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Abstract
In April/May 1979, following an “internal settlement” in Rhodesia, elections were held for a Parliament with an African majority. On June 1st, Bishop Abel Muzorewa took office as Prime Minister of ‘Zimbabwe-Rhodesia.’ Having conceded power to an African majority government, white Rhodesians expected Britain to recognize the Muzorewa regime and end crippling sanctions. However, contrary to her election promises, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher withheld recognition and maneuvered the Muzorewa government into accepting new elections inclusive of Joshua Nkomo and Robert Mugabe, who led the ‘Patriotic Front,’ against which Rhodesian security forces had been fighting for years. Thatcher's refusal to recognize the Muzorewa government ultimately allowed Mugabe to take power, an outcome highly unsatisfactory to most whites. My paper will examine primary source evidence, especially newspapers and Parliamentary records, to gauge white Rhodesian opinion from April to August 1979, when the question of British recognition hung in the balance. In particular, I will ask: How did white Rhodesians perceive their circumstances in this intriguing period? How likely did they believe recognition and an end to sanctions really were? And, lastly, how did they react when the deliverance they had hoped for, courtesy of Mrs. Thatcher, failed to arrive?
Notes
1. See W. Churchill, Defending the West, (Westport: Arlington House, 1981), 175, for the Soviet role.
2. See Churchill, Defending the West, 184.
3. It was a fitting name, in that it paid homage to the country's black and white historical and cultural traditions, respectively, but it was also unsatisfactory, insofar as these traditions were, by some measures, incompatible, and it was unclear why, under majority rule, the name ‘Rhodesia’, beloved by the whites but generally loathed by the blacks, should persist. Eventually, even many whites would come to accept that the new country would be called Zimbabwe.
4. Smith was realistic about the chances for success. In January 1979, he said there was a 50–50 probability of US and British recognition of the new government. See M. Meredith, The Past is Another Country, Rhodesia: UDI to Zimbabwe, (London: Pan Books, 1980), 356; P. Godwin and I. Hancock, ‘Rhodesians Never Die’: The Impact of War and Political Change on White Rhodesia, c. 1970–1980, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 239.
5. P. Masters, ‘Carter and the Rhodesian Problem’, International Social Science Review, 75, 3&4 (2000), 27–28; D. Caute, Under the Skin: The Death of White Rhodesia, (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1983), 176; M. Charlton, The Last Colony in Africa: Diplomacy and the Independence of Rhodesia, (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1990), 12. South Africa was also largely supportive – see S. Onslow, ‘“Noises Off”: South Africa and the Lancaster House Settlement, 1979–1980,’ Journal of Southern African Studies, 35, 2 (2009), 492.
6. N. Mitchell, ‘Tropes of the Cold War: Jimmy Carter and Rhodesia’, Cold War History, 7, 2 (2007), 270; Caute, Under the Skin, 234–235, 240; P. Moorcraft, A Short Thousand Years: The End of Rhodesia's Rebellion, (Salisbury: Galaxie, 1979), 94; Meredith, Past, 332.
7. See K. Flower, Serving Secretly: An Intelligence Chief on Record, Rhodesia into Zimbabwe, 1964 to 1981, (London: Murray, 1987), 222. Granted, voters were in many cases pressured both to vote AND to abstain from voting. In this sense, it becomes very difficult to evaluate the degree to which the April 1979 election was a fair representation of the views of the people of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia.
8. J. Wood, ‘The Rhodesian Issue in Historical Perspective: The Demise of Rhodesia,’ in A. Venter, ed., Challenge: Southern Africa within the African Revolutionary Context, An Overview, (Gibraltar: Ashanti, 1989), 378; Moorcraft, A Short Thousand Years, 135–140; Meredith, Past, 362–363; Charlton, The Last Colony, 49; Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 244; The Sunday Mail, 15 April 1979, 14; The Chronicle, 20 April 1979, 7; The Herald, 20 April 1979, 3; The Chronicle, 21 April 1979, 1; The Herald, 21 April 1979, 3; The Sunday Mail, 22 April 1979, 1; The Herald, 24 April 1979, 2, 6. The black turnout rate of 65% was widely disputed at the time, but even the most ungenerous estimates of turnout were at least 50%.
