You learn the darndest things on Fridays, with the Obama administration around.
Two days ago President Obama authorized the deployment to Uganda of approximately 100 combat-equipped U.S. forces to help regional forces “remove from the battlefield” – meaning capture or kill – Lord’s Resistance Army leader Joseph Kony and senior leaders of the LRA.
The forces will ultimately go to Uganda, South Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, with the permission of those countries.
The president made this announcement in a letter to House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, Friday afternoon, saying that “deploying these U.S. Armed Forces furthers U.S. national security interests and foreign policy and will be a significant contribution toward counter-LRA efforts in central Africa.”
So we’re going into Africa to go after some obscure nominally Christian militia, a war brought to you by the same administration that ran guns to drug cartels in Mexico. It was good of Obama to tell Boehner in a note, I suppose, but this move is the Mother of all Headscratchers.
The apparent legal basis for the kinetic military action is an obscure law passed when the Democrats still held Congress. This episode seems to back up an epiphany I had during the Darfur debate a few years ago. At that time, the very same Democrats who wanted US troops inserted into Darfur were totally against the ongoing war in Iraq. Never mind most Democrats supported that war when it was voted on. They wanted us out of that war, but into Darfur, despite the fact that there were no evident US national security interests at stake in Darfur.
The epiphany that this led to: Democrats support US intervention in foreign conflicts in inverse proportion to the US national security interests at stake.
Find an obscure conflict with no obvious US interests at stake, and Democrats will clamor to get US troops involved. But show them a situation where US national interests are clearly at stake, and they will find a thousand reasons for not intervening. “That’s somebody else’s war,” or even”Well we caused the problem in the first place” is their excuse.
By the way, this carries over into other spheres. Check out how the Democrats view the .083 Percenters occupying Wall Street, versus the real millions of Tea Party activists who protested ObamaCare. It’s in inverse proportions to the Tea Party protesters’ legitimate grievances and their legitimacy as business owners and productive citizens. The Tea Partiers got called terrorists and dismissed by the very same Democrats who toss a “God bless ‘em” at the .083 Percenters.
(h/t Ace)
Maybe we have been overestimating this guy. Maybe there is no plan at all to destroy the country.
Maybe he just does whatever he feels like doing that day.
So one day he gets an email on his private account from a fellow con in Uganda, and says, hey lets do something in Uganda. Presto, another war.
I expect code pink will be all over this one. Probably follow Obama on his next vacation.
Oh wait, they like Obama, not holding my breath.
correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t this what the U.N. peacekeeping force supposed to do?
“Some news outlets are miscommunicating today’s White House announcement. The U.S. is NOT sending combat troops to central Africa. We are sending military advisers to assist the intel-gathering and strategic planning of regional militaries that are working to protect civilians and apprehend senior LRA commanders.” -Resolve
Just thought I’d throw this out there. I have been dedicated to doing all that I can to end this war for three years now, and this is a huge step for this senseless violence to come to an end!
Check out http://www.lracrisistracker.com/ to find out more about the atrocities that the LRA has committed over the past 25 years.
Robert Heinlein wrote a novel “Glory Road” — an odd mixture of science fiction and swords and sorcery — with the lead character a former military adviser sent (along with a hundred or so others) to help our allies in a little brush war off on the edge of the third world. It was published in 1963.
By the time “Glory Road” appeared in paper back, 2-4,000,000 had died in that little brush war, Vietnam.
I hope this does put an end to this war. I just don’t think it’s likely, because the only thing that ends a war is victory, not advice.
Yeah, just like we weren’t at war with North Vietnam. That was a police action brought on by Dem Pres. Lyndon Johnson. (I did a research project on the Gulf of Tonkin resolution in high school, back when public school meant an education.)
Oh, and we didn’t send in soldiers to fight. They were “military advisors.” Thousands of them.
And remember, we don’t go to war with other countries anymore. It’s a kinetic action.
So let’s get with the program, Mr. Marx.
