Podcast Summary

Overview

Podcast: New Books Network – Genocide Studies
Host: Kellen McFall
Guest: Tom Menger, historian, author of The Colonial Way of War: Violence and Colonial Warfare in the British, German and Dutch Empires, c. 1890-1914 (Cambridge UP, 2025)
Date: January 30, 2026

The episode explores Tom Menger’s trans-imperial study of extreme violence in colonial warfare at the turn of the twentieth century, focusing on the British, German, and Dutch Empires. Menger discusses how similar patterns, practices, and ideologies shaped colonial violence regardless of alleged “national peculiarities,” drawing on a rich base of archival sources and memoirs. Central themes include the transfer of military ideas, the role of race and masculinity, the logic behind extreme violence, and debates around genocide versus exterminatory warfare.

Guest Introduction & Motivations

• Tom Menger Background

  • Historian specializing in imperial and especially trans-imperial history.
  • Teaches at LMU University of Munich; affiliated with the Munich Center for Global History.
  • Personal background fueled interest in transcultural encounters: Dutch parents, upbringing in the Netherlands and Portugal, German-language schooling.

• Interest in Colonial Violence

  • Motivated by questions about perpetration: “How do people come to be perpetrators of such deeds?” ([05:04])
  • Early academic work on German colonialism led to a skepticism about “national peculiarities” and a desire to investigate shared or connected forms of colonial violence.

Trans-Imperial History: The Field & Its Value

• Definition and Importance ([03:36])
  • Moves beyond siloed, national approaches to imperial history; emphasizes connections, cooperation, and competition between empires.
  • “Trans-imperial history...is really about looking at empires, how they competed, how they cooperated, but also how they were connected and the manifold connection that exists between them.” (Menger, [03:36])

Research Questions, Thesis & Case Selection

• Main Thesis ([07:31])

  • Argues for a “colonial way of war” distinct from national approaches; shared across empires.
  • “It is colonial, which means that it's very much defined also by processes of racialization and colonial ideology, which makes it distinct from warfare in other theaters at the time.” (Menger, [07:31])

• Case Selection ([08:42])

  • Focus on British, German, and Dutch empires due to language skills and source availability.
  • Chose large-scale colonial wars occurring after initial conquest, where resistance emerges in response to deeper colonial penetration (Namibia, Tanzania, and Aceh/Sumatra).

Transmission of Ideas and Practices

• Within Metropolitan Armies ([11:00])

  • Surprisingly little exchange of colonial warfare information among home-country armies; focus was on preparing for European wars.
  • “They did share very little information on colonial warfare in the metropole in this period...military education at the time was completely geared towards the European conventional war.” ([11:00])

• Colonial Armies & “Imperial Cloud” ([13:13])

  • Knowledge/experience transferred through the mobility of individuals—officers, non-European soldiers, not formal institutions.
  • Notable quote: “All information travels while locked up in the brains of those who have by practice one experience.” (British author, cited by Menger, [13:13])
  • Military journals and manuals became more trans-imperial only late in the period and were more reflective than forward-shaping.

• Non-European Actors ([16:00])

  • Asians and Africans serving in colonial armies crucial for knowledge transfer (e.g., Sudanese soldiers moving from the Anglo-Egyptian army to German East Africa).

Lived Experience & Mobility

• Memoirs & Mobility ([17:38])
  • Menger was struck by figures “who seem to travel all over the world and participate in conflicts or colonializing impulses in a variety of places.”
  • “Any feelings that they might once have had were blunted by years of savage warfare.” (Memoir excerpt, [18:21])

Logics & Imperatives Behind Colonial Violence

• Underlying Racial Ideologies ([19:49])

  • Extreme violence flows from racialized perceptions of the opponent: “...a racial other, as a human different from oneself.”
  • Centrality of “the native mind” concept—seen as “easy to impress, very irrational,” requiring psychological domination.

• Five Basic Imperatives (with related timestamps):

  1. Moral Effect ([22:18])
     • Goal is psychological domination through violence or “awe.”
     • “You have to have a moral effect on the enemy...this can only be done by the use of heavy violence.”
  2. The Offensive and Bold Initiative ([24:22])
     • Requirement to always advance and act boldly; inaction is seen as weakness.
  3. Force Must Be Felt First ([25:28])
     • Lasting peace is only possible after a demonstration of overwhelming violence.
     • “The only way that peace can be lasting is if you have used heavy force first.”
  4. Punishment ([27:19])
     • Mix of vengeance, pedagogy (“teaching a lesson”), and spectacle; punishment often inherently violent.
     • “To make [the opponent] behave better by imposing punishment...a very 19th century pedagogical tenet.”
  5. Massacre / “Big Bag” ([29:17])
     • Emphasis on high body count (“the big bag”) as proof of victory—a frequent British term.
     • “You can win a fight, but if you don't leave enough bodies...it won't really count.”

