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Apartheid's Reluctant Uncle - The United States and Southern Africa in the Early Cold War (Hardcover, New)
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Apartheid's Reluctant Uncle - The United States and Southern Africa in the Early Cold War (Hardcover, New)
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In 1948, civil rights for black Americans stood higher on the
national political agenda than at any time since Reconstruction.
President Harry Truman issued orders for fair employment and the
integration of the armed forces, and he proceeded to campaign on a
platform that included an unprecedented civil rights plank, pushed
through the Democratic convention by Hubert Humphrey. But on the
other side of the globe, his administration paid close attention to
another election as well: the surprising triumph of the
white-supremacist National Party in South Africa, reluctantly
accepted by the Truman White House.
Apartheid's Reluctant Uncle brings to light the neglected history
of Washington's strong (but hushed) backing for the National Party
government after it won power in 1948, and its formal establishment
of apartheid. Thomas Borstelmann's account weaves together the
complex threads of early Cold War tensions, African and domestic
American politics, and nuclear diplomacy to show how--and why--the
United States government aided and abetted the evangelically racist
regime in Pretoria. Despite the rhetoric of the "free world," and
the lingering idealism following the defeat of Nazi Germany and the
founding of the U.N., Truman's foreign policy was focused on
limiting Soviet expansion at all costs. Tensions between the two
former allies mounted in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, with
the Berlin crisis, the Greek civil war, and the impending victory
of the Communists in China. In southern Africa, the United States
sought to limit Soviet and left-wing influence by supporting the
colonial powers (Belgium, Portugal, and of course Britain) and the
fiercely anticommunist National Party, led by Daniel Malan. Despite
the unsavory racism of Malan's government--Borstelmann shows that
Pretoria fomented violence among black groups in the late 1940s,
just as it has done recently between the ANC and Inkatha--the U.S.
saw South Africa as a dependable and important ally. In addition,
America was almost completely dependent on southern Africa for its
uranium supply, and was willing to go to great lengths to secure
the critical fuel for its nuclear arsenal. Borstelmann also notes
that race relations in the segregated U.S. played a role in
Washington's policies, with few white Americans greatly disturbed
by the establishment of apartheid.
As South Africa finally nears an end to almost fifty years of
formal apartheid (and as Truman nears canonization, following the
recent presidential election), Borstelmann's account comes as a
startling reminder of America's early links to Pretoria's racist
system. Intensively researched in the files of the Truman Library,
the National Security Council, and the departments of Defense and
State, Apartheid's Reluctant Uncle provides fascinating insight
into a most revealing episode in American policymaking.
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