INTRODUCTION
This is an article about how a quiet, body building, martial arts fan became the President of the DRC. It will trace how fate and luck placed him in that seat. How Joseph led child soldiers called kadogos on an epic march in an adventure most people would call improbable. How Joseph unlike most men with money and power has stayed faithful to his sweetheart of his early days and made her officially his wife despite them already having children. How Joseph was nearly executed by his father. How a friend of his father’s hid him and was to later put Joseph in a Zimbabwean Jet fighter and flew him to Kinshasa to succeed his father. How Joseph survived intrigue which started with people doubting his very nationality.
Joseph Kabila
PART 1 IN THE BEGINNING
Joseph Kabila’s exact place of birth and even nationality is disputed. His father had many children with many women of various nationalities. What is well known is by the 1980s he was his father’s aide and right hand man. Papa Kabila was based in Dar-es-Salaam and had a small army supposedly fighting Mobutu. He would occasionally cross the border into the then Zaire burn down a small town and wait. Rumour had it then a briefcase of dollars would find its way to Papa Kabila and the war would be over until the next time he was out of cash.
With many wives and children as well as his followers to look after his cash needs where quite high. In Dar-es-Salaam Joseph Kabila was the guy who organised the dad’s businesses and handled his important guests. He was known to be a body building and martial arts expert. He had an awestruck admiration of Arnold Schwarzenegger and had a tattoo on his arm with the name written on it. Business was good with Papa Kabila owning real estate in Dar and Brussels, some hotels and lodges in Dar and running one of the biggest car hire firms.Joseph was a very sober young man and a bit of a linguist. He was honest and the old man trusted him more than other older sons. His disputed parentage was no big deal to Papa Kabila. This was his favourite son. Finish.
Then something happened in 1994 that changed everything. The Rwanda genocide. So upset was the African continent that covertly something was planned. A secret meeting with Namibia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Angola, Rwanda, Burundi, Libya, Chad, Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea, and South Africa took place.The argument was simple. The French, The Zairians (Mobutu) and the former Hutu government of Rwanda had conspired to kill 1 million Africans. The bill was due. Zambia and South Africa where against military intervention but surprisingly Zimbabwe, Namibia where for it. The Rwandese wanted the Hutu exiles crushed and wanted Mobutu out. The pan African and troublemaker Gaddafi had a bone to chew with Mobutu while Eritrea, Ethiopia wanted to liberate Zaire from its oppressive backward leader. The Rwandese with the help of Burundi offered to do the job. They had faced Zairean soldiers before and their assessment was the FAZ (Forces Armee du Zaire) was a hollow corrupt shell. So if they were going to invade they needed a Zairean face. Papa Kabila’s name came up. He had never worked for Mobutu was known as a revolutionary having fought with Che Guevara and was available. The deal was done.
Papa Kabila sent Joseph to talk details with Kagame and Joseph ended up talking to James Kabarehe. James Kabarehe is possibly the best military commander in recent history in Sub Saharan African history. More about him later. Joseph Kabila and James Kabarehe hit it off. The planning sessions where surreal. These guys were seriously planning to march across Zaire 2,000 kilometres!!! Most of the Rwandan Patriotic Army staff thought it lunacy!!! How do you feed guys over a supply line anchored in Dar-es-Salaam and Mombasa passing through Kampala and Kigali and stretching all the way to Kinshasa? But plan they did.
PART 2 – MARCHING TO KINSHASA
As the whole of Africa ganged up to get rid of one of Africa’s most colourful dictators, Joseph Kabila changed career. From running deals with his Dad in Dar es Salaam he was now going to become a soldier. He had a good teacher, the affable James Kabarehe. James Kabarehe was the real brains behind the operation and was intelligent, ruthless and innovative.James Kabarehe was born in 1959 and was part of the Ugandan based Rwandese exiles who fought for Yoweri Museveni in the NRA from 1981 to 1986.
They were part of the Ugandan Army and because they were very intelligent and dedicated dominated Museveni’s Army. They used this to launch their own invasion of Rwanda in 1990.
James Kabarehe was to distinguish himself with unconventional but effective tactics and became military adviser to Paul Kagame.
Now with the rank of Brigadier General he was commanding the force to invade Zaire and topple Mobutu. Help came from everywhere. Zimbabwe and Uganda provided weapons and ammunition. Uniforms and boots came from Zambia and Uganda. Ethiopia provided training and equipment for engineers to bridge rivers. Eritrea trained Rwandese and Burundian troops how to sail boats. Gaddafi provided everything from money to material.
