Best east africa history books according to redditors

It's always good to remember that genocides did not end after WWII.

Brits murdered and tortured hundreds of thousands people Kenya in 1953-1960 Those murderers are still living today. It's amazing how easily Brits have been able to get away all the murdering they have done.

The story is told in book Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain’s Gulag in Kenya. Book won Pulizer price, but it seems that public don't know about it.

>.. tens of thousands of Kenyans were slaughtered, perhaps up to 300,000. The British also interned the entire 1.5 million population of Kikuyu, the colony's largest ethnic group, in barbed-wire villages, forced-labour reserves where famine and disease ran rampant, and prison camps that Elkins describes as the Kenyan "Gulag." The Kikuyu were subjected to unimaginable torture, or "screening," as British officials called it, which included being whipped, beaten, sodomized, castrated, burned, and forced to eat feces and drink urine. British officials later destroyed almost all official records of the campaign. Elkins infuses her account with the riveting stories of individual Kikuyu detainees, settlers, British officials, and soldiers. This is a stunning narrative that finally sheds light on a misunderstood war for which no one has yet been held officially accountable.

Few months ago, there was a similar question at War College, though related to Uganda, see thread How does the Ugandan Army compare to its neighbors?

I agree with your conclusion that African Wars - like II Congo War - are usually discussed from the geo-political POV, very rarely from military POV. Exceptions are rather rare, regardless if it's about pre- or post-1990s, and so also in the case of such wars like that in Rwanda, or the I and II Congo Wars. For example, while there are dozens of books, and thousands of studies and articles about Rwanda, all I know - without a single exception - are dealing with the genocide of 1994. Until recently (see below) there was not one about military history of the Rwandan Civil War, 1990-1994. Similarly, books like those by Prunier are 'well known', while those discussing military campaigns appear 'non-existing'.

Now, instead of explaining whys and hows, let me come to the point, i.e. offer you a few reading tips. Since you've explicitly requested 'post 1990 Africa', in your place I would start with John W Turner's Continent Ablaze. Yes, about 95% of that book is about pre-1990s, i.e. 'classic African wars', and post-1990s chapters are limited to those about Angola, actually. Furthermore, a lot of Turner's work is based on little else but reporting by BBC's Foreign Monitoring Service and similar 'sources'. But, you'll learn a lot about most of reasons for post-1990s wars. Plus, it's one of less than a handful of books covering African wars one can find in libraries of such places like Sandhurst, so I would describe it as a 'good starter'. If nothing else, it's going to help you find out what wars do you want to follow closely.

Casual search around the internet might bring you to various books by Al J Venter, a veteran South African author of works like War Dog, Gunship Ace, or Barrel of a Gun. These are including a great deal of 'episodes' related to South African mercenaries in places like Congo, Sierra Leone, Angola etc. Al was in all of these places, and is personally befriended to most of crucial actors, and thus simply 'unbeatable' in regards of 'details'. What one might miss in his books though, would be for these stories to be put within their geopolitical and military context, i.e. a slightly better organization of all the data they're presenting. But then, that's simply a matter of taste.

Still, if you follow 'Al's trail', you might stumble into a small South African publisher titled 30 Degrees South - and thus find out this has published a number of titles penned by Eeben Barlow.

Clearly, while Barlow is well-known (or at least 'Executive Outcomes' is going to ring plenty of bells here, so I'm sure), his top military planners and tacticians like Roelf van Heerden and Andrew Hudson remain entirely unknown in the public - although at least the latter has published a number of his own titles, mostly via 30 Deg South (just check their website).

Further search for the latter might bring you to a series of books published in cooperation between 30 Deg South and Helion Publishing (UK) since some 6-7 years and appropriately titled 'Africa@War'. They've released about 25 titles so far. Of course, majority of these went into 'classic' topics from the 1960s-1980s - i.e. those related to South Africa, Rhodesia, Portuguese campaigns in the Guine, Angola, or mercenaries in the Congo etc. But, meanwhile they've brought out quite a number of titles about 'other' African wars out, and especially those about conflicts since 1990s - including such like Somalia, US Intervention, 1992-1994, or the much postponed AMISOM.

Guess, this is the point at which I must beg admins for some more of their understanding (perhaps even some 'sympathy'), then because of my own involvement the following is going to appear as another post full of 'shameless self-advertising'. Namely, I do happen to have researched quite a lot about modern-day African wars (often with help from kind people like Andrew, Al and many others) and so I have joined the gang of Africa@War and published several titles in that series, often in cooperation with my Swiss friend Adrien Fontanelaz. That's how an entire series of books explaining the military history of conflicts related to the II Congo War came into being, including:

• Wars and Insurgencies of Uganda, 1971-1994 (story of the Ugandan military build-up through 1960s and 1970s; the Kagera War of 1978-1979, and of various insurgencies of the 1980s and 1990s, some of which in turn were instrumental for the following volume)
  
  
• The Rwandan Patriotic Front, 1990-1994 (wars in Ugandas proved crucial for what happened in Rwanda of the early 1990s; namely, already Museveni's NRA was heavily dependent on hundreds of Rwandan Tutsis, who in turn created the Rwandan Patriotic Front and invaded Rwanda in 1990, launching a civil war that... well, is de-facto still going on, 'but', kind of 'culminated' with the genocide of 1994)
  
