Five Years After the Genocide Started, The World Finally Kind of Does Something
Filed under: Darfur, Human Rights, Sudan, United Nations — Jimmie on July 11, 2008 @ 8:04 pm CEST
If you want to know just how well the left’s strategy of using criminal laws and international institutions to fight Islamism, look no farther than the world’s shameful inaction in the Sudan.
Five years after Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir began his genocidal campaign in Darfur, the International Criminal Court has finally decided to try to get an arrest warrant charging him with genocide and crimes against humanity. I say “try” because even after the chief prosecutor presents his evidence to the court, it will take the panel of judges two to three months to decide whether to issue the warrant or not.
So, it’s possible that sometime later this year, almost 5 1/2 years after al-Bashir began to slaughter hundreds of thousands of Sudanese, after his forces have raped their way across Darfur, after what has amounted to a one-sided holy war to cleanse the country of all non-Arabs, the international community will act in earnest. Kind of.
The reaction from al-Bashir’s government has been scorn and defiance. His ambassador to the UN says that “If the United Nations is serious about its engagement with Sudan, it should tell this man [Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the chief prosecutor of the ICC] to suspend what he is doing with this so-called indictment. There will be grave repercussions.”
The UN responded to this bluster with its characteristic cowardice. The five permanent members of the UN Security Council (which includes the United States) are meeting with UN officials to see to the “safety” of UN peacekeepers. The UN military honchos are already “moving peacekeepers to safer locations”.
Mind you, these peacekeepers are well-armed soldiers. The forces who have been committing the genocide have killed most of their victims with machetes. Yet it is the UN forces in retreat.
And this whole kabuki play is the mechanism the left wants to bring to bear against the Islamists who are trying to kill and enslave us. Except that they want to bring the American criminal justice system to the dance, too because nothing says “speed and prevention” like a protracted court trial. This is the “global test” that the Democrats say we must use to decide our foreign policy even though they occasionally have to shout over the screams of those being hacked to death with machetes. This is where our foreign policy is headed unless we get very serious about using all our strength to beat back the forces of evil afoot in the world.
If you really want to know why so many people around the world hate the West, you don’t have to look much farther than the genocide in Darfur and the enduring realpolitik that says we should do nothing to stop it.
(cross-posted at The Sundries Shack)
1 Kevin H
July 11, 2008 @ 9:47 pm CESTI’m pretty sure it was American Conservatives, not American Liberals who have made an attempt at hobbeling the UN in recent history. If you want a strong UN, you first need to have an Administration that thinks that is a good thing.
2 Jimmie
July 11, 2008 @ 10:12 pm CESTNonsense, Kevin. The UN is inherently incompetent to handle genocide, since it expressly coddles genocidal tyrants in its membership. Its function is not to end or even discourage genocide. Indeed, its bureaucracy and moral dithering encourages tyrants.
Conservatives did not make the UN put despots in charge of its Human Rights Commission. Conservatives deplore that and remind people that the UN’s fonding principles was “never again”.
3 utsu
July 11, 2008 @ 11:33 pm CEST"Yet it is the UN forces in retreat."
Because the UN is a terrible force if it is not so damnably hampered and cautious. It must exist in this pathetic form and with such inertia, or not at all.
"Except that they want to bring the American criminal justice system to the dance, too because nothing says “speed and prevention” like a protracted court trial."
And nothing says "punishable evil" like indefinite and arbitrary incarceration without legal proceedings. You. Don’t. Get. To. Store. People. Well, you can, but then you are harming my humanity (by Kantian logic of universalism) and I have to make you stop somehow, much like we have to stop the taliban. I don’t want a lighterr shade of evil fighting a darker one. If I accept such moral relativism we could just call it a day.
Now, many people try to use the lack of a good alternative in the UN as an argument in favor of unilateralism from the US - which is dumb because many such undertakings from the US are unilateral for a simple reason - the US is acting in error and criminal selfishness. Like in Afghanistan (good in theory, continuously immoral in execution despite chances to improve) or Iraq (immoral in theory and execution) today.
In short, the argument is usually - "If the US won’t do it, no one will!". Fact is, sometimes it doesn’t have to be done. Or sometimes it has to be done, but it is hypocritical of the US to suddenly want to act, and therefore a bit dubious. I mean, Darfur was/is a greater problem than Iraq, and the US doesn’t have any arguments left in favor of the Iraq occupation other than an utilitarian one. So get to some action in Zimbabwe and Darfur, then. I mean, it will destabilize the region but that hasn’t been a consideration before, eh?
"This is where our foreign policy is headed unless we get very serious about using all our strength to beat back the forces of evil afoot in the world."
You are currently spending a lot of strength in just two countries. With results ranging from "acceptable in defiance of the incompetent contractors, poor planning, lack of a declaration of war, breaches of international agreements, Bush’s attempt to install American capitalist buddies in control of Iraqis indefinetely etc." to "laughable". What are you going to do about the rest of the evildoers? You know, the evildoers whose removal won’t even pay for itself with 30 trillion dollars of oil?
How many Iraqis did the US kill with its immoral and unjustified sanctions? Darfurian quantities. How many in Bangladesh will die as the country turns into a salt marsh because of us responsible OECD atlases?
No, I must admit I haven’t figured out this world yet, which is why I can’t really see a saviour in an auto-forgivable torturer and law-bender that easily.
