When we talk about crisis wars in the west, I usually refer informally
to two different so-called timelines, the WW I timeline, and the WW II
time. So, for example, Russia's Bolshevik Revolution (1917) is on the
WW I timeline, while Japan's war with the U.S. is on the WW II
timeline.
Talking about these two different timelines is convenient and useful
for several purposes, but it's too much of a simplification for
analyses of individual wars. For example, Iran is informally said to
be on the WW I timeline, but neither of its two crisis wars, the
Constitutional Revolution climaxing in 1910 and the Iran/Iraq war
(1988) weren't really part of WW I. China's civil war (1934-49) was
involved in WW II, but was completely separate in many ways. Other
examples that don't really fit into either timeline are Cambodia's
"killing fields" war (1979 climax), the Spanish Civil War (1939), the
India vs Pakistan war that created Bangladesh (1971), and the Bosnian
genocide (1995).
The same kind of situation applies to Africa. There are two obvious
timelines -- World War II, which applies to northern Africa and South
Africa, and the "Liberation Wars," that apply to much of Black Africa.
However, once again, there are many wars that don't really fit into
those timelines. Kenya's Mau-Mau uprising (1959 climax) might be
called a liberation war, even though it was much more an ethnic war.
But the Rwanda Hutu-Tutsi genocide (1994) was clearly an ethnic/tribal
war. Mali's Tuareg rebellion (1963) was an ethnic/tribal war.
So now I turn to the situation in Central African Republic. It's only
early days, but that situation looks to me very much like the
beginnings of a full-fledged crisis war. I keep reading things like,
"The Christians and the Muslims have lived together side-by-side in
peace for decades, so the current violence is a surprise." That's
exactly the kind of description that was used in the Rwanda genocide
and the Bosnian genocide. And it would seem to imply that the last
major genocidal war between Christians and Muslims in C.A.R. was in
the 1940s. So I would really need the details of that war. In
addition, I would like additional details about those decades
of living side-by-side in peace.
Another thing to keep in mind is the size of Africa. When you look at
Africa on a map of the world, you might think that's it's just a bit
larger than Texas. But actually, Africa is as big as the ENTIRE
United States PLUS Alaska PLUS Europe PLUS China -- and there's still
enough room left over for New Zealand.
So if you know something about a war in one part of Africa, it may not
have relevance to a nearby country, since "nearby" could end up being
hundreds or thousands of miles.
So what I need is very specific information about the relationship
between Christians and Muslims in C.A.R. French colonial histories
undoubtedly contain such information. But information about
wars in other parts of Africa, even major wars, is unlikely to
have any relevance to Christians vs Muslims in C.A.R.
