INTRODUCTION November 11, 2005, marks the fortieth anniversary of Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI), the first and only time since the American Revolution that a British Colony declared its independence from the authority of the Crown. However, the issue of Rhodesian independence during the 1960s was not simply a matter of bilateral interest between the governing parties in Britain and Southern Rhodesia. The multidimensional nature of the problem was clearly illustrated by the interest of the United States, whose Rhodesian policy was determined by a variety of factors that did not always sit comfortably with one another. For example, the desire to counter Communist subversion and infiltration in southern Africa conflicted with the need to assuage U.S. domestic opinion on the sensitive matter of racial discrimination. Such conflicting objectives were reflected in extended bureaucratic contests that illuminate the process of policymaking in the administration of President Lyndon Baines Johnson. This article examines the policy-making process from the perspective of G. Mennen Williams, a former governor of the state of Michigan with a strong record on civil rights, who was assistant secretary of state for African affairs between 1961 and 1966. (2) The article demonstrates that Williams argued a consistent case for greater U.S. involvement in the Rhodesian problem for strategic and moral reasons, but that he was ultimately unsuccessful due to implacable opposition from the highest levels of the Johnson administration.
