Is he an example of a modern Enlightened Despot?

Yes

is pic related?

fuckin sucks, desu. I even watch a Frontline documentary about the genocide and even that barely went into Kagame or the RPF

I have no knowledge of this man or anything he has every done.

>start the First Congo War to install Laurant Kabila
>start the Second Congo War to depose Laurant Kabila

pleb

I really think it has a lot to do with the fact that people in the West don't seem to like the idea of African agency. While I hate to bring up such "media conspiracy" ideas, I think it's more of a subconscious bias. Note how the only African leaders we tend to hear about are the almost comically bad or evil, Mandela being one of the few exceptions.

It almost looks the same in the Middle East, although it's hard there with just about everyone in power being pretty shitty.

Ooohhh, I get it all now, thanks user

necessary First/Second Congo War greentext

Still though, the movie industry is heavily left leaning. You'd think they'd jump at the chance to portray Africans in a positive light

Hopefully he's smart enough to slowly introduce democratic institutions once he starts feeling like his time is coming to an end.

Well, news about african dictator killing everyone and eating children does gives more clicks/views than "african leader does good thing, everyone's happy"

War, death, chaos, child soldiers, genocide, these all get headlines. This creates a feedback loop where that's all we expect to see from Africa and the Middle East. I think people in the West are a lot more interested in gawking at starving kids and "being thankful for where we live", and sending some aid money to be embezzled than they are interested in figuring out what the fuck is actually going on in these regions. The media is just there to fill that void, whether it's naturally worked out that way or part of a larger conspiracy.

>the movie industry is heavily left leaning
Only as far as it pushes their agendas and supports worldviews that support their lifestyles. Media leftism in America very much seems to be a continuation of the whole "white man's burden" idea.

Ah yeah good point. Still though, it's frustrating how popular perceptions of the continent turn to "Heart of Darkness" for everything between the Sahara and South Africa.

An honest thank you for posting that, the general thrust of what I knew about the Congo was from about two days in class in 9th grade around 15 years ago.

>hurr power vacuums are good hurr power vacuums solve everything hurr I love civil war

Because cultural and moral imperialism is good.

Constitutional states have more power because they are a superior form of government.

I have a hard time believing that Paul Kagame isn't a German who got lost.

He's so shit at grand strategy and so good at tactics, which is such a German thing to do.

>successfully conquer Congo, a country fifty times your size
>instead of hooking up with the already existing democratic opposition, put some washed up moron in charge
>because your troops are so absurdly disciplined, they enforce that discipline on the locals in Kinshasa, leading said washed up moron to ask you to leave the country before you can fully eradicate the Hutu threat
>invade a second time, do an excellent military job but fail at creating an adequate coalition or isolating the Congo from allies
>end up fighting with your last remaining allies over some trivial bullshit, beat them in said battle
>develop your country heavily, but at the cost of becoming an increasingly isolated despot and leaving your country with an unclear political future

Yeah, that's pretty fucking German.

"Prussia of Africa" indeed.

fuck

Let's just hope the next one isn't power hungry and fucks up everything again.

Because he feels strongly about his own moral convictions, wether or not they are to be considered objective, subjective, cultural, or whathaveyou - at least he holds them in greater esteem than principles such as "respecting other cultures".

>Hopefully he's smart enough to slowly introduce democratic institutions once he starts feeling like his time is coming to an end.
He'll have to ramp up education and newspress before then, otherwise they'll just vote in a different dictator.

you're right and don't forget that in Western media, Mandela was essentially a symbol created by the west, his actual politics outside of resisting aparthied were glossed over. (he was a socialist who became a neoliberal and wrecked the country after he became president)

The same can be said of Aung San Suu Kyi, most people could not name any SEasian leaders except her, but she has fallen from grace.

>I really think it has a lot to do with the fact that people in the West don't seem to like the idea of African agency.
Like how people donate a ton of food and clothes that push local farmers and clothiers out of the market, instead of just giving people cash and trusting them to choose what to spend money on.

People get fuzzy feelings from handouts but investment is what is needed.

>enforced multiculturalism on all levels
>hated populism and personal cult
He is literally the opposite of /pol/s wet dream.

Is this true? I never knew much about Mandela aside from the human rights stuff, how did he make South Africa worse?

yes, also a good statesman

I remember reading a screencap where an user pointed out that Rwanda has the potential to be Africa's Singapore and is pretty much Africa's Prussia at this point. I was a bit skeptical at first but after doing some reading of my own on Rwanda, they seem to really have the best military out of all the African countries today

Democracy works with an educated group of population. As for right now, Rwanda is FAR from being educated. His reforms right now are doing wonders to start up their economy and their country, however thats mainly dependent on foreign aid. If he wants to grow his country, he needs foreign investor/money. What the foreign investors want more than anything is political stability. If Kagame wants his country to succeed, he needs a stable politics. So a single strong benevolent(relatively in the region) "dictator" is what's needed.

>Singapore of Africa
Fixed.

A guy can dream.