Museveni opted to help by invading as well to not only grab north eastern Congo for the rebellion but to crush several rebels lurking in the jungles there. The rebel force called the AFDL was under Joseph although an old army general was the nominal head. The Rwandese assembled a force that was equipped to move fast and strike hard. Reconnaissance was done by 2 man teams on scrambler bikes equipped with binoculars and a walkie-talkie. They would probe ahead looking for the enemy and his positions. The advance guard would then hit the enemy hard after infiltrating enemy positions while the main force would then arrive from either flank to encircle and crush the enemy.
The Rwandese had decided on a plan that would help solve the logistics problems. Zaire had something most African countries did not have. Because of the vastness of the country, every town or city in the country had an airstrip. Not the usual grass strip but surfaced runways. So as they captured towns they would seize airstrips and airports first. They could then use these airports to fly in supplies or men or both.
In a stunning campaign James Kabarehe planning was proved right. Joseph Schwarzenegger Kabila proved to be brave and full of energy. The two smashed Mobutu’s army as the battle hardened Rwandese and Congolese kadogos swarmed and danced around every enemy they met. At Kisangani they ran into mercenaries from Serbia, France and South Africa and handily beat them. So paranoid did the white mercenaries become they began to beat up and detain innocent people.
No one had ever trained them to fight soldiers who used motorbikes to infiltrate positions and suddenly attack from the rear. Nor were they prepared for enemies who silently slipped past your position and then waited alongside the road you used to get to the battle front. They would then attack the Serbs head on and as the Serbs fell back they would be hit from the roadsides. The Serbs ran away by commandeering a plane at Kisangani airport and leaving behind lots of weapons and equipment.
In six short months the impossible happened Rwanda with AFDL help marched across Zaire and captured Kinshasa. Mobutu’s army had collapsed and except for the Military Intelligence troops, the Paratroopers and Brigade Kamanyola. Each time the Zairian Army had engaged the Rwandese and AFDL they were beaten badly.
A proud Laurent Kabila was able march down the broad avenues of Kinshasa and into the Presidential Palace. Joseph loved this soldiering stuff. His days of organising car hires, counting daily takings from the bars in Dar where over. “Schwarzenegger” wanted to be a soldier. He talked to his father. He got his wish. His father sent him to the National Defence College in China. James Kabarehe become Congolese Army chief. These two decisions by Papa Kabila would come back to haunt him.
PART 3 MAKING NEW FRIENDS!!!
Papa Kabila was President of Zaire but it was right now a poisoned chalice. So rich is the DRC in minerals that people have failed to describe the cornucopia of wealth under the ground. “A geological scandal”, “An embarrassment of riches”. Diamonds, gold, copper, zinc, lead, coltan, cobalt, silver have all been mined and are mined in Zaire. These minerals have been the bane of the local people. These minerals where used to make Mobutu Sese Seko one of the wealthiest men in the world.
Papa Kabila was from Katanga Province the richest province of all. Mobutu had negotiated some lucrative mining deals just before leaving power. He needed someone to renegotiate these mining deals and organise financing. The Democratic Republic of Congo had a shortage of people skilled in banking and finance as well as international trade. There where Congolese, Zaire was renamed the Democratic Republic of Congo by Papa Kabila soon after kicking out Mobutu, living abroad who had these skills. But could they be trusted?
Papa Kabila may have been a Marxist but he was a tribalist or at the very least a regionalist. He had a preference for working with people from his region, Katanga. If they were not from his own Baluba tribe, he would rather have Bembas (just like in Zambia, in Congo a large group of tribes speak Bemba and are called Bemba because they speak Bemba even when they are not Bemba at all. In actual fact there are no real Bembas in Congo) or Lundas (his mother was Lunda). He needed a guy who knew modern business, who could deal with the British, Americans, South Africans, Australians, the Chinese, the Israelis and the Americans. It went without saying he had to be from Katanga.
Someone recommended a South African based Congolese businessman, Augustine Katumba Mwanke, a Bwile by tribe. Katumba Mwanke, was Bemba speaking and was born in Pweto a small town near Lake Mweru and Zambia. Katumba Mwanke was an Engineer by training but had spent more time wheeling and dealing on an international scale than working as an engineer. Augustine Katumba Mwanke was to be the main man behind minerals in Congo for the next 15 years. He was now appointed the Governor of Katanga province and his main remit was to sign deals that would raise money for the Government fast. The government needed money quickly to pay the civil servants and the army as Mobutu had left empty coffers behind him. The only source of revenue was royalties and advance payments from people who wanted to mine the minerals of the DRC and the biggest hoard lay in Katanga and the man who now held the key to Katanga’s minerals was Katumba Mwanke.
