The First Offensive UN Force

A bit of history was made the other day, you may have missed it because it pertains to that Africa place everyone's heard so little about, specifically the Democratic Republic of Congo (or Congo for the rest of this post[1]). 

Conflict in eastern Congo has gone on for decades. All of Congo's neighbors have gotten involved at various points both directly and through proxies. The climax was the First and Second Congo Wars, Africa's deadliest conflict. Rwanda in particular has always been involved, partially to carry on fighting against Hutu militias that participated in the genocide. It is pretty much common knowledge that Rwanda sponsors rebel groups in eastern Congo.

Anyway, for the first time in UN peacekeeping history, a unit of 2,500 peacekeeping forces in Congo have been given an "offensive" mandate. Meaning they have been instructed to actively "neutralize" and "disarm" rebel groups. Unarmed US drones will also be deployed to assist with the fight. To assuage fears that this historic precedent is a historic precedent, the UN says the intervention force will be created "on an exceptional basis and without creating a precedent", oh politics.

In reality this is more of the UN making official what it has been trying to get away with in other conflicts. UN and French peacekeepers intervened on behalf of rebels (now the government) in Cote d'Ivoire, under the justification of protecting civilians from government forces. So now, in eastern Congo at least, its official, the UN has taken sides.





1.   Not to be confused with The Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo's western neighbor.