[wvns] Long CIA Involvement In Darfur
Early CIA Involvement In Darfur Has Gone Unreported
Jay Janson
http://www.countercurrents.org/janson090507.htm
There has been a glaring omission in the U.S. media presentation of
the Darfur tragedy. The compassion demonstrated, mostly in words,
until recently, has not been accompanied by a recognition of U.S.
complicity, or at least involvement, in the war which has led to the
enormous suffering and loss of life that has been taking place in
Darfur for many years
There has been a glaring omission in the U.S. media presentation of
the Darfur tragedy. The compassion demonstrated, mostly in words,
until recently, has not been accompanied by a recognition of U.S.
complicity, or at least involvement, in the war which has led to the
enormous suffering and loss of life that has been taking place in
Darfur for many years.
In 1978 oil was discovered in Southern Sudan. Rebellious war began
five years later and was led by John Garang, who had taken military
training at infamous Fort Benning, Georgia. "The US government
decided, in 1996, to send nearly $20 million of military equipment
through the 'front-line' states of Ethiopia, Eritrea and Uganda to
help the Sudanese opposition overthrow the Khartoum regime."
[Federation of American Scientists fas.org]
Between 1983 and the peace agreement signed in January 2005, Sudan's
civil war took nearly two million lives and left millions more
displaced. Garang became a First Vice President of Sudan as part of
the peace agreement in 2005. From 1983, "war and famine-related
effects resulted in more than 4 million people displaced and,
according to rebel estimates, more than 2 million deaths over a period
of two decades."
[CIA Fact Book -entry Sudan]
The BBC obituary of John Garang, who died in a plane crash shortly
afterward, describes him as having "varied from Marxism to drawing
support from Christian fundamentalists in the US." "There was always
confusion on central issues such as whether the Sudan People's
Liberation Army was fighting for independence for southern Sudan or
merely more autonomy. Friends and foes alike found the SPLA's human
rights record in southern Sudan and Mr Garang's style of governance
disturbing." Gill Lusk - deputy editor of Africa Confidential and a
Sudan specialist who interviewed the ex-guerrilla leader several times
over the years was quoted by BBC, "John Garang did not tolerate
dissent and anyone who disagreed with him was either imprisoned or
killed."
CIA use of tough guys like Garang in Sudan, Savimbi in Angola, Mobutu
in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo), had been
reported, even in mass media, though certainly not featured or
criticized, but presently, this is of course buried away from public
awareness and meant to be forgotten, as commercial media focuses on
presenting the U.S. wars of today in a heroic light. It has
traditionally been the chore of progressive, alternate and independent
journalism to see that their deathly deeds supported by U.S. citizens
tax dollars are not forgotten, ultimately not accepted and past
Congresses and Presidents held responsible, even in retrospect, when
not in real time.
Oil and business interests remain paramount and although Sudan is on
the U.S. Government's state sponsors of terrorism list, the United
States alternately praises its cooperation in tracking suspect
individuals or scolds about the Janjaweed in Darfur. National Public
Radio on May 2, 2005 had Los Angeles Times writer Ken Silverstein talk
about his article "highlighting strong ties between the U.S. and
Sudanese intelligence services, despite the Bush administration's
criticism of human-rights violation in the Sudan." Title was "Sudan,
CIA Forge Close Ties, Despite Rights Abuses." Nicholas Kristof, of The
New York Times, won a 2006 Pulitzer Prize for "his having alerted this
nation and the world to these massive crimes against humanity. He made
six dangerous trips to Darfur to report names and faces of victims of
the genocide for which President Bush had long before indicted the
government of Sudan to the world's indifference." [Reuters] But last
November saw the opening of a new U.S. consulate in Juba the capital
of the Southern region. (Maybe consider this an example of "If you
can't beat 'em, join 'em!" especially where oil is involved.)
The point is there is human suffering at mammoth level proportions.
Humanitarian activists are trying to pry open the purse strings of an
administration and congress willing to spend billions upon billions to
get people killed and keep them in their place, namely, at our feet.