Having a republic is way more important than having a democracy.

If Kagame can't leave behind a stable constitutional order, authoritarian or otherwise, then it'll go right back into the shitter as soon as he dies.

The same Kagame who told his people that they dindu nuffin, blaming the French troops for the massacre? Wow your friend must be something.

A constitution seems right. To protect his legacy he will need an authority that will outlast his government, regardless of who will fill his shoes, be that a popular elected representative or an inner-party appointee.

The problem, of course, being that you can't have rule of law if all of the power rests with one person.

It requires you to distribute power to a broader body of people who have an interest in maintaining the legal system.

Micromanagers hate to let go.

Maybe he'll pull an Ataturk and put his army in charge of forcing out governments that deviate from his basic guidelines? Seems like an idea a military guy like Kagame would see merit in.

How is Kagame not evil? He is not comical I admit but calling him good is just retarded

That thread was B A S E D af.

Are you just calling him evil because he's a dictator?

And if the person who's head of the military gets bribed or decides to say fuck it and becomes power hungery?

The reason it worked in Turkey is because not only does the military adore Ataturk but the educated masses do as well. I doubt Kagame has that kind of approval rate.

He did cause the deaths of more than five million people.

This is Africa we're talking here, its become increasingly obvious that a lot of stuff that works for the Western world doesn't work in Africa. He's managed to develop Rwanda more than any country around could've, enough that people are saying it could be Africa's Singapore in the future. Maybe we shouldn't be quick to cast stones at Kagame, maybe he's the first African leader to actually find a way to get an African nation to flourish.

Also, most of those he killed in the 2nd Congo War were the same people who tried to genocide his people, I'd say its just comeuppance for the Hutu

Does anyone have the screencap about the Ogaden War that mentions the Cuban airlift and the Soviets throwing all their backing to the Ethiopians?

He's evil because he tries to destroy the French language

Sounds more like something a hero would do.

wtf i love kagame now

rule of law is maintained so long as there is an effective policing and justice system. it has nothing to do with political structure really. ""democracies"" are capable of bad rule of law too

Ultimately, the police and the courts are powerless if there isn't political power behind them.

To give one example, Hitler got an eight year prison sentence for multiple counts of murder and treason, because the Weimar Republic was so unpopular that nobody jury would put him away for longer.

In the old South, the police and courts were totally powerless to enforce the constitution, because the real political powers effectively made them irrelevant to the day to day conduct of events.

In Russia, from the 1990s onwards, the various oligarchs used their money and patronage networks to either destroy or coopt every independent legal institution.

If Rwanda ends up under the thumb of a handful of oligarchs, then their police won't mean anything, because they will work for the people committing the crimes.

>economist.com/news/leaders/21725000-its-recovery-after-genocide-has-been-impressive-land-ruled-fear-can-never-be-happy
>Many Africans see Kagame’s Rwanda as a model. They are wrong

*Republican screeching

We mustn't forget the military genius behind Kagames political genius.

t. anglos

It's a toss-up between Rwanda and Eritrea, but Eritrea can be the North Korea of Asia instead so Rwanda can be Prussia.

Yeah I'm sure whoever the fuck wrote this has more valuable expertise on governing an African nation than the African elites.

well one can have nepotism and a functional justice system. there is after all differences between crimes. Venice, for example, had a pretty good justice system to the extent it didn't touch on the interests of the oligarchs and nobility. this is really the case in every society. economic and political elites are almost always above the law

This is the difference between a republic and a democracy.

In Venice, even though the power didn't rest with the masses, it was still concentrated among a class of people who valued the republican system.

When this is no longer the case, self interest will rapidly corrode the apparatus of state to the point where it becomes little more than a veneer.

fair enough

More like anyone who knows anything about the cancerous French linguistic policy

He wasn't as neoliberal as they say. Buried within a lot of criticism on Wikipedia is this:

>Under Mandela's presidency, welfare spending increased by 13% in 1996/97, 13% in 1997/98, and 7% in 1998/99.[272] The government introduced parity in grants for communities, including disability grants, child maintenance grants, and old-age pensions, which had previously been set at different levels for South Africa's different racial groups.[272] In 1994, free healthcare was introduced for children under six and pregnant women, a provision extended to all those using primary level public sector health care services in 1996.[273][274] By the 1999 election, the ANC could boast that due to their policies, 3 million people were connected to telephone lines, 1.5 million children were brought into the education system, 500 clinics were upgraded or constructed, 2 million people were connected to the electricity grid, water access was extended to 3 million people, and 750,000 houses were constructed, housing nearly 3 million people.[275]

Universal healthcare! That's more left-wing than any US president, after all. The guy who wrote that article is Midnightblueowl, a wikipedia user who writes articles on big historical people and also is pro-communist, so most of the "domestic programmes" section on his page is attacking him. But there's not much about, well, the domestic programs! What bills did the ANC pass in parliament, what were the names of the internal critics and allies, how did politics get done? These are integral to political history but they're glossed over.

