Liberia

Map of Liberia.

“”If we don’t hold perpetrators accountable, we will have another war. People fought the war because of corruption, nepotism and greed. These things are happening again.

—Rustonlyn Dennis, a Liberian legislator, on the legacy of Liberia's brutal civil war.

The Republic of Liberia is a country in West Africa founded in one of the most bizarre cases of colonialism ever. The country began as a settlement of the American Colonization Society (ACS). This anti-slavery organization sought to send black African-Americans to Africa based on the idea that free black people could never successfully integrate into United States culture (for their time, this idea would be extremely liberal). Liberia's name derives from the Latin word for "free" ("Liber"). The capital of Liberia, Monrovia, was named after the fifth president of the United States, James Monroe, an ACS supporter who was in office at the time of the colony's founding and "was instrumental in securing a $100,000 federal grant for the project."

As an American colony, Liberia became home to tens of thousands of freed black slaves from the United States and the Caribbean. Anyone with a brain knows that all black people aren't the same just because they're black. The "Americo-Liberians", as they became known, immediately clashed with the natives of the region. The natives considered them invaders and raided the colonial settlements. When the Americo-Liberians managed to solidify their power, they established themselves as an elite minority who held all of Liberia's political power. You can probably see the problems with that.

Liberia declared independence from the US in 1847, although the US didn't acknowledge that fact until the American Civil War. Alongside Ethiopia (until the 1940s) and the Dervish Kingdom of king Diiriye Guure, contemporarily the SSC-Khatumo State, Liberia was one of the only nations in Africa that eluded the Scramble for Africa. During World War II, Liberia backed the Allies, and the Allies rewarded them with significant amounts of foreign investment.

In 1980, tensions between indigenous Liberians and Americo-Liberians exploded when an indigenous-backed coup deposed President William R. Tolbert and replaced him with an extremely unstable military dictatorship led by Samuel Doe. The dictatorship limped along until 1986 when the half-Americo political exile Charles Taylor returned and sparked an uprising against Doe's regime. The resulting Liberian Civil War lasted from 1989 until 2003. It killed about 250,000 people (~8% of the country's population) and shrank Liberia's economy by 90%. All sides committed atrocities, and the country's infrastructure was left in ruins.

Ever since, Liberia has been in a slow, agonizing recovery. As of 2019, 85% of the population lives below the international poverty line, and 16% of the population is experiencing urgent food insecurity. Its economic recovery has been stalled by the aftermath of the 2014-2016 Ebola outbreak.

Liberia is theoretically a democratic republic, but it is highly dysfunctional. The country is crippled by catastrophic levels of governmental corruption, and its citizens are constantly threatened by a greedy and violent police force.

Historical overview

American Colonization Society

The American Colonization Society (ACS) was an organization founded in the United States in 1816, mostly by white people; its aim was to return black people to Africa after freeing them from the bonds of slavery. The idea was that black people, even after being freed, would never be able to adapt to life in the United States due to inevitable discrimination and the ACS's racist conception that black people were just too naturally inferior to work it out. There was also a fear of what slave owners euphemistically referred to as "servile insurrection"; in more explicit terms, as Thomas Jefferson argued, the freed slave had to be literally "removed beyond the reach of mixture" or he would soon be "staining the blood of his master". The ACS was also joined by many black nationalists who agreed with them that blacks could only fulfill their potential if returned to Africa.

“”The colonization movement, which advocated transporting free blacks to Africa or elsewhere and which included many of the most distinguished statesmen of the early and mid nineteenth century, officially blamed what it called "invincible" white prejudice, rather than innate racial difference, for the "degradation" of free blacks in American society. Colonizationists pointed to the legal and social prohibitions that free blacks suffered in the supposedly enlightened North -- where, as Alexis de Tocqueville observed, racial prejudice was in fact worse than in the South. In the North "free" blacks were barred from most schools and juries and could not attend white schools, worship at white churches, or labor in white workshops. They were banned from many public conveyances and forbidden to enter many lecture halls, libraries, and museums (and then were disparaged for failing to elevate themselves). The "horror" felt by whites at the "idea of an intimate union with the free blacks," the Maryland colonizationist Robert G. Harper wrote despairingly in 1824, "precludes the possibility of such a state of equality, between them and us, as alone could make us one people." Using arguments strikingly similar to those of twentieth-century black nationalists, the Connecticut Colonization Society asserted in 1828, with resignation, that whites would never allow blacks to thrive in America: "The African in this country belongs by birth to the lowest station in society; and from that station he can never rise, be his talent, his enterprise, his virtues what they may." Blacks would thus have to leave the United States if they wanted to claim their right to the pursuit of happiness.

