It fascinated him. At this stage, the young man had essentially become a self-employed intelligence agent. Kinzer writes that in Rwanda Kagame assigned himself a classic intelligence mission: to make sense of a complex situation by analyzing a thousand scattered clues. Without realizing it, he was moving into the world of subversion and covert action.

Kagame stayed in Rwanda for six weeks and a year later he returned for a second trip, this time traveling through the countryside. He watched, listened and assimilated a torrent of impressions.

These experiences shaped him in two important ways. First they were his introduction to the homeland he had never known. From his observations he drew valuable insights into Rwandan life, especially a renewed sense of outrage at the country’s apartheid-style political system.

Kagame wrestled long with the question of what he and his generation could do to bring their people back home. It was during this time that he heard a piece of welcome news. His childhood friend, Fred Rwigyema, had surfaced in the town of Fort Portal and was looking for him.

Paul quickly made his way there and found Fred with a dramatic story to tell: he had left school after being recruited by followers of Yoweri Museveni, at the time a rebel leader determined to overthrow Idi Amin’s macabre tyranny. This was a reunion that would change the course of Rwandan history.

Kagame too would join the NRA and become a guerrilla fighter. The rest, as they say, is history.