United Nations
The United Nations is an intergovernmental organization, tasked to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international co-operation and be a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations. The headquarters of the UN is in Manhattan, New York City, is subject to extraterritoriality. Further main offices are situated in Geneva, Nairobi and The Hague; the organization is financed by voluntary contributions from its member states. Its objectives include maintaining international peace and security, protecting human rights, delivering humanitarian aid, promoting sustainable development and upholding international law; the UN is the largest, most familiar, most internationally represented and most powerful intergovernmental organization in the world. In 24 October 1945, at the end of World War II, the organization was established with the aim of preventing future wars. At its founding, the UN had 51 member states; the UN is the successor of the ineffective League of Nations.
On 25 April 1945, 50 governments met in San Francisco for a conference and started drafting the UN Charter, adopted on 25 June 1945 in the San Francisco Opera House, signed on 26 June 1945 in the Herbst Theatre auditorium in the Veterans War Memorial Building. This charter took effect on 24 October 1945; the UN's mission to preserve world peace was complicated in its early decades during the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union and their respective allies. Its missions have consisted of unarmed military observers and armed troops with monitoring and confidence-building roles; the organization's membership grew following widespread decolonization which started in the 1960s. Since 80 former colonies had gained independence, including 11 trust territories, which were monitored by the Trusteeship Council. By the 1970s its budget for economic and social development programmes far outstripped its spending on peacekeeping. After the end of the Cold War, the UN shifted and expanded its field operations, undertaking a wide variety of complex tasks.
The UN has six principal organs: the General Assembly. The UN System agencies include the World Bank Group, the World Health Organization, the World Food Programme, UNESCO, UNICEF; the UN's most prominent officer is the Secretary-General, an office held by Portuguese politician and diplomat António Guterres since 1 January 2017. Non-governmental organizations may be granted consultative status with ECOSOC and other agencies to participate in the UN's work; the organization, its officers and its agencies have won many Nobel Peace Prizes. Other evaluations of the UN's effectiveness have been mixed; some commentators believe the organization to be an important force for peace and human development, while others have called the organization ineffective, biased, or corrupt. In the century prior to the UN's creation, several international treaty organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross was formed to ensure protection and assistance for victims of armed conflict and strife.
In 1914, a political assassination in Sarajevo set off a chain of events that led to the outbreak of World War I. As more and more young men were sent down into the trenches, influential voices in the United States and Britain began calling for the establishment of a permanent international body to maintain peace in the postwar world. President Woodrow Wilson became a vocal advocate of this concept, in 1918 he included a sketch of the international body in his 14-point proposal to end the war. In November 1918, the Central Powers agreed to an armistice to halt the killing in World War I. Two months the Allies met with Germany and Austria-Hungary at Versailles to hammer out formal peace terms. President Wilson wanted peace, but the United Kingdom and France disagreed, forcing harsh war reparations on their former enemies; the League of Nations was approved, in the summer of 1919 Wilson presented the Treaty of Versailles and the Covenant of the League of Nations to the US Senate for ratification.
On January 10, 1920, the League of Nations formally comes into being when the Covenant of the League of Nations, ratified by 42 nations in 1919, takes effect. However, at some point the League became ineffective when it failed to act against the Japanese invasion of Manchuria as in February 1933, 40 nations voted for Japan to withdraw from Manchuria but Japan voted against it and walked out of the League instead of withdrawing from Manchuria, it failed against the Second Italo-Ethiopian War despite trying to talk to Benito Mussolini as he used the time to send an army to Africa, so the League had a plan for Mussolini to just take a part of Ethiopia, but he ignored the League and invaded Ethiopia, the League tried putting sanctions on Italy, but Italy had conquered Ethiopia and the League had failed. After Italy conquered Ethiopia and other nations left the league, but all of them realised that they began to re-arm as fast as possible. During 1938, Britain and France tried negotiating directly with Hitler but this failed in 1939 when Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia.