—Benjamin Schwarz

The ACS started shipping black people to Liberia in 1822. They were sent over in atrocious conditions and experienced a staggeringly high mortality rate—of the 4,571 emigrants who arrived in Liberia between 1820 and 1843, only 1,819 were alive in 1843. Disregarding the horrendous death toll, the ACS persisted and redoubled its efforts. By 1867, the ACS successfully sent 13,000 black people from the United States to Liberia.

Despite heavy opposition from abolitionists such as William Lloyd Garrison and a general lack of enthusiasm amongst most African-Americans, the idea of colonization would persist into the 20th century and was later espoused by black nationalist figures such as Marcus Garvey.

Founding Liberia

The residence of Liberia's first president. Note the similarity to US slave plantations of the same era.

The incoming blacks from the United States did not get along with the indigenous Liberians, among whom were the Kru and Grebo ethnic groups. The indigenous Liberians, who viewed the African-Americans as hostile invaders, frequently raided colonial settlements, and the colonists retaliated harshly. Liberian professors Benjamin Dennis and Anita Dennis noted that the Americo-Liberians built their new society based on the only model they had: the Antebellum US South. The professors write that,

“”Racism inevitably reproduces itself in the minds of the oppressed in order to rise... [V]ictim becomes victimizer, the Americo-Liberians saw the natives the way whites saw them. Now that the Americo-Liberians were rulers, they mimicked white rule. They justified their exploitation of the natives on the basis of cultural inferiority just as whites used racism to justify slavery. In America, race trumped all other considerations. In Liberia, culture trumped race as the classification of inferiority.

The Americo-Liberians created a social structure similar to segregation in the United States or apartheid in South Africa. Indeed, what they did was directly inspired by the white power structures from which they had escaped. Indigenous Liberians could not vote, could not speak to an Americo unless spoken to, and could not enter through a building's front door. Liberian buildings were even modeled after US cotton plantations.

As in the US South, this kind of institutional discrimination held Liberia's development back greatly.

After creating a government and becoming confident that they could go their own way, the Americo-Liberians declared their colony's independence in 1847. The British Empire quickly recognized the new nation's independence, becoming the first country to do so. Liberia became a one-party dictatorship under the rule of the conservative True Whig Party.

The Republic of Maryland

Contemporary with, but separate from, the American Colonization Society was the Maryland Colonization Society, the only one of the individual state colonization societies to actually found a country separate from Liberia. Starting in 1854, its "%statename%-in-Africa" colony set up shop as the tiny, independent Republic of Maryland. Because it tried to halt the local native slave trade, it came under attack by nearby tribes and had to appeal to Liberia for military assistance. Realizing it was too small to make it on its own, it agreed to join Liberia after all in 1857. That area is now the far south bit of Liberia.

Financial dependence and exploitation

Native laborers making palm oil, 1922.

“”To the little Republic of Liberia, Firestone has brought a new day of hope and advancement. It has been a gratifying thought to us that by means of commercial progress we have been of service to mankind.

—Bullshit PR statement from the Firestone Tire and Rubber Co.

Liberia remained an isolationist country. Or at least, that was the plan. Although Liberia had a thriving agricultural sector, it entirely lacked industry. Thus, the country started running into financial troubles by the 1860s as it became harder and harder to compete with industrial powers and mechanized agriculture around the world. Liberia had to start accepting high-interest loans from both the United States and various powers in Europe to address that situation. Unfortunately, that financial dependence meant Liberia was vulnerable to influence and demands from those great powers.

Serious problems started during World War I. To appease threats from the United States, Liberia followed the US in declaring war against the German Empire in 1917. The Germans had been one of Liberia's most important trading partners, and the loss of that trade wrecked Liberia's economy. Even worse, the Germans parked a U-Boat off Liberia's shoreline and bombed the shit out of Monrovia.

