biography
| name: |
Smuts, Jan (Christiaan)
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| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1870–1950)
|
| biography:
| South African general, statesman, and prime minister (1919–24, 1939–48), born in Malmesbury, Cape Colony, SW South Africa. He studied at Cambridge, became a lawyer, fought in the second Boer War (1899–1902), and entered the House of Assembly in 1907. He held several cabinet posts, led campaigns against the Germans in South West Africa and Tanganyika, was a member of the Imperial War Cabinet in World War 1, and succeeded Botha as premier. He was a significant figure at Versailles, and was instrumental in the founding of the League of Nations in 1919. As minister of justice under Hertzog, his coalition with the Nationalists in 1934 produced the United Party, and he became premier again in 1939. |
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