Quote Originally Posted by wm View Post
You noted you're rereading Pakenham's book on the Boer War. I suspect we could find some interesting analogies from the 1880s to the early 1900s in South Africa as well. While never explicitly stated as such AFAIK, isn't something like a neutral zone part of what the Boers were after in both their conflicts with the British Empire?
Essentially yes at least when you limit discussion to the old school Boers like Oom Paul Kruger. The original trek was to get away from the Anglos and do as they the Boers wished. Where that came into conflict with the Empire was when gold and diamonds were discovered. The magnates like Cecil Rhodes and Alfred Beit sought British control because they saw it more in line with their own interests. An irony that Packenham brings out is that the mine owners felt the Boers were making them pay the Africans too much to work the mines. One of the Empire's claims was always that it sought to protect the interest of the Africans and non-whites against Boer abuses.

The wild card played in the struggle were the Uitlanders (outsiders) who flocked to the mines and they included the gamut of Europeans, Americans, Canadians, and Australians. The Boers sought to control their influence by not giving them the vote; a logical step since they outnumbered the Boers. Empire builders like Milner as well as Rhodes and Beit saw the franchise as the means to end Boer control. Once diamonds and gold were discovered, the Boer vision of a volks land was doomed.

Tom