The biggest reason Joseph Kabila is President of the DRC is down to two men, Laurent Desire Kabila and Katumba Mwanke. Without the assistance of Katumba Mwanke Joseph Kabila would not have been President. Furthermore without Katumba Mwanke’s fund raising skills Joseph Kabila would not have won two elections in 2006 and 2011. Lastly without Katumba Mwanke Joseph Kabila could have lost his life.
Another key Kabila appointment was Eddy Kapend. Eddy Kapend was to become one of Papa Kabila’s most trusted aides and had an office right next door to Kabila. Eddy Kapend was a Lunda by tribe and from Katanga and a member of the Lunda royal family. He was connected to the Angolan government as he had links with the Katangese Tigers, a rebel force that had twice invaded Katanga from Angola in 1977 and 1978 and had even been involved in the Shamwana coup plot in Zambia of 1980. The Katangese Tigers had a fearsome fighting reputation and had only been stopped in both invasions by French, Belgian and Moroccan troops as they had swept aside Mobutu’s ineffectual Forces Armee du Zaire (FAZ). This Angolan connection will feature prominently in parts 5 and 6.
Now why did Kabila find himself at war hardly a year after triumphantly sweeping into Kinshasa? One word POLITICS. Kabila found a hard core civilian opposition that had stood up against Mobutu and had forced him to abolish his one party state. These guys now wanted their reward too. Free and Fair elections. After all they may not have used guns and bullets but they did fight for DRC’s liberation as well. The DRC had developed a vibrant media who bravely reported the news as they saw it and very quickly Papa Kabila found himself on the defensive. His every move criticised and scrutinised.
One issue that would not go away was the fact that Kabila’s government was dominated by men from Eastern and Southern Congo while Western and Central Congo where woefully under represented. A particular source of disquiet where the Rwandese and their Congolese Tutsi cousins the Banyamulenge. The Banayamulenge where Tutsi brought over from Rwanda in the 1930s to work as clerks and bureaucrats and as farmers by the Belgian colonial masters. The Tutsis turned out to be more organised, more amenable to western education and therefore where found in the civil service and other organisations in numbers far outweighing their proportion in the population. This trend continued after independence and led to a backlash.
Mobutu withdrew the citizenship of the Banyamulenge and proceeded to make them a scape goat for his economic problems. The Banyamulenge who now occupied a portion of Eastern DRC had protested and said they were Congolese!! They had been in Congo for many years and knew no other home. Infact some parts of Congo are populated by Tutsis. So when Kabila’s Rwandan led ragtag army swept across DRC on its way to victory, a large portion was made up of Banyamulenge.
With Kabila now finding himself a dictator but in an atmosphere that still had a free media, the criticism that he was a Tutsi stooge stung!!! Even worse was when he was called a Rwandese/Ugandan puppet. That was the last straw.
The Rwandese had officers and officials inside the DRC government. For instance, James Kaberebe, as Army commander, was retraining and rebuilding the Forces Armee Congolese (FAC) to be a modern army. He had RPA (Rwandese Patriotic Army) troops assisting him. He and his boss Paul Kagame became aware of a trend of anti-Rwandese sentiment. Furthermore Kabila was putting the Interhamwe and the ex- Forces Armee du Rwanda troops in camps but it seems he was not controlling them. The Rwandese realised their time might be short in Congo if Papa Kabila stayed in power. They began secretly stockpiling arms and also began ensuring their troops were concentrated and not scattered across the vast DRC.
Kabila meanwhile also began to look for friends further afield to less his dependence on Uganda and Rwanda. Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe and Dos Santos of Angola where quickly committed to help. Mugabe began implementing a two pronged plan to get some benefits out of helping Kabila. First of all Zimbabwe began re-equipping and rearming the FAC. In deals worth as much as $200 Million. The Zimbabweans won contracts to supply everything from boots to mortar bombs. Infact so large where the Congolese contracts that Zimbabwe Defence Industries had work for the next three years nonstop, On the civilian side Zimbabwe won deals to supply the mines with all sorts of consumables and even had lucrative mining concessions with one to this day still in operation a diamond mine in Mbuji Mayi. The ties with Kabila where so strong that prominent Zimbabwean businessman Billy Rautenbach became the head of Gecamines, the Congolese mining parastatal. Rautenbach even gave the government of Kabila a US$45 Million loan!!!! Rautenbach’s Wheels of Africa trucking firm became very, very busy in Congo.
Papa Kabila now announced that Rwandese and Ugandan troops had to leave Congo immediately. Furthermore he fired all Rwandese from the positions they held. However even he could not have bargained for what followed. James Kaberebe had been planning for this day. All he needed was a provocation and but even he could not have bargained for what followed, mobs roamed the streets of Kinshasa looking for Rwandese or Tutsis, lynching and killing.
