WAR ON THE SAVANNAH: THE MILITARY COLLAPSE
OF THE SOKOTO CALIPHATE UNDER THE INVASION OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE, 1897-1903.
Risto
Marjomaa. Helsinki: The Finnish Academy of Science
and Letters, 1998. pp. 305.
Scholars have long pondered the ease
and suddenness with which the European conquest of Africa occurred during
the closing decades of the nineteenth century. Marjomaa's book, War
on the Savannah, is an attempt to grapple with this broader problem
through a focus on the British conquest of the Sokoto caliphate. Forged
under the combustive crucible of religion and militarism, the Sokoto
caliphate was the most extensive and politically formidable empire in
Africa on the eve of European conquest. Marjomaa's book is not so much
concerned with the reasons why but rather with the method of British
conquest. The study restricts itself to the traditional field of strategy
and tactics exemplified in specific military engagements or battles.
The study is divided into five sections.
The first two sections examine the strategies, tactics and tools of
warfare employed by all the parties involved. The third focuses on nine
crucial battles in the struggle for the control of the Caliphate. The
final two sections attempt to articulate the motivations that drove
rulers and soldiers to the horrors of warfare. Confronted simultaneously
by at least three European imperial powers, separated by great distances
and divided by internal squabbles, the emirates could not muster enough
resources to confront the European menace. Instead they adopted an evasive
policy, sometimes resorting to mass emigration (hijira) and hoping that
the British would eventually depart. In the ensuing encounter with British
tactics of pitched battles and artillery bombardment, the caliphate
strategy of attrition and static defense failed dismally.
The author notes that the fundamental
differences in military traditions between Caliphate and British forces
should provide fertile ground for comparative studies in weapon systems,
strategies, and in the motivations of the combatants. This emphasis
on societal contrasts, predicated on a postulated dichotomy between
the forces, breaks down on the final point: the nationalities and composition
of the combatants. Europeans did not fight on the side of Sokoto, while
Africans constituted the bulk of the British regular army (not its officer
cadres).
In explaining why the Caliphate was unable
to successfully repel British military conquest and domination, the
author maintains that the strongest British asset "was their indisputable
superiority in firepower" (p. 89). As for the Caliphate, Marjomaa
argues repeatedly that their chief undoing was an inability "to
adapt to changing circumstances" (p. 217). While some of these
points must be conceded, they cannot be pushed too far. The case of
Burmi shows that the Caliphate was not as closed to innovation as the
author seems to infer. After recovering from the shock of their initial
defeat, it took the Burmi defenders only a matter of weeks "to
envisage the same tactics, trench warfare, as European military theorists
were adopting to escape the effects of the firepower of modern weapons"
(p. 218). With this adaptation in tactics, they inflicted a major defeat
on the British forces.
That other emirates were unable to follow
the path of Burmi, was not due to "their intransigence" nor
to their "anachronistic" "inflexible" and "highly
hierarchical military organization" (p. 218). Rather, the Caliphate,
surrounded by the three imperial powers, did not have time, space or
access to the modern weapons needed for a decisive response to the British
military assault. As the Burmi experience shows, the encounter with
European heavy firepower was not always as overwhelming as scholars
have assumed. One of the lessons of modern history (from Vietnam to
Somalia) is that the possession of superior killing power does not always
guarantee victory: sometimes other non-military factors are equally
important.
Finally, Marjomaa spends much time analyzing
the aims and strategies of the British but writes very little on those
of the Caliphate authorities. He explains the motivations and tenacity
of the British officers through references to the "noble"
ideology of the civilizing mission. Yet he precludes the possibility
of any ideological vision beyond self-preservation and material interest
in explaining the "intransigence" and "stubborn"
resistance of the Caliphate. Even the possible influence of a jihadist
vision on this important Islamic state is examined in roughly two pages
(pp. 261-263) and dismissed summarily as insignificant. The author's
disclaimer, that his study is based on "source material heavily
dominated by British view," should not extenuate this imbalance
(p. 7).
These criticisms notwithstanding, Marjomaa
should be commended for producing a well-researched history of the clash
of aims and arms that resulted in the demise of the most formidable
Islamic empire in Africa. While one may not always agree with some of
his conclusions, one cannot but be impressed with the lucidity of his
account, as well as his penetrating and incisive analysis of the nature,
the muddle and the dynamism of British imperialism. This important study
should be in the library of every individual and institution with an
interest in military tactics or strategies, as well as the clash of
civilizations and cultures perceptively portrayed in this book.
Funso Afolayan
Department of History
University of New Hampshire
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