Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book emphasises the wide variety of military action in recent times, and the huge differences in both the size of African armies and their capabilities. It explores how conflict in Africa increasingly resembles war in pre-colonial Africa: 'bodies of men, usually ethnically bonded, fighting for economic assets in areas not demarcated by agreed borders'. The book deals with the composition, training, capabilities and requirements of the peacekeeping forces in Africa. It examines, within the context of state collapse, the concomitant growth of private security firms and mercenaries. The book shows how Sudan was itself an interventionist state, in the sense of lending support to rebel groups in Ethiopia and Eritrea, to the guerrillas of the Lord's Resistance Army in northern Uganda, and to other groups in Chad and Democratic Republic of Congo.