March 3, 2025 • 37 mins
James talks to Kevin McDonald about the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the history and future of peacekeeping there.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Cause Media.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Hi everyone, and welcome to the podcast. It's James Today
and I'm joined again by Kevin McDonald. Kevin is a
retired officer fine the Irish Defense Forces with some special
forces and peacekeeping experience. Welcome to the show, Kevin.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Thanks, thanks very much for having me. And just as
a sort of disclaimer at the very start, any viewser
opinions that I expressed, the opinions of a retired senior
officers from the Irish Defense Forces can't be construed has
been in any way the views of the Irish Defense Forces,
not indeed that of the United Nations. So I just
wanted to but that I was there before we get
into it.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, yeah, not a UN or an Irish Defense Forces spokesperson.
Not that we've had many of those suppose on our show, Kevin.
We're here today to talk a little bit about the
situation in Congo and and perhaps more specifically like how
the peacekeeping mission there has evolved and changed and sort
of morphed over the years. So maybe just to begin with,
(00:59):
I can give an idea that like this city of Goma,
which is the capital of North Kivu Province, has recently
been captured by m twenty three rebels would explain who
they are people who an't familiar in a minute. It's
a city of about a million people. I believe that's
saying around three thousand people have been killed in this operation,
which is I mean, it's a massive.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Death toll in a short space of time, very.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Short space of time. Yeah, And some of the other
stuff I've heard, like at one point there's a prison
within the city which there was a jail break, and
they think a hundred of the women who were incarcerated
there were sexually assaulted and in some cases burned alive
after the jail break happened. Thousands of Congolese military and
police have surrendered a contingent of I believe Romanian private
(01:46):
military contractors were captured.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Yes, captured, surrendered either where they went into Rwanda. I
think about three hundred of them, which is a significant
amount of mercenaries.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Yeah, yeah, especially when we're talking about Romania, which is
not a vast country.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Understandably, a lot of things are happening in the US,
so people may have missed it, and like I think
people in the US, just due to the nature of
news being quite naval gazing here may not be as
familiar with the conflict in Congo, Like if they know
about it, it's from Warren's Evon songs or maybe from
maybe from a couple.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Of films, Lyer's Gone and Money. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Yeah, what's the other one?
Speaker 3 (02:22):
Roland, the Thompson Ganna. That's the yeah, Lowland, the headless Thompson.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
That's it. That's the one. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So let's
talk then about the various United Nations peacekeeping missions in Congo.
They've been there for since the nineteen sixties, is it
on and off?
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah? So the first mission in the Congo was or
No in nineteen sixty, and a lot of people would
say that that was the first UN mission, but as
I think we discussed the last time, the first YU
went mission was full scale war in nineteen fifty in Korea. Yeah,
and that mission is still in existence the UNC, the
United Nations Command. But I suppose speaking about the Congo specifically.
(03:04):
So in nineteen sixty there was seventeen newly independent states,
of which fourteen were from Africa, agreed to a call
from the U went to establish this mission in the Congo,
and Ireland answered the call as well, so we deployed
it was the first time that we deployed with the
UN and we had a battalion there from nineteen sixty
(03:26):
to I think nineteen sixty whenever the initial deployment ended,
and it was a fairly tough, intense introduction to peacekeeping.
In the early in nineteen sixty there was an engagement
between an Irish platoon and a large group of Beluba
(03:46):
tribesmen and there was nine Irish soldiers killed and twenty
six Belubas killed, and that was the first time that
Ireland kind of had to deal with that kind of
death overseas, so it was pretty traumatic. And then in
nineteen sixty one, you've probably seen the film The Siege
of Jariteville, but it recounts the true story of an
(04:06):
Irish company under COMMONDA. Pack Quendlin. His company was one
hundred and fifty eight roughly strong, and they were attacked
while they were at mass on a Sunday morning by
a group of between three and four thousand Catanganese well
armed soldiers backed up by French and Belgium and South
African mercenaries. They also had an attack helicopter and they
(04:27):
had an attack chest.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
I think he had some of the old Rhodesis in
there as well at that time.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, well yeah, unfortunately, anything for a fight,
but the Irish held out for I think over a week,
and they didn't give up when they ran out of water,
they didn't give up when they ran out of food.
It was when they had no bullets left they negotiated
a surrender thanks to the skill of the officers and
(04:53):
NCOs and men. Not one fatality on the Irish side. Unfortunately,
when they came home because they had surrendered, they were
treated like praias. For years it was seen like a
state on the nation. Now if God forbid, they had
fifty percent casualties that have been treated like heroes. Yeah yeah,
and it's only in recent years that they're getting the
(05:14):
recognition that they should have got back in nineteen sixty one.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
That's really interesting. I know they've been treated that way.
It's quite sad to hear.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
Yeah, yeah, it's a strange one and a lot of
the people that we will say shunning these officers and
NCOs and men. It's happened to serve to overseas and
like if the UN they tried once to resupply them
with ammunition from the year, but it wasn't successful, So
if the UN had fully supported that company, they would
have held out even longer. But I suppose that's that's
(05:44):
the way things things go. So that's the first mission
to the Congo, and I could be corrected. I think
sixty four or sixty five. It might have sort of
started to draw down then in nineteen ninety nine, after
it was the first the second war, or the UN
established monarch monu See and that lasted from nineteen ninety
(06:05):
nine until twenty ten when it was renamed and rechanged
into MINUSCO. And the difference between the two is that
MINUSCO is what we call an integrated mission, and the
three pillars of an integrated mission are the restoration of
the rule of law, the protection of civilians, and the
provision for long term recovery and democratic governance. So it's
(06:29):
combining we'll say, the force of a military presence, but
also there's special advises on justice and policing, on governance,
all that sort of stuff which you wouldn't have an
emission like UNIFILM, which we discussed the last time, yeah,
which is the earlier form of peacekeeping. So MINUSCO was
(06:50):
supposed to have left the country in twenty twenty four,
but they were given a I think a one year extension. Yeah,
and unfortunately now with the twenty three rebel advance, the
mission is relocating most of its staff evacuating others. The
difference between the two terms is very specific. You relocate
(07:12):
within the country and you evacuate out of the country.
And I also note that the some of the Hybrid
African Union peacekeeping operations there was I think thirteen South
Africans killed and in the initial stages of the of
the onslaught towards towards going. So that that's kind of
where we are with the with the I think at
(07:35):
the at its height with in twenty one twenty two,
there was probably a strength of twenty thousand. But if
you think the DRC is the second largest country in Africa,
vast and the eleventh largest country in the world, just
the size of just phenomenal. So you can imagine what
the Congo and this entire no more than Sudan, but
what the Congo and its entirety was back in the day. Yeah,
(07:58):
absolutely huge.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
Yeah, it's asked. It encompasses different climates, own different ethnic groups,
as we're seeing.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Right, two hundred main ethnic groups.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Yeah, Yeah, it's it's a fascinating place. It's a place
I've wanted to go for a long time. I spent
some time on the Congo Rwanda border a few years ago.
I'm not so far from going er actually like riding
riding my bike around, and it's a very interesting place
in terms of what Rwanda is a very interesting place
in terms of its relation to its neighbors. I think
people will probably struggle to conceptualize. I actually saw somebody
(08:30):
had posted on Twitter, somebody who talks about Syria mostly
like how on Earth is Rwanda invading Congo? And they
had like a picture, you know, and the land mass
of Rwanda. Ruanda is one of the smaller countries in Africa,
and Congo is obviously a vast country. Are you comfortable
explaining a little bit of like the Rwandan involvement.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
It's complicated and it goes back to the it is
genocide back in ninety four ninety four, I think you yeah.