At the time James Kaberebe had been summoned home to Kigali by Paul Kagame and was briefing Kagame when news came in of what was happening in Kinshasa. Once again Kagame gave James Kabarehe a mission many people would have thought impossible. Get the RPA battalion trapped in Kinshasa out and to overthrow Kabila was his operation orders. From this he crafted a brilliant plan.
PART 4 NEW FRIENDS, OLD FRIENDS WAR COMES BACK to CONGO
It was war. Papa Kabila felt the Rwandese did not respect him. He felt there was a limit to the gratitude he had to feel for the Rwandese. Little Rwanda, one fortieth the size of Congo want to rule us he remarked to his aides. Now his actions to show that he was independent of Rwanda touched off a war. The beating and burning of the Rwandese and Tutsis on the streets of Congolese cities and towns, touched off the war. James Kabarehe planned for a swift decisive blow. He had inside knowledge of the Congolese Army having been its commander a scant two weeks before. He knew Papa Kabila well and had worked closely with him. He personally knew all the commanders and had an encyclopaedic knowledge of who would fight and who would not. He felt Kabila did not have a stable military force to keep him in power. His army of kadogos, the child soldiers mostly from Kivu where no match for a disciplined well led force. However Kabila had some things going for him. The Rwandese did not have many troops in Central Western and Southern Congo. In eastern Congo, the Rwandese quickly switched insignia from Congolese to Rwandese Army and with their Banyamulenge allies quickly took over Eastern Congo. In the north the Ugandans pushed west to Kisangani.
However Congo is a very large country. From the southern Capital Lubumbashi to either Kinshasa the national capital or Kisangani the eastern capital are both further by air than Johannesburg, South Africa!!! Goma in the east is a three and a half hour flight from Kinshasa.
James Kabarehe’s plan to seize Kinshasa was audacious in the extreme. He intended to seize the airbase at Kitona 300 kilometres south west of Kinshasa. He then would push north to the Kinshasa Matadi highway. He would then roll straight up the highway and surround Kinshasa before storming the city. He told the Kinshasa garrison to fight its way out and hide out in the jungles around Kinshasa. They would then infiltrate back into the city and lead the Kitona force into the city.
Because of the size of the Kinshasa garrison and its heavy arms, Kabarehe planned to use the heavy equipment stockpiled at Kitona. Kitona held one of Mobutu’s best units and equipment. They had been exiled there for re-education and re-orientation by Papa Kabila. Also with them where some of kadogos sent to Kitona for punishment. The ex-Mobutu troops would operate the heavy equipment and the kadogos would provide readymade scouts and reconnaissance troops.
However the big obstacle with the plan was Kabarehe was 2,000 kilometres from Kitona in Kigali how would he get there? The solution was simple. Kabarehe simply seized the planes on the ground at Goma airport. He marched his troops in and four heavily laden planes took off separated by 30 minutes intervals Kabarehe had a man in each cockpit who was on the radio and the plan was simple. The lead plane would land at Kitona then Kabarehe and his men would seize the terminal and negotiate with the troops based there. Kabarehe knew the troops at Kitona had not been paid for months so the first plane into Kitona carried a special cargo. A pallet full of cash. Congolese francs for the troops, and for the officers Kabarehe carried several briefcases full of dollars!!!!
Kabarehe told the pilot to make what was basically an emergency landing at Kitona. The plane came in low and fast and landed in a very short distance and out of all the doors came piling heavily armed Rwandese troops. They quickly spread out and grabbed the terminal from the dazed Congolese troops. They captured a jeep and drove it to the plane. They loaded the Jeep full of bundles of brand new plastic wrapped cash. There was pandemonium at the airport!!!!! Kabarehe had arrived with cash to pay the troops! The negotiations with the senior officers lasted minutes with chunks of dollars handed out. 30 minutes after landing three other planes landed full of Rwandese troops and a small Ugandan contingent.
The march to Kinshasa was on.
The first signs that things where dangerously wrong in Kinshasa was when garrisons in Bas Congo failed to report and then the commander at Banana reported he was under attack by Rwandese troops before he fled. Papa Kabila frantically tried to call the Kitona garrison, forgotten and unpaid and received no answer. One look at the map and it was obvious what was going on. Someone was cutting off Kinshasa from the port of Matadi and was advancing north east on the Kinshasa Matadi road. Meanwhile a full scale mutiny in Kinshasa by the Banyamulenge troops and some of the kadogos was underway. The Rwandese troops in Kinshasa had somehow managed to slip out of the city. The Congolese Army smashed the mutiny but the whole city was tense and panicky as the first fleeing soldiers and civilians from Bas-Congo arrived with tales of hordes of Rwandese troops on the march. Papa Kabila acted fast. He flew to Lubumbashi first and established himself there before flying to Harare to meet Robert Mugabe. He also phoned Sam Nujoma his old Dar-es=Salaam friend. Sam Nujoma and Kabila had even been in a Marxist study group together in the early 1970s in Dar –es-Salaam.
