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THE DANGERS OF WHITE TOTALITARIANISM
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Elizabeth Schmidt
September 12, 2024
Africa is a Country
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_ Why is the US ultra-right turning to Rhodesia as their model for a
white supremacist state? _
Air Rhodesia Vickers Viscount VP-YND at Bulawayo in the early 1970s.
Image via Veteran Rhodie on Flickr CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.,
In June 2015, a young white man named Dylann Roof walked into the
Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South
Carolina. After accepting an invitation to pray with the parishioners,
Roof drew a Glock .45-caliber handgun and began to shoot. Within
minutes, he fired some 74 rounds—killing nine church members,
including the pastor and a state senator. Roof, we later learned, wore
a jacket bearing two flags—one from apartheid South Africa and the
other from white-minority-ruled Rhodesia
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Zimbabwe). We also learned that the shooter, an avowed white
supremacist, was a 21-year-old high school dropout who blamed African
Americans for his failure to launch.
In the decade that followed the church massacre, members of the US
ultra-right have increasingly turned to Rhodesia as their model
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a white supremacist state. In particular, they have idolized the
Selous Scouts, a brutal special forces regiment in the Rhodesian Army
that killed an untold number of civilians, as well as insurgents
fighting for democracy and majority rule. Promoting their views
on social media platforms
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YouTube videos that garnered hundreds of thousands of followers, they
attracted the attention of clothing vendors who began to market
pro-Rhodesia t-shirts, hoodies, posters, and patches to white
supremacists and gun lovers. Mimicking a Trump rallying cry, one
retailer sold a red and white patch sporting the slogan, “Make
Zimbabwe Rhodesia Again
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The following year, Donald Trump was elected president of the US, in
part as a result of anti-democratic gerrymandering and intensified
voter restrictions that inhibited low-income populations and racial
and ethnic minorities from exercising their Constitutional rights.
Within months of Trump’s taking office, hundreds of white
nationalists gathered in Charlottesville, Virginia, to protest the
removal of a statue honoring Confederate General Robert E. Lee. They
attacked counter-protestors, killing one and injuring nearly three
dozen more
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Trump drew national attention when he refused to unequivocally condemn
the white nationalists, claiming instead that there were “very fine
people on both sides
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As president, Trump welcomed white supremacists into the fold. Those
who rejected democracy
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equality, and the peaceful transfer of power, including Proud Boys,
Oath Keepers
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QAnon, and more than a dozen other neo-Nazi, neo-fascist white
supremacist groups
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formed the base of Trump supporters who stormed the Capitol in 2021
following their candidate’s electoral defeat. Although their
attempts to steal the election failed, racists, xenophobes, and other
white supremacists had grown stronger under the care of the Trump
administration.
While many journalists have exposed the composition and objectives of
these ultra-right organizations, few have investigated the Rhodesian
model that inspired them. Nor have they explored the ways in which
moderates and liberals publicly decried Rhodesia’s racist,
anti-democratic actions, while privately lending tacit support to the
minority regime in order to protect their own interests. As we witness
the erosion of democracy in the US, we would do well to heed the
lessons of white-ruled Rhodesia nearly 60 years ago.
Rhodesia, a white-ruled British settler colony established in Southern
Africa in 1890, was governed by a narrow minority of its population.
In the 1960s, when many other African colonies were achieving
political independence, whites in Rhodesia, who comprised just 7%
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panicked. White farmers, ranchers, and mine owners, who benefited the
most from cheap black labor, manipulated the working-class whites to
fear their fate should the country embrace democracy. Blacks, who
comprised 93% of the population, lived far below the poverty line,
subsisting on per capita incomes of $500
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compared to $18,482
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their white counterparts. Few met the educational and income levels
required to obtain the vote.
