Genocide
General Trotha stated his proposed solution to end the resistance of the Herero people in a letter, before the Battle of Waterberg:
| “ | "I believe that the nation as such should be annihilated, or, if this was not possible by tactical measures, have to be expelled from the country...This will be possible if the water-holes from Grootfontein to Gobabis are occupied. The constant movement of our troops will enable us to find the small groups of nation who have moved backwards and destroy them gradually." | ” |
Trotha's troops defeated 3,000–5,000 Herero combatants at the Battle of Waterberg on 11–12 August 1904 but were unable to encircle and eliminate the retreating survivors.
The pursuing German forces prevented groups of Herero from breaking from the main body of the fleeing force and pushed them further into the desert, and as exhausted Herero fell to the ground unable to go on, German soldiers acting on orders killed men, women and children. Jan Cloete, acting as a guide for the Germans, witnessed the atrocities committed by the German troops and deposed the following statement:
| “ | "I was present when the Herero were defeated in a battle in the vicinity of Waterberg. After the battle all men, women, and children who fell into German hands, wounded or otherwise, were mercilessly put to death. Then the Germans set off in pursuit of the rest, and all those found by the wayside and in the sandveld were shot down and bayoneted to death. The mass of the Herero men were unarmed and thus unable to offer resistance. They were just trying to get away with their cattle." | ” |
A portion of the Herero escaped the Germans and went to the Omaheke Desert, hoping to reach British territory of Bechuanaland; less than 1,000 reached Bechuanaland, where they were granted asylum. To prevent them from returning, Trotha ordered the desert to be sealed off. German patrols later found skeletons around holes 13 m (approx. 40 ft) deep that had been dug in a vain attempt to find water. Maherero and between 500 to 1,500 men crossed the Kalahari into Bechuanaland where he was accepted as a vassal of the Batswana chief Sekgoma.
On 2 October, Trotha issued a warning to the Hereros :
| “ | I, the great general of the German soldiers, send this letter to the Hereros. The Hereros are German subjects no longer. They have killed, stolen, cut off the ears and other parts of the body of wounded soldiers, and now are too cowardly to want to fight any longer. I announce to the people that whoever hands me one of the chiefs shall receive 1,000 marks, and 5,000 marks for Samuel Maherero. The Herero nation must now leave the country. If it refuses, I shall compel it to do so with the 'long tube' (cannon). Any Herero found inside the German frontier, with or without a gun or cattle, will be executed. I shall spare neither women nor children. I shall give the order to drive them away and fire on them. Such are my words to the Herero people.
He further gave orders that: This proclamation is to read to the troops at roll-call, with the addition that the unit that catches a captain will also receive the appropriate reward, and that the shooting at women and children is to be understood as shooting above their heads, so as to force them to run . I assume absolutely that this proclamation will result in taking no more male prisoners, but will not degenerate into atrocities against women and children. The latter will run away if one shoots at them a couple of times. The troops will remain conscious of the good reputation of the German soldier. |
” |
Trotha gave orders that captured Herero males were to be executed, while women and children were to be driven into the desert where their death from starvation and thirst was to be certain; Trotha argued that there was no need to make exceptions for Herero women and children, since these would "infect German troops with their diseases", the insurrection Trotha explained "is and remains the beginning of a racial struggle". German soldiers regularly raped young Herero women before killing them or letting them die in the desert After the war, von Trotha argued that his orders were necessary writing in 1909 that "If I had made the small water holes accessible to the womenfolk, I would run the risk of an African catastrophe comparable to the Battle of Beresonia"
The German general staff was aware of the atrocities that were taking place; its official publication, named Der Kampf, noted that:
| “ | This bold enterprise shows up in the most brilliant light the ruthless energy of the German command in pursuing their beaten enemy. No pains, no sacrifices were spared in eliminating the last remnants of enemy resistance. Like a wounded beast the enemy was tracked down from one water-hole to the next, until finally he became the victim of his own environment. The arid Omaheke was to complete what the German army had begun: the extermination of the Herero nation. | ” |
Alfred von Schlieffen who served as Chief of the Imperial German General Staff approved of von Trotha's intentions in terms of a "racial struggle" and the need to "wipe out the entire nation or to drive them out of the country", but had doubts about his strategy, preferring their surrender.
Governor Leutwein, later relieved of his duties, complained to Chancellor Bernhard von Bülow about Trotha's actions, seeing the general's orders as intruding upon the civilian colonial jurisdiction and ruining any chance of a political settlement. According to Professor Mahmood Mamdani from Columbia University, opposition to the policy of annihilation was largely the consequence of the fact that colonial officials looked at the Herero people as potential source of labor, thus economically important. For instance, Governor Leutwein wrote that:
| “ | "I do not concur with those fanatics who want to see the Herero destroyed altogether...I would consider such a move a grave mistake from an economic point of view. We need the Herero as cattle breeders...and especially as labourers. | ” |
Having no authority over the military, Chancellor Bülow could only advise Wilhelm II that Trotha's actions were "contrary to Christian and humanitarian principle, economically devastating and damaging to Germany's international reputation."
Upon the arrival of new orders at the end of 1904, prisoners were herded into concentration camps and given by the German state to private companies as slave labourers, and exploited as human guinea pigs in medical experiments
Read more about this topic: Herero And Namaqua Genocide