Chapter 7

In This Chapter

Touring the empires of Europe

Understanding how Europeans controlled their colonial holdings

Europe’s worldwide empires were at their strongest in the years before the First World War, but to people at the time it seemed that they became even more powerful after the war was over. In the 1920s and 1930s Europeans could travel the world going from one colony to another, feeling like lords of the earth. They could see no reason why this way of life shouldn’t go on for ever. But the Asian and African peoples they ruled had very different ideas. The days of the great European empires were rapidly running out.

The White Man’s World

By the 1920s, Europeans held colonies in the following parts of the world:

Britain: India; Burma; Malaya; Singapore; huge areas of southern, eastern, and western Africa; islands in the Caribbean, the Pacific, the Mediterranean, the Indian Ocean, and the South Atlantic; Honduras; Hong Kong; Australia; Canada; New Zealand. Also League of Nations mandates in Palestine, Transjordan, Arabia, and Iraq.

France: Western and northern Africa including Senegal and Algeria; islands in the Pacific and the Caribbean; Indochina; Guyana. Also League of Nations mandates in Syria and Lebanon.

Portugal: Angola, Mozambique, and Goa.

Netherlands: Indonesia.

Belgium: Congo.

Italy: Tripoli (Libya).

The European empires were all based on the idea that white people being in charge of non-whites was the natural order. The European colonialists often downplayed this idea and tried to pretend that imperial rule was based on ideas of common identity, but this didn’t fool many of the colonised people. In some colonies, such as Australia and South Africa, the original inhabitants had virtually no rights in their own land. The Europeans thought their empires were part of the natural order of things, but the twentieth century presented them with a problem. How could Europeans say they stood for democracy, freedom, and the rule of the majority when they were clearly not applying these principles in their colonies?

The First World War had a profound effect on Europe’s empires. It brought down four empires – those of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, and Turkey – and prompted some serious rethinking in the empires that survived, both by the rulers and the ruled.

Empire of the trenches: The colonies in the Great War

It’s easy to overlook the fact that European colonies played a vital role in the First World War and that troops from Africa and India were fighting on the western front. After the war, many people from Europe’s colonies assumed that they’d receive some sort of self-government in recognition of all that they had done to help their imperial masters. They assumed wrongly.

Colonial troops fought on all the major fronts in the First World War:

African and West Indian troops: The French brought colonial troops over to France from North Africa to fight the Germans. The British used African troops against the Germans in Africa itself and West Indians as auxiliaries on the western front.

Indian troops: Indian troops fought for Britain on most fronts: Indian battalions fought in France, where they badly scared the Germans, in Africa, and against the Turks in the Middle East.

Chinese troops: The British used Chinese troops as labour battalions on the western front, where they suffered high casualty rates.

Australians, Canadians, and New Zealanders: They fought alongside the British on all fronts in the war, particularly the disastrous Gallipoli and Somme campaigns.

The peace settlement of 1919 (refer to Chapter 3) was meant to be based on the idea of treating countries equally, but that looked pretty hollow to the people in Europe’s overseas colonies.

Only the ‘white’ colonies were represented at the peace conference: Australia, Canada, Newfoundland, South Africa, and New Zealand all had official representatives in Paris; other colonies had to be content with the French and British representatives speaking for them.

Only white colonies got national self-determination: President Wilson’s great idea for spreading global peace by allowing nations to set up their own independent states (refer to Chapter 3) somehow didn’t apply if those nations were ruled from overseas by Europeans. This meant that the Poles and Czechs apparently deserved their freedom, but the Indians and Africans didn’t.

Only white colonies were allowed to join the League of Nations: To join the League you had to be self-governing. That meant that ‘white’ colonies, who had their own elected governments, could join but colonies who were ruled directly by an imperial power like Britain, France, Portugal, or the Netherlands couldn’t.

Just to make things even more unequal, the League of Nations took over the former colonies of the old German and Ottoman empires and then mandated them – handed them over – to the British and French to rule. In theory, the British and French were supposed to prepare these mandated territories for independence, but in practice they treated them as colonies. That’s why the British and French empires actually emerged from the Great War a lot bigger than they were when they went in.

