From Rapid Reaction to Delayed Inaction? Congo, the UN and the EU

In 2008, the UN faced a military and humanitarian crisis in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and asked the EU to send a rapid-reaction force to help stabilize the situation. The EU failed to do so. This article analyses the immediate circumstances and consequences of this non-deployment. It also identifies longer-term flaws in the EU–UN relationship which contributed to European inaction in this crisis. The article argues that the events of 2008 meant that over-inflated expectations of European rapid-reaction capabilities have been replaced with an assumption that the EU is no longer a significant military player in sub-Saharan Africa. Studying this ‘non-event’ provides a clearer understanding of the wider EU–UN relationship than can be derived from studying examples of successful inter-institutional cooperation alone.