C.S. Lewis and the cowardice of the True Believers

This quote perfectly describes the way True Believers choose to perceive the Boer War. Not only is their refusal to acknowledge blatant facts the only way they can keep the Apartheid-era myths staggering on a little longer, but also proves their deep-seated cowardice.

Indeed, when it comes to the Boer War, it is remarkable just how many – even including so-called academics – shamelessly shut their eyes to any and all inconvenient facts, no matter how straightforward and undeniable they are.

Here are some examples of the sort of facts that these panic-stricken fellows frantically shut their eyes to:

• Kruger started pushing for an Offensive Alliance against the British at the Secret Conferences of 1887

• Republican secret service agents had been gun-running and rabble-rousing in British territory for years before the Boer War

• These things predated both the Jameson Raid and the arrival of Milner in South Africa

• The Boers started moving their forces to the frontiers of British territory in September 1899

• Both Boer republics mobilised before the British army

• In October 1899, the Boers significantly outnumbered the scattered British garrisons of Natal and the Cape Colony

• The Boer republics were the ones who declared war on Great Britain

• The Boers – having declared war – invaded British territory

• In Natal, the invading Boers captured, looted, and renamed Newcastle and Dundee

• They also looted and burned Weenen and Pomeroy

• The first significant action in Natal was at Talana Hill – 9 days after the invasion

• The first significant action on the Western Front was at Belmont – about 6 weeks after the invasion

• No significant actions were fought inside either Boer republic during the first four months of the war

• Therefore, there were clearly no British troops ‘massing on the border’

• The Boers laid siege to Ladysmith, which involved starving and bombarding the civilian population

• On the Natal Front, the invading Boers looted and rampaged all the way down to Mooi River – about 150 miles from their start line at Volksrust

• On the Western Front, the invading Boers annexed vast swathes of British territory

• The Boers laid siege to Kimberley, Mafeking, and even little Kuruman; again, using starvation and bombardment against civilians

I know various True Believers secretly read my blog articles, and I hereby throw out a challenge to them (especially those who pose as authorities on the subject): prove that any of the facts presented above are false. Do not deflect, do not frantically change the subject, do not squeal and scream about Rhodes, or Milner, or concentration camps: just prove that the facts presented above are wrong.

It’s a simple, straightforward challenge, and I dare one of them to take me on. Come on – be brave, let’s see what you’ve got. Here is your chance to show how ‘wrong’ Ash is.

Needless to say, my voluble gaggle of detractors will simply ignore this challenge, and just keep on squawking their usual self-serving, and self-pitying, myths, and crying about the nasty British bully, and Kitchener stealing gold ’n’ diamonds.

It is a shame, as understanding, acknowledging, and accepting the aforementioned facts is essential to being able to hold a rational and worthwhile discussion about the Boer War. These are not things I have made up, nor are they ‘my opinion’, or a subjective version of events. They have nothing to do with ‘jingoism’: they are simple, straightforward objective facts that anyone can check for themselves – assuming they are open-minded and intelligent enough to want to. Desperately discounting them so as to keep their comforting myths staggering on is every bit as pathetic and stupid as trying to discuss the Second World War while denying that Germany invaded the USSR in 1941, or pretending that Japan didn’t attack the US fleet at Pearl Harbor.

As long as someone is prepared to accept the facts above – or somehow prove them to be incorrect – then we can enjoy an interesting and beneficial conversation. There really is no point engaging in any discussion with someone who refuses to accept these undeniable historical truths – such a fellow is simply bleating away from a position of emotion, has no interest in learning what actually happened, and is desperate only to keep flogging the horse of the Boers being the innocent victims of British ‘aggression’.

And, as the old saying goes: ‘you cannot reason a man out of a position he has not reasoned himself into’.

Indeed, the way True Believers (including various charlatans in South African academia) ignore, deny, or wish away these (and other) undeniable facts is not only disingenuous, but is – as C.S. Lewis rightly stated – also cowardly. There is simply no way that any of the facts above can be denied, or dismissed: they are exactly what happened historically, and as soon as one accepts them as reality, then the Apartheid-regime version of events starts collapsing like a house of cards.

Which is, of course, rather inconvenient for those who don’t want to admit that they have willingly gobbled down the rubbish fed to them by the National Party propagandists, and their only recourse is to blank out any and all awkward truths. Those who are determined to continue to wallow in their Apartheid-era swamp of self-pity and victimhood have no choice but to continue to deflect, lie, and shut their eyes to facts.