Western Security, Regime Security and the Fruits of Plunder

The ruling parties in Addis Ababa, Kampala and Kigali proved to be adept at capitalising on the West’s post-Cold War security concerns, deriving significant benefits from the shift in Western donor focus and the increasing securitisation of their development assistance. This chapter examines how the military experience of the ‘new leaders’ helped them to engage with their Western counterparts on security issues and to argue the threats posed to their regimes also constituted threats to Western interests. Offering their armed forces and themselves as allies in defence of Western security, and as model African countries through their participation in UN- and African Union-sanctioned peace operations, paid handsome dividends not only directly in financial terms. Securitised development assistance also strengthened their security forces as essential regime props, increasing their capacity to repress internal dissidence. In the case of both Uganda and Rwanda, such enhanced capabilities could also be diverted to the pursuit of other objectives, such as their interventions in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the plundering of that country’s resources. By turning themselves into critical Western security partners, this shift in donor focus also meant an increased willingness by Western capitals to overlook their malfeasance in other areas.