The Nigerian civil War
Date
1972
Authors
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Publisher
London, Great Britain: Hodder and Stoughton Limited,
Abstract
Dramatis Personac 12; Factsheet 15; Introduction 17; Prologue 21; I The Soldiers Take Over 27; II, Ironsi's Two Hundred Days 49; III. Counter-Coup and Pogrom 65; IV Things Fall Apart 89; V The Phoncy War 123; VI Ojukwu's Mid-West Gamble 145; VII Outsiders Step In 177; VIII Biafra's Darkest Hour 203; IX The Humanitarians 233; X The Front-Linc 253; XI Britain's Cloaked Dagger 289; XII The Hircd Guns 309; XIII War of Words 241; XIV Bchind the Lines 367; XV Thc Biafran Sun Sets 391;
Description
This account of the Nigerian civil war is neither intended to be pure history nor pure journalism; it falls between the two and is thus susceptible to the strengths and weaknesses of all hybrids. I would rather call it die story ofthe Nigerian war—it has a beginning, a middle and an end—and leave it at that. In this story I flitted in and out as a working journalist: an observer, an outsider, a white man. However, like many in a similarly peripheral position, I was drawn deeper and deeper into the human and political complexities, tragedies and heroics presented by a nation at war with itself. Most civil wars generate more heat than light at the time they are being fought and, indeed, for long after the guns are silent. It is certainly too soon to know the whole truth about die Nigerian war; it may be too late to recapture its passions and its special atmosphere. Nevertheless this book is an attempt to put the record as straight as possible: to cut through the choking fog of myth and propaganda that obscured the conflict, and to clarify the causes and course ofthe war while highlighting its rights and wrongs.