Africa's heart of darkness was never darker
But the conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is bigger than the 1914-18 war. If you take the area of the DRC and superimpose it on Europe, it stretches from London to Moscow. About 50 million people live among the country's unparalleled reserves of timber, copper, cobalt, rubber, gold, diamonds and ivory. Lawlessness rules.
The country is a mass of warlords' fiefdoms. Six neighbouring countries are fighting for supremacy as pillager-kings.
Cynically, the markets rallied in South Africa yesterday. Investors apparently felt the power vacuum created by Kabila's reported death.
There is little reason to believe the succession made up entirely of Kabila's extended family will be any more intent on implementing the still-born July 1999 Lusaka peace accords than he was.
Besides, doing business is more lucrative for the few than is peace for the masses.
Kabila, a one-time bush-Marxist fought for years against the brutal and megalomaniac 32-year rule of Marshall Mobutu.
But almost as soon as Kabila had won his prize in 1997, after the death of Mobutu, it became clear that he had lost his head in the jungle of savagery and despair which in many ways has not changed since Joseph Conrad wrote Heart Of Darkness.
Backed in his ascent to power by Rwandan military forces, Kabila was compromised from the start.
When, feeling threatened, he threw them out of the country in August 1998, they responded by backing rebel groups in the east of the territory.
Angola, Namibia and Zimbabwe rallied to President Kabila's cause, claiming that it was crucial to prevent the break-up of the DRC.
The international community dithered, the allies' military commitment failed to develop into supremacy and their principles deteriorated into a scramble for the country's wealth war for business or, put differently, imperialism.
In return for about 2,000 troops, President Sam Nujoma of Namibia got a stake in the Miba diamond mining company.
For its 11,000-strong troop commitment Zimbabwe briefly was handed the management of Gecamines, the DRC state mining company.
The Zimbabwe Electricity Supply Authority (Zesa) signed a deal to double its import of hydro-electricity. The other side three rebel groups backed principally by Uganda and Rwanda are also doing business.
The rebels and their allies entered the war on an ethnic pretext to create a buffer against Hutu-Tutsi tensions but Uganda, especially, has evolved its strategies in relation to attainable mineral deposits.
Uganda, which backs the Kisangani faction of the Rally for Democracy (RCD) as well as the Movement for the Liberation of the Congo (MLC), last year made nearly as much money from gold exports as from coffee, thus correcting its trade balance, despite having hardly any reserves at home.
Many observers argue that the DRC subject to emperors for so long is a geographical anomaly, too big and too diverse to survive.
Today, the only organisation which can be said to have a "national" reach is the Roman Catholic Church.
Statistics from the United Nations about the humanitarian situation in DRC beggar belief.
They offer stark proof that either the world does not care about the 50 million people in DRC or the international community is simply too overwhelmed by the magnitude of the crisis to impose a drastic solution.
- Alex Duval Smith in Johannesburg
