WHAT IS A DEFENE PACT?
A defence pact (or treaty) is a formal
covenant between states to enhance the defence and security capabilities of its
signatories. In a general sense, it can range from a non-aggression
pact, to a broader joint "friendship and cooperation" security treaty
to a very specific military commitment for mutual defence against aggression or
to protect sovereignty and/or territorial integrity and/or strategic defence interests. (Nowa
Omoigui, www.dawodu.com, retrieved June
2016).
Usually pacts
are written agreements that seek to protect the military alliance and interests
of signatories. It is diplomatic demonstration of “injury to one is injury to all”, an arrangement that NATO
represents. As exemplified by the
alliance between the United States and Israel, a serious but informal
defence alliance may exist between states in the absence of a formal pact. Also
the current scenarios playing out in Syria (with Russia/Iran) and Yemen (with
S’Arabia and Iran clashing interests) typify the fascinating mix of classic and
contemporary unwritten (albeit informal) pacts. The case of Syria is
particularly curious as it continues to find itself an echo and stubborn
vestige of the Cold War that officially ended close to thirty years ago. Bashir
Al-Assad’s government is Shia in nature while his adversaries including the
much feared ISIS are Sunni. Iran that sees itself as the deliverer of Shia
moslems worldwide fear the fall of another Shia power as a pointer to the
complete domination of Sunni ideology across the world, hence, its decision to
arm and support the Assad regime. “Tehran has bolstered its client state by
dispatching senior military figures, pressing its Lebanese client Hezbollah to
send fighters, providing much-needed petroleum products and extending Syria a
hefty line of credit (Barak Barfi, http://nationalinterest.org/feature/the-real-reason-why-iran-backs-syria-14999.
Retrieved June 2016).
Again, Russia considers Syria a strategic ally in the Middle
East that has continued to see increased United State economic and military
presence. This competition dates back to the Cold War Era. Hafez Al-Assad (Bashir's father) found
a willing ally and big brother in the Russians to square up against the
unsurprising military exploits of the Zionist who had American backing however
wary they are of the communist ideology. Russia in turn needed a client-nation
to counter US presence in the Mid East and Syria’s sentiments perfectly fit her
cast. These same alliance still resonates till today. In Yemen, Houthi rebels are supported by the same Iranian government in an uprising that started in 2014 against the Sunni led Yemini central government. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia started air strafing of Houthi and Iranian targets.
However, due to personal and historical influences,
examples abounds that suggest that even without state-to-state pacts, combat
troops can be sent to aid friendly governments in crisis. The deployment of
Nigerian and Egyptian troops to Guinea to assist in repelling a Portuguese
naval invasion launched from Guinea-Bissau in the night of November 21-22 1970
is a case in point. (Nowa Omoigui, www.dawodu.com,
retrieved June 2016). Also, Israeli
forces in 1976 without any known pre-existing treaties used Kenya as a base for
its commando operation in neighbouring Uganda during Operation Thunderbolt.
One is tempted to consider the AU and
ECOWAS Missions in peacekeeping as an institution of defence pacts. However,
from the perspectives of speed of deployment and nature of assignments, one
cannot consider Missions as fulfillment of pacts. Troops in Missions are
largely on peacekeeping (as opposed to combat) assignment and deployments
cannot be made by a unilateral decision of one country.
DEFENCE PACTS & COUPS IN AFRICA
To place this in context, we must
understand how defense pacts may work to prevent or contain coups either as a primary
or secondary objective. The possibility of defence pacts as an effective
deterrent to the activities of would-be coup plotters should form an exciting
academic research topic as critics sometimes invoke the fact that many African coup plotters underwent training in Western
military academies as evidence of the inefficacy of defense pacts. Some
have argued that the teaching of uprightness and constitutionalism within the
walls of Western military academies could not have anticipated the “lack of
character of political leaders within the chaotic reality of African societies
in transition on the other” (Ronald Matthews. Forecast for
Africa: More Plots, More Coups. New York Times, April 10, 1966.) This, by
itself, is considered a source of internal conflict among such soldiers and
officers, reducing their threshold for mutiny, according to Omoigui.