Logging truck in the early 1960s.

In 1920, Firestone Tire and Rubber Co. arrived in Liberia, hoping to find a source of natural rubber free of European domination. Firestone found Liberia to be debt-ridden and desperate for any kind of business. The company got one of the most ridiculous deals in business history. Firestone leased 10% of Liberia's land at six cents per acre for 99 years. That lease came with the right for Firestone to do whatever they wanted with the raw materials on that land. Not just rubber, but minerals, other plant-based resources, anything. That deal became a scandal when the League of Nations sent investigators into the region and found that Firestone and the Liberian government were collaborating to force the natives to work effectively as slaves for Firestone's resource extraction. Firestone responded with a public relations campaign amounting to the same old "Mission to Civilize" rhetoric. The company also bribed Liberia's leadership by giving them control of vast and profitable rubber plantations. The whole country of Liberia was basically owned by a private American corporation.

Later, Liberia decided to provide much-needed rubber resources to the Allies during World War Two. After that, Liberia joined the United Nations and began accepting foreign aid from the West. The US built an air and naval base near Monrovia and started supplying Liberia with cash and weapons, especially once the Cold War kicked off. In exchange for these services, Liberia could be counted on to be staunchly anti-communist and vote alongside the US whenever a controversial matter came before the United Nations. This relationship ensured that the US had an outpost in Africa even as the rest of the continent threw off its colonial bonds.

This cozy relationship chilled when William R. Tolbert assumed the presidency of Liberia in 1971. For some bizarre reason, Tolbert was under the impression that Liberia was a sovereign country. Like a fucking idiot, he started to take diplomatic actions independently of US interests, like cutting relations with Israel and accepting diplomats from China and the Soviet Union. Worst of all, Tolbert insisted on raising taxes on Firestone and requiring that the company hire more Liberians.

The US was presumably about to break out the pimp hand at this point, but Tolbert suddenly died of non-natural causes in 1980. Welcome to the rest of the story.

Dictatorship

Samuel Doe with the US Secretary of Defense in Washington DC, 1982.

We've already established that life sucked for indigenous Liberians. Well, those indigenous Liberians had finally had enough. Samuel Doe, a member of the Krahn tribe, led an attack by a group of Krahn soldiers on the Liberian executive mansion, killing President William R. Tolbert. Doe then had most of Tolbert's allies in government summarily tried and executed. With all opposition brushed aside, Doe became Liberia's new dictator.

One of the first things Doe did as dictator was renegotiate the Firestone deal, offering the company generous tax breaks once more. As you can imagine, the US fucking loved Samuel Doe. Between 1980 and 1990, the US poured about $500 million into Liberia's coffers. Doe opened Liberia's ports and bases to US troops, banned Soviet diplomats, and re-established diplomatic ties with Israel.

For the US, it didn't matter that Doe's dictatorship was becoming increasingly violent and repressive. Doe's regime banned political opposition, closed down all newspapers, misused foreign aid, and abused civilians. Americans who were aware of these crimes were outraged, but the Ronald Reagan administration still viewed Samuel Doe as an important Cold War ally. Those dominoes don't prop themselves up, you now.

Unfortunately for Doe, the Soviet Bloc collapsed in 1989, and the US stopped giving a shit about Liberia. Shit hit the fan just about a year later.

Liberian Civil War

Child soldiers from one of the factions.

“”He killed my Ma, he killed my Pa, but I will vote for him.

—Charming slogan from Charles Taylor's presidential campaign, 1997.

During Samuel Doe's reign, he forced politician Charles Taylor into foreign exile for corruption. It didn't help things that Taylor was half-Americo through his father's side. Taylor was imprisoned in Plymouth County Correctional Facility in 1984 on charges of embezzlement; he mysteriously escaped a year later with what he claims was CIA help and then disappeared for the next four years, apparently being trained by Gaddafi. In 1989, Taylor came back alongside an armed militia called the National Patriotic Liberation Front (NPLF). That kicked off Liberia's civil war. However, although Taylor was the one who began the end of Samuel Doe's reign, he didn't get the honor of killing Doe himself. A rival warlord, Prince Yormie Johnson, was the one who captured Doe. What happened next was a gut-wrenching tale of cruelty.