When war broke out in 1939, the League closed down and its headquarters in Geneva remained empty throughout the war. The earliest concrete plan for a new world organization began under the aegis of the U. S. State Department in 1939; the text of the "Declaration by United Nations" was drafted at the White House on December 29, 1941, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Roosevelt aide Harry Hopkins
Motor Machine Gun Service
The Motor Machine Gun Service was a unit of the British Army in the First World War, consisting of batteries of motorcycle/sidecar combinations carrying Vickers machine guns. It was formed in 1914 and incorporated into the Machine Gun Corps in October 1915 as the Machine Gun Corps. Although the usefulness of the machine gun had not been appreciated by the British Army before the outbreak of the Great War, it soon became apparent that mobile machine gun units would be of considerable value in the fluid warfare that characterised the first few weeks of the war. Accordingly, the formation of batteries of motorcycle-mounted machine guns was authorised in November 1914, under the command of Lt-Col R. W. Bradley, DSO, South Wales Borderers; these batteries were designated part of the Royal Field Artillery, one battery being allocated to the divisional Artillery of each Division of the British Expeditionary Force. Each battery consisted of 18 motorcycle/sidecar combinations, carrying six Vickers machine guns and spare parts, eight motorcycles without sidecars, two or three cars or trucks.
However, as the war became bogged down in the stalemate of trench warfare, few opportunities arose to exploit the tactical mobility of the MMGS batteries. The units did perform useful service on occasion, for example during the Battle of Neuve Chapelle. Up to that date, only seven MMGS batteries had been deployed on the Western Front, their potential for future use continued to be acknowledged, by the date of the Battle of Loos, there were 18 MMGS batteries serving with the BEF. The motorcycle combinations used by the MMGS were Scotts. Royal Enfields and Clynos were later used. Solo units were Triumphs. Early in 1915, following trials, the army settled on the Clyno as its standard machine for MMGS outfits. However, other marques of cycle in service were retained; the sidecars used for both the Scott and Clyno combinations were designed in consultation with Vickers for their specific role. Members of the service were recruited from motor cycle clubs and other bodies of enthusiasts, with officers seconded from other regiments.
On the creation of the Machine Gun Corps in October 1915, the MMGS was incorporated into it as the Machine Gun Corps. Most MGC batteries on the Western Front were disbanded in the course of 1916; the surviving mobile batteries came into their own during the advances of 1918, as well as in other theatres of the war, notably Palestine and East Africa. From 1916, many men of the MGC were transferred to the Heavy Section, MGC, which became the Tank Corps. Carragher, Michael. San Fairy Ann? Motorcycles and British Victory 1914–1918. Brighton: FireStep Press. ISBN 978-1-908487-38-4
British Empire
The British Empire comprised the dominions, protectorates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It originated with the overseas possessions and trading posts established by England between the late 16th and early 18th centuries. At its height, it was the largest empire in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power. By 1913, the British Empire held sway over 412 million people, 23% of the world population at the time, by 1920, it covered 35,500,000 km2, 24% of the Earth's total land area; as a result, its political, legal and cultural legacy is widespread. At the peak of its power, the phrase "the empire on which the sun never sets" was used to describe the British Empire, because its expanse around the globe meant that the sun was always shining on at least one of its territories. During the Age of Discovery in the 15th and 16th centuries and Spain pioneered European exploration of the globe, in the process established large overseas empires.
Envious of the great wealth these empires generated, England and the Netherlands began to establish colonies and trade networks of their own in the Americas and Asia. A series of wars in the 17th and 18th centuries with the Netherlands and France left England and following union between England and Scotland in 1707, Great Britain, the dominant colonial power in North America, it became the dominant power in the Indian subcontinent after the East India Company's conquest of Mughal Bengal at the Battle of Plassey in 1757. The independence of the Thirteen Colonies in North America in 1783 after the American War of Independence caused Britain to lose some of its oldest and most populous colonies. British attention soon turned towards Asia and the Pacific. After the defeat of France in the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, Britain emerged as the principal naval and imperial power of the 19th century. Unchallenged at sea, British dominance was described as Pax Britannica, a period of relative peace in Europe and the world during which the British Empire became the global hegemon and adopted the role of global policeman.