9. The Chronicle, 18 April 1979, 1.
10. Caute, Under the Skin, 22.
11. P. Sharp, ‘Thatcher's Wholly British Foreign Policy’, Orbis, 35, 3 (1991); see also A. Verrier, The Road to Zimbabwe 1890–1980, (London: Jonathan Cape, 1986), 227; M. Hudson, Triumph or Tragedy? Rhodesia to Zimbabwe, (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1981), 152–153.
12. Hills, Last Days, 132.
13. The Chronicle, 12 April 1979, 1; The Herald, 12 April 1979, 5; see The Herald, 18 April 1979, 2, for Mrs. Thatcher's remarks of a similar nature.
14. Even before the May 3rd election, there had been hints that the Conservatives’ sympathy for ‘Zimbabwe-Rhodesia’ was tempered by caution. See Mitchell, ‘Tropes’, 273. Indeed, Mrs. Thatcher herself put down a small revolt of pro-Rhodesia Conservatives in late 1978. See F. Emery, ‘Mrs Thatcher Shares Feelings on Rhodesia But Unity Comes First’, The Times, 10 November 1978; J. Davidow, A Peace in Southern Africa: The Lancaster House Conference on Rhodesia, 1979, (Boulder: Westview Press, 1984), 35; Caute, Under the Skin, 289–292.
15. Report to the Prime Minister on the Election Held in Zimbabwe-Rhodesia in April 1979, www.rhodesia.nl/elect1.htm, accessed 19 January 2013.
16. D. Martin and P. Johnson, The Struggle for Zimbabwe: The Chimurenga War, (Boston: Faber and Faber, 1981), 301; Report to the Prime Minister.
17. Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 300; see p. 302 for backtracking; see also Hudson, Triumph, 150; The Chronicle, 7 April 1979, 1; The Herald, 10 April 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 11 April 1979, 8; The Herald, 11 April 1979, 14; The Chronicle, 16 April 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 17 April 1979, 6; The Herald, 5 May 1979, 3. Mrs. Thatcher had said almost exactly the same thing. Hudson, Triumph, 149.
18. See Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) House of Lords Official Report, 388, 2 February 1978, 874–886, for equivocation; Hudson, Triumph, 150; H. Wessels, P.K. van der Byl: African Statesman, (Johannesburg: 30 Degrees South, 2010), 259. Carrington himself admitted that Rhodesia was mainly of interest because it was ‘distracting’ him from pursuing more pressing concerns. P. Carrington, Reflecting on Things Past: The Memoirs of Peter Lord Carrington, (New York: Harper & Row, 1988), 287. He also believed that recognition ‘would achieve little – except the likely break-up of the Commonwealth.’ Carrington, Reflecting, 290. It was a bad sign for the Rhodesians that the Tory right-wing frequently vilified Carrington, but David Owen held him in high esteem! See Davidow, Peace, 27; I. Smith, Bitter Harvest: Zimbabwe and the Aftermath of its Independence, (London: John Blake, 2008), XIV.
19. Sharp, ‘Thatcher's’; see also Masters, ‘Carter’, 29; People, 29 October 1979; P. Sharp, Thatcher's Diplomacy: The Revival of British Foreign Policy, (New York: St. Martin's, 1997), 30; H. Young, One of Us: A Biography of Margaret Thatcher, (London: Macmillan, 1989), 177.
20. Carrington, Reflecting, 292; Davidow, Peace, 14; Sharp, Thatcher's Diplomacy, 35–36; M. Thatcher, The Downing Street Years, (New York: HarperCollins, 1993), 73; Smith, Bitter Harvest, XIV; J. Campbell, The Iron Lady: Margaret Thatcher, from Grocer's Daughter to Prime Minister, (New York: Penguin, 2011), 150–152; Charlton, The Last Colony, 19, 31–34; Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 244.
21. I would have liked to have access to television and radio news coverage from Zimbabwe-Rhodesia in 1979, but so far my efforts to obtain such materials have been unsuccessful, and in any case such broadcast news sources were heavily influenced by government propaganda. With respect to the question of whether or not my newspaper sources are representative of white opinion, it is important to point out that the three newspapers cited, though censored, were not government-owned, and in fact they were often seen as hostile to the Ian Smith regime. My view is that they did represent, albeit imperfectly, the views of their mostly white readership. For what it is worth, these newspapers were owned by a subsidiary of the Argus Press group in South Africa. It is therefore plausible that their editorial bias may have been affected by this South African connection – although once again the Argus Press was by no means slavishly obedient to the South African government. One last point: my methodology for the inclusion of items from the aforementioned newspapers in this analysis was simply that the material be relevant to the issue of British recognition of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia or to the British-Rhodesian relationship as a whole. From that starting point I narrowed down the available material based on its level of interest.