Dominions: All grown up, ready for independence . . . and white

The British made a distinction between ‘white’ colonies – that is, colonies where white settlers were a majority – and the rest of their empire. Australia, Canada, Newfoundland, New Zealand, and South Africa were often referred to as ‘dominions’ rather than ‘colonies’, and before the First World War they enjoyed a degree of self-government. Self-government, of course, meant the white population ruling themselves: The Maoris, Aborigines, and black Africans didn’t get much of a look-in. In 1926 these dominions (which included Malta from 1928, another safely ‘white’ colony) were given full control of their own affairs and the whole situation was topped off in 1931 by the Statute of Westminster, which gave the dominions complete independence in all matters, including foreign and defence policy, but kept the link to the British crown.

Dominion status was a recognition that a colony had ‘grown up’ and no longer needed to be ruled from Europe. But granting this status to some countries raised the question of when other colonies, in Asia or Africa, might also be judged to have ‘grown up’ and to be ready to govern themselves. If the empires weren’t based on racial ideas, and the Europeans always denied that they were, then, logically, at some point all the colonies would qualify for dominion status and these mighty European empires would become redundant. The Europeans took a long time to accept this point of view.

The tragedy of the child migrants

One of the saddest stories of the inter-war empires is of the fate of the children sent from Britain to Australia. The Australian government had a policy of only allowing white people in as immigrants; Britain wanted to get rid of some of its orphans and illegitimate children: Shipping them off to Australia seemed the perfect solution. Some children found good homes, but many ended up being treated as cheap labour. Many suffered abuse at the hands of unscrupulous foster parents or in church-run children’s homes. Even worse was the deceit involved in sending them away: Their mothers were often tricked into letting them go and the children were often told that their mothers had died. Not until many years later, when the child migrants had grown up and started to look into their own stories, did the shameful truth finally become known.

Life, colonial style

Europeans who went out to the colonies could live like kings. They thought themselves superior to every ‘native’, even the highest ranking. They lived in nice bungalows or villas, often built in the styles they were used to from home. Even today you can see houses and churches in Africa and Asia which look as if they’ve come from an English or French village. They had armies of servants to look after their needs, operating the fans and bringing them nice cool drinks. It’s no wonder that they found it hard to adapt when they went home and found they had to carry their own bags and clear up their own mess.

Moving in

Wherever possible the Europeans encouraged their own people to emigrate – that’s how Australia and New Zealand ended up so ‘white’ – but people would only go if the climate suited them. Nice, easy climates like Kenya or South Africa were fine; hot, sticky, and disease-ridden areas like central Africa took a bit more persuasion. The Italians seized Libya in 1911, but not many Italians fancied living in the desert, so Mussolini had to force 30,000 of them to move there whether they wanted to or not.

Did we really teach them those ideas?

Ironically, the ideas that would finally bring the Europeans’ empires down had been developed in Europe itself. As European education spread in the colonies, many of the best students at colonial schools travelled to Europe to finish their studies at university in England or France. They learned two new ideas in particular: Socialism and nationalism. As socialists, they rejected the way in which the Europeans were exploiting the colonies for their own economic advantage: Lenin called imperialism ‘the highest form of capitalism’. European nationalists had developed the idea that every nation had a right to be free and to have its own national state, especially if that meant overthrowing foreign rule. This idea appealed very strongly to overseas students whose own nations were under European rule. Funny, that.

What a way to run an empire

The British ran their vast empire with a tiny number of administrators and large numbers of native officials. Wherever possible they operated indirect rule, through the native kings or chiefs. In India, the Europeans worked closely with the Indian princes; in Nigeria, they operated through local tribal chiefs, though doing so worked better in some areas than in others.

