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1. The Extent and Effects of German-Boer Collaboration During the First World War: A Comprehensive and Chronological Analysis

Author:
Christian De Jager
Publication Date:
09-2017
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
The Boer Rebellion of 1914 provides a fascinating example of how ethno-linguistic bonds can directly influence the development and formation of pragmatic military and political alliances. What had begun in the late nineteenth century as reciprocal perceptions of shared ethnic heritage had, by the fall of 1914, developed into an official military and political alliance between the German Empire and the Boers of South Africa. Contributing to scholarship in colonial military and cultural history, this essay offers an original interpretation of the often misrepresented and under-studied extent and effects of German-Boer collaboration during the First World War. The author makes use of sources in English, Afrikaans and German to provide a comprehensive account of the events, concluding that German-Boer collaboration was remarkably extensive and ultimately decisive for the course of the South-West Africa campaign and demonstrating the important link between military decision-making and cultural and political structures.
Topic:
Diplomacy, Military Strategy, Alliance, and Cultural Diplomacy
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, South Africa, and Germany

2. At the Edges of the Map: The Chronotope of Informatics and Maps of Human Terrain

Author:
Riley Collins and Sabrina Peric
Publication Date:
08-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
Cultural data gathered by researchers has provided militaries across the globe with intelligence and a unique insight into a category of analysis that is not normally given primacy in military strategic planning. Such data has been used in the past; it was used during World War Two to gain insight into the Japanese mind; it was used during British Colonial pacification efforts in Northern Africa; and it is again used today by the U.S. armed forces’ Human Terrain Teams to understand and relay cultural expectations and needs of occupied communities. This paper examines how the U.S. forces relate to an idea of culture for consumption as intelligence through an analysis of the Human Terrain Teams Handbook. Through this lens, we show how the U.S. armed forces condition members of Human Terrain Teams to interact with and think about local cultures in certain ways that are operationally relevant to military activities.
Topic:
Intelligence, Military Strategy, and Culture
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, Japan, Asia, and North Africa

3. Revisiting Africa in Canadian Security Planning & Assessment

Author:
Christopher Roberts and Tim Stapleton
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
During the Second World War, Canadian expeditionary forces played a proportionally significant role in the war in Europe, but, just like the First World War, Canada avoided or was not asked to consider deployment of land forces in any significant way to African theatres of operations. Not since the South African War (also known as the Second Anglo-Boer War) of 1899-1902 had Canadian-raised combat arms units been sent to the continent. Between 1956 and 1969, however, Africa became an active theatre of operations for the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF), but in substantially new roles: peacekeeping (Suez, Congo) and military training and assistance outside the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) (Ghana, Tanzania and Nigeria). Africa was the experimental lab for both of these new taskings, and the first time Canadians served alongside, under, or trained soldiers from newly independent African states. Canada’s early engagement with post-colonial Africa was led by security, commercial, and world order considerations, with the CAF and not official humanitarian and/or development assistance at the forefront. Where commercial and security concerns characterized Canada’s initial activity (1955-1965), between 1965 and 1975 development, “facilitated by, rather than caused by, the public’s increasing responsiveness to the humane internationalism of the era,” came to dominate Canada-Africa relations.1 From one of the lowest contributors to foreign aid on a proportional Gross National Product basis in the early 1960s, Canada had surpassed many other major and minor Western donors by the middle of the 1970s.2 Not unrelatedly, the 1970s also marked a nadir of Canadian defence spending, with the CAF shrinking in personnel, its presence in Europe halved, and its ships, aircraft, vehicles, and even small arms aging without replacement. Under Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau, from 1968 to 1979, the government’s international fiscal envelope skewed spending heavily towards development at the expense of defence. Peacekeeping – or at least support for “Collective Measures for maintenance of peace and security embodied in the Charter of the United Nations”3 – that rated first mention in the 1964 White Paper on Defence – dropped to last in the foreign policy priorities articulated in the 1970 foreign policy overhaul, Foreign Policy for Canadians,4 and the subsequent 1971 White Paper on Defence. Military training assistance efforts shrank to a care and maintenance basis in the 1970s, totalling less than 0.25% of Canada’s growing annual foreign aid budget.5 Kilford concludes his chapter on the winding down of military assistance in the early 1970s with the observation that it took thirty years (until the early 2000s) “before the funds allocated for military assistance even came close to the amount spent in the 1960s.”6 These periodic shifts that privileged defence/security over development, or development over defence/security (to use two of the “3Ds” of diplomacy, defence, and development now in regular use), have represented a somewhat regular thematic influence in Canadian relations with Africa. At times, especially during the “human security” era of the late 1990s, development and security were seen as complementary. In the mid-2010s, however, there is wide consensus that security, development, and governance are the three crucial interlocking pillars required to underpin Africa’s economic prosperity, human empowerment, and regional stability. In other words, one cannot be prioritized at the expense of the others if any kind of long-term stability is the goal of local and international stakeholders. Over fifty years of pursuing development and conflict-management in Africa and fifteen years of doing the same in Afghanistan have produced agreement on the three pillars but no consensus about how to go about cultivating them concurrently. Many good intentions around state-building, poverty alleviation, humanitarian intervention, and conflict amelioration have foundered on the shoals of the hard reality of political and economic complexity and vested interests, both local and international. This is the conundrum which lies behind this “African security” themed issue of the Journal of Military and Strategic Studies. It follows a workshop the editors co-chaired, in June 2016 at the University of Calgary, on the precise theme of “Revisiting Africa in Canadian security planning and assessment,” an initiative which grew out of that conundrum.7 As Canada signals it will again increase its involvement in addressing African security and development challenges,8 the workshop examined the difficulties in mobilizing consensus around what Canada and other external actors can and should do, as well as some of the multifaceted security challenges facing contemporary Africa, from terrorism and transnational criminal networks to political elites who are not that interested in deepening constitutionalism. This collection of essays showcases the research and insights of a handful of the over thirty participants at the June workshop.9
Topic:
Security, Military Strategy, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:
Africa, Canada, and North America

