During the Boer War of 1899–1902, he rose to the rank of general, becoming the assistant chief commandant of the military forces (Commando units) of the Orange Free State.

Despite some military reverses, he gained renown as a resourceful leader of the Boer commandos who chose to continue fighting, the so-called "bitter-enders".

As prime minister, Hertzog presided over the passage of a wide range of social and economic measures that did much to improve conditions for working-class whites.

According to one historian, "the government of 1924, which combined Hertzog’s NP with the Labour Party, oversaw the foundations of an Afrikaner welfare state".

It also established a Wage Board that regulated pay for certain kinds of work, regardless of racial background (although whites were the main beneficiaries of the legislation).

The government also assisted farmers by guaranteeing prices for farm produce, while work colonies were established for those in need of social salvage.

[9] The law on miners' phthisis (pulmonary tuberculosis) was overhauled, and increased protection of white urban tenants against eviction was introduced at a time when housing was in short supply.

27 of 1925) bestowed upon the Minister for Labour the power to force employers to give preference to whites when hiring workers,[17] while the Mines and Works Amendment Act (No.

[18] In a sense, therefore, the discriminatory social and economic policies pursued by the Pact Government helped pave the way for the eventual establishment of the Apartheid state.

Property and education requirements for whites were abandoned in the same year, with those for non-whites being severely tightened, and, in 1936, blacks were completely taken off the common voters' roll.

Through the system of gradual disenfranchisement spanning half a century, the South African electorate was not made up entirely of whites until the 1970 general election.

[19]: 301  When Germany remilitarized the Rhineland in March 1936, Hertzog informed the British government that there was no possibility of South Africa taking part if Britain decided to go to war over the issue, and, in the ensuing crisis, South African diplomats took a very pro-German position, arguing that Germany was justified in violating the Treaty of Versailles by remilitarizing the Rhineland.

[19]: 299  Though Hertzog did not share the anti-Semitism of Gie, the latter's dispatches portraying the Third Reich in a favourable light were used to support the prime minister's foreign policy preferences.

[19]: 304  When te Water reported to Hertzog on 25 May 1938 that the British foreign secretary, Lord Halifax, had promised him that the British government was applying diplomatic pressure on Czechoslovakia to resolve the dispute over the Sudetenland in Germany's favour, and was pressuring France to abandon its alliance with Czechoslovakia, Hertzog stated his approval.

[19]: 312 In the middle of September 1938, when Britain was on the verge of war with Germany over the Sudetenland issue, Hertzog clashed in the cabinet with Smuts over the course of action that South Africa would pursue.

On the other hand, Smuts favoured South Africa allying with Britain and going to war with Germany, and threatened to use his influence with the MPs loyal to himself to bring down the government if Hertzog did declare neutrality.

[19]: 316 On 23 September 1938, at the Bad Godesberg summit, Hitler rejected the Anglo-French plan for transferring the Sudetenland to Germany as insufficient, thus putting Europe on the brink of war.

[19]: 315 In his messages to te Water in the last days of September 1938, Hertzog consistently portrayed Czechoslovakia and France as the trouble-makers, and argued that Britain must do more to apply pressure on those two states for more concessions to Germany.

[19]: 3186  Te Water and the Canadian high commissioner in London, Vincent Massey, in a joint note on behalf of South Africa and Canada to Lord Halifax, stated that Sir Basil Newton, the British minister in Prague, should tell the Czechoslovak president Edvard Beneš, that "the obstructive tactics of the Czech government were unwelcome to the British and Dominion governments".

Governor-General Sir Patrick Duncan refused Hertzog's request to dissolve parliament and call a general election on the question.

[21] Angered at being outmaneuvered, Hertzog issued a press statement in October 1941 in which he attacked "liberal capitalism" and the party system, while praising Nazism as in keeping with the traditions of the Afrikaners.

[22] Supporters of Hertzog invented the Hertzoggie, a jam-filled tartlet with a coconut meringue topping, that is still a popular confection in South Africa.