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"Trust Me I'm a Mercenary"
The Lethal Danger of Mercenaries in Africa
By Laurie Nathan
University of Cape Town
February 20, 1997Introduction
I want to argue that mercenaries are a generic problem of great proportions, regardless of the specific conduct or misconduct of Executive Outcomes.
By mercenaries I mean soldiers who are hired by a foreign government or rebel movement to contribute to the prosecution of armed conflict - whether directly by engaging in hostilities, or indirectly through training, logistics, intelligence or advisory services - and who do so outside the authority of the government and defence force of their own country.
General argument against mercenaries
In the literature on civil-military relations, armed forces are described as `the managers of organised violence'. Their defining institutional feature is the tremendous power at their disposal. This power can be used for legitimate purposes: in defence of a country and its people against aggression, or in peace operations sanctioned by an international authority.
But the power of the military can also be misused for illegitimate ends: to topple its own government; to suppress opposition to government; to kill and injure citizens; and to wage wars of aggression against other states;
Because armed forces constitute a potential threat to governments and citizens, they are subject to a range of controls in democratic countries. These controls are intended to ensure that the military does not undermine the political process, usurp the authority of government, abuse the rights of citizens, and exercise excessive force.
The controls include the following:
1. Executive control. The military and the use of military force are subject to strict executive control, flowing from the head of state to cabinet to the minister of defence to the chief of the armed forces.
Mercenaries are not subject to such control.
2. Parliamentary control. The executive itself is accountable and answerable to Parliament, which has powers of investigation, recommendation and oversight over the armed forces.
Mercenaries are not subject to such control.
3. Public control. Parliament in turn is accountable to the electorate. The electorate may vote to replace a government whose defence policy or armed forces lack popular support.
Mercenaries are not subject to such control.
4. Legal control. The functions of the armed forces are determined and regulated by domestic law, chiefly the Constitution, the Defence Act and the Military Disciplinary Code. These instruments describe the circumstances in which force may be used; the manner in which force may be used; and the sanctions which apply if soldiers are guilty of misconduct.
Mercenaries are not subject to such control.
5. International control. Armed forces are bound by international humanitarian law, chiefly the Geneva and Hague conventions and protocols. These treaties aim to curb the excesses of war, and to protect civilians in particular. Signatory states are expected to ensure that military personnel comply with international law, and to prosecute soldiers who violate its rules.
Mercenaries are not subject to such control.
6. Internal control. In a democracy the orientation and values of the armed forces provide a form of internal self-restraint. Soldiers respect the primacy of civilian rule, human rights, the rule of law and the principle of political non-partisanship. These values are inculcated and reinforced through education and training programmes; through the conduct and attitudes of officers; and through disciplinary action against personnel who are guilty of misconduct. 1
Mercenaries are not subject to such control.
Consider the effort that South Africa has made to introduce or strengthen these controls with respect to the SANDF: new constitutional provisions on security and defence; amendments to the Defence Act and Military Disciplinary Code; the emphasis on civil supremacy in the White Paper on Defence; the establishment of a civilian Defence Secretariat; oversight by the parliamentary defence committee; the training of military personnel in international humanitarian law; and the development of a civic education programme on `defence in a democracy' for the SANDF.
Can anyone argue seriously that this effort is justified in the case of South Africa's defence force but is not relevant to private companies which play a military role outside our country?
The consequences of weak or absent control
Citizens who volunteer for military service in democratic states are generally motivated by a desire to serve their country, and to do so with honour. Mercenaries, in contrast, are typically motivated by profit, as Eeban Barlow concedes in the case of Executive Outcomes, and are therefore driven mainly by self-interest.
As a result, and given the absence of strong control, the political reliability and military discipline of mercenaries are inherently suspect. Machiavelli emphasised this problem in 1513: Mercenary captains either are or are not skillful soldiers. If they are, you can cannot trust them for they will always seek to gain power for themselves, either by oppressing you, their master, or by oppressing others against your wishes. If, on the other hand, they are not skillful soldiers, they will still be your ruin in most cases. 2
Acts of terror, looting, pillage, theft, mutiny and desertion by mercenaries in Africa have been well-documented 3 . In the 1970s and early 1980s mercenary strike forces were involved in coups or coup attempts in Guinea, Equitorial Guinea, Benin, Togo, the Comoro Islands and the Seychelles 4. More recently, mercenaries are reported to be propping up the dictatorial regime in Zaire and to be fighting on both sides of the civil war in Sudan.
International prohibitions
For the reasons outlined above, mercenary activity has been condemned internationally:
• the 1977 Geneva Protocols stripped mercenaries of combatant and prisoner-of-war status in armed conflict;
• in 1977 the Organisation of African Unity adopted the Convention for the Elimination of Mercenarism in Africa 5; and
• in 1989 the United Nations General Assembly adopted the International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries. This convention makes mercenary activity an international crime. It prohibits states from recruiting, using, financing and training mercenaries, and obliges them to extradite or prosecute any mercenaries found on their territory.
