These reserved powers were intended to protect the indigenous black Africans from discriminatory legislation and to safeguard British commercial interests in the colony,[5] but as Claire Palley comments in her constitutional history of the country, it would have been extremely difficult for Whitehall to enforce such actions, and attempting to do so would have probably caused a crisis.

Voting qualifications regarding personal income, education and property, similar to those of the Cape Qualified Franchise, were applied equally to all, but since most blacks did not meet the set standards, both the electoral roll and the colonial parliament were overwhelmingly from the white minority of about 5%.

[18] Believing full dominion status to be effectively symbolic and "there for the asking",[17] Prime Minister Godfrey Huggins (in office from 1933 to 1953) twice ignored British overtures hinting at dominionship,[19] and instead pursued an initially semi-independent Federation with Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland, two colonies directly administered from London.

[36][n 6] Attempting to win black political support, Whitehead proposed a number of reforms to racially discriminatory legislation, including the Land Apportionment Act, and promised to implement these if his UFP won the next Southern Rhodesian election.

[45] Meanwhile, secessionist black Rhodesian parties won electoral victories in Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland,[45] and Harold Macmillan's Conservative administration in Britain moved towards breaking up the Federation, resolving that it had become untenable.

[55] The British government's refusal to grant independence to Southern Rhodesia under the 1961 constitution was largely the result of the geopolitical and moral shifts associated with the Wind of Change, coupled with the UK's wish to avoid opprobrium and loss of prestige in the United Nations (UN) and the Commonwealth.

Amid the Cold War, Britain opposed the spread of Soviet and Chinese influence into Africa, but knew it would become an international pariah if it publicly expressed reservations or backed down on NIBMAR in the Southern Rhodesia question.

[58] Once the topic of Southern Rhodesia came to the fore in the UN and other bodies, particularly the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), even maintaining the status quo became regarded as unacceptable internationally, causing the UK government a great deal of embarrassment.

[69] Proponents of the RF stand downplayed black Rhodesian grievances regarding land ownership and segregation, and argued that despite the racial imbalance in domestic politics—whites made up 5% of the population, but over 90% of registered voters—the electoral system was not racist as the franchise was based on financial and educational qualifications rather than ethnicity.

[72] These factors combined with what RF politicians and supporters saw as British decadence, chicanery and betrayal to create the case they put forward that UDI, while dubious legally and likely to provoke international uproar, might nevertheless be in their eyes justifiable and necessary for the good of the country and region if an accommodation could not be found with Whitehall.

[78] Lord Salisbury, one of Southern Rhodesia's main supporters in Britain, despaired at Field's lack of action, telling Welensky that as he saw it "the simple time to have declared independence, whether right or wrong, would have been when the Federation came to an end".

[79] The RF's replacement of Field drew criticism from the British Labour Party, whose leader Harold Wilson called it "brutal",[83] while Nkomo described the new Smith Cabinet as "a suicide squad ... not interested in the welfare of all the people but only in their own".

The British and Rhodesians argued about this unilateral act by Salisbury, described by the historian J R T Wood as the "veritable straw in the wind",[88] alongside the independence issue until Portugal accepted the mission in late September, much to Britain's fury and Rhodesia's delight.

[131] Strongly alluding to Thomas Jefferson's text throughout, the Rhodesians used one phrase verbatim—"a respect for the opinions of mankind"[132]—but no reference was made to the assertion that "all men are created equal", nor to the "consent of the governed", two omissions later stressed by a number of commentators.

At 11:00 local time on 11 November 1965, Armistice Day, during the traditional two minutes' silence to remember the fallen of the two World Wars, Smith declared Rhodesia independent and signed the proclamation document, with Dupont and the other 10 ministers of the Cabinet following.

He claimed that UDI did not mark "a diminution in the opportunities which our African people have to advance and prosper in Rhodesia", described "racial harmony in Africa" as part of his agenda and condemned black Rhodesian activities as attempts to "blackmail the British government into ... handing the country over to irresponsible rule".

[116] Within hours of UDI, the UN General Assembly passed a condemnatory resolution, 107–2—South Africa and Portugal voted against, and France abstained—decrying Rhodesia's actions and calling on Britain to end "the rebellion by the unlawful authorities in Salisbury".

Security Council Resolution 217, following on 20 November, condemned UDI as an illegitimate "usurpation of power by a racist settler minority", and called on nations neither to recognise what it deemed "this illegal authority" nor to entertain diplomatic or economic relations with it.

[158] British Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart stated that the United Kingdom thought that Rhodesian forces were well-equipped, well-trained and highly motivated and that an invasion would lead to "a medium sized war of uncertain duration".

When the Rhodesians continued to receive oil, Wilson attempted to directly cut off their main supply lines, namely the Portuguese Mozambican ports at Beira and Lourenço Marques, by posting a Royal Navy squadron to the Mozambique Channel in March 1966.

[162] Wilson predicted in January 1966 that the various boycotts would force Smith to give in "within a matter of weeks rather than months", but the British and UN sanctions had little effect on Rhodesia, largely because South Africa and Portugal went on trading with the breakaway colony, providing it with oil and other commodities.

[165] The Rhodesian government set up a string of front holding companies in Switzerland, Luxembourg and Liechtenstein to help keep trade open with some success; goods that had been imported from Britain were replaced by Japanese, French and West German equivalents.

[64] But although South Africa and Portugal gave economic, military and limited political support to the post-UDI government (as did France and other nations, to a lesser extent), neither they nor any other country ever recognised Rhodesia as a de jure independent state.

[171] Rhodesia's unsuccessful attempts to win Western support and recognition included offers to the US government in 1966 and 1967, ignored by Lyndon B Johnson's administration, to provide Rhodesian troops to fight alongside the Americans and other anti-communist forces in Vietnam.

[147] Several countries followed Britain's lead and closed their consulates in Salisbury, with one prominent exception to this being the United States, which retained its consulate-general in post-UDI Rhodesia, relabelling it a "US Contacts Office" to circumvent the problem of diplomatic recognition.

[178] In late February 1968, considering the fate of James Dhlamini, Victor Mlambo and Duly Shadreck, three black Rhodesians convicted of murder and terrorist offences before UDI, Beadle ruled that Salisbury retained its pre-UDI powers regarding executions and could carry out death sentences.

At the hearing for Dhlamini and Mlambo on 4 March 1968, Beadle argued that he saw the statement from London as a decision by the UK government and not the Queen herself, and that in any case the 1961 constitution had transferred the prerogative of mercy from Britain to the Rhodesian Executive Council.

He ruled that only Whitehall could determine what constituted the maintenance of "law and order" in Rhodesia, and that the Rhodesian emergency measures were unlawful as they had been formalised by the Officer Administering the Government, a post-UDI figure who was, in British eyes, unconstitutional.

After the Conservatives returned to power in Britain in 1970, provisional agreement was reached in November 1971 between the Rhodesian government and a British team headed by Douglas-Home (who was Foreign Secretary under Prime Minister Edward Heath), and in early 1972 a Royal Commission chaired by Lord Pearce travelled to Rhodesia to investigate how acceptable the proposals were to majority opinion.

He announced his acceptance in principle of one man, one vote during Henry Kissinger's Anglo-American initiative in September 1976, and in March 1978 concluded the Internal Settlement with non-militant nationalist groups headed by Bishop Abel Muzorewa, the Reverend Ndabaningi Sithole and Chief Jeremiah Chirau.