Mugabe called an emergency SADC meeting and there SADC split into two groups, the Zimbabwean and Namibians wanting immediate military action to save Kabila while South Africa, Zambia, and Botswana and company looking for a negotiated settlement. Angola did not take any sides. When the meeting ended Mugabe told Kabila not to worry.
Mugabe had a lot at stake, Zimbabwe had literally billions of dollars of deals in the works or in the pipeline and if Kabila was toppled would lose everything. He called in the commander of the Air Force Air Marshal Perence Shiri. Perence Shiri was a unique officer. He had served in the Zimbabwean liberation forces as a ground soldier and after Independence commanded several units including the notorious 5th Brigade. He had then been ordered to learn to fly and given command of the Air Force. Perence Shiri got his wings and by sheer hard work and effort had transformed the Zimbabwean Air Force into the most professional air force in Sub Saharan Africa. Perence Shiri may have been a political soldier but he was a thoroughly professional one!!!
He then quickly assembled a force to defend Kabila. Pouring over maps the Zimbabweans decided they needed two main bases to operate from Kamina in Katanga and Ndjili or Ndolo in Kinshasa.
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Kamina is the biggest airbase south of the Equator. Bigger than anything in Sub Saharan Africa including South Africa. Built by the Belgians to house a NATO force in case of a nuclear war Kamina had massive hangars, huge fuel storage facilities and servicing equipment. The corrupt Mobutu had also piled weapons and aircraft into Kamina.
Zimbabwe’s well-trained military entered the war as the best equipped side. The Airforce of Zimbabwe (AFZ) deployed six Chinese F-7s, C.212 transport planes, at least four Cessna 337G Lynxes, and most of its helicopter force including Alouettes, Bell 412s and Mi-35s, to Congo. Unlike most African Air Forces the Zimbabweans had a very well trained and capable cadre and could maintain and fly all their aircraft without external help. The Zimbabweans who were already under a British arms embargo bought spares from Kenya for its fleet of Hawks and deployed them as well.
The No.2 AFZ Squadron deployed BAe Hawks T which were used as strike-fighters and equipped with AIM-9B Sidewinder AAMs, Mk.82-series bombs, and Hunting BL.755 cluster-bomber units (CBUs), as well as launchers for unguided rockets. No.5 squadron deployed its Chinese made F-7 Air Guards and these were used as Combat Air Patrols to intercept Rwandese and Ugandan transport flights as well as backup strike craft. No.3 Squadron, was the transport squadron and deployed 12 CASA C-212 Aviocar and six Britten-Norman BN-2A Islander light transports. No.7 Squadron, equipped with Aerospatiale SA 316B Alouette IIIs where used as heliborne transports for Special Forces and VIPs as well as resupply for high value items and liaison. No.8 Squadron, equipped with Agusta-Bell 412SPs with underslung rocket pods as well as the newly acquired Mi-35s provided close air support as an alternative to the Hawk fixed wing air support.
The Zimbabweans moved into Kamina and setup a forward base and maintenance facilities. Mobutu had based his personal DC-10 and Mirage jets here and therefore there was ample maintenance equipment and a fully equipped machine shop. The Zimbabweans quickly sent an advance party to Kinshasa and set up communications, logistics and other arrangements. Then the fastest deployable units in Harare where flown in. 1 Commando based at Cranbourne barracks near to the Airport, the Zimbabwe SAS based at Karbit Barracks also next to the Airport and 1 Parachute Regiment comprised of paratroopers based at Inkomo Barracks north of Harare.
These three units where all part of the Zimbabwean Special Forces Command. 1 Commando is a Counter insurgency force trained to fight insurgents. Soldiers join one commando after a Selection phase which include four-day navigating day and night in the Zambezi Valley while carrying a 30 kg weight on an empty stomach. Further training curriculum includes river crossing, mountain climbing, reconnaissance, anti-hijacking, sniping, unarmed combat, tracking and bush craft. Also included is jungle survival on wild fruits and natural remedies for medical treatment.
One Parachute Regiment is similar to 1 Commando however its troops are delivered into combat by parachute. They will jump into combat pursue the enemy and eliminate them. In Mozambique while chasing Renamo, 1 Para had sometimes jumped into combat on the same day in two areas three hundred kilometres apart!!!