  
• Great Lakes Holocaust: I Congo War, 1996-1997 (in 1996, Rwanda, followed by Uganda, launched an invasion of the then Zaire, eventually toppling US/French-supported dictator Mobutu Sese-Seko; this is the story of that conflict), and
  
  
• Great Lakes Conflagration: II Congo War, 1998-2003 (in 1998, Rwanda and Uganda launched their second invasion of the DR Congo, this time attempting not only to topple President Kabila, but also establish themselves in control over immense mineral wealth in the east of that country; this in turn prompted a counter-intervention by Zimbabwe, Angola, Namibia - and even Libyan-sponsored Chad, plus few other countries; what is next-to-unknown is that this war kind of 'faded away' not only because of highly-published series of major clashes between Ugandans and Rwandans related to distribution of the loot, but especially because the Congolese began applying the same strategy upon Rwandans, which Rwandans used to apply on the Congolese, early during that war).
  
  I did originally intend to follow-up with a third volume on the DR Congo since 2003, but sad point is: as much as they are praised by all of their readers, the latter remain very limited in numbers. My understanding of the reasons is that these books are neither sensationalist, nor discussing usual topics like mass suffering of civilians, but rather dry military histories of conflicts in question. And since majority of potential readers cannot imagine - just for example - Zimbabweans deploying their adaptation of Rhodesian 'Fire Force tactics' in the centre of the DR Congo of 1998, they never come to the idea that there are any kind of books discussing such topics. Unsurprisingly, I doubt we've sold more than 500 copies of any of these titles, which in turn means they simply do not pay. For similar reasons, I dropped the idea of preparing similar volumes on topics like Sudan or Chad, just for example. Slightly more successful was the Libyan Air Wars mini-series (3 titles); that might eventually 'provoke' me to ready a title (or two) on 'Libya since 2011' (there're certainly enough sources and info, especially thanks to research by Arnaud Delalande). We'll see...
  
  Fans of obscure (indeed: often enough 'weird') air forces and their (frequently: 'colourful') aircraft have found the two-part study African MiGs slightly more interesting (indeed, even the library at Wright Patterson should have a copy of each). Except for discussing acquisitions and operational history of its title, it's also providing - often quite lengthy - summaries of local air forces at wars, so also those since 1990 (just for example, I do not know any other book discussing COIN ops by the Ugandan People's Defence Force/Air Force against Lord's Resistance Army since 2000). 'Bonus', if you like: Volume 2 ends with a big appendix providing a detailed ORBAT of 23 African air forces as of 2010 (with exception of Mozambique and Mali, not much changed ever since).

Because they're [crazy] (http://www.amazon.com/Imperial-Reckoning-Untold-Story-Britains/dp/0805080015/) [fucking] (http://exiledonline.com/war-nerd-tibet-five-to-one-against/) [violent] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malayan_Emergency#War_crimes).

I actually read a book on this. The F5Es gave a good account of themselves here but I do recall the losses being very high on the account of AA systems the Iraqis possesed.

Another good conflict which the F5Es did extremely well was the Ethiopia-Somalia conflict, which there is also a good book on. The Ethopians did well with good GCI and actually came out on top, which is quite amazing given how outnumbered the F5s were.

Great book written by him.

The movie that everyone is so familiar with is actually based on a book: Black Hawk Down by Mark Bowden. It's a really good read, and the movie follows it fairly well.

Dude you're miles ahead of me and I still have the 40lbs of fat to lose. You've got what it takes just focus on your swimming. When I first started swimming freestyle I couldn't make it past a lap without getting extremely tired, and it turned out that I just needed to exhale slowly underwater till i turned for a breath. I went from that to doing 500m in about a week. I would recommened reading Never Quit ,None Braver, Black Hawk Down I would recommend watching inside combat rescue, and then Rescue Warriors which actually follows a class through indoc and some of the follow on training. Get your EMT-B for a test of the medicine while you're working on your swim. I'm taking the time to get my EMT-P (paramedic) while I work on my run/swim times and remaining fat. Learn what you can where you can and put in that work. I'm sure after looking into it you'll find the answer of whether you have it in you to do it all. I know I sent you a lot but let me tell you when it's your passion, no amount of information seems like enough.

Here are all the local Amazon links I could find:


amazon.com

amazon.co.uk

amazon.ca

amazon.com.au

amazon.in

amazon.com.mx

amazon.de

amazon.it

amazon.es

amazon.com.br

amazon.nl

amazon.co.jp

amazon.fr

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It was a book before it was a movie. Very well written. Here's a link to the Kindle edition.

Suggest this book as well:

• Making Sense of Somali History Val.1 and Val.2 by Abdurahman Abdullah

The author of this piece is Tom Cooper, who has written many history books about Aerial combat in the Middle East and Africa.