22. The Chronicle, 21 April 1979, 4.
23. The Sunday Mail, 22 April 1979, 12.
24. The Herald, 23 April 1979, 1; see also The Chronicle, 23 April 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 25 April 1979, 1.
25. The Chronicle, 27 April 1979, 9; see also The Chronicle, 26 April 1979, 1.
26. The Herald, 27 April 1979, 10.
27. The Sunday Mail, 29 April 1979, 12.
28. The Chronicle, 7 April 1979, 3; The Chronicle, 23 April 1979, 5; The Herald, 23 April 1979, 3; The Herald, 26 April 1979, 2; The Sunday Mail, 29 April 1979, 1; The Herald, 30 April 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 1 May 1979, 5; The Herald, 1 May 1979, 2; The Chronicle, 2 May 1979, 6; The Herald, 2 May 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 3 May 1979, 1; The Herald, 3 May 1979, 1, 4, 8; The Herald, 4 May 1979, 1.
29. The Sunday Mail, 8 April 1979, 25; The Chronicle, 10 April 1979, 5; The Herald, 25 April 1979, 8.
30. The Herald, 5 May 1979, 4.
31. The Chronicle, 5 May 1979, 4; see also The Chronicle, 4 May 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 5 May 1979, 1.
32. The Sunday Mail, 6 May 1979, 11.
33. The Sunday Mail, 6 May 1979, 10.
34. The Chronicle, 8 May 1979, 1.
35. The Herald, 9 May 1979, 4.
36. The Chronicle, 12 May 1979, 8.
37. Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 303.
38. Hudson, Triumph, 158; see also Caute, Under the Skin, 353.
39. The Herald, 14 May 1979, 1.
40. Hudson, Triumph, 159; see The Chronicle, 16 May 1979, 1.
41. Smith, Bitter Harvest, 301.
42. The Herald, 16 May 1979, 8.
43. The Herald, 16 May 1979, 1; The Herald, 17 May 1979, 1.
44. The Herald, 18 May 1979, 1.
45. The Chronicle, 19 May 1979, 1; see Hudson, Triumph, 159–160.
46. The Chronicle, 21 May 1979, 4.
47. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, 967, 22 May 1979, 869.
48. The Herald, 23 May 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 23 May 1979, 1.
49. The Herald, 23 May 1979, 1; The Herald, 24 May 1979, 12.
50. The Chronicle, 24 May 1979, 8.
51. Mail and Guardian, 30 December 2009, http://mg.co.za/article/2009-12-30-margaret-thatcher-blocked-talks-with-terrorist-mugabe, accessed 23 February 2012.
52. The Chronicle, 25 May 1979, 8.
53. The Chronicle, 26 May 1979, 4.
54. The Herald, 26 May 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 26 May 1979, 1.
55. Flower, Serving Secretly, 228, 230. In assessing Zimbabwe-Rhodesia's prospects for recognition, Flower perceived the new Conservative government as depressingly ‘ambivalent,’ but he noted that many other countries in both Europe and Francophone Africa were prepared to grant recognition, if and when Britain took the plunge. See Flower, Serving Secretly, 225–226; see also Charlton, The Last Colony, 18; Hudson disagrees: see Hudson, Triumph, 154–155.
56. The Sunday Mail, 27 May 1979, 14.
57. Meredith, Past, 15–18; The Herald, 1 June 1979, 1.
58. The Herald, 1 June 1979, 1.
59. Time, 113, 23 (4 June 1979), 39.
60. The Herald, 4 June 1979, 6.
61. The Herald, 4 June 1979, 3; see also The Herald, 2 June 1979, 4; The Chronicle, 4 June 1979, 4, referring to African ‘blackmail’; The Chronicle, 2 June 1979, 1; J. Nkomo, Nkomo: The Story of My Life, (London: Methuen, 1984), 192; Verrier, Road to Zimbabwe, 242; Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 302–303; see also Wessels, P.K., 249, for evidence that U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance was also fearful of the ‘African lobby.’
