Confidently believing the first answer that comes to mind, when a question is posed, is the height of polisci intellect.
Why, if Namibia is so inhospitable, did the Germans try to colonize it? Why are other deserts relatively populous? Israel for example supports a huge population. Hell even Las Vegas has like 1/4 of Namibia’s population by itself.
Germans didn't just try to colonize it, but genocided hundreds of thousands of people there and the best agricultural land is still owned by settlers until this day and demanded as restitutions by the descendents of the genocide survivors, which may or may not be a reason why German think tanks are running anti-postcolonialism psyops.
did they colonize the sahara for the stuff in the sahara, or because to control the coasts (where people actually live), you had to control the interior, otherwise you'd have constant raids on your ports?
no you don't, nobody before the colonists bothered with direct administration of the desert folk because simply trading with them and some buffer defenses could keep the coast safe.
so what did they do it for? who can paint the biggest chunk of the map to their own color? resources the sahara might have? control of trade routes to subsaharan africa?
to extract the resources, and probably a bit of pride to paint the map & connect the north with subsaharan colonies. by the time the French were colonizing africa it was faster to use boats for trade though
Why, if Namibia is so inhospitable, did the Germans try to colonize it?
Probably for fancy rocks n shit, or just because they can. Wouldn't be the first time Europeans rocked up and settled in a place that the natives knew better than to bother with. Also, did the Germans really try to colonize all the parts that nobody lives in, or did they do the things Europeans usually do and actually go to where people are already living (in other words, the places that are good to live in) and kill the people who were there so they could live there instead?
I don’t know a lot about Namibia either.
Confidently believing the first answer that comes to mind, when a question is posed, is the height of polisci intellect.
Why, if Namibia is so inhospitable, did the Germans try to colonize it? Why are other deserts relatively populous? Israel for example supports a huge population. Hell even Las Vegas has like 1/4 of Namibia’s population by itself.
Germans didn't just try to colonize it, but genocided hundreds of thousands of people there and the best agricultural land is still owned by settlers until this day and demanded as restitutions by the descendents of the genocide survivors, which may or may not be a reason why German think tanks are running anti-postcolonialism psyops.
France colonized the Sahara. theres minerals and sometimes oil in the desert
did they colonize the sahara for the stuff in the sahara, or because to control the coasts (where people actually live), you had to control the interior, otherwise you'd have constant raids on your ports?
no you don't, nobody before the colonists bothered with direct administration of the desert folk because simply trading with them and some buffer defenses could keep the coast safe.
so what did they do it for? who can paint the biggest chunk of the map to their own color? resources the sahara might have? control of trade routes to subsaharan africa?
to extract the resources, and probably a bit of pride to paint the map & connect the north with subsaharan colonies. by the time the French were colonizing africa it was faster to use boats for trade though
At least in Algeria they have huge deposits of oil and gas in the desert
Also the french used the desert as a test site for nuclear bombs
Probably for fancy rocks n shit, or just because they can. Wouldn't be the first time Europeans rocked up and settled in a place that the natives knew better than to bother with. Also, did the Germans really try to colonize all the parts that nobody lives in, or did they do the things Europeans usually do and actually go to where people are already living (in other words, the places that are good to live in) and kill the people who were there so they could live there instead?