Talk:Second Boer War/Archive 3

Genocide, civilian deaths
"It has been argued that "this was not a deliberately genocidal policy; rather it was the result of [a] disastrous lack of foresight and rank incompetence on [the] part of the [British] military."[54] British historian Niall Ferguson also argues that "Kitchener no more desired the deaths of women and children in the camps than of the wounded Dervishes after Omdurman, or of his own soldiers in the typhoid stricken hospitals of Bloemfontein."[55]"

"However, to Kitchener and the British Command "the life or death of the 154,000 Boer and African civilians in the camps rated as an abysmally low priority" against military objectives."

I am astonished that the death of a quarter of interned civilians, nearly half of the interned children, can be seen as anything else than genocide.

The excuses are incompetence and the life or death of the civilians in the camps being low priority. Is incompetence an argument for civilian death not being genocide? Did the civilian death have any consequences for the persons responsible, I am not talking just about Kitchener and/or Milner, but also about the persons directly responsible for running the concentration camps. Regarding both Milner and Kitchener is there any statement of acknowledgement of responsibility, regret or apology for the civilian death. Has the responsible Government acknowledged the responsibility for the civilian death rate?

The idea of war crimes is already well established at the time of the Second Boer War. The UK is a signatory already to the first Geneva Convention from 1864. The first convention talks only about the treatment of the wounded enemy, but IMO there was seen no need to talk about the treatment of civilians rather than a sign for allowing ill treatment of civilians. There are also reports of ill treatment of enemy prisoners, and if the civilian death are not a breach of the first Geneva Convention, than ill treatment of enemy soldiers is. The argument that 14.000 soldiers died of diseases during the conflict just adds to sense of callousnesses of the British military and civilian war leaders.

I have the feeling if we would talk about a German, Turkish or some other nations war, than it would be no question about this death toll of civilians being called genocide. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jochum (talk • contribs) 17:39, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

It is mentioned in the article why the civilian death should not be called Genocide and the argument is, the death were not deliberate the references are British Historians. But it is also mentioned in the article that family members of the Boer fighters were deliberately set on half rations. So starfing children to death was deliberate. British subjects should be very careful in trying to keep the mentioning of Genocide and perhaps war crimes out of this article.Jochum (talk) 19:59, 16 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Do you have a suggestion to improve the article then? Jim Sweeney (talk) 21:36, 16 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I would start with cutting out to try to absolve Kitchner from the blame for the death of the Boers in the camps. Kitchener was the commanding officer. Under his command the refugee camps were changed to concentration camps. Under his command it was practice to cut the rations of family´s of Boer fighters. Under his command the civilians were forced into the camps. It was part of his strategy. Then you get a Niall Ferguson to speculate that Kitchner really did not wanted this to happen, I can not see any reference in "The Rise and Demise of the British World Order" to a document stating that Kitchener did not know what was happening, while it was happening. The British government was staling, have a look at the timeline http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/women-children-white-concentration-camps-during-anglo-boer-war-1900-1902. I do not see any indication that they did not know what was happening. Milner did know what was happening, he writes about it, how can you take a historian serious speculating that it was all unintentional.
 * You read for example in Bitter Legacy: "Many Afrikaners believed, though it was not the case in fact, that the British had embarked on a deliberate policy of genocide." From where have the British historians the "fact" that it was not a case of deliberate genocide? Always stated, never a reference.Jochum (talk) 22:53, 16 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Quote: "21 December, Contrary to the announced intention, Lord Kitchener states in a memorandum to general officers the advantages of interning all women, children and men unfit for military services, also Blacks living on Boer farms, as this will be "the most effective method of limiting the endurance of the guerrillas... "The women and children brought in should be divided in two categories, viz.: 1st. Refugees, and the families of Neutrals, non-combatants, and surrendered Burghers. 2nd. Those whose husbands, fathers and sons are on Commando. The preference in accommodation, etc. should of course be given to the first class. With regard to Natives, it is not intended to clear ... locations, but only such and their stock as are on Boer farms." http://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/women-children-white-concentration-camps-during-anglo-boer-war-1900-1902
 * The different categories of concentration camp inmates is straight from Kitchner, so he should be personal responsibility for the death of starvation of children in the second group.Jochum (talk) 00:24, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Wiki's POV rules apply here -- Jochum seems to have made up his mind; that belongs on his Facebook page. For Wikipedia editors need to cite the full range of RS on the topic. Rjensen (talk) 01:23, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * For me it is a British point of view being Defended here. You can always choose the right reference. Here a reference to Kitchner "Kitchener no more desired the deaths of women and children in the camps than of the wounded Dervishes after Omdurman, or of his own soldiers in the typhoid stricken hospitals of Bloemfontein."[55] nice quote.
 * But how do you like this quote:
 * Killing the Wounded
 * Sven Lindqvist, a Swedish historian, has pointed out that the decisive battle of Omdurman was fought in the name of civilisation, but nobody in Europe asked how it came about that 15,000 Sudanese were killed while the British lost only 48 men. Nor did anyone question why almost none of the 16,000 Sudanese wounded survived. In "Exterminate All the Brutes", Lindqvist turns up 19th-century newspaper accounts of British massacres of wounded Sudanese after the battle.
 * At the battle's conclusion, Churchill wept. He wrote to his mother on the 26th of January 1899: 'Our victory was disgraced by the inhuman slaughter of the wounded and Lord Kitchener was responsible for this.' :::::http://angloboer.com/crimes.htm Whos POV is used in the article?Jochum (talk) 01:41, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Please follow the rules at wp:RS, anonymous Boer blogs are not reliable sources. Lindqvist's commentary on battles in Sudan 2000 miles away and years apart are not about the Boer war. As for the politics: in Britain at the the the Liberals generally denounced the Boer war; they did so for political reasons and they are not reliable secondary sources.  Rjensen (talk) 02:09, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * What "blog" I used was an anonymous Boer blog? Is http://www.sahistory.org.za/ an anonymous Boer Block in your POV? In the article is Kitchner und the Sudan war mentioned, I did not bring it up. Ask the guy who put that comment in the article.Jochum (talk) 04:33, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Jochum, the use of Rense.com is not helpful. WP:RSN has addressed that site a number of times. It is not considered a reliable source. Capitalismojo (talk) 03:33, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * The article was with author and were it was published originally. I took out rense.com and but in the gurdian with the original article. I found corroboration on http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/africa/boers.html Jochum (talk) 04:33, 17 February 2014 (UTC)


