The endgame in the British Crown Colony of Aden was played out against the endlessly shifting background of interwoven regional and international interests that had long characterised South Arabian politics. By the time of the final troop withdrawals on 29 November 1967, the British administration had long lost the ability to call the tune in even the small territory of Aden itself. Although there was no let-up in attacks on the British during the last months, violent internecine struggles between rival nationalist groups over who would succeed the departing colonial power had already become the more significant point of contest (for an idea of the complexity of this phase see Dresch 2000, 108-14). The ebb tide of British rule in the ancient port exposed an enervated, cash-strapped imperial power whose final resort in the face of widespread political opposition and violent insurgency was to be nothing markedly more sophisticated than martial law.

The post-war decision to make isolated, barren Aden a redoubt of imperial strength was one of the motivating forces behind the so-called ‘forward policy’ in South Arabia during the 1950s, an extension of the old policy of treaty-making which had brought most of the sheikhdoms and tribal areas of Arabia’s south western extremity into British orbit as ‘protected states’ of one kind or another (this process had been neither complete nor without bloodshed). The central aim was to use these states – the ‘Protectorates’ – as a bulwark against both the Imams of the northern Yemen, who harboured dreams of southward expansion, and Nasser, who as well as providing nationalist inspiration had been extending Egyptian material influence into the Arabian peninsula. (Spencer Mawby has observed that the ‘forward policy’ was less a grand design than an organic development that came about through the dovetailing of ‘the natural inclination of the men on the ground to pursue a policy of imperial pacification and the instincts of Whitehall policy-makers…to maintain a significant role in Middle Eastern politics.’ Mawby 2005, 29.)  

The pursuit of this goal lead eventually to a ‘Federation of Arab Amirates of the South’ being created in 1959. In the natural absence of a friendly government with whom to negotiate for the long-term security of the Aden base, the British attempted to manufacture one from the traditional rulers they already had influence over (Halliday 2002, 171). In so doing they stored up trouble for themselves, as the ineffectual and conservative pro-British Federal rule in the Protectorates became an obvious target for the pan-Arab nationalism being spurred on by Nasser. The toppling of the Imamate state in Yemen by a nationalist coup at the end of 1962 added not only momentum to Nasserite sentiment, but also hardware: as the British and their local allies ramped up operations against rebels within the Federation, armed tribal dissent increasingly took on the cast of a proxy war between Britain and Egypt, whose presence in and support for the newly republican Yemen, and for Arab nationalists across South Arabia, was no secret.

Up to this time dissent within Aden had been based around leftist political and trade union bodies, principally the Peoples Socialist Party (PSP) and the Aden Workers’ Congress (ATUC), and had been largely peaceful, despite occasional violent incidents and swingeing responses from the authorities (mass deportations of striking workers, and similar). But Yemen’s new status and the increasing trouble in the Protectorates had made the atmosphere altogether more flammable, and late 1962 saw the foundation of a new group, the National Liberation Front for Occupied South Yemen (NLF).

The NLF’s tactics were of a different order. Committed to armed struggle and to the political awakening of  Aden’s South Yemeni hinterland, their first success was in organising the 1963 tribal insurrection in the rugged Radfan district. The British were drawn into a brutal guerrilla war in the mountains, and violence spread through several other districts in the Protectorates during the succeeding months and years (ibid., 195-99). In Aden, stifling emergency regulations were brought in after an unsuccessful attempt was made on the life of the High Commissioner, Sir Gerald Kennedy Trevaskis, in December 1963. This attack had been executed by a militant PSP cell, but from 1964 NLF operations within the colony – whether bombs, shootings, or bazooka or grenade attacks – increased dramatically year on year. The 36 violent incidents recorded in 1964 multiplied exponentially: 1967 would log a staggering 2900 (Paget 1969, 264; ‘By October 1967,’ Paget writes, ‘the situation was so confused due to inter-factional fighting between the NLF and FLOSY, that it was impossible to define incidents, and no further statistics were kept’).The security forces responded with strong-arm tactics; torture during interrogation and casual brutality became routine. The colony became a turbulent, dangerous pressure cooker.

The true beginning of the end came in February 1966, with the unexpected declaration by the British Government, in a Defence White Paper, that South Arabia would be independent by 1968 and the Aden base would be abandoned. Any remaining shreds of British legitimacy were thrown to the wind. The NLF, sensing victory, broke from the Nasserite coalition FLOSY (Front for the Liberation of Occupied South Yemen, convened in 1965) and turned their guns on their erstwhile comrades. The final months in British Aden were an unpleasant combination of vicious factional street-fighting, terrorist attacks, and ruthless repression. ‘The British,’ writes Gavin, ‘could in no way control this whirlwind of nationalist revolution or influence the choice of their successors. The best they could do was conduct a fighting retreat’ (Gavin 1975, 349). The People’s Republic of South Yemen came into being at midnight on the 29^th November 1967 when the NLF, victorious over FLOSY, assumed complete control. By Brendon’s account, the last British official to board the final plane out of the 130-year old British colony ‘climbed the steps backwards, holding a Walther PPK pistol in his hand.’ (Brendon 2007, 509. Brendon doesn’t provide a reference for this assertion, and Paget suggests that the last Briton to leave Aden was in fact Lt.-Colonel Dai Morgan of 42 Commando, who left by helicopter at 1500hrs on the 29^th [Paget op. cit., 256-8]. Nevertheless, the image is perfectly fitting to the situation.)