As a matter of personal opinion, the
following factors should ordibarily serve as deterent to plotters:
i. intelligence
gathering and sharing: since coup plotting is often than not planned in
secrecy, intel sharing by superior-surrogate arrangements would intimate the
leadership of a possible usurpation by disgruntled military elements. This is
practical in the sense that most coups in Africa are not without the knowledge
(and some times, active consent or participation) of European powers …Britain
& France are major culprits. It goes without saying that coups frequently
succeed when the colonial powers allowed it. Even in such circumstances that
coups are planned, executed without the knowledge, consent, encouragement
and/or participation of these ‘superior’ powers, counter-onslaughts are quickly
organized to crush such rebellions. Examples abound of how French forces are
deployed to this end, atimes ostensibly to ‘secure French assets and interests’
or as implementation of existing pacts.
It is this regard that the moral standing of the UK government’s refusal (as we
shall see) to help crush the Jan. 1966 usurpation has been question and the
associated peculiarity of the Nigerian polity examined.
ii. Arrangements
that tie the internal security system of the country to those of a major
foreign power complicate matters significantly, since the neutralization (or
co- option) of the (usually highly sophisticated) internal security system of
that country becomes an integral part of any plans for a coup. Even if
the system is beaten, danger looms after the plot is hatched, for a massive
military counter-response - unless the guarantor state supports the coup from
the outset or is pacified through post-coup policies. According to Edward
Luttwak, this is the main reason why one of the essential prerequisites of a
successful 'independent' coup is for the target country to be relatively politically
independent (Edward Luttwak: Coup d’Etat - A Practical
Handbook. Alfred Knopf-Random House 1969). Examples of
this principle will be discussed with reference to Senegal-Gambia,
Senegal-Guinea-Bissau, South Africa-Lesotho, Tanzania-Seychelles, Nigeria-Sierra
Leone and others. The interesting thing about the African
environment is how often (with some obvious exceptions), these interventions
have also taken place with no formal mutual defense pact in place (Nowa
Omoigui, www.dawodu.com).
WHEN PACTS HAVE SUCCEEDED IN PREVENTING
COUPS
Gabon 1964
As previously noted, the maintenance of
friendly African governments in power was an important, but secondary and
somewhat discretionary aspect of the Francophone defense pacts, depending on
French economic interests (Uranium) and the closeness of the personal and
political relationship to specific regimes. Thus, when on February 17/18,
1964 some young army officers opposed to the imminent one-party rule,
successfully kidnapped and took control from President Leon Mba, a battalion
strong taskforce of French paratroopers under the command of General
Kergaravat, having first secured Libreville airport as a staging area, flushed
them out of the army base at Baraka 36 hours later, restoring the government to
power. The official political request for French intervention from Vice-President
Yembit came only after the coup had already been crushed. Leon Mba
was rescued from captivity after the coup had failed. Crucial early
intelligence that a coup was in progress and that French intervention be
undertaken actually came directly from Omar Bongo, the Gabonese Chief of Staff
who contacted the local French garrison commander
immediately. Again, after Mba died some years later from
a long illness, France oversaw the peaceful transition of power to Omar Bongo,
the then Vice President. Much later, in September 1990, two coup attempts
were unmasked before execution with the help of French military intelligence.
The East African Mutinies of 1964
Like Nigeria, Tanganyika, Uganda and
Kenya were former British colonies. What happened in those countries in
1964 provides an interesting "live exercise" in foreign military
assistance to the civil power for internal security. The details of the 1964 East African
British intervention illustrate the importance of strong domestic political
will and quick thinking followed by the rapid deployment and concentration of
superior forces at decisive points. An interesting detail is also that
although these former colonies had typical commonwealth post-colonization
defense agreements (involving the retention of British officers and NCOs in
transition to Africanization), formal mutual defense pacts were not in force.