Largely unnoticed by the world at large, this small colony on the
periphery moved to the center of the world stage on November 11, 1965,
when Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith announced a Unilateral
Declaration of Independence (UDI). The declaration severed the
colony’s ties to the UK without the requisite authorization from the
British parliament. In the eyes of the world’s great powers, who had
also been colonizers and empire builders, Smith’s regime was
therefore deemed illegal. Newly independent African and Asian states
also claimed that the regime was illegitimate—but because it came to
power on a platform dedicated to retaining power in white hands.
The Rhodesian move put the UK in a quandary. The territory’s
declaration of independence came amid widespread decolonization on the
African continent. Mass movements for political independence grew
stronger after World War II, when African troops
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drafted into the British army and African farmers
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compelled to feed the imperial army and motherland. By the mid-1960s,
the UK had been forced to grant independence to most of its African
colonies based on the principle of majority rule.
Many of the new African states were deeply influenced by the
resolutions passed at the 1955 Bandung Conference
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States. Participants had resolved to oppose colonialism and
imperialism and to promote economic and cultural cooperation
throughout the Global South (then called the “Third World”). They
voiced particular support for decolonization and national liberation
in Africa.
Knowing that new African members of the UN and the Commonwealth would
never recognize Rhodesian-style independence, Britain denounced
Rhodesia’s illegal action and refused to recognize its independence
until it showed a willingness to move toward majority rule. Composed
of the UK and its former colonies, the Commonwealth was a potent
symbol of the UK’s gloried past. Weakened by World War II and
desperate to keep the Commonwealth together, it was forced to make
concessions to African members. African nations demanded an even
stronger response to the Rhodesian regime. Rallying under the slogan,
“No Independence Before Majority Rule,” many threatened to leave
the Commonwealth if London failed to impose majority rule as a
precondition for Rhodesian independence.
The US faced a similar quandary. Washington feared that if it failed
to oppose the rebel regime, it might drive newly independent African
states away from its own orbit and towards the communist powers.
Moreover, coming at the height of the US civil rights movement,
Rhodesia’s unilateral declaration of independence required a
race-sensitive response. However, many in the US government were
sympathetic to Rhodesian whites. The US was also hampered by other
concerns. It had strong ties to Portugal, a NATO member that furnished
the US with critical Cold War services, and apartheid South Africa,
where it had significant economic interests. Both countries provided
life-saving assistance to the outlaw regime.
Faced with conflicting demands, Washington devised a two-pronged
strategy. It would publicly support majority rule and denounce the
breakaway state but privately engage in actions that prolonged its
life—and protected both Portugal and South Africa. When UN sanctions
were imposed, the US, like many other Western powers, turned a blind
eye while its businesses engaged in sanctions busting.
Although the UK was sympathetic to Rhodesian whites, many of whom had
emigrated from Britain after World War II, it was cognizant of African
sentiment and refused to recognize the renegade state. However, it
quickly undermined its public display of opposition. Describing the
Rhodesian outlaws as British “kith and kin,” London declared that
it would not use force to bring Rhodesia back to legality and opposed
all-out economic warfare. Instead, it proposed a limited set of
economic sanctions, the purpose of which was not to bring the rogue
prime minister to his knees, but to make him “reasonable.” It
urged the international community to do likewise.
At London’s behest, the UN Security Council
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Britain’s lead, enacting selective voluntary sanctions in April 1966
that discouraged the sale of petroleum products to Rhodesia. In
December of the same year, it added selective mandatory sanctions that
blocked the import of an array of Rhodesian products including sugar,
tobacco, and strategic minerals, and the export to Rhodesia of oil,
arms, and military equipment. It was not until May 1968 that the
Security Council imposed comprehensive mandatory sanctions,
prohibiting any economic or diplomatic relationship with the rebel
state.
The US was aware that the selective mandatory sanctions
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on Rhodesia after UDI were being only “loosely observed.” Although
opposed to the imposition of comprehensive mandatory sanctions, the UK
and the US agreed to discuss those propositions in order to deflect
“more radical measures” advocated by African and Asian members of
the UN General Assembly. These measures included the use of force
against the Smith regime and the extension of economic sanctions to
Portugal and South Africa, where the Western powers had significant
economic and military interests. Although closing the sanctions
loopholes and using force to bring Rhodesia into compliance were their
preferred options, African and Asian states considered the imposition
of comprehensive mandatory sanctions in May 1968 a victory.
