Rumble In The Jungle

Thirty-four years ago Mohammed Ali regained his heavyweight title with a massively hyped fight held in what was then called Zaire. The name was part of dictator Joseph Mobutu's equally massive piece of hype--the Africanization of the former Belgian Congo.

Unlike the overwhelming majority of fights in the Congo, the original Rumble in the Jungle was decisive. There was a winner (well paid) and a loser (very well paid.)

Also, running against the current of typical Congo battles, no one was killed. No rapes were reported. There wasn't any obvious looting.

The present Rumble in the Jungle runs to type. It is so far indecisive as to outcome. It is bloody. And, in the usual way of things in the Congo, the Congolese Army has shown itself very proficient at talking tough, running fast, looting with alacrity and raping with zeal. Congolese troops also continue to demonstrate a genuine talent for killing civilians during or immediately after the raping and looting phase of the exercise has been completed.

Comes now the European Union, or at least France, with a swagger and a stated desire to enter the Congo Rumble. Apparently heeding the cry of the High Minded and the UN, France is mooting the idea of sending an elite reaction force of somewhere between 1,500 and 3,000 men to back the 6,000 members of the 17,000 UN peacekeeping force present in the combat area around the provincial center of Goma.

"Wait one, Geek, where are the other 11,000 lads with blue helmets?" You ask.

Simple, they are spread around the rest of the Congo. It seems there is anti-government sentiment lurking everywhere in that jungle.

Noting that the majority of the peacekeeping force come from African Union members a South African defense and security analyst with a greater grip on reality than the requirements of political correctness, Henri Boshoff, maintains that a highly trained and capable force must be deployed to the land around Goma within five or six days. Longer would mean too late.

Only the EU has the capacity for such rapid deployment. (The US would as well were it not that Uncle Sam has two wars and an election on his hands.) Boshoff seems to think that an EU contingent would arrive ready, able and willing to use the weapons at its disposal.

The Europeans don't see it that way. French ForMin Koucher avers that any battlegroup sent to the Congo wouldn't be going there to fight but rather to assist in humanitarian operations.

Yeah. Right. Sure they will, Bernie. Or maybe you are of the belief that the men under General Nkunda will simply fold in panic and run like they were Congolese special forces when they see white dudes with guns get off the planes?

That may be the case. Nkunda has shown a willingness to turn peaceful before when the correlation of forces was not favorable. In any event the Congo way of war allows for time-outs. Even unlimited time-outs.

Should the threat of EU intervention or the efforts of UN and other negotiators and envoys prove successful in extending and broadening the ceasefire ordered by Nkunda, it would only signify one more destabilising, bloody and quite inconclusive military essay. The history of the Congo over its forty-eight years of independent existence is filled with such events.

Nkunda has an agenda. For the record he wants the immediate disarmament of the Hutu militia which he maintains is fighting alongside the Congolese National Runaway, Loot, Rape and Murder Force as well as preying on the Tutsi population along the Congo-Rwanda border. Also for the record is his objection to the deal between China and the Congolese central government which is valued at nine billion dollars. The deal exchanges rights to exploit mineral resources over a vast swath of the Congo in exchange for the building of a railroad and a highway.

Laurent Nkunda may well have a point there. The deal seems to be in line with the standard issue business transaction which has marked the Congo since Leopold I, King of the Belgians scarfed up the territory for his personal benefit. And, at the expense of generations of Congolese.

Leopold should have patented his business model since any number of foreign firms, usually backed by their governments have made similar "deals." Outsiders have exploited the natural resources of the mineral rich territory and the human resources of the people who live there for the benefit of the outsiders--and, of course, the insiders, the governing elite that make sure the deal goes down.

China has never been noted for making bargains that benefit the other party--beyond the local elite that made things happen and the security forces which protect the elite and the Chinese alike. Chinese involvement in the "development" of a country's resources will have no benefits for the people on the ground. Quite the opposite. After the Chinese and their local clients get up and running, the folks on the ground will look back at the bad old days of colonialism with fondness.

Don't believe the Geek? Ask the Burmese then. That is if you can get through to anyone who is not on the government's approved to talk to outsiders list. If that's too tough, try the Sudan.

The Geek has argued that the Congo is a geographic expression. A failing state that never really was. Well intentioned intervention by the UN, the EU or the US would only prolong the agony. Unnecessarily lengthen the time until the inevitable collapse of the Congo occurs.

Laurent Nkunda and his (highly probable) backers in Rwanda may be another passel of dictators and exploiters in the making. Then again they may not be of that mold. Nkunda has done something almost unprecedented in the dreary history of Congolese internal war. He called and enforced a ceasefire while the enemy and the UN peacekeepers were on the run.

Perhaps Nkunda and his backers want only a small portion of the vast territory called (for the moment at least) the Congo. Breaking away a piece of the geographic expression might be the necessary first step in creating a less bloody, more stable artifact--a collection of states based on population, on primary linguistic and cultural affiliations.

Sure it is unfashionable to argue that the dismantlement of larger entities into their several natural components is the best way to go. The Congo today like an artifact called Yugoslavia a decade and more ago points in that direction.

No man-made artifact lasts forever. Why should the Congo, the creation of one man's ambition, greed and skill be an exception?

If the locals want a unitary Congo it would be self-evident. It's not. What the folks who live there, love there and, all too often die violently there seem to want is an end to the Rumble in the Jungle and that means an end of the Congo.