The Technology of Death

Recently I watched a documentary on the making of the Shaka Zulu miniseries. The documentary joggled my memory and made me reflect on the actual miniseries I had watched years ago. Perhaps one of the more amusing aspects of the miniseries was the way war was portrayed among the various African ethnic groups in Southern Africa. Insults were hurled across the battlefield along with the occasional spear and arrows. The death toll in the wars prior to the rise of Shaka was very low. In the miniseries, Shaka changed all that and transformed war into something much more brutal and horrible.

The arrival of the Europeans in Southern Africa also signaled the arrival of a new technology of destruction that would transform Southern Africa and the rest of the African continent. European guns and canons forced many African freedom fighters to beat their spears into plows and ask the age-old question of why the different ethnicities can’t just get along. African resistance movements armed with stone age war technology quickly learned that it simply does not make sense to bring a knife to a gunfight.

The Chinese had discovered gunpowder in the tenth century and had created cannons by the thirteenth century. The Chinese regrettably did not choose to enter the naval arms race. Far more backward and poorly resourced Europeans from the sixteenth century onward enjoyed a monopoly on the oceans with guns and cannons capable of raining down death and destruction from a distance. In his book Exterminate the Brutes, Sven Lindqvist states that Europeans became the gods of cannons that killed long before the weapons of their opponents could reach them.

Where European ships could not reach, steamers and gunboats armed with the latest weaponry sailed up rivers leaving an abundance of corpses in villages near river banks. Initially the Africans had a fighting chance against Europeans armed with the muzzle-loaded, smooth-bored, flintlock muskets. These guns had a range of only about one hundred yards, took about a minute to reload, and misfired very often. A good archer could fire faster and further.

Improvements in gun technology gradually gave European soldiers the advantage on the battlefield. The introduction of automatic weapons and the use of dumdum bullets which were prohibited in intra-European wars but allowed in colonial wars, convinced even the brave Ashanti warriors that war with the European gods of death was sheer hell that had to be avoided at all cost. The British tried all forms of provocation to draw the Ashanti on to the Battle field. The first Ashanti War of 1874-1876 had been a real eye-opener for the Ashanti nation. War with the British meant extermination and the Ashanti were not that suicidal.

The European technology of death laid the foundation for European hegemony over the African continent, India, China and the Middle East. Europe became like a death star sending wave after wave of death dealing ships, steamers, gunboats, and armies capable of killing the enemy from a safe distance. The Age of Exploration and Discovery was truly the Age of Might over Right.

While it is true that the rest of the world has lessened the gap vis-a-vis the technology of death, Europe still seems to have the upper hand. After releasing the nuclear genie from its bottle, European states have attempted to kick down the ladder with non-proliferation treaties designed to prevent nations in the Third World from developing nuclear arsenals. The only African country that came closed to developing a nuclear program was apartheid South Africa.

Notwithstanding the fact that Caucasians are the only ethnic group to have used an atomic weapon in an armed conflict, a case is still presented that favors mainly Caucasian nations as voting members in the nuclear club. The permanent members of the UN Security Council are still predominantly Caucasian. A no-vote by any of the permanent members of the UN Security Council still functions as a veto against any proposed UN action.

At this late stage of the global game of thrones that is being contested among the nations, an African country should have already joined the nuclear club. Africa needs the same kind of deterrence that North Korea has. A few strategically stationed long-range missiles capable of reaching London, Paris, Rome, Berlin, Brussels, Amsterdam, and all the other major cities of Europe would also be a plus for the African continent.

Africans know by experience the insanity of bringing a knife or a bow and arrow to a gunfight especially when the modern technology of death is being deployed. Africa and indeed the rest of the non-Caucasian world need to upgrade its military to a standard that would make invaders think twice before launching any new waves of attack. Anything less than a modern military upgrade will leave the African continent vulnerable to new incursions by those who would rob Africa and Africans of their place in the sun.

Lenrod Nzulu Baraka is the founder of Afro- Caribbean Spiritual Teaching Center and the author of The Rebirth of Black Civilization: Making Africa and the Caribbean Great Again.