Chapter 224: The Darkening Continent
Extracts from a report to the Duma Military-Foreign joint committee on Africa.
At the direction of his Imperial Majesty, the following summary report on the current powers and actors on the African Continent is provided for your consideration.
Overall Evaluation: Africa is currently wracked by a continent spanning conflict. This war pits the Internationale powers and their local proxies, individually the best armed forces on the continent, against two co-belligerent factions, namely the Entente and Mittelafrikan aligned powers. The local powers of Egypt and Abyssinia are both currently neutral, though it is suspected that they may seek to capitalise should the conflict continue unresolved.
Red Africa (c. 90-100 divisions):
Before the commencement of Operation Mercury, the African continent saw the second highest commitment of combat manpower by the Internationale outside American and the Canadian-American war.
Given the rapidity of the collapse of red forces in Europe, our enemies have not had sufficient time to withdraw their armies from this region, and so are believed to still have a majority of their forces in place, though responsibility for their supply now lies with the Americans.
Red forces can generally be split into two groupings, their local proxies, and their zones of direct control.
The Internationale’s original approach to seizing the African continent relied on the use of local Syndicalist proxies, supplied with foreign equipment. With their support, uprisings were commenced in Algeria, the Sahel, the Benikongo, German East Africa, and South Africa (to name only the major uprisings).
Of these, the Alegerian, East African, and South African uprisings have all been conclusively military suppressed. In the Sahel and Benikongo however, European armed black Syndicalist insurgents continue to exercise defacto control over stretches of territory. These groups are not formally allied with the Internationale, but received significant support from it prior to the fall of France.
The Sahel region is both the more powerful and more endangered of the remaining local regimes. Lacking any real industrial base and facing the resurgent Entente forces, it is unlikely that the approximately 150,000 fighters fielded by the region (including approximately 40,000 foreign volunteers) will be able to continue conventional resistance indefinitely. The regime is known to be suffering badly from the demographic limitations of the region, and the collapse in foreign volunteer rates may speed its demise, though the recent landing of more Commune forces on the Liberian border may support the Sahel Front.
While weaker, with perhaps only 100,000 men and even less industry, the Benikongo benefits from its position at the far edge of the Mittelafrikan empire and the more distracted nature of its opponents. Without any dramatic change in local conditions, we expect this area to continue its struggle into 1943.
Much more significant in military terms are the areas of the former French Empire in Africa which are now directly occupied by the conventional military forces of the Commune of France and the Americans.
Within this perimeter, the Commune of France has established Libreville as a destination of choice for ships carrying evacuees from Continental Europe. The territory contains an approximate 45-55 red divisions, sitting at the edge of a supply line that extends all the way to America. A second concentration of Commune forces is known to be present in Freetown in support of the Sahel uprising, and a collection of British forces are fighting a defensive action in Totalist Morocco.
It is worth noting that the Commune forces present in this occupied section of Africa include some of the best formations the Sorelians could raise. The Commune’s marines, and a number of elite infantry formations, are believed to be at the forefront of the fighting against Mittelafrika, not America.
Overall Assessment: Taken as a unit, the revolutionary forces are the largest, and perhaps most capable military force in Africa. Until the commencement of Mercury, Internationale forces were making steady progress in Gabon and were growing close to linking up with the Benikongo uprising while also pushing back Goering’s forces in Central Africa.
While the indigenous forces are comparatively lower in quality than the French, British, and American units, they provide considerable mass to the red forces and have required Germanic and French resources to stretch in response.
With the fall of France, these African holdings have taken on existential importance for the Commune of France, as evidence suggests the creation of an exile Government in Gabon.
However, the Internationale forces in Africa face considerable challenges not shared by their opponents.
Unlike the other power blocs in Africa, they have extremely limited local domestic industry and economical capability. Coupled with the vast distances and woeful local infrastructure, the Internationale has not been able to concert its superior military resources into rapid territorial gains.
The viability of ongoing red operations in Africa relies on an unbroken sea connection to the Americas that is only guarded by the Republican Navy.
Germanic Africa ( c. 40 divisions)
Mittelafrika:
Under the leadership of Stadtholder Herman Goering, the German empire in Africa has been in a state of semi-legal rebellion against the Authority of the Konigsberg government since the fall of Berlin to the reds.