 * [posted on Rjensen talk page] Could you explain to me how http://www.sahistory.org.za/ is an anonymous blockJochum (talk) 02:24, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * www.sahistory.org.za/ = an anonymous self-published blog.  It fails the standards of WP:RS Articles should be based on reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. a) it's anonymous--has the weak quality of student work; -- for example the footnotes are to Sparticus (a popular encyclopedia) and Wikipedia! no track record of reliability, fact-checking or accuracy. b) no prestige among scholars (they do not footnote it and Wiki should not either) c) it is not third party--it's a pro-Boer site that spews hatred for the enemies of the Boers. d) it's not published (WP:RS calls for academic and peer-reviewed publications, scholarly monographs, and textbooks are usually the most reliable sources.  The POV is because the editor selected not on the grounds of quality but on the grounds of text that seemingly supported the editor's private POV. Rjensen (talk) 04:41, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Have you had a look at www.sahistory.org.za/ ? somehow I do not connect it to a British hating Boer site.
 * Did you check the article in www.sahistory.org.za I was referencing to? This are the references they give, no Sparticus, no Wikipedia, the Anglo-boer War Museum site has already been used two times in the article as reference:
 * The Anglo-boer War Museum site: A History of the Boer Nation
 * Cloete, P.G. ( 2000). The Anglo-Boer War: a chronology, Pretoria: Lapa.
 * Potgieter, D.J. et al. (eds)(1970). Standard Encyclopaedia of Southern Africa, Cape Town: NASOU, v. 3, p. 378-380.
 * Potgieter, D.J. et al. (eds)(1970). Standard Encyclopaedia of Southern Africa, Cape Town: NASOU, v. 5, p. 544-546.
 * As my first try to discuss this here on talk was strait away removed, I rather have the feeling that this discussion hits some nerves somewhere.Jochum (talk) 05:34, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * There is an article here on Wikipedia regarding the South African History Project and there is mentioned the webpage South African History Online. Some how rather unboerish.Jochum (talk) 05:49, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * yes I did look at the www.sahistory.org.za/ and it's not up to scholarly standards. the text is unsigned and unfootnoted it's a self-published anonymous blog. The 1970 " Standard Encyclopaedia" mentioned is a Afrikaans (Boer) production (it's editor D. J. Potgieter wrote several books in Afrikaans). None of these cites claim there was "genocide" Indeed on the genocide issue there is an interesting discussion at (a Socialist site) that points out that some Boers still believe it happened but neutral scholars do not. Rjensen (talk) 06:02, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I have read that piece before, but it has really little new to say. That the concentration camps in the Boer war do not compare to the German extermination camps is a given, that we will not find a similar occurrence in history like the German "Death machine", made still more horrible due to their bureaucratic precision, is a second given. But events, also not comparable to the holocaust have been called genocide. The most telling sentence in that BBC piece is IMO this sentence: "While Britain has tried to write this chapter out of history, the Afrikaners at the other extreme attempted to elevate it to folklore. Both routes led to a distorted history." I thing Wikipedia, or of course the authors here, are trying the British solution, reducing the Concentration camps of the Second Boer war to a horrible little accident with nobody really responsible, not Kitchener, not Milner and especially not the British government. Who are this neutral historians, British Historians in the process of writing the chapter out of history?Jochum (talk) 06:54, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Read through one of my other references: http://www-sul.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/africa/boers.html In July 1901 latest the British Government had statistics regarding the death toll, for what did they need a commission to react? It is also stated that the policy of withholding the meat part of the ration from those families of those on commando was retracted on February the 27th. (I assume it to be February 1901) But Emily Hobhouse still mentions different rations for different groups. So the policy existed at least at a time and what other explanation can a neutral Historian give than doing it to put pressure on the commandos? You do not read this information in textbooks.Jochum (talk) 07:36, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * the Stanford cite is another unpublished blog (a much better one) that does not mention "genocide." It says and the RS agree that the British policy was to force the Boers to come to terms: the policy worked, they in fact did so and the harsh conditions were immediately ended. Smuts (one of the Boer generals) became a top BRITISH general & field marshal after he surrendered. The problem here is the eagerness to accuse armies of war crimes when people die of measles. That is an old political allegation designed for attacking rhetoric and is not encyclopedic.  The experts on genocide reject the idea that the 2nd Boer war situation comprise genocide.  Here is a quote from a standard reference book on genocide: " the legacy of bitterness the camps created, however, lasts to this day, with some Afrikaners [Boerevolks]  claiming that the British actions were genocidal.... Though extreme and unfounded owing to the fact that the British strategy was military and not genocidal in intention, these allegations point to a deep and lasting existential anger that has not yet been reconciled."  Rjensen (talk) 09:36, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * The Stanford site is not an unpublished blog my reference are the original papers shown there. You are very free with the terminus blog and still more free with the terminus anonymous blog, and and according to your definition amazone would also only be a blog.On that site are mainly original documents you can read by yourself. That is also an old plot, that talking about military necessities. It is also a very old truth that if you force people into unhealthy conditions and do not give them enough food, most of the death will be by deceases, that does not absolve you from having killed them and that does not make it unintentional. It is documented that families of combatants got less food, it is on the side of the perpetrators to show that the intention was not to kill them. It seems to me that it is every time genocide is connected to British actions, a far higher standard of proof is effective, than regarding other nations.
