“The West has this model of a disciplined, neutral army that stands on the sidelines, independent of domestic politics,” explains Jakkie Cilliers of the Pretoria-based Institute for Strategic Studies (ISS). “But the African model is of a military that is used internally and is part and parcel of domestic politics and resource allocation.”

Presidents like Zaire’s Mobutu Sese Seko, who himself staged two successful coups, warded off likely repeats by deliberately keeping national armies divided and faction-ridden. Mobutu was a great believer in building up and then running down competing elite forces, relying in a real crisis on Western paratroopers and white mercenaries to do his fighting for him.

Elsewhere on the continent, fragile, twitchy civilian governments often encouraged the generals they feared to become de facto businessmen, with foreign sorties seen as particularly lucrative forms of distraction. None of this encouraged discipline, nor was it healthy for rank-and-file morale.