page_title: Seventh German Inner Africa Research Expedition
section_title: Strategic aims
hierarchical_section_title: Seventh German Inner Africa Research Expedition / Strategic aims
caption_attribution_description: English: Taken from old colonialism wikipedia map and outlined. Dated around 1900 (shows Italian - although the flag is not correct - North Africa post 1910 and Austro-Hungarian Empire circa WW1). British territories of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa would later become dominions. Nations involved with imperialism, directly or indirectly, are coloured. Meant to portray the world around the time of WWI. In case anyone wonders, the red flag with the yellow crescent and star is the Rashidi house and their allies. Below them are the Saudis and their allies. Grey countries may be smaller empires (Nepal and Bhutan) or have extended their geopolitical boundaries over unsettled/inhabitated areas (i.e. Latin America such as Chile acquired Easter Island and the Antarctic Peninsula).
context_page_description: The Seventh German Inner Africa Research Expedition was led by German ethnologist and archaeologist Leo Frobenius in October 1914-March 1915. Though referred to as the seventh of Frobenius' scientific expeditions to Africa it was a front for a German military espionage mission to Ethiopia. The objective was to restore communications with the German legation at Addis Ababa; persuade Ethiopian Emperor Lij Iyasu to support the Central Powers in the First World War and to proceed to Anglo-Egyptian Sudan to provoke an uprising there. This could have threatened British and Italian colonies in Eastern Africa and possibly the vital supply route of the Suez Canal.
  The expedition is thought to have comprised seventeen persons, five of European descent and twelve of Turkish or Arab origin. The European contingent left Berlin in October 1914 and rendezvoused with the other members in the Ottoman Empire. After travelling by rail, cart, camel and dhow to Al Qunfudhah the party boarded a sambuk for the Red Sea crossing to Eritrea.
context_section_description: Oberste Heeresleitung, the German high command, were keen to secure the entry of Ethiopia into the war on the side of the Central Powers. Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, the East Africa Protectorate, British Somaliland and French Somaliland were all possessions of the Entente Powers and the Germans hoped that an Ethiopian declaration of war would lead to territorial losses or else the withdrawal of Entente units fighting the Germans on the Western Front.  Germany was also suspicious of the loyalty of the Italians, nominally members of the Central Powers but not yet participants in the war.  If the Italians were to join the Entente Powers then Ethiopian forces would be ideally positioned to occupy Italian Eritrea and Italian Somaliland.  
  The Germans were hopeful that Ethiopian Emperor Lij Iyasu could be persuaded to ally with Mohammed Abdullah Hassan, a nationalist and religious leader who had fought the colonial authorities in the Somalilands since 1899.  The Germans also had plans to instigate an uprising in Sudan which might threaten the Suez Canal and inspire a wider jihad against the British.
  The German government was unable to communicate directly with Friedrich Wilhelm von Syburg, their envoy at the German legation in Ethiopia, and messages had to be passed in cipher via disguised couriers on a route through the Ottoman Empire, the Red Sea and Italian Eritrea.  The Germans planned an expedition to Ethiopia which would restore communications and advance their objectives for Ethiopia and Sudan.  It was decided that this expedition would publicly be called scientific to disguise its military and political aims.  Frobenius offered his services as leader of the expedition to the Kaiser on 13 November 1914, who directed that the expedition should proceed.  The expedition would form the seventh of Frobenius' Deutsche Innerafrikanische Forschungs-Expeditions (German Inner-Africa Research Expeditions), though some sources incorrectly refer to it as his fourth expedition.  In German intelligence circles it was codenamed HIDDEK, an acronym for Die Hauptsache ist, daß England untergeht (The main thing is that England is destroyed).
caption: Territories in the Middle East and Africa at the start of the First World War.  The Ottoman Empire is in light green, British Empire in pink, German East Africa is the dark grey territory at the bottom of the image.  Ethiopia is in brown towards the centre of the image and Italian Eritrea is the red territory immediately north.
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