COIN case: LRA Lords Resistance Army

[M-A Lagrange]

If Kony on the loose brings American aid, where's the incentive to catch him?

Hey Dayuhan,

You're actually asking the only interresting question that no one wants to answer.
And most probably responding to the question: why is UPDF uncapable to catch the man...

[JMA]

Ugandan army says Sudan is backing Joseph Kony's LRA

Surprise, surprise, who would have guessed.

[M-A Lagrange]

Hello JMA,

Apparently it is true. But Museveni is coming back also with ADF, another Sudan funded group.
Keep in mind this is taking place in a time where both Sudan are on an undeclared war. And also Museveni is very much criticized by Muslim community in his country.

[davidbfpo]

A short BBC News report:

A senior commander in the rebel Lord's Resistance Army has been captured by the Ugandan army, a spokesman has said. Caesar Achellam was seized on Saturday following a struggle between Ugandan soldiers and a group of 30 rebels. The commander, whom Ugandan officials say is a top rebel military strategist, was captured in the Central African Republic, one of several nations where the Ugandan-led LRA operates.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-18051522

Note a local reporter says the prisoner was with one, or two wives and eight children.

[carl]

The report said Kony is being forced to move almost every other day. Perhaps an actual end is near.

[M-A Lagrange]

A report evaluating the US military effort to end LRA.

I did not read the entire report but what I read was interresting, even if I do not agree with all what is said. (Political context might sometimes be too lightly understood or analysed for me)
Out of the electoral advocacy game, it is good that someone follows that up closely.

MOMENT OF TRUTH
The potential and limits of the US
military’s counter-LRA deployment
https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/...une%202012.pdf

[davidbfpo]

Skimming through the cited report I noted on pg.10:

The 391st battalion of the Congolese military, which received extensive training by the US military and is now deployed to northern Congo, continues to face logistical constraints and has engaged little with LRA forces. MONUSCO, despite instability in eastern Congo, has opened up new bases in northern Congo’s Bas Uele region and utilized the Guatemalan Special Forces unit (GUASFOR) and other units to set up temporary bases in towns hit hardest by LRA activity

On pg.14 and one wonders which lawyers did imposed this condition:

US advisers are also helping to streamline US logistical support to Uganda’s counterLRA operations, which amounts to approximately $1.5 million a month for supplies and helicopter support provided through third-party contractors. The contracts for this support stipulate that the helicopters (US-contracted MI-8 helicopters) overnight at the Ugandan military base in Nzara, South Sudan, even though they are most needed at the Ugandan military’s current forward operating bases in Obo and Djemah, CAR. Consquently, the helicopters must fly hundreds of extra miles each day from Nzara to Djemah and Obo, wasting fuel and flight hours and reducing the effectiveness of Ugandan military tracking teams operating there.....US officials have restricted the advisers’ travel radius to within several miles of the towns where they are deployed.

...a $35 million authorization in the FY2012 defense authorizations act for US
support to military forces operating against the LRA. However, six months after the authorization bill was passed, bureaucratic hurdles within the Department of Defense have prevented any of the authorized funds from being put to use.