Lord Kitchener is usually blamed for the scorched earth policy, but the architect of the atrocities was none other than Field Marshal Lord Roberts of Kandahar, V.C., K.G., K.P., G.C.B., O.M., G.C.S.I., and G.C.I.E.
Now that we have Canadian troops in Afghanistan, I try to rationalize his actions by thinking that perhaps it was his experiences there, that had sent him to South Africa prepared to win the battle by whatever diabolical means he saw fit to employ. Members of our Canadian forces, even if wounded, know that returning to Canada hopefully means returning to “home and family”. The Boer soldiers, on the other hand, had no homes and frequently no families left to return to, and all that had precipitated the horror in the first place, was the unfortunate fact that gold and diamonds had been discovered in their country!
Following the defeat of the conventional Boer forces, Kitchener succeeded Roberts as overall commander in November 1900, and after the failure of a reconciliatory peace treaty in February 1901 (due to British cabinet veto) which Kitchener had negotiated with the Boer leaders, Kitchener inherited and expanded the successful strategies devised by Roberts to crush the Boer guerrillas.
In a brutal campaign, these strategies – as we have already seen - removed civilian support from the Boers with a scorched earth policy of destroying Boer farms, slaughtering livestock, building blockhouses, and moving women, children and the elderly into concentration camps. Conditions in these camps, which had been conceived by Roberts as a form of controlling the families whose farms he had destroyed, began to degenerate rapidly as the large influx of Boers outstripped the minuscule ability of the British to cope. The camps lacked space, food, sanitation, medicine, and medical care, leading to rampant disease and a staggering 34.4% death rate for those Boers who were kept there. The biggest critic of the camps was a Cornish humanitarian and welfare worker EMILY HOBHOUSE. As chief of staff to Lord Frederick Roberts, Kitchener was responsible for developing Roberts’ strategies to deal with the Boer guerrilla campaign. His decision to destroy Boer farms and to move civilians into concentration camps resulted in his being highly criticized by politicians such as David Lloyd George and Charles Trevelyan.
Holocaust denial anyone???
Ta HuGe m8, will have the whole 3/4 hour pod on utoob v.soon.
Hope you don't mind my little inserts into the narrative?
Now just who were the good guys again??????
fmj. not anglo-saxon, not norman, PICT!