 * Out of www.Wikipedia.org: "a legal definition is found in the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG). Article 2 of this convention defines genocide as "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: killing members of the group; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; [and] forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."[4] It does not state all of this acts, it states any of the above acts. I would say killing of 50% of the children under 16 of a small nation, by holding the better part of the civilian population captive under bad conditions, does apply as deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life, calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part. The legal definition does not make an exception for the aims being military. If you read through the page Genocide here on Wikipedia I find definitions agreeing with you but I also find definitions agreeing with my point of view.
 * It was the intent to destroy the Boers as cohesive group. It was the intention to destroy there form of government, form of live, the possibility to feed themselves, their lively hood and drive them of there land, at the time of war. It is not and was not at that time an accepted form of warfare to go after the civilian population. Kitchener planed and executed it, The British government let it happen.
 * I accept hereby that there would be no agreement to call the afore mentioned acts genocide here, but I do not accept the POV that it was all only accidental and that nobody intended any civilian to die. I did not use the word genocide in the changes I made in the article, but I stand by the changes I made. The order alone to cut the rations of the families of the combatants, it does not really matter if it stayed in place three month or half a year, shows the mentality of Kitchener Jochum (talk) 15:59, 17 February 2014 (UTC)
 * the Stanford cite is very useful indeed. It links to a lot of good primary sources, but Wiki editors have to be very careful in doing original research from primary sources. The British wanted to stop the war and they did so on generous terms to the Boers. The problem was that the Boers used their civilian farms as hiding places, and as a supply system without with their military strategy would have failed. It was not an accepted form of warfare to use civilians the way the Boers did.  Hiding behind the women and children proved a very bad strategy indeed. The cooks and supply sergeants in the British regiments got shot up and captured. What about the cooks and suppliers for the Boers? They did not get shot down but they did get captured and put in camps. The British never expected they would die of measles by the thousands (the Boer children, unlike kids in the UK, had no immunity to measles and some other diseases.)  It is simply false to say that British actions were "committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial... group" [UN definition]. They wanted the Boers to remain on the land and behave themselves, which indeed they agreed to do. They then turned political power over to the Boers like Botha (prime minister of the Transvaal & then SA in 1917-19) and Smuts (prime minister 1919-24 & later). Rjensen (talk) 12:30, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * You get the out of prison card regarding the Genocide but I am tired of all this excuses for the British way to conduct the war. What they did, did not constitute war crimes at that time, but it would constitute war crimes today. How generous the terms were after the war has no bearing on events during the war. After the war the British government had to deal with the aftermath both at home and in South Africa. The way the war was conducted in the end was condemned both at home and in quite a few countries around the world.
 * I do not find any report accusing the Boers of cruelty against British civilians, or bad treatment of British prisoners. The cooks and train of the British Army were military personal.
 * The British went after the civilian population. The destroyed not only the living base for the combatants, but also the living base for the civilian population. They put the bigger part of the civilian population in concentration camps. They started out with putting the families of the combatants on below living rations, at least for several month. Nobody should excuse the British High Command from knowing exactly what they were doing. The action against the civilians was to put pressure on the combatants.
 * A nice excuse: we did not kill the civilians, diseases did that. I do not assume that the British High Command and Government was a bunch of uneducated people, I assume they did know what they were doing. At that time of history it was well known, what you do to big groups of people, by crowding them in unhygienic quarters, not well protected from the environment and feeding below subsistence rations. They die by themselves, you do not have to kill them, hunger and diseases do it for you. The lessons from the Crimean War were just turned around and used against a civilian population. There are reports of poisoned sugar. The British government waited and watched. In July 1901 at the latest they did know about the horrific death toll, in December 1901 they started to do something about it. They did know than that the war would soon end and they were afraid about public opinion, both at home and abroad. This from you is accurate the "white wash" British officials and historians like to apply to this war. The killing of the civilians was perhaps not genocidal but still deliberate and cruel.Jochum (talk) 18:27, 18 February 2014 (UTC)


