Violent Resistance: Lessons from History

By Hussein Ali Ghandour and Raghuveer Vinay Vyas

“We were told that violence in itself is evil and that, whatever the cause, it is unjustified morally. By what standard of morality can the violence used by a slave to break his chains be considered the same as the violence of a slave master?” These are the words of Walter Rodney, a Guyanese historian and political activist.

The late 19th century was rife with instances of armed struggle and violent resistance, like the Algerian Liberation War, the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya, and many others. Organizations leading these movements were almost always criminalized and ostracized by governments or the international community. A famous example is Nelson Mandela, Nobel Peace Prize winner and national hero who contributed to ending apartheid in South Africa and who was listed as a terrorist by the US Department of State until 2008. Looking back through history can help us to distinguish between different motives for violence and to understand the violent struggles that still exist today. 

Algerian Liberation War

The Algerian Liberation Front (FLN) fought a war of Liberation with France from 1954 to 1962. France had invaded Algeria in 1830 and had been colonizing it for more than 100 years. The Algerian decolonization struggle was one of the most violent, and it resulted in an estimated 300,000-500,000 deaths and over 2 million displaced. Acts of violence committed by both France and the FLN during the years of war were appalling. 

In the summer of 1954, convinced that elections and political reform on the part of the French were hopeless, “activists” from across the Algerian political landscape created the FLN. They prepared for armed insurrection as a solution for the political stalemate and decades of inequality and discrimination. In its founding documents, the FLN declared its goal to be Algerian independence and restore a sovereign, social, democratic state within the framework of Islamic principles. 

The FLN had an armed wing – the ALN – and called for the general public to mobilize and join the armed struggle against the French colonization. The leadership of the FLN was distributed inside Algeria, whose objective was to create awareness about the movement and carry out armed attacks, and outside Algeria, whose goal was to bring international attention to the “Algerian question” and supply arms to the ALN back home. On the eve of November 1st, 1954, the FLN simultaneously carried out a series of 70 armed attacks across the country, marking the beginning of the Liberation War.

The first year of the war was unsuccessful in achieving the stated goal of awareness and independence. On the 20th of August 1955, two leaders of the FLN from the North of Algeria launched an offensive. This offensive targeted gendarmeries, city halls, post offices, and military barracks. However, the offensive also extended to two villages where 92 civilians, 71 of whom were Europeans, were killed. French retaliation to this offensive was brutal, and more than 10,000 Algerian civilians were killed. This situation led to widespread awareness and increased support of the FLN among the Algerian public. What started as a minor rebellion had transformed into a full-fledged revolutionary war. 

In 1956, after the execution of two FLN activists, a cycle of violence broke out between the FLN and pro-French Algerian activists that lasted until the end of the year and in which many civilians, both Algerian and French, lost their lives. Eventually, the FLN organized a major counter-offensive using tactics of terrorism like planting bombs in public spaces, mainly targeting French administration offices and European settler quarters in the city of Algiers. The FLN employed Algerian women who would dress and act like French women to plant these bombs in cafes, theaters, and public offices. 

Moving the guerilla warfare to the urban center of Algiers successfully attracted more attention to the Algerian question. French brutal retaliation that followed pushed players in the international arena to distance themselves from France. One of the French army’s main tactics to crush the FLN in Algiers was torture. They tortured civilians through hanging by feet or hands, water torture, electric torture, sleep deprivation, and rape. They tortured and terrorized Algerian civilians into denouncing and ratting out the FLN and its leaders. The FLN also resorted to decapitation, mutilation, throat-slitting, and other terror tactics against Europeans and Algerians to further its political goals and to prevent any domestic opposition. 

Although France was militarily superior to the FLN, armed resistance was key in advancing the decolonization struggle, mainly through raising awareness and mobilizing the Algerian public. On September 19, 1958, at a Cairo press conference, a provisional government, the Gouvernement Provisoire de la République Algérienne (GPRA), was announced, with its capital in Tunis, where it became better organized. More importantly, the GPRA helped gain diplomatic recognition. Its diplomatic endeavors succeeded in “internationalizing” the Algerian war, which was crucial for achieving independence. In 1962, France signed the Evian Accords with the FLN after a negotiation process, returning independence to Algeria. 

