The Cape Town - Cairo Railway is an unfinished project of a railway crossing Africa from south to north. The plan was initiated at the end of the 19th century by Cecil John Rhodes in order to connect the adjacent possessions of the British Empire with a continuous line from Cape Town (South Africa) to Cairo (Egypt). Most of the plots were commissioned, but the majority between Sudan and Uganda has been missed.
History
The railroad project was caused by the colonial policy of the British Empire. Cecil Rhodes dreamed of the "red line" of the British possessions on the map. The railway was to become an important element of this plan, uniting the territories, easing control, enabling the military to move quickly to the right place, helping settlements and encouraging trade. This construction was an important technological challenge.
France had a similar project of connecting its colonies from west to east, from Senegal to Djibouti. In 1897, France sent an expedition to establish a protectorate over South Sudan and pave the route through Ethiopia. The plan failed when the British flotilla on the Nile collided with a French expedition at the intersection of the French and British routes, which led to the Fashod incident and, eventually, to France’s diplomatic defeat.
The British had to overcome obstacles connected not only with the climate, but also with the intervention of other forces. The Portuguese tried unsuccessfully to connect Angola and Mozambique (the Pink Card ). In South Africa, the British were opposed by the Boers. Germany ensured the security of its possessions in East Africa. With the defeat of Germany in the First World War, all its colonies were ceded to Britain, but economic reasons prevented the completion of construction in the interwar period. After World War II, the liberation movement of African peoples and the end of the colonial period destroyed the grounds for the completion of the project.
Literature
- Tabor, George, The Cape to Cairo Railway & River Routes (2003), London: Genta. ISBN 0-9544847-0-3 .