n
agrarian conflict with a distinctly industrial radiation” (p. 17). This is a point
worth contemplating for the tension between the old and the new permeated
the clash throughout, both within and without republican society, from the
contrast between the military methods of the older patriarchs and the more
ruthless younger commanders like Botha and Smuts to combat, at once, a
“traditional countryside war of movement” and one which was dependent
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New Contree, No. 60 (November 2010)
on the railway, electronic communication, aerial observation and modern
firearms. In other respects, too, this was a “war of modernity” (p. 28) with
echoes of the suffering and destruction of the great industrial campaigns of
the twentieth century. As in the Algerian case, the notorious concentration
camps were regarded by the imperialists as a means of educating country
people whose way of life seemed worse than antiquated, actively dangerous in
their flouting of “modern” public health practices.
One of the difficulties in dealing with this war is that the first period, with
its set battles, is much easier to describe than the elusive guerrilla war. Most
historians, like Pakenham, tend to concentrate on the first year but Nasson
has dealt a little more even-handedly with the two parts. He has not, however",
devoted much attention to the Cape invasions and such folk heroes as Gideon
Scheepers receive no mention. The strength of this book, then, lies less in the
military history than in Nasson’s understanding of the broader context.
Nasson is, for instance, alert to the gendered aspects although he deals with
it lightly. Wartime attitudes, he points out, were often shaped by gender (p.
281). Thus, at the end, when the land was devastated and families incarcerated",
what remained to the men was “to be men”; those who did not stay in the
fight were not fully men (p. 246). Women like Hendrina Joubert and Hester
Cronjé were doing more than carrying domesticity to the front. They were
identifying actively with the republican war effort (p. 111). As one would
expect from a historian who has dealt extensively with the participation of
blacks, their part is treated with judicious intelligence. His discussion of the
role of the agterryers, for instance, gives full weight to their essential role in the
field, when “war is a form of work” (p. 86).
Much of the book contemplates the meaning of the war in a modern South
Africa in which Afrikaners have lost the political independence for which
they had been fighting. Nasson concludes that the war remains of historical
significance. The last two chapters, particularly, are devoted to a consideration
of the impact of the conflict since 1902, taking into account many of the
recent debates. Nasson is less concerned with the role of the war in the making
of Afrikaner nationalism than with its role in the making of the new South
Africa. He is well aware of African, and Afrikaner, ambivalence about the
meaning of the war, noting the tendency of Afrikaner writers like Antje Krog
to see the war as a “hinge” of national reconciliation. He is sceptical, however",
that its peace was a lost opportunity, agreeing with the argument that the
alternative outcome of counterfactual history is likely to be the same as the
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Book review
one that took place (p. 299). And he gives short shrift to the suggestion that
blacks were merely common victims of suffering. They were also active agents",
collaborating with the British, serving the Boers and acting independently;
commemoration has tended to hide this from full recognition, he suggests.
References are provided both in the form of footnotes and in an annotated
select bibliography in which Nasson’s shrewd comments are a delight. Thus
Tabitha Jackson’s The White Man’s War offers a rounded view “which may be
too round” (p. 340). Above all, Nasson is known for his distinctive style and
this book is a pleasure to read, with its ironic