 * You can not apply today's standards to something that happened over 100 years ago. The only British civilian I know of that the Boers came into contact with had a £25 bounty, dead or alive, put on his head for escaping from their prison camp. Hardly an act that would see favour today, and would be condemned in the United Nations. Once again talk pages are for improving the article, do you any improvements to suggest. Jim Sweeney (talk) 19:55, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * when the Boers started using their womenfolk and their farms as military assets in a guerrilla war against the British army they had militarized their civilians. They knew that their farms would be attacked and they would be starved out. Jochum for some reason does not see that as a Boer crime against civilians. Rjensen (talk) 22:57, 18 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Jim Sweeney. Of course one applies today standards for actions not longer than 100 years ago. The second world war just 12 years on is judged by today's standards. The Herero War were judged by the 20th century standards. This is the lamest duck excuse you can draw up.
 * Rjensen: Regarding your reference: Dictionary of Genocide. The argument for not accepting the acts as genocide, were not that the acts themselves were below the level of genocide, but that the aim was military not genocidal. What the British did was a deliberate, brutal crime against civilians and it would without a doubt be a war crime today. There is the report of the american consul a bit up the page and it is quite clear that he thinks the action of the British are unacceptable, he talks about the annihilation of a nation, so do not tell me that it were different times and going after the civilian population was an accepted mode of war. The British did not take families of combatants only, they took most of the white civilian population, they took a big part of the black population, a population clearly designated as non combatant. The British killed 25% of the interned inmates and 50% of the children of the Boer Nation and that some of you would call acceptable mode of ware fare? And when we go on to the black prisoners, does anybody believe the numbers? were they less susceptible to diseases? Perhaps they got better rations? If nobody counts the guess is usually low.
 * What do I want changed, the concentration camps an integral part of the conduct of the war, it was used to put pressure on the other side to stop the war. I want that it is stopped to try to reduce the blame far both the British High Command and the British Government. The acts against the civilians is central to the conduct of the war. The main line of defence, something the British needed to do to win the war is as hypocritical as it can be, some things one does not do just to win a war.Jochum (talk) 02:03, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
 * I think my problem with Jochum's approach is that he uses 21st century criteria to lambaste the British, but ignores the crimes of the Boers.  What the Boers did was turn their farms and families into military assets, and when the British came, they deserted the farms and their families.  When the British tried to give the custody of the families back to the Boers, the Boers refused.  That is because the Boers could not feed their own families, and decided to let the British feed and house them.   Tens of thousands of Boers, mostly small children, died under these circumstances.  In 2014 terms, that is called child abuse, spouse abuse, and endangerment of minors and the men in charge – the Boers – would go to  prison for that.  In Wikipedia terms, that is POV pushing, whitewashing the Boers' horrible crimes against women and children while attacking only the British.  Rjensen (talk) 02:24, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Rjensen. That is the best way, accusing the victims for the crimes of the perpetrators. And you accuse me of looking at things out of my POV. The dying of the Boer Families did not happen out on the veld but in concentration camps were the British army had forcefully collected them. I do not apply 21th century standard, using 20th century standards does it well enough. So in the Second World War when for every German soldier killed by the guerilla the Germans went to the next village and shot ten males, you would blame the Guerilla for the death because somehow it was necessary to stop the killing of German soldiers and the invading Germans would somehow have a right to a victory. Not really comparable but similar way of thinking. The invading army has the right to do everything to get the enemy to stop fighting.Jochum (talk) 04:41, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Jochum sees no problem at all with what the Boers did -- using their women as shields, leaving their children to die. In 21st century terms those are crimes. The Boers went in hiding and left the women & children to either starve to death or be be cared for by the British army. Abandonment & endangerment are crimes today. Using civilians as a shield against the enemy is a war crime today Rjensen (talk) 05:17, 19 February 2014 (UTC)
 * Rjensen I understand now were you come from, you are an citizen of the USA I assume if one attacks how the British conducted the war against the Boers, than one condemns also the similar tactics the USA used in the Philippine-American war, with a very severe civilian toll. Relative to the population size the death rate of civilians in the Philippines was not as bad as in the Boer War, but absolute they were quite impressive. It seems that the British Empire and the USA had at that time similar ideas of the worth of the lives of the civilians of the opposing force. And both had the opinion that winning the war is all that matters, who condemns the victorious nation?Jochum (talk) 22:13, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