The missionary position

Christian missionaries often saw the colonies as an opportunity to spread the gospel. Many of them set up mission stations with services and Bible classes and often a school or a hospital as well. Many colonised people got their education through missionary schools and some went on to college and university, often in Europe. The idea was that they could then serve in the civil service and help run their countries on behalf of the Europeans, though, needless to say, natives were only allowed onto the lower levels of the administration. However, many nationalist leaders used the education they received in mission schools to read radical texts and develop ideas about democracy and national independence – and about how to get them.

Although the settler peoples usually attended church, they were nervous about the idea of the native peoples joining them there. Christianity teaches awkward ideas like equality in the sight of God and loving your neighbour as yourself, which didn’t sit very easily with thrashing your servant if the champagne wasn’t quite chilled. Settlers were often suspicious of missionaries – and the feeling was mutual.

We are one big, happy family: Empires united?

The Europeans tried to foster a sense of unity in their empires. Children in French colonies learned French history at school, just as if they were in France. The French empire also tried to tie its people to France by offering them full French citizenship, though the qualifications for citizenship were often so difficult that very few Africans or Asians actually got it. The British introduced their own home-grown sports, especially rugby and cricket, to try to develop a sense of everyone-in-the-empire-together.

Technology played an important part in holding empires together and creating a sense of imperial unity. In 1924 a wireless link was established between Britain and Australia, and in 1930, only three years after Charles Lindbergh became the first man to fly solo across the Atlantic, the British aviator Amy Johnson flew all the way from Britain to Australia. Soon airlines were establishing regular flights from Europe to the colonies. As technology shrank distances, so it cemented empires together. In theory.

‘Buy empire’

During the years of economic depression in the 1930s, the British and French tried to make use of their empires to climb out of the economic mess. They encouraged trade within their empires and urged people to ‘buy empire’. This tactic wasn’t enough to resolve the economic crisis; nor could it stop the growing tide of nationalist criticism that all empires were having to face.

Ireland lights the fuse

The first colony to throw off its European masters in the twentieth century was itself in Europe: Ireland. The English had conquered Ireland back in the Middle Ages, and although Ireland had been a part of the United Kingdom since 1801, to Irish nationalists the country was essentially a British colony. The question of Irish independence was complicated by the fact that the Protestants of Ulster were determined to stay within the UK but Irish nationalists thought they could soon be won over (or ignored). Uprisings had occurred before, but at Easter 1916, at the height of the Great War, the nationalists struck and set in motion a chain of events that would lead to the separation of much of Ireland from the UK:

Easter Rising in Dublin, 1916: Irish nationalists stage a coup but fail. The British defeat the rising but then alienate Irish public opinion by executing many of the prisoners.

Irish parliament established, 1919: Irish nationalist Sinn Fein MPs set up an Irish parliament, Dail Eireann. Nationalist leader (and half-American) Eamon de Valera escapes from prison in England and is elected Dail president. The Irish Republican Army under Michael Collins leads a guerrilla war against British security forces.

‘The Troubles’ 1920–1: Bitter and bloody guerrilla warfare between Collins’s IRA and the British army. In the worst incidents, the IRA assassinate twelve British secret agents, and in retaliation British troops open fire at the crowd at Croke Park football ground. The British deploy a paramilitary force, the ‘Black and Tans’, against the IRA. After a failed attack on the Dublin Customs House, the IRA is forced to negotiate with the British.

Anglo–Irish Treaty, 1921–2: Collins negotiates a deal with the British which sets up an Irish Free State within the British empire but without the Protestant counties of Ulster, which remain part of the UK. Irish anger at these concessions erupts into civil war, in which Collins himself is assassinated.

Many nationalists elsewhere in the world took enormous encouragement from the Irish success in throwing off British control. The Irish example seemed to show that guerrilla tactics could force even the most powerful nation to talk with insurgents and even to grant their demands. It also showed that the authorities might be able to retaliate with heavy force, but doing so would be bound to lose them public support, both at home and abroad. These were lessons that many governments, including the British, would often forget.