The week of January 20-25 1964, witnessed a chain of army rebellions in three
East African countries. The ostensible reason was that disgruntled soldiers
were demanding better pay as well as the dismissal of British officers still
commanding African units. Fearing the syndrome of a "creeping
coup", and acting at the request of the governments of Tanganyika, Uganda
and Kenya, citing existing defense relationships as well as the collateral
agenda of saving British lives, crack British troops were simultaneously
launched against mutinies in all three countries.
Tanganyika, which had been German
territory (by treaty) since 1884, was allocated to Britain under a League of
Nations mandate after World War 1. It became independent on December 9,
1961. Just off its coastline, the island of Zanzibar, originally
ruled by the Sultanate of Oman in the 18th century, had been a British
protectorate since 1890. It became independent on December 10, 1963. But
barely one month later, tensions between the majority indigenous working class
African population and the dominant minority Arab land-owners, exploded into a
violent anti-Arab revolt which took place on Sunday, January 12,
1964. Abeid Amani Karume and Abdul Rahman Mohammed led it. Like a
"domino", the fever of revolt soon spread to engulf Dar es Salaam, in
neighboring Tanganyika (as well as Kenya and Uganda). On Monday, January 20,
troops of the Tanganyika Rifles deposed their British Commander, Brigadier
Sholto Douglas, seized the capital, and began rioting, looting and killing,
demanding more pay. News reports claim 20 people died with at least 100 others
injured ("African Fire Brigade," West Africa (15 February 1964),
169). President Julius Nyerere initially played along, avoiding any
direct public criticism of the soldiers, but eventually, made an urgent appeal
to Britain for help, risking a backlash of African nationalist criticism from
Ghana’s President Nkrumah among others.
On Saturday January 25, 1964, a British
naval artillery barrage shook the shores of Tanganyika. Under the command
of Brigadier Douglas, 60 commandos of the 45th Royal Marine Commandos (usually
based at Aden in the Arabian Peninsula) were moved onshore by helicopter from
the Aircraft Carrier, Centaur, sitting off the Indian Ocean coast. Heavily
armed with small arms and squad automatic weapons, supported by a single
bazooka antitank rocket launcher along with thunderous noise from "naval artillery,"
they overpowered 800 Tanganyikan soldiers at Colito (10 miles north of the
capital) in 40 minutes. During the "naval bombardment" from the
Centaur and its sister ship, the Cambrian (a Destroyer), blank powder charges
were used. The surprised Tanganyikan mutineers were so mesmerized by the
intensity of the fireworks that they gave up quickly. Three of them were
killed and a large number were wounded. No British commandos were hurt.
While the unit at Colito was being pinned
down by concussion and deception, 600 additional British commandos were
airlifted with their trucks and equipment directly into Dar es Salaam airport,
in the capital. 150 commandos stayed behind to secure the airport while
about 450 troops fanned out into town heading for key strategic locations
including the State House, radio station, telephone exchange, overseas cable
office, airport and the quarters of government officials. These objectives
were quickly secured. Meanwhile, paratroopers had dropped from the skies over
Tabora (450 miles west of the capital) and Nachingwea (260 miles south, near
Mozambique) to complete the immobilization of the entire Tanganyika Army.
By noon, it was over. With the
situation under control, Nyerere went on national radio to announce that he had
decided to disband the Tanganyika Army and set up a new one.
Members of the Youth Wing of the Tanganyika African National Union were called
up to register as recruits for the new army. In his broadcast, delivered
in Swahili, he described the mutineers as "intoxicated with the poison of
disloyalty and disobedience..". He stated that the mutiny was "the
most disgraceful" event in the history of the country. He also went
on to say that "No popular government can tolerate an army that
disobeys its instructions. An army that does not obey laws and orders of
the people's Government is not an army of that country. It is a danger to
the whole nation." (British Put Down African Mutinies in Three
Nations: London sends in troops after calls from Tanganyika, Kenya and Uganda.
