By The EastAfrican

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When Russia joined the conflict in Syria in September 2015, its approach was to treat all armed anti-government groups as enemy forces. Within months, it had turned the tide of the anti-Assad campaign in favour of Damascus, stymying the advance of the Arab Spring.

Were it not for the entry of Turkey into the northwest of the country, and the persistence of the United States, the picture in Syria would be completely different today. 

With hindsight and in view of the current sabre-rattling between Kigali and Kinshasa, one is inclined to believe that an iteration of that approach would have suited the situation in the Eastern DR Congo. Had the UN mandated Force Intervention Brigade, led by Tanzanian forces, adopted the Russian modus operandi when it was authorised to flush out the M23 fighters from the DR Congo in late 2012; the narrative in eastern DR Congo would perhaps be different today.

In the event, the operation took a partial approach, with the result that the M23 was able to cultivate and sustain the sympathy that has kept it a potent force. As President Paul Kagame of Rwanda has pointed out on numerous occasions, it was a misnomer that the Force Intervention Brigade, and indeed MONUC, should have ignored or even allied with the Democratic Forces for the Liberation Rwanda (FDLR) rebels, while turning the hammer against the M23. 

This week, in response to stray shells from the Congolese army landing on Rwandan territory, President Kagame made barely veiled threats that he would consider the unwarranted continued shelling into Rwanda, an invitation to the Rwanda Defence Forces to join in the fray. He also suggested that President Felix Tshisekedi of DR Congo was stirring things up in his own backyard, to delay planned elections next year, which he could lose.

Fraught with risk

A Rwandan incursion into the DR Congo would, beyond attacking the capacity of the FDLR to make war, be fraught with risk. It would make the conflict more complex, alienate Kinshasa even further and prolong the misery of ordinary Congolese. With Kenyan troops strengthening their presence on the ground, it is time for Rwanda and the DRC to pull back and let Kenya attempt peace support.

The challenge in this conflict is the conflicting perceptions of the major protagonists. While France and most of the Western world see the FDLR as refugees fighting for the right to return home, Rwanda and Uganda have the same view of the M23; while seeing the FDLR as a negative force whose core is made up of people who were key players in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. 

It is wishful thinking to expect Kampala or Kigali to ditch the M23, just as it is useless for them to deny habouring sympathy for the group. Diplomacy needs to recognise the fact that many of the older generation in M23, played roles in the wars that brought Museveni, Kagame and subsequently the late Laurent-Desire Kabila to power at different times.

The best-case scenario in the current configuration, would be for the Kenya Defence Forces to succeed in taming the appetite for mischief by the principal protagonists. If indeed peace is everyone’s aim, the principal protagonists should pull back and give the KDF the opportunity to sanitise the Kenya ground for dialogue.