4. Challenges to Contemporary Peace Support Operations in Africa

Author:
Marina Caparini
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
This article examines the significant challenges faced by the numerous and large PSOs in Africa including the involvement of non-state actors within fragile states, the rising expectation to focus on protection of civilians without appropriate resources, African suspicions of neo-colonial agendas by Western powers and the pursuit of ambitious yet vague mandates.
Topic:
Post Colonialism, Peacekeeping, Fragile States, and Civilians
Political Geography:
Africa

5. Networked security between “restraint” and “responsibility”? Germany’s security policy towards Africa

Author:
Ulf Engel
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
Ulf Engel assesses the recent evolution of German security policy towards and engagement in Africa which should serve as a useful comparative model for Canada. Notably, in 2014 the German government adopted a comprehensive and networked approach through its Africa Policy Guidelines which is something completely lacking in Canada.
Topic:
Security, International Cooperation, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, Canada, Germany, and North America

6. Critical Perspectives on Transnational Criminality in West Africa

Author:
Kwesi Aning and Lydia Amedzrator
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
This is an overview of the impact and challenge of transnational organized crime which often overlaps with Islamist insurgency in West Africa. Although these developments threaten the foundations of the state in West Africa, the regional Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) has been unable to deal with the situation. Canadian policy makers pondering a troop commitment to Mali should pay particular attention to this piece.
Topic:
Crime, Insurgency, Fragile States, and transnationalism
Political Geography:
Africa, West Africa, and Mali

7. Insecurity implications of unconstitutional changes of government in Africa: from military to constitutional coups

Author:
Pacifique Manirakiza
Publication Date:
10-2016
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
This article investigates the AU’s approach to mitigating unconstitutional changes of government. While military coup d’état’s were once the most common form of regime change on the continent, the post-Cold War democratization process and the adoption of anti-coup diplomatic interventionist policies by the AU have reduced this phenomenon. However, it remains uncertain as to the effectiveness of the AU in curtailing the new trend of undermining African democracy by manipulating national legal structures so as to extend the life of a regime.
Topic:
Democratization, Regime Change, Coup, and African Union
Political Geography:
Africa

8. The Military And The Challenge Of Democratic Consolidation In Nigeria: Positive Skepticism And Negative Optimism

Author:
Emmanuel O. Ojo
Publication Date:
03-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
This paper is an attempt to consider the role of the military in Nigeria's democratic transitions. The paper has one major thrust – an in-depth analysis of military role in democratic transitions in Nigeria - the fundamental question, however, is: can the military ever be expected or assumed to play any major role in building democracy? The reality on the ground in Africa is that the military as an institution has never been completely immune from politics and the role of nation-building. However, whether they have been doing that perfectly or not is another question entirely which this paper shall address.
Topic:
Democratization
Political Geography:
Africa and Nigeria

9. The Terrorist Threat in North-West Africa: Part One

Author:
J. G. Gilmour
Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
After recently returning from the Republic of Mali in West Africa, it became clear that a security risk now exists in the Sahel region of this vast region. The Sahel is an arid belt of land on the Sahara Desert's southern fringe that spans Africa from Senegal to the west, to parts of Ethiopia in the east. Its remoteness lends itself to the establishment of either fixed or temporary bases used by terrorist groups for the purposes of training, logistics or command and control functions.
Topic:
Security
Political Geography:
Africa

10. The Security Dilemma in Northeast Mali: Part Two

Author:
J. G. Gilmour
Publication Date:
10-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Journal of Military and Strategic Studies
Institution:
Centre for Military, Security and Strategic Studies
Abstract:
Prior to last March, Mali was deemed to be by most Western countries as one of the most democratic, stable and peaceful nations in Western Africa. The Malian President Amadou Toumani Toure had only another month of office before he stepped down and elections were to be held throughout the country.
Political Geography:
Africa