Twenty years ago, in August 1998, one of the bloodiest wars in modern history began. The huge number of casualties, the nine participating countries and the incredible brutality shown by all parties to the conflict allowed this armed conflict to be called the Great African War. Given that the events on the Black Continent are rarely covered in the press, the details of this terrible war are poorly known. Indeed, from a Eurocentric standpoint, the deaths of hundreds of Englishmen or Frenchmen are seen as a tragedy, while the deaths of tens of thousands of Africans remain practically invisible.
The events, which will be discussed below, unfolded on the territory of the second largest country in the African continent - Congo with its capital in Kinshasa. The territory of this state is very rich in natural resources, forests, fresh water. Congo has a colossal potential for development, since the land of this large country is fraught with not only diamonds, copper and gold, but also coltan, which is very necessary for modern industry. The long-suffering state gained independence in 1960. Before that, Congo was a Belgian colony. At one time, it was about the actions of the Belgian colonialists that Arthur Conan Doyle wrote the publicistic book Crimes in the Congo. Patrice Lumumba and Moise Tshombe, Ernesto Che Guevara's African campaign - this is also the history of the Congo. In 1965, the chief of the General Staff, Joseph-Desiree Mobutu, seized power in the country.
A former sergeant of the Belgian colonial forces, and then a journalist for one of the capital's newspapers, Mobutu, after the proclamation of the country's independence, made a dizzying career and became one of the most influential political figures in the Congo. After coming to power, he soon renamed the Congo Zaire - this name the country bore from 1971 to 1997, and he himself adopted the traditional African name Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu wa for Banga. The main ideology of Mobutu, who appropriated the title of marshal to himself in 1983, of course, was money, but he officially declared his adherence to traditional African values and beliefs. Since Mobutu was a staunch opponent of communism and Soviet influence in Africa, he enjoyed great support from the West. Americans and Europeans also turned a blind eye to failed economic policies,and repression against the opposition, and an incredible level of corruption.
Until the early 1990s, the West needed Mobutu as one of Africa's most staunch anti-communist leaders. Zaire, under the rule of Mobutu, supported anti-communist and anti-Soviet movements in neighboring countries, primarily in Angola. However, the weakening and subsequent disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991 led to a change in US and Western policy on the African continent. Such odious politicians as Mobutu have lost their significance, moreover, in the changed situation they rather discredited the West and the values it declared. But if interest in Mobutu was lost, then the richest natural resources of Zaire continued to attract the attention of a variety of stakeholders, primarily American and European corporations.
The political situation in Zaire has never been stable. From time to time, the country was shaken by armed conflicts; the central authorities could not control part of its territory even in the best years. The situation in the country became even more complicated after the outbreak of the civil war in neighboring Rwanda. Two peoples Tutsi and Hutu, constituting the main population of Rwanda and historically at odds with each other, entered the war for life and death. Quite quickly, the Hutu won the victory, slaughtering up to a million Tutsis. Hundreds of thousands of refugees - Tutsis - poured into neighboring Zaire. However, then the Rwandan Patriotic Front, formed by the Tutsis, came to power in Rwanda, after which the Hutu fled to Zaire, fearing retribution. The war between the two Rwandan peoples continued on the territory of the neighboring country.
The Tutsis in Zaire revolted against Mobutu and captured a number of cities, including the provincial capital of South Kivu Bukavu and the capital of North Kivu Gomu. This situation was immediately taken advantage of by the Congolese opposition - the Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of the Congo, which was led by Laurent Desiree Kabila, a guerrilla leader with thirty years of experience, in the past - Ernesto Che Guevara's ally during his African campaign. For twenty years, from 1967 to 1988. Kabila controlled the mountainous regions of South Kivu province, west of Lake Tanganyika, where he created his own "people's revolutionary state", which existed through the extraction and smuggling of minerals, predatory raids and military assistance from China (Kabila was considered a Maoist, pro-Chinese politician). In 1988, Kabila mysteriously disappeared, and eight years later, in 1996,reappeared and rebelled against Mobutu. Kabile was supported by neighboring countries - Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda, which had their own claims to Mobutu. Therefore, already in May 1997, Kabila won a complete victory over Mobutu, who fled from Zaire. On May 20, 1997, Laurent Kabila entered the country's capital Kinshasa and proclaimed himself the new president of the country. Zaire was renamed the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
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However, having strengthened his position, the new head of state actually continued the policy of Mobutu, who was overthrown by him. Laurent Kabila feared that the presence of more than a million Tutsis on the territory of the Congo threatened his power, and therefore, on July 27, 1998, announced the expulsion of all foreigners from the country and the disbandment of the Congolese army units manned by Tutsis. On August 2, 1998, dissatisfied with this decision, Tutsi soldiers who served in the 10th brigade of the Congolese army revolted in the city of Goma in the east of the country and literally in one day captured the cities of Uvira and Bukavu. The uprising was led by Major General Jean-Pierre Ondekan, who began his service in the army of Mobutu, but then went over to the side of Kabila. Ondekan, an ethnic Tutsi, quickly found his bearings and realizedthat he had a chance to become the political leader of the territories occupied by Tutsi soldiers.
