Western countries’ silence on Uganda’s decision to send troops into South Sudan is being interpreted as tacit endorsement of the intervention.

“It is difficult for me to explain why Western powers are not coming out to support us openly, but privately they are telling us they are grateful for the role we are playing. While they have not supported us publicly, it is significant that they have not come out to condemn us publicly either, which could be interpreted to mean that they support what we are doing in South Sudan,” a senior figure in the Ugandan Cabinet told The EastAfrican.

According to diplomatic sources, one aspect that Western powers are grateful for is that Uganda People’s Defence Force’s intervention has bought the international community and regional players the time to organise their own intervention.

By moving in, the UPDF has created conditions that have not only controlled the slaughter that characterised the early days of the meltdown but also allowed humanitarian work to continue.

More than a month after the flare-up, the UN is still trying to raise its presence to 5,500 troops. The Inter Governmental Authority on Development (Igad), has approved a force of 5,600 troops but it will be a while before it gets countries willing to contribute.

For instance, Kenya, which has extensive economic interests in South Sudan, has already said it will not be contributing troops — a telling sign of what little appetite exists among countries to dabble in the internal conflicts of others.

READ: Kenya 'will not' send troops to South Sudan despite UN request

This, however, has not tempered debate, both at home and the region, as to the wisdom, and consequences, of President Yoweri Museveni’s latest military adventure. Uganda already has soldiers in Somalia and the troubled Central African Republic.

A scrutiny of the mission will be undertaken when parliament returns in the middle of February to debate a supplementary budget to finance it.

The Defence Ministry’s request will be tabled at a time when it will start becoming clearer how long the UPDF may have to remain in Africa’s newest nation, where over 1,000 people have been killed and over 646,000 displaced in the seven weeks the conflict has lasted to date, according to the United Nations Office for Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

A key question revolves around the timelines for the UPDF presence in South Sudan. While a senior Ugandan diplomat says “the mission is not open-ended,” and “we shall get our troops out as soon as the situation normalises and there are no more killings or rape of civilians or after the international community puts together a neutral force to take our place,” concerns about the cost of the mission and the risk of unexpected outcomes persist.

A lawyer who has worked at the International Criminal Court says while Uganda may be in South Sudan on the invitation of the government there, it will still have to answer for any human-rights violations that may be laid at its door.

READ: Rights group cites crimes by both sides in South Sudan

The actual duration of the UPDF mission will begin emerging when the mediation process, which secured a shaky truce between embattled President Salva Kiir and Dr Riek Machar, his former deputy, resumes on February 7.

Hosted in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa under the auspices of Igad, the process is expected to review the setting up of various mechanisms agreed in the January 23 agreement to cease hostilities. After that, it will look into the substantive issues that set the country on the warpath on December 15.

On December 19, 2013, the Ugandan army leadership deployed troops — whose actual number they remain tightlipped about — only four days after conflict broke out in the capital Juba and quickly spread to the northeastern states of Jonglei, Unity and Upper Nile.

READ: Museveni reveals Uganda combat role in South Sudan

The UPDF soldiers were credited with holding back Dr Machar’s forces and thus forcing him to the negotiating table. His insistence that Uganda should withdraw its soldiers for substantive talks to proceed lends credence to this view.

But, Uganda’s decision to back President Kiir, whose manner of governing has elicited widespread criticism, has stripped the country of its neutrality, according to some observers.

Moreover, they add, President Kiir’s apparent inability to hold power on his own means President Museveni will have to subsidise his security and his government’s defence for quite some time.

This poses several inherent risks. For one, there is the temptation to get involved in next year’s elections, one way or another. Besides, a long stay attracts all manner of allegations and accusations, especially now that the Ugandan army is involved in combat where property and life are being destroyed.

A $10 billion fine hangs over the country’s neck following its forays into DR Congo, where the International Court of Justice accused it of plundering and looting natural resources.