With its capital in Dar es Salaam, the state is in reality more of a composite of multiple colonial states and allied tribes, over which Goering and his Government exercise varying degrees of control. The state had achieved profitability and a degree of self sufficiency in basic military products prior to the outbreak of war, and has thus been able to generally sustain itself over the last several years of conflict. It should be noted however that this financial position is secured by the economic exploitation of 'hostile' tribes and groups and the nationalisation of many extractive industries.
Militarily, the Mittelafrikan regime has changed as a result of its successful counter-revolutionary campaigns in its heartlands. The trend towards the use of primarily white settler troops has been reversed, and instead Askari units and the wholesale deployment of ‘allied’ tribal personnel in militia units has become more common, causing the army to swell from 9 to 40 divisions in the last 18 months. This rate of growth is likely to be maintained should the strategy of the authorities in Dar es Salaam be continued.
The overwhelming priority of the regime recently has been the containment of the Internationale forces to its West. To this end, the Mittelafrikans have employed a combination of conventional military operations and ‘afrikanised’ warfare, inspired by their native and Boer allies. Captured Internationale intelligence sources suggest deep frustration with Mittelafrikan techniques, including guerrilla actions, deep raids, and the exploitation of divisions between ethnic, linguistic, or kin groups in order to secure recruits and undermine unity in the revolutionary camp.
Overall Evaluation: Essentially a rogue province, Mittelafrika’s drift towards ideological extremism appears to have been tempered by the demands of the current conflict, which has forced it into greater employment of local personnel. Treatment of ‘hostile’ groups however remains extremely severe, now that legal checks from Berlin are no longer in place and it is believed that forced labour and harsh repressions are common in parts of the country while
being all but unknown in others. The military has shown itself to be flexible and reasonably well adapted to African conditions.
Militarily, Mittelafrikan forces are likely sufficient to slow the advance of Internationale forces in the near term, while in the longer term its Industrial capacity may prove decisive.
The security of the territory will be significantly driven by the attitude of the Imperial Governments in Berlin and Saint Petersburg, as well as its potentially opportunistic neighbours to the North East.
Mittelafrika’s only ally on the African continent, the South African state has undergone dramatic changes over the last few years, shaped by perhaps the most brutal recorded Syndicalist uprising anywhere in the world.
Isolated from its former entente allies and less familiar with counter-insurgency fighting than Mittelafrika, South Africa was fertile ground for syndicalist agitation amongst the native African population in 1940.
It is interesting to note that the revolution in South Africa, despite nominally being led by the so called “African National Congress” was substantially less organised and centrally controlled than the uprisings in the Sahel, Benikongo, or central Mittelafrika. Organised military formations were supplemented with small militias and bands of looters, raiders, and insurgents. These groups would greatly magnify the human suffering caused by the revolutionary conflict.
At their most successful, these various rebel groups occupied approximately 80 percent of the South African landmass and displaced approximately 40 percent of the white population through the occupation of a number of major cities and population centres.
The South African Government reports that a number of massacres took place during this period, including the confirmed instances of sexual violence and execution against the civilian populations of entire towns. Bands of ‘machete rebels’ and looters are claimed to have swept through small population centres, looting, burning, and murdering, taking advantage of the power vacuum caused by the more organised and disciplined red-African paramilitaries.
It was the disastrous early conduct of this war, coupled with the outright assassination of numerous political figures by the ANC, that caused the collapse of the South African Government.
In its place, paramilitary organisations and militias grew significantly in influence In particular, the Ossewabrandwag (OB), a paramilitary organisation with links to Dar es Salam, played a significant role in both raising its own independent formations to reclaim lost territory, and in furnishing recruits for the regular army.
The elections that lead to the elevation of the current van Rensburg government were a direct result of the influence of the OB militias, and the promise that, while the Entente was unwilling to aid South Africa’s whites, Mittelafrika would. Held in the small pockets of the nation still controlled by the Government and shaped by these militias and a climate of fear, the election handed the current Government a legal majority which it has used to undertake considerable legal reform and harsh military action.
Since taking power, the van Rensburg Government has led a singularly brutal fightback that first virtually eliminated the ANC, and now includes the contribution of fighting men to the Mittelafrikan cause against the Internationale.
The details of the campaign against the ANC are deliberately obscured by the South Africans themselves, however a few points can be expressed with confidence to the Duma.
- Official Government statistics claim that approximately 500,000 “ANC fighters” have been killed by the Government since the beginning of the uprising.
- Intelligence suggests this number may both be miscategorised (by the inclusion of civilians) and a potential underestimate.