NPOV
Just from quickly scanning this page it is very clear that it is heavily pro British POV. The entire article slants from a British perspective and does not reflect a neutral point of view. It seems to reflect British view of history only, this is somewhat similar to Coca-Cola paid for research stating that sugar is good for you OR the many, many, respected and published, British Tobacco paid, for research that says there is no link between cancer and smoking.

Anyway, all war is bad and there are losses and strong emotions on all sides. Emotions run deep and opinions are strong. Nobody wants to look bad/weak/evil/wrong or consider the other side's point of view. At the end of the day though, when the t's are crossed and the i's are dotted: This page is simply not WP:NPOV. And this is what this is all about - neutral point of view, just reflect what is historical accepted fact.

Another POV: Trouble is that the British version of historical fact and the "Boer" view of historical fact, is not exactly the same. Then there are the two different types of "Boers", the Cape Afrikaners, the Black tribes, the other European nations and everyone else that also have a right to have their POV reflected here, which clearly it does not. How were the black tribes affected by this war? except in a sentence where black people also died in concentration camps, how about some numbers? Was it eighty thousand black women and children, as some documents, from that time, estimate? The lowest estimate that I have read was 47 000. 47 000 little black children and women. This needs to be reflected here as well? Did they also die because they were dirty / bad hygiene as this page suggests the loving women, wives, mothers, babies and little children died? What did they mostly die of, them not even receiving food, never mind receiving medicine and having to rely on using dung and insects? What happened to little children (boys) that tried escaping from the concentration camps? Were little children really shot in the head by British soldiers? For the amount of source documentation, there is so very little real information about the camps here. There is also a lot of contradicting source documentation and it has never been beneficial to anyone to look too closely to this period in time.


 * I also have to comment that the entire page uses the word "boer" interchangeably to describe the citizens of ZAR and the citizens of the Orange Free State, whereas these were similar as much as an Irishman is an Englishman, the British POV here would complain to high water if the word "British" was replaced it with "redneck" - to understand this POV, read the page yourself and replace the word British with "Redneck" (which is what the British citizens were called at the time).
 * It seems that sometimes the use of the word "boer" in this page seems designed to de-humanize the "boer" and although the "Boers" were not Afrikaners, they were real people and they did bleed red if you cut them.

Anyway, all this, not so very cool Zarpboer (talk) 12:52, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Boer War
The article title Boer War is a redirct. Yesterday I altered to redirect from Boer Wars (which is currently a very poor article) to redirect to Second Boer War (see hist) and added a hatnote to Second Boer War (see here.

I explain my reasoning on Talk:Boer War. The changes have been reverted with an explanation in the same section. Clearly more editor input there would help decide whether or not the change is appropriate. -- PBS (talk) 18:42, 14 September 2014 (UTC)

Request for comment
Considering that this is already the second war and that the first was ended in independence for the two countries, should this encyclopedic entry to the second war have an "origins" section where there is a very poor overview of the entire history of Southern Africa? So, basically should the origins section be vastly expanded to cover the events better or should the origins section deal only with the origins of the second war? Zarpboer (talk) 05:46, 22 September 2014 (UTC)
 * 1. Deleted
 * 2. Improved and Expanded
 * 3.Altered to deal only with this war

Comments

 * These are way too many questions for one RFC, so I will only respond to one of them: Collapse the Origins and Background sections into one, which can be divided in subsections dealing with social, economic, demographic, and political issues. Context is always useful on historical articles. when you do that, per WP:SUMMARY try and summarize existing articles and provide see also links as appropriate. -  Cwobeel   (talk)  02:38, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