Like 1, 2, and 3

Also the author of this post as well: https://www.reddit.com/r/hoggit/comments/53h2a8/timely_article_on_a_historical_f5_vs_mig21/

More to the precise point of your question -- for most of the Middle East slavery existed only in memory by 1962. The slave trade had been dismantled for almost a century (the slave trade had been outlawed, if not terribly well enforced, in varying degrees beginning in the mid-19th century) and the last people to hold slaves were those who came from elite Ottoman families wealthy enough to own household slaves (concubines, which were typically Circassian, and eunuchs, typically Sub-Saharan). As the discussion below between /u/Trigorin and /u/i_like_jam details, Ottoman/Islamic slavery was a different animal when compared to the European variety -- but most importantly to the discussion of Malcom X (and other civil rights leaders) is that in the Middle East, slavery created very different associations and feelings about race. Not to say that race and slavery were not tied in the Middle East, but those bonds were definitely different (and had different aftereffects) than in the US or Europe. For instance, a "black" person descendant from Islamic slavery often doesn't have the same sort of associations as a "black" person in the US, nor do they really feel that they've lived though similar conditions. In fact, the lives of "black" people in the Middle East after the end of slavery has arguably been a more sordid one than in the US (thanks in large part of colonization and de-colonization, economic hardship and civil war), and this is not lost on many sub-saharan Africans living in places like Egypt.

So directly to your question, how aware was Malcom X of these phenomena prior to making Haj? I doubt he knew much, and he certainly wasn't exposed to much while he was there. It should be understood that Malcom X didn't make Haj the way most of the billion plus Muslims make Haj. He rolled up to Mecca in Bentley. He was being watched by the CIA. He was a celebrity, and he was treated like one, especially by the Saudis.

Some additional reading material:

Eve Troutt Powell A Different Shade of Colonialism and Tell This in My Memory

Ehud Toledano As If Silent and Absent

The edited volume Black Routes to Islam is also essential for the relationship between African Americans and the Islamic world.

Slaves in the Middle East weren't all African. Here are some books that can give you a better perspective on slavery in the Islamic world:
http://www.amazon.com/Race-Slavery-Middle-East-Historical/dp/0195053265/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1353987039&sr=8-1&keywords=bernard+lewis+race+and+slavery

http://www.amazon.com/Tell-This-My-Memory-Enslavement/dp/0804782334/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353987192&sr=1-1&keywords=eve+troutt+powell

http://www.amazon.com/Women-Slavery-Late-Ottoman-Empire/dp/1107411459/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353987281&sr=1-2&keywords=madeline+zilfi

EDIT: I think it's important to note that I don't have some sort of pro white revisionist history agenda, I just think it's important to know that Europeans were not the only ones who had slaves. I say this as a half Arab myself.

You might enjoy Fingerprints of the Gods. I thought it was the best written and least kooky book when I was into the whole ancient astronauts thing.

And his more famous Sign and the Seal.

I don't think mention the legend of Gilgamesh, but if you're into such things, you'll probably dig them.

• For books about the Vietnam War, pretty much anything by Tim O'Brien will work.
  
• For the current war in Sudan, there's Darfur: A New History of a Long War and Darfur Diaries: Stories of Survival.
  
• The English Patient is an award-winning novel about the aftermath of WWII on Allied forces in Italy.
  
• Code Name Verity is YA historical fiction about a spy captured by the Germans in WWII.
  
• Maus and Maus II are graphic novels about concentration camps in WWII.

Sorry that it took me 5 days to make this reply, but I honor my promises (thanks to /u/nixons_nose). So here are the other books:

• The Emperor: Downfall of an Autocrat, written by the famed Polish correspondent Ryszard Kapuscinski, is about the waning days of the last Ethiopian Emperor, Haile Selassie I (also known as Ras Tafari). This is a really compelling read.
  
• Another book on Emperor Haile Selassie, King of Kings: The Triumph and Tragedy of Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia offers a more complete and balanced view of the Emperor. Must be read along with Kapuscinski's book.
  
• Gebru Tariki's The Ethiopian Revolution: War in the Horn of Africa tells us of the rise and fall of the socialist dictatorship that replace Selassie's empire, the Derg and Mengistu eras.
  
• Tom Cooper's Wings over Ogaden: The Ethiopian-Somali War, 1978-1979 chronicles a little-known episode of the Cold War era (I'd use "saga" over "era", it sounds better.), the Ogaden War. Nice to see books on African wars, because they are usually ignored and overlooked. Must-read.
  
• Lastly, for a general history of Ethiopia, this book fits the bill: Harold Marcus' A History of Ethiopia Updated Edition.
  
  I hope these books will help you. ;)
  
  EDIT: Added bullets and a link.
  
  
  

The Dungeons of Nakasero is about the legacy of Idi Amin's rule in Uganda.

31 days for Augustus

August is a good month all around. School starts, and Autumn is starting. The leaves are the most beautiful, and the weather is nice. Hunting season also begins.

Thanks for the contest!

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The book he's referencing is fantastic. I had to read it in grad school, and loved it. Dr. Elkins just had an op-ed in the Guardian, I think, about the criticism she took for it, and how she's basically been proven right by further archival evidence.

The excerpt he's referencing is from a book by Caroline Elkins, professor of history at Harvard

Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain's Gulag in Kenya

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