Rebel movements and proxy warfare: Uganda, Sudan and the Congo (1986-99)

Abstract

Sudan and Uganda have for many years carried out an undeclared war. One little-known aspect of this conflict is the use of Zaire/Congo as an outside battlefield where proxy guerrilla organizations either fought each other or fought the armies of their sponsor's enemy. From a small scale prior to 1996, the conflict grew to occupy a major place in terms of men engaged and battles fought after this proxy war morphed into the bigger 'Congolese' conflict which developed from the fall of President Mobutu and lasted until 2002. IN MANY WAYS SUDAN AND UGANDA HAVE BEEN RUNNING an undeclared war on their common border since 1986. Sudan has been supporting a bizarre syncretic and millenarian movement, the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA),' which is still fighting the Museveni regime in northern Uganda. Meanwhile, Kampala has progressively given increased help and facilities to the Sudanese People's Liberation Army (SPLA) which is fighting the Khartoum regime in the southern Sudan. But what is often not noted is that this undeclared war has also been fought, largely through proxies, on the territory of the neighbouring Republic of Zaire, later the Democratic Republic of Congo. This proxy war has centred on the creation of the Allied Democratic Force (ADF), a coalition formed from a variety of antiMuseveni movements, aided and abetted by Sudan, and which has been active along Uganda's western border with Zaire/Congo. The proxy war has also involved other, less well known, rebel movements, such as the Former Uganda National Army (FUNA), the Uganda National Rescue Front (UNRF (II)) and the West Nile Bank Liberation Front (WNBLF). This largely neglected field of conflict has in fact been a main motivating factor in Uganda's growing engagement in the Congo. Only later did economic motives begin to replace Kampala's initial security concerns. One reason why this 'side-show' has received little attention is that the patterns of this Gerard Prunier is at present the Director of the French Center for Ethiopian Studies in Addis Ababa. 1. See Box 1 for a full list of acronyms used.