Not so fast

>Ah yeah good point. Still though, it's frustrating how popular perceptions of the continent turn to "Heart of Darkness" for everything between the Sahara and South Africa.
That wasn't even talking about the africans, it was talking about what Leopold was doing there.

Yes, Xi is.

Why is the Rwandan military so effective?

Is it their own military tradition or did they receive training or funding from elsewhere?

Funding isn't everything.
Saudi Arabia is the biggest arms importer in the world and they're still shit.

yeah for sure, but it still plays a big factor - after all the expertise of a soldier can only go so far if they don't have any food to eat

I'm just wondering how Rwanda in particular got gud

Growing up in the jungle, knowing that the only way they'd ever see their home country again was if they conquered it.

The same combination of spartan conditions and extreme nationalism made the VC good as well.

if that is in fact the case, then its interesting that they were just as effective at invading and operating in another country with a different terrain (the congo is flatter and at a lower altitude iirc) as they were at fighting in their own country

the more that I read about him the more I like Kagame and the RPF.

That was legit one of the best threads Veeky Forums has ever had.

They legitimately ruined the Congo though.

I respect them, but I understand that they harmed other people by pursuing their own self interest.

congo seems pretty shit tier and incompetent and wasn't innocent. Things didn't turn out well but the sheer balls of a tiny country that just lost a million of its own people to genocide and then had millions more flee to straight up invade its neighbour that is like 50 times larger and fuck their shit up with no problem, then do it again

Best greentext in Veeky Forumstory

Erdogan, unironically

There was a lot of hand wringing on NPR about kagame because it's easy for them to preach and promote the idea of democracy and liberty and all the touchy feel good stuff in the safety and comfort of the West. When that can lead to instability and chaos in the third world it leaves them with a challenge to their worldview.

If he's autistic then I agree with you he's actually some lost Prussian.

Honestly I don't blame Aung san Suu Kyi at all. It's easy to be sanctimonious and moralistic. Hell it's second nature to a liberal. But they should put themselves in her shoes. She was held under arrest for decades by the military, they are still a major power in the country, the entirety of the non Muslim populace hate the Rohingjya, who have a jihadist history the West glances over and ignores (same as the Bosnians and how unless you dig deep yourself the popular media/culture never notes "oh yeah, the afghan-arab jihadist veterans of Afghanistan fought for the Bosnians"). What could she do and still stay in power?

I think the purist or armchair liberals as much as the purist armchair reactionaries have a suicide fantasy with wanting some pure righteous figure who loses horribly rather than compromises. It's why the far right fantasize about hitler or someone behaving like an unabashed Neo-Hitler and expecting them to actually get elected or hold power in the West.

Most people don't have that suicide fantasy so they'd rather have someone who isn't perfect but does a good job and manages as best they can than someone whose good intentions pave the way to hell. If Aung San had gone out full tilt for the Rohingja either she gets snipped out and Myanmar returns to full on Authoritarian or there's a civil war and even more people die.

His foreign policy is a mess. He's lucky that NATO wants control over the bosphorus.

I don't blame her cause fuck rohingyas. Living with sunni muslims is impossible, even Shia can't do it without violence, what hope do a bunch of polytheists have?

I'm a big fan of Africa but I don't think the Congo was really going places before that. Rwanda did some major power projection with those invasions and I think it really (for lack of a better phrase) brought them together as a country. That's probably why they're continuing to succeed while their counterparts just tread water or flail about

Gee maybe they should give them autonomy/independence if they don't want to live with them then.

They're Muslims, you know they won't stay on their side of the fence for very long if they gained independence

>It almost looks the same in the Middle East, although it's hard there with just about everyone in power being pretty shitty.

You forgot the exception to the rule.

literally no one is migrating to Burma except to bolster the Rohingya insurgency in their struggle to get annexed by Bangladesh, a slightly less shitty country.

Fuck off /pol/

No one wants to live in third world burma

How is Rwandan society currently? Given that Tutsi are only like 10% of the populace, does it means that they use the police and military to suppress the Hutu majority? Are the Hutu basically the lower castes of Rwanda who form the underclass of society?

>the worst of all of them isn't shitty
t.kike

>giving away the rightful clay of your people because some Bangladeshi fucks migrated there a few decades ago and arbitrarily declared it as theirs

>muh clay
Burma shouldn't even fucking exist, it makes about as much sense as the Ottoman empire

Is "Enlightened Despot" just the same thing as "Benevolent Dictator"?

This isn't /pol/ you faggot. Stop speaking out of your ass.

Hutu's are very amenable to taking orders. Most hutu's probably could care less, but their tribal elders told them to have a go at the tutsi's and they dutifully complied.
There were too many hutu's compared to tutsi's for the lot of them to go a genociding, so those who remain are those who simply did not have a chance of having fun, while those who left were the ones capable of taking action. As it stands today the remaining hutu's have little in the way of inciting them to genocide, the political organizations responsible have since left the country, and so they comply dutifully with the central government, as they had always done.

The Ottoman Empire was powerful
Burma ain't even that