits: the cause of, and also the "solution" to, all Africa's problems.
@@jahnkaplank8626I don't think Britain caused all of Africa's issues. Especially in the last 50-75 years. People like you don't even consider French, Belgium Portugal and Italy ext
@@clintbeast-bud8119or the Africans themselves…
Proud Black Zimbabwean that supports Rhodesian Economic Models
your avatar is a white guy, your name is monseieur anthony and your location from your page is new zealand. nice try
I’d put a lot of money on that ur some loser white guy from Hull
Great video!
Funny how they never tried for all those decades… and then when the writing was on the wall they were suddenly ok with working and living with the Zimbabweans. If they had done that 30 years sooner and integrated EVERYONE into the country then Rhodesia could possibly still be a thing.
Zimbabwe would still be a success story to this day if the British never set foot there, and also South Africa.
Or at the very least, the economic heights of the 80s would continue. And Zimbabwean politicians as a whole would have higher standards of accountability.
Agreed. Totally.
We [white] Rhodesians were too arrogant and paternalistic.
Even if they had met the demands of the British government, it wouldn’t have been enough to placate the revolutionaries. The war with its inevitable outcome was unavoidable.
Continuing to oppress the native black population sure as a hell didn’t help the Rhodesians.
The British totally hung them out to dry
Yes tend to agree with this .. lots of fault on all sides and too much fault on all sides made the war inevitable ..
“Ndedele” For ndebele is killing me😂😂😂
Nadel😂😂😂
British Prime Minister Alec Douglas-Home's name is pronounced 'Hume'
A really thorough explanation of this issue thanks😊
Looking good brotha!
Your videos are interesting, I always learn something.
Imagine how much better Zimbabwe would have been if the british colonists listened to Garfield Todd
there is a tragic irony with Garfield Todd in that while at the time, the Reactionary Colonists probably thought he would "destroy Rhodesia," the ensuing blood shed out of their stubbornness for the impossible preservation of the past ultimately led to a greater and more complete obliteration of Rhodesia from existence than anything Todd could have done by giving the natives actual representation in government.
silence white supremacist
Indeed
Zimbabwe would have been a better country in a hole if they were never colonized from the beginning if the power leaders would have got together and initiated a form a militia group of all natives to Zimbabwe and also if the leaders were not corrupt and forced foreigners to pay a heavy price for raw materials that were coming out of Zimbabwe you would have had a beautiful country that was built on the wealth of foreign Nations but because the corruption and because of the Europeans constantly invading and forcing their way into a lot of these African countries and forcing other countries not to work with countries without their hand it made it very difficult
@user-hr6uk7mn5o. African countries were created by those super powers and not Africans. A pen on the map after discussions created African countries which before then was nothing but minor tribal collective if at all. The problem wasn't the white feeling above the African, but the African unwilling to remove themselves from tribal loyalty for the betterment of the country created. Tribal mentality and communist affiliations destroyed Africa.
8:10 "right wing when it comes to race and left wing when it comes to economics"...
Just like that little German party from the 1930s that will remain unmentioned.
Same was true of South Africa's _National Party_ .
All I know is that the Rhodesian Ridgeback is awesome 👍
Very well presented, must admit I did pause to look at your books
It is so funny to listen to Americans making videos about Africa! Too ignorant to realise that Africans are not just "black", but actually divided into nation which differ from each other the way Germans differ from French and these differences matter. In Rhodesia, the Shona which were led by Robert Mugabe were actually a minority and the Matabeles, led by Joshua Nkomo were the majority and actually supported the Ian Smith government in establishing a sustainable independent state. Mugabe however, sold the copper mining rights as well as diamond mining rights in exchange for foreign intervention to secure his hold on power. Trying to explain the world in terms of how Americans see it, is totally different to how the world realy is.
Wow. That was thorough
The minute it ended I said 'wait!! What happens next?!' Even though I kinda already know hahaha
beautiful job as always and forever
I don't think you gotta worry about hearing whatever you just said we never heard of this at all. I'm sure 95% of your commentators Feel the same dude but I'm not disrespectful. It's really an interesting video.
For me very informative. Thank you.
Zimbabwe kicked out the British . The natives squandered all their money and blamed it on the British .
That usually happens with most countries when you give power to people not ready for it. It happened in all the other African colonies too. You can see that Smith had a point and was genuinely trying to stop Rhodesia going the same way. He knew the locals needed more time to get a level of political development (you can't teach 2,000 years of it within a few years) where they could.
Hi, I am white and have lived many years in Africa including Rhodesia when it was called that. You failed to mention Chief Lobengula! You failed to mention that Rhodes had tried and failed several times to gain a mining concession so he sent Moffat tosign the 'treaty of friendship' which prevented Lobengula from doing business with anybody but the British and then later there was the Rudd Concession which gave unlimited mining rights to the British - Lobengula was tricked into signing this because he had verbally only agreed to a limited concession for 10 persons. So thereafter, with the mining rights came all the other rights and effectively Lobengula's lands were ANNEXED or rather, STOLEN. You should have mentioned this in your video!
In the first 3 minutes he explicitly says "I am not talking about the founding of Rhodesia".
He hasn't ignored it, it's not what he's talking about
@@andrewtully3622 He doesn’t say anything about not talking about the founding of Rhodesia, he says he’s not going to talk about Cecil Rhodes and then goes on to talk about him … he should have provided context!
