David H. Rothman's Blog: Drone Child novel, page 2

People don’t give a squat about child soldiers: Global interest lowest in 18 years

The child soldier horrors in the Drone Child novel, alas, are not pure fiction.

In the above video, author-activist Michel Chikwanine tells how Congolese rebels forced him as a boy soldier to kill his best friend—just as a 13-year in Child must murder his parents.

That happened years ago, but the atrocities go on. President Biden has acted to try to discourage the use of child soldiers in the Congo and elsewhere, but America could be doing much more (here and here).

Global interest in the gener...

Mining kleptocrats and the need for true democracy in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Caption: ABC, an Australian television network in this case, documents the deadly collapses and other horrors in Congolese cobalt mines. All while mining kleptocrats and friends grow richer!

An article in the influential Wilson Quarterly reminds us how “America’s Past and Present Collide in the Democratic Republic of Congo”:

“A significant percentage of the human slave trade in the 17th and 18th centuries originated from the DRC, as did the rush for rubber and other key minerals that fueled techn...

The Online Book Club’s Q&A with me

This is a well-done Q&A on me and my checkered past. Here’s a little more about the paraphrased quote on doctors, actors, and writers. The war novelist was Norman Mailer, who, of course, was a lot more than just the author of The Naked and the Dead. And I know the quote is accurate, because I w...

Are war novels too scary for kids?

“Still reading,” by Tony Alter. CC licensed. “If Liam has no chores to do he is reading, non-stop.”

Are war novels too scary for kids?

My answer is: “Lots of ‘It depends.’” The biggest question would be, “How old is the child emotionally?” S...

Music and a cell phone tax repeal show the power of the DR Congo’s next generation

The song ”Nini To Sali Te” (“We Tried Everything”) attacks the callousness and hypocrisy of so many politicians in the DR Congo.

Switzerland we aren’t. The Democratic Republic of the Congo remains a poor, corrupt, chaotic country. Just a few weeks ago, soldiers marched up and down the street of Kinshasa to help bottle up an attempted coup against President Félix Tshisekedi.

Why, then, am I optimistic about my country’s future? Because I can hear change—through the music now fashionable with young...

Why David Rothman wrote Drone Child: Lemba Adula’s Q&A with him

I, Lemba Adula, happen to be the hero of Drone Child: A Novel of War, Family, and Survival. So here I am, a Congolese villager turned self-taught hacker turned child soldier turned military drone expert turned sea-going pirate turned university student turned entrepreneur turned major industria...

US vs. China in the Congo over cobalt: More foreign invention in DRC ahead?

A just-published series in the New York Times spotlights the competition between US and Chinese interests over Congolese mineral wealth (here, here, and here).

The current Kinshasa government has called for audits and renegotiations of Sino-Congolese agreements negotiated under the corrupt predecessor of the present leader, Félix Tshisekedi.

Will the Chinese budge sufficiently? Or could they respond by fomenting unrest to get the current government overthrown? Meanwhile rebel militias remain major threats in some mineral-rich areas.

And yet another variable: What if electric cars could be cheaper without cobalt? Imagine what that could mean to the already-battered DRC economy.

Update, Nov. 29, 2021: The New York Times’s expose of Albert Yuma Mulimbi, “a longtime power broker in the Democratic Republic of Congo and chairman of a government agency that works with international mining companies to tap the nation’s copper and cobalt reserves.” His enemies say he has has stolen billions from his impoverished country. “Top State Department officials have tried to force him out of the mining agency and pushed for him to be put on a sanctions list, arguing he has for years abused his position to enrich friends, family members and political allies.”

Update: Dec. 3, 2021: Article in the Times reporting the ouster of Albert Yuma Mulimbi as chair of the DRC’s state mining company, Gécamines. Alas, however, the Times says that for the moment “Mr. Yuma will retain his role supervising the reform of small-scale and informal mining in Congo, one industry executive said. His plans include buying cobalt from the informal miners, also known as artisanal miners, and regulating pricing. Cobalt produced by artisanal mining, as opposed to industrial operations, makes up about 30 percent of the nation’s output.” Mulimbi says he will improve safety. Let’s see. Mineral production has been a disaster not only in terms of safety but also environmental protection.

Another Afghanistan ahead? A Congolese perspective

The Nation article was very interesting. So far, there is just a small number of U.S. Special Forces guys in the Eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and officially, they’re not there to take part directly in the fighting.

Their mission will be to train Congolese troops engaged in fighting the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), as well as train some ecoguards from the National Park of the Virunga since the rebels are also operating within the park.

But we all know this type of story by now - think about Putin’s Wagner Group, a possible Russian equivalent in some ways. We never know what's hiding underneath.

Will the size of the U.S. Force grow and will the U.S. unwittingly get entangled just like Afghanistan? That's a good question.

As for possible threats, there are very few Muslims in Congo, and they definitely don't share that much with radical Islamist groups. I guess that’s why you'll find lots of foreign nationals - Somalis, Kenyans, etc. - among the ADF, which originally was a Ugandan group.

Now some people are getting more and more concerned about the possible arrival of Afghanistan's refugees in Uganda - fearing it will possibly fuel the ADF with religious ideologues and maybe fighters as well. We’ll wait and see. Perhaps the extent of ADF’s ties with the Islamic State has been exaggerated.

Some say that insecurity had been created on purpose by people who want to exploit minerals without the control of the Kinshasa government. The funniest aspect of this hypothesis is that most of those people work in the government and the army.

Another possible reason for the ADF to be listed as a terrorist group right now would be to obtain a lifting of the United Nations embargo on armament for the Kinshasa government.

Whenever the explanation, why the increased interest now in such a listing, considering the ADF’s long-time record of violence? The ADF existed for over 20 years in the Eastern DRC (where it started with some Ugandans involved) without threating the locals. But suddenly, at least seven years ago, they started killing civilians, as if they got a new vocation.

The week ahead will tell us more about what is at stake.

US Special Forces to help DRC fight armed militias

The US is pulling out of Afghanistan, but could its military involvement in Africa be growing? Another deadly quagmire ahead?

DRC President Felix Tshisekedi has accepted temporary help from the US Special Forces to fight the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), an armed group.

Will the anti-terrorism help in the eastern DRC last longer than the several weeks envisioned? And will the size of the US forces grow? Is it possible the US should also be considering more nonmilitary means to promote stability in this mineral-rich region? Also, are certain Americans exaggerating the importance of the ADF’s Islamic ties? If nothing else, keep in mind that just a tiny fraction of Congolese people are Islamic. Complicating matters is the anti-Muslim hostility of the corrupt and tyrannical government of neighboring Uganda, whose brutal security forces have encouraged the anti-ADF efforts in the DRC.

Related: “The Bewildering Search for the Islamic State in Congo. Will a Texas hedge fund drag the US into another dangerous quagmire?” by Helen Epstein in The Nation.

Drones as life-savers in the Congo

Lemba Adula, hero of my novel, makes his fortune off new tech for drones. Some medical ones are already buzzing around in the DRC. See Drone experiment in DR Congo could be the future of access to healthcare.