Black Rhodesian soldiers’ loyalties – as opposed to motivations for initial enlistment – were premised upon a shared sense of professionalism. Inherent to this ethos was their soldierly prowess, honed through continuous training and operational experience, which was also co-constitutive of a deep, emotive sense of mutual obligation between fellow soldiers. Furthermore, these soldiers were socialised into a distinctive military culture, which created a powerful, emotive regimental loyalty that incorporated traditions to create an accentuated sense of in-group belonging and homogeneity that bound them to their regiment, and thereafter the wider army. professionalism and regimental loyalties of these troops ensured that they remained steadfast during combat and in the face of the surge in popularity of the nationalist challenge to white settler-colonial rule.

This book has contributed to a new understanding of the loyalties of black Rhodesian soldiers during the era spanning the terminal years of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, Zimbabwe’s war of liberation, and the tumultuous first two years of independence from 1980. That these black soldiers fought for white-minority rule in Rhodesia appears, superficially, both paradoxical and extraordinary, and it has led to their characterisation as supporters of the RF, mercenaries, or ‘sell-outs’ in neo-Rhodesian and nationalist literatures.

Once the RAR was an established, regular force, new forms of micro-level solidarities particular to regular soldiers took root, which fundamentally differentiated these soldiers from other combatants. professionalism of the Rhodesian Army was institutionalised and embedded during its transformation to a regular army, and was modelled upon British practice, doctrine, and traditions. This chapter thus uses a literature which has studied the British practice of creating soldierly cohesion and loyalty. Incorporating the arguments of military sociologists, particularly the work of Anthony King, and historians, it shows how a soldierly identity was shaped, which itself fed into an ideal of soldierly professionalism which become co-constitutive. Through extensive training, black RAR soldiers acquired great confidence not only in their own abilities, but also those of their peers, whom they could expect to fight for them in difficult situations. Underpinning these professional norms was a system of military discipline that relied upon a quasi-juridical form of oversight, which my interviewees attested was rational and fair.