'Terror' tag shifts Uganda's war

Established in 1987 by Joseph Kony, a former Gulu altar boy turned self-proclaimed prophet, the LRA has an agenda that is neither well articulated nor understood. Claiming they want to overthrow Museveni's government and install a leadership that will rule according to the Ten Commandments, the LRA is better known for behavior not usually sanctioned by the laws carved upon the holy tablets.

They have killed untold thousands and displaced over half a million Acholi people. Some 15,000 children have been abducted and forced to serve in their ranks, carrying out brutal killings in their own communities. Escaped LRA members tell of being forced to club to death the weak or the disloyal. Girls as young as 9, meanwhile, are given to LRA commanders as "wives" or traded around. Hundreds of babies have been born in LRA captivity and brought into battle strapped on their mother's backs.

In the early days, the LRA managed to play on the Acholi people's feeling of alienation from the government – and as such gained some sincere support. Today, however, most sympathy for them has been squandered.

"They believe they will take over the government, but what will they do once they get there?" asks Christine Angeio, a secretary at the local college. "There is no plan. They say they are fighting for us? But they are killing us. They are capable of anything, even of removing your children from your own house."

According to various estimates, Mr. Kony's active fighters now number only between 2,000 and 5,000, but it is still unclear whether they continue to get outside support. UPDF commanders, speaking on condition of anonymity, say they believe Sudan continues to arm them.

Two weeks ago, when the LRA attacked a refugee camp at Acholi Pii, they barely touched the supplies, including food and drugs. Recently released abductees, meanwhile, told military intelligence that fighters who had reentered Uganda brought land mines and ammunition.

But the real problem in fighting the rebels, Museveni admitted in a meeting with legislators last week, is the "internal weaknesses" of the UPDF. When it came time to start operation "Iron Fist," say sources close to the military, it transpired that troop registers were greatly inflated and soldiers unprepared. Commanders were corrupt, salaries were late and low, and there was little incentive for anyone to fight.

"It was a mess and everyone knew it. That is why Museveni came to Gulu – to clean house. He is rearranging his staff and bringing in better troops," says Dennis Ojwee, the Gulu reporter for the government owned New Vision daily newspaper.

It is clear the UPDF has a long way to go before it will be able to decisively crush LRA guerrilla units. For example, soldiers escorting food convoys into the internally displaced camps are often drunk by day's end. And buses leaving Gulu for the capital Kampala are routinely stopped and searched in an attempt to catch the many army deserters.

Recognizing these failings, and pressured by local leaders and the international community, Museveni reiterated an offer to go to peace talks this weekend, saying his government was ready, under certain conditions, to halt operations against the LRA. A negotiations team was ready to sit down anytime, he said, speaking Friday on a local radio station popular with the rebels.

The conditions Museveni set, including the rebels agreeing to stop all killings and retreat to specified positions outside Uganda – are ones the LRA has rejected in the past.

The LRA nonetheless declared a temporary cease-fire from midnight on Saturday. It was a sign, perhaps, that the diplomatic option might be possible.

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