The Wars That Keep Museveni in Power

Uganda's Peacekeeping Missions and the Politics of Survival

The Ugandan government newspaper New Vision ran headline that was impossible to miss:

"US PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP CALLS MUSEVENI OVER MISSION"

The smaller headline beneath it read:

"UPDF TROOPS TO DEPLOY IN GAZA."

According to the paper, President Donald Trump personally called President Yoweri Museveni to discuss sending Ugandan troops to a proposed International Stabilisation Force in Gaza. Museveni was said to have agreed.

The story relied on what it called "highly placed military sources."

Maybe the phone call happened. Maybe it didn't.

So far, there has been no official confirmation from the White House, Uganda's State House, or major international news organizations like Reuters, the BBC, or the Associated Press.

But that is not really the story.

Uganda has sent troops into foreign conflicts many times before, with or without public fanfare from Washington. Whether the White House confirms a phone call is almost beside the point. The real question is this:

Why is Uganda always ready to send its soldiers abroad?

Many people see these deployments as peacekeeping missions. They are that. But they are also something else. They have quietly become one of the strongest pillars keeping President Museveni and his family in power.

For nearly two decades, Uganda has become one of Africa's biggest suppliers of soldiers. The country has maintained a large military presence in Somalia since 2007 under AMISOM and later ATMIS. Ugandan troops have also been deployed to South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Central African Republic, Equatorial Guinea, and previously Liberia.

There have also been repeated reports—often denied or never fully explained—that Ugandan security personnel have appeared in neighboring countries during times of political unrest, helping governments deal with protests, opposition movements, or disputed elections.

Every deployment buys Uganda something more valuable than money.

It buys political protection.

Governments in Washington, London, and Brussels may criticize elections in Uganda or express concern about human rights. But criticism rarely goes very far when Uganda is helping contain terrorism or stabilize regions that powerful countries would rather not police themselves.

It is an old bargain dressed in modern clothes.

Uganda provides boots on the ground.

Western governments provide military training, intelligence, equipment, funding, and, perhaps most importantly, silence.

While Ugandans complain about corruption, shrinking freedoms, disappearances, torture, and people being dragged into unmarked drone vans in broad daylight, the international response often sounds like a smoke alarm with dead batteries. It makes a little noise, then falls silent.

The regime understands this exchange very well.

Sending soldiers abroad also helps manage the army at home.

An idle military can become restless. A military fighting overseas stays busy, gains experience, earns allowances, and builds careers. Officers return from Somalia or elsewhere with promotions, medals, and influence. Many know exactly who made those opportunities possible.

Loyalty grows quickly when your paycheck, your promotion, and your future all wear the same face.

Then there is the money.

Peacekeeping missions bring reimbursements from organizations like the African Union and the United Nations. The payments cover troop allowances, equipment, transport, and logistics. For a government struggling with debt and limited domestic revenue, that is an important stream of income.

Officially, the money strengthens Uganda's security forces.

In reality, it also strengthens the political system built around them.

The security budget remains large. The military remains loyal. The regime remains secure.

Ordinary Ugandans, meanwhile, continue paying higher taxes, struggling with poor public services, and wondering why hospitals, schools, and roads never seem to have enough money.

Perhaps Gaza will become Uganda's next mission. Perhaps it won't.

But history suggests that if Ugandan troops are sent, the greatest victory may not be won in Gaza at all.

It will be won much closer to home, where every foreign deployment helps tighten the foundation beneath a government that has survived not simply through elections, but through carefully managed alliances, a loyal military, and the quiet political value of sending other people's sons and daughters to fight in other people's wars.

The uncomfortable question is not whether Ugandan troops can bring stability.

It is this:

At what cost?

The United Nations and international human rights organizations have documented serious allegations against Ugandan troops during some foreign deployments, including reports of unlawful killings, sexual violence, and other abuses in places such as Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Some cases have been investigated. Others have quietly disappeared beneath the larger story of fighting terrorism and keeping the peace.

The cameras always seem to know when to switch off.

Powerful countries talk loudly about human rights until security interests enter the room. Then the conversation changes. Stability becomes more important than accountability.

That silence has consequences.

A government that learns the world will overlook abuses committed abroad has little reason to believe the same world will suddenly become outraged when abuses are reported at home.

So why should Ugandans expect the international community to rush to their defense when opposition supporters report torture, enforced disappearances, prison abuse, or political violence? If the same government is praised for bringing "stability" overseas, many Ugandans wonder why anyone would expect different standards inside Uganda itself.

Perhaps the most painful part of this story is not what happens to civilians.

It is what happens to Uganda's own soldiers.

Most of them are not sons of ministers or wealthy businessmen. They are young men from villages and crowded towns where jobs are scarce and military service promises a paycheck. When one dies, another unemployed young man is ready to take his place.

Poverty is the army's most reliable recruiting officer.

The dead rarely stay in the headlines for long.

Some families receive a coffin. Others wait for answers that never come. Some never even see their sons return home.

One of the darkest examples came on 26 May 2023 during the Battle of Buulo Mareer in Somalia. Al-Shabaab fighters attacked a Ugandan military base with suicide car bombs before launching a large ground assault. The base was overrun.

Uganda officially acknowledged that 54 soldiers were killed, making it the country's deadliest single loss since it first deployed troops to Somalia in 2007. Some survivors hid in the surrounding bush for days before they could be rescued.

When President Museveni addressed the tragedy, many expected words of comfort for grieving families.

Instead, he focused on how the deployment had been managed.

He argued that Somalia was a combat zone, not a place where officers should send cooks or bodyguards simply to collect United Nations allowances.

As he put it:

"This unfortunate incident should be used to remind all those concerned, that operations in Somalia and other theatres are combat missions and not welfare missions where you can access UN allowances."

The statement may have addressed failures within the military, but it revealed something else.

The dead seemed to become a lesson.

Not sons. Not fathers. Not husbands.

Just another warning about running an efficient military machine.

That is why many Ugandans struggle to celebrate foreign deployments.

If these same security forces are praised for "stabilizing" other countries despite repeated allegations of abuse, why should anyone believe the international community will suddenly sound the alarm if those methods are used inside Uganda?

History suggests otherwise.

Governments that provide strategic value are often given room to do things that ordinary countries could never get away with.

Today many Ugandans are simply exhausted.

They have marched, voted, protested, written petitions, and buried friends. They have watched promises come and go while power remains in the same hands.

And they understand one painful truth.

If powerful nations decide that doing business with the Museveni family serves their interests, then the cries of ordinary Ugandans may once again be drowned out by a single word that has justified so much for so long:

Stability.

— Yasin Kakande  

Author of The Missing Corpse