South West Africa

Control over South West Africa - along with what is now Cameroon, Togo and other colonial territories - was stripped from Germany by competing powers after World War One.

Namibia, previously called South West Africa, suffered decades of looting and colonial violence at the hands of Europeans who had flocked to the country around the turn of the 20th Century.

At the time, Namibia was known as South West Africa and its people were under occupation from South Africa.

The war in South West Africa and Angola became a proxy for the ongoing Cold War and Western countries’ fear of communism spreading.

Namibia faced apartheid when neighboring South Africa’s white minority government controlled what they called South West Africa.