Rhodesians Never Die: Anticommunism, White Supremacy, and Foreign Fighters in Rhodesia, 1965–79

This paper examines the mobilization, experiences, and legacies of white mercenaries in the short-lived white supremacist state of Rhodesia. Since its formation, many in the United States as well as Britain and Europe saw Rhodesia as both a bastion of white rule and a crucial anticommunist ally. For them, the rise and radicalization of armed African nationalist movements in Rhodesia not only imperiled the security of Rhodesia’s white population but also presaged a larger communist assault across southern Africa. Convinced that the West had abandoned Rhodesia and the Cold War itself, thousands of white men joined Rhodesia’s beleaguered military forces. Many were veterans who shared the common experience of having fought against leftist national liberation movements in one part of the world or another, from Vietnam to the Congo, Malaya, Burma, Angola, and Algeria. To them, Rhodesia offered adventure, purpose, and power the chance to continue their anticommunist crusades and recover the stature they had presumably lost at home in the wake of the rights revolutions of the late 1960s and early 1970s. The Rhodesian government, working through quasi-state vectors, played to those aspirations and fears, promising a more a secure and more comfortable life in a society unchanged by civil rights, feminism, and decolonization. Although their impact was negligible, Rhodesia’s foreign fighters had a long legacy. For many years after its collapse, Rhodesia lingered on in right-wing memory and mobilizations as both the paragon of white power and a parable for its demise.