(1st Place) The United Nations Congo Intervention: A Force of Decolonization

“1960 was the decolonization year. It was this year that the decolonization process started in full force, and he [Hammarskjold] felt that what happened to the Congo would be extremely important – because of the timing, because the Congo had a unique strategic position and because also the Congo had very great natural resources.”[1]

On June 30, 1960, Belgium granted independence to the Belgian Congo, officially transferring power to the Republic of the Congo (Leopoldville) under the government of Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba and President Joseph Kasavubu.[2] Lumumba’s independence speech was filled with nationalistic and Pan-African remarks as he proclaimed, “The Congo’s independence is a decisive step towards the liberation of the whole African continent… Eternal glory to the fighters for national liberation! Long live independence and African unity! Long live the independent and sovereign Congo!”[3] In that same speech, Lumumba asserted that “The Republic of the Congo has been proclaimed and our beloved country’s future is now in the hands of its own people.”[4] Sadly, the future of Congo would be in the hands of its people for less than a month before Lumumba would find it imperative to request United Nations help in stabilizing his new nation. However, the underlying question behind this request is why, for the first time in its history, the United Nations decided to intervene in a sovereign state by implementing one of the largest peacekeeping forces ever assembled to this day. Was this action simply driven by the Cold War or was there a deeper message, signaling that decolonization must not be hindered?

By July 4, 1960, only four days after the newly established independence, the Congolese Army known as the Force Publique revolted against its European officers. Although the initial revolt was not widespread across the Congo, it caused a panic amongst Belgian nationals who then began to flee the country, consequently plunging the nation deeper into turmoil and anarchy.[5] Additionally, statements made by Belgian military generals regarding the immobile social situation of the Congolese infantrymen after independence, and the fact that the new government received pay raises while the military was excluded, only added to the tension and fostered the rebellion across the country.[6]

As the Congo’s system of rule quickly began to unravel, the Katanga province under Moise Tshombe attempted to secede from the newly independent nation. The members of the Force Publique within Katanga—renamed the Gendarmerie Katangese—did not revolt like the rest of their comrades due to the more unified training and additional pay from the Belgian mining company, Union Minière. Additionally, the Congolese infantrymen shared the same tribal background as Tshombe and therefore supported his political stance.[7] As the secession began to evolve, it became clear that it was not simply an internal rift, but a conflict engineered by Belgian colonial interests that meant to preserve their economic prosperity generated by Katangese mines, which held the majority of the Congo’s wealth. Belgian support of both Tshombe and the Katanga secession was indisputable. Union Minière representatives met with Tshombe daily to write his speeches and correspondence, sometimes with the assistance of Belgian Consul General van der Wal.[8] Furthermore, the Belgian government in Brussels was “heavily influenced by mining interests and by the Belgian citizens who were still down there and owned most of the riches.”[9]

With Belgian interests in Katanga clearly established, Lumumba saw his newly independent country quickly vanishing as his regime in Leopoldville became incapable of properly governing the country. Determined not to fall under the control of Cold War ideologies, Lumumba turned to the United Nations for military assistance. On July 14, the Security Council passed Resolution 143, which contained two main objectives: to withdraw the entire Belgian military and to provide military assistance in order to ensure internal stability.[10] The Security Council saw these goals as essential because the “Belgian actions represented a violation of the sovereignty of an independent country… and because the internal instability was such that it left the country open to manipulation by other countries, especially the United States and the Soviet Union.”[11] It is important to note that both France and the United Kingdom abstained from the vote, which clearly showed that the resolution was in conflict with their imperialistic stance and not simply a preventative Cold War action.[12]

