European Union Military Operations: The Use of Force in the Central African Republic, Chad, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo

Abstract

The European Union (EU) has developed its own policy, strategy, norms, structure, and decision-making process to deal with security issues. In this sense, crisis management missions and operations emerged as a pragmatic response to the security challenges that the EU faced from the end of Cold War. Since the establishment of the European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP) in 1999, the EU has launched missions and operations in 19 different countries ranging from advisory missions to large-scale military operations. Out of them, nine military operations were deployed in Africa. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Central African Republic (CAR) were established six military operations, among which four were authorised by the UN Security Council (UNSC) to take enforcement action in the performance of their mandate. This chapter focuses on EU military intervention in the DRC and the CAR in which the use of force was authorised. In this way, it focuses on Operation Artemis, EUFOR Chad/RCA, EUFOR RCA, and EUFOR DRC and addresses why, how, and what the context in which EU operations were established, as well as the implications of these interventions for EU presence and actions in the world.