The Foreign Service Journal, April 2023

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | APRIL 2023 33 What Went Wrong Certainly, Central Africans themselves, especially their political elite, must accept a share of the blame. Political squabbling over power and control of rent-seeking opportunities has made the government much less effective than it should have been. Out- side actors, initially CAR’s neighbors and later Russia, have also manipulated and profited from the violence. In hindsight, however, early signs of the likely failure of the international community’s game plan for stabilization should have been evident. The international community failed to accu- rately identify the security—but especially the political—chal- lenges to durable peacebuilding. Among its mistakes are the following four. The stabilization strategy lacked a sense of urgency. The scope and size of the international community’s security, eco- nomic, and humanitarian intervention beginning in 2014 gave a sense of inevitability to the stabilization process. The influx of out- siders even led to a mini–construction boom in Bangui. True, the international community’s deployments were complex, ponder- ous, and slow, measured in years rather than months. Yet, it was easy to believe that time was on the side of the peacebuilders. The reality, however, was that security was in fact not improv- ing for most Central Africans outside the capital. And the problem was not just the original armed groups. Even after MINUSCA’s garrisons deployed to major cities, the surrounding countryside remained remarkably lawless. In that power vacuum, local militias proliferated. An attack on one village led to a response, creating a cycle of retaliation and counterretaliation that both spread and entrenched violence at a level too localized for MINUSCA’s forces to engage. Whether for profit or just to settle grudges, violence became the principal currency of community relations. Without enforcing a cessation of hostilities at the local “granu- lar” level, time was never going to be on the side of peace. By fail- ing to recognize that quickly, the international community missed its window of opportunity. The international community’s peace strategy was funda- mentally flawed. Initially, the violence in CAR was not an espe- cially difficult military challenge in a traditional sense. The armed groups were neither numerous, highly motivated, nor militarily sophisticated. MINUSCA’s mandate, however, was limited. It did have the authority to use force in certain situations, such as for civilian protection, but it had neither the mandate nor the forces to disarm all the militias and broadly enforce peace. From the beginning, therefore, the international community’s preferred solution to the violence was an inclusive peace deal, one negotiated by all parties to the conflict—including the armed groups. This peace strategy had a fundamental flaw, however: The armed groups had no interest in any deal that would have mean- ingfully reestablished the rule of law. Indeed, their business model depended on the absence of law. Seleka fighters, mostly from neighboring Sudan and Chad, roll marijuana while waiting outside a meeting between their commander and African Union (FOMAC) peacekeepers in Bossangoa, Central African Republic, Nov. 25, 2013. REUTERS/ALAMYSTOCKPHOTO