Coffee Break: Armed Madhouse - Africa’s Enduring Wars | naked capitalism
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Africa’s wars are often explained with a single, convenient cause—colonialism, ethnicity, terrorism—but the reality is far more complex. A review of post-1960 conflicts shows that most deaths come not from fighting, but from governance collapse and misguided interventions. Simplistic diagnoses have had deadly consequences.

Since decolonization, Africa has experienced a succession of wars whose combined death toll likely reaches into the tens of millions—mostly from indirect causes such as displacement, famine, and state collapse rather than combat itself. This article surveys major post-1960 conflicts, argues against monocausal explanations, and examines how persistent misreading of African political dynamics has led to repeated and costly foreign policy failures, particularly by the United States.

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