However, public opinion and elite opinion in Germany demanded colonies for reasons of international prestige, so Bismarck was forced to oblige. In 1883–84 Germany began to build a colonial empire in Africa and the South Pacific.Paul M. Kennedy, The Rise of the Anglo-German Antagonism, 1860–1914 (1988) pp. 167–83. The establishment of the German colonial empire started with German New Guinea in 1884. Within 25 years, German South West Africa had committed the Herero and Namaqua genocide in modern-day Namibia, the first genocide of the 20th century.
