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Battle for the Bundu: The First World War in East Africa
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Macmillan Publishing Co. (1974-01-31)
ISBN: 0025849301
EAN: 9780025849303
Hardcover: 353 pages
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Customer Reviews
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Battle for the Bundu - A WWI Review
Rating  (3)
Date: 2008-02-09
Battle for the Bundu by Charles Miller is a crisp piece of narrative history that explores the German and British campaigns in East Africa during World War One. The author follows the exploits of the British Army under a variety of commanders, including Jan Christiaan Smuts of Boer War fame, and an ad-hoc command of Germans under General Paul Emil von Lettow-Vorbeck.
At the forefront of Miller's narrative is an introduction to the historical background of British and German East Africa and the soldiery, the German Askaris and British KAR, that the area supplied to both sides. Though Miller often seems to rely on hyperbole, he traces the intense campaign that the British were forced to wage on the highly mobile and spirited troops of Von Lettow-Vorbeck. Miller's history explores how Von-Lettow's force of fewer than 20,000 managed to outwit, outfight and outmaneuver multiple British armies easily numbering more than twice its size.
A keystone of Miller's work is his presentation of the campaign as a "black man's war." He includes in his narrative the recruitment and training of both German and British African forces. Often times, with white officer's paralyzed by malaria or other sicknesses, the common black soldier is what holds both sides together.
A major portion of the book is dedicated to the British naval campaigns both off the coast of East Africa as well as on the interior African lakes such as Lake Tanganyika, Lake Victoria and Lake Nyasa (Lake Malawi today). Certainly the best portion of Miller's history of these naval campaigns is the blockading of the German cruiser SMS Konigsberg in the Rufiji Delta. Interestly, this major campaign, which required a variety of British vessels, including two shallow drafted monitors that had to be towed from England, is left out of other major histories. For example, Robert K. Massie's Castles of Steel, which gives overviews of the British naval campaigns in the North Sea, Mediterranean, Pacific and South Atlantic, pays no attention to the SMS Konigsberg affair.
Miller's work is filled with interesting characters from "Slim" Janie Smuts and the callous Richard Meinertzhagen to the great hunter, survivalist and scout Pieter Pretorius. Of particular interest is the story of Pretorious and his efforts to help the British root the Konigsberg out of its swampy lair. It is unfortunate that Miller focuses much of his narrative around Meinertzhagen as much of what Meinertzhagen wrote has been regarded somewhat suspiciously in recent years. How much can we attribute to Meinertzhagen's active imagination we will never know.
Unfortunately, the work does have other faults. Miller's tendency to rely on hyperbole or clumsy anecdotes spoils some of the reading. For example, Miller writes of Jan Smuts' plan to destroy Von Lettow's force that it "might be likened to the tactics of a street brawler who seizes his opponent's lapel with one hand to set him up for the blow that will put him out of the fight - whether it be an uppercut to the jaw, a kidney punch or a kick in the balls (Miller 147)." Much of the work is riddled with this sort of colorful, but ultimately unscholarly prose. At times it adds to to visceral nature of the experience of World War I bush combat. At other time it distracts from the reading.
In addition, while Von-Lettow and his British pursuers traipse over thousands of miles of East Africa, the reader does not get a sense of the people who inhabit these lands. Africans appear as a monolithic group with no distinctions between those who live north of Kilimanjaro or those who live south of it. The best description of Africans and their different cultures comes when Miller describes the creation of the British Carrier Corps.
Lastly, Miller offers descriptions of the bushland through which the opposing forces struggle. Yet his descriptions fail to allow the reader to develop a good understanding of the terrain. Are battles being fought on Savannah, scrub grass, thorny bush or in jungle? At times it is difficult to tell.
In the end, Miller's work is a good history for the average reader looking for an entertaining examination of one of World War One's lesser known campaigns. Despite its faults, the work is certainly worth reading. Serious students of history may become aggravated by Miller's narrative style, but the effort spent wading through will be worthwhile. Miller also provides an excellent bibliography for those who wish to purpose other works or perhaps look into some of the primary documents involving the campaign.
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An amazing story, brilliantly told
Rating  (5)
Date: 2005-03-22
3 out of 3 customers found this reveiw helpful
In this book, Miller tells the story of the first World War in east Africa, and he tells it well.
While shells flew and men died at the Western Front, the perfect Prussian officer, Paul Von Lettow Vorbeck led his vastly outnumbered band of German and African infantry across thousands of miles of East Africa, and come Armistice Day in 1918, his was the only German army that had not been forced to surrender.
It is a fascinating book, and particularly well researched. Miller has brought together materials from memoirs and diaries of those who took part, to military archives, making it both accurate and detailed as well as funny in parts and quite human.
The story abounds with stuffed-shirt generals, wily elephant hunters, cynical intelligence officers and singing porters. For a large part, all these characters go about prosecuting a war as if it were a game of cricket. Yes, they killed an awful lot of each other, but they always seemed remarkably gentlemanly about it.
There are many side plots, including the history of the German raider Konigsberg, which was mirrored in World War Two with the Graf Spee in the River Plate, an amazing rescue attempt by zeppelin, and a bizarre campaign to control the great lakes of Africa, which later inspired the film African Queen.
Whereas many historians and chroniclers tend to get bogged down in their subject matter, producing a somewhat dry, flat book, the reader will be pleasantly surprised with this offering, as it is full of life.
Whether you are interested in history, or just like a good read, I recommend this book to you.
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A fascinating account of an extraordinary event
Rating (5)
Date: 2004-12-24
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
When the First World War broke out, the British government believed that seizing Germany's African colonies would be accomplished quickly and painlessly. One man decided to ensure that this would not be the case. That man was Colonel von Lettow-Vorbeck, commanding officer of the German army in the colony of German East Africa. From the very start of the war until after the Armistice was signed in Europe, von Lettow led his mixed army of Germans and native Africans (mostly the latter!) on an odyssey around East Africa, tying down a large British army, and refusing to be beaten. This is the story of the Kaiser's African soldiers, and their brilliant leader.
This is a great book! The author takes what is a forgotten chapter of world history, and spins a fascinating tale of action and adventure. The book is thick and quite informative, but more than that the author succeeds in making the story interesting and even periodically humorous. So, if you want to read a fascinating account of an extraordinary event in world history, then you must get this book. I give this book an enthusiastic two thumbs up!
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A well written book about a facinating chapter of WWI
Rating  (4)
Date: 1998-06-30
8 out of 8 customers found this reveiw helpful
An incredible story about German resistence to British invasion in East Africa during the 1st world war. What started as a beach landing calculated to force the German to surrender overnight, ended four years later with an undefeated German army surrendering to a British army that had not defeated them! This book is full of hard-to-believe stories. Once you start reading you will not put it down.
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Amazon.com's Price:$24.99
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