Chad: From Civil Strife to Big Power Rivalry

Beginning from 1980 when Libyan tanks first rolled into Chad, international interest and involvement in its 18-year old civil war has been mounting. As the sputtering war erupted with renewed ferocity in summer 1983, the scope and intensity of external involvement became bewildering. France, the erstwhile gendarme of Francophone Africa and Chad's former (?) colonial master despatched hundreds of paratroopers with sophisticated weapons to N'Djamena. 1 Apparently disturbed by what looked like an initial foot-dragging in Paris, the Reagan Administration, in a tough move directly committed the United States into the war. Apart from the offer of a $10m military aid package, it also sent its Redeye anti-aircraft missiles, F-15 fighters and two AWACS radar planes to back the forces of President Hissene Habre. As a corrolary, the United States aircraft carrier Eisenhower also steamed around the Mediterranean just off the coast of Libya. 2 In its reaction, the Soviet Union described the American posturing as a “proof that NATO powers are openly interfering in Chad's sovereign affairs†while the Chinese Foreign Minister called on the local war lords to “prevent super power meddling and sabotage.†3 From these accounts therefore, what until recently, was a smouldering civil strife with international implications “has become a cosmopolitan war with local complications†and Chad, carrying the unenviable distinction of being the “poorest country of the poorest continent†has emerged as a potential hotbed of super power rivalry in the continent. The present developments have, in effect, confirmed the fears expressed in 1977 by Major Wadel Kamougue, then Chad's Foreign Minister, about the possibility of the country becoming a “strategic-region†that “could easily lead to big power rivalry.†4 In spite of the recent developments, the genesis, development and the external complications of the Chadian conflict remain obscure and unappreciated. What then, is the trouble with Chad? How and why did external forces get involved? What efforts have been made to resolve the conflicts and what are the implications of all these for the country. These are some of the issues discussed in this paper with a view to contributing to the greater awareness of the nature of the conflicts in Chad and the external interests and issues that have now come to overlay them.