Tell me that's not an interesting wargame idea…
"Prince Dabulamanzi kaMpande glanced over the field of victory with much reflection. The bodies of around 600 British soldiers, along with a similar number of their horses, littered the ground around his vantage point. Even the dead body of the British commander, Lord Chelmsford, lay at his feet. But the Prince was not a happy man. Even with such a great victory, he was not a happy man. Fore not only had the main Zulu army achieved a far greater victory over the British a few days earlier, one which he missed, but he had lost 19 of his Rhinos and 28 of his Elephants in his recent engagements. Furthermore there was every chance that the British would return with an even larger army anytime soon.
It had been some 200 years since the Zulu Empire decided to utilise suitable beasts of nature in order to support its already impressive military prowess. In that time, even though the Rhino and Elephant Cavalry had been seldom used in battles, the Zulu still preferred infantry engagements. Only on the odd occasion, did they deploy their Rhino and Elephant Cavalry; yet when they had victory it was always that much more stunning. In fact such feats had become legendary, amongst the local African tribes, long before the arrival of the British to southern Africa. And so the Zulus were much feared.
The British, however, viewed such military units with a mix of amazement tempered with a large dose of scepticism. Having experienced centuries of warfare in Europe, where the power of the rifle and cannon now ruled more than ever, tales of Rhino and Elephant Cavalry seemed to jump out at them like stories of Alexandria The Great and those of Cathage and its most famous general Hannibal. The Zulus, though, had never heard of either. And furthermore they had had two centuries to perfect the craft of mixed engagements wherein the human infantry, rhinos, and elephants all had a particular part to play in their battle plans.
The causes of the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879 are somewhat complicated, but essentially it came down to the fact that two empires wanted control of southern Africa. The Zulus were slowly expanding from the north-eastern regions, based around the coastline of the Indian Ocean, whilst the British were following earlier Dutch settlers, known as the Boers, and wanted the same region for themselves. Consequentially it was merely a matter of time before a clash of arms took place in order to settle the issue of territorial ownership…."
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