In "Shooting an Elephant," what does Orwell mean when he says he understands "the real motives for which despotic governement act?"

Interestingly, this quote comes before the actual
narration of the shooting of the elephant, which indicates the theme of the rest of the
story that is conveyed through the elephant story. This concerns, as Orwell describes
it, "the real nature of imperialism."

As Orwell
demonstrates through the subsequent narration, the "real motives" for imperialism seem
to be nothing more than saving face and not being laughed at. Orwell discovers through
this story that actually, in spite of his power and prestige, he has lost his freedom by
the very power that he has gained, because he is forced to act "like the white man" and
kill the elephant:

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Here was I, the white man with his gun, standing
in front of the unarmed native crowd - seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in
reality I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces
behind. I perceived in this moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his own
freedom that he destroys. He becomes a sort of hollow, posing dummy, the
conventionalised figure of
a sahib.

Thus, in turning
"tyrant," Orwell explains the paradox that white man actually destroys his "own
freedom," being forced to act in a way that he has conditioned the oppressed natives to
expect. The danger of not to act in this way would be to look "like a fool," as Orwell
says as he closes this essay, which would be an anathema to a colonial officer. The
fiction must be sustained.