In October 1968, Africans and Asians in the General Assembly again
introduced a proposal that called for the use of force. London warned
its allies
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it would veto the proposal, noting “that continued abstention by
Western states would only serve to encourage further pressures and
extreme demands from militant Afo-Asians.” The United States
followed Britain’s lead and voted against the resolution.
The lag time of more than two years before comprehensive mandatory
sanctions were imposed gave Rhodesia time to restructure its economy
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markets, and devise sophisticated means of selling its products
clandestinely. It found willing partners on several continents. Some
UN member states openly flouted the sanctions resolutions. Apartheid
South Africa and the Portuguese colonial regime in Mozambique served
as conduits for Rhodesian imports and exports. They ignored the UN
call for a boycott of Rhodesian goods—helping the outlaw state sell
its products and supplying it with petroleum, military equipment, and
foreign exchange.
Subsequent events shredded even the facade of US support for majority
rule. In 1971, Congress passed the Byrd Amendment to the Military
Procurement Authorization Act, which allowed the importation of
“strategic and critical” materials from Rhodesia, including chrome
and 21 other minerals, so long as there was no similar ban on such
imports from communist countries. A Rhodesia lobby
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pro-segregation southerners in the US Congress and a number of US
businesses, had pushed hard for the amendment.
This loophole added years to the life of the white-ruled state by
providing it with the foreign currency needed to buy weapons and
petroleum on the black market. The Western powers’ refusal to hold
Rhodesia to account culminated in a 14-year war between Africans
fighting for liberation and the Rhodesian security forces—a conflict
that cost some 20,000 lives
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Even with outside support, Rhodesia was in dire straits
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the war, a worldwide recession, and the toll of sanctions forced
Rhodesia to the bargaining table. In 1979, the rebel regime was
compelled to accept a settlement that eventually led to majority rule.
The parallels between Rhodesia over a half-century ago and the US
today are troubling. In both Rhodesia and the US, extremist
politicians have rejected the basic tenets of democracy and majority
rule and manipulated working-class whites, frightening them with
rumors of replacement by non-white populations. In 2024, the US is
faced with another constituency of whites
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threatened
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the advancement of US-born racial and ethnic minorities and immigrants
from the Global South. Some have openly embraced Rhodesia as a model
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preserving minority rule. In both cases, extremist political and
business leaders have aligned with anti-democratic forces that do
their dirty work. The blind support of this constituency continues to
be vital to the success of the regimes’ ultimate objective:
protecting the interests of wealthy white populations in business and
industry.
The case of Rhodesia also has much to teach us about how
self-proclaimed critics of a renegade regime professed to support
human rights, democracy, and respect for the rule of law, but in fact
prioritized their self-interest and prolonged the regime’s life,
which ultimately led to civil war. As the 2024 elections approach,
die-hard supporters of the extremist minority will not be swayed by
evidence. But perhaps lessons from Rhodesia can sway the
fence-sitters.
Elizabeth Schmidt is professor emeritus of history at Loyola
University Maryland and vice president of the African Studies
Association. She has written six books about Africa, covering U.S.
involvement in apartheid South Africa, women under colonialism in
Zimbabwe, the nationalist movement in Guinea, and foreign intervention
in Africa from the Cold War to the war on terror.
_Africa Is a Country is a site of opinion, analysis, and new writing
on and from the African left. It was founded by Sean Jacobs
[[link removed]] in 2009. Unless otherwise noted, all
the content on Africa Is a Country is published under a Creative
Commons BY 4.0
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* white minority rule
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* white nationalism
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* Zimbabwe
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* Donald Trump
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* Dylann Roof
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