Why Americans Should Care About Rhodesia

You Really Should

Welcome back, and thanks for reading! Now that I’m done with the series on the White Rajahs of Sarawak (click to read Part I, Part II, Part III, and Part IV), I’ll be getting back to some of my more usual content while I start researching for the next Colonial Heroes project — more news on that soon. Amongst those topics I want to dig deeper into is the history of Rhodesia and how its murder is relevant to Americans. So, to start, I figured a concise explainer of why I find the subject so important for Americans to learn about—something I’ve tried to get at but not explained to my satisfaction in past articles. Also, I have tried the “voiceover” option for this article; please let me know if you like it. Enjoy! And as always, please like and share the article so the algorithm knows to promote it!

While I have now written a great deal on the Rhodesian story—from how Carter¹ and the CIA² justified murdering it to how its destruction is a crystal ball for the path South Africa is now on³—an aspect of the story I would like to explain more satisfactorily is the one that many people ask about: how is the history of that landlocked country in Southern Africa relevant to Americans?

To some extent, the similarities are obvious. It was a country steeped in Anglo-Saxon tradition—not unlike the American colonies and early Republic—⁴that was murdered by the same sorts of people behind the race communist mindset⁵ that is destroying America.⁶ It is no real surprise that we got the civilization-killing disparate impact ideology⁷ inflicted upon us in America around the same time that our rulers killed Rhodesia. Further, America’s politicians call for race-based “reparations”⁸ and grants⁹ not unlike the Zimbawean land expropriation,¹⁰ so it’s not hard to see where those blue zones are headed.

But it is deeper than that. Everyone with a brain knows “Zohrab Mamdani” would be a disaster for NYC; Rhodesian history isn’t needed to explain it. Similarly, residents of everywhere from Baltimore to St. Louis, Memphis to Detroit can tell you why their cities are a mess. South African and Rhodesian history helps put this race communism in context and show where it might be headed,¹¹ but we have plenty of (less aesthetically interesting) examples of that already, many of them from close to home.

The real reason that Rhodesia matters for Americans is that the spiritual problem presented is one that we very much need to answer, for the same forces that destroyed it are destroying us. It, better than any other historical case study, shows how much the Western mindset shifted and how much the one now prevalent in America is at odds with our history, tradition, and culture.

The basic problem is this: Is it human flourishing that matters, or commitment to a vague idea of total equality enforced by the state, whatever the consequences?

Human Flourishing and the Rhodesian World

The old view is that it is human flourishing that matters. The Greeks called the concept eudaimonia, and it roughly translates as living a life of virtue, wisdom, and purpose. This is what Jefferson meant by the “happiness” line in the Declaration of Independence, not a subjective sense of being emotionally upbeat in the moment.

In the view of all in Western Civilization up until about the Civil Rights Era, the point of the state was, ideally, to ensure those who did what they ought could flourish by living lives of virtue and purpose while gaining wisdom. Notably, the American Founders quite latched onto this concept,¹² and the British gentry across the pond were nearly as committed to it, as were the Greeks and Romans of Classical times.

So, “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” does not mean government-allowed licentiousness or the chasing of temporary pleasures while being subsidized by taxpayers. It means living in a flourishing society in which iron sharpens iron as the best become ever better and those who wish to emulate them strive to do so by living similar lives of virtue and purpose while attaining wisdom.

Notably, such a concept is much more aristocratic than egalitarian. It is about achievement, excellence, and long-term horizons over which a vision is slowly acted out, not short-term pleasures or the smug self-satisfaction that comes with societal equality, which by its nature is about being average rather than excellent.

Flourishing, in short, requires distinction and superiority in a competition that lasts forever. This is why we look back to George Washington, for example: by any metric, he was truly excellent. He flourished. He obtained eudaimonia as much as any man could,¹³ and that was both his ultimate goal and the objective toward which the society in which he lived was oriented.

Gerald Shields, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Rhodesian Excellence

By the old metric of eudaimonia, Rhodesia was an excellent state. Long after all of its cousins—from the British home country to the American experiment—devolved into managerial rule by the average for the benefit of the worse than average,¹⁴ it remained an excellence-focused society characterized by flourishing in a land that had never known such a state of things before the Rhodesians arrived.