While I do not support Obama and this most recent, feeble attempt at posturing as a leader, PLEASE get your facts straight about The Lord’s Resistance Army. It is not even close to being a “nominally Christian Militia” any more than Adolph Hitler and his Nazi’s were. Joseph Kony is a self-appointed mystic who can best be described as demonic. As ‘leader’ of this ethnic-cleansing movement, Joseph Kony perverts the Bible and scripture to justify the kidnapping, torture, rape and mutilation of children, and then forces them into his militia, often initiating them into service by forcing them to murder their own parents. If they refuse, they are tortured in front of their parents. The girls become ‘incubators’ for the misogynists who “Lord” over them, are repeatedly raped to produce male children who can then be raised and indoctrinated to further this madness. Joseph Kony and his men are merciless, brutal rebels. Obama sending 100 troops is pathetic, b/c this is a subversive, ethnic “cleansing” of culturally terrorized tribes. Please do your homework and report it accurately, no matter what your views are of Obama.
Truly horrible.
How different is is than the drug cartels in Mexico, especially as we have aided and abided them?
I have a really nice citrine ring given to me back in the early sixties by an Aussie mercenary friend. He had been employed in the Congo and Angola. I asked him where he got the ring and he said ” Hadda cut that one off. Fella didnt mind though.”
Blah Blah Blah……That is the same thing that has been going on there since the dawn of time. It will never end. Joseph Kony and the LRA are just the latest in an endless parade of monsters. Sending our soldiers in there is unconscionable. No matter what we do there, they will be right back at it as soon as we leave. What a waste. Another inane blunder motivated by ‘feel good’ ideals. Can 2012 get here fast enough?
Prognostication: Expect to hear “US out of Uganda!” by this time next year.
Well, Obambi belonged to a church that had a non-negotiable committment to Africa and also called on God to damn America, so if you’re expecting Obambi to put American interests above African interests…you’re expecting a lot.
What’s going on there is none of our business, but Obambi thinks it’s his business.
Another cheap wag the dog moment for the ObaMao administration. Either that or there must be some sort of financial windfall out of all this for Valerie Jarrett…
And yet, Obama has still not done anything about Darfur. It’s seems all those who were outraged at Bush’s suppossed inaction have know completely forgotten about that conflict. Go figure.
The world is so full of monsters so why this one and why now ? I guess that Obama felt so good during his Bin Laden moment that he is trying to get another minor Kony moment that might impress at least the black voters. The White House is probably busy inventing other “Wag the dog” ideas to divert the voters focus from the miserable economy.
One more reason to like swedish women.
From Foreign Policy. I thought we were in favor of removing murderous brutal dictators:
Amerislump
Decline Watch: Cocaine Use on the Decline
F.P. on TV
Keating on Washington Journal
Zambia and China
A Setback for the Dragon
Rush Limbaugh on Lord’s Resistance Army: “Obama Invades Uganda, Targets Christians”
Posted By Blake Hounshell Saturday, October 15, 2011 – 12:52 PM Share
Photo: A former abductee of the Lord’s Resistance Army
Yesterday, when President Obama announced that the United States would be sending 100 special operations forces to help Uganda battle the Lord’s Resistance Army, a notorious and brutal death cult led by Joseph Kony, a joke went around on Twitter that Michele Bachmann would soon be attacking the president for “targeting Christians.”
Of course, to call the LRA “Christians” is to abase the English language. As the Atlantic’s Graeme Wood put it in a profile of Kony last year, “An American diplomat in Bangui compared the group to the Manson family, but given that the LRA has killed 12,000 people, the comparison is self-evidently unfair to Manson.”
Human Rights Watch’s Ken Roth wrote of the group last fall:
Its cadre often descends on a remote village, slaughters every adult in sight, and then kidnaps the children, some shockingly young — the boys to become soldiers slinging AK-47s, the girls to serve as “bush wives.” Over more than two decades, many thousands have fallen victim to these roving mass murderers.
