TAKING TANGANYIKA: Experiences of an Intelligence Officer 1914-1918

The Great War in East Africa is a ‘sideshow’ campaign that has acquired legendary status. The German military Governor in today’s Tanzania, General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, was a guerilla leader of genius, and, with a staff of white officers and a small army of Africans, the loyal Askaris, he ran rings around vastly superior allied forces – not least around another famous guerilla leader, South Afriuca’s Jan Smuts. This interesting book casts new light upon the campaign, since its author, unlike many of his brother officers, was an old east Africa hand and knew the terrain where the war was fought well. His breezy and charming account, does not seek to gloss over the many difficulties and frustrations of the campaign, nor to glamourise his own role in it – which included one hair-raising expedition behind the enemy’s lines. In his foreword to the book, Francis Brett Young, author of a classic account of the campaign,. says of this book: ‘The soldier who wants to realize what bush-fighting is like could not find a better text-book’. With 22 illustrations and a map.