62. The Herald, 5 June 1979, 6.
63. Masters, ‘Carter’, 29; The Herald, 8 June 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 9 June 1979, 5.
64. Mitchell, ‘Tropes’, 263; Smith, Bitter Harvest, 306.
65. Mitchell, ‘Tropes’, 274. Carter seems also to have seen the Rhodesian problem largely through the prism of race relations in the American South, and thus he was determined not to appease the whites.
66. The Herald, 9 June 1979, 6.
67. The Chronicle, 9 June 1979, 4; see also The Chronicle, 9 June 1979, 1.
68. The Sunday Mail, 10 June 1979, 12.
69. Smith, Bitter Harvest, 306, 308.
70. Flower, Serving Secretly, 226–227.
71. The Herald, 12 June 1979, 6.
72. The Herald, 12 June 1979, 6; the reader will note that hostility to Ian Smith is a prominent theme in these letters to the editor, but whether this reflects the prejudices of the white masses, or the notorious anti-Smith bias in the press itself, is hard to say. Hard, but not impossible: we do have the evidence of the white election results in 1979 and 1980, in which Smith's Rhodesian Front won every single contest.
73. The Herald, 12 June 1979, 1.
74. The Chronicle, 13 June 1979, 1.
75. The Herald, 16 June 1979, 2.
76. The Sunday Mail, 17 June 1979, 1.
77. The Herald, 18 June 1979, 1.
78. The Herald, 19 June 1979, 4.
79. The Herald, 23 June 1979, 1.
80. The Sunday Mail, 24 June 1979, 6; see Charlton, The Last Colony, 31, for an admission by Muzorewa that he was ‘angry’ about British policy.
81. The Herald, 25 June 1979, 3.
82. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 26 June 1979, 16, 18.
83. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 27 June 1979, 45–46.
84. The Herald, 27 June 1979, 1.
85. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 28 June 1979, 135–136.
86. The Herald, 28 June 1979, 12.
87. The Chronicle, 28 June 1979, 10.
88. The Sunday Mail, 1 July 1979, 12.
89. See The Herald, 2 July 1979, 1; The Herald, 3 July 1979, 1. For an account of the horrified reaction of Lord Carrington and Malcolm Fraser, Australian PM, to these remarks, see S. Chan, Robert Mugabe: A Life of Power and Violence, (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2003), 9, and S. Chan, Southern Africa: Old Treacheries and New Deceits, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011), 15. Thatcher's statement motivated Fraser to redouble his efforts to prevent recognition of the Muzorewa regime. See Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 304. See also, Charlton, The Last Colony, 32. Kaunda appears to have been particularly interested in negotiating with ‘Zimbabwe-Rhodesia’. See Wessels, P.K., 231.
90. The Chronicle, 3 July 1979, 4.
91. The Herald, 3 July 1979, 4; see also Charlton, The Last Colony, 27.
92. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 3 July 1979, 259.
93. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 4 July 1979, 285–286.
94. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 4 July 1979, 314.
95. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 6 July 1979, 387–388.
96. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesi, 6 July 1979, 411–412.
97. C. Soames, ‘From Rhodesia to Zimbabwe’, International Affairs, 56, 3 (1980), 407; see also Verrier, Road to Zimbabwe, 242; Smith, Bitter Harvest, 309; Onslow, ‘Noises Off,’ 493.
98. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, 970, 10 July 1979, 263.
99. The Herald, 7 July 1979, 6.
100. The Herald, 9 July 1979, 1.
101. Davidow, Peace, 9; Meredith, Past, 371–372. Ken Flower describes in detail Muzorewa's travels, during which the Bishop was received cordially, even sympathetically, by British officials, including Lord Carrington. See Flower, Serving Secretly, 228–229; National Review, 31, 31 (3 August 1979), 959. The disunity within Muzorewa's own UANC, combined with the initial refusal of Ndabiningi Sithole's ZANU to recognize the results of the April election, undoubtedly diminished the credibility of the new regime, in British eyes.