In the early 19th century, the Industrial Revolution began to transform Britain. The British Empire expanded to include most of India, large parts of Africa and many other territories throughout the world. Alongside the formal control that Britain exerted over its own colonies, its dominance of much of world trade meant that it controlled the economies of many regions, such as Asia and Latin America. During the 19th century, Britain's population increased at a dramatic rate, accompanied by rapid urbanisation, which caused significant social and economic stresses. To seek new markets and sources of raw materials, the British government under Benjamin Disraeli initiated a period of imperial expansion in Egypt, South Africa, elsewhere. Canada and New Zealand became self-governing dominions. By the start of the 20th century and the United States had begun to challenge Britain's economic lead. Subsequent military and economic tensions between Britain and Germany were major causes of the First World War, during which Britain relied upon its empire.
The conflict placed enormous strain on the military and manpower resources of Britain. Although the British Empire achieved its largest territorial extent after World War I, Britain was no longer the world's pre-eminent industrial or military power. In the Second World War, Britain's colonies in East and Southeast Asia were occupied by Japan. Despite the final victory of Britain and its allies, the damage to British prestige helped to accelerate the decline of the empire. India, Britain's most valuable and populous possession, achieved independence as part of a larger decolonisation movement in which Britain granted independence to most territories of the empire; the Suez Crisis confirmed Britain's decline as a global power. The transfer of Hong Kong to China in 1997 marked for many the end of the British Empire. Fourteen overseas territories remain under British sovereignty. After independence, many former British colonies joined the Commonwealth of Nations, a free association of independent states.
The United Kingdom is now one of 16 Commonwealth nations, a grouping known informally as the Commonwealth realms, that share a monarch Queen Elizabeth II. The foundations of the British Empire were laid when Scotland were separate kingdoms. In 1496, King Henry VII of England, following the successes of Spain and Portugal in overseas exploration, commissioned John Cabot to lead a voyage to discover a route to Asia via the North Atlantic. Cabot sailed in 1497, five years after the European discovery of America, but he made landfall on the coast of Newfoundland, mistakenly believing that he had reached Asia, there was no attempt to found a colony. Cabot led another voyage to the Americas the following year but nothing was heard of his ships again. No further attempts to establish English colonies in the Americas were made until well into the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, during the last decades of the 16th century. In the meantime, the 1533 Statute in Restraint of Appeals had declared "that this realm of England is an Empire".
The subsequent Protestant Reformation turned Catholic Spain into implacable enemies. In 1562, the English Crown encouraged the privateers John Hawkins and Francis Drake to engage in slave-raiding attacks against Spanish and Portuguese ships off the coast of West Africa with the aim of breaking into the Atlantic slave tr
General Service Medal (1918)
The General Service Medal was instituted to recognise service in minor Army and Royal Air Force operations for which no separate medal was intended. Local forces, including police, qualified for many of the clasps, as could units of the Indian Army prior to 1947; the GSM was equivalent to the 1915 Naval General Service Medal. Both these medals were replaced by the General Service Medal in 1962; the 1918 GSM is a circular silver medal. The obverse shows the crowned effigy of the reigning monarch; the reverse bears the standing winged figure of Victory in a Corinthian helmet and carrying a trident, bestowing a wreath on the emblems of the Army and the RAF. A bronze oak leaf emblem is worn on the ribbon of the medal to signify a mention in dispatches for a campaign for which the GSM was awarded. Eighteen clasps have been approved for the 1918 GSM; these clasps consist of small metal bars into which the name of the relevant campaign or theatre of operations was moulded. The clasps were attached to the medal's suspension bar.