- The new Government has expressed the view that South Africa can not be a secure homeland for its non-African population as long as they remain in the minority. It has thus committed to achieving black-minority status over significant portions of the country.
- It has thus become the policy of the South African Government to encourage or compel African tribal, ethnic, or kin groups not effusively supportive of the Government to emigrate to designated ‘homelands’ in Mittelafrikan territory.
- Despite apparent military defeat, the Government asserts that the ANC remains a threat and, arrests, internments, and executions, and military counter-insurgency operations have continued, with the number of persons incarcerated and compelled to forced labour having grown continuously even according to official statistics.
Overall Assessment: South Africa is a moderately significant military actor on the continent, closely aligned to Dar es Salaam. The OB influenced government operates an ethnically discriminatory policy and appears to be actively seeking to reshape the demographics of their territory to the detriment of the black-African population. This policy will place a significant limitation on the nation’s potential allies, and the upper limits of its potential military mobilisation.
Entente Africa (41 Divisions):
The Junta in French Africa has recovered from the intense territorial losses and casualties caused by the Algerian, Sahel, and Bedouin uprisings and regained most of its lost territories over the course of 1942.
This recovery has only been possible due to the largesse of outside forces. Approximately a third of Petain’s army is made up of Australasian and Indian allies, another third of indigenous recruits. The militarisation of state industry and absence of exports has caused the Junta to run up extensive debts and its financial viability is currently tied to the ongoing provision of loans and military supply assistance by our Government.
That said, the industrial capabilities of the territory are non-negligible, with the primary limitations being the availability of reliable manpower. The resources available to the Junta have been sufficient to end the Alegerian uprising and it appears that a counterattack against the Totalists in Morocco (supported by Britain) may have a reasonable chance to succeed if foreign support continues to be forthcoming.
Critically, it is not known how the exile population of the state will respond to the destruction of the Commune. The question of return by individuals poses a question for the Imperial Government, and a potential manpower challenge for the Petain regime.
In the near term however, a second military collapse by the Algiers regime seems unlikely so long as financial support continues.
The Cairo Pact (42 Divisions):
Dominating the territories running from Libya to our holdings on the Suez, the Cairo Pact powers of Egypt and Libya must be accounted for in any assessment of the African situation.
While somewhat backwards technically and marred by corruption, the Egyptian regime in particular is known to have comparable industrial output to the Algiers regime, an army of approximately equivalent size, and has not suffered the cost of recent casualties or the devastation of its territory.
It is believed that the Egyptians' intentions may have been to seek concessions in relations to the Suez from us in the event that war between Russian and the Commune went badly. This suspicion has its only basis in intercepted Egyptian diplomatic cables and is not suitable for disclosure by members of this committee.
Officially however, Egypt has reinforced a neutral stance towards Russia recently and has instead begun redeploying military forces to face both National France in North Africa (via Libya) and against Mittelafrika in the South. While no declarations of hostility have been made, it is suspected that the Cairo Pact may act in a militaristically opportunistic fashion should it ever become convinced that easy gains might be made (for example, in the case of a Mittelafrikan collapse).
Abyssinia (21 divisions):
Under the leadership of its Monarch, Haile Selassie, Ethiopia has undertaken some modernisation efforts in the last several years and was among the powers to capitalise on the reduction of German influence on the continent.
With its unilateral cancellation of debts to Germany after the fall of Berlin, scope has opened up in the Ethiopian budget to, coupled with social and legal reforms, establish a decently sized army approximately a quarter million strong.
The nation lacks the technology or industry of its Cairo pact neighbour or of Mittelafrika, but it also enjoys a degree of strategic initiative, given that both of its neighbours must concern themselves with threats to their other borders.
While Imperial intelligence sources do not predict imminent hostile action by Ethiopia, it is included in this report because the potential exists for it to choose to insert itself into the Mitelafrikan conflict if the influence of European powers is not demonstrated in the near future.
During indicative wargames conducted by cadets of the Imperial army, it was found that a rapid intervention by the Ethiopians against Mittelafrika usually resulted in the capture of Dar es Salaam and more than half of Mittelafrika’s industrial base, before Mittelafrikan forces could be diverted to meet the threat. In reality, it is doubtful that Ethiopian organisation and doctrine is up to such a task, but the Duma may wish to consider the potential influence of Abysinia on the outcome on the evolution of the current conflicts in Africa.
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