Last week Adam Hochschild reminded us that one of the great “what ifs” in post-World War II history is what might have happened had Patrice Lumumba lived to lead the newly independent Belgian Congo. Instead, he was killed by his rivals who took control, and were eventually supplanted in another coup four years later and more than three decades of American-fueled misrule of Zaire by Mobutu Sese Seko. The path not taken is obviously easy to romanticize and Lumumba likely was not going to be a panacea. But he represents the road not traveled in today’s war and violence-fueled Democratic Republic of the Congo.