Its agriculture was internationally recognized. Its dogs—the famous Rhodesian Ridgebacks—could fight lions or terrorists while also playing well with children; they were meticulously improved into being the best dogs for the Rhodesian environment.

Bonnie van den Born, http://www.bonfoto.nl, CC BY-SA 3.0 <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/>, via Wikimedia Commons

Its men could farm and fight, and were as courageous as they were wise and innovative. This is why the Rhodesian state lasted so long after sanctions were supposed to have killed it: the Rhodesians could stick together and do things of consequence in a way few other peoples of that degraded post-war period then could.

This is a common theme of life in Rhodesia, and was glimpsed by visitors when they travelled there. The unique mix of austere conditions, boundless opportunity, and aristocratic influence¹⁵ had turned Rhodesia into an excellence-oriented society, and this was evident even in the darkest of days. Dr. Theodore Dalrymple, for instance, was shocked to discover upon arriving in Rhodesia that it was functioning perfectly well even as the whole world ganged up on it and the Bush War entered its final stage.¹⁶

Importantly, this carried through to the Rhodesian political system. Whether one was black or white, male or female, only those who had either attained a high degree of education or (more commonly) had proven themselves to be stewards by obtaining a reasonable level of property could vote.¹⁷

Those who could not handle themselves well, those who could not flourish, were screened out until they bettered themselves. They had to become excellent by acting with wisdom and purpose to become propertied in a harsh land, and retain the respect of their peers by acting with virtue. That is a very different standard than mass democracy in that it is excellence-oriented rather than about the mere accumulation of mass.

So, by its very nature, Rhodesia was unequal and hierarchical in every respect. And, as a result, it functioned well. Quite well, in fact. It had the highest living standards for blacks on the continent, was immensely prosperous, maintained classic British social culture well after taxes and war destroyed that in Britain, and was generally a society that did not just allow for but encouraged human flourishing. Eudaimonia was alive and well in Rhodesia even as it struggled against the whole world to the bitter end.

Zimbabwean Decline

Then Zimbabwe rejected that system, with the election of Robert Mugabe in 1980, and became the opposite in every respect. For one, the benefits of Rhodesian rule died out nearly immediately: it was characterized by disorder and lawlessness rather than smooth functioning, kleptocracy rather than just and paternalistic rule, famine rather than being a breadbasket, and total destruction and decay rather than human flourishing.¹⁸

More importantly, however, was that the concept of excellence so integral to the Rhodesian attitude died out. Unlike Prime Minister Ian Douglas Smith, the Rhodesian Front leader who ruled Rhodesia during its independent days and was described by those who met him as the perfect gentleman in every respect, Mugabe did not premise his rule on his personal excellence and having the support and advice of the best men. Rather, his rule was democratic in the only way that mattered: the mob, the teeming mass of humanity, threw its weight behind him.

It then gave him a mandate to violently level society, and that is what he did. Much as the Russian communists genocided the Borzoi dog breed because of its association with the aristocracy,¹⁹ Mugabe was a demagogue and tyrant who ruled in the name of “the people” and wiped away the traces of Rhodesian excellence. He destroyed the prosperous agricultural estates in the name of economic equity. He destroyed the old political hierarchy in the name of democracy. He impoverished the country to show it rejected the old state of things.

For that, he was praised. Jimmy Carter and Andy Young have praised him to the end of their days.²⁰ Queen Elizabeth the Worst ushered the Mugabe project along, and “her” government did everything in its power to support him;²¹ Prince Charles even flew down to Zimbabwe to lend Mugabe his support and legitimacy.²² And, of course, the American Civil Rights apparatus has forever damned Rhodesia and praised Mugabe though he eradicated flourishing in the name of equality.

Yes, Americans Should Care

That should matter quite a great deal to Americans. Much as the Rhodesian system was designed to be run by the best, who saw it as their duty to lead the state through times bright or perilous, the American Founders saw themselves as gentlemen and wanted to build a system that would create “natural aristocrats” and teach them to do their duty by leading.²³

That was, of course, murdered over the course of the 19th and 20th centuries,²⁴ and we now live in the increasingly tattered and tyrannical world built by the same ideology that destroyed Zimbabwe.