The Natives Are Restless

The British and French may have felt pleased with themselves when they took over the former German and Turkish colonies as League of Nations mandates (see Chapter 3) but many of these territories merely presented their new rulers with serious problems to solve. In the years between the wars, nationalist groups became active in European colonies all around the world, demanding the right to rule themselves. Some of them worked through peaceful means; most of them didn’t.

Middle Eastern promise

The Middle East had been part of the Turkish Ottoman empire, but the Turks had been driven out by the British, helped by an Arab nationalist revolt led by Prince Feisal. The Arabs thought they’d been fighting so they could rule themselves; the British and French had other ideas. Both wanted to take over land in the Middle East. Both had their eyes on Palestine and Syria, but in the end they decided to divide the region between them rather than fight over it.

The Europeans wanted the Middle East for a mixture of strategic and sentimental reasons: It lay on the route between Europe and its rich colonies in the Far East and it was the scene of events from the Bible and the Crusades. The British had their eye on Iraq’s oil fields, but it wasn’t until after Britain and France had carved the region up that they discovered just how much oil they were sitting on top of.

Dodgy dealings in Damascus and Iraq as the consolation prize

The Arabs had driven the Turks out of Syria and ensconced Prince Feisal in Damascus as king of Syria pending the Peace Conference in Paris. This situation was awkward, though, because the French wanted Syria for themselves. Feisal went to Paris to plead his case: The French rather grumpily gave him a tour of the battlefields and the Légion d’Honneur, France’s highest award, before doing a deal with the British to take his kingdom off him. Feisal tried to resist the French take-over but the French proved too strong for him. As a final insult, the French general who turfed Feisal out of Damascus was the same man who’d presented him with his Légion d’Honneur: No wonder the Arabs regarded the whole 1919 settlement of the Middle East as a piece of European trickery and hypocrisy.

After what happened over Syria (see previous section) you could hardly have blamed Prince Feisal if he’d decided to go home and sulk but instead he took up a British offer to become king of their new mandate in Mesopotamia, which they were renaming Iraq. Feisal proved a canny ruler: He kept on good terms with the British, who used bomber aircraft to defeat Kurdish rebels trying to set up their own state in the hills. In 1930 he got the British to agree to end the mandate and go home as long as Iraq remained a British ally; two years later they did just that. With extensive oil fields being discovered in his kingdom, Feisal was now one of the most important figures in an increasingly important region of the world. And yah boo sucks to the French.

While Britain, France, and Feisal were working out the future of Syria and Iraq, big things were happening in the rest of the region:

San Remo Agreement between Britain and France (1920): Britain gets the mandate for Palestine; France gets Syria and the newly-created Lebanon. Arabs launch attacks on British troops in Palestine.

Transjordan Mandate (1921): Britain hives off Transjordan from Palestine and makes it a separate mandate, under Prince Abdullah Ibn Hussein, brother of King Feisal of Iraq. Abdullah and Feisal are both of the Hashemite house, which claims direct descent from the Prophet Muhammed.

Coup in Arabia (1924): The Hashemites’ old rival, Ibn Saud, stages a coup and takes control of Arabia, which is later renamed ‘Saudi Arabia’.

Saudi Arabian attacks (1928): Saudi Arabia launches raids against the British mandate in Iraq and the British protectorate of Kuwait. The Saudis are driven back by the RAF and bands of Iraqi tribesmen.

If the British thought Iraq and Transjordan were problematic, Palestine was to prove even worse.

Your land is my land: Palestine

Palestine is the ‘promised land’ of the Bible where the Israelites settled after Moses brought them out of Egypt (have a look in the Book of Exodus if you’re a bit hazy on the details). However, the Jews had been thrown out of Palestine, or ‘Judaea’ as it was called, by the Roman emperor Titus in what is known as the ‘Jewish diaspora’ (diaspora means dispersal over a wide area). From the first century to the twentieth, Jewish communities had settled and sometimes prospered in different parts of the world, but each year at Passover they would say, ‘Next year in Jerusalem’ – they were dreaming of home.