The Zimbabwean Special Air Service has a speciality of infiltration and silent movement. Troops were trained to remain invisible to the enemy and where trained to avoid heavy fighting. Their job was reconnaissance and ambush. In one famous episode, the Zimbabwean SAS was reputed to have killed a group of Renamo bandits by flying over their bases and dropping sacks of heavily weighted and sharpened nails which had silently and quietly rained down on the camp killing all the occupants.
The troops were at 2 hours’ notice assembled and driven to the airport. So sudden was the deployment that one commanding officer arrived in Kinshasa in his golf attire having been taken from the golf course and put on a plane to Kinshasa.
The Zimbabweans quickly secured the airport and got established at Kamina and quickly began to operate an air bridge between Kinshasa and Harare with Kamina established as a maintenance and logistics base. Zimbabwean planes of various types now made the 3,500 kilometre flight from Harare in hops. From Harare to Kamina then to Kinshasa. Zambia graciously allowed use of its airspace.#
Within 24 hours a small air force was on the ground in Kinshasa. Hawk fighter jets, Alouette and AB412 Griffon helicopters, and CS 212 transports. They now had to locate and engage the enemy approaching from the south west. The Zimbabweans did not have good intelligence but relied on the Congolese and they quickly flushed out Rwandese reconnaissance troops hiding out in Kinshasa and the surrounding hills. In several firefights the two forces clashed and took their measure.
The Rwandese where motivated and hard fighters, the Zimbabweans professional and disciplined. In the fighting the Zimbabweans and their Congolese allies defeated the Rwandese. Several Rwandese owed their lives to the Zimbabweans who captured prisoners rather than burning or torturing them unlike the unruly Congolese. Kabarehe meanwhile was driving hard for Kinshasa. In typical Rwandese Army fashion. Lightly armed advance troops in jeeps fanned out ahead and on the flanks to probe the enemy forces ahead and then reported back on the radio of enemy positions and strength while the main column pushed on or by passed objectives. He grabbed the Inga dam and the water works supplying Kinshasa and switched off power and water to the city.
Kabarehe’s biggest problems where his Congolese allies. They were looting and stealing and raping. So the planed three day dash looked like becoming a one week march. 400 kilometres in 6 days is still very fast especially considering he had a column of thousands of troops. However the delays by the Congolese had fatal results.
On the third day of his dash north eat to Kinshasa, his rear guard began reporting attacks by strange aircraft and a strange enemy. When they captured a prisoner, the news was bad, the Angolans where in the war. The Angolans decided the devil they knew was better than the devil they did not. They wanted Kabila in charge in Congo.
They flew a task force into Cabinda which borders Bas Congo. The task force was a fully armed Angolan Army brigade and was more heavily equipped than the WHOLE Rwandese Army. The task force was also accompanied by Mi-24 choppers and SU-25 ground attack aircraft. This force then struck southwards into Congo and attacked the Rwandese along the Kinshasa-Matadi road. When Kabarehe’s rear guard was engaged by the Angolans they could not hold off the Angolans who had tanks, planes and choppers. The Rwandese where forced to retreat into the hills and hide from the Angolans. The Angolans began to follow Kabarehe up the Matadi Kinshasa highway!!!!
The news got worse for Kabarehe when his advance guard ran into an ambush by another new and unseen enemy. The lead probing column of Rwandese jeeps was ambushed and hit by an enemy who killed 18 men and destroyed several jeeps before melting away without being seen!!! Kaberebe had ran into the Zimbabwean SAS!!!
While his advance guard was reporting back to Kabarehe, they had been trailed silently by the SAS who now called in air strikes. The Zimbabwean Air Force Hawks and helicopter gunships caught the massive column trundling up the road to Kinshasa and promptly bombed it!!! The Rwandese and Congolese had no missiles to defend themselves against air attack but had Chinese anti-aircraft guns mostly clones of Russian ZP-1s, ZP-4s and ZU-23-2s.
The column was savagely mauled by the Zimbabweans but Kaberebe got everyone organised and punched straight through the light screen of Zimbabwean SAS and sent hunter killer teams into the bush looking for the Zimbabweans. The Zimbabwean SAS melted into the jungle and the pressure of the hunter teams was such that they were unable to give the exact position of the column.
The Rwandese decided they were going to take Kinshasa and suck the Angolans and Zimbabweans into street battles. The Rwandese then made one of those lightning attacks that knocked their opponents off balance. Rwandese troops smashed through defending Congolese and Zimbabwean troops and grabbed part of the airport. A big fight erupted as the Rwandese and Zimbabweans fought for control of the airport. The result was a strange battle with planes for both sides landing and taking off in the middle of firefights on the contested runway. Each side occupying an end of the runway with The Rwandese holding one end of the airport, the Zimbabweans another end. Ndjili Airport has one of the longest runways in the world, 4700 meters long, this allowed the Zimbabweans to resupply despite only holding half the runway, Zimbabwean planes would land offload supplies and take off without switching off engines. The Rwandese were also able to get one flight in of much needed supplies and ammunition.
