In an attempt to destabilise Amin's rule and capture weapons for an insurrection, a group of guerrillas launched a raid from Kenya against Tororo, whose garrison partially mutinied and joined them after a brief fight.
In 1971 Idi Amin launched a military coup that overthrew the President of Uganda, Milton Obote, precipitating a deterioration of relations with the neighbouring state of Tanzania.
[1] Obote and other Ugandans opposed to Amin fled into neighbouring countries, where they organised militant opposition groups and planned to initiate an insurgency.
[6] As his army further progressed into Uganda, he drew up plans whereby the Tanzanians would advance to Kampala's outskirts, destroying Amin's forces along the way, and allowing members of Obote's Kikosi Maalum to seize the capital with minimal resistance.
[11][a] This time the FNR targeted Tororo, a town located in eastern Uganda which served as a major commercial and transport hub.
[12] Obote's men prepared by stockpiling weapons in the bush near the Kenyan-Ugandan border and gaining the sympathy of Tororo civilians and anti-Amin soldiers of the garrison.
Obote made a unity pact with Ateker Ejalu's Save Uganda Movement (SUM) and the two agreed to undertake the attack jointly.
[19] Some of the rebels who were involved in the Tororo operation were reportedly also housed at a farm in Bondo District which belonged to Kenyan opposition leader Jaramogi Oginga Odinga.
[15][16] Having commandeered a large number of civilian vehicles, the Gaddafi Battalion rushed toward Tororo, and soon met resistance by mutinous troops who had themselves advanced toward Kampala along the road.
[14] An alleged guerrilla leader later stated that the Uganda Army soldiers proved to be poorly trained, claiming that the loyalists "drove in lorries [trucks] right into our ambushes and we slaughtered them.
[26][e] On 3 March, a group appeared in Nairobi, Kenya, claiming to represent the Air and Sea Battalion and calling for an uprising by the army and people of Uganda against Amin, and the restoration of Obote to the presidency.
[4][f] The defeat of the insurgents was ensured when the Uganda Army Air Force's MiGs started a mass bombardment of the area[10] on the orders of President Amin.
[24] However, the government aircraft made no distinction between the rebels, loyalists, and civilians, instead attacking everyone; the battle thus descended into complete chaos, as a large number of guerrillas, army forces, and locals fled into Kenya to escape the air strikes.
[10] They also failed to recover a significant number of weapons or disrupt cross-border road transportation; within two days Kenyan oil trucks had resumed their regular routes through the area.
[28] In contrast, SUM member Paul Oryema Opobo described the raid as "uncalled for" and only succeeding in "altert[ing] Idi Amin-Dada about the dangers against him coming from Eastern Uganda".
[4] The mutiny at Tororo inspired other army units to revolt,[14] while the raid spread panic among Ugandan troops and forced Amin to draw resources away from the southern front.
[3][26] Brigadier Tiyua and his forces (by then just 100 soldiers) were among the last elements of the Uganda Army to surrender; as result, he was treated as a war criminal by the new Ugandan government and eventually joined a rebel group consisting of ex-Amin loyalists.
[32] A rebel veteran of the battle at Tororo, Patrick Masette Kuya, participated in the Moshi Conference that led to the establishment of Uganda's first post-Amin government.