ABSTRACT
Had anyone been asked early in 1959 to put together a "worse case scenario" for the history of the first thirty years of the Central African Republic, one might have imagined something close to the actual sequence of events that has unfolded in this archetypical, neocolonial polity that has yet to become an autonomous state. 1 To speak of "ambiguity" as some have done to characterize the French role in the Central African Republic is only to use a euphemism for what must be seen as a fiasco, the consequences of which have yet to be fully appreciated. The record speaks for itself: France's continued military involvement, though supplemented by massive injections of economic and financial aid, have utterly failed to stabilize its client state.
