What I Am Reading: "There Was A Country: A Personal History of Biafra" by Chinua Achebe

I had a bit of a library crisis trying to get my black-authored black history book this month, so I decided at the last minute to swap in some modern African history by a famous Nigerian novelist. Anecdotally: I think of Chinua Achebe as an important author in my own educational background - his famous novel, Things Fall Apart, was the summer read before my freshman year honors English class, accompanied with a packet of over a hundred questions to answer. It was the source of considerable aggrieved discussion among my tight-knit classmates, as we had never really dealt with summer work before at the time.

In another reading background link, it was around the same time, in middle school, that I first read about the cause of Biafra, in a trashy paperback about the exploits of mercenaries. In Biafra’s case, it was the slightly more noble cause of Count Carl Gustav von Rosen, a Swedish nobleman pilot (and nephew by marriage of Hermann Göring) who flew relief supplies into Biafra, and proceeded to organize a small-scale Biafran air force that raided Nigerian airstrips. I hadn’t read much about the topic since then, though it is the kind of thing that comes up in books about broader left-wing ‘60s activism. I guess it is also referenced (though conflated with the Congo Crisis) in “Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner” by Warren Zevon.

Anyway, this latter-day history is more of a memoir of or primer on that conflict. Achebe was active on behalf of the Biafrans, and the book touts the cause of his ethnic group, the Igbo, who made up the leadership and a large proportion of the population of Biafra. In fact, Biafra came into existence as a result of the Nigerian state's inability to safeguard the Igbo against ethnic violence.

This is getting ahead of ourselves a bit. In fact, Achebe spends the first part of the book discussing his own background and education. He was born in 1930, and was part of the generation that came of age as Nigeria gained its independence from Britain in 1960. Some of the notes on his upbringing are fun, as upbringings in faded historical settings can be; and he is interesting as he speaks about his worldview and writings shaped by the conflict between Christianity (his father was a high-profile convert and community leader) and traditional Igbo values and mythology, espoused by other members of his extended family. The book flags, however, when Achebe covers his education. He was an elite student, and this section contains considerable name-dropping of other important Nigerian leaders and intellectuals that he went to school with, or who went to the same school at some point. I don't want to belabor the point, but I will say that anyone curious about Achebe's grades in comparison to those of his friends will come away satisfied.

After school, Achebe went to work in broadcasting, and began his writing career. This was around the same time that Nigeria was gearing up for independence. The country was divided geographically and socially: the Hausa and Fulani, Muslims, in the north, the Yoruba, in the west, and the Igbo, in the east (the latter both Christian). The Muslims and the Yoruba had largely maintained their traditional feudal hierarchies under British rule, whereas the Igbo, decentralized and with civil society focused mostly at the village level, were quicker to integrate western ways (as depicted in Things Fall Apart of course). The British, while granting the country independence, also endeavored to put the northerners in charge of the country politically, with the south divided between the Yoruba and the Igbo.

Achebe describes considerable resentment for the Igbo, who were heavily over-represented in elite institutions in Nigeria. In the section "A History of Ethnic Tension and Resentment," Achebe frames the story as one of everyone hating the Igbo for their success:

"The Igbo culture, being receptive to change, individualistic, and highly competitive, gave the Igbo man an unquestioned advantage over his compatriots in securing credentials for advancement in Nigerian colonial society. Unlike the Hausa/Fulani he was unhindered by a wary religion, and unlike the Yoruba he was unhampered by traditional hierarchies. This kind of creature, fearing no god or man, was custom-made to grasp the opportunities, such as they were, of the white man's dispensations ... The rise of the Igbo in Nigerian affairs was due to the self-confidence engendered by their open society and their belief that one man is as good as another ... any observer can clearly see how the competitive individualism and the adventurous spirit of the Igbo could have been harnessed by committed leaders for the modernization and development of Nigeria ... The denial of merit is a form of social injustice ..."

It is my suspicion that Igbo dominance would be viewed differently by members of other ethnic groups underrepresented in the country's institutions, or members of the non-Igbo ethnic groups brought along in the east’s succession (who are briefly mentioned). In any event, what is undeniable is that the Igbo were the victims of persecution at both the individual and institutional level in independent Nigeria.

Nigeria became independent in 1960, and it took about six years for the republican government to (in Achebe's telling) mismanage themselves into their overthrow. The Nigerian political culture was divisive, and the path to political power was to build up an ethnic power base. In 1966, the government was overthrown by a military coup led by young Igbo officers. The coup plotters were quickly displaced with by General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi, whose government turned a blind eye to rioting and assassinations against the Igbo in reaction to the "Igbo conspiracy." At this point, Achebe and his wife fled the capital, as did many Igbo, to return to their homeland in the east.

