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Bitter Harvest: Zimbabwe and the Aftermath of its Independence
In July 2007, Zimbabwe's worsening economy saw inflation skyrocket to 7,634 per cent, deepening the already chronic food shortages in a country where only one in five of the adult population is in employment.Months later, on 20 November 2007, Ian Smith, the former Prime Minister of Rhodesia died, leaving behind him a lifetime of resistance to black majority rule and the dangers that he believed it would bring to his country.Ian Smith was a man with the ability to excite powerful emotions in all who heard his name. To those who still revere his memory he was a hero, a mighty leader, a man whose formidable integrity led him into head-to-head confrontation with the Labour Government of Britain in the 1960s. To others, he was, and remains, a demon, a reactionary whose intransigence long delayed majority rule in an important corner of Africa.The last decades of the twentieth century and the first years of the new millennium have seen Zimbabwe spiral into a chaos of violence and towards the brink of economic collapse, prompting many to reappraise Smith's role and the prescience of his actions.In this revealing and important historical document, Ian Smith charts the rise and fall of a once-great nation. He tells the remarkable story behind the signing of the Unilateral Declaration of Independence, as well as the excesses of power that Mugabe has used to create the virtual dictatorship which exists in Zimbabwe today.
465 pages, Kindle Edition
Published May 5, 2008
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
January 5, 2026
This was wonderful, and it’s a shame that it’s out of print. I don’t read biographies often, but I enjoyed this one and don’t think I’ve ever made so many highlights in one book. Rhodesia will go down in history as a tragedy of Western betrayal, and Zimbabwe is a stain on our culture. Here are just a few snippets of gold:
“The beauty of Lebanon, with its cedar-clad mountains, warm coastline and rich history, makes the recent suffering of its friendly people all the more grotesque. The great failing of our civilisation is that, despite its advances in science and other fields, it is impotent when faced with such tragedy.”
“How could one condone the dreadful fact that Stalin had connived with Hitler over the invasion of Poland, and joined in dividing the spoils of their ill-gotten gains. However, there would be problems getting the politicians to go along with this—maybe not Churchill, but Roosevelt certainly seemed to have been conned by Stalin.”
“There was a cultural gap associated with our respective history, tradition and ways of life, but provided things could be done in our own time, maintaining standards of Western civilisation, there was no reason why we could not all live together to our mutual benefit, gradually bringing our black people in, as and when they were prepared to accept change.”
“All land requires dedicated people who believe in that well-known maxim that we do not inherit our land from our fathers, we borrow it from our great-great-grandchildren, and each generation is honour-bound to pass it on in better condition than it was in when received.”
“As everybody knows only too well, in the fields of espionage and propaganda, the Marxist-Leninists are world beaters. Moreover, it is common knowledge that once they control a country, the free enterprise system goes out the window—and that is exactly what happened in every case.”
“Terrorists are adept at using the freedom inherent in our philosophy and constitution in order to subvert freedom. Intimidation is a dreadful instrument, and it is used most expertly by those who are disciples of the philosophy of communism, or fascism, or Nazism—there is no difference between them. They are all dictatorships which believe in the ‘one-party state’ philosophy: once power is seized, it is held for ever, and anyone who dissents receives a clear message: change your mind, or else!”
“So while the administration of justice must always be scrupulously fair, it must be firm and prompt if you are going to get the message over that your decent law-abiding citizens will be protected against the gangsters and the bully-boys. And the more primitive and simple the society you are dealing with, the greater the need for positive and swift action. Even more important is the need for anticipation, in order to ensure that trouble can be forestalled, because once it gets into its stride it is extremely difficult to contain.”
“When dealing with law and order, and justice, it is important to emphasise the need to be on the side of law-abiding citizens, as opposed to the criminals. I come down heavily in support of those who believe that our modern system of justice tends to lean over towards the law-breaker. So while supporting impartiality in the administration of justice, as depicted in our coat of arms showing the scales evenly balanced in the centre, if we have to choose between the good guy and the bad guy, there should be no equivocation.”