The 1918 GSM was never awarded without a clasp. The clasps and the award criteria for each are: S. PersiaService at or near Bushire with Major-General J. A. Douglas and Brigadier-General A. M. S. Elsmie from 12 November 1918 – 22 June 1919 Service at or near Bandar Abbas with Major-General Sir Percy Sykes or Lieutenant Colonel E. F. Orton from 12 November 1918 – 3 June 1919KurdistanThis clasp was awarded for the following: At Kirkuk or north of a line east and west through Kirkurk between 23 May and 31 July 1919. At Dohok or north of a line east and west through Dohok between 14 July and 7 October 1919. North of the advanced bases near Akra and Amadia between 7 November and 6 December 1919; the 1924 Army Order No. 387 and Army Instruction No. 132 of 1925 extended eligibility for this clasp to cover further operations in Kurdistan: Operations under Air Marshal Sir J. M. Salmond or Colonel Commandant B. Vincent between 19 March and 18 June 1923. Operations under Colonel Commandant H. T. Dobbin between 27 March and 28 April 1923.
IraqThis clasp was presented to those who satisfied one of the following conditions: Served at Ramadi or north of a line east and west through Ramadi between 10 December 1919 and 13 June 1920. Part of an establishment within Iraq between 1 July and 17 November 1920. N. W. PersiaAwarded to members of NoPerForce and those on various lines of communications serving under Brigadier-General Hugh Bateman-Champain from 10 August to 31 December 1920. Southern Desert IraqAwarded to the RAF for its services against the Akhwan in the Southern Desert, under the command of Air Commodore T. C. R. Higgins between 8 and 22 January 1928, or under the command of Wing Commander E. R. C. Nanson between 22 January and 3 June 1928. North KurdistanFor operations against Sheikh Admed of Barzan in the area Diana – Erbil – Aqra – Suri due north to the Turkish frontier, between the dates of 15 March and 21 June 1932. Awarded to the RAF and to Iraq Levies, no British Army units were present. PalestineFor service in the British Mandate of Palestine between 19 April 1936 and 3 September 1939, during the Arab Revolt.
S. E. Asia 1945–46For service in South-East Asia after the Japanese surrender, for various activities such as guarding Japanese POWs and maintaining law and order. By November 1946, British troops had handed over their responsibilities to the territories former colonial powers; the qualifying dates were: Dutch East Indies: 3 September 1945 to 30 November 1946. French Indochina: 3 September 1945 to 28 January 1946. Bomb and Mine Clearance 1945–49Awarded for a total of 180 days active engagement in the removal of mines and bombs in the UK between May 1945 and December 1949. Bomb and Mine Clearance 1949–56In May 1956 Queen Elizabeth II approved the extension of eligibility to 1956, to include service in the Mediterranean. Palestine 1945–48Part of the resolution of the 1936-9 revolt was the imposition of an immigration quota for Jews wishing to enter Palestine; this was opposed by the Jewish settlers in Palestine, in 1944 a guerrilla war was launched against the British forces there, principally by the Irgun and Lehi.
While service in this conflict prior to May 1945 is counted as World War Two service, service between 27 September 1945 and 30 June 1948 is acknowledged by this clasp to the GSM. Berlin AirliftAs a result of the 2012 Independent Medal Review conducted by Sir John Holmes, from 1 March 2015 a Berlin Airlift clasp has been awarded to RAF or civilian aircrew with at least one day's service in the Berlin Airlift operation from 25 June 1948 to 6 October 1949 inclusive. MalayaFor service in Malaya and Singapore against communist guerrilla forces; the qualifying dates for service were between 16 June 1948 and 31 July 1960. For the Colony of Singapore, the date period was between 16 June 1948 to 31 January 1959. Recipients who served after 31 August 1957, the day Malaya became an independent member of the Commonwealth, were subsequently awarded and given permission to accept the Malaysian Pingat Jasa Malaysia Medal from 2007 and wear them from 2011. Canal ZoneAwarded for 30 days continuous service between 16 October 1951 – 19 October 1954 within certain specified geographical boundaries in Egypt.
