“There is no way this is going to end up well for the United States. Every tribe in Yemen has received missiles from American drones. The US aided and financed Saleh all these years. They covered for him up to just two weeks ago. The Yemenis won’t forget this. The crack troops we saw Friday fighting the tribes are the anti terrorist forces equipped and trained by the United States.”
Category Archive: war
No sooner had Allasane Ouattara announced reconciliation and promised a government of unity in which all the country’s forces will be represented than he reneged on that promise by keeping New Forces rebel Leader Guillaume Soro as Prime Minister and Defense Minister. Is this because Soro has the backing of the rebel army and therefore has the guns to call the shots?
French president Nicolas Sarkozy said at a French Army base in Abidjan Saturday that French troops would remain in the Cote d’Ivoire “pour toujours” (for ever) while in almost the same breath saying French policy in Africa will change. But that is far from the only neo-colonial double speak in his important speech.
It is amazing to see how those in the mainstream press simply ignore anybody who leaves the ‘official frame’ set by the ‘respected authorities’. The limits of debate are narrow and ‘official speak’ is full of new euphemisms and phraseology with meaningless content destined to join ‘collateral damage’ in the dustbin of used spin. Let us look at some examples.
The first lie is “pro-Ouatara forces captured Gbagbo”. Lets look at the events. On Saturday night and all day Sunday, French attack helicopters fired rockets at the Presidential compound in direct violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1975 which gave a mandate for protecting civilians and not taking sides. Then on Monday morning, as reported by al Jazzeera, a column of thirty French armored vehicles and French special forces moved in on the residence. Fighting lasted the whole day. Now they tell us the Ivorians took Gbagbo.
To further underscore the lie, the video of Gbagbo’s arrest was released by the French! Maybe once the French took the compound they let Ouattara’s thugs in for the camera. Lets not forget that up until Saturday, Ouattara’s troops were being pushed back all over the city. A clear sign of the support Gbagbo has.
Today the head of UN troops in the Ivory Coast, Alain Le Roy, accused loyalist forces of « trickery » because they used a ceasefire “to consolidate their positions” the lapdog press reports. What the press failed to tell us was that when President Laurent Gbagbo offered a ceasefire on Tuesday, rebels and the French army attacked his residence and that they never accepted the ceasefire in the first place.
And, HELLO, when you are at war, you consolidate your positions!
“Laurent Gbagbo must understand violence will get him nowhere,” said French Defense Minister Gerard Longuet while French attack helicopters and troops attacked Abidjan.
There is a new Euphemism: “protecting civilians”. This is the catch word used to provide air to ground support to rebels in the Libyan desert and it now used to justify France’s destruction of the Ivorian Army while pro-Ouattara rebels conduct the ground offensive.
First I want to make it clear: Qaddafi does not like me and I don’t like him. He refused me a visa to report there more than once.
But I have to voice my opinion against this war on Libya because it is wrong and risks creating a disaster and turmoil which will last for years.
In his 2004 book, Colossus, Niall Ferguson argues the United States is an empire and should assume its rightful place as the inheritor of Britain’s 19th century ‘White Man’s Burden’. He decries the American schizophrenia of being an empire in denial, sending troops abroad without the intention of staying and being squeamish when GIs die. Ferguson says we should go, stay and impose our will for world order and to prevent chaos.
This may seem easy to say for a man comfortable in the Ivory Towers of Oxford and Harvard who never did military service, much less saw the harsh realities of war but he does have a point. Americans need to back their wars or not fight them and that is why I say we need to bring back the draft.
Ndjamena: Dec. 6 – 12, 2009: Lake Chad is drying up faster then feared and water reserves are dwindling with famine predicted in the north in 2010 due to a short rainy season and over grazing; the 2009 census shows that the population of Chad has doubled in just 15 years although it was widely criticized when the authorities rigged the figures to favor the Muslims of the north to the detriment of the Christians in the south; 80% of the population is illiterate; the war in the east continues — but hey, lets hold elections!
KazoDaily 