Scramble for the Congo Anatomy of an Ugly War
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SCRAMBLE FOR THE CONGO ANATOMY OF AN UGLY WAR 20 December 2000 ICG Africa Report N° 26 Nairobi/Brussels Table of Contents MAPS DRC: MONUC Deployment ............................................................................. i DRC: Deployment of Other Forces ................................................................ ii EXECUTIVE SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS...................................... iii I. INTRODUCTION................................................................................... 1 II. THE STALEMATE ON THE CONVENTIONAL FRONTLINES .................... 2 A. The Equateur Front ............................................................................. 4 B. The Kasai and Katanga Fronts............................................................. 6 C. Rwanda and Uganda Also Come to Blows........................................... 8 D. Conclusion to the Military Situation.................................................. 10 III. THE MANAGEMENT OF CHAOS: THE REBEL WAR EFFORT AND ITS CONSEQUENCES ................................................................................ 11 A. The Breakdown of the Rwandan-Ugandan Alliance.......................... 11 B. Rwanda and Burundi’s Unfinished Civil Wars, and Local conflicts in the Kivus ........................................................................................... 11 1. The Rwandan Patriotic Army versus ALiR ........................................... 11 2. The Burundian Armed Forces versus the FDD/FNL .............................. 18 3. The Failure of the RCD...................................................................... 21 4. Fragmentation and Warlordism in the Kivus........................................ 23 5. Scenarios......................................................................................... 26 C. Uganda: Back to the Military Solution?............................................. 29 1. The Security Motives for the War....................................................... 30 2. The Army Goes into Business ............................................................ 31 3. The UPDF and the Bloodletting in Ituri ............................................... 32 4. Uganda’s Showpiece Rebel Movement: Wamba and the RCD-ML ......... 33 5. Jean-Pierre Bemba and the MLC: A Winning Formula?......................... 36 6. Conclusion ....................................................................................... 39 IV. LAURENT-DESIRE KABILA: IN POWER BY DEFAULT......................... 40 A. Kabila Inc.: The Absence of Regime Building.................................... 41 1. Political Control Compensates a Fragile Legitimacy.............................. 42 2. Personal Rule in the Extreme............................................................. 47 B. Kabila and Co.: Angola, Zimbabwe, and Others ................................ 54 1. Angola: The Godfather...................................................................... 54 2. Zimbabwe: Trapped in the Congo...................................................... 60 3. The Other Allies: Mercenaries and Mineral Buyers............................... 65 V. AN INSUFFICIENT RESPONSE TO A LEADERLESS PROCESS............. 66 A. Humanitarian Tragedy is Underway in the DRC................................ 66 1. Massive Displacement and Food Crisis................................................ 66 2. Lack of Donor Commitment............................................................... 68 3. An Urgent Necessity to Create Incentives for Peace ............................ 69 B. The Failures of Lusaka....................................................................... 70 1. Belligerents Made into Peace Keepers: The Story of the JMC ............... 70 2. MONUC: Mission Impossible? ............................................................ 72 2. The Failure of the Inter-Congolese Dialogue....................................... 79 C. Revising or Reviving Lusaka?............................................................ 82 1. The Belligerent’s Views ..................................................................... 82 2. The International Position ................................................................. 83 3. The New Focus on Disengagement: Saving MONUC and Saving the SADC? ............................................................................................. 84 VI. CONCLUSION ..................................................................................... 