Until the nineteenth century Jewish people could only dream of going back to Palestine, but in 1896 a Jewish journalist called Theodor Herzl, fed up with European anti-Semitism, called for the establishment of a Jewish national state in Palestine. The idea caught on among Jewish communities around the world: It was known as Zionism (from ‘Zion’ the ancient name for Jerusalem).

However, the Arab people who had actually lived in Palestine since the days of the Roman emperor Titus also regarded it as home and they didn’t look kindly on the idea of lots of Jewish settlers coming to stay. Before 1914 none of this mattered very much because the whole place belonged to the Turks, but when the British decided to drive the Turks out, London had to start thinking seriously about who would get the land after the war.

In 1917 the British foreign secretary, Arthur Balfour, wrote to the banker, Lord Rothschild, to say that Britain would support the idea of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, as long as the rights of the Arab Palestinians were fully respected. This Balfour Declarationwas a bit vague on details – especially how you could respect the rights of people if you were moving them to make way for new people – and it meant that when Britain got the Palestine mandate in 1920, the British had to:

Allow Jewish people to settle in Palestine, but not too many

Take some of the Palestinians’ land off them, but not too much

Stop Palestinians attacking Jewish settlers

Stop Jewish settlers attacking Palestinians

Get used to both sides hating them

The British tried to work with both sides, but as clashes between Jews and Arabs became progressively more violent, the British found they’d created an impossible situation. In 1929 they declared martial law and in 1930 they imposed strict limits on Jewish immigration, but that made the Zionists more angry, especially once the Nazis started persecuting Jews in Europe. The British hadn’t found a solution by the time the Second World War broke out in 1939, but were wishing the Palestine mandate had gone to someone else.

Morocco bound

Some of the fiercest resistance to European colonial rule was in Morocco. The French and Spanish had long been angling to take the kingdom over, and in the fuss that followed the German Kaiser’s interference in Morocco back in 1905 (see Chapter 3) the two countries agreed to divide the country between them. The Moroccans put up a fight, but by 1912 Morocco was officially divided into a French and a Spanish protectorate. End of story? Not quite.

The French and Spanish had reckoned without a Moroccan journalist-turned-judge called Abd al-Krim. Al-Krim organised a resistance army which in 1921 wiped out an entire Spanish garrison of 2,000 men at Mellila and declared a new ‘Republic of the Rif’. The Spanish had to call on French help to fight al-Krim, and in 1926 a joint Franco–Spanish force under the French war hero Marshal Pétain finally forced al-Krim to surrender.

The Moroccans kept up their resistance to French and Spanish rule, though they didn’t make any real progress until after France had itself been occupied by Germany in the Second World War. However, one Spanish officer posted to Morocco was able to make his mark: General Francisco Franco raised an army in Morocco that crossed over to Spain, set off civil war, and eventually put Franco in supreme power until his death in 1975.

Walk like an Egyptian

Egypt became a British protectorate (which means ‘not strictly a colony but it is really’) in 1914. The British had long wanted to control Egypt because it lay directly on the route to India; it became doubly important once the Suez Canal had opened in 1869. The canal was owned by a private company in which the British government was the major shareholder. On the other hand, the Egyptians didn’t appreciate being ruled – er, protected – by the British. So in 1919, a delegation of Egyptian nationalists led by Saghlul Sa’d asked the British if, now they’d won the war, Egypt could have its independence, please? The British told them to get lost. Saghlul took that as a no, and the next few years were rather eventful ones:

1920: Egyptians stage anti-British riots.

1921: British send more troops to Egypt.

1922: British grant Egypt sort-of independence as a constitutional monarchy, though the British still keep their troops there, still guard (and own) the Suez Canal, and can veto anything the Egyptian government does.

Saghlul set up his own political party called Wafd (‘delegation’) after the original delegation that went to see the British. Although Wafd remained anti-British, it quickly discovered that it hated King Faud of Egypt more: Wafd even turned to the British for help against the king. This meant the British could play their old divide-and-rule tactic to keep their hold on the country.

Get out of Africa!

