[2] This was most prevalent during the Cold War era, but continues to this day, notably with the Russian Wagner Group.
[4] The second group of actions are mercenaries working on behalf of large multinational corporations, helping to secure resource extraction areas.
[5] During and directly after the African Independence movement foreign nations used mercenaries to influence the civil wars and violence in the newly created states.
The strategies employed by these groups included training and fomenting rebels, carrying out coup-de-tats, defending unpopular leaders, and political intimidation.
The Katanga province was the site of large mineral wealth, and the Belgian government had a continued interest in accessing those resources.
[7] These efforts were relatively successful in that Joseph Mobutu became the leader of the Congo, and he would continue to provide access to the Katangan mines to the Belgian corporations that operated in the province.
[7] The second group of mercenaries are those that were employed by Cold War actors, most significantly the United States and Russia.
The CIA and South African support for UNITA and the FNLA was kept relatively covert, which relied on the use of mercenaries, and shipments of large amounts of weapons and other armament material.
[5] Research seems to have shown that PMC's do little to help the long term stability of the state, and are wildly expensive[6] making them an ineffective tool of statecraft.
[5] In the vacuum of force that occurred after this, the NPRC government was quickly overthrown by a coalition of the military and the Revolutionary United Front (RUF).
In order to restore the government, the Sandline International Corporation was hired, paid for by the businessman Rakesh Saxena, who had a controlling interest in the company Diamond Works of Vancouver, which had bought Branch Energy.
[2] This has changed somewhat with the corporatization of mercenaries, with legislation that legalizes their activity, as long as they operate only in the interests of the nation where they are based.
[5] In September 2021, a United Nations working group called for the introduction of a "binding international legal framework" to regulate the actions of private military companies.
“South African Private Security Contractors Active in Armed Conflicts: Citizenship, Prosecution and the Right to Work.” Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal, vol.
“Mercenary Intervention in Sierra Leone: Providing National Security or International Exploitation?” Third World Quarterly, vol.
“Soldiers of Misfortune: The Angolan Civil War, the British Mercenary Intervention, and UK Policy towards Southern Africa, 1975–6.” The International History Review, vol.
“Mercenaries in the Congo and Biafra, 1960-1970: Africa's Weapon of Choice?” Small Wars & Insurgencies, vol.