Request for comment: Foreign volunteers
Should the nations from which foreign volunteers came be listed in the infobox? Srnec (talk) 18:56, 19 September 2014 (UTC)
 * No, looks to me like another attempt to make the infobox all-encompassing. That's not what infoboxes are for. The war was between the British Empire and the Boer community. They were the belligerents. Others than sent volunteers, or from which individual volunteers came can be adequately detailed in the body of the article. Peacemaker67 (send... over) 21:52, 20 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I would leave it alone per Peacemaker67. PointsofNoReturn (talk) 00:00, 21 September 2014 (UTC)
 * no reasons as per Peacemaker67, it is reasonable to reflect the countries, the two independent countries, Britain and Australia as well as the self governing colonial countries, canada, cape colony, etc. the combatants citizenship not - see other conflicts and wars and their infoboxes as examples Zarpboer (talk) 09:40, 21 September 2014 (UTC)
 * No - Not important to put in the infobox. I would support inclusion of better numbers on foreign volunteers in the body of the article.  Robert McClenon (talk) 02:01, 22 September 2014 (UTC)
 * No for the reasons already stated above. -The Gnome (talk) 23:15, 22 September 2014 (UTC)
 * yes-foreign volunteers are mentioned in other war infoboxes, just as mercenaries are. Nations which contributed large numbers of volunteers are worthy of mention. There is even an article devoted entirely to the foreign volunteers in this conflict. Toolen (talk) 20:27, 4 October 2014 (UTC)


 * @Srnec You undid my edit of removing Canada? If you are listing colonies, you should list all the colonies that were involved and not decide yourself which colonies should be in the infobox and which not... WP:NPOV Then, Generally academically accepted view of history is as follows: Australia became a fully independent country during this war. This new independent country did not withdraw from the war, instead increased efforts and continued fighting in the war for over a year after independence. So, historically, the only four fully independent countries involved in this conflict is the UK, Australia, ZAR and OFS. Should you require citations in that regard, please ask me? - So, please reverse your undo of my edit and you should decide whether you wish to list the colonies in the infobox or not. I am of the opinion not, as only independent countries have the choice of fighting in any war. This was also the majority view above as this belongs in the body and not the infobox. Zarpboer (talk) 05:51, 23 September 2014 (UTC)
 * I don't know where you're getting your information, but Australia was not fully independent in 1901. Only with the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act 1942 did she even have an independent foreign policy. Canada was a self-governing dominion (the same status Australia got in 1901) from 1867, well before the Boer War. Neither country was independent during the war. There were only three sovereign states involved. Srnec (talk) 11:30, 23 September 2014 (UTC)
 * The Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act was passed by the British Parliament in 1900, this relinquished British suzerainty, although potentially legally subject to british Imperial law, (which the statute of Westminster of 1931 cleared up), the commonwealth could decide its own foreign policy. When a country can decide its own foreign policy, it has a choice whether it wants to war or not. (btw - am going to search for it, but was this same discussion not had in parliament House Melbourne and was it not then that it was voted on to continue with the war?) - From History of Australia wikipedia page (with citation on that page): "Before 1901, units of soldiers from all six Australian colonies had been active as part of British forces in the Boer War. When the British government asked for more troops from Australia in early 1902, the Australian government obliged with a national contingent. Some 16,500 men had volunteered for service by the war's end in June 1902." If I recall correctly, the British were to pay a certain amount in pounds, etc. etc. - this is all public record at the au parliament? - Anyway, the point still being - you cannot decide which colonies should be in the infobox and which not... So: If you are adding the colonies - you need to add them all... If you are not, then that is fine also. Do you agree? Zarpboer (talk) 13:59, 23 September 2014 (UTC)

Salisbury's reasons
I was told by an Oxford-educated historian that the 2nd and 3rd reasons ascribed to Salisbury for going to war ("...because he thought that the Transvaal, the Orange Free State, and the Cape Boers aspired to a Dutch South Africa, and that the achievement of such a state would damage Britain's imperial prestige around the world; and because of the Boers' treatment of black South Africans") are false. For such important assertions more than one published source is necessary. - Owain Knight (talk) 17:21, 29 October 2014 (UTC)

January being winter in South Africa??
User:HLGallon I see you stated in one of your edit summaries that "‎January and February are winter months in the Southern hemisphere". If that is what you wish to assert, then I do indeed think a source would be needed. However more likely is that a muddle has arisen. I am not reverting at this stage; leaving it to you if you see fit.SovalValtos (talk) 13:42, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
 * See Climate of South Africa. HLGallon (talk) 13:50, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Would that be the article that has a chart describing the summer months as "Jan"? Britmax (talk) 14:03, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Reverted article. Sorry everyone, I got very confused for some reason. HLGallon (talk) 14:10, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
 * S'alright, it happens. I wish it was the worst mistake I'd ever made... Britmax (talk) 14:12, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