This clasp was awarded some 50 years in October 2003 following representation to the Prime Minister, Tony Blair. CyprusIn 1956 the Cypriot movement for union with Greece started under the leadership of Archbishop Makarios and General George Grivas; the General led the guerrilla organisation EOKA against the British troops stationed on the island. The conflict was a bloody affair, involving 40,000 British troops over 4 years; the clasp was awarded for 120 days service between
Korea Medal
The Korea Medal, sometimes referred to as the Queen's Korea Medal to distinguish it from the United Nations Service Medal, is a campaign medal created in 1951 to recognize troops from Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom who had given either one day's service in an air sortie over Korea, or 28 days service offshore, during the Korean War. The medal was identical in all countries where it was awarded, except for Canada where it contained unique elements. An award distributed across the Commonwealth, the Korea Medal holds a different place in each country's order of precedence for honours; the Korean War was the first event in which United Nations armed forces took on a combat role in suppressing aggression, involving the participation of 20 UN member states, as well as the Republic of Korea and Italy, in a multinational effort to stop the North Korean takeover of the Republic of Korea. The Korea Medal was created in 1951 to recognize members of the armed forces from King George VI's various states at the time that participated in the Korean War.
South Africa produced its own version of the Korea Medal. Designed by Edward Carter Preston, the Korea Medal is in the form of a 36 millimetres diameter disc. All medals were of cupro-nickel, except for the Canadian version, made of silver. On the obverse is an effigy of Queen Elizabeth II, surrounded by an inscription, symbolizing her roles as both fount of honour and Commander-in-Chief of her various forces. At the time of the medal's creation, King George VI was monarch and his effigy was to have appeared on the Korea Medal. However, he died on 6 February 1952 and so the image of his daughter was placed on the obverse of the medal, uncrowned, as per custom for sovereigns prior to their coronation. There are three versions of the inscription surrounding the Queen's head: ELIZABETH II DEI GRA. BRITT. OMN. REGINA F. D.. ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA F. D. awards omitting BRITT. OMN.. ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA CANADA, awarded to Canadian participants. On the reverse is a depiction of Hercules wrestling the Hydra—a symbolic representation of communism—with the word KOREA below.
The recipient's name and regimental number was impressed on the medal's rim. This medal is worn on the left chest, suspended from a bar on a 31.8 millimetres wide ribbon with five vertical stripes in alternating yellow and blue, the latter representing the United Nations. No bars were awarded. A single bronze oak leaf emblem was issued to signify a Mention in Despatches, worn pinned to the same ribbon from which the medal was hung. Members of the British and Commonwealth armed forces were granted the Korea Medal for active service in the theatre of the Korean Peninsula between 2 July 1950 and 27 July 1953. To receive the medal, navy personnel were required to complete either 28 days aboard ship in the operational areas of the Yellow Sea or the Sea of Japan, or at least one day of shore duty. Any military members who had made an official visit to the region for a period of no less than 30 days were eligible for the medal, as were those who had not fulfilled the requirements due to injury or death in combat.
In some countries, civilians in the Red Cross, Order of St. John Voluntary Aid Detachment, Salvation Army, or YMCA could receive the Korea Medal, per navy requirements if they served aboard a hospital ship, or per army requirements if they were stationed on land; some 15,000 Korea Medals were issued to Canadian personnel, amongst which 33 members of the Royal Canadian Navy and 248 individuals in the Canadian Army were granted oak leaves to pin to their Korea Medal ribbons. All persons awarded the Korea Medal automatically received the United Nations Service Medal for Korea; the South Korean government offered to all UN militia the Korean War Service Medal, though regulations at the time did not permit persons from the Commonwealth to accept the decoration. Some orders of precedence are as follows: Korea Medal Australian campaign medals British campaign medals New Zealand campaign medals Canadian order of precedence
Australian honours system
The Australian honours system consists of a number of orders and medals through which the country's sovereign awards its citizens for actions or deeds that benefit the nation. Established in 1975 with the creation of the Order of Australia, the system's scope has grown since and over time has replaced the Imperial/British honours system that applied to Australians; the system includes an array of awards, both civil and military, for gallantry, distinguished service, meritorious service, long service. Various campaign and commemorative medals have been struck. New honours can be awarded at any time, but conventionally most new honours are awarded on Australia Day and on the Queen's Birthday every year, when lists of new honours are published; the Australian states and the Commonwealth of Australia used the Imperial honours system known as the British honours system. The creation in 1975 of the Australian Honours System saw Australian recommendations for the Imperial awards decline, with the last awards being gazetted in 1989.
