After the military defeat of the Mouvement du 23 mars (M23, March 23 Movement) rebellion in November 2013, armed mobilization in the eastern DRC has continued at a frightening pace. An initial, much-advertized wave of surrenders did not persist, and consisted mostly of individual combatants rather than armed groups as a whole. During the course of 2014, the armed group landscape underwent further fragmentation, as existing groups split and new ones emerged. A recent count identifies more than seventy groups in the Kivu provinces alone. Most of these groups—such as the various Raia Mutomboki and Nyatura factions—are not larger-scale rebel movements. They have a limited, although variable, number of fighters, often less than 300. What explains this proliferation of smaller-scale armed groups in the eastern Congo? What policies have been adopted to address this situation? And finally, what are the implications for efforts towards stabilization and peacebuilding?