With Security Resolution 143 passed, and the rest of the world blaming Belgium for the disastrous outcome of the Congo Independence, the Belgian government went on the defensive. As UN troops began dispersing throughout the Congo, Belgian troops began to withdraw from the country as the safety of Belgian nationals was assured.  However, there was no sign of an intention to leave Katanga, as the Belgians claimed, “the Katangese authorities beg us to stay.” [13] These were the same authorities that were being funded by the Belgians. Jean Paul van Bellinghen, the Belgian responsible for explaining the Belgian position to the United States and the UN, asserted that Belgium had been utterly unprepared for Congolese independence due to their misconception that since Africa had been the last continent colonized, it would be the last one to be decolonized. Under this logic, the Belgians justified their lack of action in preparing the Congo for independence by claiming that Asia was currently decolonizing and that they thought it would be years before Africa would face the same situation.[14] Belgium’s plea of ignorance and innocence becomes more doubtful when their policies with the local Congolese are examined more closely.

Belgians continued to assert that their intentions in the Congo were purely symbiotic by citing statistics that demonstrated that the Congo was one of the most developed nations in Africa with one of the highest literacy rates. However, several of Belgium’s policies revealed that their intentions were more self-serving than publicly portrayed. The Belgian Congo System had “in recent years instituted a number of progressive economic and social welfare reforms… yet there is strict surveillance against any open manifestation of political awareness for African nationalism.”[15] In practice, Belgium attempted to maintain Congolese dependence and reduce their political capabilities, something that African nationalist Kwame Nkrumah claimed would “benefit the colonizers not the Africans, therefore independence would only be prolonged.”[16] For decades, Belgium promoted lower education through missionaries but strategically avoided any encouragement of the attainment of a university degree, so much so that by 1960, only seventeen Congolese held degrees. By limiting education of the people of the Congo, the Belgians succeeded in delaying Congolese independence until 1960, but moreover ensured that the natives would be unprepared and incapable of governing themselves when the time finally came.[17]

The Belgian creation of an “education gap” makes it appear that Belgium never had any intention of relinquishing their control of the Congo or Katanga, thereby making the underlying UN intervention not one of Cold War interests, but rather one of anti-imperialist action in support of decolonization. With a clear understanding that decolonization was the primary cause of the Congo conflict, the real question to be considered is how the UN realigned itself as an anti-colonialist and Third World supporter at such a tenuous time in world relations. In order to understand how the UN policy in the Congo came about, the diplomatic influence of the UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold must be taken into account.

One does not have to look far to discover Dag Hammarskjold’s values and the dreams that he had for the future of the United Nations. Sture Linner, the Chief of Civilian Operations in the Congo, claimed that Hammarskjold had “third world interests closest to his heart.”[18] Hammarskjold saw the Congo Crisis as the focal point of decolonization, where inaction could lead to the reversal of decades of progress in the Third World. Furthermore, the Congo Crisis was a chance for the United Nations to prove itself as a significant world order that would be in place for generations to come. The two necessities for this establishment of principles and global acceptance were: 1) The UN was a union of nations that symbolized state sovereignty and therefore must defend the rights of every free and independent nation; and 2) The UN must transition from discussion to action in order to make its opinion heard on the world stage. By successfully applying these two objectives, the UN could further distance itself from the failed, inactive, and imperialistic League of Nations, thereby solidifying itself as a legitimate and powerful international organization.

With these two goals, Hammarskjold saw an opportunity in the Congo to make a statement not only by furthering Third World progress and decolonization but also by establishing the UN as a peacekeeping force capable of intervening if world order were to be broken. As the crisis unfolded, Hammarskjold rose to the occasion, garnering support for a Congo intervention from all corners of the world, and ultimately succeeded both in the Congo and in “mov[ing] the UN onto the plane of executive action without large-scale war …[a]… movement from words to deeds, from general resolution to intervention…”[19] Although Hammarskjold may have been the driver behind the Congo intervention, his success would have been impossible to achieve without the support of the United States and the rising Third World.