“It is difficult for people who have never lived in this part of the world to appreciate that sub-Saharan Africa is different. It was the last part of our world to come into contact with western European civilisation, and when the pioneers arrived in this country the local people had no written language, no form of currency, no schools or hospitals, and lived in makeshift houses with grass roofs. The wheel had not even evolved, nor had the plough. The change which has taken place is absolutely phenomenal, and is a tribute to what the white inhabitants did over a period of ninety years.”
“Those of us who live in Africa know from experience that this is the kind of thing we live with: white liberals climbing on the bandwagon of black nationalist movements, hoping to gain favours in return.”
“Whether their philosophy is communism, fascism or Nazism is of no consequence, because there is no difference between them. The people who use these techniques do so for two main reasons: power and money. Power to keep themselves in office, and money to line their own pockets.”
“The failures resorted to the parrot cry that they were in their current predicament because they were exploited by the colonial powers. But Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Rhodesia had gone through the same history, and as a matter of interest, so did USA and South Africa, and they are all glorious success stories.”
“The majority of members, however, are either one-party dictatorships or military dictatorships; whether they are communist or fascist is immaterial, because there is no difference, they are equally evil.”
“In reality, colonialism was the spread of Western Christian civilisation, with its commitment to education, health, justice and economic advancement, into areas which were truly ‘darkest Africa’.”
“There remained, however, the test of acceptability among the Rhodesian people as a whole, and on the evidence before us we were satisfied that it would receive approval, although, as we had always stated, it would be impossible to obtain an honest assessment from our black people, since the vast majority of them had never exercised a vote in their lives, could neither read nor write, did not understand the meaning of the word ‘constitution’, and were completely bemused by all the talking and manoeuvring going on around them.”
“The original concept of apartheid, as explained by the then Prime Minister, Dr Malan, when he first used this previously unheard-of word, was the division of the country into different areas in order to accommodate different peoples according to their history, culture and traditions. Whether one approved of this or not, it was possible to argue the pros and cons. The nearest English word portraying a similar meaning is ‘Balkanisation’, which derives from the division of parts of Europe into a number of states known as the Balkans. Even Britain has a well-trodden record in this area: it separated, with disastrous results, India and Pakistan, Palestine and Israel, and Ireland between the Protestants and Catholics. Coming closer to home, the metropolitan powers divided sub-Saharan Africa while sitting at their desks in London and the other capitals of Europe, drawing lines on a map, and certainly never taking the trouble to consult the local people on the ground.”
“A division within a unitary country based purely on race, declaring that white people were first-class citizens and blacks were second-class citizens, was unprincipled and totally indefensible. Not only would it be impossible to gain support for such a philosophy anywhere else in the world, but most important of all, it would create bitterness and hatred among the great mass of the people—a blatant affront to them, based purely on race. I believed that there were answers to the problem without abandoning our Western civilisation, and lived in expectation as to how the South Africans were going to deal with it.”
“So there were four of them—Muzorewa, Nkomo, Sithole and Mugabe—all claiming to be the leader. That’s Africa. Anyone who does not comprehend that kind of scene does not understand Africa. There is actually a lot of logic, common sense and practical experience associated with it.”
“We would continue to hunt down and destroy terrorism wherever it was found, but we knew on the evidence before us that many, if not the majority, of the tribal people were not voluntarily on the side of the terrorists, but had had pistols pointed at their heads. So it was necessary, although difficult, to counsel cool heads and remind people that two wrongs do not make a right: the sins of the gangsters should not be visited upon their fellow-tribesmen.”
“The communists were always ready to rush in and support their friends, but the Western world, with their guilt complex, always fell into the trap of sitting on the fence, thus allowing the communists to steal a march on them.”
“Agypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco have always been orientated northwards towards the Mediterranean and southern Europe. Historically, they derive from the East, not the South. Ask people from any of those countries, as I have, what is their culture, religion, language, history, race, and they will reply: Arab. Their history goes back thousands of years, to civilisations which preceded those of western Europe, long before cartographers commenced producing maps of an imaginary landmass to their south and calling it Africa. In fact the true Africa can only be sub-Saharan. Any attempt to include countries bordering the southern Mediterranean as part of Africa is convenient pretence and has nothing to do with reality. These countries in fact constitute western Arabia.”
