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The struggle for independence

“Vade Retro domum” - “Nolo Relinquere”

“ Less concrete changes include the growing assertiveness of Commonwealth nations.
Battles such as Gallipoli for Australia and New Zealand, and Vimy Ridge for Canada led

to increased national pride and a greater reluctance to remain subordinate to Britain,
leading to the growth of diplomatic autonomy in the 1920s. These battles were often
decorated in propaganda in these nations as symbolic of their power during the war.

Colonies such as the British Raj (India) and Nigeria also became increasingly assertive
because of their participation in the war. The populations in these countries became

increasingly aware of their own power and Britain's fragility.

***

Also extremely important in the War was the participation of French colonial troops (who
amounted for around 10% of the total number of troops deployed by France across the

war), including the Senegalese tirailleurs, and troops from Indochina, North Africa, and
Madagascar. When these soldiers returned to their homelands and continued to be

treated as second-class citizens, many became the nuclei of pro-independence groups."

"Aftermath of World War I" 97
Wikipedia

*****
“ From the African point of view, perhaps even more remarkable than the apparent
exodus of Europeans was the spectacle of white people fighting each other, a thing they

had never done during the colonial occupation. What is more they encouraged their
subjects in uniform to kill the 'enemy' white man, who hitherto had belonged to a clan
who, by virtue of the colour of his skin, was held to be sacrosanct and desecration of

whose person had hitherto been visited with the direst retribution.

***
At a time when the Allied colonial regimes in Africa could least afford trouble in their own
‒
backyards, their authority still only tenuously established in places like southern Ivory
‒
Coast, much of Libya, or Karamoja in Uganda was widely challenged by armed risings
and other forms of protest by their subjects.

As a result, the Allied powers had to divert scarce military resources, needed for fighting
the Germans in Africa as well as on the Western Front, to dealing with local revolts. So

scarce were these resources, and so widespread the revolts in certain areas such as
French West Africa and Libya that the reimposition of European control over the revolted

areas had to be delayed until troops became available. Large areas of Haut-Sénégal-