A statue of Field Marshal Jan Christiaan Smuts located at the Company's Gardens Cape Town South Africa
Field Marshal Jan Christiaan Smuts, OM, CH, PC, ED, KC, FRS (24 May 1870 – 11 September 1950) was a prominent South African and British Commonwealth statesman, military leader, and philosopher. In addition to various cabinet appointments, he served as Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa from 1919 until 1924 and from 1939 until 1948. He served in the First World War and as a British Field Marshal in the Second World War. For a majority of his public life, Smuts exemplified the stance taken by many native-born South Africans of white Afrikaner heritage advocating segregation between the races and was opposed the unilateral enfranchisement of the black-race majority in South Africa, fearing that would lead to the ultimate destruction of Western civilization in the nation. However, in 1948 his government issued the Fagan Report, which stressed the impracticability of complete racial segregation in South Africa and wanted to abolish the restrictions on African migration into urban areas. In this he was opposed by a majority of Afrikaners under the political leadership of the National Party who wished to deepen segregation and formalise it into a system of apartheid. This contributed to his narrow loss in the 1948 general election. He led commandos in the Second Boer War for the Transvaal. During the First World War, he led the armies of South Africa against Germany, capturing German South-West Africa and commanding the British Army in East Africa. From 1917 to 1919, he was also one of five members of the British War Cabinet, helping to create the Royal Air Force. He became a Field Marshal in the British Army in 1941, and served in the Imperial War Cabinet under Winston Churchill. He was the only person to sign the peace treaties ending both the First and Second World Wars. One of his greatest international accomplishments was the establishment of the League of Nations, the exact design and implementation of which relied upon Smuts
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Photo credit: © John Keates / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: africa, african, cape, christiaan, companies, company, companys, field, gardens, jan, located, marshal, sculpture, smuts, south, statue, town