Gender & Masculinity

• Application to Women & Children ([31:29])

  • Military codes retained some reservations about harming women/children, but violence was often justified by necessity or racial hatred.
  • Perpetrators often displayed selective ‘benevolence’ to maintain self-image.

• Masculinity ([33:55])

  • Colonial armies framed as intensely masculine spaces; harshness is a valued, ‘manly’ trait. Clemency = weakness/effeminacy.
  • “There’s this idea of you have to be harsh because that's sort of a masculine trait.” ([33:55])
  • Experiences in colonial warfare help define ideal masculinity, influencing models back in the metropole (e.g., Boy Scouts derived from colonial martial ideals).

• Women’s Influence ([37:17])

  • Some consensus among colonial settler women supporting violence; few exceptions (e.g., Olive Schreiner in South Africa); resistance to violence in philanthropic circles more common in metropoles.

Genocide, Extermination, and Warfare

• Genocide as a Concept ([39:01])

  • Cautions against loose application of the term; by strict UN definition, only a few cases (e.g., Herero genocide) qualify.
  • Proposes “exterminatory warfare” as a more accurate concept for many colonial conflicts.

• “Collateral Damage” Logic ([41:45])

  • Extermination was rarely an explicit aim, but acknowledged and accepted as collateral damage in quest for submission.
  • Justifications ranged from “hardships of war” to Social Darwinist ideology.

• Wars of Devastation vs. Extermination ([43:01])

  • Defines “wars of devastation” as scorched-earth tactics (village/crop destruction to induce famine), central to colonial warfare.
  • “The image of colonial warfare is actually these soldiers... burning down villages, cutting crops, etc. And that's what I call the war of devastation.”
  • Resulted in massive civilian death without intentional genocide (e.g., mortality in Tanzania rivaled Namibia).

Empire-Specific Findings

• German Southwest Africa/Herero Genocide ([46:06])

  • Challenges prior argument for German exceptionalism (“Sonderweg”); finds more trans-imperial similarities in methods and thinking than previously claimed.

• The Dutch in Aceh ([48:18])

  • Initial appearance of divergence: Dutch shift from scorched earth in Aceh to “piecemeal killing” via patrols.
  • Ultimately, “the Dutch fit just as much into these trans imperial patterns as the other colonial powers.”
  • Notably, Dutch military discourse acknowledged populations as assets, showing limited divergence in some genocidal absolutism.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “All information travels while locked up in the brains of those who have by practice one experience.” ([13:25])
• “Any feelings that they might once have had were blunted by years of savage warfare.” ([18:21])
• “[Colonial violence] is very much defined by processes of racialization and colonial ideology, which makes it distinct from warfare in other theaters at the time.” ([07:31])
• “If we want to use that term, [genocide] we should first keep in mind that this is primarily still a juridical term [... ultimately] the permissiveness inherent in the colonial way of war, this sort of partial extermination or even near-complete extermination of a group is sort of accepted as legitimate as long as it serves this aim of subjugation.” ([39:01]–[41:45])

Book Recommendations ([54:07])

• Academic:

  • The Broad Platform of Extermination (article) by Karl Jacoby
  • American Genocide by Benjamin Madley

• Menger appreciates these works for their nuanced, case-by-case approach to the question of colonial genocide.

Next Projects ([56:16])

• Menger is developing research bridging sea/maritime empires (like those in his book) and continental land-based empires (Ottoman, Russian, Austro-Hungarian), focusing on their interactions—particularly in the Ottoman Balkans. He aims to challenge the analytical division between empire “types” and further investigate the “boomerang thesis” of violence returning to Europe.

Endnote:
This episode provides a sophisticated, empirical critique of the idea of national exceptionalism in colonial violence, emphasizing deep trans-imperial connections and patterns. It offers new perspectives on old debates about genocide, masculinity, military culture, and the colonial transmission of violence—valuable for historians, genocide scholars, and anyone interested in the legacies of empire.