The Curious Case of Germany & Genocide

Namibia, the Holocaust, and Now Gaza

The Germans get things done. It’s not just in building cars. Historically, it’s more than that.

Germans, or at least the governments that lead them, the soldiers who do the killing, and the citizens who support it, kill innocent people for their own gain very well, too. They practically invented 20th-century genocide.

Most of us in the United States know about the Germans and the Holocaust. This is taught in World History in most high schools (albeit not nearly as thoroughly as it should be in most schools). I went to a decent public high school in the mid-1980s. The version of colonialism I learned had much to do with bringing education and modernization to less developed lands and promoting trade; it was mostly a bloodless endeavor in our textbooks.

The reality, of course, is quite different.

During the early 20th century, the most significant instance of mass killings by Germans in Africa occurred during the Herero and Namaqua genocide in what is now Namibia. This occurred from 1904 to 1908 when the region was under German colonial rule.

The genocide was directed against the Herero and Nama people following their rebellion against German colonial rule.

“How dare they refuse to give up their lands to the German settlers,” right?

Close to 80,000 Herero (about 80% of the total Herero population) and up to 10,000 Nama (about 50% of the total Nama population) were slaughtered by the Germans. While many died from direct violence, others died of starvation and dehydration in the desert, where many victims were driven in search of safety.

In their African colony, German colonial officers studying eugenics, a discredited belief in improving the human race through selective breeding, are believed to have developed ideas about racial purity and the mixing of races.

Clearly, it was a prelude to the Holocaust, in my opinion.

This mass murder of Black Africans by German colonizers is recognized as one of the first genocides of the 20th century. The Germans tried to erase it from their memories. And who can blame them for forgetting about killing 70,000 Black Africans (from what is now Namibia)? Within 50 years of the 20th century’s first genocide, the Germans ushered in another government that went on to kill six million Jews and other minorities in the Holocaust.

It took over 100 years to get the Germans to acknowledge the atrocities they committed. Why did it take so long for Germany to acknowledge this crime of crimes against Black Africans?

Racism.

German textbooks are only now addressing this genocide. Most Germans did not learn about their dubious and reprehensible title as the perpetrators of not one but two genocides in the 20th century.

Germany only recently agreed to pay approximately $1.35 billion to Namibia for various projects (over the span of 3 decades), but it refused to call the payment reparations. Deep down inside, perhaps they still don’t believe their actions were wrong.

The descendants of the survivors of the German genocide in Herero and Namaqua remember. They believe Germany is not truly sorry. Germany failed to make reparations. What can one make of such a rich and powerful country shrugging off the Black African survivors of their genocide? Indifference? Arrogance?

Yes, to both, perhaps. It is worth noting that Germany did commit to reparations to the victims and descendants of the Jewish victims of the Holocaust. That commitment came quickly, in 1951.

And this:

Namibia had pressed for describing the money as “reparations.” But Germany rejected the term, which would have amounted to acknowledging guilt under the 1948 United Nations Convention on Genocide. The Germans argued that the convention cannot be applied retroactively to past genocides. Reparations could have also made Germany — and other former European colonial powers — liable to claims from other former colonies.

Oh my! Who would want to make former European colonial powers liable to claims from their former colonies?!

Germany is at it again. In the first two genocides, Germany took the lead. Today, they are willing accomplices.

Germany is providing military aid and assistance to Israel to aid the latter in carrying out its genocide (and other war crimes) in Gaza against the Palestinians. As if that was not bad enough, Germany recently announced that it will enter its appearance in the World Court in support of Israel as South Africa seeks to hold Israel responsible for genocide in Gaza.

It looks like Germany is not only efficient but also consistent, with genocides in two back-to-back centuries.

I think I have just scratched the surface of the sins of colonialism.

Many of the conflicts and struggles in former colonies can be directly traced back to the policies and practices of colonial powers. The genocide in Gaza and the apartheid in the West Bank are two more examples. And Germany is right there in the thick of it.