Mau Mau in Kenya

The Mau Mau rebellion of 1952-1960 was led by a group who came to be known as the Mau Mau^[1] (referred to by some as the Kenya Land and Freedom Army, or KFLA), emerged after decades of British settler-colonialism that was in itself met with heavy resistance upon establishment. This settler-colonial project was marked by legally sanctioned large-scale land expropriation, livestock confiscation, Hut and Poll taxes, reservations for distinct ethnic groups, and the establishment of racially segregated settlements and sociopolitical systems. The Mau Mau consisted of members of the Kikuyu, Meru, Embu, Kamba, and Maasai communities, many of which were dispossessed for the “White Highlands” settler societies. 

In 1952, the uprising began in earnest after Mau Mau members stabbed a European woman to death near her home. While Europeans were often the targets of Mau Mau attacks, the vast majority of the conflict was actually between rebels and so-called “loyalists” who worked for and, to some extent, supported the colonial regime. An example of this is the assassination of prominent Senior Chief Waruhiru – one of the strongest local supporters and facilitators of the British presence in Kenya. The assassination led to a State of Emergency in Kenya, and the armed insurgency escalated. 

The methods of the Mau Mau were highly violent and remain deeply controversial in Kenyan society. The fighters employed guerrilla attacks in the cover of darkness, using improvised and stolen firearms, machetes, bows, and arrows. The targets of their attacks were either livestock, settlers, or “loyalists.” While some Mau Mau members would live and even work for their targets, most would disappear into the forests of Mount Kenya and the Aberdares to protect themselves from arrest or attack. 

Undeniable war crimes were committed by the Mau Mau during their campaign. Men, women, and children were all targeted and, in many cases, hacked to death with machetes. In the Lari Massacre of 1953, Mau Mau fighters herded loyalists and their families into huts and set them on fire, killing 97 people. As part of the intense espionage war between the British and the Mau Mau, thousands of fellow Kikuyus were tortured, mutilated, or murdered. As many as 1,800 to 5,000 native Kenyans are estimated to have been killed by the Mau Mau, alongside 32 European and 26 Asian civilians (although the casualty figures of European security officials would likely be higher). 

The British response to the Mau Mau uprising was similar to that of other colonies and apartheid regimes. The organization was banned in 1950, and members were promptly labeled terrorists, savages, and devils. More concerning and sinister was the British adoption of a practice of collective punishment against communities suspected of harboring Mau Mau fighters. As many as 320,000 Kenyans were placed in concentration camps, while the rest – including over a million Kikuyu – were placed in enclosed villages with strict surveillance and restriction of movement. 

The Home Guard, or “loyalists,” were also found to have engaged in routine acts of torture, execution, and even rape. European officers were directly involved in such acts or actively facilitated their cover-up afterward. Ultimately, the Mau Mau uprising was quelled in 1956 with the capture and execution of Field Marshal Dedan Kimathi. However,  other rebellion members continued to struggle for independence under different leaders, such as Field Marshal Musa Mwariama. Its legacy remains contentious and controversial in Kenya for both the chosen means of resistance and the deep divisions it created within the Kikuyu community. 

While the uprising failed to evict settlers and Kenya only gained independence in 1964, many scholars contend that the consequences forced British officials to reevaluate the costs (physical, moral, and financial) and feasibility of maintaining a settler colony in Kenya. 

The experiences of the FLN and the Mau Mau demonstrate how complicated and impactful the role of violence in liberation struggles can be. While the actions of these two organizations caught the attention of French and British colonial authorities, respectively, their conduct – and the consequences – left hundreds of thousands of civilians dead. Simultaneously, it is demonstrative of how violence can often serve as a mechanism for the disenfranchised to achieve their objectives when legal or peaceful means have been exhausted. 

Recognizing this does not exonerate armed resistance, militants, and their actions, but understanding that the choice of violence can often result from losing confidence in political and legal avenues. Furthermore, it is to acknowledge that such acts of violence can be fundamentally intertwined with the values and aspirations of freedom from occupation because they often arise as a result of conditions created by occupation or colonialism. They can even contribute to this liberation directly, as was the case of the FLN, or indirectly, as in the case of the Mau Mau.

To this end, decolonization can be (and often is) a highly violent affair, underscoring the deep, divisive, and long-lasting scars societies bear in the quest for independence. Traumatic violence, societal divisions, and collective punishment are some of the highest prices for freedom, and yet many oppressed peoples – both in the past and today – have chosen to pay. 

^[1] The etymology of the word is disputed. Eventually, however, the term became a Swahili acronym for Mzungu Aende Ulaaya, Mwafrika Apate Uhuru (the white man/foreigner should return abroad, the African should gain independence).