The Tutsi army of 60 thousand people moved towards the capital of the country, Kinshasa. On August 3, Colonel James Cabarere, at the head of a Tutsi detachment, hijacked a transport plane in the city of Goma and flew to the Keatona airbase, where about 3,000 more Tutsi soldiers were stationed. So the second Western Front was opened against the capital of the country. The Cabarere offensive was so successful that a frightened Laurent Kabila turned to the government of neighboring Angola for help. Already on August 31, Angolan troops managed to oust the Cabarera rebels from the port of Matadi, and on September 1, liberated Keatona.
Having enlisted the support of the Tutsi-hating Hutu formations and neighboring Angola, Kabila began to seek the intercession of other African states. The President of the Congo was supported by Namibia, Zimbabwe, Sudan and Chad. For Angola, participation in the war on the side of Kabila was important in terms of further fighting its own rebel group UNITA, Namibia and Zimbabwe got involved in the war as long-standing allies of Angola, and Sudan sided with Kabila out of solidarity, seeking to harm its long-standing enemy - Uganda.
Kabila was also supported by the distant DPRK, which sent over 400 military specialists and instructors, as well as a large number of weapons. The reasons for North Korean sympathies for Kabila were also clear - not so much the pseudo-communist phraseology of the new Congolese president, as the natural resources of the Congo - uranium and cobalt - interested the DPRK. Libya, which tried to actively participate in Central African politics, also provided assistance to Kabila. In turn, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, as well as the Angolan rebel group UNITA took the side of the Tutsi rebels. On November 6, 1998, units of the Rwandan armed forces invaded the territory of the Congo, and the troops of Zimbabwe and Namibia entered the southern provinces.
Thus, in the fall of 1998, the civil war in the Congo ceased to be an internal armed conflict. After the entry of nine neighboring countries into it, it received the name of the Great African War (African World War). Fierce fighting broke out in the east and south of the DRC, and not only the rebels and government troops of Kabila, but also the armies of neighboring African states fought with each other. The intervention of Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Sudan and Chad on the side of Kabila allowed the latter to maintain control over the capital and its environs and prevent the advance of rebel forces. However, it was also not possible to defeat the rebels, for whom the troops of Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi stood up. The war became protracted, and the civilian population of the Congo suffered the most from the hostilities.deprived of the opportunity to defend oneself and turned out to be the object of violence, robbery and murder by all parties to the conflict.
The terrible "calling card" of the Great African War was the incredible brutality that insurgents, government soldiers and foreign military showed towards civilians. More than half a million women were raped during the war in the Congo, according to international organizations. Militants and soldiers did not spare even little girls, raping them, and often killing them after the violence. Capturing villages inhabited by "foreign" peoples, the militants ripped open the bellies of pregnant women, killed the elderly, and dealt with the clergy. The brutality common to African militants was joined by the desire to mortally scare the population of the occupied territories so that they would not even think to resist, and the drug intoxication in which many fighters of both rebel and government formations were found.
The shocked international community put pressure on the leaders of the African states participating in the war, so that they quickly begin negotiations on the cessation of hostilities. In the end, on June 21-27, 1999, negotiations between the parties to the conflict took place in the capital of Zambia, Lusaka, and on July 10, 1999, the leaders of Congo, Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Uganda and Rwanda signed the Lusaka Agreement, according to which, within 24 hours after his conclusion, the parties pledged to stop all military operations, further military movements, and also agreed to the deployment of the UN International Peacekeeping Force.
However, despite the agreement signed in Lusaka, fighting continued on the territory of the Congo, albeit on a smaller scale. Thus, on June 5-10, 2000, a six-day war between the armies of Rwanda and Uganda took place in the Congolese city of Kisangani. On January 16, 2001, President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Laurent Kabila, was assassinated during a military council meeting.
The new head of state was his 29-year-old son Joseph Kabila. He continued to act against the insurgents until a peace agreement was signed between the DRC and Rwanda in July 2002. Joseph Kabila signed the agreement on behalf of the DRC, and President Paul Kagame on behalf of Rwanda. The leadership of the Congo pledged to recognize the political organizations of the Tutsis in the country as legal, to disarm the Hutu militant units controlled by Kinshasa, and the leadership of Rwanda agreed to the demand for the withdrawal of the 20,000th Rwandan corps from the territory of the Congo. The leader of the Congolese Tutsis, Major General Jean-Pierre Ondekan, was appointed Minister of Defense in the new interim government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He held this post until 2005.
In the Great African War, by smaller standards, from 4 to 5 million people died, and the largest number of victims was precisely among the civilian population. People not only died at the hands of militants, but also died of hunger and numerous epidemics, since there was no normal medical service on the territory of the war-torn country. But even the agreement between Kabila and Kagame did not bring peace to Congolese soil. In 2004-2008 and 2012-2013 in the Kivu, armed conflicts again took place, caused by the actions of the Tutsi rebels. The second conflict in the Kivu led to another military clashes between the Congo and the Tutsi formations, on the side of which were Uganda and Rwanda.
Armed clashes and killings of civilians continue on Congolese soil to this day. Millions of Congolese people have become refugees from their homes. There are at least 70 rebel armed groups operating on the territory of the country, fighting among themselves and against government forces. The situation is aggravated by the dire poverty of the population, the lack of any work, even in relatively large cities of the country. Meanwhile, in Congo, rich in natural resources, the birth rate is very high even by African standards, the country's population is young and active, but almost the only ways to earn at least some money here are war and crime.
Author: Ilya Polonsky