Language
" In Afrikaans it may be called " - 'may be' called? Who is giving permission? This is language unbecoming of Wikipedia.MrSativa (talk) 05:00, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
 * We must change that a auto-alleged academic put that.Mr.User200 (talk) 21:24, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

The role of English industrial working conditions in the Boer War
I may have missed it if one exists, but there seems to be no section on the debate in England over the working and living conditions of the working classes insofar as it had an impact on the Empire's ability to recruit healthy men to fight the war. See kuczynsky, 1942, pp. 58-60

Major General H. C. Borrett, Inspector-General of Recruiting, wrote in his Annual Report for 1902 as follows: the one subject which causes anxiety in the future as regards recruiting is the gradual deterioration of the physique of the working classes, from whom the bulk of the recruits must always be drawn." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.84.88.181 (talk) 20:16, 19 January 2016 (UTC)

Genocide
There needs to be some mention as to whether the British conduct of the war was a genocide. (81.132.48.85 (talk) 11:30, 25 December 2016 (UTC))
 * No there is not, see the archives of this talk page, and the archives of talk:Genocides in history --PBS (talk) 17:12, 4 February 2017 (UTC)


 * It is not easy to find the mentioned talk in the history Provide a direct link or consider the request. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.252.75.62 (talk) 13:02, 7 July 2017 (UTC)

NPOV
This lengthy article is full of uncited points of view. Slanted weasel words are often thrown in casually misleading the reader. Often the article reads like a school history essay. I will tag the top of the article and make an effort to take out some of the offending words and sentences. I hope other editors can please help by doing the same. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 10:13, 21 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Your NPOV dispute is very vague. Please provide specifics so that these can be addressed. --RAM (talk) 22:53, 26 March 2017 (UTC)


 * In section 'second phase', for example, an uncited comment: "After a succession of defeats, the Boers realised that against such overwhelming numbers of troops, they had little chance of defeating the British and so became demoralised...." How do we know what the Boers realised or ow they felt? This is just one of dozens of non NPOV comments. I cannot and should not go through each line. I believe a major overhaul of this article is needed, in many areas a complete re-write. It seems that lines have been taken directly from text books, such as Pakenhan-Scramble for Africa and pasted here, out of context.Roger 8 Roger (talk) 00:15, 27 March 2017 (UTC)


 * Lack of citation is a valid complaint, but it's not WP:NPOV. Statements supported directly by textbooks are the sort of WP:VERIFIABLE statement that Wikipedia encourages.  The solution is to add references, without altering the statements (unless they're so verbatim as to be a WP:COPYVIO).
 * Statements about the Boers' thoughts like "realised" or "demoralised", for example, could be supported by archived newspaper reports, correspondence or minutes of discussions. Then a historian would interpret those primary sources when writing a WP:SECONDARY source that Wikipedia can rely on.  There's nothing inherently NPOV about statements of that type.
 * I'm not claiming the article is POV-free, just that an accusation that it's not needs to be supported by evidence of a lack of historical consensus on a particular point, and this discussion hasn't adduced any. 104.153.72.218 (talk) 02:14, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

First sentence
Our first sentence basically states "The Second Boer War... began on [date] and ended on [date]." That's a poor description for any war. Worse, this sentence is now 90% a list of other names for the subject. Ugh.

I'd usually just go and fix things like this, but so many editors have recently put effort into making it this way, I thought I'd try a discussion first. (Plus, y'know, there's that "dispute" tag.)

The first sentence should generally state the basic idea of what the war was fought over, and at least an indication of the sides.

Yes, alternative naming is usually very early in similar articles, but that's best where the list of alternate names is very short and notable. Since the alternate names will be in bold, I don't think there's any harm to leave them to a sentence or two later -- still very easy to find in the first paragraph.

Thoughts?

--A D Monroe III (talk) 17:13, 17 July 2017 (UTC)


 * With no other input for a couple months, I've resolved the issue with this edit. --A&#8239;D&#8239;Monroe&#8239;III(talk)  18:13, 10 October 2017 (UTC)

British case for war
I find it disturbing that in the 'British case for war' section gold is not even mentioned. The other reasons listed were surely propaganda.

