Uganda, as is all too common in the world, is not perfect:
Uganda will tell the United Nations it is withdrawing its forces from military operations in Somalia and other regional hotspots after the world body accused it of supporting Congolese rebels, the security minister said on Friday.
Minister Wilson Mukasa said the decision was irreversible and another Cabinet minister would explain Uganda's position at the United Nations in New York. However, it was not immediately clear if an irrevocable decision had been taken. ...
Ugandan troops account for more than a third of the 17,600 U.N.-mandated African peacekeepers battling al Qaeda-linked Islamist rebels in Somalia and their withdrawal could hand an advantage to al Shabaab.
Its soldiers, backed by U.S. special forces, are also leading the hunt for fugitive Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony in Central African Republic, with some stationed in South Sudan.
In a leaked report, a U.N. Group of Experts last month accused Uganda and Rwanda of supporting the so-called M23 rebel group commanded by Bosco Ntaganda, a warlord indicted by the International Criminal Court nicknamed "the Terminator". ...
Mukasa said Uganda would withdraw troops from Somalia, Central African Republic and Democratic Republic of Congo to concentrate on domestic security.
"We are tired of being maligned even after sacrifices have been made to ensure that our friends, our neighbors are okay. The 'thank you' we get is that you are now aiding this, you are this and that, so we are tired," he told reporters in Kampala.
If we're going to lead from behind, we have to understand that you push the proxy army you have into the fight and not the proxy army you wish you had. Uganda joins the Syrian rebellion and Pakistan as an example of imperfect actors we need to work with to achieve our objectives.
Not that I don't prefer to support others to fight. That's always preferable to committing our own troops. But getting others to fight for us does raise problems like this. Unless you are comfortable being unilateral, we can't always be picky about our allies. During the Cold War, liberals always complained about the failings of some of our allies who were willing to side with us against the Soviet Union.
This is likely just an open push by Uganda to get the UN to just file the report away without doing anything, but it highlights a problem of our sainted international community.
And it is another reminder that when we don't do the job, and we have to rely on others willing to do the job, we should save the lessons for later whenever we can.