102. The Chronicle, 13 July 1979, 1.
103. The Herald, 14 July 1979, 6.
104. The Sunday Mail, 15 July 1979, 12.
105. The Chronicle, 16 July 1979, 1; The Herald, 16 July 1979, 1–2.
106. The Herald, 18 July 1979, 6.
107. Young, One of Us, 177; see also Thatcher, Downing Street, 72.
108. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, 971, 25 July 1979, 625.
109. Young, One of Us, 178–180; see I. Hancock, ‘Australian Policy Towards Rhodesia/Zimbabwe,’ http://www.naa.gov.au/collection/publications/papers-and-podcasts/international-relations-and-foreign-affairs/hancock-transcript.aspx, accessed 19 January 2013, for Australia's role in persuading Mrs. Thatcher against recognition; see also The Herald, 27 July 1979, 6.
110. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 26 July 1979, 480, 494.
111. The Herald, 27 July 1979, 4.
112. The Sunday Mail, 29 July 1979, 1.
113. The Herald, 30 July 1979, 10.
114. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 1 August 1979, 628–630; see also Meredith, Past, 366, for additional information about the Carter administration's attentiveness to African opinion.
115. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 1 August 1979, 630–631.
116. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 1 August 1979, 673–676.
117. Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 312.
118. Verrier, Road to Zimbabwe, 242; The Herald, 2 August 1979, 1, 5, 8; The Herald, 3 August 1979, 4; Charlton, The Last Colony, 43–46.
119. See S. Chan, Twelve Years of Commonwealth Diplomatic History: Commonwealth Summit Meetings, 1979–1991, (Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 1992), 29–33, and Chan, Southern Africa, 18–20, for accounts of the jockeying at Lusaka.
120. Verrier, Road to Zimbabwe, 244; Charlton, The Last Colony, 54; see also The Chronicle, 1 August 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 2 August 1979, 1; The Herald, 3 August 1979, 4.
121. Nkomo, My Life, 193; Carrington, Reflecting, 295; Charlton, The Last Colony, 58.
122. The Sunday Mail, 5 August 1979, 14.
123. See The Sunday Mail, 5 August 1979, 1, 3.
124. Flower, Serving Secretly, 230; see also Wessels, P.K., 262, 265.
125. H. Wiseman and A. Taylor, From Rhodesia to Zimbabwe: The Politics of Transition, (New York: Pergamon, 1981), 5.
126. Hudson, Triumph, 165; Charlton, The Last Colony, 50; see The Herald, 7 August 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 7 August 1979, 1; The Chronicle, 10 August 1979, 1.
127. The Herald, 6 August 1979, 6.
128. The Herald, 7 August 1979, 1.
129. The Herald, 7 August 1979, 6.
130. The Chronicle, 9 August 1979, 1, 4; see also Caute, Under the Skin, 371.
131. The Herald, 9 August 1979, 4.
132. The Herald, 9 August 1979, 4.
133. The Herald, 10 August 1979, 6.
134. The Herald, 10 August 1979, 10.
135. The Chronicle, 10 August 1979, 6.
136. The Chronicle, 13 August 1979, 1.
137. The Sunday Mail, 12 August 1979, 1.
138. The Sunday Mail, 12 August 1979, 14.
139. The Chronicle, 13 August 1979, 4.
140. The Herald, 13 August 1979, 6.
141. The Herald, 13 August 1979, 6.
142. Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 14 August 1979, 1090.
143. The Herald, 14 August 1979, 4.
144. The Herald, 15 August 1979, 1, 12.
145. The Sunday Mail, 26 August 1979, 1.
146. J. Wood, ‘Rhodesian Insurgency’, http://rhodesia.nl/wood1.htm, accessed on 18 January 2013; see Carrington, Reflecting, 293–294; Davidow, Peace, 15–16, 44–45; Moorcraft, A Short Thousand Years, 111–112, 117–120, 212; Caute, Under the Skin, 380; Charlton, The Last Colony, 18, 50, 120–121; Campbell, The Iron Lady, 153; Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 261; Wessels, P.K., 231, 241, 243; Wood, ‘The Rhodesian Issue,’ 381–382; Smith, Bitter Harvest, 257, 308; Thatcher, Downing Street, 73; Meredith, Past, 334, 345–351, 374; Flower, Serving Secretly, 228, 230; Sharp, Thatcher's Diplomacy, 39; Verrier, Road to Zimbabwe, 238–239; B. Raftopoulos and A. Mlambo, eds., Becoming Zimbabwe: A History from the Pre-colonial Period to 2008, (Harare: Weaver Press, 2009), 165; Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 305; P. Carrington, ‘Did we help bring a tyrant to power?’, The Times, 5 April 2008, 23; see also S. Chan, Exporting Apartheid: Foreign Policies in Southern Africa, 1978–1988, (New York: St. Martin's, 1990), 94.