85 APPENDICES A. Abbreviations, Names and Places B. Chronology of the War in DRC C. The Balance of Conventional Military Forces D. Who’s Who in the Congolese Armed Forces (FAC) E. Who’s Who Among Interahamwe Military Commanders F. Maps: DRC Infrastructure and the Kivus G. About the International Crisis Group H. ICG Reports and Briefing Papers I. ICG Board Members 10° 15° CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC 25° 30° SUDAN 5° Uban Bangassou 5° Bangui gi Juba Zongo DEMOCRATICYaoundé Gbadolite Bondo Faradje REPUBLIC OF THE Libenge Businga Uele Ki Gemena Aketi Buta Isiro Watsa bali CONGO gala Gulu on Lisala Bumba Mungbere M PROVINCE International boundary o ORIENTALE UGANDA i ng i Bunia Lake u o opor Aruwimi Lake District boundary Ouesso g C L Basoko Albert n Kyoga a Basankusu Bafwasende b a National capital ong u l Lu Kisangani District capital O EQUATEUR Yangambi Kampala Jinja Libreville Butembo Kasese Town, village Mbandaka S 0° CONGO Boende Ubundu NORD- 0° Main road T L Lake shu L u N ap o a Lubutu Edward Secondary road a m l L a KIVU Lake o b I L m a Ikela m a Punia Victoria Railroad u el il a i Goma ak U a ( Airport l A Inongo C in Lake RWANDA o d i Kivu Bolobo n Kigali g 0 100 200 300 km Lac T Kutu o Bukavu Butare Mai-Ndombe ) KASAI 0 100 200 mi L Kindu SUD- N Bandundu ukenie Lodja Uvira Bujumbura K Kampene asa Kibombo KIVU K i ORIENTAL U BURUNDI Brazzaville w Sa il nk Kinshasa u Ilebo u MANIEMA r O KASAI u SA Kenge Bulungu Kasongo HA Mweka Lusambo Kigoma Pointe-Noire KINS 5° Tabora 5° L Cabinda BAS-CONGO Kikwit OCCIDENTAL Lubao Kongolo M Mbanza- a Boma Matadi uga k (ANGOLA) Ngungu uk e UNITED BANDUNDU Mbuji-Mayi Kabalo L Kananga Kalemie Tshikapa L REPUBLIC u ATLANTIC Kabinda a K K l OF a a w b T sa OCEAN a i a A a TANZANIA N'zeto n Manono n g Mwene-Ditu g o Moba a SHABA n Sumbawanga B L y uv i (KATANGA) ua k Kapanga Pweto a Kamina M Luanda L Mbeya u l U u Lake ANGOLA a Mweru DEMOCRATIC Katanga T ° REPUBLIC OF THE Saurimo Plateau ° 10 CONGO I 10 Dilolo Kasenga ZAMBIA M M Kolwezi L Likasi a ze Lake k A be Bangweulu e am Lubumbashi M Luena Z L Solwezi Kipushi a A Lobito l The boundaries and names shown and the designations used on a w Sakania W this map do not imply official endorsement or acceptance by the i United Nations. Ndola I 10° 15° 20° 25° 30° Map No. 4007 Rev. 6 UNITED NATIONS Department of Public Information April 2000 Cartographic Section Approximate Deployment of Forces in the DRC (Source: IRIN) SCRAMBLE FOR THE CONGO ANATOMY OF AN UGLY WAR EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Lusaka Ceasefire Agreement, signed eighteen months ago to stop the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), has proved hollow. The accord largely froze the armies in their positions, but did not stop the fighting. The mandated United Nations observers, who were to oversee the disengagement of forces, have remained unable to deploy for the most part due to the continuation of hostilities. Similarly, the Inter- Congolese Dialogue, that was to have brought a ‘new political dispensation’ to the Congo, appears stillborn. Faced with this impasse in the peace process, the Congo has begun to fragment. Throughout the country a humanitarian catastrophe is underway. The fighting has already cost the lives of hundreds of thousands, and an estimated additional two million Congolese have been displaced as a result. The violence has also encouraged ethnic militarism to grow, and the east of the country has already been transformed into a patchwork of warlords’ fiefdoms. The territorial integrity of the Congo is threatened, as will in time be the stability of its nine neighbours if the chaos continues. The failure of the Lusaka Ceasefire has been due to an absence of leadership. The agreement depended entirely upon the cooperation of the parties to succeed. Tragically, none of the signatories fulfilled what they had pledged. Each suspected the others of a double game, and used its suspicions to justify its own duplicity. Since the belligerents themselves were the ones responsible for policing the agreement, and since there was no external guarantor to compel their compliance, the agreement quickly became empty. Today it remains only as a reference document, at hand for when the belligerents come to realize that they have no other options. At present this is not yet the case. All are determined to persist with their military adventurism precisely because they have so far failed to accomplish their war objectives. They all need to recoup something for the investment of blood and treasure they so foolishly squandered in the Congo. They all want to win, despite the fact that winning is no longer possible. Scramble for the Congo: Anatomy of an Ugly War ICG Africa Report N° 26, 20 December 2000 Page iv Rwanda and Uganda’s second war in the Congo has seriously endangered their own stability. The lightning strike they unleashed in August 1998 to overthrow Kabila has since become of a war of occupation, and risks becoming an unsustainable war of attrition. Energies and funds that each need to spend on economic development have been redirected towards their