New York Times, January 26, 1964.) A few months later, early
in April 1964, units of the Nigerian Army were airlifted into Tanzania as part
of a phased "African" transition from the old Tanganyika army to the
new one. To this day, Tanzania, in spite of some internal problems, has
had civilian rule and the Tanzanian Armed Forces have been highly focused on
external missions.
Kenya had been self-governing since
December 12, 1963 barely two days after Zanzibar gained independence. It,
too, was affected by the wave of revolts. In response to a plea by Prime
Minister Jomo Kenyatta, troops from the Royal Horse Artillery were initially
mobilized. Using 6 Ferret scout cars, they launched an armored car assault on
the 11th battalion of the Kenya Rifles in Lanet Barracks near Nakuru where
there was a sit down strike by 150-armed Kenyan soldiers who had taken over the
parade ground. As the ferrets arrived, rebellious snipers fired at them
from rooftops. To shake up the rebellious troops, one of the ferrets then used
a .50 caliber machine gun to destroy an empty hut in the barracks - in the full
view of the soldiers. This action seriously affected the fighting spirit
of the mutineers who promptly gave up their weapons. In the meantime, families
of British soldiers attached to the insurgent unit, took refuge at the Rift
Valley Club and Stag's Head Hotel in Nakuru. Simultaneously, 700 additional
commandos (mainly Scots Guards) were strategically airlifted at two-hour
intervals into Nairobi Airport from bases in Britain and Cyprus in an emergency
night operation lasting well into the following day. They fanned out to
town to guard the radio station; the Prime Minister's Office, Police HQ and the
Post Office. After British troops took full control, Jomo Kenyatta went on
Kenya radio to condemn the mutineers and promise that they would be
court-martialed.
To this day, since 1964, there has only
been one known serious attempt to seize power in Kenya. It was the failed
attempt by the Kenya air force against Kenyatta’s successor, Arap Moi, in
1982. In response, President Arap Moi disbanded the air force and began
an aggressive policy of trade-off with the Kenyan military. It must be
mentioned too that a small permanent administrative logistic element called
BATLSK (British Army Training and Liaison Staff Kenya) is still located on the
outskirts of Nairobi, Kenya. Under a defense agreement, three British
infantry battalions a year carry out a six-week exercise called Exercise GRAND
PRIX. In addition, a Royal Engineer Squadron is deployed to carry out a civil
engineering project. Whether these transient ‘training’ units played any role
in crushing the 1982 coup has never been publicly clarified. But
there has not been any coup attempt since then. However, environmental
damage and injuries to nomads and cattle from unexploded British munitions
remain a source of intermittent irritation in Kenyan-British relations.
The Ugandan Exception: Like his other
East African colleagues, Prime Minister Milton Obote requested British
military action. Using burp guns, thirty handpicked soldiers of the
Staffordshire Regiment supported by Scots Guards attacked and overwhelmed 300
rebels at Jinja on the northern edge of Lake Victoria. The first phase of the
operation involved a direct assault through the main gate, heading directly for
the armory. They seized it before the surprised soldiers became fully
awake, as 450 additional British troops surrounded the base. As in Kenya,
the families of British soldiers attached to the unit were evacuated to Lake
Victoria Hotel in Entebbe, from where they were airlifted to Nairobi. Uganda,
(a country created by Lord Lugard out of the Bantu kingdoms of Buganda,
Bunyoro, Ankole and Toro) seemed the least agitated of the three nations at the
time. However, subsequent events were to prove complicated. After the
1964 crisis, Obote began to distance the Uganda military from its British links
and gradually began raising the profile of the Israelis as technical partners
and trainers. He also developed a penchant for covert operations in the
Congo. Using then Paratroop Colonel Idi Amin, he not only set up
camps for Christophe Gbenye, [successor to Lumumba and opponent to Mobutu], but
also collected gold and ivory which was then used to buy arms for the so called
"Simba" rebellion against Mobutu, then Congolese Army
Commander (Uganda’s New Military Ruler: Idi Amin. New York
Times, January 28, 1971).
