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THE UPDF COUNTER-INSURGENCY STRATEGY
[a] The Tactics Despite strength in weaponry and assistance by western donor military advisors, the UPDF adopted a counter-insurgency policy involving de-legitimating tactics. [i] The de-legitimating tactics: In some respect, the de-legitimating tactics perpetrated atrocities committed by the LRA insurgents in order to deny support, if any, the insurgents enjoyed in the community. The media extensively illuminated and credited the atrocities solely to the insurgents, while concealing UPDF complicity and in a perverted manner, praising their gallantry as liberators. However, the success of the UPDF de-legitimating strategies was short-lived, as local militia units consistently caught them committing atrocities. [ii] The perpetration of demonstrative atrocities and destruction against civilian targets: The UPDF would masquerade as the LRA and promote gross atrocities only to return and pretend to be saviors. Some testimonies from victims exposed such strategies: a 30-year-old woman victim confirmed that she was maimed by the UPDF; and, the defunct Shariat newspaper reported in the 1990s that the UPDF soldiers were caught masquerading as the LRA rebels and planting landmines to blow up civilian vehicles. The effectiveness of the militia units against the disguised UPDF soldiers embarrassed the government. But the guilty UPDF soldiers were promptly transferred to other mobile units to continue perpetrating more atrocities against civilians. A UPDF officer based in Gulu pointed out "that these atrocities are approved by higher headquarters and committed under clear operation mission orders." And in cases where the guilty UPDF soldiers told the truth, the UPDF Military Court Martial (MCM), to silence and conceal complicity, expeditiously and summarily executed them. The Military Court Martial has become a legal weapon of war against truth and human rights violations. It is part and partial of the counter-insurgency policy concealing the perpetration of genocide. [ii] The UPDF abductions and atrocities: Masquerading as the LRA, the UPDF burned down Radio Wa in Lira and abducted civilians. When a stage-managed rescue was conducted, the abductees testified that they were abducted by the UPDF. This prompted a Lango Member of Parliament to issue a press release that the "UPDF burnt Radio Wa and abducted civilians." The terrorizing of the Langi, a community of the late President Obote, was meant to isolate and contain the LRA within the Acholi sub-region. As the local militia units were quickly uncovering these strategies of mass deception, an ingenious strategy was developed by the UPDF elite and military advisors to entrap the Acholi population in concentration camps, under the ruses of protection. [b] The UPDF tactics of creating the concentration
camps
One of the common features of genocide is the
concentration camp. The tactics of evacuating the Acholi population into
concentration camps by the UPDF, ostensibly to "protect" them was sheer terror
and genocidal campaign. The strategies, which can be described as state
terrorism against the Acholi population, attacked the family units, means of
survival and livelihood and social infrastructures. This scorched-earth policy
included the following:
[i] Siege and artillery bombardment of villages:
TheUPDF siege and indiscriminately bombed villages
with little, if any, regard for civilians. The attacks were aimed at terrorizing
the civilian population, thereby inducing them to flee into concentration camps.
The Monitor newspaper reports that after the expiration of a 48 hours deadline,
heavy artillery bombardments commenced against civilians.
[ii] Intermittent or sporadic artillery bombardment: The aim is to cause civilians to falsely believe that they are safe and when the civilian population commence mass exodus, expose them to more artillery bombardments. The tactics of siege and intermittent bombardments caused a very large, though incalculable proportion of the total dead Acholi civilians moving into the concentration camps. A victim sobbed, "we thought we were temporary safe in our hiding place but during the lull in bombardment we got out of our hiding place to run for safety; the bombardments started, killing my pregnant wife and two year old daughter who could not run." The false sense of security to lure unsuspecting civilians into open ground for bombardment caused appalling massacres of women, children, young and old people, who were daily shredded to pieces by shrapnel debris scattered by motor shells deliberately lobbed among exposed fleeing civilian columns. [iii] Strafing with helicopter gunship: The nature of the shelling, strafing with gun ships
destroyed schools, hospitals and dispensaries and water wells. This scorched
earth policy is a genocidal campaign. An Acholi Member of Parliament remarks to
the New Vision newspaper: "we spoke with President Museveni about moving Acholi
civilian population in a planned manner to camps. The President said that he
would look into the matter. To our dismay, the next day, helicopter gunship came
and started strafing villages killing scores of unarmed civilians."
[iv] Deploying UPDF mobile military patrols into villages: Following the bombardments and gunship strafing,
UPDF mobile infantry units went into villages to destroy homes of those too
frightened to move and to force them to abandon their homes. Water wells were
poisoned, food granaries were burned or looted and those grievously injured or
too weak to move were summarily shot. A victim cried, "we were herded like
animals. We were not considered human beings; only the UPDF felt they were human
beings. They killed our family members and got rid of them like animals." A UPDF
patrol leader agrees, "The mission order from my superiors was to "omuhiigo
ebikoko" (translated from Runyankole to mean, "to go hunting animals"). He
emphasized, "the 'ebikoko' (meaning animal) obeys order or gets shot." This
scorched-earth policy threatened Acholi survival in fundamental ways because
families were separated by death due to thirst, exhaustion, physical abuse and
execution by the UPDF. The traumatic evacuation process destroyed the Acholi
social, cultural and economic support system, which is fundamental to their
survival. It is what Jan Egeland, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for
Humanitarian Affairs (UN-OCHA) accurately described during his visits to the
concentration camps on April 4 2006, as the "worse form of terrorism in the
world." He emphasized that "nowhere in the world have large areas where between
80 and 90 percent of the population have been terrorized into camps by
violence." Once again, General Museveni opposed Egeland's comprehensive approach
to the concentration camps, including a Special UN envoy for Northern Uganda.
This means that the genocide project against the Acholi people will continue
unabated.
Part four continues |
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