Description

World War Africa: The Congo 1998-2001 is a wargame simulation of the 2nd war fought over the Congo by two coalitions of African countries during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The consequences of these two wars are still felt today.

In the war of 1996-97, the corrupt regime of Joseph Mobutu was overthrown by a coalition of East African countries led by Rwanda. The country formerly known as Zaire was renamed Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and Mobutu was replaced by another Cold War era dinosaur, Laurent Kabila, at the helm of the huge, mineral-rich African country. One year later, however, Kabila’s sponsors, particularly Rwanda were not pleased. A number of issues including; the expulsion of Rwandan advisers from the DRC, Kabila recruiting Hutu combatants who had fled Rwanda, and the discrimination suffered by ethnic Tutsi in eastern DRC, moved Rwanda to try to remove Kabila from power. Supported by Uganda, Congolese rebels and the Tutsi minority in DRC, the Rwandans expected to win an easy victory, just as the year before. Kabila, however, was quickly supported by expeditionary forces of Zimbabwe and Angola, among other African countries, so overthrowing him turned out much harder than expected. The resulting conflict would involve about a dozen African countries, and cost the lives of an estimated 5 million people, thus earning the name of “World War Africa”, or “The Great African War”.

Each hex on the map represents 100 kilometers from side to side. Each turn of play represents from one to three months, with 13 game turns (GT) covering the period from August 1998 to June 2001. Ground units represent brigade, regiment and battalion sized formations. The combat aircraft units represent various numbers of sorties needed to accomplish missions over the time-frame of a turn.

—description from the designer