The British-led League's sacred trust

'Superior.' This is how the nature of the Entente powers' colonial rule at the Conference of Paris was described. As a matter of fact, the wording of the British delegations sounded a bit differently. In Germany's absence, they recounted this nation's rule as inferior. From the perspective of linguistics and neutral observance, this meant that not only British, but also Belgian and Portugese rule was deemed superior compared to that of the Germans in Asia and Africa.

According to the twin delegations of Lloyd George and his colonial hero Jan Smuts, the people were treated badly under the regime of colonialism's youngest actor, Germany. They took the overwhelmed allies as well as the Americans, whose leader fathered the concept termed the 'League of Nations', to the following consenses: These unfortunates deserved to be ruled by Europeans that properly observed their rights, if not the basics of human dignity. Ever since, this goes with a specific note for specialists of international law. It reads that Germany's colonial empire was dissolved according to the Völkerrecht.

Obviously, none of the colonising nations could be exempted from the historical role of mistreating the inhabitants. On May 29th, 2022, the centenary of a British-South African slaughter of Bondelswarts was commemorated by our commission. Who were the Bondelswarts? These Nama ethnic people lived in the south-east of the newly installed Class C-mandate, present-day Namibia. Officially, the League of Nations supervised the South African masters in their administration of Germany's former colony.

At the end of May 1922, this people were brutally attacked.(1) The 29 May assault by British South-African De Havilland DH-9 warplanes left over a hundred people aka Khoikhoi or Hottentotten dead.(2)

At the time, initial arguments against the commensurate treaty and league stipulation articles were three-year-old. Firstly, this first stroke of the conference, before Woodrow Wilson and David Lloyd George took a break mid February, was designated as the 'colonial guilt lie' (Kolonialschuldlüge) in the Weimar republic. During the exclusion of Germany's participation at the conference, the internally transforming country managed to compose a White Book named Die Behandlung der einheimischen Bevölkerung in den kolonialen Besitzungen Deutschlands und Englands. Eine Erwiderung auf das englische Blaubuch vom August 1918: Report on the natives of South-West Africa and their treatment by Germany (Berlin 1919).

However, when the Germans were invited respectively summoned to join the Allied and Associated Powers in Paris, any interchange was denied. On June 28th, 1919, their appearance in front of the treaty designers lasted less than an hour and solely good for a signature.

Subimperialism. This 1919 variant of high imperialism was an exclusively British one.

Secondly, the colonised would be able to raise a serious argument. For this bottom-up experiences, time into the mandate imperialism including an exclusively British sub-imperialism was needed. People in Cameroon, Tanganyika, New Guinea, South-West Africa etc. would have the unique experience of being subjected to different regimes from Europe. Some time into the 1920s, they may acknowledge the superiority of British-South African, British-New Zealand's, British-Australian, French, Belgian, Japanese as well as British rule. In case of conflict, the League would interfere and hold the Japanese and Europeans to account. As a matter of fact, a linear rebuttal of the argumentation against the Germans coincided with the publication of their White Book. When the British massacred the peaceful demonstration of Indians on April 13th, 1919, the Paris conference was about to enter its fourth month.

Never before, colonial subjects had been attacked by an air force. After his return from Paris, Smuts took office as the independence seeking British dominion's prime minister. As previously stated in de Bourgraaf's centenary title, this sub-imperialist actor was proclaimed fit for the civilising mission only months before. Under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, it was empowered to extend its rule under the roof of the League of Nations as a coloniser that had the interests of the colonised people in mind. Like the other six mandatory powers, it would be held accountable by this international organisation. They were supposed to report on a yearly base. In Geneva, Switzerland, the League's Permanent Mandates Commission (PMC) had just taken office.

The excluded and demoralised Germans could observe that the Permanent Mandates Commission of the British-led organisation failed to hold the British/South African bombers accountable. In Geneva, the Nama call for assistance was not given a proper follow-up.(3) Time and again, the treatment of people from Samoa to non-binary places such as Afghanistan would cause them to file similar cases.

Footnotes

1.  Peter de Bourgraaf, De eerste wereldvrede, thesis, Amsterdam University, 1997, 54.

2.  Golf Dorfseif, Bondelswarts und Buren-bomber, 2013, 6, 9–12.

3.  Gavin Llewellyn Mackenzie Lewis, The Bondelswarts rebellion of 1922, thesis, Rhodes University, 1977, 130, 232.

🐺  Quote ... the P.M.C. covered the essential causes of the 1922 revolt. Unquote, p. 232.