The most active nationalist movements in Africa grew up among the white population of South Africa and Rhodesia. Like other nationalists they resented colonial rule, but their agenda was significantly different.

Britain and France both gained land in Africa after the First World War: France got Togo and Senegal, Britain got Tanganyika (modern-day Tanzania), and South Africa got South West Africa (modern-day Namibia). Both countries thought they had a ‘mission’ to rule the ‘dark continent’. Moreover, getting Tanganyika fulfilled the British dream of owning land in an unbroken line from the north of Africa to the south.

Southern Africa was different from the rest of Africa as it had a substantial white settler population, some of whom were descended from European settlers who’d arrived in the seventeenth century. The two main groups were:

Afrikaaners: Descended from the seventeenth-century Dutch and speaking a form of Dutch called Afrikaans. Afrikaaners loathed the black Africans and had no time for the wishy-washy liberal attitudes of the British. They’d given the British a bloody nose in the Anglo–Boer War (see Chapter 1) and don’t you forget it.

British: More recent settlers than the Afrikaaners, whom they didn’t like much. Keen to maintain the link with Britain and uneasy with the tough racial laws the Afrikaaners were so keen to introduce.

British South Africa was divided into three main areas:

The Union of South Africa set up in 1910 out of the old British colonies and Boer republics that had fought in the Anglo–Boer War. The prime minister was the strongly pro-British Afrikaaner Jan Christiaan Smuts. Smuts was opposed, however, by the growing Nationalist Party led by J. B. M. Hertzog.

Southern Rhodesia (modern-day Zimbabwe) originally set up by the British South Africa Company, but in 1923 the British government took it over and set the area up as a self-governing dominion. Unlike South Africa, with its substantial white population, the whites in Southern Rhodesia made up barely 5 per cent of the population. They therefore tended to be in favour of anything that would keep the black population under strict control. In 1933 they elected the United Party, which set about doing just that.

Northern Rhodesia (modern-day Zambia). In 1924 the British government took this region over from the British South Africa Company but ruled it from London as a crown colony, rather than allowing it to govern itself, like its southern neighbours. The reason is probably obvious: Not nearly enough white settlers lived there and Europeans simply could not conceive of Africans ruling themselves.

In 1924 Hertzog’s Afrikaaner nationalists won the elections in South Africa and started bringing in laws to limit the freedom of movement of black South Africans and to cut South Africa’s ties with Britain. The king wasn’t allowed to grant titles to South Africans and they even removed his head from the stamps. The national anthem changed from ‘God save the King’ to ‘God save South Africa’ – from its black population, presumably.

Not all white South Africans were happy with this anti-British policy (though they didn’t have any problems with the limits on black South Africans) and in 1933 Hertzog was forced to enter into a coalition with Smuts. Extreme Afrikaaner nationalists – and white supremacists – set up a new Nationalist Party under Dr D. F. Malan. The Nationalist Party sympathised strongly with the Nazis and thought South Africa fought on the wrong side when war came.

Malan’s Nationalist Party was responsible for the apartheid system to keep the black population out of public life and to keep them under white control. Apartheid would not collapse until 1993. Chapter 19 tells you how.

Rage against the Raj

South Africa’s racial policies (see previous section) also provided the starting point for the nationalist movement in India. Large numbers of Indians lived in South Africa (the British ‘exported’ vast numbers of Indians to work in different parts of their empire) where they were classified as ‘coloured’ rather than ‘black’, but they still had to carry special passes to allow them to move about the country or get a job. A London-trained Indian lawyer, with a taste for the finer things in life, led the protest movement that eventually lifted these restrictions: Mohandas K. Gandhi.