4 utsu
July 12, 2008 @ 12:07 am CESTIsn’t it strange that John Garang, the man that started the rebel war five years after oil was discovered in Southern Sudan (1983), was trained at Fort Benning in Georgia (you know, where Reagan’s personal torture and terrorism agents for South America where trained?)? Isn’t it strange how the US sent him like 20 million dollars even though his human rights record would be considered evil by America’s founders?
I mean, the guy was active in a conflict that killed millions and displaced millions and I mean like wow and stuff. I think it is so cool of the US to just give the guy some money so he could defeat the regime in Khartoum, I mean its not like the CIA had any implicit or explicit conditions attached to that money while he fought a rebellion (that totally allowed dissenters and never breached international agreements and stuff). Oil? What’s that?!
I mean its so smart - if the guy you throw outdated weapons and some tax dollars at win, then obviously he was a freedom fighter who never hurt the innocent (DUH!). And if he loses (like that Savimbi dude in Angola) he is forgotten. If the rebellion you instigate win (Yugoslavia) then some German/UK/US capitalists arrive and buy up the social- and state-owned assets in the chaos - and happiness is everywhere!! We see the US working tirelessly to create some good-ole neo-liberalism in Iraq as we speak, while the Iraqis experience some stimulating and reenergizing chaos! Yeah, the US has the road to a free and fair world all figured out. Forgive my pussilanimous and postmodernist European whining.
5 Michael Merritt
July 12, 2008 @ 6:20 am CESTLast time I checked, nobody was doing much about the Darfur genocide. I’m not entirely sure how you can pin this one on liberals, Michael, when nobody is doing anything. Nobody.
The U.N. is weak, yes, but only because it gets less done than the U.S. Congress. That’s what happens when you have a Security Council that is essentially an oligarchy of five ego-driven nations.
6 Jimmie
July 12, 2008 @ 7:24 am CESTMichael didn’t post this.
And I’m putting this on the UN because stopping genocide is exactly what the UN was founded to do. The whole reason it exists is to give body to the phrase "never again".
If the UN can’t even slow down a genocide, can’t do a darned thing for five years, then it is worse than useless.
utsu - At some point, you and reality are going to have to meet and introduce yourselves. Your view of the past five years seems…otherworldly. I do, however, applaud the deathgrip you have on the old immoral realpolitik policies of the last fifty years or more. They’ve certainly done a world of good, haven’t they?
What I don’t think you understand at all is that the notion of stuffing cotton in our ears to muffle the screams of the millions of people being slaughtered in genocides around the world is nothing I want a part of. I didn’t want it in Iraq and I don’t want it in Darfur. We can quibble over what means we use to break the tyrants (and I’m fully in favor of using any and every means we have, fair or foul) but I’m not willing to budge on the need to do so.
7 utsu
July 12, 2008 @ 10:10 am CESTIf you use any means, fair and foul, you get destabilized regions, terrorism like Black Sunday or the pesticide attacks on Cuban farmers, torture in South America, lack of infrastructure in Iraq and the only people that gain anything are some western capitalists. In short, you lose the high ground and I cannot care if you succeed or not. Utilitarianism (we need some torture and purchasing of warlords to save more lives) as a basis for broad action is just the sort of of naivite that needs a kick in the head.
Then, something strikes back from that region of chaos and desperation you created, 3000 people die and all of a sudden the world needs a daddy again. Actually, the only thing that happened was that some douchebags of an even higher order decided to play by the rules you had been playing by since more than a hundred years. No, I am not saying that IX XI was not an evil atrocity, or that the US deserved it. I was just not that surprised or upset, because even before the Iraq occupatin or the Afghanistan screw-up I did not care about the well-being of America.
8 JB
July 13, 2008 @ 5:02 am CEST"If you use any means, fair and foul, you get destabilized regions, terrorism like Black Sunday or the pesticide attacks on Cuban farmers, torture in South America, lack of infrastructure in Iraq and the only people that gain anything are some western capitalists."
I would say that genocide in a region is already symptomatic of "instability". Was Saddam’s reign a model of stability (multiple wars, attempted genocide, terrorist support, etc.)?
Your argument seems to be not against instability but against Western involvement. Your issues with the West should be taken up with your therapist, as your argument makes virtually no sense in light of historical facts. A laundry list of grievances, real or perceived, is not an argument.
9 Michael Merritt
July 13, 2008 @ 6:30 pm CESTSorry, Jimmie. I think it’s because I had just been reading one of Michael’s entries!
I agree the U.N. needs reform, but it has to start with the ridding of the permanent positions (yea, that’ll happen). Consider what happens any time a proposed actions gets too close to a permanent member country, or does something a permanent member doesn’t like. They veto it, and then it’s useless.
I also wouldn’t mind strengthening their power to take on a country like Sudan who is committing genocide.
Next, General Assembly resolutions should probably be made binding, rather than the symbolic ones they currently are.
Finally, the dues paid need to be made a little fairer, I think. The U.S. pays 22% of the funding for the U.N. Make the amount per country more even, I say, and then you might have a more egalitarian body.
10 utsu
July 13, 2008 @ 6:47 pm CEST"I would say that genocide in a region is already symptomatic of "instability". "
Well, the US tried to gain a foothold in the region after oil was discovered. Why? Because they wanted to be top dog, using "foul means".
"Your argument seems to be not against instability but against Western involvement."
Wrong, it´s against the latter on the grounds that it creates the former!
"Your issues with the West should be taken up with your therapist, as your argument makes virtually no sense in light of historical facts."
Where is the historical facts in support of more western involvement? It’s all about the oil, no matter the suffering of civilians or the security of American citizens.