Republic of Congo

Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville)

The nation today known as the Republic of Congo (République du Congo) was originally inhabited by Pygmy peoples, later displaced by migrating Bantu-speaking tribes, in particular the Bakongo. Between the 14th and 16th centuries, several Bantu kingdoms would emerge in the region, controlling trade up and down the Congo river and eventually establishing commercial relationships with Portuguese and French traders seeking sources for gold, ivory and slaves. As the power of the Bantu kingdoms declined, the region of present day Congo came under French administration in the 1880s. French Equatorial Africa (AEF) was organized in 1908, comprising Middle Congo (modern Congo), Gabon, Chad, and Oubangui-Chari (modern Central African Republic), administered through the capital of Brazzaville.

The nation was granted independence as the Republic of Congo on August 15, 1960, electing its first president, Fulbert Youlou. The Trois Glorieuses occurred between 13 and 15 August 1963, a mass uprising combining elements of the army, opposition trade unions, and the Union de la jeunesse Congolaise or Congolese Youth Union, who removed Youlou from power and replaced him with Alphonse Massamba-Débat. This began a period of "scientific socialism" for the country, with the Congo establishing strong relations with the USSR, China, North Korea, Cuba, and North Vietnam.

In 1966, a failed coup d'etat by paratroopers loyal to Marien Ngouabi was quelled with the assistance of sevral hundred Cuban military personnel who were in the country to help train political militias. Two years later, in August 1968, another coup d'etat was successful, placing Marien Ngouabi in the presidency and establishing the Congo as a People's Republic. Although he survived an attempt to wrest power from him in 1972, Ngouabi was assassinated on March 16, 1977 and replaced by Joachim Yhombi-Opango, who in turn was ousted two years later, with Denis Sassou Nguesso assuming the position of president. Under Sassou, the country became even further aligned with the Communist Bloc and signed a twenty-year friendship pact with the Soviet Union. The dictatorship would continue well into the present era.

A period of unrest began in the summer of 1993, spawned by political rivalries between supporters of Denis Nguesso, ex-PM Pascal Lissouba, and politician Bernard Kolelas, which later broke into outright civil war among the political militias, ending in January 1994. The rivalries were largely caused by accusations of fraud in the 1992 election. In June 1997, a Second Civil War broke out between the militias and supporters in the Army on both sides: the so-called Ninja militia (Kolélas supporters) and the Cocoye militia (Lissouba supporters) against the Forces Démocratique and Patriotique, aka the Cobra militia (supporters of Nguesso). The war lasted for two and a half years, ending with the destruction of much of Brazzaville and the loss of tens of thousands of civilian lives. A military intervention by Angola in October of 1999 re-installed Sassou as president. He would be re-elected in 2002, but discontent over the one-party system and a questionable electoral processes instigated a rebellion in the Pool region which ended by peace treaty in April 2003. Sassou remains president of the Republic of Congo, although the country continue to face accusations of election fraud and irregularities.

When the Congo became independent a fledgling armed forces was created with senior French commissioned officers and mostly ethnic Bakongo junior officers and enlisted men. After Alphonse Massamba-Débat siezed power in 1963, the French officers were expelled from the country and the army was significantly disempowered, replaced by Cuban-trained political militias and his own Civil Defense Corps. Shortly thereafter the political entities would be integrated with the armed forces, creating the Armée Nationale Populaire. With the formation of the People's Republic of Congo in 1969, the armed forces were again restructured along ethnic lines, placing largely Mbochi career officers in key positions of command, followed by numerous political purges throughout the 1970s. By the 1990s, many military personnel had deserted their positions to take up with regional militias.

The Forces armées congolaises (FAC) is composed of the Army, Air force, Navy and the Gendarmerie. The Army is the largest branch of the military, followed by the small and poorly equipped Air Force (Force Aérienne Congolaise), a very small Navy, a battalion-sized Presidential Guard (direction générale de la securité présidentielle - DGSP), and around 2,000 members of the Gendarmerie Nationale.

Camouflage Patterns of the Republic of Congo

• During the 1960s, under the leadership of president Alphonse Massamba-Débat, some units of the Republic of Congo armed forces adopted French tenue du leopard camouflage uniforms in a design unique at the time and not modeled on the standard French military issue. Use of "lizard" camouflage continued under the regime of Marien Ngouabi, although the pattern fell into disuse after his assassination in 1977.

• First seen in 1970, a unique splotch or spot camouflage design was in use with elite military units of this country, evidently restricted to the Garde Republicaine and the Para-Commandos Battalion. Phased out by 1975.

• Following the assassination of president Ngouabi, the Comité militaire du parti (CMP) was formed under the leadership of colonel Joachim Yhombi-Opango in 1977. During this period, the nation re-aligned itself with the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact nations, receiving considerable war materiel from several Eastern European countries. Early photographs of the CMP illustrate top members of the Armed Forces wearing East German M58 Flachtarnenmuster camouflage uniforms, and later photographs of some Army personnel suggest this continued for a few years at least.

• The standard camouflage pattern of the current era is a copy of the US m81 woodland design, produced in Asia. As with many other African nations, the source for uniforms over a period of time changes and, therefore, one may encounter slight variations in dye batches and uniform styles within the same unit, reflecting different periods of issue to different groups of military personnel.

• An odd variation of the French Europe Centre or CE woodland pattern emerged during the early 2000s, modified by embedding the national coat of arms in black ink within the khaki areas of the pattern. In addition to the logo, the pattern also incorporates a silhouette of the country's geographical boundaries next to the coat of arms. This design may have been created during the Civil War era (1997-1999) to stand out against the use of older, standard CE pattern camouflage uniforms by insurgents, but production numbers must have been limited as it does not appear to have reached significant numbers of armed forces personnel.

Members of the DGSP (Presidential Guard) adopted a copy of the Italian Army's vegetato camouflage design as recently as 2018.

• Also worn by some units of the Army is a copy of The French CE woodland pattern.

• At some point in 2024, members of the Presidential Guard (direction générale de la securité présidentielle) began wearing a Chinese-made "copy" of USMC MARPAT camouflage, having a slight color variance and similiar to that encountered in Iraq and other parts of the world. Whether this will completely replace the unit's use of vegetato remains to be seen.

Camouflage Worn by Paramilitary and Non-Military Entities

• During the Second Republic of Congo Civil War, members of all three militias wore a vast array of uniforms, from legitimate, military issue to civilian clothing, and everything in between. The Cobra militia, in particular, seems to have made heavy use of woodland camouflage clothing, most likely from ex-military personnel supporting Denis Nguesso. In some instances, individuals or small groups of Cobra militia members were observed wearing ex-Bundeswehr flecktarn pattern camouflage uniforms.

• This nation publicly supports the World Conservation Society (WCS) efforts to combat poaching, and the government has supported an Ecoguard program in cooperation with other central African countries. Formed with monetary assistance from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the Ecoguards of this nation operate primarily in the vast Odzala-Kokoua and Nouabalé-Ndoki National Parks. Members of this service have been outfitted variously in DPM, woodland, French CE woodland, lizard and commercial tiger stripes designs, although many just wear solid olive green uniforms.