Aguiyi-Ironsi ruled as an authoritarian, and promulgated a decree transforming the country from a federation into a unitary state, reducing the power of local and regional leaders. He was not in charge for long, however, and was killed in mid 1966 by another coup led by northern officers. They allowed and even led greater violence against the Igbo, including pogroms targeting Igbo who lived in other parts of the country than their homeland. This was the catalyst of the crisis: the Igbo leadership pressured the country's new military leader, Lt. Col. Yakubu Gowon, to take action to protect Igbo citizens and re-empower local leaders. After a confederation agreement was made but not implemented, the leadership of Igbo territory in eastern Nigeria systematically severed their ties with the central government. Their leader, General Emeka Ojukwu, proclaimed the east, Biafra, a republic in May of 1967.

The book picks up a lot once the war begins. To Achebe, an element of the succession and of the war is the sort of rivalry between the two leaders. Gowon was a pristine, British-trained military leader, viewed with some suspicion as he ran the country despite being far from the highest-ranking military officer. Ojukqu was also a military leader; he came from an elite, cosmopolitan background and defied his father to join the military. Both leaders had an aloof temperament, and according to Achebe continually missed opportunities to compromise and end or prevent the fighting. Achebe is willing to criticize the Biafran government, and says that Ojukwu's efforts to feed his people, including courting sympathy with his famous "Biafran Babies" speech after the Nigerians commenced a massive blockade, were attempts to deflect attention away from his own government's failures. Achebe also blames Ojukwu’s go-it-alone style for alienating Nnamdi Azikiwe, Nigeria's first head of state and a voice in favor of Biafra until 1969, when he gave up his international lobbying efforts.

A large part of Achebe's own contribution was also to lobby internationally on behalf of the embattled republic, speaking to audiences and heads of state. The great powers' split on Biafra is interesting: the British backed the Nigerians for largely realpolitik reasons, and the French, their competitors for influence in West Africa, backed the Biafrans for the same. Labour's government under Wilson comes under repeated fire for this abrogation of its humanitarian ideals. Meanwhile, sensing an opening, the Soviets also sent materiel to the Nigerians, while the Chinese and Portuguese quietly sent support to Biafra. The United States proclaimed its non-involvement despite considerable support for Biafra among the activist community and civil rights organizations; Nixon was in fact more friendly to Biafra than Johnson.

This support was necessary because, after a brief foray into and occupation of Nigerian territory (about which Achebe, evenhandedly, airs humanitarian concerns), the Biafrans were pushed back by the larger and better-armed Nigerian military. They rapidly cut the Biafrans off from the sea (killing Igbo as they went) in an effort to wage a three-front push on their capital, but were held off by Biafran guerrilla warfare. By late 1968, the Nigerian advance had stalled enough for the Biafrans to regroup, and launch a large air supply effort to acquire weapons and food, while seeking international support.

When he was not active abroad, Achebe was in the country, suffering with its people through starvation and bombing. He describes having to move frequently in the face of the encroaching enemy or their bombers, though often moving between large estates in a chauffeured car. He lauds many times the courage of the Biafrans, and their ingenuity in making do with limited supplies. They were a great international underdog, and the cause received sympathy and aid from around the world. Achebe also participated by helping, with other intellectuals, the National Guidance Committee to write the country's founding document, the Ahiara Declaration. He also writes a lot about his friend and colleague, Christopher Okigbo, a poet and larger-than-life, enigmatic figure who enlisted as a Major in the Biafran army and was killed in combat in 1967.

The UN was not useful in brokering any kind of compromise, or stopping the atrocities or starvation blockade. The Biafrans had a last hurrah when they recaptured the city of Owerri in 1969, but the Ojukwu government proceeded to squander some international good-will when he took an Italian oil field and kept its employees as hostages. Achebe presents two sides to the argument: was this a blunder? Or an effort to hasten a negotiated end of the war by cutting off the oil supply?

Another controversial Ojukwu move was his flight from the country in early 1970 as the Nigerians closed in for the final time, recapturing Owerry in January of that year. This flight, under the cover of seeking more support abroad, was seen by some as cowardice; though Achebe thinks it may have taken some of the heat out of the Ojukwu-Gowon rivalry, and given the Biafrans a more lenient deal than they would have received otherwise. The war ended in surrender shortly thereafter.

Achebe goes on to deplore the state of Nigeria in the years since. Some think that Gowon's economic policies (in the years before he himself was overthrown) sought to dis-empower the Igbo, including mandating foreign sale of capital to Nigerians at a time where the war-torn east would not have had much capacity to invest. Gowon is given a chance to respond through an interview with journalist Pini Jason, where he says that the economic situation in the east wasn't really that bad at the time, and that others had the same complaints about the ("successful") program in other regions. Achebe also raises the question of whether the attack on Biafra was a genocide, with quotations and analyses in favor juxtaposed against claims that the blockade was necessary in a time of war. He concludes by noting Nigeria's status as a failed state at his time of writing, and hopes that they will be able to rescue their country, with the first step being the improvement of democratic institutions.

As someone largely unfamiliar with the topic, I thought that this book was a good introduction, though as noted such a first-hand account of such a situation yields inevitable blind sports. Achebe tempers this by meticulous even-handedness in analysis of the war itself. I definitely eased myself into post-colonial African history with the famous activist lost cause, almost like Africa’s Spanish Civil War.