Reminding Congress of what needs to be atoned for because of past
policies of supporting war and human destruction could eventually make
present policies of war intolerable. Americans are presently not
exactly conscious stricken about dead and maimed Iraqis and Afghans,
for commerical media always keeps of most of the human particulars of
war crimes modestly out of sight, dramatizing much lesser losses and
suffering of American military personal abroad.
Darfur made the headlines again because a governor of presidential
timber was building up his foreign policy credentials. Meanwhile we
are going to continue to see newsreels of our mass media depressing us
with scenes of starving children, basically as testimony of how evil
another Islamic nation's government is, so we can feel good - and want
to purchase the products needing the advertising - which pays for the
entertainment/news programs - which keep viewers in the dark about
THEIR contribution to the suffering brought upon those people all the
way over there in Africa.
Just try to put 4 and 2 million of anything into perspective. We are
talking about an equivalent to the sets of eyes of half the population
of Manhattan. Imagine one of us, whether a precious child ,a handsome
man, a beautiful women, - to the tune of, (dirge of), one times four
million, half of us dead. Sorry! It has no impact right? We realize
that, remembering the words of Joseph Stalin (of all people), "One
man's death is a tragedy, a thousand, is a statistic." There is
absolutely no way we can whip up enough anguish to match a total of
four million displaced and two million dead Sudanese, unless we could
be of a mind and heart with Martin Luther King dealing with three
million dead Vietnamese, also as in this case, over on the other side
of the world, far from our living rooms - "So it is that those of us
who are yet determined that "America will be" are led down the path of
protest and dissent, working for the health of our land." (MLK, 1967,
"Beyond Vietnam")
This writer remembers reading newspapers articles about the U.S.
backing the Southern Sudan rebellion way back then. If we had
supported a side that wound up winning, we would be bragging about our
having supported 'freedom fighters'. But we just threw a lot of money
and outdated weapons at a John Garang in the Sudan, as we did with
Jonas Savimbi in Angola, to the ultimate destruction of millions of
people, and they LOST! Like we did in Vietnam, and half-way lost in
Korea, and now are mid-way losing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Jesus!
Calculating the chances of an investment in human life and money
coming to a fruition of sorts - that is certainly the job of any
intelligence gathering agency! What we have had is an Agency using its
gathered intelligence to do unintelligent things because, as our Ralph
Waldo Emerson wrote more than a hundred and twenty-five years ago,
"Things are in the saddle and ride herd over men" (trampling others
under foot, we might add)
The European Union is under pressure from inside to assure that a
United Nations force of 20,000 men will be sent to Darfur as required
by Security Council resolution 1706, and to threaten sanctions in
order to halt a war the U.S. was originally interested to see begun.
The U.N. Security Council will receive a list from the International
Criminal Court of those Sudanese officials who could be charged with
war crimes. The list is expected include some members of rebel
organizations among Sudanese government officials and Janjaweed
militias. There assuredly will be no names on the list of non-Sudanese
officials of nations which were known to have involved themselves in
this Sudanese civil war contrary to accepted provisions and
obligations of U.N. membership. But we can know that the
responsibility for war, slaughter, rape and theft in Sudan extends
beyond the leaders of those murderously weilding guns and swords.
It will be good if outside influence will now be focused on peace, but
citizens best be vigilant of their nation's foreign policy intentions.
The world has heard many protestations that oil is not a reason for
war, but blood and oil has been known to mix.
*********************************************************************
WORLD VIEW NEWS SERVICE
To subscribe to this group, send an email to:
wvns-subscribe@yahoogroups.com
NEWS ARCHIVE IS OPEN TO PUBLIC VIEW
http://finance.groups.yahoo.com/group/wvns/
Need some good karma? Appreciate the service?
Please consider donating to WVNS today.
Email ummyakoub@yahoo.com for instructions.
To leave this list, send an email to:
wvns-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wvns/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/wvns/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
mailto:wvns-digest@yahoogroups.com
mailto:wvns-fullfeatured@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
wvns-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
No comments:
Post a Comment