The United Nations, created in 1945, had fifty-one original members, “the majority of them European states (including the USSR), the Americas, and the so-called ‘White British Commonwealth.’”[20] By 1960, UN membership had almost doubled with forty-eight new members, many of whom represented the regions of Asia and Africa where independence had been earned through the process of decolonization. With the Third World gaining representation so quickly in the UN, it is no surprise that there would also be increasing support for the Secretary General Hammarskjold and his policies concerning the Congo Crisis and decolonization. Although the UN Security Council was in charge of establishing operations and making the final decision, the great rise in the representation of the Third World in the UN inevitably changed the views of the Security Council. Additionally, there was now a growing threat of a “Third World vote” if a lack of unanimity on the Security Council led to a vote by the General Assembly.

The upsurge of prominence of the Third World in the global order was noticed not only politically in New York but also physically with their personnel presence in the Congo. In addition to the white European diplomats on the ground in the Congo, the majority of the military forces were Indian, Ethiopian, and Irish, once again signaling to the Congolese, the Belgians, and the rest of the world that the UN was truly an international organization.[21] Although it is generally accepted that European and American forces were limited in the Congo to reduce Cold War tensions and protest by the Soviet Union, the diversity of the UN forces also indicated that the UN had changed and was no longer an organization of imperialists. The UN ground forces in the Congo not only represented decolonization through nationality but also through mentality, for the UN forces “were in a certain sense, convinced that our [the Belgian’s] chapter was finished. The colonial chapter was finished and the word colonialism was about the worst possible word you can use.”[22]

The United Nations and Hammarskjold not only gained support from new Third World nations, but also from African Nationalists and Pan-Africanist movements. Kwame Nkrumah, the first President of Ghana stated, “The United Nations … remains the only world organization in which the many problems of the world have a chance of finding reasonable solution.”[23]

Although Hammarskjold’s persistence and the Third World’s size and growing significance initiated the talks of UN intervention and decolonization, none of these goals could have been achieved without the financial and political backing of the United States. The Korean War had made Eisenhower realize that there were new limits to the sacrifices Americans were willing to make “to extend Americanism abroad.”[24] With this understanding, Eisenhower saw the need to direct international attitude through new methods including his policy of “quiet internationalism.” [25] Hammarskjold realized he had a great opportunity at hand and attempted to phrase United Nations policy in such a light so that Eisenhower would provide full approval. The problem for Hammarskjold was that Eisenhower “had no personal interest in Africa, nor did he fully realize the potential strategic value of improving US relations with the recently decolonized continent,” and “was afraid of causing a possible rift with his NATO allies.”[26] Ultimately, Hammarskjold decided the best path towards American support of the Congo Operation would be by placing the situation in relation to the Cold War, reminding Eisenhower that the collapse of a regime was one step away from Communism. In this way, Hammarskjold formed his policy of decolonization around American Cold War interests so that America could then reform their policy around the United Nations’ interests, including those held in the Congo. This worked so effectively that by 1961, the Assistant Secretary of State Cleveland Harlan asserted that “the UN was much more central to our foreign policy” and that the position of the US is to “support the initiative of Dag Hammarskjold.”[27]

By July of 1960, Hammarskjold’s diplomatic success showed as the Eisenhower administration approved the first of several UN Security Council Resolutions regarding the Congo Crisis. Additionally, when the topic of funding for the Congo Operation arose, “The President said he saw nothing to do but to go to the Congress and ask to have the contingency fund increased by $100 million.”[28] By rephrasing the mission so that the US believed that “if the UN weren’t in there then we would probably have to be,” Hammarskjold gave the US motive for continued support of the UN and decolonization.[29]

With a change of administration in 1961, the United States only improved relations and increased support for Dag Hammarskjold and the United Nations as the more liberal John F. Kennedy took office. While civil rights issues were a sensitive topic in the US, Kennedy had “a reputation for being sympathetic toward African nationalism,” a factor that showed in the pursuance of his liberal internationalist policy.[30] This meant that Hammarskjold could place more emphasis on continuing decolonization without so much Cold War banter, which is what consequently occurred in 1961 with UN Security Council Resolutions 161 and 169. Resolution 161 added “other foreign military, paramilitary, and political advisers” to the list of those who should be withdrawn, and Resolution 169 approved for the use of force and demanded the end of Katangese secession thereby “completely rejecting the claim that Katanga is a ‘sovereign independent nation.’”[31]

Admittedly, the intense American focus on the Cold War and the fact that American and United Nations’ policies on the Congo were interwoven makes it harder to imagine the UN intervention in the Congo as more than just a result of Cold War competition. Although this paper portrays the UN intervention as an act of perpetuating decolonization, many historians believe that the UN took action in order to prevent the Soviet Union and the United States from starting a bloody proxy war over one of the most valuable African regions.