Executive Outcomes
Executive Outcomes will tell you that the problems described above do not apply to them. They "heartily endorse reconstruction and development for a better quality of life for individuals and communities"; they believe that "people's beliefs, cultures and values should be treated with the utmost respect"; they are "a-political"; they will only work for "legitimate governments"; and they will not work for clients involved in "organised crime", "ethnic cleansing" or "international terrorism". 6
These claims inspire no confidence whatever. They amount to this: `trust me, I'm a mercenary'.
This assertion misses the point. The various forms of control over armed forces, described earlier, exist because in a democracy, by definition, we the people do not trust officials and institutions which have power. We establish a range of checks and balances - which are complicated, costly, time-consuming, even inefficient - in order to control the exercise of power and prevent its abuse.
Executive Outcomes is not subject to these checks and balances. The best they can offer is that they operate under the principles of business law! And that "any attempt to commit crimes will lead to their collapse".
Who determines whether Executive Outcomes personnel have committed a crime? Who investigates allegations of criminal conduct? Who prosecutes if the allegations are justified? What action is taken following prosecution? The answers to these questions are no-one, no-one, no-one and nothing of any reliability.
Of course the host government may kick Executive Outcomes out of their country; and Executive Outcomes may indeed collapse. But this is hardly reassuring, not least because many of its members previously served in 32 Battalion and the CCB which ran hit squads.
The problem is compounded by the fact that Executive Outcomes is less than forthright when describing its activities. According in Eeban Barlow in Finance Week, Executive Outcomes has somewhere between 200 and 7000 employees and is deployed in Angola, Sierra Leone, elsewhere in Africa, somewhere in Europe and somewhere outside of Europe. 7 In Barlow's former job in the CCB, one of his tasks was to feed false information to the press. 8
In short, Executive Outcomes' protestations of innocence and goodwill provide scant assurance because they cannot be scrutinised and checked by a proper authority.
Is there an alternative to private security?
Executive Outcomes and others who favour the privatisation of security in Africa insist that mercenaries fill a critical need in countries whose governments or armed forces are unable to provide even the most basic security to citizens. Mercenaries may not be the ideal solution, but what other solution is there?
This is a profound challenge to African countries, regional institutions like the OAU, and the international community.
There are alternatives to private security companies:
1. Countries can formally invite other governments to provide advice in reconstituting and training their armed forces. British military advisory and training teams have played this role in every SADC state except Angola. The teams remain subject to the full weight of the authority of the British army, government and law.
2. In situations of crisis and imminent crisis, the role of private security companies could be played by a United Nations Rapid Reaction Force. It is uncertain whether such a force will be established, but the planning is in an advanced stage. There is also support within the OAU for the formation of an African peace force, although there is no consensus on the different proposals in this regard advanced by major powers.
3. If private companies like Executive Outcomes were incorporated into the structures of the SANDF or the UN Office for Peacekeeping, and operated formally under their auspices, the objections raised above would fall away.
4. The OAU and the United Nations have to summon the will to take preventive action, which is not reliant on the use of force, before situations of conflict degenerate into crises. The current failure of will of these bodies, their tendency to wait too long before acting, contributes to situations in which desperate governments believe they have no option but to call in mercenaries.
Let me end by way of domestic analogy. In the Western Cape Pagad claims, with great justification, that it is has been forced to go to war with gangs because for years the police have virtually ignored the problem of gangsterism. But we will not tolerate vigilantes who operate outside the law, no matter how righteous their cause. And if we will not tolerate this in our own communities, how can we tolerate it elsewhere?
REFERENCES
1. See Nathan, L., 1994. The Changing of the Guard: Armed Forces and Defence Policy in a Democratic South Africa. Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria, Chapters 6-10.
2. Quoted in Thomas, G.S., 1984. Mercenary Troops in Modern Africa. Westview Press, Boulder, pg. 116.
3. See, for example, Thomas, op cit.
4. Ibid.
5. The convention is reproduced in Hough, M. and Du Plessis, A. (eds), 1996. Africa: Selected Documents on Political, Security, Humanitarian and Economic Issues. Institute for Strategic Studies, Pretoria, pp. 36-41.
6. Barlow, E., 1997. `The privatisation of `peacekeeping' in Africa', presented to the Institute for Security Studies, February.
7. Finance Week, 9 November 1995.
8. Mail and Guardian, 24 January 1997.
I thank Guy Lamb, Research Associate at the Centre for Conflict Resolution, for undertaking research in the preparation of this paper.
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