And the the two Kivus, North and South Kivu, which
is on the border with Rwanda, there's a large amount
of ethnic Tutsis Congolese Tutsis there. I think what Rwanda
(09:12):
has always projected force into the Two Kivus and Catanga
because like literally that that's that's where the money is.
Of course Rwanda would say they don't, but they are
actively supporting and empty industry and have and most of
the twenty three, certainly the leadership would be ethnic conglese Utsis.
(09:33):
So ostensibly I think the raison deaths for Romanda's involvement
was to protect the ethnic Tutsis from Hutus that had
escaped from the from the the genocide. So it's complicated,
but if you kind of part those complications and think
of the money trail, it kind of leads to the
(09:55):
Two Kivus because seventy percent of the world's bolt, I think,
is kind of located between the Two Kivus, and then
you have gold, diamonds, all the other sort of rich minerals.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Yeah, incredible wealth in Congo.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
Yeah yeah, but I was reading that the estimated deposits
in eastern Congo is something like twenty three trillion, Like
it's off the wall stuff. Yeah, So it's no wonder
it's become the battleground that it has essentially since nineteen
sixty because in nineteen sixty, after getting independence, the Kivu
(10:33):
and Katanga wanted to secede back by belt and that's
kind of what kicked off a lot of the conflict
in nineteen sixty and the reverberations from that are still
are still kind of being felt and been exploited because
everyone wants to get a piece of the action, like
all the surrounding countries. So yeah, I see, I think
it was yesterday that the they're planning a meeting. I
(10:56):
think it's this week or this weekend to try and
resolve the afflict. And this time they're going to try
and include entry twenty three in the in the amazing
rather than ex Google. I don't think that the choice.
I mean they're heading down to Book of Auso.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Yeah, I mean A twenty three have said that they're
going for sort of the whole country now that they're
not you know, it's not as not a regional or
like you know, ethnic movement so much as a and
that they will M twenty three would say that they're
not like per se ethnic separatists, right, like I think
they would claim that they're like a Liberation of Congo force.
And then you've Burundi supporting the Congolese government. You know
(11:32):
that there's all kinds of as you say, like regional
and international actors because of the wealth in Congo, and
like let's Congo emerge from the DC emerged from its
colonial past. Right, it's always been destabilized by these actors,
both regional and international, who who wanted a piece of
that mineral wealth, and then they've created and sustained these
(11:52):
differences which have become I think there's some evidence to
suggest that, like certainly that they're like the ethnic differences
have become more pronounced and more like intransigent, I suppose,
or like you know, it's become more difficult for those
ethnic groups to co exist over time due to decades
of conflict, right and killing, and it's a very difficult
(12:14):
situation and it leaves people like the civilians living in
Goma today in a terrible situation where I think this
is the fifth time that people have attacked Goma, Like
it's certainly I think the last time was about twenty twelve,
was it when the last time M twenty three took Goma?
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Yeah, and that's that's when the which we've probably just
gossed later, the Force and Invention Brigade. Yeah, we took
Goma in twenty thirteen in a relatively shar space of time. Yeah,
compared to how long we took to more, they regained
it very quickly.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Yeah, So I think we break for adverts now. I'd
like to come back and discuss the Force Intervention Brigade
because I think it's something that people ought to understand
when we talk about peacekeeping. And we're back, okay, So, yeah,
(13:07):
you mentioned the Force Internsian Brigade, which is something a
bit unique within peacekeeping, and there's a lot of like
when people talk about peacekeeping, they'll be like, oh, why
aren't they fighting? Why aren't they like going and stopping
the things? And I understand why people ask that, So
can you explain a little bit about what the FIB
was and what it did.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
The concept of the Force Interventional Brigade was I think,
to my knowledge, it's the first UN mission that developed
that concept, and they actually changed the mandate to include
an offensive capability for U and troops as opposed to
defensive or separation of war in factions. This was full
on war fighting and what they had figured out because
(13:51):
the DRC is so big, but the footprint even with
twenty thousand troops the footprint on the ground was not
sufficient to say, as I said, one of the three
pillars of an integrated emissions protection of civilians, and they
were finding that very difficult. So they decided to use
a concept of protection by projection rather than protection by presence.
(14:15):
So not alone did they have the force and digans
from brigade, they had the joint protection teams and also
an idea of a rapidly deployable battalion. So the idea
was that the force and Divention Brigade would say, do
the heavy lifting, and then when hotspots that flare up,
they could choose either the rapidly deployed out the battalions
(14:35):
or the joint protection teams. So the idea was that
rather than having static positions trying to protect people, they
would go where the action was. That was the idea,
and in fairness, the FIB had artillery, martor snipers, attack helicopters, UAVs,
special forces then retook Gum And I don't know the
(14:56):
exact timeframe, but I think it was less than a
month of the problems and I think we touched one
at the last time we spoke, and I think this
was a specific problem to the how the FIB didn't
really keep going the way it should have is that
two of the men TCCs were Tanza, Vegan and South Africa,
and they would have had slightly different agendas in terms
(15:20):
of who they should and they shouldn't attack based on
the government's position. Sorry, true country from the countries. Excuse me,
I should have said that.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, yeah, it's a sea of acronyms here. I've tried
to avoid all these faction acronyms, but yeah, yeah, explain
that a bit, because when people think of the UN
or in peacekeepers or troop contributing countries, the only time
it comes on the news in sort of the global
north is when people from say Northern Europe or North
(15:52):
America are part of these UN peacekeeping missions. So they
think of people British troops, America and Canadian what have you,
yea in their blue helmets. Right that the vast bulk
of TCCs don't come from from Northern Europe. Right in Africa,
that the majority of TCC's or other African countries, I
think I'm right saying it's a majority.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
Yeah, Like like here here in in South Sudan, most
of the big battalions are Wanda, Nepal, Mongolia, China. Generally speaking,
in my experience in the Central African Republic and and
here a lot of the battalions come from Africa, which
which is fair enough. I mean it's it's their continent. Yeah,
(16:36):
and they should have a they should have a stake
in trying to faster piece and develop peace and and
and help countries in less or more dire situations than
they themselves perhaps are. So it's understandral point about about
different countries being aware of what the UN does based
on I take, for instance, everyone in Ireland knows about
(16:59):
the UN when and then all about the Irish and Lebanon,
and in Syria and in Africa. I'm sure in the
Nha Kingdom, because you've got a very small UN footprint. Yeah,
Cyprus been one, and there's a few of you guys here.
Generally people in the UK, I'm sure you'll be able
to enlighten me on this wouldn't have the exact same
intimate knowledge or even interest in the UN, yeah, because
(17:20):
basically they don't have a big footprint, deployable footprint.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah. Yeah. And it's the same with the United States.
I think it's not something that people think about for
the most part, and so like that's this question of
like why doesn't the un Certainly I think when people
saw what happened recently in Lebanon, they were like, why
are these peacekeepers? You know where you had these peacekeepers.
And we spoke about this in our last episode, right
being shelled being shot at. You know, the people were
(17:47):
asking why they went out there fighting, and there are
a lot of reasons for that, one being it that's
not what they're there to do. But yeah, when we
had this Force Intervention Brigade in Congo, they did some
good things, right, they were able to retake Goma, and
for the people who lived in Goma, I'm sure that
was very important, like that meaningfully improved their lives. But
like it also comes with these complications that you've addressed, right,
(18:09):
Like each of those those troop contributing countries, you need
everyone to be committed to like the same mission, I suppose,
and like if if your government is giving your armed
forces one mission that differs slightly from that which the
whoever's in commanded the force into gentry brigade hats, then
we get friction, right, or it's not as efficient as
(18:30):
it could.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
Be Yeah, I think I'm sure I mentioned this when
we last spoke. It's one thing developing a robust mandate,
but if the if the TCCs don't have the skills,
the experience, the training, the equipment, or the will to
enforce the robust nature of that mandate, well then the
mandate isn't really worth anything, you know. So it's it's
(18:53):
kind of like, yes, the FIB was extremely effective for
a while until it wasn't. Now whether that was a
lack of will on the TCCs or on New York
or mission leadership, I have no idea, but it was
a great idea and it worked and then it didn't work.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Plus the fact that the DOC wanted the mission to
downsize and eventually leave, that added to the should we
really invest in something when we're going to pull out
because the country doesn't want to see her anymore? Which is
again it's a fair point.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yeah, right, No one wants foreign troops in their country, right,
you know, walking around, especially you know, engaging their own citizens.
But I mean it's interesting. I was watching a speaks
the current president of the DC, Felix Tishi Sakedy. I've
tried my best to pronounce it correctly. It's not that diffrespect.
He was saying that the international community is bordering on
(19:52):
complicit in M twenty three to advance because of the
failure to do anything about it in a speech he
gave this week, And it was interesting because it had
previously been, like you said, for under very understandable reasons,
especially in the DRC, which has this long and horrible
history of colonialism, like the terrible things done in the
Belgian Congo. We've covered. There's a lot on basketsweenw the
(20:13):
show that we do. People can listen to that if
they want to. But like now he's asking for more help,
which is also understandable because you know, his military is
one hundred and twenty five thousand or so like and
a large number of that it's not very combat effective
forces maybe and they've just been overrun in Goma in
(20:34):
a big city, a city of a million people. So like,
where do you think we go from here? What's like,
we're at a very unique time in world history in
which the United States is it's doing some things with
his foreign policy. Like I mean, I don't know, I
won't really meant words about anything. It's terrible, but if
(20:56):
we talk about like USAID, right I was speaking to
people on the Thai Burmese border last week who were
telling me that USAID has turned off life support machines
as part of it to throwdown, and that people obviously
directly died as a result of that. There So the
US is not necessarily averse to having terrible consequences to
its whatever it's trying to do right now, which I
(21:18):
don't really have a good word for. So look, where
do we go from here with the US becoming more isolationists.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Well, let's discuss for a few minutes the alternatives to
UN peacekeep yep, and there's a lot of them here
in Africa. So you have the South African Development Community static,
the East African community. There was an African Union stroke
un Hybrid mission and therefore unimit which is closing. There
(21:47):
was a NEO mission in Somalia. There is the Lake
Chad based and Multinational Task Force. There's the Group of
Five for the Sahel. Then you had EU four which
was an EU force in Chad and in Mali and
subsequently became miner Cat in Chad and Minusma and Mali.
Then you have the EUTM mission in Mali, which I
(22:09):
was part of at one stage and another one in scenario,
And of course we have our mercenaries, you know, and
when it emerged that there was over three hundred of
them allowed into Rwanda, I was reading the report that
they were getting something like three and a half thousand
dollars a month, whereas the DRC soldiers were getting maybe
(22:32):
three hundred dollars a month. Yeah, you know, and these
guys were brought in to protect the minds because again
it goes back to money.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah yeah, yeah, platal resources, not people. That's a different thing.
So what if those like those African led peacekeeping missions
look like like you talked about these various like international
and regional groups.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
I think it's it's certainly worth a try, because dun
hasn't the ability, need the money izume to keep doing
these large, big missions. At one stage, the three largest
missions were MENUSCO, which were discussing MINUSCA and the Central
African Republic, and MINUSMA, which was in Mali. Mali's gone,
(23:14):
DRC is on the drawdown. Central African Republic is still there,
but I've noticed I spent four years there and obviously
have a keen interest in the place. But there has
been a big increase in anti anti French with a
Francophone country. Yeah, anti French and linked with a kind
of an anti UN sentiment. No, the special advisor to
(23:37):
the President is from Russia. Wagner, you had a big
part to play when I was there. There were key players.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:44):
Most likely they're inter linked.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, I mean, and they've done some things which are
horrific in terms. We've covered that as well with the
print Derma on the show. I did want to talk
about this because the US is talking about withdrawing its
sort of what we call soft power assets right around
the world, and I saw, like I forget who it
was saying, like, oh, let the chips fall where they may.
It's very obvious where the chips will fall in this
(24:07):
part of the world, right like when I was in Rwanda.
Every fancy road in Rwanda they call them Chinese roads
because they go from the mind to the airport beltion braces.
It's as naked a resource extraction project as you'll see
right now. China also does a soft power thing. They'll
build hospitals and these. You know, I forget where the
(24:28):
quote comes from, but like every time the US comes
we get a lecture and every time China comes, we
get a hospital. This will reorient the way these countries,
specifically in Africa, associate with the world right with the
US draw down and the United Nations not capable or
willing of sort of doing these massive peacekeeping missions. And
(24:53):
I think for very understandable reasons, groups like the EU.
You know, it's best not to have large deployment to
European and unmour what is in Africa for reasons that
are probably quite obvious. So like, yeah, we were likely
to see I mean, hasn't Wagner rebranded itself as the
Africa Core now?
Speaker 3 (25:11):
Yeah, I'm not sure who who's running it now, but
I'm sure the strings are being more closely pulled by
by Putin as opposed to having very loose control when
Pregosi was there.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yeah, it was given him like a standoff capability, was right,
This is just a PMC, nothing to do with me. Yeah,
but I would imagine after his drive to Moscow and
a subsequent demise, I'm sure that whoever is running the
Africa Core is much more tightly controlled by the criminal
I would I would imagine.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, it's like a British India Company kind of model,
like a sort of proxy colonialism, but very tight. Like
you say, it's just almost just like a different badge
on the same thing there. I think this is one
(26:05):
of the things that won't get talked about in the
next four years because the US media will talk about
the US a lot. Again, I mean they always do.
But I think people should be concerned about this about
the future for like multi national peacekeeping in Africa, and
more importantly, I guess the future for or interlink without
the future for human rights in Africa. What do you
(26:25):
see as like meaningful ways that people can advocate for
a future for Africa which is not just another set
of countries extracting resources and leaving very little for the
people there, which is something that has happened. You know,
I'm a British person. This has happened by British people
for a very long time and other European people for
a very long time. But like that doesn't mean that
(26:46):
we shouldn't try to stop it happening in the future.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
That's a difficult one to answer, because yeah, ideally African
problems should, in my opinion, be solved by African nations,
and that's the reason that the African Union and all
these other ones that I mentioned I think are an
attempt to do that. Yeah, And certainly Europe and the
(27:13):
US shouldn't be dictating how Africans government themselves. They should
be assisting in good governance, good policing, good judiciary. But
it kind of goes back to money again, because there's
so much of a vested interest. I heard a figure
that twenty three were getting eight hundred thousand dollars a
(27:33):
month from some of the mines in the Kivus. I believe, so, well,
get that kind of money floating around, a lot of
people maybe don't want to sort things out, and it
may suit to leave the mayhem there and use all
these artisanal miners who are getting paid a couple of
cents a day. And Rwanda has just got a big
(27:54):
contract with the EU in terms of diamonds.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Yeah, I mean that is the thing, right, we can
hell where this stuff comes from, Like there is a
means to try and limit the amount of these resources
which you can leave conflict zones in a way which
benefits belligerent parties. It's where the markets for those resources
are willing to do it, right.
Speaker 3 (28:16):
Yeah, And everyone has mistaken the plat whether it's the
overseer of the mind, whether it's the company that owns
the mind, whether it's the people that move the product
from Kivu into someone's neighboring country, and then ultimately the
people that bias commercially in Western Europe or around the
(28:36):
rest of the world.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Yeah, yeah, and it's it's not you know, people think
of diamonds a lot, and I think people that there's
been a kind of movement to purchase diamonds which you're
ethically sourced, or to just not use diamonds, to sort
of move away from them as like a store of value.
But it's also the parts in your mobile phone, isn't it.
It's not you know, it's not just like fancy engagement
rings because.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
This is it. Yeah, you wouldn't a bit double the
price for more ethical mining methods most people probably earn.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
Yeah, that's the thing, right, and especially when it's out
of sight, out of mind for most people, even compared
to you know, we obviously genocide Palestinian people or the
you know, when we think about these other atrostees, right, like,
those have not remained out of sight out of mind,
because they're visible in people social media because you know,
(29:29):
people in Palestine have phones and they can film, and
that's I think meaningfully changed the way. Like I wouldn't
have thought American people would care about Palestinian people. I
moved here in two thousand and eight, and you wouldn't
have found much interest in Palestine.
Speaker 3 (29:47):
You wouldn't have expected them to promote ethnic cleansing of
guz Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
I know you well, you wouldn't have expected that either.
But the movement like to support Palestinian people from the
grassroots and then also the government doing the exact opposite.
You know, It's come from the bottom up. It hasn't
come from like government advocacy. But we don't see that
as much with certainly this part of Africa, right like,
and it's I expose it's contro it's goings of like
(30:13):
people in Congo maybe aren't able to access those global
networks of like social media and maybe to share their stories,
you know. And I think it's also a consequence of
us in the media not reporting at all, you know,
Like I've for years tried to sell stories about Africa
to American publications and at best they'll want a story
(30:34):
about like the people who are starting like social enterprise
European or North American people starting like social enterprises or
like sort of beneficial companies. And I understand it's have
a role, but like, you're not going to persuade me
that there isn't a single African person of interest to you,
and that like it's someone who came from North America
that is the only relevant story to tell in Africa.
(30:57):
And like I've had this falling out with so many
editors over the years that like, no, I don't want
to tell that story. I want to tell a story
about people from Congo and Congo, about people from Rwanda
and Rwanda.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
I live in the town towards the west coast of Iland,
and there's a guy from there. What I'll do is
I'll send you a link. Yeah, yeah, but he's passionate
about getting free education in Africa, between online courses and
online libraries. Obviously, the more education you get, the better
chance you have of having a better life. So yeah,
(31:30):
I think of some stuff and I'll send an Auntie
and then you can figure out whether it'll be an
interesting topic or whatever. But I just literally as we
were talking, I was thinking of how one guy is
trying to change conditions for younger people in Africa and
trying to give it to them for free.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
That's it. Yeah, that's the key. It is like people
doing it. One of the things that people did which
I thought was really great as an example as a model,
is from October about October the tenth of twenty twenty three.
I suppose people weren't going to school or university in Gaza,
and very quickly there weren't any universities in Gaza because
(32:05):
they all got bombed. Right, the colleagues of mine in
academic departments started putting on seminars and lectures that Palestinian people,
be they displaced or still in Gaza, but with access
to internet, you know it's still displaced but internally displaced,
could attend and continue with their educations. And I thought
that was a really great, like solidarity based way to
(32:28):
facilitate access to something that people have had taken away
from them through no fault. There weren't by state aggression.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Absolutely, yeah, there's a model for that. I mean, colonialism
has done many terrible things, but it's given us a
common language with a lot of our African friends. You know,
you speak French and English, you can do quite well,
So like, yeah, there are things available, and I wish
people would I don't think people should stop caring about Palestine,
of course I don't, but I do wish they would
(32:55):
care more about people in Africa too, because like, they
don't deserve this any more than anyone else.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
I was born in nineteen sixty when the first mission
went to to the Congo. Yeah, and it's been going on,
like I'm sixty four, it's been around sixty four years. Yeah,
so no more than the problem with the Palestiniots, I
think some people, unless you have a specific interest in
(33:22):
it or feel passionate about it, a lot of people
just I think, chuwe out and to go to the
next pronouncement from the White House, you know, clickbit.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:33):
So I think it's a sad fact, but it's the
factor I.
Speaker 2 (33:37):
Think, Yeah, yeah, it's a shame. And like you know,
if there's one thing I'd like to do with my career,
I'd like to spend more time in that part of
the world and do more reporting. And I think we
could do a lot with as a media with just
explaining how life is for everyday people, because people think
about Congo in terms of yeah, the m twenty three
(33:58):
in the Congolese government and who too, militias and this
and that, But the vast majority of people are just
trying to get on with their day. You know, they
want a better future for their children. Yeah, and you
know the fact that your mobile phone it's cheap, it's
maybe making their children's future worse. And that's something that
we need to reckon with. And e cares Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I mean this is the thing. People don't talk about
electric cars. It's so as weird. It's all that stuff
(34:21):
come and then even here in America right whether the
US trying to mind lithium on reservations where you know
the land there's little land it's left indigenous people to
have sovereignty on it's where it's now trying to do
this very invasive form of mining. Kevin, you've written a book,
So would you like to as we wind down here,
do you want to expend a little bit about about
your books so that if people are interested in your
(34:42):
life and your time as a peacekeeper and an archaeologist.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Okay, so what starts on off as a lockdown Prodridge.
When COVID hit back in the day, I decided I
would write an account of my weird of wonderful life
for my just from my family, and we'll just start
writing as or no doubt where you start remembering. And
suddenly I was at something like a hundred thousand words
and I thought, right, there might be a book in this.
(35:06):
And I know, obviously I'm opinionated about my own book naturally,
but it's not just a book about some random military
guy waffling on about his military career. I've a separate
career in mountaineering and kind of nearly a separate career
in archaeology, so it's it's a mixture of soldiering, mountaineering
(35:28):
and archaeology. As someone said it to me, it's a
bit like Chris Bonnington meets Bear Grills meets Indiana Jones,
which is a weird and wonderful way to do. So
the title of the book is a Lifeless Ordinary, which
this was a recruiting slogo in the nineteen nineties for
the Irish Defense Forces. I think I'll sent you the
(35:50):
link yep.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
If not, I'll do it yeah immediately, so all your
viewers can can order the book. You can only get
it online at the publishers. It's not on Amazon at first.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
Yeah, well maybe maybe fore the best given the way
tech people are playing the US economy. Yeah, you can.
You can get it online. You can get it sent
to the United States if you interest dated. I did.
Thank you so much for your time, Kevin. You're insights today.
I know we really appreciate it. Is there anywhere else
if people want to follow you online? Aside from the book?
Speaker 3 (36:18):
The book is probably the best one. What is probably
the best way to get in comment? I'm on LinkedIn
and yeah, the normal stuff. Just google Kevin McDonald and
I should, I should come up. I was resisting for
years and years, and eventually I googled Kevin McDonald and
I was surprised at the amount of Kevin McDonald's There
is a famous American actor I think called Kevin McDonald. Yeah, yeah,
(36:40):
but I just as a small parting shot when when
I was in Mali, I was researching the archaeology of Mali,
and the world expert on Malayane archaeology is a professor, naturally,
Kevin mac donald. So I sent him an am here
and I said, by the way, I'm also an archaeologist
(37:02):
and my name is Kevin McDonald, and he goes my words.
I'd be in Bungi are in Bamaco in two weeks time.
Let's meet. So the two Kevin McDonald's two archaeologists met
up in Bamaco to discuss archaeology.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
So that's nice when these things kept.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
Again another one of my word and wonderful stories.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Yeah yeah, well, thanks so much for joining us to Kevin.
So it's nice to hiss me.
Speaker 3 (37:23):
You're more than welcome, Jims.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
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listened directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening.
Cause Media.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Hi everyone, and welcome to the podcast. It's James Today
and I'm joined again by Kevin McDonald. Kevin is a
retired officer fine the Irish Defense Forces with some special
forces and peacekeeping experience. Welcome to the show, Kevin.
Speaker 3 (00:17):
Thanks, thanks very much for having me. And just as
a sort of disclaimer at the very start, any viewser
opinions that I expressed, the opinions of a retired senior
officers from the Irish Defense Forces can't be construed has
been in any way the views of the Irish Defense Forces,
not indeed that of the United Nations. So I just
wanted to but that I was there before we get
into it.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Yeah, yeah, not a UN or an Irish Defense Forces spokesperson.
Not that we've had many of those suppose on our show, Kevin.
We're here today to talk a little bit about the
situation in Congo and and perhaps more specifically like how
the peacekeeping mission there has evolved and changed and sort
of morphed over the years. So maybe just to begin with,
(00:59):
I can give an idea that like this city of Goma,
which is the capital of North Kivu Province, has recently
been captured by m twenty three rebels would explain who
they are people who an't familiar in a minute. It's
a city of about a million people. I believe that's
saying around three thousand people have been killed in this operation,
which is I mean, it's a massive.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Death toll in a short space of time, very.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
Short space of time. Yeah, And some of the other
stuff I've heard, like at one point there's a prison
within the city which there was a jail break, and
they think a hundred of the women who were incarcerated
there were sexually assaulted and in some cases burned alive
after the jail break happened. Thousands of Congolese military and
police have surrendered a contingent of I believe Romanian private
(01:46):
military contractors were captured.
Speaker 3 (01:49):
Yes, captured, surrendered either where they went into Rwanda. I
think about three hundred of them, which is a significant
amount of mercenaries.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
Yeah, yeah, especially when we're talking about Romania, which is
not a vast country.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Understandably, a lot of things are happening in the US,
so people may have missed it, and like I think
people in the US, just due to the nature of
news being quite naval gazing here may not be as
familiar with the conflict in Congo, Like if they know
about it, it's from Warren's Evon songs or maybe from
maybe from a couple.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Of films, Lyer's Gone and Money. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Yeah, what's the other one?
Speaker 3 (02:22):
Roland, the Thompson Ganna. That's the yeah, Lowland, the headless Thompson.
Speaker 2 (02:27):
That's it. That's the one. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So let's
talk then about the various United Nations peacekeeping missions in Congo.
They've been there for since the nineteen sixties, is it
on and off?
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah? So the first mission in the Congo was or
No in nineteen sixty, and a lot of people would
say that that was the first UN mission, but as
I think we discussed the last time, the first YU
went mission was full scale war in nineteen fifty in Korea. Yeah,
and that mission is still in existence the UNC, the
United Nations Command. But I suppose speaking about the Congo specifically.
(03:04):
So in nineteen sixty there was seventeen newly independent states,
of which fourteen were from Africa, agreed to a call
from the U went to establish this mission in the Congo,
and Ireland answered the call as well, so we deployed
it was the first time that we deployed with the
UN and we had a battalion there from nineteen sixty
(03:26):
to I think nineteen sixty whenever the initial deployment ended,
and it was a fairly tough, intense introduction to peacekeeping.
In the early in nineteen sixty there was an engagement
between an Irish platoon and a large group of Beluba
(03:46):
tribesmen and there was nine Irish soldiers killed and twenty
six Belubas killed, and that was the first time that
Ireland kind of had to deal with that kind of
death overseas, so it was pretty traumatic. And then in
nineteen sixty one, you've probably seen the film The Siege
of Jariteville, but it recounts the true story of an
(04:06):
Irish company under COMMONDA. Pack Quendlin. His company was one
hundred and fifty eight roughly strong, and they were attacked
while they were at mass on a Sunday morning by
a group of between three and four thousand Catanganese well
armed soldiers backed up by French and Belgium and South
African mercenaries. They also had an attack helicopter and they
(04:27):
had an attack chest.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
I think he had some of the old Rhodesis in
there as well at that time.
Speaker 3 (04:32):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, well yeah, unfortunately, anything for a fight,
but the Irish held out for I think over a week,
and they didn't give up when they ran out of water,
they didn't give up when they ran out of food.
It was when they had no bullets left they negotiated
a surrender thanks to the skill of the officers and
(04:53):
NCOs and men. Not one fatality on the Irish side. Unfortunately,
when they came home because they had surrendered, they were
treated like praias. For years it was seen like a
state on the nation. Now if God forbid, they had
fifty percent casualties that have been treated like heroes. Yeah yeah,
and it's only in recent years that they're getting the
(05:14):
recognition that they should have got back in nineteen sixty one.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
That's really interesting. I know they've been treated that way.
It's quite sad to hear.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
Yeah, yeah, it's a strange one and a lot of
the people that we will say shunning these officers and
NCOs and men. It's happened to serve to overseas and
like if the UN they tried once to resupply them
with ammunition from the year, but it wasn't successful, So
if the UN had fully supported that company, they would
have held out even longer. But I suppose that's that's
(05:44):
the way things things go. So that's the first mission
to the Congo, and I could be corrected. I think
sixty four or sixty five. It might have sort of
started to draw down then in nineteen ninety nine, after
it was the first the second war, or the UN
established monarch monu See and that lasted from nineteen ninety
(06:05):
nine until twenty ten when it was renamed and rechanged
into MINUSCO. And the difference between the two is that
MINUSCO is what we call an integrated mission, and the
three pillars of an integrated mission are the restoration of
the rule of law, the protection of civilians, and the
provision for long term recovery and democratic governance. So it's
(06:29):
combining we'll say, the force of a military presence, but
also there's special advises on justice and policing, on governance,
all that sort of stuff which you wouldn't have an
emission like UNIFILM, which we discussed the last time, yeah,
which is the earlier form of peacekeeping. So MINUSCO was
(06:50):
supposed to have left the country in twenty twenty four,
but they were given a I think a one year extension. Yeah,
and unfortunately now with the twenty three rebel advance, the
mission is relocating most of its staff evacuating others. The
difference between the two terms is very specific. You relocate
(07:12):
within the country and you evacuate out of the country.
And I also note that the some of the Hybrid
African Union peacekeeping operations there was I think thirteen South
Africans killed and in the initial stages of the of
the onslaught towards towards going. So that that's kind of
where we are with the with the I think at
(07:35):
the at its height with in twenty one twenty two,
there was probably a strength of twenty thousand. But if
you think the DRC is the second largest country in Africa,
vast and the eleventh largest country in the world, just
the size of just phenomenal. So you can imagine what
the Congo and this entire no more than Sudan, but
what the Congo and its entirety was back in the day. Yeah,
(07:58):
absolutely huge.
Speaker 2 (07:59):
Yeah, it's asked. It encompasses different climates, own different ethnic groups,
as we're seeing.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Right, two hundred main ethnic groups.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Yeah, Yeah, it's it's a fascinating place. It's a place
I've wanted to go for a long time. I spent
some time on the Congo Rwanda border a few years ago.
I'm not so far from going er actually like riding
riding my bike around, and it's a very interesting place
in terms of what Rwanda is a very interesting place
in terms of its relation to its neighbors. I think
people will probably struggle to conceptualize. I actually saw somebody
(08:30):
had posted on Twitter, somebody who talks about Syria mostly
like how on Earth is Rwanda invading Congo? And they
had like a picture, you know, and the land mass
of Rwanda. Ruanda is one of the smaller countries in Africa,
and Congo is obviously a vast country. Are you comfortable
explaining a little bit of like the Rwandan involvement.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
It's complicated and it goes back to the it is
genocide back in ninety four ninety four, I think you yeah.
And the the two Kivus, North and South Kivu, which
is on the border with Rwanda, there's a large amount
of ethnic Tutsis Congolese Tutsis there. I think what Rwanda
(09:12):
has always projected force into the Two Kivus and Catanga
because like literally that that's that's where the money is.
Of course Rwanda would say they don't, but they are
actively supporting and empty industry and have and most of
the twenty three, certainly the leadership would be ethnic conglese Utsis.
(09:33):
So ostensibly I think the raison deaths for Romanda's involvement
was to protect the ethnic Tutsis from Hutus that had
escaped from the from the the genocide. So it's complicated,
but if you kind of part those complications and think
of the money trail, it kind of leads to the
(09:55):
Two Kivus because seventy percent of the world's bolt, I think,
is kind of located between the Two Kivus, and then
you have gold, diamonds, all the other sort of rich minerals.
Speaker 2 (10:09):
Yeah, incredible wealth in Congo.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
Yeah yeah, but I was reading that the estimated deposits
in eastern Congo is something like twenty three trillion, Like
it's off the wall stuff. Yeah, So it's no wonder
it's become the battleground that it has essentially since nineteen
sixty because in nineteen sixty, after getting independence, the Kivu
(10:33):
and Katanga wanted to secede back by belt and that's
kind of what kicked off a lot of the conflict
in nineteen sixty and the reverberations from that are still
are still kind of being felt and been exploited because
everyone wants to get a piece of the action, like
all the surrounding countries. So yeah, I see, I think
it was yesterday that the they're planning a meeting. I
(10:56):
think it's this week or this weekend to try and
resolve the afflict. And this time they're going to try
and include entry twenty three in the in the amazing
rather than ex Google. I don't think that the choice.
I mean they're heading down to Book of Auso.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
Yeah, I mean A twenty three have said that they're
going for sort of the whole country now that they're
not you know, it's not as not a regional or
like you know, ethnic movement so much as a and
that they will M twenty three would say that they're
not like per se ethnic separatists, right, like I think
they would claim that they're like a Liberation of Congo force.
And then you've Burundi supporting the Congolese government. You know
(11:32):
that there's all kinds of as you say, like regional
and international actors because of the wealth in Congo, and
like let's Congo emerge from the DC emerged from its
colonial past. Right, it's always been destabilized by these actors,
both regional and international, who who wanted a piece of
that mineral wealth, and then they've created and sustained these
(11:52):
differences which have become I think there's some evidence to
suggest that, like certainly that they're like the ethnic differences
have become more pronounced and more like intransigent, I suppose,
or like you know, it's become more difficult for those
ethnic groups to co exist over time due to decades
of conflict, right and killing, and it's a very difficult
(12:14):
situation and it leaves people like the civilians living in
Goma today in a terrible situation where I think this
is the fifth time that people have attacked Goma, Like
it's certainly I think the last time was about twenty twelve,
was it when the last time M twenty three took Goma?
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Yeah, and that's that's when the which we've probably just
gossed later, the Force and Invention Brigade. Yeah, we took
Goma in twenty thirteen in a relatively shar space of time. Yeah,
compared to how long we took to more, they regained
it very quickly.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
Yeah, So I think we break for adverts now. I'd
like to come back and discuss the Force Intervention Brigade
because I think it's something that people ought to understand
when we talk about peacekeeping. And we're back, okay, So, yeah,
(13:07):
you mentioned the Force Internsian Brigade, which is something a
bit unique within peacekeeping, and there's a lot of like
when people talk about peacekeeping, they'll be like, oh, why
aren't they fighting? Why aren't they like going and stopping
the things? And I understand why people ask that, So
can you explain a little bit about what the FIB
was and what it did.
Speaker 3 (13:28):
The concept of the Force Interventional Brigade was I think,
to my knowledge, it's the first UN mission that developed
that concept, and they actually changed the mandate to include
an offensive capability for U and troops as opposed to
defensive or separation of war in factions. This was full
on war fighting and what they had figured out because
(13:51):
the DRC is so big, but the footprint even with
twenty thousand troops the footprint on the ground was not
sufficient to say, as I said, one of the three
pillars of an integrated emissions protection of civilians, and they
were finding that very difficult. So they decided to use
a concept of protection by projection rather than protection by presence.
(14:15):
So not alone did they have the force and digans
from brigade, they had the joint protection teams and also
an idea of a rapidly deployable battalion. So the idea
was that the force and Divention Brigade would say, do
the heavy lifting, and then when hotspots that flare up,
they could choose either the rapidly deployed out the battalions
(14:35):
or the joint protection teams. So the idea was that
rather than having static positions trying to protect people, they
would go where the action was. That was the idea,
and in fairness, the FIB had artillery, martor snipers, attack helicopters, UAVs,
special forces then retook Gum And I don't know the
(14:56):
exact timeframe, but I think it was less than a
month of the problems and I think we touched one
at the last time we spoke, and I think this
was a specific problem to the how the FIB didn't
really keep going the way it should have is that
two of the men TCCs were Tanza, Vegan and South Africa,
and they would have had slightly different agendas in terms
(15:20):
of who they should and they shouldn't attack based on
the government's position. Sorry, true country from the countries. Excuse me,
I should have said that.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
Yeah, yeah, it's a sea of acronyms here. I've tried
to avoid all these faction acronyms, but yeah, yeah, explain
that a bit, because when people think of the UN
or in peacekeepers or troop contributing countries, the only time
it comes on the news in sort of the global
north is when people from say Northern Europe or North
(15:52):
America are part of these UN peacekeeping missions. So they
think of people British troops, America and Canadian what have you,
yea in their blue helmets. Right that the vast bulk
of TCCs don't come from from Northern Europe. Right in Africa,
that the majority of TCC's or other African countries, I
think I'm right saying it's a majority.
Speaker 3 (16:12):
Yeah, Like like here here in in South Sudan, most
of the big battalions are Wanda, Nepal, Mongolia, China. Generally speaking,
in my experience in the Central African Republic and and
here a lot of the battalions come from Africa, which
which is fair enough. I mean it's it's their continent. Yeah,
(16:36):
and they should have a they should have a stake
in trying to faster piece and develop peace and and
and help countries in less or more dire situations than
they themselves perhaps are. So it's understandral point about about
different countries being aware of what the UN does based
on I take, for instance, everyone in Ireland knows about
(16:59):
the UN when and then all about the Irish and Lebanon,
and in Syria and in Africa. I'm sure in the
Nha Kingdom, because you've got a very small UN footprint. Yeah,
Cyprus been one, and there's a few of you guys here.
Generally people in the UK, I'm sure you'll be able
to enlighten me on this wouldn't have the exact same
intimate knowledge or even interest in the UN, yeah, because
(17:20):
basically they don't have a big footprint, deployable footprint.
Speaker 2 (17:25):
Yeah. Yeah. And it's the same with the United States.
I think it's not something that people think about for
the most part, and so like that's this question of
like why doesn't the un Certainly I think when people
saw what happened recently in Lebanon, they were like, why
are these peacekeepers? You know where you had these peacekeepers.
And we spoke about this in our last episode, right
being shelled being shot at. You know, the people were
(17:47):
asking why they went out there fighting, and there are
a lot of reasons for that, one being it that's
not what they're there to do. But yeah, when we
had this Force Intervention Brigade in Congo, they did some
good things, right, they were able to retake Goma, and
for the people who lived in Goma, I'm sure that
was very important, like that meaningfully improved their lives. But
like it also comes with these complications that you've addressed, right,
(18:09):
Like each of those those troop contributing countries, you need
everyone to be committed to like the same mission, I suppose,
and like if if your government is giving your armed
forces one mission that differs slightly from that which the
whoever's in commanded the force into gentry brigade hats, then
we get friction, right, or it's not as efficient as
(18:30):
it could.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
Be Yeah, I think I'm sure I mentioned this when
we last spoke. It's one thing developing a robust mandate,
but if the if the TCCs don't have the skills,
the experience, the training, the equipment, or the will to
enforce the robust nature of that mandate, well then the
mandate isn't really worth anything, you know. So it's it's
(18:53):
kind of like, yes, the FIB was extremely effective for
a while until it wasn't. Now whether that was a
lack of will on the TCCs or on New York
or mission leadership, I have no idea, but it was
a great idea and it worked and then it didn't work.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Plus the fact that the DOC wanted the mission to
downsize and eventually leave, that added to the should we
really invest in something when we're going to pull out
because the country doesn't want to see her anymore? Which is
again it's a fair point.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
Yeah, right, No one wants foreign troops in their country, right,
you know, walking around, especially you know, engaging their own citizens.
But I mean it's interesting. I was watching a speaks
the current president of the DC, Felix Tishi Sakedy. I've
tried my best to pronounce it correctly. It's not that diffrespect.
He was saying that the international community is bordering on
(19:52):
complicit in M twenty three to advance because of the
failure to do anything about it in a speech he
gave this week, And it was interesting because it had
previously been, like you said, for under very understandable reasons,
especially in the DRC, which has this long and horrible
history of colonialism, like the terrible things done in the
Belgian Congo. We've covered. There's a lot on basketsweenw the
(20:13):
show that we do. People can listen to that if
they want to. But like now he's asking for more help,
which is also understandable because you know, his military is
one hundred and twenty five thousand or so like and
a large number of that it's not very combat effective
forces maybe and they've just been overrun in Goma in
(20:34):
a big city, a city of a million people. So like,
where do you think we go from here? What's like,
we're at a very unique time in world history in
which the United States is it's doing some things with
his foreign policy. Like I mean, I don't know, I
won't really meant words about anything. It's terrible, but if
(20:56):
we talk about like USAID, right I was speaking to
people on the Thai Burmese border last week who were
telling me that USAID has turned off life support machines
as part of it to throwdown, and that people obviously
directly died as a result of that. There So the
US is not necessarily averse to having terrible consequences to
its whatever it's trying to do right now, which I
(21:18):
don't really have a good word for. So look, where
do we go from here with the US becoming more isolationists.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Well, let's discuss for a few minutes the alternatives to
UN peacekeep yep, and there's a lot of them here
in Africa. So you have the South African Development Community static,
the East African community. There was an African Union stroke
un Hybrid mission and therefore unimit which is closing. There
(21:47):
was a NEO mission in Somalia. There is the Lake
Chad based and Multinational Task Force. There's the Group of
Five for the Sahel. Then you had EU four which
was an EU force in Chad and in Mali and
subsequently became miner Cat in Chad and Minusma and Mali.
Then you have the EUTM mission in Mali, which I
(22:09):
was part of at one stage and another one in scenario,
And of course we have our mercenaries, you know, and
when it emerged that there was over three hundred of
them allowed into Rwanda, I was reading the report that
they were getting something like three and a half thousand
dollars a month, whereas the DRC soldiers were getting maybe
(22:32):
three hundred dollars a month. Yeah, you know, and these
guys were brought in to protect the minds because again
it goes back to money.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah yeah, yeah, platal resources, not people. That's a different thing.
So what if those like those African led peacekeeping missions
look like like you talked about these various like international
and regional groups.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
I think it's it's certainly worth a try, because dun
hasn't the ability, need the money izume to keep doing
these large, big missions. At one stage, the three largest
missions were MENUSCO, which were discussing MINUSCA and the Central
African Republic, and MINUSMA, which was in Mali. Mali's gone,
(23:14):
DRC is on the drawdown. Central African Republic is still there,
but I've noticed I spent four years there and obviously
have a keen interest in the place. But there has
been a big increase in anti anti French with a
Francophone country. Yeah, anti French and linked with a kind
of an anti UN sentiment. No, the special advisor to
(23:37):
the President is from Russia. Wagner, you had a big
part to play when I was there. There were key players.
Speaker 2 (23:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:44):
Most likely they're inter linked.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, I mean, and they've done some things which are
horrific in terms. We've covered that as well with the
print Derma on the show. I did want to talk
about this because the US is talking about withdrawing its
sort of what we call soft power assets right around
the world, and I saw, like I forget who it
was saying, like, oh, let the chips fall where they may.
It's very obvious where the chips will fall in this
(24:07):
part of the world, right like when I was in Rwanda.
Every fancy road in Rwanda they call them Chinese roads
because they go from the mind to the airport beltion braces.
It's as naked a resource extraction project as you'll see
right now. China also does a soft power thing. They'll
build hospitals and these. You know, I forget where the
(24:28):
quote comes from, but like every time the US comes
we get a lecture and every time China comes, we
get a hospital. This will reorient the way these countries,
specifically in Africa, associate with the world right with the
US draw down and the United Nations not capable or
willing of sort of doing these massive peacekeeping missions. And
(24:53):
I think for very understandable reasons, groups like the EU.
You know, it's best not to have large deployment to
European and unmour what is in Africa for reasons that
are probably quite obvious. So like, yeah, we were likely
to see I mean, hasn't Wagner rebranded itself as the
Africa Core now?
Speaker 3 (25:11):
Yeah, I'm not sure who who's running it now, but
I'm sure the strings are being more closely pulled by
by Putin as opposed to having very loose control when
Pregosi was there.
Speaker 2 (25:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yeah, it was given him like a standoff capability, was right,
This is just a PMC, nothing to do with me. Yeah,
but I would imagine after his drive to Moscow and
a subsequent demise, I'm sure that whoever is running the
Africa Core is much more tightly controlled by the criminal
I would I would imagine.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Yeah, it's like a British India Company kind of model,
like a sort of proxy colonialism, but very tight. Like
you say, it's just almost just like a different badge
on the same thing there. I think this is one
(26:05):
of the things that won't get talked about in the
next four years because the US media will talk about
the US a lot. Again, I mean they always do.
But I think people should be concerned about this about
the future for like multi national peacekeeping in Africa, and
more importantly, I guess the future for or interlink without
the future for human rights in Africa. What do you
(26:25):
see as like meaningful ways that people can advocate for
a future for Africa which is not just another set
of countries extracting resources and leaving very little for the
people there, which is something that has happened. You know,
I'm a British person. This has happened by British people
for a very long time and other European people for
a very long time. But like that doesn't mean that
(26:46):
we shouldn't try to stop it happening in the future.
Speaker 3 (26:49):
That's a difficult one to answer, because yeah, ideally African
problems should, in my opinion, be solved by African nations,
and that's the reason that the African Union and all
these other ones that I mentioned I think are an
attempt to do that. Yeah, And certainly Europe and the
(27:13):
US shouldn't be dictating how Africans government themselves. They should
be assisting in good governance, good policing, good judiciary. But
it kind of goes back to money again, because there's
so much of a vested interest. I heard a figure
that twenty three were getting eight hundred thousand dollars a
(27:33):
month from some of the mines in the Kivus. I believe, so, well,
get that kind of money floating around, a lot of
people maybe don't want to sort things out, and it
may suit to leave the mayhem there and use all
these artisanal miners who are getting paid a couple of
cents a day. And Rwanda has just got a big
(27:54):
contract with the EU in terms of diamonds.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Yeah, I mean that is the thing, right, we can
hell where this stuff comes from, Like there is a
means to try and limit the amount of these resources
which you can leave conflict zones in a way which
benefits belligerent parties. It's where the markets for those resources
are willing to do it, right.
Speaker 3 (28:16):
Yeah, And everyone has mistaken the plat whether it's the
overseer of the mind, whether it's the company that owns
the mind, whether it's the people that move the product
from Kivu into someone's neighboring country, and then ultimately the
people that bias commercially in Western Europe or around the
(28:36):
rest of the world.
Speaker 2 (28:38):
Yeah, yeah, and it's it's not you know, people think
of diamonds a lot, and I think people that there's
been a kind of movement to purchase diamonds which you're
ethically sourced, or to just not use diamonds, to sort
of move away from them as like a store of value.
But it's also the parts in your mobile phone, isn't it.
It's not you know, it's not just like fancy engagement
rings because.
Speaker 3 (28:58):
This is it. Yeah, you wouldn't a bit double the
price for more ethical mining methods most people probably earn.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
Yeah, that's the thing, right, and especially when it's out
of sight, out of mind for most people, even compared
to you know, we obviously genocide Palestinian people or the
you know, when we think about these other atrostees, right, like,
those have not remained out of sight out of mind,
because they're visible in people social media because you know,
(29:29):
people in Palestine have phones and they can film, and
that's I think meaningfully changed the way. Like I wouldn't
have thought American people would care about Palestinian people. I
moved here in two thousand and eight, and you wouldn't
have found much interest in Palestine.
Speaker 3 (29:47):
You wouldn't have expected them to promote ethnic cleansing of
guz Yeah.
Speaker 2 (29:50):
I know you well, you wouldn't have expected that either.
But the movement like to support Palestinian people from the
grassroots and then also the government doing the exact opposite.
You know, It's come from the bottom up. It hasn't
come from like government advocacy. But we don't see that
as much with certainly this part of Africa, right like,
and it's I expose it's contro it's goings of like
(30:13):
people in Congo maybe aren't able to access those global
networks of like social media and maybe to share their stories,
you know. And I think it's also a consequence of
us in the media not reporting at all, you know,
Like I've for years tried to sell stories about Africa
to American publications and at best they'll want a story
(30:34):
about like the people who are starting like social enterprise
European or North American people starting like social enterprises or
like sort of beneficial companies. And I understand it's have
a role, but like, you're not going to persuade me
that there isn't a single African person of interest to you,
and that like it's someone who came from North America
that is the only relevant story to tell in Africa.
(30:57):
And like I've had this falling out with so many
editors over the years that like, no, I don't want
to tell that story. I want to tell a story
about people from Congo and Congo, about people from Rwanda
and Rwanda.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
I live in the town towards the west coast of Iland,
and there's a guy from there. What I'll do is
I'll send you a link. Yeah, yeah, but he's passionate
about getting free education in Africa, between online courses and
online libraries. Obviously, the more education you get, the better
chance you have of having a better life. So yeah,
(31:30):
I think of some stuff and I'll send an Auntie
and then you can figure out whether it'll be an
interesting topic or whatever. But I just literally as we
were talking, I was thinking of how one guy is
trying to change conditions for younger people in Africa and
trying to give it to them for free.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
That's it. Yeah, that's the key. It is like people
doing it. One of the things that people did which
I thought was really great as an example as a model,
is from October about October the tenth of twenty twenty three.
I suppose people weren't going to school or university in Gaza,
and very quickly there weren't any universities in Gaza because
(32:05):
they all got bombed. Right, the colleagues of mine in
academic departments started putting on seminars and lectures that Palestinian people,
be they displaced or still in Gaza, but with access
to internet, you know it's still displaced but internally displaced,
could attend and continue with their educations. And I thought
that was a really great, like solidarity based way to
(32:28):
facilitate access to something that people have had taken away
from them through no fault. There weren't by state aggression.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (32:34):
Absolutely, yeah, there's a model for that. I mean, colonialism
has done many terrible things, but it's given us a
common language with a lot of our African friends. You know,
you speak French and English, you can do quite well,
So like, yeah, there are things available, and I wish
people would I don't think people should stop caring about Palestine,
of course I don't, but I do wish they would
(32:55):
care more about people in Africa too, because like, they
don't deserve this any more than anyone else.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
I was born in nineteen sixty when the first mission
went to to the Congo. Yeah, and it's been going on,
like I'm sixty four, it's been around sixty four years. Yeah,
so no more than the problem with the Palestiniots, I
think some people, unless you have a specific interest in
(33:22):
it or feel passionate about it, a lot of people
just I think, chuwe out and to go to the
next pronouncement from the White House, you know, clickbit.
Speaker 2 (33:32):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:33):
So I think it's a sad fact, but it's the
factor I.
Speaker 2 (33:37):
Think, Yeah, yeah, it's a shame. And like you know,
if there's one thing I'd like to do with my career,
I'd like to spend more time in that part of
the world and do more reporting. And I think we
could do a lot with as a media with just
explaining how life is for everyday people, because people think
about Congo in terms of yeah, the m twenty three
(33:58):
in the Congolese government and who too, militias and this
and that, But the vast majority of people are just
trying to get on with their day. You know, they
want a better future for their children. Yeah, and you
know the fact that your mobile phone it's cheap, it's
maybe making their children's future worse. And that's something that
we need to reckon with. And e cares Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I mean this is the thing. People don't talk about
electric cars. It's so as weird. It's all that stuff
(34:21):
come and then even here in America right whether the
US trying to mind lithium on reservations where you know
the land there's little land it's left indigenous people to
have sovereignty on it's where it's now trying to do
this very invasive form of mining. Kevin, you've written a book,
So would you like to as we wind down here,
do you want to expend a little bit about about
your books so that if people are interested in your
(34:42):
life and your time as a peacekeeper and an archaeologist.
Speaker 3 (34:45):
Okay, so what starts on off as a lockdown Prodridge.
When COVID hit back in the day, I decided I
would write an account of my weird of wonderful life
for my just from my family, and we'll just start
writing as or no doubt where you start remembering. And
suddenly I was at something like a hundred thousand words
and I thought, right, there might be a book in this.
(35:06):
And I know, obviously I'm opinionated about my own book naturally,
but it's not just a book about some random military
guy waffling on about his military career. I've a separate
career in mountaineering and kind of nearly a separate career
in archaeology, so it's it's a mixture of soldiering, mountaineering
(35:28):
and archaeology. As someone said it to me, it's a
bit like Chris Bonnington meets Bear Grills meets Indiana Jones,
which is a weird and wonderful way to do. So
the title of the book is a Lifeless Ordinary, which
this was a recruiting slogo in the nineteen nineties for
the Irish Defense Forces. I think I'll sent you the
(35:50):
link yep.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (35:51):
If not, I'll do it yeah immediately, so all your
viewers can can order the book. You can only get
it online at the publishers. It's not on Amazon at first.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
Yeah, well maybe maybe fore the best given the way
tech people are playing the US economy. Yeah, you can.
You can get it online. You can get it sent
to the United States if you interest dated. I did.
Thank you so much for your time, Kevin. You're insights today.
I know we really appreciate it. Is there anywhere else
if people want to follow you online? Aside from the book?
Speaker 3 (36:18):
The book is probably the best one. What is probably
the best way to get in comment? I'm on LinkedIn
and yeah, the normal stuff. Just google Kevin McDonald and
I should, I should come up. I was resisting for
years and years, and eventually I googled Kevin McDonald and
I was surprised at the amount of Kevin McDonald's There
is a famous American actor I think called Kevin McDonald. Yeah, yeah,
(36:40):
but I just as a small parting shot when when
I was in Mali, I was researching the archaeology of Mali,
and the world expert on Malayane archaeology is a professor, naturally,
Kevin mac donald. So I sent him an am here
and I said, by the way, I'm also an archaeologist
(37:02):
and my name is Kevin McDonald, and he goes my words.
I'd be in Bungi are in Bamaco in two weeks time.
Let's meet. So the two Kevin McDonald's two archaeologists met
up in Bamaco to discuss archaeology.
Speaker 2 (37:15):
So that's nice when these things kept.
Speaker 3 (37:17):
Again another one of my word and wonderful stories.
Speaker 2 (37:19):
Yeah yeah, well, thanks so much for joining us to Kevin.
So it's nice to hiss me.
Speaker 3 (37:23):
You're more than welcome, Jims.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media.
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It Could Happen Here News
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Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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