German South West Africa (German: Deutsch-Südwestafrika) was a colony of the German Empire from 1884 until 1915, when it was captured by the Western Allies during World War I. However, Germany did not officially recognise its loss of this territory until the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. German rule over this territory was punctuated by numerous rebellions by its native African peoples, which culminated in a campaign of German reprisals from 1904 to 1908 known as the Herero and Nama genocide.
In 1915, during World War I, German South West Africa was invaded by the Allies in the form of South African and British forces.