Don’t hit back

Gandhi was a devout Hindu, but he had deep respect for other faiths: He incorporated elements of Islam and Christianity into his philosophy and prayers. After his success in South Africa he returned to India, where he found inspiration in the simple world of the Indian peasants. Gandhi believed it would be pointless for India to throw off British rule if it simply meant that rich Indians took the place of rich Britishers; India had to rediscover its soul and embrace a simpler, less sophisticated way of life. To show he meant what he said, Gandhi set up communes known as ashramswhere people lived and worked on equal terms, rejecting the deeply-ingrained Indian concept of separate castes. Gandhi took up spinning cotton on a simple spinning wheel and insisted that his followers wear Indian homespun cloth, instead of cloth imported from Britain.

Gandhi developed a philosophy for fighting the British. Instead of pitched battles in the streets, he said Indians should stage protests and allow the British to attack without hitting back: Doing so would show the British for the bullies they were. This philosophy of non-violence was known assatyagraha; to many of his followers, this idea seemed like madness. Would it work?

Massacre at Amritsar

One event changed everything in India. On 13 April 1919, with rioting sweeping through Punjab province (by no means did all Indians follow Gandhi’s line of non-violence), British General Reginald Dyer decided to use shock tactics to restore order. He ordered his men to open fire on an unarmed crowd of Sikhs holding an illegal meeting in an enclosure in the Sikh holy city of Amritsar: 379 people were killed and some 1,200 wounded. This act certainly had a shock effect: Even moderate Indian nationalists were appalled and decided that the British would have to go. Some of the British supported what Dyer had done and even raised a fund to support him when he was forced to retire from the army; but the official inquiry into the massacre, and most public opinion in Britain, came down firmly against him.

The Amritsar massacre made it difficult to claim that British rule was for India’s good. If that sort of violence was needed to keep order, what was the point of the British staying on? Following the massacre, several events occurred:

Government of India Act (1919): sets up an elected parliament for India, though the British viceroy can still do more or less as he likes. Indians in the provinces are now allowed to control education and health but the British keep the big things, like justice and the police, in their own hands.

Gandhi calls on Indians to boycott foreign cloth (1921): Doing so hits the British cotton industry significantly. Gandhi also tells Indians to have nothing to do with a tour of India by the Prince of Wales. This act hits British pride significantly.

Gandhi thrown into jail (1922): Meanwhile riots are spreading, both against the British and between Muslims and Hindus.

British introduce a tax on salt (1923): Indian nationalists launch a campaign of civil disobedience, refusing to obey British laws. Many of them join Gandhi in prison.

Gandhi released from prison and goes on hunger strike until the Muslim–Hindu violence stops (1924): It does.

Gandhi launches a 240-mile march to the sea to gather salt in defiance of the British (1930): This gathers enormous support and international publicity.

British hold talks with Indian leaders in London (1930): Gandhi goes, and even meets the king. The talks fail.

Gandhi and other nationalist leaders arrested and thrown in jail (1932): Again.

British hand provincial government in India over to Indians (1935): Was this a crack in the wall? It certainly looked that way.

I say, can’t you nationalist chaps let a man get some peace?

If unrest in Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Palestine, Morocco, Africa, and India wasn’t enough, the Europeans were having to face nationalist revolts in almost every other corner of their empires, too:

Burma (1920): Buddhist students lead opposition to British rule. Students stage anti-British strikes in 1920, 1936, and 1938. Burmese nationalists go on to help the Japanese during the Second World War.

Kenya (1920): Established as a British colony. The Kikuyu people, especially the young, protest against European settlers taking over the fertile ‘white highlands’.

Philippines (1924): US President Coolidge dashes hopes of nationalists by saying the Philippines won’t be getting their independence any time soon.

Java (1926): Rebellion breaks out against Dutch rule.

Hong Kong (1927): Anti-foreigner protests and a boycott of trade with Britain.

Indochina (1930–1): Nationalist risings against French colonial rule, especially in Vietnam. The rebels are brutally suppressed.

Cyprus (1931): Greek Cypriots riot in protest against British rule and in favour of Enosis – union with Greece. Turkish Cypriots don’t join in.

Nigeria (1936): Missionary-educated young people found the Nigerian Youth Movement to campaign for independence.

Jamaica (1938): Nationalist leader Norman Manley founds the People’s National Party to campaign against British rule.