But Bachmann was too smart to fall into this trap, and instead it was Rush Limbaugh who jumped on the news to attack Obama. Behold:
Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan. … So that’s a new war, a hundred troops to wipe out Christians in Sudan, Uganda, and — (interruption) no, I’m not kidding. Jacob Tapper just reported it. …
Lord’s Resistance Army objectives. I have them here. “To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people.” Now, again Lord’s Resistance Army is who Obama sent troops to help nations wipe out. The objectives of the Lord’s Resistance Army, what they’re trying to accomplish with their military action in these countries is the following: “To remove dictatorship and stop the oppression of our people; to fight for the immediate restoration of the competitive multiparty democracy in Uganda; to see an end to gross violation of human rights and dignity of Ugandans; to ensure the restoration of peace and security in Uganda, to ensure unity, sovereignty, and economic prosperity beneficial to all Ugandans, and to bring to an end the repressive policy of deliberate marginalization of groups of people who may not agree with the LRA ideology.” Those are the objectives of the group that we are fighting, or who are being fought and we are joining in the effort to remove them from the battlefield.
Then, after a break, he (sort of) realizes his mistake:
Is that right? The Lord’s Resistance Army is being accused of really bad stuff? Child kidnapping, torture, murder, that kind of stuff? Well, we just found out about this today. We’re gonna do, of course, our due diligence research on it. But nevertheless we got a hundred troops being sent over there to fight these guys — and they claim to be Christians.
It takes your breath away, doesn’t it?
Is the death and suffering any worse than in, say, North Korea? Should we count children dying young around the world, day by day?
when i first heard this my gut impression was “heart of darkness”
although there are only supposed to be 100 troops/soldiers/advisors (why are we telegraphing this anyway) was this not how the seeds of vietnam were planted?
i still feel that, along with abolishing the 2nd amendment and encouraging discontent and revolutionary angst, another of the left’s ageless goals is to remove threats to it’s existence– if the 2nd amendment goes and there are riots in the streets it damn well makes sense (for the totalitarians) to have the american military as far away and as dispersed as possible around the world– this foray into the middle of the african continent just gets my statist shenanigan sensors tingling
First, Hats off, Bryan! Nothing gets past your sharp brain! You are one of the happy few who are reporting about this bizarre excursion. Whatever you’re drinking, you should send a few cases to your blogosphere colleagues to wake them up (it would be wasted completely on the MSM).
You’re quite right, of course: the Uganda move is a Barack Obama Friday Special. We’ve had more than enough examples, by now, of his addiction to the dark arts of misdirection to recognize one of his maneuvers when it slides down the pike. So, what’s really up?
Obama & Company say that our 100 military advisers are going to Uganda to help, advise and train government forces in the effort to go after Lord’s Resistance Army leader, Joseph Kony and his pals. These are some evil people, no question. And they richly deserve to encounter a large chunk of their black karma come back to get them. But why now? This struggle has gone on for 25 years, and has displaced millions of people, and so, all of a sudden, with virtually no explanation, The One is sending just 100 U.S. military advisers to clear up the little problem. Right. And Occupy Wall Street is a spontaneous, grassroots expression of citizen concern, just like the Tea Party…..
Dunno if I’m on the right track, but here’s one possible explanation of what’s really going on with this move, and one that also answers the question, why now?.
This is Obama’s Second War for Oil – or more accurately, for the Oil Companies. First Libya (for Total, ENI, Exxon, and a host of other European oil companies with large and crucial fields throughout Libya), now Uganda where the country’s Parliament, on 14 October, amid charges of extensive government corruption and bribery involving foreign oil companies, voted to suspend all new oil deals between Uganda and foreign oil companies, and to undertake an investigation. So far, four government ministers have resigned and President Yoweri Museveni was forced to speak to the situation in a national address. Things look shaky for the regime. Some of the foreign oil companies involved in the suspension are: ENI (Italy), and Tullow Oil (Ireland) whose $2.9 billion deal with China’s CNOOC and France’s Total is left up in the air by the Parliamentary suspension. Sound familiar? In light of this little drama that’s unfolding right now, our military would be there to advise and protect President Museveni and his government and keep him in power. And by protecting him, we protect the interests of the foreign oil companies. To say nothing of doing our pals, the Chinese, a solid. And who knows, maybe in their spare time our guys could send Mr. Kony and his gang on to their just rewards.
Just a possibility…..
Can we say “R2P”?