DF Malan and the Rise of Afrikaner Nationalism. Lindie Koorts
the shocking disparity hit close to home. In general, the Dutch accused the British of using the camps as a method to exterminate the Boer race, with the word volksmoord (genocide) doing the rounds.[27]
The news was not always reliable, as the British tried to control the flow of information as much as possible. During the first stages of the war, the Dutch used Ons Land as their main source of information, since the mail services from the Cape Colony were far more reliable than those from the two Republics. Ons Land took a clear stance in support of the Boer Republics and condemned the British army for its scorched earth tactics. This did not last very long, as its editor, F.S. Malan, was jailed for libel in early 1901 after printing a letter by a Boer woman that accused General John French of war crimes against civilians. After this, reliable news became ever more difficult to come by.[28] Malan, for one, was not always certain whether or not the reports coming from the Cape Colony could be taken at face value. He was rather dubious as he wrote to his parents:
Judging from the cablegrams, the Cape Colony must be very restless. It was cabled a few days ago that there is a reign of terror in the Dutch towns, the English dare not open their mouths any more, that the students of Stellenbosch openly unfurled the Transvaal flag and are openly singing the Transvaal anthem, that the mail train encountered no less than seventy obstructions south of the Orange River, etc. I don’t know whether all of this is true, but I immediately thought that it is exaggerated with the aim of getting martial law proclaimed.[29]
Malan may have had reasonable grounds for his suspicions, but there was another important dimension to the reports about the Cape Colony. The Dutch hoped that there would be a general uprising among the Afrikaners in the Cape, who would then assist their kinsmen in the north. If this could happen, their combined numbers would not only outnumber the British presence in South Africa, but it would also open up a second front. The Dutch press noted the failure of this pipe dream with some disappointment. They blamed the Cape Afrikaners’ failure to join their kinsmen on their anglicised school system – which had earlier served to alienate the two communities on either side of the Orange River from each other. They condemned the Cape’s political leaders, especially ‘Onze’ Jan Hofmeyr, for their cautious position – although Hofmeyr, who had in fact tried to prevent the war at the negotiating table, now found himself walking a political tightrope. In all fairness, the Dutch newspapers took cognisance of the harsh treatment of Cape rebels, who faced, and received, the death penalty for high treason if captured.[30]
As more and more reports of British atrocities were magnified by the Dutch press and the debate about the Cape Afrikaners’ position raged on, Malan became increasingly agitated, especially after receiving a letter from a friend who expressed similar sentiments. To his sister, he wrote:
I can write you volumes about the war, because my heart is more than full, but where would I end? I fully agree with a friend who wrote to me that we have to stop talking and protesting, which helps less than nothing, but we now have to do something. I add to it that we are not only justified, but that it has become a duty.[31]
Malan also wrote to his father to express his sentiments on the matter: ‘In any event, I think now that the English are worse than the Kaffirs [sic] in going about this war, it is not only justified, but it has also become a duty for the Colonial Afrikaners – for the sake of humaneness and humanity – to intervene with violence.’[32] It is unfortunate that we do not know what the father replied to his son’s hot-headed words. It was most certainly not an encouragement to return to South Africa to take up arms, as there was never any question of Malan abandoning his studies in the Netherlands. Malan did not repeat his pleas for intervention in any of the letters that followed. To Nettie, he lamented: ‘With South Africa in such a sad state, I find life to be as bad here, for me at least. Sometimes, when I see how much is suffered, I feel half ashamed of my own comparative comfort and safety.’[33]
His frustration was not entirely confined to his own feelings of powerlessness. He was also angered by the Dutch state’s resignation to its own impotence on the world stage. He soon realised that the roaring public support for the Boers was nothing more than that: public support. Dutch diplomatic policies remained unchanged. These policies, framed in the face of necessity, rested on three principles: staying out of the larger European nations’ power politics; maintaining a policy of neutrality in international conflicts; and promoting free trade.[34]
In short, the Dutch chose to confine themselves to cultivating their own niche in international relations as upholders of peace and international law. It was a far cry from their heyday as a superpower. In the aftermath of the Scramble for Africa – in which the Netherlands did not take part – at a time when colonial possessions determined international status, the Netherlands’ last claim to national pride and international status lay in its Indonesian colonies.[35] For this reason, there was no question of military intervention in the war. Alienating Britain meant endangering its possessions in the East Indies, as Britain dominated the international trade routes. Furthermore, it was thought that Britain’s military might served as a deterrent to German and French expansion in the direction of the North Sea, since it was believed that Britain – as a maritime power – would not allow its continental rivals to control the strategically significant Netherlands. The Dutch found themselves in a diplomatic love-hate relationship with the British: on the one hand, Britain was a natural ally; on the other hand, it was a superpower that was not to be trifled with.[36]
In the face of the public’s impassioned support for the Boers, the Dutch government’s main concern was to avoid confrontation with Britain and, at the same time, prevent public opinion from turning against it.[37] It succeeded in this aim through a ‘masterstroke of publicity’.[38] It offered to assist Kruger to leave the Transvaal and provided a cruiser, the Gelderland, to transport him to Europe. His voyage and his subsequent tour through Europe received mass publicity, and his presence drew crowds wherever he went.[39]
In reality, the crowds and the publicity only served to mask Kruger’s diplomatic failure. Kruger had hoped to appeal to Germany for assistance, but Kaiser Wilhelm II refused to receive him. Unfortunately for Kruger, the Germans and the British had held secret talks during the summer of 1898. The outcome of these negotiations was that they would divide the Portuguese possessions in Africa between them, as it was thought that the Portuguese state was nearing bankruptcy. As part of their cordial relationship, they undertook not to allow the South African issue to cause any further divisions between them.[40] Instead of heading for Berlin, Kruger was forced to travel to the Netherlands where, in December 1900, he stopped in Utrecht on his way to The Hague. Malan went to the station to see him. ‘There was such an incredibly large and excited mass of people that I was nearly flattened by the Dutch,’ he wrote to his parents. ‘Shouts of “Long live Kruger, Long live the Boers” were so incessant that the speeches were inaudible, even to the speakers.’[41]
The public’s enthusiasm filled Malan with cynicism. After only two months in the Netherlands, he had observed enough to write to his parents that ‘Nothing is to be expected from the European powers. Here, self-interest reigns supreme. Besides, they mistrust each other too much to work together. We will now have to do ourselves what we expect others to do for us.’[42] In his diary he noted: ‘The salvation of South Africa lies in and has to come from South Africa.’[43]
Despite Malan’s preoccupation with politics, he had to concentrate on his reason for being in the Netherlands in the first place: his studies. He was already counting the years and months until he could return to South Africa – by December 1900 he calculated that he had two years and nine months to go.[44] Unbeknown to him at the time, his stay was to be longer.
The first hurdle was that the University of Utrecht did not recognise his previous qualifications, so Malan busied himself with preparations for the exams that he had to retake. Most of the work was a repetition of what he had done before, but he resigned himself to it. At least it gave him time to consider his future plans. He was still uncertain as to whether or not he would undertake doctoral studies.[45] This raises the question of why he went to the Netherlands in the first place, and what he would have done if he had not decided to pursue doctoral studies. Unfortunately, this is a question that the surviving documents leave unanswered, but one may speculate that he left for Europe precisely because, even after completing his theological studies, his nagging feelings of