@@famdegroot1988 Eh, I'm not certain the context for how Rhodesia was founded is important for the causes of Rhodesian Independence.
Foundation, definitely, but this video is not about that.
@@andrewtully3622 I think you miss my point: I am looking for objective and balanced reporting. The first 1’20” covers Cecil Rhodes to the point he was put in charge of Southern Rhodesia by the Crown. There is not one mention of Lobengula nor the Rudd Concession. This concession was used as a pretext for British military action against Lobengula's forces during the First Matabele War, leading to the eventual defeat of the Ndebele kingdom. Is this not important historical information? At least he should have mentioned that Rhodes pursued a policy of "imperialism by conquest," seeking to expand British control over Southern Africa. Is that not more important and relevant than mentioning that Rhodes supported educational institutions in England???!
@@famdegroot1988 It's an interesting point. I wouldn't go so far to say the foundation of Rhodesia has NOTHING to do with independence, but I do think it (and the pre British history of the area) has a very minor role when the topic is about Rhodesian independence (as opposed to Rhodesian foundation).
Again, omitting the concessions and annexation aren't unfair to us viewers, simply extra information as to the focal point of the video.
Hope that makes sense!
Part 2 please!
15:47 LEGEND. Garfield Todd ❤
Didn’t know Ian Smith had been in the Goon Show.
Glad I could be a part
Whoever read Ian Smith's quotes did a phenomenal job hahahaa. Perfect impression. 🫡
Very interesting, but what's with Ian smiths voice?
Thanks for making this video mate, looking forward to the next one! I find Rhodesia 20th century to be fascinatingly odd, particularly in contrast to the happenings in the rest of the World concurrently.
I'm Australian and from a historical learning perspective (especially in School) we tend to be a bit sheltered from things like, happening to another Commonwealth nation no less!
Looking forward to the rest of this series 😊
Great video!
Minor quibble tho - Alec Douglas-Home is pronounced *Hume*
Rhodesia? Well this won't be controversial at all. 😉 I think I'll just stay out of the comments.
A lot of stuff that I didn't know in this video. Thanks for that.
Please read Ian Smith’s book “The Great Betrayal”. It was a very eye opening account on how that part of the continent was developed and eventually discarded.
If you had watched the video the whole way through, or looked at my sources listed in the description, you would see nearly half the quotes were from Smith's memoirs.
I actually laying in bed and listened to the video. My apologies for not watching it 😞
@@CasualHistorian Hi. I have watched your video in its entirety and enjoyed doing so. Moreover, I was born and bred in Salisbury and my father served in the Rhodesian Air Force. Ian Smith's book is very interesting but, sadly, like a lot of Rhodesian books it waters down the importance of race in Rhodesia and scapegoats South Africans for apartheid. Another example is 'Wings of Destruction' by one of my father's former colleagues, Peter Petter-Bowyer. Peter says that Rhodesians despised apartheid and had an entirely different outlook to South Africans but, as you are well aware, that claim can easily be blown out of the water. Rhodesia did have better race relations than South Africa and blacks had more rights but, contrary to what a lot of Rhodesians say, it was the Portuguese in Angola and Mozambique who had the highest levels of racial integration. For example, the following footage from October 1973 shows a black teacher in Angola's capital with a multi-racial class at a time when all government schools in Rhodesia were segregated. th-cam.com/video/Az9O2wVF30s/w-d-xo.html
@@glendodds3824Serving Secretly by Ken Flower is one of the best memoirs I ever read.
@@donatist59 Hi. Flower is of course a very controversial figure. I shall look at his book. Best wishes.
Absolutely fantastic! I've always been fascinated by Rhodesia and various other transitions from colonial era rule. Thanks Casual Dude! Oh yeah and.. subscribed!
Here’s the story of Rhodesia a land both fair and great!
Oh is that's why it ceased to exist?
Unless you were Black
… on the 11th of November, an independent state.
@@martinzwaan2721 that doesn't exist anymore. Besides , you're not even from Africa
@@donovanlocust1106 You're right, it doesn't exist anymore. The lines are quotes from a song.
Ian Smith going for UDI against the British is perhaps one of the most Badass moves imo
It’s like the north of the USA. Smith was right
Fuck that, its not ‘badass’ to enforce a racist Apartheid regime. Ian Smith should have fucking died in WW2 and the world would have been a better place.
I enjoyed this video because I remember all this happening. Just a small point though, Sir Alex Douglas-Home’s name is pronounced Hume not Home. The Humes are an old family in Scotland and some spell the name Home and others Hume. Just one of those Scottish quirks! Otherwise an enjoyable and informative video.
What a brilliant document. Rhodesia is a fascinating topic of study.
Very interesting to minority of people who are white in Africa.
Lovely Video
I like your channel dude. Bring about the African countryballs
I have a question. How did the merger affect Africans in Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland? They weren’t discriminated as systematically, right?
There wasn't much of a chance for much to happen. Malawi and Zambia realizing what would happen with white minority rule hightailed it out of the union fast.
They wanted to maintain white rule and avoid majority black rule like in malawi and Zambia (northern Rhodesia) just saved you 47 minutes
And Kommies
Interesting history lesson 👍
Commented so early nobody mentioned Mugabe is dead
Yeah. He only died fairly recently. 😊
If you seek to live in union ,you will thrive but if you seek dominion for whatever reason, you will soon find your demise.
14 years old Neo-nazis favorite country (Zimbabwe under Mugabe was bad too)