Britain’s defeat of Italy in 1940 reawakened Somali nationalist ambitions

Evidence

Within a period of fifteen years, Somalia experienced a gigantic political transformation. Some of these changes were from the postwar shift in world affairs and others were induced by the determined struggle and initiative of the Somali people led by the SYL. Somali resistance to European colonial rule had been somewhat dormant since the defeat of Somalia’s modern national leader, Sayyid Mohamed Abdille Hassan, in 1921. However, the defeat of Italian fascism by Britain in northeast Africa in 1940 provided an opportunity for Somalis to wake up again and think of their destiny as free people. The British occupation of four Somali lands—the former Italian colony, the British protectorate, Northern Frontier Districts, and Somali Ethiopia—created an occasion for Somali nationalists to recognize the silver lining that the defeat of Italy brought about: a Somali union. While the major war of resistance against colonialism in the first two decades of the century was based in the British protectorate, the seeds of the second wave of resistance sprouted in Mogadishu, which became the hub of the nationalist movement. — Abdi Ismail Samatar, Africa’s First Democrats, 465

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the earlier narrative in this book about SYL formation and the first wave of resistance under Sayyid Mohamed Abdille Hassan defeated in 1921.