WarFronts Weekly 10.16.2026: Friday Blitz.
🟨 WarFronts Weekly | Friday Blitz
Fronts Staff • October 16, 2026
Congo Ex-President Joseph Kabila Launches Coalition to Replace M23:
Joseph Kabila, the former President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, resurfaced this week in the rebel-held city of Goma. There, Kabila announced the launch of a new political and military coalition called the Front for the Refoundation of the Nation (FRN), to unite the eastern Congo’s rebel groups with a new political leadership structure.
Kabila, age fifty-five, served continuously as the DRC’s president from 2001 until 2019, when he stepped down and ceded power peacefully to the nation’s current president, Félix Tshisekedi. After leaving office, Kabila has been engaged in a deepening feud with Tshisekedi and the Congolese government.
In 2023, Kabila left the DRC to go into exile, returning in 2025 when he arrived in the city of Goma—already under the control of the M23 rebel group by that time. Since his return, the Congolese government has accused Kabila of colluding with M23 and its associates in the rebel Congo River Alliance, banning media coverage of Kabila and his party, and sentencing Kabila to death in absentia in a show trial.
Kabila’s new FRN organization integrates M23 and the other factions of the Congo River Alliance, with Kabila himself at the head of the group. Several high-ranking rebel leaders will join the organization, including Corneille Nangaa, who previously led the Congo River Alliance and will now serve as one of the FRN’s two Vice Presidents. The other Vice President will be Bertrand Bisimwa, M23’s political chief.
Kabila and his allies have sought to justify the FRN’s existence, with whatever appearance of legitimacy they can muster. The FRN intends to unite the Congo’s fractured political opposition, according to its top adviser, Claude Ibalanky. That effort will be made substantially easier due to Tshisekedi’s anti-opposition legal crackdowns, and other attempts to prolong his presidency and consolidate his power.
More important, however, is Kabila’s international backing. The ex-president has secured the tacit support of several powerful African nations, and appears to have been selected as a convenient figurehead by Rwanda, the nation widely understood to be bankrolling and coordinating the eastern Congo insurgency—an allegation that Rwanda routinely denies. Kabila’s history as president, and his enduring political base across the DRC, confer a degree of legitimacy on the FRN under his leadership.
For now, experts anticipate that the announcement of the FRN presages an escalation of rebel attacks, and a possible disengagement from, or attempt to restructure, ongoing peace talks. Speaking to the Associated Press, expert Yvon Muya explained: “You don’t make an announcement like this without having prepared the actions that follow. We will likely witness an escalation on the military front.”
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Around the World:
Yemen’s Houthi rebels continued their drone and missile campaign against Saudi Arabia this week, striking the headquarters of the state-owned oil company Saudi Aramco and several other high-profile targets across the nation. On Thursday, the Saudi-led anti-Houthi coalition in Yemen announced that it was able to stop a cruise missile attack that targeted the holy city of Medina, although the Houthis denied that they were behind the attack, and have previously vowed to avoid attacking both Medina and Mecca. The Houthis did claim responsibility for another attack on Thursday, when missiles and drones impacted near Yemen’s de-facto presidential palace in the port city of Aden. Two security guards were killed in the strikes, while Yemen’s Prime Minister and several cabinet ministers were unharmed.
Russian strikes hit all three of the major power stations that provide electricity and heat to the Ukrainian capital city of Kyiv, after the United States reportedly declined to warn Ukraine of incoming strikes, and the Starlink military product Starshield—controlled by the US military—unexpectedly placed speed restrictions on its terminals. The US denies cutting off intelligence support or limiting Starshield access. The Starshield terminal-speed restrictions severely impacted Ukraine’s ability to launch interceptor drones, to deal with incoming Russian kamikaze drones. The US restrictions and lack of intelligence-sharing followed pressure from Washington against Kyiv, to halt long-range attacks on Russian oil refining capability—a request that Ukraine had honored for several days, before the suspected US reprisals. WarFronts covered the situation in greater depth here. Starshield access was restored to Ukraine on Thursday, but Kyiv resumed its attacks on Russian refineries that morning.
Also in Ukraine, the nation’s military general staff announced that it had damaged six Russian Su-34M fighter-bomber aircraft in an overnight strike on an airfield in the Russian region of Voronezh. Four of the aircraft were completely destroyed in the strike, with the remaining two damaged heavily. Ukraine indicated that its Neptune family of cruise missiles was used in the strike. On the ground, meanwhile, Ukrainian forces announced the end of the fourth phase of Operation Vivaldi, a complex, months-long effort to liberate settlements near the city of Lyman. According to Ukrainian authorities, the fourth phase of the operation led to the recapture of 101 square kilometers of territory, and Russian losses totaling nearly three thousand personnel.
Approximately seventy people, including four soldiers, were killed in a series of intercommunal clashes in South Sudan last week, in the latest mass-casualty confrontation between local armed groups. This time, the fighting broke out in the country’s Lakes State, between youth gangs representing two majority-Dinka communities. The cause of the clashes was not immediately known, but South Sudan has witnessed several similar outbreaks of violence in recent months, usually prompted by disputes over cattle grazing and land access.
Two trade ships were sunk in the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday and Thursday, including a small Singapore-flagged container vessel that was struck while sailing through the strait on Tuesday. The other vessel, an Antigua and Barbuda-flagged bulk carrier, sank several weeks after it was hit by a projectile and its crew was forced to evacuate, with one crew member killed onboard. Despite the ongoing Middle East conflict centered on the Persian Gulf, these are only the second and third ship sinkings since the conflict began on February 28. The sinkings underscore the seriousness of Iran’s return to attacking ships in and around the Strait of Hormuz, over the last ten days. The United States is reportedly preparing a return to large-scale strikes against Iran, including a potential strike that would use the GBU-43/B Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb, among the largest non-nuclear bombs in America’s arsenal.
Meanwhile in the Black Sea, seven sailors are reported missing after another two trade ships—this time, chemical tanker vessels—were struck as they traveled close to the Romanian coastline. NATO officials confirmed, in conversation with Western media, that Russian drones were responsible. The strikes are the latest to target commercial shipping in the Black Sea, after a wave of similar attacks against ships in Bulgarian waters left eleven sailors missing and presumed dead.
Continued after the break...