There remains an array of sources that contend the belief that Hammarskjold’s end goal was decolonization. Jonathan Dean claimed that Hammarskjold’s initial intention of the UN intervention was to simply preserve the peace and that that policy only changed when the West feared “that the Congo would become Balkanized into a lot of small states unable to sustain themselves and that the Communist influence which was then feared so much, would become predominant in these ministrates.”[32] The West was not the only side that earned notice by the UN, for the Director General of the UN Association of London posited that “It may well be that until the world is substantially disarmed the Russians will never allow the UN to have a well trained, well equipped, standing force adequate to deal with situations of this kind wherever they may occur.”[33]

In light of specific sources, it seems feasible that East-West tensions of the Cold War directed overall UN policy and intervention in the Congo. However, this preconceived notion that any international crisis during the Cold War was directly related to the war itself has slowly been outdated as historians begin looking back on this period of history with a clear and more impartial view in an attempt to discover what was really happening behind the façade that the two superpowers had created. Although it is likely that the CIA and the KGB were running clandestine operations in the Congo at the time of UN intervention, these efforts and intentions were entirely separate from those of the UN.

In rebuttal to the above claims of a Congo intervention based around the Cold War, one must first take into account the simple necessity of the US foreign policy to be perceived both at home and abroad as purely anti-ommunist regardless of the situation. Although American policymakers were in favor of Hammarskjold’s decolonization intentions in the Congo, they could not simply endorse decolonization on the world stage for that would be political suicide. Endorsing Hammarskjold’s policies and beliefs without rephrasing the situation around the Cold War would enrage imperialist NATO allies while simultaneously sparking civil rights issues at home.

If the UN intervention in the Congo was a result of Cold War tension, then why were there no other major “Cold War” UN interventions of comparable size to that of the Congo in the next two decades even as Cold War proxy wars developed across the African continent in Angola, Namibia, Ethiopia, and Somalia? In spite of the fact that the UN had always been an extension of Washington’s own policy, “the advent of new, independent Third World states began already in the 1960’s to change the role of the United Nations into a more diverse forum, less susceptible to American influence.”[34] This change in UN influence therefore made it harder for direct US initiatives to be instituted, making it even less likely that US Cold War interests would be accepted by Dag Hammarskjold and pursued through a UN intervention of the Congo. Additionally, the conflict in the Congo over decolonization “showed how the UN developed from being viewed by many as an arm of US intervention abroad to being an altogether different organization, in which the strengthened position of the nonaligned countries was perhaps the most visible characteristic.”[35]

Conor Cruise O’Brien, a controversial figure in the UN intervention, suggests that the British secretly supported Tshombe and Katangan secession.[36] While his claims tend to be debatable and remain unverified, the accusation in itself speaks volumes. It inadvertently proposes that the process of decolonization was active in the UN intervention and therefore led to the British protecting their interests by siding (secretly nonetheless) with the imperialist faction behind Tshombe. This British connection could also tie in to multiple British abstentions on Security Council resolutions regarding the Congo question.

With time comes new information and another reason to doubt Cold War influences in the UN intervention of 1960. In the 1990’s David Gibbs uncovered archives suggesting that Dag Hammarskjold’s death was the possible result of a Belgian assassination attempt.[37] Successful or not, the fact that there is evidence that the Belgian faction plotted to assassinate the Secretary General of the UN suggests that the Congo was not a Cold War conflict but a battle against decolonization. As a last resort, the Belgians debated removing the leader who was at the forefront of the movement that diametrically opposed their interests.