147. The Times, 5 April 2008; Onslow, ‘Noises Off,’ 496, 499, 503; Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 227–228, 270; Smith, Bitter Harvest, 262–266; Flower, Serving Secretly, 194; Martin and Johnson, Struggle, 294–295; Time, 113, 23 (4 June 1979), 39; Caute, Under the Skin, 314 .
148. Davidow, Peace, 44. Godwin and Hancock offer an equally bleak assessment of the military prospects for Zimbabwe-Rhodesia's security forces: see Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 251–253. Stephen Chan seems to think that something like a stalemate had been reached – a common view. See S. Chan, Grasping Africa: A Tale of Tragedy and Achievement, (New York: I.B. Tauris, 2007), 132; and Chan, Robert Mugabe, 6, 14; Chan, Southern Africa, 13.
149. Wood, ‘Rhodesian Insurgency’.
150. Onslow, ‘Noises Off,’ 492–498, 504–505. South Africa's strong support of Muzorewa (under Prime Minister Botha) marked a reversal of the inconsistent and lukewarm support given to Smith (under Prime Minister Vorster). Of course, South African support was a double-edged sword for Zimbabwe-Rhodesia.
151. Moorcraft, A Short Thousand Years, 144; Caute, Under the Skin, 269–271; Onslow, ‘Noises Off,’ 497.
152. Wood, ‘The Rhodesian Issue,’ 384.
153. Caute, Under the Skin, 375–376; see The Herald, August 3 1979, 1; Charlton, The Last Colony, 29, includes an assurance from Muzorewa that he was ‘sure’ that victory could have been obtained; Mugabe also appears to have been ready to escalate the conflict, by embarking on a campaign of urban terrorism – see Charlton, The Last Colony, 53; in a bad sign for Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, in 1979 it suffered its most serious losses of aircraft and helicopters: see Caute, Under the Skin, 375.
154. Having said this, the present study takes no position on which election, that of April 1979 or February 1980, was more representative of the views of the majority of black Zimbabweans. Coercion clearly played a role in both contests, after all. Moreover, it is possible that both elections were reasonably valid, in that blacks may have downgraded their opinion of Bishop Muzorewa in the course of a turbulent ten-month period.
155. Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 213, 294; see Parliamentary Debates (Hansard) Official Report, House of Assembly of Zimbabwe-Rhodesia, 26 July 1979, 470.
156. Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 251, 287.
157. Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 281.
158. Caute, Under the Skin, 369. Nonetheless, as Godwin and Hancock point out, ‘…the [white Rhodesian] society which claimed to stand for certain principles…was composed of people whose common interest was that they came, and stayed, for a good material existence.’ Godwin and Hancock, Rhodesians, 314.
159. Smith, Bitter Harvest, 293; The Herald, 24 April 1979, 1. It is likely that, if Zimbabwe-Rhodesia had made constitutional concessions to obtain British recognition, such concessions would have helped to justify recognition not only from Britain but from other Western, and possibly non-Western, states. Nonetheless, Zimbabwe-Rhodesia would have struggled to gain widespread recognition.
160. On the other hand, such an approach would have had the virtue, from the British perspective, of avoiding a period of direct British rule over Rhodesia, and of avoiding British responsibility for overseeing a free election in that country – an enterprise fraught with peril.
161. Carrington, Reflecting, 297, 300; Davidow, Peace, 16, 39–41; Meredith, Past, 375; Charlton, The Last Colony, 43, 117; Chan, Robert Mugabe, 12–15.
162. Smith, Bitter Harvest, 318; see also Wessels, P.K., 235; Charlton, The Last Colony, 33, 90, 116.
163. The Times, 5 April 2008.
164. Young, One of Us, 182.
165. Personal communication, 3 April 2012.
166. Charlton, The Last Colony, 31.