Imperial Reckoning

“The Expansion of Europe during the last century has been the story of crime and violence against backward people under the cloak of protective civilization.” - Captain Richard Meinertzhagen

The Untold Story of Britain’s Gulag in Kenya

By: Caroline Elkins

Railways

• Symbol of imperial achievement – By 20th Century - Crossed all over Asia & Africa– Part of British Colonial Domination

• Required large amounts of money & labor– Dangerous

• Uganda Railway– Major railway being built - exploited Africa’s labor &

resources

• Sir Charles Elliot -- didn’t see potential in Kenya– Too few people -> “black & uncivilized” – Africa can’t pay for railroad or become major cash-crop

producers

Westernization of Africa

Kenya

Kenya• WWII -- Brought changes to Kenya

– Unleashed & exposed inequality of British colonization

• Kenya Colony (under British rule)– Increase colony’s production & use of railroads:

• Britain launched campaign to attract settlers to Kenya– Plenty of cheap land, abundant labor & potential profit– Thousands responded & migrated to Kenya - in search of easy $

» Many white colonists -- came to take advantage of cheap land & labor… & to not work (leisure)

• Drained Kenya’s limited resources

– Imperialism• Cultural & political

• Kenya - 1950– On verge of one of the bloodiest & most extensive wars of

decolonization fought in British 20th Century

Social Darwinism

• Western views towards Africans– Inferior

• Smaller brains• Limited capacity to feel pain or emotion• Different nutritional needs (lesser portions)• Had to be controlled (aggressive & unpredictable)

– Foundation for Western’s inhumane & brutal treatment of Africans

– Used as an excuse to justify their actions within Africa

Kenya’s Deterioration• Mrs. A. M. Wright & Senior Chief Waruhiu

– Stabbed by assassins - Police suspected Mau Mau

• Mau Mau– Anti-European & atavistic– Two major Mau Mau strikes - Brutal & vicious – Organized operation providing intelligence, weapons, & food

• Jomo Kenyatta – Mastermind behind Mau Mau assassinations

• Operation Jock Scott (code name)– Directed at Kenyatta & 180 other identified leaders of the Mau Mau

• Kenyan policemen arrested them all

– Leadership in Mau Mau passed to younger generations - & led to more violence

– British soldiers brought in all over to patrol– Put Kenyatta & other men on trial

• Focused on Kenyatta (lacked evidence) - found guilty anyway -set to live in isolation

• Found guilty & set to live in isolation for rest of life

Transit Camps• Transit Camps (Kenya’s Gulag)

– Held thousands of Kikuyu - in poor conditions• Overcrowded, malnutrition, dirty, diseases (typhoid epidemic, dysentery,

diarrhea)

– Set out to annihilate the Kikuyu population– Similar to Hitler’s concentration camps -- treatment & racist basis

• Forced labor (Working Party) - such as 37 mile irrigation system

– A “pipeline” of camps (system of camps) - known as “The Pipeline”• Based on the “principles of organized terror, violence, & degradation”

• Screening– Interrogation of Kikuyu (men, women, & children) in transit camps– Attempted to persuade people into confessing to Mau Mau affiliations

• Branded as dangerous - shipped to detention camps & reserves

• Screening Teams– Teams of interrogators – Ruthless in pursuit of information (not a secret to Kenya or Britain)

• Brutal & bloody - beat/torture many (to death)

Rehabilitation Program• Mau Mau

– Treated by colonial government as prisoners of war– Not given any trial

• Rehabilitation – Used to colonize the Kikuyu people & lead them away

from the Mau Mau and towards Western civilization – “Colonial government’s campaign for the hearts and

minds of the Kikuyu”– Strategy for reconstructing Malayan society – Presumed Britain’s moral superiority over the Kikuyu– Communal labor (forced upon prisoners)

• Colonial government - argued it benefited the community & Africans enjoyed it (false)

– British portrayed it as a success (really a huge disaster)

Within the Camps• Communication was prohibited between detainees

– Still tried to communicate without the knowledge of the guards

• Detainees – Desperate - starving & weak

• Willing to do anything to save themselves - many became informants & surrenders

– Extortion• Used if detainees didn’t give in - threatened family & property

• Rehabilitation– Different than the rehabilitation program– Prisoners secretly held literary, survival skills & Bible classes-

punished if caught

• Oathing ceremonies (rituals)– Religious - united people before they were detained– People were often killed if they refused to take the oath

• Anticolonial struggle (within the Pipeline)– Resistance movements

The Pipeline• Detainees

– Many buckled under pressure & deprivation - agreed to work– Were separated into cooperators and noncooperators

• Noncooperators (“The Hard Core”) - suppose to be exiled

– Feared death - by: sexual/physical abuse, poor conditions, starvation, or execution

– Many wrote letters reflecting on the brutal Pipeline• If caught with letters (“letter smugglers”) - punished• Guards tried to prevent letters (expose truth) from leaving camps

– Burial gangs• Detainees forced to dig burial holes for Kikuyu who died - gruesome

– Worst punishment

– Nearly all children born in camps died - given no care

• Kenyatta– Refused to participate in prison politics - angered detainees– Eventually joined forces with the colonialists and became part of the

screening teams - similar to surrenders

Villagization• Villagization

– Process removing Kikuyu from their homesteads and into huts

• Surrounded by barbed wire & spiked trenches• Worked similarly to detention camps - forced labor

– An attempt to cut off supply lines to the forest - worked– Separated many families in the process– Home Guards & YY

• Brutalized women - sexually harassed & raped - tortured & humiliated

– Often forced detainees to watch their families deaths & bury them– Many women attempted to escape - faced death if caught

• Illness– Anyone who fell ill would die - just a matter of how long

Misperception• 1955

– A thousand detainees were being released every month• No room in the reserves

• Reserves– Altered by Johnson to accommodate 150,000 more Kikuyu – Brought back detainees (reunited many families)

• Brutality in Kenya– High level officials within Britain were fully aware (as well

as many back home) & chose not to act

• Western Population– Convinced that Mau Mau were slaughtering thousands of

Europeans in Kenya & Britain was the good guy – Told their actions were just & holy - nonviolent

Outrage, Suppression, & Silence

• British Government– Excused inhumane actions - claiming “that’s war”– Denied allegations of brutality by victims

• Operation Progress (ironic) – Used to break remaining detainees in The Pipeline using

the most extreme violence ever seen in Kenya• Worked on most - led to confession (couldn’t bare the torture)

• European Convention – Argued that during the state of a national emergency

(Kenya) the Human Rights Treaty was to be disregarded

• Pipeline– Riots breaking out - suppressed through violence

Exposure of Brutality

• Unjust brutality– Many cases coming to light - European government made

excuses to cover up their actions (situation worsened in Kenya)

• Britain fought to avoid an independent investigation (uncover truth)

• Investigation– Representatives of the African detainees saw the truth &

reported back to Britain - led to outrage– “The Hola Massacre”

• 10 detainees were brutally beat to death & British officials claimed they died through water contamination

– Truth was exposed to the world through private investigation - validated years of allegations

“We consider this the most brutal and inhumane treatment ever compared to the Nazi concentration camp. As we have nowhere to appeal we now appeal to the High Court of World Public Opinion”

- Remaining detainees

Hundreds of thousands killed