It is also of particular interest and value to note that the Katangese made it clear that the Soviets were not welcome within their province because “they were wanting to establish themselves as good anti-communists and reliable to the business community and Western Europe, amongst whom they had quite a measure of support or partial support, at least.”[38] The continuing rejection by Katanga of Communism and the East is a clear signal that Katanga had every intention of avoiding the rise of Cold War tensions in their conflict against the UN, thereby signifying that there was no Cold War threat for the UN to act upon in the first place.

Lastly, in order to obtain a complete argument in favor of decolonization as the driving force behind the UN intervention, it is necessary to analyze the African outlook of the Cold War. Through the eyes of most Pan-Africanists, African nationalism and Communism were not at all connected. Rather, it was widely believed that “Cold War propaganda [was] designed to discredit African nationalists and to alienate from their movements the sympathy and support of anti-colonial elements within progressive organizations.”[39] The generally accepted belief that Communism was used to disenfranchise African nationalists only adds to their negative perception of the Communist ideology that failed to properly integrate the Africans, who were seen through the lens of Communism as “Negro workers and peasants” and ultimately “revolutionary expendables.”[40] With the majority of the African continent and the Pan-African movement excluded and marginalized by Communism, the situation in the Congo in 1960 clearly comes into focus as a conflict exempt from Cold War influence, purely influenced by imperialist greed and ultimately balanced by UN intervention that establishes decolonization as a permanent force of the African continent.

In interpreting the UN decision to intervene in the Congo, it is useful to take into account the UN’s decision for withdrawal and the time at which they decided to withdraw. In June of 1964, the United Nations pulled the last of its military forces out of the Congo, signaling that the objectives had been achieved and the mission to end Katangan secession (and ensure the continuation of decolonization) had been successful. Although other internal conflicts were still raging within the Congo borders, including the Simba rebellion, the UN still proceeded towards its exit. The UN decision to leave the Congo at this point in time while tribal conflict was still going on helps to distinguish Katangan secession from the rest of the Congo’s troubles. The amplified UN focus on Katangan secession can thereby be explained by the fact that it was only major conflict in the Congo that was openly manipulated by external imperialist actors. Additionally, as the UN was moving its forces out, the US, USSR, and Cuba were simultaneously preparing their first unrestricted actions within the country as they prepared to outmaneuver each other for an alliance with the Congo leadership. Although the UN could not predict the future of the Congo, at the time of the conflict one could clearly see that a UN exit would ultimately lead to Cold War competition in the Congo, therefore any relation between UN intervention and Cold War prevention seem highly unlikely.

Although the phrase ‘as a result of the Cold War’ can be applied to most international events of that era, this simple explanation does not always make the most accurate historical interpretation and tends to ignore evidence from before the era of bi-polarity. When the question of why the United Nations intervened in Congo arose, it was not simply enough to look at the action as a moment in time and place. The question of the Congo therefore could not properly be assessed in the decade it occurred but rather in the century that surrounded it. By properly taking into account Africa’s and the Congo’s dark history with colonialism and Empire, one can arrive at a conclusion that may be the closest to the truth: Dag Hammarskjold, under the cover of the Cold War, enlisted the support of the Third World and the United States for a United Nations Congo intervention. This intervention if successful, would achieve Hammarskjold’s goals: 1) extend decolonization across the continent of Africa; 2) set a precedent that the interference of national sovereignty would be unacceptable; and 3) establish the United Nations was an intergovernmental organization of action. Although Hammarskjold never had the opportunity to see the result of his endeavors in the Congo before his untimely death on September 18, 1961, there was a definitive global consensus on the success and value of his efforts. Therefore, he was posthumously awarded the Nobel Peace Prize of 1961 “in gratitude for all he did, for what he achieved, for what he fought for: to create peace and goodwill among nations and men.”[41]

This essay was awarded 1st Place in the 2013 Acheson Prize.

Max Nickbarg (’14) is a History major in Trumbull College.

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