Introduction: The Unraveling of a Settler State Few conflicts encapsulate the violent contradictions of late colonialism and the Cold War in Africa like the Rhodesian Bush War. Lasting from July 1964 to December 1979, this grueling, fifteen-year conflict was more than a war of liberation; it was a brutal civil war, a counter-insurgency campaign, and a bloody proxy struggle all rolled into one. It pitted a determined white minority government, which had unilaterally declared independence from Britain to preserve its power, against two rival African nationalist armies fighting for majority rule. Set against the backdrop of the Cold War, the…

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