The Angolans and the Zimbabweans managed to finally beat off the Rwandese attempt to take Kinshasa. When they finally pushed the Rwandese out of the airport, James Kabarehe was now faced with a dilemma his attempt to knock out Kabila had failed but he still needed to get back home to Kigali.
He managed to break free of the Angolan and Zimbabwean task forces. He gathered all his men and their dependants and he retreated back to Kitona but with the Angolans massing to smash him how could he get out. He and his staff brainstormed and then realised that southwards in Angolan territory was another airport at Manuela do Zombo. If he grabbed it and moved his force there, he could bring in the planes to fly his men out!!!
Kabarehe moved southwards from Kinshasa crossed the Angolan border, first smashing a small Angolan force at the border then defeated an Angolan battalion and grabbed the airport at Manuela do Zombo. He then in his usual style sent out jeep mounted patrols to ensure his perimeters where secure.
The airport at Manuela do Zombo was only 1400 meters long. For him to get all his men out and his loot as well he needed an airport of a minimum 1800 meters long. He set up base and had a bulldozer and other equipment flown and working day and night began lengthening the run way!!!
The Angolans attacked several times but each time where defeated by the Rwandese. For six weeks Kabarehe held off the Angolans. His troops used a leap frog style defence and relied heavily on surprise and ambush. Kabarehe eventually escaped. He got everybody out. The men he brought out from Rwanda, the Kinshasa garrison everybody went home to Rwanda. The last group of soldiers including Kaberebe ran to the plane while shooting it out with the approaching Angolans.
How did Angola get involved in DRC? After initial reluctance, who changed Dos Santos’ mind? Joseph Kabila!!! Sent by his father to plead the case for intervention, the Angolans did not want a hostile country on their northern and eastern borders. The experience of Mobutu supplying and arming Holden Roberto and later Jonas Savimbi convinced Dos Santos he had to ensure Congo was in the hands of an ally. Kabila was that man. Joseph Kabila was with the Angolan Generals Miala and Kopelipa as they fought the Rwandese.
James Kabarehe and Joseph Kabila had been friends, infact Joseph had been with James Kaberebe when he first captured Kinshasa. James Kaberebe had even kept Kabila and another Congolese rebel called Anselem Masasu in a posh house in a lakeside Kampala suburb. James Kabarehe had phoned an ecstatic Papa Kabila to inform him that he could move to Kinshasa and take his seat as President, Now Joseph was fighting to keep his father in power. Joseph was fighting his old friends and had made new friends.
PART 5 – PAPA KABILA BREAKS THE PEACE
The Congo War had rumbled to a stalemate and the Zimbabweans, Angolans, Namibians, Chadians had stabilised the front against the Ugandans, Rwandese and Burundian troops.
Papa Kabila was short of guns, short of men and even short of victories. Joseph “Schwarzenegger” Kabila his favourite son, was now commander of the Congolese Army. With the help of the Zimbabweans and Angolans he had managed to keep the major money spinners for the Congo out of Rwandese and Ugandan hands with the diamonds of Mbuji Mayi and the copper, cobalt, gold of Katanga firmly in Kabila’s controls.
A whole host of characters where now involved in many intrigues and plots around the DRC. One of the surprising players was a young Israeli businessman. Dan Gertler was a young (27 years old) Orthodox Jew. His family was rich from trading diamonds but Dan Gertler wanted to be his own man. Born in December 1973, Dan Gertler is the grandson of Moshe Schnitzer, who was the founder and first President of the Israeli Diamond Exchange and 2004 winner of the Israel Prize (the most prestigious award issued by the State of Israel) for lifetime achievement in recognition of his contribution to Israeli society and the State.
An enthusiastic diamond-dealer even as a teenager, Dan Gertler learned the secrets of the trade not only from his father but also from his grandfather’s life-long experience. He spent time with both of them during school holidays and whenever else he was able. Even while carrying out his three-year mandatory service in the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF), all of his free time was spent either at the offices of his father or grandfather, learning and practicing the essentials of the diamond business. He started his own firm and looked at where he could get his hands on diamonds. Congo looked like a good bet. Not only did Congo have a lot of diamonds but in neighbouring Angola a lot of diamonds where smuggled into Congo. Dan may have been a very young man but he always thought big.
