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Even leaving aside the vast death and suffering that it wrought on indigenous populations, German ambitions to transform Southwest Africa in the early part of the twentieth century were futile for most. For years colonists wrestled ocean waters, desert landscapes, and widespread aridity as they tried to reach inland in their effort of turning outwardly barren lands into a profitable settler colony. In his innovative environmental history, Martin Kalb outlines the development of the colony up to World War I, deconstructing the common settler narrative, all to reveal the importance of natural forces and the Kaisereich’s everyday violence.
“In this compelling portrait of how non-human actors—from ocean currents to arid interiors to naval shipworms—thwarted German colonial ambitions, Martin Kalb fills a significant gap in the scholarship about a country and a region of growing international interest to environmentalists and ecotourists.” • Thomas M. Lekan, University of Southern Carolina
Chapter 1. Currents, Chances, Commodities
On the Margins
Boiling Giants
Clubbing the Wing-footed
Shoveling White Gold
Chapter 2. Accessing an Arid Land
Our Place in the Desert
Reaching Southwest Africa
Germany’s Own Entrance
Chapter 3. Harbors, Animals, Trains
Technological Marbles
Animal Engineering
Reaching Inland
Chapter 4. Solving Aridity
Existing Structures
Water Structures
Engineering Water
Chapter 5. Access and Destruction
Supplying War
Maintaining Access
Fighting People and Nature
Chapter 6. Expanding War and Death
Drilling Wood
Accessing the South
Reaching Beyond
Chapter 7. Creating a Model Colony
Visions of a Model Colony
Solving the Water Question
Creating a Settler Paradise
Bibliography
Index