A beautifully bizarre bit of general knowledge that not even some A grade history students will know. The world’s shortest war was the Anglo-Zanzibar War of 1896 ⚔️⏱️
🕰️ How short?
- Reported to be a total of 38 minutes
- Widely accepted as the shortest war in recorded history
📍 Where?
- Zanzibar (which is now part of Tanzania)
- Between the British Empire and the Sultanate of Zanzibar
⚠️ What happened?
- The pro-British sultan died.
- His cousin Khalid bin Barghash claimed power without British approval.
- Britain issued an ultimatum to step down by 9:00 a.m.
- He didn’t.
💥 The “war”
- At 9:02 a.m. British warships opened fire on the palace.
- The palace was very quickly destroyed.
- Zanzibar’s navy was also very rapidly sunk.
- 9:40a.m. the fighting is reported to have ended.
📊 Casualties
- Zanzibar: Around 500 killed or wounded
- Britain: 1 injured sailor
🏁 Aftermath
- Khalid fled to the German consulate.
- Britain installed a more compliant sultan.
- War over before most people could finish breakfast.