Do have a source that indicates that gold was a primary reason for war? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mute1991 (talk • contribs) 16:41, 6 November 2017 (UTC)

CE
Did a cheeky little drive-by ce but the article needs someone with far more sources than me, to do justice to its citation problems. I have a copy of Pakenham so can add page numbers when I get to it. Keith-264 (talk) 17:17, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

Editing issues
The page's infobox fills the entire screen, due to some long text in it, should be fixed.... don't know how myself though 2.25.46.38 (talk) 18:09, 2 December 2017 (UTC) — Berean Hunter   (talk)  19:16, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Yes, I removed because I do not see how to fix it. Maybe will see the problem.
 * Hello, got the message, had a look through the text and found lots of page needed notices inside sfns instead of on the outside. The article width reconciled to my laptop screen when I sorted them out. I'll have a look at the infobox now.Keith-264 (talk) 19:46, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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Fixing style/layout errors
It looks like I've found most of the errors but there's still a section not showing in the right place. Was this my doing? Keith-264 (talk) 19:59, 2 December 2017 (UTC)Keith-264 — Berean Hunter   (talk)  22:22, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * The infobox was pasted here to repair errors and pasted back into the article; cut from here to avoid wasting space.Keith-264 (talk) 20:18, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
 * Thank you for repairing that Keith-264. I don't think anything was your fault. Oddly, the edit that seems to break everything happens here by in early February but that can't be right. He wouldn't leave an article like that and I have a hard time believing that it would have been messed up for that long without someone reporting it before now. Someone must gave changed a template somewhere or some parameter. All versions from that edit until you repaired it appear to have the messed up infobox. I'm not sure.
 * When too tired to write properly, I've been creep checking articles by pasting them into Word and using the splendidser; I don't remember doing it to this one but if I did, I may be the culprit by forgetting to check for inadvertent errors. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 10:33, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

@Keith-264 and Berean Hunter The error was caused by a change, in templates (calling templates, calling templates) in late November/early December. It was fixed on 7th Dec. -- see Module talk:Footnotes. -- 18:55, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Itinerant farmers
Isn't this almost a contradiction in terms? If in fact they had no fixed abode, wouldn't "nomadic herdsmen" be more accurate? If in fact they did have homes, but widely roamed the open range, someone should come up with a better term.

TimGregg (talk) 22:00, 11 October 2018 (UTC) TimGregg (talk) 22:00, 11 October 2018 (UTC)

Poisoning of wells and the salting of fields
Salting of the fields is fake. There are no references given. It's made up.

Discussed here : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Salting_the_earth#Second_Boer_War_and_"unfeasible_for_herbicidal_warfare"? (Possible original edit: Salting of fields https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Second_Boer_War&diff=159136406&oldid=159013150 )

I will also remove "Poisoning of wells" since this is unsourced, unlikely and is part of this "salting of fields edit". ( Possible original edit: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Second_Boer_War&diff=160709578&oldid=160388483 )

Cheezypeaz (talk) 09:23, 18 March 2019 (UTC)


 * Also, white people cannot be the victims of genocide committed by other white people in a territory none of them were even native to, lol.--2A00:23C4:3E0F:4400:8198:78E5:ACD4:838C (talk) 22:34, 31 March 2020 (UTC)
 * What a stupidity! Of course, genocide will remain genocide when one group of people deliberately tries to take the life of another group of people just beacause ethincity. If you write before the word "people" the name of a color, for example "white" - nothing will change. In addition, the colonists from the Netherlands were the first to arrive on the territory of South Africa - before that, no man had set foot there. So the Boers are quite the "indigenous people" of South Africa.
 * It can be argued whether or not the British conduct in Boer war can be called Genocide. Stating that 'white people cannot be victims of genocide committed by other white people' is just being blind. A good example of this happening is during the French wars of Religion, where the Catholic Monarchy would Sanction the Persecution of Huguenots. Rjbraasch (talk) 23:32, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

The end of the war
I came across a reference to a copy of the photo in this section titled 'Peace conference at Vereeniging' which says it is of the first Peace conference 1901 perhaps at Middelburg https://collection.sl.nsw.gov.au/record/9AL4KARY/bxrp8amdmaE7w Can anyone confirm this is from the Vereeniging peace conference 1902? Eothan (talk) 03:58, 22 April 2022 (UTC)

Title
I am aware historians long referred to the conflict as the Second Boer War or simply and at a time more often, "The Boer War". The modern practice trend is to refer to the conflict as the "Second Anglo-Boer War". Do any editors object to my making this title change? OgamD218 (talk) 05:57, 21 December 2021 (UTC)
 * I think the most current official term for it, as encouraged by the South African government, is the South African War.--Discott (talk) 12:21, 9 January 2022 (UTC)
 * Just noting in support of this, Britannica now refers to the South African War. It is also referred to as such in New History of South Africa by Hermann Giliomee & Bernard Mbenga. I also recommend the title is changed to "South African War". Fifth Evasion (talk) 10:58, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

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