He flew into Congo and studied the situation, he then made a fantastic contact. Augustine Katumba Mwanke, Governor of Katanga and money man for the Kabila government. Katumba Mwanke, the cool, suave polygamous Bemba speaking Katangese governor who had a soft spot for Joseph Kabila and who fet there there was something about this big earnest intelligent young Jew.
Katumba Mwanke introduced Joseph Kabila to Dan Gertler and a lifelong friendship began.
Dan Gertler spun a story that both Katumba Mwanke and Joseph Kabila found tempting. Dan Gertler’s startling offer was as follows for $200 Million with $20 million paid upfront could Papa Kabila give him a monopoly on all diamonds in the Congo? $200 million was a lot of money. It would enable Papa Kabila to create a new army and pay it well and equip it. Gertler even threw in the offer of Israeli military gear and trainers. Papa Kabila liked the proposition and went for it hook, line and sinker. Short of cash and men, Kabila ever the nationalist felt he did not want to depend on foreigners even if they were friendly foreigners.
UNITA where losing the war but to keep the war going, they needed to sell diamonds. Their Ugandan and Rwandese friends could help and so could their Zambian friends but none of these countries had the necessary connections and networks to move large quantities of diamonds. Congo has diamonds. Lots of diamonds more diamonds infact than Angola, so many diamonds that UNITA could safely hide their diamonds among the Congolese diamonds.
UNITA began to get diamonds into Congo and Kabila cash hungry as usual eventually got into the act. Discreetly so as not to piss off the Angolans UNITA diamonds found an outlet through Congo.
The Angolans began to get intelligence of UNITA diamond operations in Congo. The Angolan President. Eduardo dos Santos, a Soviet trained petrochemical engineer, is outwardly a very quiet and reserved man. This however does not mean he is not a decisive and ruthless man. Dos Santos was not one to allow treachery of the level exhibited by Kabila to go unpunished.
Dos Santos had men close to Kabila who were reportedly reporting Kabila’s activities to Luanda. Kabila’s trust of people from Katanga had led him to Katumba Mwanke. It had also led to appointing a Portuguese speaking, former Katangese Tiger, and Eddy Kapend as his military aide. Infact Eddy Kapend had an office next to Papa Kapila. The commander of military forces in Kinshasa was General Yav Naweej, a royal Lunda prince who was also connected to Luanda.
The kadogos were very restless. These where Kabila’s boy soldiers and where Papa Kabila’s most loyal troops. Nicknamed the “little green men” in reference to the colour of their boots, they were best known under the name “kadogos” the “child soldiers”. They had been with Kabila since the early days of the rebellion against Mobutu. Ranging in age from as young as 10 to as old as 25, these where the children who had fought for Kabila. They had marched right across Congo. Infiltrating enemy positions, the Zairean Army and the Zimbabweans as well had not caught on that the little boys playing around their positions where spies and in certain cases snipers and soldiers!!!
In October 1996, when the rebellion against Mobutu started in the east of the former Zaire, these children were in the hundreds. Then, along the way, more than 1500 kilometres through a “country-continent” they became thousands. Dressed in in their olive green uniforms, their bare feet in rubber boots. They were young, very young. Sometimes as young as ten years old. An Astonished city watched as they entered Kinshasa on 17 May 1997, without firing a shot and always walking in long columns. Well-disciplined and very loyal to Kabila, the residents of the capital nicknamed “kadogos” the “child soldiers.” The kadogos where led by Anselm Masasu, a young man born in Bukavu Southern Kivu in 1969.Masasu was a close friend of Joseph Kabila. In 1996 they had even lived together in a house in Gabba Beach, Kampala Uganda.
The kadogos being young and illiterate where basically forgotten in the hustle and bustle of forming a new government. They guarded Kabila but they did not get promotions or the cars others enjoyed and even their pay was irregular. One incident embarrassed the Kabila regime. One day, Mrs Kabila was driving out of the Presidential Palace when she was confronted by a mob of young kadogos. They shouted out Maman, maman nous avons faim (Mummy, mummy we are hungry). She was visibly annoyed as nearby Mzee Kabila was dining al fresco with guests, both Ministers and businessmen. She told them to go to the chicken run behind the palace and kill all the chickens there and eat. The young soldiers did as she said. It was however an ominous sign. The kadogo were getting ideas beyond their status.
In November 2000, the war was hotting up once again in Katanga near Pweto. Papa Kabila sent Joseph to Pweto and built up a big force there. He also asked for help from Zimbabwe who provided artillery and armour. Papa Kabila had bought T-62 tanks from North Korea and had rearmed the army. Joseph recently returned from a military course in China would lead the new offensive.
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