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Military Intervention and the Myth of Collective Security: the Case of Zaïre

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Michael G. Schatzberg
Michael G. Schatzberg
Affiliation:
Associate Professor of Comparative Politics and African Studies, The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, The Johns Hopkins University, Washington, D.C.
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Extract

Zaïre has been open to external penetration from its earliest days as the Congo Independent State of King Léopold II, but unlike most other weak and vulnerable African states it has experienced repeated military interventions. When President Mobutu Sese Seko addressed the U.N. General Assembly in October 1973 he formally thanked the world organisation for preserving his country during the early 1960s:

If a small minority of member countries of this organisation had refused to participate in the Congo operation, at the time, the vast majority had, however, spontaneously put troops at its disposition or intervened in favour of this operation. This permitted the maintenance of peace, unity, and the integrity of the national territory.

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 27 , Issue 2 , June 1989 , pp. 315 - 340
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1989

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References

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3 Salongo, 16 May 1978.

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1 For an excellent discussion of the various meanings of security in Africa, see Luckham, loc. cit. pp. 203–28.