Prince Johnson and his men took Doe to a compound where they filmed the former dictator's bloody torture and murder. They stripped Doe naked, beat the shit out of him, cut his ears off, then finally shot him. Parts of the video are still available on the internet.

Guess what? Doe's messy execution didn't bring peace. Who woulda thought? With Doe out of the way, Johnson and Taylor immediately turned on each other, plunging Liberia into more civil war. Other warlords and rebel groups got in on the fun too.

Summary execution during the civil war.

The war became a horrifying stew of violence and war crimes. Warlord and part-time preacher Charles Taylor recruited many child soldiers who called him "Pappy Taylor" and unleashed them on Liberia's civilians. The other factions also recruited child soldiers and committed crimes. Atrocities included such pleasant subjects as war rape, sexual slavery, ethnic cleansing, torture of civilian non-combatants, and fucking cannibalism. Probably the best-known perpetrator of all the above is the warlord who ended up going by General Butt Naked, who is now (of all things) a Christian minister who says of himself that he should be tried for war crimes.

After tearing up the country for seven years, the rebel groups agreed to a cease-fire in 1997. During that cease-fire, Liberia held elections under grave threat from all armed rebel groups. Charles Taylor won the election with 75% of the vote. See that horrible section quote just above? Yeah, that was an actual campaign slogan used by Charles Taylor. Tells you the kind of guy he was.

Taylor's election failed to halt the violence, and the fighting began again in 1999. To prop up his government during the hostilities, Taylor ordered the selling of blood diamonds and also started doing trade deals with armed factions in the similarly brutal Sierra Leone Civil War. Liberia became an international pariah.

The second phase of the civil war pitted Taylor's government against two new rebel groups: the Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD) and the Movement for Democracy in Liberia (MODEL). The problem was that LURD and MODEL had different ethnic memberships, meaning they were hostile to each other. Taylor's government didn't fare very well against two different enemies. By 2003, LURD had besieged Monrovia, and they bombarded the city with artillery and killed about 1,000 people.

Having been defeated, the warring parties finally agreed to the Accra Comprehensive Peace Agreement in late 2003. It essentially stipulated that Liberians shouldn't kill each other over racial issues. That sounds like a good idea. It also set a date for new elections in 2005.

From terrible to just bad (this is progress)

Liberian legislator George Fohr meets with a CDC representative during the 2014 Ebola outbreak.

Liberia's main focus has been rebuilding itself after that devastating civil war. Despite making a dazzling show of being a good Christian preacher, Taylor failed to prevent the UN from finding him guilty of many war crimes and sentencing him to at least 50 years in prison. Taylor is currently serving his prison sentence in the UK.

Other war criminals are slowly being found and prosecuted in international courts for their heinous acts. As for Prince Johnson, the murderous warlord who tortured and murdered Samuel Doe? He's currently serving in the Liberian Senate.

The 2005 elections were regarded by international observers as the freest and most fair in Liberia's history. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, a Harvard-educated economist and former Minister of Finance, was elected as the first female president in Africa. She was responsible for sending Taylor to the Hague for trial.

In 2006, Liberia established a ruth and Reconciliation Commission to further investigate war crimes. In 2018, George Weah, a famous football player, won Liberia's presidency. This was Liberia's first peaceful transfer of power in 74 years.

Liberia is notorious for being one of the countries that provide "flags of convenience": As the regulations applying to a ship and its crew depend on the country it's registered in, Liberia's lax ship registry allows (allowed?) ship owners to get away with things that would be impossible in more developed countries. The tanker that caused the first major tanker-caused oil spill in 1967, Torrey Canyon, was sailing under a Liberian flag.

Sadly, Liberia suffered from the Ebola outbreak in 2014 and still struggles with the aftermath of the civil war.

Gallery

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  Downtown Monrovia in 2009.

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  Beachside barbecue.

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  Liberia's capital building.

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  Studying by candlelight.

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  Old Firestone Co. sign.

See also

• Back to Africa

References

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