BY T.J. FIGUEROA
CAPE TOWN, South Africa - Large-scale military clashes have broken out in southern Africa. In early August, a military rebellion opened against the government of Laurent Kabila in the Democratic Republic of Congo (formerly Zaire), which directly affects neighboring Rwanda and Uganda. Imperialist governments, particularly Washington, Brussels, and Paris, are maneuvering to stake out a position in the region. U.S. president William Clinton has ordered two warships with 1,200 Marines to head for the Democratic Republic of Congo.
At the same time, the government of Angola is mobilizing troops in response to renewed assaults by the reactionary National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), led by Jonas Savimbi. Since 1994, the Angolan government and UNITA have operated under the terms of a United Nations "peace" accord. The U.S., Russian, and Portuguese governments are "monitoring" the accord. A U.S. official said the Angolan government has been warned not to do anything "precipitous."
The big-business press is once again presenting the events in the region largely as a consequence of alleged ethnic hatreds between those of Hutu and Tutsi background. But while some forces are using appeals to reactionary nationalism along these lines, these are class, not "ethnic" conflicts.
Kabila, a former businessman, stood at the head of an armed rebellion that ousted dictator Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire in May 1997. Kabila's march on Kinshasa reportedly had strong military support from the governments of Rwanda and Uganda. The Rwandan government in particular, which opposed Mobutu, also wanted to put an end to armed raids by militias in eastern Zaire that had participated in the massacres in Rwanda in 1994. As many as half a million Rwandans were butchered that year, especially those of Tutsi background. The slaughter had its origins in the social relations foisted upon the African toilers by colonial powers Germany and later Belgium.
The forces fighting Kabila today comprise 19 battalions consisting of about 15,000 troops. The rebellion includes former officials of Kabila's regime, a cross-section of the military, people of Rwandan birth and Tutsi background living in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, and - according to Kabila - Rwandan troops. Kabila says Rwanda has invaded and that his troops will take the war back into Kigali. The government has locked up hundreds of "Rwandans" in the capital, and some government-run radio stations are urging listeners to "take revenge on the Rwandan Tutsis."
A spokesperson for rebel commander Jean-Pierre Ondekane claims their objective is to "end all forms of dictatorship" and "promote peace and security in the Congo and the sub- region." They charge Kabila with corruption and nepotism. A factor in the apparent support of the governments of Rwanda and Uganda for the rebellion is that both are under pressure from the so-called Alliance of Democratic Forces, a loose guerrilla coalition including former supporters of Mobutu and loyalists of the previous Rwandan government.
Press reports have indicated little if any popular support for either Kabila's government or the rebels. As of August 17, the rebellion was said to be encountering very little opposition and had already taken major towns in the east and west of the country. Some news reports stated that the rebels might be within Kinshasa, the Congolese capital, within a week of that date.
These events will also have consequences for neighboring Angola. As the Angolan people won their independence from Portugal in 1975, UNITA launched a civil war - backed by Washington, Pretoria, and Kinshasa - to prevent the coming to power of a government led by the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA). For more than a decade, successive attempts to overturn the MPLA government - including armed invasions by apartheid South Africa - were smashed with the decisive assistance of Cuban internationalist troops, who fought alongside the Angolan army.
UNITA participated in elections in 1992, but refused to accept the results - it lost. Savimbi's group resumed armed attacks until 1994, when it signed agreements that it never implemented to dismantle its army and become a normal political party.
Since May, Savimbi's troops have retaken more than 100 localities throughout Angola, consolidated their control over a large swath of the country's diamond-producing regions, and killed hundreds of people. In response, the government deployed 18,000 troops in regions under its control.
The UN Security Council has provided de facto encouragement to UNITA, while claiming that it wants to forestall war. UN envoy Lahkdar Brahimi said in early August that UNITA needs sufficient "political space" to comply with the accords. Meanwhile, the Security Council called on both the government and UNITA to cease "hostile propaganda, refrain from laying new mines and to stop forced conscriptions. The two parties were urged to renew efforts towards national reconciliation."