America Should Side with the Rebels in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Not every rebellion is bad. British oppression and taxation without representation justified the rebellion of American colonists against King George III. A quest for liberty and freedom likewise justified the 1821-1829 Greek War of Independence against the Ottoman Empire. T.E. Lawrence’s efforts to spark the Arab Rebellion during World War I became the stuff of legend. In recent years, many Americans and Europeans cheered the Arab Spring masses who ousted Tunisian dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, and Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi. Not even Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham’s Al Qaeda past could blunt the enthusiasm with which many in Washington greeted its ouster of Bashar al-Assad. 

Often, however, European and American policymakers automatically or arbitrarily castigate rebellions and insurgencies as counter to freedom and U.S. interests. Finnish and Norwegian authorities have respectively arrested Simon Ekpa, expatriate leader of the Biafra cause in Nigeria, and Cho Lucas Yabah, president of the Ambazonia Governing Council in Cameroon. They may have done so at the diplomatic request of the Nigerian and Cameroonian governments, but they are effectively prioritizing diplomatic etiquette over one of the most brutal anti-Christian regimes in Nigeria and an anti-Anglophone dictatorship in Cameroon.

The State Department, too, rejects rebellions that, on their face, they should support. Consider the fighting in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s North Kivu province.  The current rebellion has roots in the 1994 anti-Tutsi genocide in Rwanda. Certainly, Kagame’s efforts to oust the genocidal Hutu regime was just. After Paul Kagame’s Rwandan Patriotic Front pushed the génocidaires into eastern Congo, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees allowed the Hutus who slaughtered Tutsis based on their ethnicity to settle armed into the camps. UN camps became catalysts to incite a new generation. They were the fuel in fire.

Congolese President Félix Tshisekedi was the match. He rose to power not by winning a legitimate election, but by buying off votes after the fact. Tshisekedi floundered through his first term; he could point to no real achievements. As he began campaigning for re-election, then, he turned to ethnic incitement to distract Congolese away from him by turning them against each other. It was a dangerous strategy given the fragility of society and history of civil war. Congolese Tutsis woke up to find night letters demanding they abandon land they farmed for well over a century or face murder and rape. As violence increased, in 2012, the March 23 Movement (M23) formed to fight after the Congolese government failed to implement a 2009 peace treaty. I spent a portion of August 2024 embedded with the M23 in North Kivu. What I saw among ordinary people was far less fear of the group than I had seen among other Congolese during a previous visit to Kinshasa. Many appeared relieved they no longer faced Tshisekedi’s ruinous taxes, nor the random shake downs that left farmers hungry. 

While a small group of activists and academics argue that Rwanda directs M23, they substitute repetition and volume for appreciation of regional nuance. Many Congolese spent time in Rwanda as refugees but returned to North Kivu where their families resided since the 18th century. While the UN has accused Rwanda of deploying forces into North Kivu, most UN officials cannot tell the difference between a Rwandan Tutsi and a Congolese one. It is telling that through months of fighting, Tshisekedi’s government cannot produce any captured Rwandan or the body of any Rwandan soldier allegedly killed in Congo.

Nor are accusations of Rwandan looting anything more than exaggeration. What the State Department says is looting, businessmen in eastern Congo say is normal business: They trade their goods across the border into Uganda and Rwanda because customs duties are an order of magnitude lower than the internal taxes they would pay to transport goods to Kinshasa. 

Rather than condemn rebels, Washington should recognize that what the rebels in eastern Congo face are the same groupings that perpetrated genocide or now cheer it on. Rather than side with a corrupt Congolese government that cultivates China and whose dictator seeks an illicit third term, Washington should be blunt: the city of Goma would be better under M23 control as capital of a federal region, not unlike Iraqi Kurdistan. Rather than condemn the rebels, the United States, Europe, and African states should work with them to build their capacity and help them govern freely and fairly. Congo deserves better than Tshisekedi. The rebels may be how they achieve a fairer, freer, and more prosperous future.

About the Author: Dr. Michael Rubin

Michael Rubin is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and director of policy analysis at the Middle East Forum. A former Pentagon official, Dr. Rubin has lived in post-revolution Iran, Yemen, and both pre- and postwar Iraq. He also spent time with the Taliban before 9/11. For more than a decade, he taught classes at sea about the Horn of Africa and Middle East conflicts, culture, and terrorism, to deployed US Navy and Marine units. Dr. Rubin is the author, coauthor, and coeditor of several books exploring diplomacy, Iranian history, Arab culture, Kurdish studies, and Shi’ite politics. The author’s views are his own.