While the armed forces of Tanzania and
Kenya were focused on less controversial external self-perception enhancing
pursuits to buy time for the legitimization of their political classes, the
domestic misuse of the military ultimately proved Obote’s undoing. After
independence on October 9, 1962, Obote initially tried to "integrate"
Buganda with the rest of the country by getting his party (Uganda Peoples
Congress), then a minority in parliament, to accept the Kabaka as Ceremonial
President of the whole country. This was achieved in 1963. Then, he
moved to use state patronage to lure coalition ministers away from their
parties until he had a clear parliamentary majority. Once this was
achieved, he broke off the coalition even as personal, religious, ideological
and "North-South" ethnic disputes tore his cabinet apart. On
April 15, 1966 during an internal power struggle that actually began in
February, Obote convened parliament and asked it to function as a constituent
assembly in changing Uganda's constitution. He made the country a unitary state
under his rule and deprived the kingdom of Buganda its federal status.
Claiming that he was trying to put down an army coup, he detained many
politicians and got cabinet approval to cede total control of the Ugandan army
to himself, pushing the President (Sir Edward Mutesa II) aside. He then
appointed his friend and fellow northerner, then Brigadier Idi Amin (a Moslem
Kakwa from the West Nile district) as Army (and Airforce) Chief, replacing
Shaban Opoloto, whom he had initially made Defense Minister before sacking him
for allegedly plotting a coup.
Reacting to all these events, the Buganda
legislature asked the Central Government to leave Buganda. Obote responded
by sending in the Army to sack the palace of the Kabaka. In 1969, Obote
survived one of many assassination attempts, after which he declared a state of
emergency and banned all opposition parties. In late 1970, with political
tensions in society now playing out within the military, he tried to remove
Amin from headship of the Army on charges of embezzlement of defense funds
along with accusations that he was selectively recruiting soldiers from his
ethnic group to challenge the dominance of pro-Obote Acholi and Langi
groups. On January 25, 1971, an increasingly disaffected Major-General
Idi Amin, allegedly encouraged by Israel and Britain, overthrew Milton Obote
while the latter was returning from a Commonwealth leaders' summit in
Singapore (Obote is ousted by Ugandan Army. New York Times, January 26,
1971).
A subplot in this scenario was the
alleged desire of British intelligence to use Uganda as a base of operations to
assist southern Sudanese liberation movements against the Moslem north, which
Obote did not want to support. After seizing power, Amin initially feigned a
shift back toward Britain by requesting a 17-man British military training
mission (under Colonel Hugh Rogers). Then, he turned around and accused
the Team of organizing an invasion against him, expelling them a few months
later in September 1971. In early 1972, the 150-man Israeli military training
team was also sent packing, as Amin now embraced Libya as his new external
guarantor. The failed role of Libya during the 1979 Tanzanian invasion of
Uganda to overthrow Amin will be addressed later. To this day, Uganda remains
the only one of the three East African countries that survived the mutinies of
1964 with targeted external guarantor assistance to have experienced subsequent
military rule. It is noteworthy that while engaging in the dangerous internal
security dance that eventually brought him down, Obote had no External
Guarantor modality in place. His attempts at an ethnic Trade-off
military control strategy backfired. Neither he nor the
Ugandan political system had achieved political legitimacy. To the
cheers of unsuspecting civilians, Amin used Obote’s
alleged violation of the Ugandan Constitution as his purported
reason for seizing power. As he pointed out, “Throughout my
professional life, I have emphasized that the military must support
a civilian government that has the support of the people, and I have not
changed from that position.” (Biography of Idi Amin
Dada. http://www.uganda.co.ug/millenium/amin.htm )
Comments
Post a Comment