Description
Book SynopsisSome historians have traced a line from Germany’s atrocities in its colonial wars to those committed by the Nazis during WWII. Susanne Kuss dismantles these claims, rejecting the notion that a distinctive military ethos or policy of genocide guided Germany’s conduct of operations in Africa and China, despite acts of unquestionable brutality.
Trade ReviewKuss has provided a comprehensive study of German military force in colonial theaters before the First World War. Her account, which covers campaigns in China, Southwest Africa, and East Africa, extends to the motivation, ideology, and training of German soldiers for colonial service; their weaponry; the injury, disease, and other environmental challenges they faced; the parliamentary politics and diplomacy of colonial warfare; and the subsequent memorialization of their service in the colonies. This is an altogether fascinating book. -- Roger Chickering, Georgetown University
This is an extraordinary work that provides many new insights into German colonial warfare. Kuss analyzes several aspects of military violence in this context that have so far been neglected. Excellent. -- Stig Förster, coeditor of
War in an Age of Revolution, 1775–1815Challenging the thesis of a significant link between Imperial German colonialism and Nazi racial policies, Kuss asserts instead that German colonial behavior was shaped by specific local conditions and that National Socialism did not turn to the colonial model to justify its ideology and behavior. Her counter-argument is provocative and persuasive. -- Dennis Showalter, author of
The Wars of German Unification
