Author: Peter Stiff
Publisher: New English Library (1976)
Edition: First UK Edition
Condition: Minor wear to the dust jacket, the boards have minor fading as well as small bumps to the corners and spine ends. A small stain the front free-end paper as well as tape residue to both end-papers. Otherwise the contents are bright, clean and tightly bound.
Binding: Hardcover with dust jacket & Brodart.
Pages: 256
Dimensions: 21.5 x 14.7 x 2.5 cm
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by Peter Stiff
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When this was first published in 1973 there was still some hope for Rhodesia. The fact that you can no longer find it in an atlas should tell even those too young to remember the Rhodesian War and the Lancaster House Agreement; that things didn't work out for that country. The book opens at about the same time as Ian SMITH declared UDI and ends seven years later. It is a fictional setting of real incidents, this artifact being required to circumvent the Official Secrets Act after the author's resignation from the police. It contains no commentary on the Rhodesian government, and I suggest that any negative opinions would have probably lead to the blocking of its publication.
The book was written to "whistle blow" on the bush war, the scale of which was being kept from the public by the government. It is an exciting read - well paced, honest and graphically depicts some horrific attrocities by ZIPRA/ZANLA terrorists. The author is sympathetic to both sides - except for the senior "nationalist" leaders who are (unfairly) depicted as entirely dishonest and self-interested. Characterisation is perhaps a little simplistic and this edition is full of typographical errors. Certainly the machinations of the SRANC, then the NDP, later ZAPU (still later ZANU) are greatly oversimplified (here simply "The Party"). However as it was not written as a history text or "art" they do not detract from the book's original purpose. Additionally the fictional nature allows the depiction of scenes in a level of detail that would not otherwise be possible.
However, Rhodesia is gone, never to return. If Peter STIFF's book is to prove anything other than a "mildly entertaining, fairly informative, historical overview" it must be read in the context both of Zimbabwe today, and counter insurgencies in general. Whatever the original intentions of the founders of the Southern Rhodesia African National Congress (SRANC), and the policies of the Rhodesian government both before and after UDI; the result has been the rule of Zimbabwe by ZANU-PF under a former teacher - Robert MUGABE. Only the most foolish individual can honestly believe that life today for the ordinary Zimbabwean under MUGABE represents any kind of improvement from life under the British in 1956 - more than half a century ago (and lets face it, it wasn't great then).
Today the West appears impotent in the face of the MUGABE regieme. For decades Western policy has been informed by the lazy, insulting and racist view that all black Africans are the same (when in fact they are are the same only in the sense that they are not white). This has been combined with a patronising view of their cultural heritage and a very narrow interpretation of the elusive concept of democracy. The appalling means of ZIPRA and ZANLA terrorists (financed, trained and facillitated by the usual suspects - China, Russia, East Germany, Cuba, North Korea and Libya; together with Tanzania, Ethiopia Mozambique and Zambia), would not, in my view, have justified any ends. As for MUGABE, he joined the Party (then the National Democratic Party - NDP) in 1960. The subequent internal fueding and violence of the "nationalists", leading to MUGABE as the ultimate benificiary, and his current behaviour, must lead to serious doubts as the purity of his motivation personally, and that of ZANU-PF members more genera
lly. These things need to be born in mind when dealing with the current problems of Africa and Zimbabwe, and this is the primary reason why "The Rain Goddess" remains relevent.
Zimbabwe is a long way from most of our homes, and its last 50 years of history is a confusing mish-mash of acronyms. However, beyond that it is an on-going tragedy that both the West's disengagemnt from the continent, and China's unashamed exploitation of Africa are unlikely to solve. I hope that a reading of this old book by a new generation of Westerners outside Zimbabwe may help them to overcome their paralysis over Africa, (caused by both disinterest and fear of being called racist). And by that I do not mean the lazy and wasteful expedient of Aid increases, but that's another subject. Nor do I expect or wish to see a military campaign. The West, having squandered its treasure and blood on George W's pointless adventures in Iraq, has no stomach for another fight. Anyway, I serioulsly doubt that a Western military campaign could work.
But is a serious, creative attempt to improve the sorry state of Zimbabwe in particular, and Africa in general too much to ask? Or will it remain just a sad footnote in the aftermath of the Cold War?
