Inderdaad, soos jy sê, die waarheid maak seer. Must be this fact that moved you to take up the pen to breek ’n lansie for your English friends who are still smarting from the bloedbek they received from the Boers.
Incidentally, what brought this about, this outburst of anglophilia amongst (a lot of) you Germans? Is it because of the fact that you got thumped by the English (and their many many allies) in the Great War and WW2; driving you, as it were, a couple of rings down the food chain? Are you embarrassed to be German? I find this quite puzzling.
I was in Germany a few months ago and battled to find souvenirs with only German on them; just about every item had ‘Germany’ written all over it. In the airport shops (Frankfurt) my wife could not find one bottle of Eau de Cologne, shampoo or bath salts with a German label, EVERYTHING was English. And German, it seems, is transforming into Denglish. A lot of Afrikaners have German wives, husbands, grandfathers etc and this type of gedienstigheid is a great embarrassment.
Be that as it may, back to the war. Let’s look at your ‘main and undisputed facts’:
‘The Brits did not start the war’. How naïve can you be? Why were there British troops here, as tourists? The mere presence of British troops was tantamount to a declaration of war. The fact that Kruger issued an ultimatum is immaterial (it was solicited by the Brits in any case).
‘At that stage the British had very few troops in SA’. At ALL stages the Boers had few troops in SA. What’s your point here anyway?
‘The British won their first couple of battles, in spite of their limited resources, and they had a few bad weeks with battles lost.’ Well, the Boers then, ipso facto, lost their first couple of battles, because of their limited resources, and then had a few good weeks with battles won despite their limited numbers and resources.
‘The British did not lose any defensive battles’. Could be, I’m no war historian but a reason for this could be, amongst others, that the Boers lacked that killer instinct, that kick-a-man-when-he’s-down instinct that seems to be so natural to those Imperial Brits. The Boers were not referred to as ‘the hand shaking army’ for nothing. They even let their prisoners go, just took their boots to make the journey back to their regiment more difficult.
‘After a few successes the Boers lost every battle after that.’ Is that possible? How long did the first few successes last and how long the subsequent failures? You’re going to find it difficult to make the ‘first few successes’ and the then subsequent ‘unsuccesses’ span for a period of three years.
‘-nevertheless the British had the tactics and courage to win them’ Nonsensical statement; does that imply those battles that the British lost they did NOT have the courage and tacticts to win? Think again, your statement does not make sense, just pure rhetoric.
‘The boers used dumdum ammunition, which was banned and misused the white flag on many occasions, neither of which the British did.’ Ek betwyfel dit sterk. Just about every Boer was a sharpshooter; why would they have used dumdums? As for the ‘misuse of the white flag’ and nogal ‘on many occasions’, you’ve got your facts the wrong way round. It was Colonel Thorneycroft, arriving with reinforcements at the Battle of Spioenkop, that resulted in misuse of the white flag BY THE BRITISH. After that the Boers were wary of ‘British white flags or emblems of surrender’ (Davitt).
So, your ‘neither of which the British did’ is nonsense. In fact, I would not put it past the British to have used dumdums, given their inherent qualities of mind and character as displayed in this war. Listen to what Captain L March had to say:
“Farm burning goes merrily on, and our course through the country is marked as in prehistoric ages, by pillars of smoke by day and fire by night. We usually burn six to a dozen farms a day. I do not gather that any special reason or cause is alleged or provided against the farms burnt … We find that one reason or other generally covers pretty nearly every farm we come to, and so to save trouble we burn the whole lot without inquiry. The fire bursts out of windows and doors with a loud roaring and black volumes of smoke roll overhead. […] The women, in a little group, cling together, comforting each other or hiding their faces in each other’s laps. In the background a number of Tommies are seen chasing poultry, flinging stones, and throwing themselves prostrate on maimed chickens andducks. Further off still, herds and flocks and horses are being collected and driven off.”
What a swell party that must have been.
‘The Boers then started using guerilla tactics.’ That’s right, necessitated by their limited numbers and resources. If, as you say, it is so difficult to counter, why then did the British not also resort to those tactics?
‘The Boers had ample opportunity to agree to peace.’ Another example of gross naiveté on your side; was it ‘agree to peace’ or ‘surrender’? Truth is, the Brits were starting to consider some way or other to pull out of this war as the cost had escalated to something like ₤1m a day (month? still a lot considering the value of the pound at the turn of the previous century). Just imagine, 8 000 blockhouses, 3 700 miles of fencing guarded by 50 000 men; for how long could that be sustained?
You say “Kruger was an ignorant fool to believe the Kaiser in the first place and to take on the British.” Can’t find much wrong with this statement; seems to me ol’ Wilhelm must have been a bit of a flapdrol, shit scared of ouma and the Brits (hence the changed words: Wir wollen unseren alten Kaiser Wilhelm wiederhaben ABER NUR NICHT BALD).
‘Grow up and face the facts, the Boers were totally outclassed and ground into dust.’ The ground into dust part is true, no being ‘magnanimous in victory, remember we’re British and all that’; nothing of that sort; they just trampled the Boers deeper into the dust. Outclassed? Not so in the least; even with the help of their friends the Brits still got a smack they will never forget; they are still smarting and the attempts at whitewashing one of their darkest hours (like the Chris Ashes of this world do) have the opposite effect; they once again highlight the sheit the Brits committed / indulged in / caused. This practice does catch a few though, but only the uninformed and gullible ones; those that haven’t grown up yet .
Jan Rap
NB It grates me to write in English to someone with the name of ‘Becker’. Are you an anglicised Afrikaner or an anglicised German?