The Rise of Rail-Power in War and Conquest, 1833-1914

by Edwin A. Pratt

Central Africa

Germany's hopes of thus strengthening her position in Central Africa by means of the Tanganyikabahn received, however, a serious set-back through the activity and enterprise of Belgian and British interests in providing, opening up or projecting alternative transport routes which threatened (1) to divert a large proportion of the traffic she had expected to secure for the East Africa Central line; (2) to diminish greatly the prospect of her achieving the commercial and political aims she cherished in regard to the Belgian Congo; (3) to make it still more difficult for German East Africa to emerge from a position of comparative isolation, and (4) to impede greatly the realisation of Germany's aspirations in regard alike to Central Africa and the African Continent.

It is the more necessary that the bearing of all these facts on the general situation should be understood because they tend to indicate the critical nature of the position into which the said aspirations had drifted, and the imperative necessity by which Germany may, by 1914, have considered she was faced for adopting some bold course of action if she were still to look forward to the possibility of those aspirations being realised.

The principle originally adopted by King Leopold in his efforts to develop the Congo State was that of supplementing navigation on the Congo by railways wherever these were necessary either to overcome the difficulties presented by rapids or to supply missing links in the chain of communication to or from the west coast. The same policy was followed by the Belgian Government when they assumed control, and the last of these links—the line, 165 miles long, from Kabalo to Albertville, connecting the Congo with the Tanganyika—was opened in March, 1915. One reason, in fact, given in Germany for the express speed at which the Tanganyikabahn was completed to Kigoma was an alleged fear that the Belgians might capture the trade and transport of the territory in question by getting to the lake first.

This combined river and rail transport still left it necessary for traffic from the Congo basin to the west coast to follow the winding course of that river, with a number of transhipments; and if the route in question had been the only competitor of the Tanganyikabahn, Germany would have had less cause for uneasiness. Meanwhile, however, the Compagnie du Chemin de Fer du Bas-Congo had built a line—forming a continuation of the Rhodesian Railways—from the boundary of Northern Rhodesia, at Elizabethville, to Kambove (Katanga); and a continuation of this line to Bukama, on the Lualaba, a navigable tributary of the Congo, was (1) to give shorter and better access to the Congo for products from Katanga, and (2) to establish combined rail and water transport between the entire railway system of South Africa and the mouth of the Congo. Already the minerals from Katanga were finding their outlet to the sea on the east coast via the Rhodesian Railways and the Portuguese port of Beira, instead of via the Tanganyikabahn and the German port of Dar-es-Salaam. The former had, indeed, become the recognised route for this important traffic in preference to the latter. The line between Kambove and Bukama had not been completed when war broke out in 1914; but the provision of this through route, and the various facilities it would offer, rendered still more uncertain the prospect of Germany getting control of the trans-Tanganyika traffic for her own lines.

There were other important railway schemes, besides.

From Bukama rail communication is to be continued right across Central Africa to Matadi, to which point the Congo is navigable for large vessels from its mouth, less than a hundred miles distant. This line, in addition to avoiding the great bend of the Congo, will open up and develop the vast and promising territory in the northern districts of the Belgian Congo, south of that river.

Another scheme which is to be carried out is a line from Kambove, in the Southern Katanga, to the south-western boundary of the Belgian Congo, and thence across Portuguese territory to the present eastern terminus of the Lobito Bay Railway. This will give to the mining interests of Katanga direct rail communication, by the shortest possible route, with a port on the west coast, while the connection at Kambove with the Rhodesian and South African systems will make the line a still more important addition to the railways of Africa for the purposes alike of development in the central districts and as a shorter route to and from Europe. German financiers were at one time desirous of undertaking the extension eastward of the Lobito Bay Railway—mainly, as it seemed, with a view to furthering German interests in Portuguese territory (see page [314]); but the Kambove-Lobito Bay line is now to be constructed with British capital.

Finally there is the Cape-to-Cairo Railway which, passing through the Katanga mining districts, is likely to divert still more of the traffic Germany had counted upon alike for her Tanganyikabahn and as a means towards the attainment of her political aspirations in Central Africa.

Whilst these various developments were proceeding, there were still others, in the Cameroons, to which attention may now be directed.