Genocide in Darfur
Darfur is approximately the size of France. The current conflict in Sudan
is predominately in the Western Region and centered along ethnic and tribal lines. This conflict began in February 2003 and consists of four groups. The Sudanese military and the Janjaweed fight together and are of Arabic descent. The Sudan Liberation Movement/Army and the Justice and Equality Movement are of African descent. The current government of Sudan is strongly Arab based.
The Janjaweed loosely translated to mean “devil on horseback” are one of the major players in the continued decimation of the farmers over precious few resources and land allocation. Millions of people have been displaced since October 2006. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum estimates a 100,000 deaths in the Sudan region for each year because, of the assistance of the Arab- backed Sudanese government.
The United States has called the mass massacre in Darfur genocide but, the United Nations falls short of calling the killings genocide. It is in my opinion that the United Nations falls short of enacting stronger UN sanctions due to China'sinterference. (China receives huge amounts of oil from Sudan) There is an argument as to who supplies more weapons to the Janjaweed China or Russia. What is not in dispute is that at least 90% of the weapons used to continue the genocide in Darfur are imported weapons.
Men are killed or either mutilated, forcing women and children to flee their homes for refugee camps. Women and young girls are often raped and brutalized if they venture too far away from the refugee camps while searching for firewood. Rape and sexual abuse are used as a weapon of terror to continue a cycle of fear. The refugee camps are filled with hundreds of families trying to escape the brutal systematic slaughter carried out by the Janjaweed.
If you would like to aid the victims of a sense less war fought among herders, farmers and the most marginalized of us all women and children; then please click on the following links to find a way you can contribute and help.
Help Darfur Now
Save Darfur
24 hours for Darfur
A message to President Elect Obama
My support for the war in Iraq has always been liberation oriented -- Saddam was a genocidal fascist and had to go. I've never hid that. I supported the war in Iraq because I thought that the political will was there to prosecute it to the end (I, like 99% of the world, thought that we would find WMDs).
I wish that the political will was there to stop the genocide in Darfur, but all we would have the will to do would be to make things worse, like we did with Somalia in Mogadishu. That, like Darfur, was a situation where we had the ability to stop it, but not the political will to devote the blood and treasure it would require.
Liberty has been, historically speaking, cheap in Iraq. I fear that it would be expensive in Darfur, and even with a horrible expenditure, still risky. (Relative liberty in Iraq was a sure thing given enough blood and treasure.)
I have to disagree with one thing, though. You can't stop the flow of weapons into a country. There are too many people with an interest in continuing the genocide that can fund the smuggling, and it is too easy to manufacture weapons when you have access to a machine shop. The only way to stop the weapons would be to throw Darfur into the stone age, which I cannot support. What we need is more weapons in the right hands.
An unarmed woman cannot stand up to an unarmed man with genocidal intent, much less 10 men armed with machetes. A woman with an AK-47, on the other hand, can stand up to all of them, on even terms. Right now, it costs the murders nothing to massacre an entire village, because there is no one to resist them. We need to make that sort of action more expensive to them.
“That, like Darfur, was a situation where we had the ability to stop it, but not the political will to devote the blood and treasure it would require.”
Why is that Phelps, I truly want to believe that there is some valid reason other than these people are Africans. However what I see is that their lives are somehow less value than the Iraqi people and that there is little difference between the two other than skin color.
Liberty has been, historically speaking, cheap in Iraq. I fear that it would be expensive in Darfur, and even with a horrible expenditure, still risky. (Relative liberty in Iraq was a sure thing given enough blood and treasure.)
You are going to have to explain that comment I am assuming you mean by the number of lives lost. However, the same liberty you speak of in Iraq is costing the American people millions of dollars monthly that we don’t have. We are so heavily indebted to China that there can be little wonder why we don’t come down on them harder for their obvious involvement in keeping a country in continued strife.
An unarmed woman cannot stand up to an unarmed man with genocidal intent, much less 10 men armed with machetes. A woman with an AK-47, on the other hand, can stand up to all of them, on even terms. Right now, it costs the murders nothing to massacre an entire village, because there is no one to resist them. We need to make that sort of action more expensive to them.
I agree with this is part women; need to be taught how to defend themselves but, leveling the playing field does not stop the killing.
As a side note Phelps, places like Darfur and Somalia are growing a strong extremist Muslim presence. I would think it would be in our country’s, and those of the G8, to curtail the stronghold these extremist are gaining in these countries.
Why is that Phelps, I truly want to believe that there is some valid reason other than these people are Africans. However what I see is that their lives are somehow less value than the Iraqi people and that there is little difference between the two other than skin color.
A lot of it is economic (that part really does come down to oil). Part of it is education -- Iraqis are fairly well educated. There was already a lot of infrastructure in place in Iraq. Iraq had a pre-Saddam functioning republic to draw from. Darfur is unfortunately barely above stone-age without imports. That means that we would have to start climbing that mountain from much further down.
You are going to have to explain that comment I am assuming you mean by the number of lives lost.
Money too. War is expensive. Liberty is expensive, even here (it costs a lot to keep the court systems running to protect liberty.)
I agree with this is part women; need to be taught how to defend themselves but, leveling the playing field does not stop the killing.
I think that shifting more of the deaths to the ones carrying out the genocide now would be a massive improvement. Not ideal, but better.
As a side note Phelps, places like Darfur and Somalia are growing a strong extremist Muslim presence. I would think it would be in our country’s, and those of the G8, to curtail the stronghold these extremist are gaining in these countries.
That's a main area where the will is lacking. We are too afraid of being accused of declaring war on Islam. We are too timid and too approval-seeking.
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