From: wolda002@umn.edu
Date: Tue Nov 24 2009 - 23:58:53 EST
U.S. Sows Seeds of Wider War in East Africa
By Glen Ford
Created 11/17/2009 - 19:54
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
Like a pyromaniac, the United States threatens to ignite the entire East
African region in its campaign to suppress Islamist forces in Somalia.
Unable to marshal support for the pitiful puppet regime in Mogadishu, the
Americans try to buy ethnic Somali recruits in surrounding countries. A new
military offensive is set for late December.
U.S. Sows Seeds of Wider War in East Africa
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
“The Americans have organized mass recruitment among the hundreds of
thousands of Somalis who have fled the fighting to refugee camps in
Kenya.”
Somali refugees and ethnic Somali citizens of Kenya are being recruited and
trained [2] by the thousands for a U.S.-backed offensive in Somalia, to
begin next month. The Associated Press, citing numerous sources among
refugees, young men who have deserted from the new militia and their
families, local Kenyan officials and foreign diplomats, reports that the
offensive against Islamist forces in Somalia is planned for late December,
the end of the Somali rainy season. That’s the same seasonal window the
Americans took advantage of three years ago, when the U.S. instigated an
Ethiopian invasion of Somalia that plunged the country into what the United
Nations described as the “worst humanitarian crisis in Africa.” That
crisis continues, complicated by a severe drought and a U.S. blockade of
food aid. [3]
Washingrton supports a puppet government that controls little more than a
small corner of Mogadishu, Somalia's capital, and would immediately
collapse where it not for the protection of Rwandan and Burundian troops
that guard the airport. Most of central and southern Somalia is controlled
by Islamist Shabab fighters. The U.S. is attempting to starve the region
into submission by withholding 40 million pounds of food warehoused in
Mombasa, Kenya.
With little support inside Somalia, the Americans have organized mass
recruitment among the hundreds of thousands of Somalis who have fled the
fighting to refugee camps in Kenya – a practice that violates
international law. Recruits are also being drawn from ethnic Somalis who
are Kenyan citizens, in the northeastern part of the country. The
Associated Press has learned of similar recruitment and training in the
Somali regions of Ethiopia and Djibouti, where the United States maintains
a huge military base.
The recruits are lured into service with promises of $600 a month, but
deserters say they are often beaten, ill-fed and unpaid.
“The Americans are fanning the flames of war among Somalia's neighbors
– including Kenya.”
The Americans are playing a very dangerous game. In addition to breaking
international law and discrediting aid agencies by recruiting among
refugees, the U.S. is encouraging a wider conflict in East Africa. Ethnic
Somalis dominate in northeastern Kenya, in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia,
and in Djibouti. Ethnic Somalis waged a secessionist war in Kenya [4] in
the mid-1960s and continue to resist Ethiopian rule in the Ogaden.
According to the Associated Press, recruits in Kenya are deprived of their
identification cards and told, “You are not a Kenyan. From this moment,
tell yourselves and other people you are a Somali.” Recruiters are
apparently doing the same thing among ethnic Somalis in Ethiopia and
Djibouti.
The Americans, in their zeal to defeat the Islamist Shabab in Somalia, are
encouraging Somali nationalism [5] in neighboring countries, and thus
planting the seeds of future wars of secession. Although the U.S. may think
that it is turning brother Somalis against one another for U.S. foreign
policy purposes, in reality the Americans are fanning the flames of war
among Somalia's neighbors – including Kenya. These are the fruits of
AFRICOM, the U.S. military's African Command. Commander-in-Chief Barack
Obama is destabilizing his father's own homeland, and the whole of East
Africa.
For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Glen Ford. On the web, go to
www.BlackAgendaReport.com [6].
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at
Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.
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