As in total war, invading powers often directed actions against indigenous non-combatants and local economies. This included the burning of villages, theft of cattle, and systematic destruction of crops as committed by the French in pacification campaigns in Algeria, and the Germans in the Herero Wars of southern Africa. In extreme cases, some powers advocated for the extermination of troublesome peoples, as the Germans did following the Herero conflict, resulting in the Herero and Namaqua genocide. Such actions were usually undertaken when there was a lack of political or military goals for an invader to achieve (if there was no central government to seize or organized army to subdue) as a means to subjugate local populations. European powers held the common perception that Asians and Africans "only understood the language of violence" so that they would not be subdued but through heavy-handed means. They refused to make concessions to indigenous forces for fear of appearing weak.