The Commonwealth of Australia ceased making recommendations for Imperial awards in 1983, with the last Queen's Birthday Australian Honours list submitted by Queensland and Tasmania in 1989. The Queen still confers upon Australians honours that emanate from her such as the Royal Victorian Order, apart from the Order of Australia. Only a handful of peerages and baronetcies were created for Australians; some were in recognition of public services rendered in Britain rather than Australia. Hereditary peerages and baronetcies derive from Britain. There have never been Australian baronetcies created under the Australian Crown. Individual Australian states, as well the Commonwealth Government, were full participants in the Imperial honours system. There was bipartisan support, but Australian Labor Party governments, both national and state, ceased making recommendations for Imperial awards – in particular, appointments to the Order of the British Empire after 1972. During the Second World War, the Governor-General, on the advice of wartime Labor governments, made recommendations for gallantry awards, including eleven for the Victoria Cross.
Appointments to the Order of the British Empire were for officers and men engaged in operational areas. In 1975, the ALP created the Australian Honours System. Recommendations were processed centrally, but state governors still had the power, on the advice of their governments, to submit recommendations for Imperial awards. From 1975 until 1983, the Liberal Party was in power federally, under Malcolm Fraser and, although it retained the Australian Honours System, it reintroduced recommendations for meritorious Imperial awards, but not for Imperial awards for gallantry, bravery or distinguished service. Recommendations for Imperial awards by the federal government ceased with the election of the Hawke Labor Government in 1983. In 1989, the last two states to make Imperial recommendations were Tasmania; the defeat of both governments at the polls that year marked the end of Australian recommendations for Imperial awards. Following the UK New Year Honours List in 1990, which contained no Australian nominations for British honours, the Queen's Private Secretary, Sir William Heseltine, wrote to the Governor-General, saying "this seems a good moment to consider whether the time has not arrived for Australia, like Canada, to honour its citizens within its own system".
There followed more than two years of negotiations with state governments before the Prime Minister, Paul Keating, made the announcement on 5 October 1992 that Australia would make no further recommendations for British honours. The Australian Order of Wear states that "all imperial British awards made to Australian citizens after 5 October 1992 are foreign awards and should be worn accordingly"; the Australian Honours System has followed United States rather than British practice in allowing for late awards years after an action, being commended. More than one hundred late awards for the Second World War and Vietnam have been gazetted. In the British system, no Victoria Cross has been awarded more than six years after the action commended; the longest period between action and award of the US Medal of Honor is 137 years, when in January 2001 President Bill Clinton presented the Medal of Honor to descendants of a Civil War soldier. Although'The Report of the inquiry into unresolved recognition for past acts of naval and military gallantry and valour' released in March 2013 did not recommend any belated Victoria Cross for Australia awards, it did recommend a Unit Citation for Gallantry to HMAS Yarra for February and March 1942.
Australian Bravery Awards have been gazetted years after the action being commended, including a Commendation for Brave Conduct awarded in 1987 to Robert Anderson for his courage in rescuing a child from a burning car at Kalgoorlie eight years earlier in 1979. Australians become recipients of each of the 55 different types of Australian awards and honours through one of two separate processes. Nomination: Individual nominations may be made by members of the public or a community group for the Order of Australia and Australian Bravery Decorations. Nominations for Meritorious Service Awards are based on nominations from each specific organisation; the Department of Defence nominates individuals for a range of service decorations. Non-Australians can be given honorary awards for "extraordinary service to Australia or humanity at large". Nomination forms for the Order of Australia are available through the Australian Honours
Union of South Africa
The Union of South Africa is the historical predecessor to the present-day Republic of South Africa. It came into being on 31 May 1910 with the unification of the Cape Colony, the Natal Colony, the Transvaal, the Orange River Colony, it included the territories that were a part of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State. Following the First World War, the Union of South Africa was granted the administration of South West Africa as a League of Nations mandate, it became treated in most respects as another province of the Union, but it never was formally annexed. Like Canada and Australia, the Union of South Africa was a self-governing autonomous dominion of the British Empire, its independence from the United Kingdom was confirmed in the Balfour Declaration 1926 and the Statute of Westminster 1931. It was governed under a form of constitutional monarchy, with the Crown being represented by a governor-general; the Union came to an end with the enactment of the constitution of 1961, by which it became a republic and temporarily left the Commonwealth.
