Goma held. But the CNDP is now consolidating its gains, which could easily be expanded during future fighting. Nkunda, the CNDP's Tutsi rebel leader -- alternately described here as "charismatic," "populist," "ruthless" and "murderous" -- is on the ascendant. And he has little reason to negotiate a political settlement while he can dream of controlling the whole region, or even overthrowing the increasingly fragile Congolese government of President Joseph Kabila.
Security in eastern Congo is the prerequisite for political progress. Nkunda will continue to push until someone effectively pushes back. The Congolese army is incapable of defeating him. While MONUC is the reason Goma was not taken, it does not have the political will and the capabilities to contain Nkunda. It lacks rapid reaction forces and night-fighting capabilities.
This leaves one alternative -- a capable, hard-hitting European military force, supported by the United States, which would stabilize the situation, give MONUC some breathing room, and put a limit on Nkunda's ambitions. But Britain and Germany, to their shame, have opposed this kind of "bridging force." (It is particularly obscene that Germany, of all nations, should lose its outrage at mass violence.)
Such an intervention could help a variety of confidence-building efforts to move forward. Direct negotiations between Kabila and Rwandan President Paul Kagame might lessen Tutsi and Hutu tensions in eastern Congo and result in a more serious military effort against the FDLR -- a brutal rebel group founded by the Hutu authors of Rwanda's genocide. And Kabila could attempt to include a humbled Nkunda in future political arrangements -- if the young, insecure president is capable of such magnanimity.
These steps appear necessary -- and unlikely. Few seem to care sufficiently about Congolese suffering on a distant lake, beneath the cloud and fire of Mount Nyiragongo.
But the Congolese themselves provide hope. On the black lava fields -- where a rabbit would not burrow and nettles would not grow -- people are constructing fences of pumice and homes of reed and rock. It is human beings who choose to build even on foundations of disaster.
Michael Gerson
Michael Gerson writes a twice-weekly column for The Post on issues that include politics, global health, development, religion and foreign policy. Michael Gerson is the author of the book "
Heroic Conservatism" and a contributor to Newsweek magazine.
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