Everyone who wants to understand the decline of the West should read this book. Rhodesians never die!
“The beauty of Lebanon, with its cedar-clad mountains, warm coastline and rich history, makes the recent suffering of its friendly people all the more grotesque. The great failing of our civilisation is that, despite its advances in science and other fields, it is impotent when faced with such tragedy.”
“How could one condone the dreadful fact that Stalin had connived with Hitler over the invasion of Poland, and joined in dividing the spoils of their ill-gotten gains. However, there would be problems getting the politicians to go along with this—maybe not Churchill, but Roosevelt certainly seemed to have been conned by Stalin.”
“There was a cultural gap associated with our respective history, tradition and ways of life, but provided things could be done in our own time, maintaining standards of Western civilisation, there was no reason why we could not all live together to our mutual benefit, gradually bringing our black people in, as and when they were prepared to accept change.”
“All land requires dedicated people who believe in that well-known maxim that we do not inherit our land from our fathers, we borrow it from our great-great-grandchildren, and each generation is honour-bound to pass it on in better condition than it was in when received.”
“As everybody knows only too well, in the fields of espionage and propaganda, the Marxist-Leninists are world beaters. Moreover, it is common knowledge that once they control a country, the free enterprise system goes out the window—and that is exactly what happened in every case.”
“Terrorists are adept at using the freedom inherent in our philosophy and constitution in order to subvert freedom. Intimidation is a dreadful instrument, and it is used most expertly by those who are disciples of the philosophy of communism, or fascism, or Nazism—there is no difference between them. They are all dictatorships which believe in the ‘one-party state’ philosophy: once power is seized, it is held for ever, and anyone who dissents receives a clear message: change your mind, or else!”
“So while the administration of justice must always be scrupulously fair, it must be firm and prompt if you are going to get the message over that your decent law-abiding citizens will be protected against the gangsters and the bully-boys. And the more primitive and simple the society you are dealing with, the greater the need for positive and swift action. Even more important is the need for anticipation, in order to ensure that trouble can be forestalled, because once it gets into its stride it is extremely difficult to contain.”
“When dealing with law and order, and justice, it is important to emphasise the need to be on the side of law-abiding citizens, as opposed to the criminals. I come down heavily in support of those who believe that our modern system of justice tends to lean over towards the law-breaker. So while supporting impartiality in the administration of justice, as depicted in our coat of arms showing the scales evenly balanced in the centre, if we have to choose between the good guy and the bad guy, there should be no equivocation.”
“It is difficult for people who have never lived in this part of the world to appreciate that sub-Saharan Africa is different. It was the last part of our world to come into contact with western European civilisation, and when the pioneers arrived in this country the local people had no written language, no form of currency, no schools or hospitals, and lived in makeshift houses with grass roofs. The wheel had not even evolved, nor had the plough. The change which has taken place is absolutely phenomenal, and is a tribute to what the white inhabitants did over a period of ninety years.”
“Those of us who live in Africa know from experience that this is the kind of thing we live with: white liberals climbing on the bandwagon of black nationalist movements, hoping to gain favours in return.”
“Whether their philosophy is communism, fascism or Nazism is of no consequence, because there is no difference between them. The people who use these techniques do so for two main reasons: power and money. Power to keep themselves in office, and money to line their own pockets.”
“The failures resorted to the parrot cry that they were in their current predicament because they were exploited by the colonial powers. But Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Rhodesia had gone through the same history, and as a matter of interest, so did USA and South Africa, and they are all glorious success stories.”
“The majority of members, however, are either one-party dictatorships or military dictatorships; whether they are communist or fascist is immaterial, because there is no difference, they are equally evil.”
“In reality, colonialism was the spread of Western Christian civilisation, with its commitment to education, health, justice and economic advancement, into areas which were truly ‘darkest Africa’.”