The Union of South Africa was a unitary state, rather than a federation like Canada and Australia, with each colony's parliaments being abolished and replaced with provincial councils. A bicameral parliament was created, consisting of the House of Assembly and Senate, with members of the parliament being elected by the country's white minority. During the course of the Union, the franchise changed on several occasions always to suit the needs of the government of the day. Parliamentary supremacy was a convention of the constitution, inherited from the United Kingdom. Owing to disagreements over where the Union's capital should be, a compromise was reached in which every province would be dealt a share of the benefits of the capital: the administration would be seated in Pretoria, Parliament would be in Cape Town, the Appellate Division would be in Bloemfontein. Bloemfontein and Pietermaritzburg were given financial compensation; the Union remained under the British Crown as a self-governing dominion of the British Empire.
With the passage of the Statute of Westminster in 1931, the Union and other dominions became equal in status to the United Kingdom and it could no longer legislate on behalf of them. The Monarch was represented in South Africa by a Governor-General, while effective power was exercised by the Executive Council, headed by the Prime Minister. Louis Botha a Boer general, was appointed first Prime Minister of the Union, heading a coalition representing the white Afrikaner and English-speaking British diaspora communities. Prosecutions before courts were instituted in the name of the Crown and government officials served in the name of the Crown. An entrenched clause in the Constitution mentioned Dutch and English as official languages of the Union, but the meaning of Dutch was changed by the Official Languages of the Union Act, 1925 to include both Dutch and Afrikaans. Most English-speaking whites in South Africa supported the United Party of Jan Smuts, which favoured close relations with the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.
Unlike the Afrikaans-speaking National Party, which had held anti-British sentiments, was opposed to South Africa's intervention in the Second World War. Some Nationalist organisations, like the Ossewa Brandwag, were supportive of Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Most English-speaking South Africans were opposed to the creation of a republic, many of them voting "no" in the 5 October 1960 referendum, but due to the much larger number of Afrikaans-speaking voters, the referendum passed, leading to the establishment of a republic in 1961. The Afrikaner-dominated Government withdrew South Africa from the Commonwealth. Following the results of the referendum, some whites in Natal, which had an English-speaking majority, called for secession from the Union. Five years earlier, some 33,000 Natalians had signed the Natal Covenant in opposition to the plans for a republic. Subsequently, the National Party government had passed a Constitution that repealed the South Africa Act; the features of the Union were carried over with little change to the newly formed Republic.
The decision to transform from a Union to Republic was narrowly decided in the referendum. The decision together with the South African Government's insistence on adhering to its policy of apartheid resulted in South Africa's de facto expulsion from the Commonwealth of Nations; the South Africa Act dealt with race in two specific provisions. First it entrenched the liberal Cape Qualified Franchise system of the Cape Colony which operated free of any racial considerations; the Cape Prime Minister at the time, John X. Merriman, fought hard, but unsuccessfully, to extend this system of multi-racial franchise to the rest of South Africa. Second it made "native affairs" a matter for the national government; the practice therefore was to establish a Minister of Native Affairs. According to Stephen Howe, colonialism in some cases—most among white minorities in South Africa—meant that these violent settlers wanted to maintain more racial inequalities than the colonial empire found just. Several previous unsuccessful attempts to unite the colonies were made, with proposed political models ranging from unitary, to loosely federal.
Sir George Grey, the Governor of Cap
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