Whereas once we thought of excellence and flourished because of it, our rulers bowed before the idea of egalitarianism, and so we are following Zimbabwe’s path to ruin.²⁵ The old spirit was killed, with what vestiges of it that remained in public being fully dead and buried by the post-WWII period, and so eudaimonia has been rejected in the name of “equity” as the world around us crumbles.²⁶

This can be seen in nearly every aspect of American life. Americans are taxed to the point of poverty so that the government can pay out reparations programs, whether directly called such or hidden as “welfare” programs for an underclass that refuses to better itself.²⁷ DEI and disparate impact have made it illegal to consistently hire the best man for the job, meaning that “equity” comes first and excellence last.²⁸ Soft-on-crime policing and the anarcho-tyranny that is so attendant to it²⁹ mean that the worst elements of society can prey on the successful, but when the law-abiding citizen tries defending himself, he faces years of lawfare like Kyle Rittenhouse.

The practical effects are dire, but the caustic effect upon the spirit is all the more severe. America used to be a land of accomplishment, a land that conceived of and did great things. Rather than living in the muck and mire for eternity like the pre-European residents of Dahomey, we went to the moon, built the Hoover Dam, built the transcontinental, carved the Panama Canal out of the jungle, and did much else besides.

American excellence

All of that, most notably the leaps forward in aerospace creation for which America became particularly noted,³⁰ required excellence. Much as the Rhodesian farmer and his trusty ridgeback were defined by excellence, the American creator was defined by his excellence.

George Washington and Robert E Lee were renowned for ages as the consummate gentlemen and wise leaders, not unlike Ian Smith.³¹ American engineers landed astronauts on the moon and American astronauts jumped around on top of it, the only humans to set foot on another celestial body. American designers built the SR-71, the fastest plane ever built, with slide rules…and it was never shot down. On and on it goes. The standard once was excellence, and striving toward it with virtue and wisdom created a state of human flourishing.

Not so much anymore. While Americans still do some cool things—Elon Musk’s SpaceX is the prime example—the American spirit has withered on the vine in much of society as our people embraced the Zimbabwean spirit. Instead of trying to conquer and settle Mars, for example, we funded welfare at home and foreign aid in Africa; the favela was put before accomplishment as equity smashed our civilization.³² That horrid song “Whitey on the Moon” (yes, this is a real, Civil Rights-era song, listen to it below) became the defining tune of the new American experiment. And it is marching us towards Zimbabwe.

Rhodesia is relevant not just because it shows where this leads, a dire outcome of which we sadly have many examples already, but because it shows the alternative. The only way to avoid Zimbabwification is to reach back for what we were, what Rhodesia still represents through its aesthetics and history: we must embrace human flourishing by choosing hierarchy, paternalism, and stewardship while rejecting egalitarianism and all its discontents.

While that is now derided as “un-American,” it is what our Founders chose. It is what our leading men represented when the republic flourished. Excellence is not un-American, nor is the society it creates.

That is difficult for many raised in the egalitarian tradition to accept, but it is true. There is no compromise that can be made with the global race communist poison. It must be rejected root and branch, in all its forms. Flourishing must be put first, and “equity” dismissed as the cancer it is. The correct defining spirit of our civilization must be chosen, and it is the one represented by men like George Washington and Ian Smith.

For, if we continue the languorous decline into Global Zimbabwe in the name of not being offensive, if that choice continues to be avoided in the name of embracing comfort through abdication of duty, we won’t just keep drifting toward the Zimbabwification cliff, but will fall off of it. Choose excellence. Choose flourishing. Choose the Rhodesian attitude.

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4. The similarities:

5. What that term means:

6. Discussed here:

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8. We are already paying reparations:

9. For example, here’s the Mayor of Chicago doing so: https://x.com/GuntherEagleman/status/1934707554254508523

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15. Rory discusses this some in this podcast:

16. https://www.city-journal.org/article/after-empire

17. The voting system is discussed in depth here:

18. Discussed some here:

19. The story told here: https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/14/nyregion/a-soviet-visitor-and-a-quest-preserving-the-borzoi.html

20. Discussed here:

And here:

21. Her involvement is discussed in this book:

22. https://www.britishpathe.com/asset/180266/

23. Discussed here:

24. Described here:

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29. Anarcho-tyranny discussed here:

30. I got the term from this post, and I think it’s an excellent descriptor: https://x.com/PettitFrontier/status/1949878038059008282

31. South African politician Roman Cabanac and I discussed Ian Smith’s status as the perfect gentleman in this show:

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