“There remained, however, the test of acceptability among the Rhodesian people as a whole, and on the evidence before us we were satisfied that it would receive approval, although, as we had always stated, it would be impossible to obtain an honest assessment from our black people, since the vast majority of them had never exercised a vote in their lives, could neither read nor write, did not understand the meaning of the word ‘constitution’, and were completely bemused by all the talking and manoeuvring going on around them.”
“The original concept of apartheid, as explained by the then Prime Minister, Dr Malan, when he first used this previously unheard-of word, was the division of the country into different areas in order to accommodate different peoples according to their history, culture and traditions. Whether one approved of this or not, it was possible to argue the pros and cons. The nearest English word portraying a similar meaning is ‘Balkanisation’, which derives from the division of parts of Europe into a number of states known as the Balkans. Even Britain has a well-trodden record in this area: it separated, with disastrous results, India and Pakistan, Palestine and Israel, and Ireland between the Protestants and Catholics. Coming closer to home, the metropolitan powers divided sub-Saharan Africa while sitting at their desks in London and the other capitals of Europe, drawing lines on a map, and certainly never taking the trouble to consult the local people on the ground.”
“A division within a unitary country based purely on race, declaring that white people were first-class citizens and blacks were second-class citizens, was unprincipled and totally indefensible. Not only would it be impossible to gain support for such a philosophy anywhere else in the world, but most important of all, it would create bitterness and hatred among the great mass of the people—a blatant affront to them, based purely on race. I believed that there were answers to the problem without abandoning our Western civilisation, and lived in expectation as to how the South Africans were going to deal with it.”
“So there were four of them—Muzorewa, Nkomo, Sithole and Mugabe—all claiming to be the leader. That’s Africa. Anyone who does not comprehend that kind of scene does not understand Africa. There is actually a lot of logic, common sense and practical experience associated with it.”
“We would continue to hunt down and destroy terrorism wherever it was found, but we knew on the evidence before us that many, if not the majority, of the tribal people were not voluntarily on the side of the terrorists, but had had pistols pointed at their heads. So it was necessary, although difficult, to counsel cool heads and remind people that two wrongs do not make a right: the sins of the gangsters should not be visited upon their fellow-tribesmen.”
“The communists were always ready to rush in and support their friends, but the Western world, with their guilt complex, always fell into the trap of sitting on the fence, thus allowing the communists to steal a march on them.”
“Agypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco have always been orientated northwards towards the Mediterranean and southern Europe. Historically, they derive from the East, not the South. Ask people from any of those countries, as I have, what is their culture, religion, language, history, race, and they will reply: Arab. Their history goes back thousands of years, to civilisations which preceded those of western Europe, long before cartographers commenced producing maps of an imaginary landmass to their south and calling it Africa. In fact the true Africa can only be sub-Saharan. Any attempt to include countries bordering the southern Mediterranean as part of Africa is convenient pretence and has nothing to do with reality. These countries in fact constitute western Arabia.”
Everyone who wants to understand the decline of the West should read this book. Rhodesians never die!
July 20, 2025
Morally Courageous
Outstanding account of one’s man love for an entire people (ALL), never quitting, and living a true courageous example of how to professionally stand up for justice; even when living under the dictatorship of Mugabe (when most Rhodesians fled).
Outstanding account of one’s man love for an entire people (ALL), never quitting, and living a true courageous example of how to professionally stand up for justice; even when living under the dictatorship of Mugabe (when most Rhodesians fled).
March 13, 2025
Ian Smith gives a fantastic recounting of his life and the history of Rhodesia through the lens of actual Rhodesians. This book is a must in order to understand post-colonial (sub-Saharan) Africa from a firsthand account. Sprinkled throughout the book are nuggets of political wisdom accompanied by practical experiences outlining these timeless wise-sayings.
The betrayal experienced by Rhodesia from the West in her fight against Communism is one that though not taught in our generation’s public school in, must and will be taught to our children’s children. Every man would do well in learning of the tragic yet inspiring story of Rhodesia.
The betrayal experienced by Rhodesia from the West in her fight against Communism is one that though not taught in our generation’s public school in, must and will be taught to our children’s children. Every man would do well in learning of the tragic yet inspiring story of Rhodesia.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews