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Zaire FOREIGN MILITARY RELATIONS
Foreign Influences
In the years since independence, Zaire has benefited
from a
variety of foreign military assistance. President Mobutu
was adept
at playing one country against the other to gain increased
aid.
Nevertheless, by the early 1990s, Zaire was receiving less
foreign
assistance as Mobutu's hold on power became increasingly
precarious. In addition, the end of the Cold War
superpower
competition was accompanied by a decrease in superpower
involvement
and interest in African affairs and thus in willingness to
provide
military aid to the region.
Belgian influence predominated within the ANC after
independence. All the arms and equipment with which the
new
Congolese force began its existence were of Belgian
origin, as were
the training, organization, and military doctrine. During
the early
independence period, however, other Western influences
became more
important. After the withdrawal of UN forces in June 1964,
the
Congo established bilateral military assistance
relationships with
Belgium, the United States, Italy, Israel, and Britain.
Much of the
aid provided by these countries was in the form of grants,
but some
assistance was also provided by military technicians and
advisers.
The Congo's Western allies also made advanced and
specialized
training available to Congolese military personnel.
By the late 1960s, military assistance fit a pattern
that
continued into the early 1990s with slight modifications.
Belgium
directed its aid primarily to ground forces and military
schools;
Israel trained airborne personnel; Italy worked with the
air force;
and the United States provided logistics support.
Subsequently,
France replaced Israel for airborne training and Italy for
the air
force.
During the 1970s, China and the Democratic People's
Republic of
Korea (DPRK--North Korea) also began cooperation and
training
relationships with the FAZ. In the 1980s, China provided
military
equipment and spare parts to Zaire, assisted in repairing
and
maintaining Chinese-built T-62 medium main battle tanks
and other
armored vehicles, and maintained the navy's Chinese-built
fast
patrol craft. A Chinese military delegation arrived in
Zaire in
February 1990 to assess the work of Chinese advisers who
had spent
several years training soldiers of the 41st Commando
Brigade, a
rapid intervention unit of the FAZ in Kisangani. The North
Koreans,
who once maintained a 400-man mission in Kinshasa,
withdrew during
the mid-1970s, but military cooperation resumed in 1985
with the
training of the Kamanyola Division. In October 1990, Zaire
and
North Korea discussed the possibility of upgrading the
military
cooperation between the two countries.
In late 1991, unconfirmed reports circulated that South
Africa
had undertaken the training of Zairian troops. Fifteen
South
African military instructors reportedly were in Zaire, at
a
military base near Kitona in Shaba. Some reports also
suggested
that South Africans were helping establish special units
intended
to harass Mobutu's political opponents.
By 1992 foreign military training relationships with
Zaire's
major allies had largely dissolved because of the
country's
deteriorating political situation. In the 1980s, Belgium
had
provided advisers to the 21st Infantry Brigade and ran the
Officers
Basic Training Course, the Command and Staff School, the
Naval
Officers Basic Course, and a variety of other schools. But
by mid1990 , relations between the two countries had broken down
over the
Zairian government's human rights abuses, and by late
1990, there
were no longer any formal military training relationships
between
Belgium and Zaire.
The French had trained and advised the 31st Airborne
Brigade
and the 32d Airborne Brigade, ran an inter-African armor
training
course, and provided technical assistance to the air
force. In
early 1989, Zaire ordered French military matériel,
including
twelve VAB armored personnel carriers and thirteen rebuilt
AMX-13
light tanks. But by 1992, France had ended aid to Zaire.
Israel provided military training in the form of
advisers,
instructors, and technicians, and some Zairian military
personnel
trained in Israel. In a 1983 five-year agreement, Israel
was
entrusted with restructuring and upgrading the military
capability
of the Zairian armed forces and began training and
equipping the
newly formed DSP. Israel also provided Zaire with weapons
systems,
including small arms. The status of Israeli military
assistance in
the 1990s was uncertain.
The United States had long provided Zaire with military
assistance and grants, technical and training support,
repair and
maintenance of United States-supplied equipment, spare
parts, as
well as weapons. Between 1960 and 1991, Zaire reportedly
received
an estimated US$38.2 million in grants under the United
States
Military Assistance Program (MAP), an additional US$18.2
million
under the United States International Military Education
and
Training (IMET) Program (1,356 Zairian students were
trained under
this program), and US$144.7 million in Foreign Military
Sales (FMS)
agreements (US$132.7 million of that amount was in the
form of
Foreign Military Sales deliveries). Payment was waived for
US$135.5
million of the FMS agreements. A number of joint
American-Zairian
military exercises were conducted in the late 1980s,
according to
published reports. However, in the late 1980s and early
1990s,
American military assistance was increasingly threatened
by
congressional opposition to the Zairian government's
violations of
human rights, as well as widespread corruption and
maladministration. As a consequence of the worsening
repression in
Zaire, in November 1990 the United States announced that
it had
decided to terminate all military and economic aid (except
humanitarian aid) to Kinshasa.
Zaire and Egypt entered into a military pact in
February 1980.
Egyptian military instructors trained the Zairian Civil
Guard, as
well as units of the FAZ, and Egypt provided Zaire with
Fahd
armored personnel carriers and other Egyptian-manufactured
military
equipment. The status of this relationship in the early
1990s was,
however, unclear.
Data as of December 1993
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