In a thought-provoking reflection, Trevor Watkins discusses how early compromises in conflicts could have spared countless lives. Drawing parallels between Rhodesia’s independence struggle, the current war in Ukraine, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he questions the motivations behind prolonged wars and suggests that earlier peace efforts might save the youth from unnecessary bloodshed. Citing South Africa’s peaceful transition as a model, he argues for diplomacy over war.
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By Trevor WatkinsÂ
When speaking to a senior Rhodesian expatriate recently, he made the somewhat surprising point that he thought Ian Smith should have ‘folded’early on in the independence negotiations with England. This would have spared the lives of tens of thousands of young men, black and white, sacrificed on the altar of old men’s egos. The final result- economic and social collapse of Zimbabwe- was inevitable if not predictable.
This quandary is particularly relevant in 2024 in 2 current warzones.
Ukraine is busy sacrificing the flower of its youth, and of many Russian youths, to achieve a meaningless and inevitable result, a bad compromise that suits no one. Should they have folded earlier? For many non-participant observers, this is heresy, liberal crazy-talk, unthinkable. How can you reward a monster like Putin with victory? How will you discourage him from greater atrocities in the future? Who cares how many Russians died?
The Western powers, in the form of the clown-like Boris Johnson, sabotaged the Minsk accords where a settlement had already been agreed to by both sides. According to USA Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, as long as Russians were dying the US was in favour of continuing on,. Most of the arms supplied to Ukraine were built in the home states of congressional supporters in the USA, using borrowed funds. What’s not to like?
Israel is decimating the Palestinian population at the cost of its own young men. Like Ukraine, cease-fire is a dirty word, a concession to the forces of evil, unthinkable. Rational thought is suspended while there is a single surviving Hamas member, and a single surviving Israeli boy to shoot him. Old men play god from their well-protected bunkers, invoking old enmities to justify their obscene blood lusts. Israel has taken maybe 50,000 lives to avenge 2,000. But Israel has a right and a duty to respond to the Hamas horror show, as if that was not always the intention of the horror that Hamas inflicted.
Why do Arab and Israeli mothers give up their sons so easily? Why do Russian and Ukrainian fathers not do a better job of protecting their families? It is because they are sold the lie that there is no alternative. The sheep believe the wolves for the sake of an endless supply of mutton.
South Africa faced this dilemma in the 1990’s. A numerically small but well-armed and efficient white population faced a weak and disorganised black population 5 times larger. Apartheid guaranteed many grievances aching to be settled. South Africa was surrounded by hostile states, with the dreadful example of Zimbabwe demonstrating how any settlement might end. And yet 2 exemplary men saved us from an existential catastrophe. One decided to fold, the other decided not to fight. Although there were atrocities aplenty on both sides, their cooler heads prevailed. We decided not to spend our youth dividend on a bankrupt race war. We came to an accommodation with each other in just 4 years of jaw-jaw rather than war-war. We had an election, drew up a constitution, and sat down in a universal suffrage parliament. We only need to look at Ukraine, Israel, Somalia, or Sri Lanka to see what could have been.
There are probably 100,000 black and white boys alive today, building, enjoying loving families, and investing, where there might have just been death and ruins.
Perhaps South Africa’s greatest contribution to the world is to provide an example of the alternative to war.
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