1914–1918: (Africa in the First World War — German Territories Invaded, Von Lettow-Vorbeck’s Remarkable Campaign of Attrition Through East Africa, 750,000 to…

1914–1918: (Africa in the First World War — German Territories Invaded, Von Lettow-Vorbeck’s Remarkable Campaign of Attrition Through East Africa, 750,000 to One Million Africans Forced into Service as Porters with One in Five Dying, 150,000 West Africans Dispatched to the Western Front, Conscription Known as the Blood Tax, the 1918–1919 Influenza Epidemic, and the War as the Concluding Phase of the Scramble): The First World War erupted when most colonial states were attempting to consolidate — in some areas it can be considered the end of Africa’s long nineteenth century and the concluding phase of the Scramble. German Togo and Cameroon were invaded in late 1914, with Cameroon’s fighting dragging on until 1916. German South West Africa was swiftly occupied by South African forces who would not leave for over seventy years. In eastern Africa the fighting was most bitter — the German commander von Lettow-Vorbeck led his troops on a remarkable campaign of attrition through Mozambique, Nyasaland, and northeastern Rhodesia, remaining essentially undefeated and only surrendering upon hearing of the armistice in November 1918. Between 750,000 and one million Africans were forced into service as porters, with around one in five dying mostly from disease. Scorched-earth tactics ravaged local economies, and the influenza epidemic of 1918–1919 swept across western, central, and eastern Africa with unprecedented devastation. Most soldiers on both sides were African under tiny numbers of European officers. The French dispatched 150,000 West Africans to the Western Front, of whom thirty thousand were killed — the experience of combat in Europe was politicizing for survivors. Conscription itself became known bitterly as the blood tax, and French campaigns to suppress resistance to recruitment actually brought the Scramble to a conclusion in areas of French West Africa not fully subjugated since the 1880s and 1890s.