A Deterritorialized History: Investigating German Colonialism ...

interest in 1888 in acquiring a colonial possession on the Niger River, renowned for its
mineral wealth and transport links, coupled with British acquiescence, very nearly gained
another colony for the Reich. Germany also tried to acquire parts of northeast Africa and
south Africa with no success.
This continued desire for territory was one of the few unifying characteristics
between the four very different German colonies. The largest of the colonies, Southwest
Africa, was established primarily as a settler colony because of its much-publicized
grasslands that seemed to offer a bountiful prairie for German colonists. In Southwest
Africa land became critical to colonialism as ranching was the colony’s most profitable
business. Nonetheless, the barren steppes of the colony never proved a success for either
companies or settlers. Unlike Southwest Africa, the large German East African colony
was blessed with verdant soil and forests. The colony became a plantation colony
because of the difficulties involved in settling and farming the available land. The two
small west African colonies of Togo and Cameroon were more successful because of
their fertile climate that nurtured desirable products for the German market. In fact,
Togo’s productive tropical agriculture meant the colony was the sole German African
dependency that could turn a profit. These local differences and the links between the
colonies mandate an approach to their history that contrasts much existing historiography
by conceiving all the colonies as situated within a variegated yet inter-connected system.
Additional variation is present diachronically, for whenever one speaks of
colonial expansion, one cannot ignore the phases of rule, since differing themes were
dominant in different times. Baumgart identifies three phases: annexation euphoria, anti-
climax, and revolt. 60 But the colonial period can conversely be seen as developing from a
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