Hung up on the Horn of Africa
We should let the fractious region go its own way
15 September, 2010 | By Dan Simpson (Pittsburg Post-Gazette)
-------------------------------------------------------------------
the "horn" part referring to the fact that the African coastline in the
northeast takes that shape. Looking at the region strategically,
Sudan belongs to the Horn as well.
I take full responsibility for my own part in what has occurred in the
Horn, having served as U.S. ambassador and special envoy to
Somalia during the relatively ruinous years of 1994 and 1995, but
there is a fundamental problem for the United States in devising
policy toward the area: The people there have an unfortunate,
pronounced predisposition to settle problems among themselves by
warfare and violence.
They are fractious and heavily armed. If they ever lack arms, they
do not hesitate to sell whatever they have to sell to get them --
including their allegiances or humanitarian food deliveries from
abroad intended for their hungry populations. The regime of
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, a sometime-favorite of
American leaders, provided the most recent example.
The people of the Horn are also enterprising in getting assistance,
including military assistance, from American administrations. It took
the Ethiopians and some of the Somalis no time to figure out that
America's hot button since 9/11 has been "Islamic terrorism."
Suggesting that one's enemy was infected by -- or even in touch
with -- al-Qaida or some other radical Islamic group was enough
not only to get U.S. military aid, but even to get the Americans to
attack the enemy in question.
That particular vulnerability on America's part has become even
more severe in recent years as the U.S. military has come to play a
large role in determining and carrying out U.S. policy in the Horn.
Part of this phenomenon is an accident of history.
For many years the United States had no military command
dedicated to Africa. When I was deputy commandant of the U.S.
Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., in 1993-1994 I wrote a
monograph in which I noted that there were military commands for
Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and South Asia but
none for Africa. This, I argued, was to slight Africa: It showed a
lack of respect that there was no military-to-military contact and
none of the ample Department of Defense resources flowing to
Africa.
The Pentagon, certainly not because of my advocacy, created an
African Command in 2008. Because none of the African countries
where AFRICOM might have liked to have been located wanted its
headquarters, AFRICOM continues to be based in Germany. Its
one base in Africa is in Djibouti, in the Horn.
In late 2006, claiming radical Islamic activity in Somalia, Ethiopia,
backed by U.S. arms, aircraft, intelligence and possibly special
operations forces, invaded Somalia. The Somalis hate the
Ethiopians a lot, dating in part from the 1970s when the United
States supported the Ethiopians against them, then switched sides
and supported the Somalis in a Cold War-era regional war.
Eventually the Somalis "convinced" the Ethiopians to go home in
2009.
The bad part for the Somalis came in the fact that the only stable
government it's had since its armies forced dictator Mohamed Siad-
Barre out in 1991 was an Islamic Courts regime that was in power
in Mogadishu for the six months preceding the Ethiopian invasion.
This government was relatively moderate in Islamic terms. (When I
was in Somalia in the 1990s, Somalis in general were moderate
Sunni Muslims. The women did not go veiled, wore bright colors
and played public roles in society.)
By the time the Ethiopians had been driven out, the Islamic Courts
had morphed into the more radical and religiously rigid al-Shabab.
In the meantime, the world had organized a Somali "transitional"
government in Kenya -- after years of arm-twisting and bribes --
that was installed in Mogadishu under foreign, African Union
protection. The members of this "government," busily fighting among
themselves, are now cornered in a few square blocks in Mogadishu,
and the African Union troops, from Uganda and Burundi, are
cursing the day they got dragged into the intra-Somali conflict.
My guess is that pretty soon al-Shabab will overrun the transitional
government enclave, forcing the flight of the fickle government
forces and obliging the AU to leave. I fervently hope the Americans
at the base in neighboring Djibouti do not intervene to help the
government hold on against the al-Shabab forces. But I don't rule
that out.
In the meantime, elsewhere in the Horn, Ethiopia and Eritrea, both
with undemocratic, heavy-handed governments, continue to quarrel
with each other as they have since Eritrea's breakaway from
Ethiopia in 1993. Djibouti hangs on -- a tiny, reasonably democratic
state of 850,000 living like a chihuahua sleeping among pit bulls.
Sudan is what needs to be watched now. The basic problem there
is that an agreement brokered in 2005, including by the United
States, provides for the people in the south to vote on
independence in 2011. The South undoubtedly will choose
independence. But the current government is based in the north, in
Khartoum, and most of the country's oil wealth is located in the
south -- a recipe for conflict. The Obama administration is having
internal policy differences over what U.S. policy toward Sudan
should be.
I would suggest that Sudan's fate is, almost entirely, none of
America's business. Last of all should U.S. military resources based
in Djibouti come into play in seeking to determine one outcome or
another in Sudan.
Just because you think you can do something doesn't mean you
should, particularly in the Horn of Africa.
Dan Simpson, a former U.S. ambassador, is a Post-Gazette
associate editor (dsimpson@post-gazette.com
Courtesy
We should let the fractious region go its own way
15 September, 2010 | By Dan Simpson (Pittsburg Post-Gazette)
-------------------------------------------------------------------
- With the exception of
countries the United States
has wrecked through wars
-- Vietnam, Iraq and
Afghanistan -- the area
where we have done the
most damage in recent
years probably is the Horn
of Africa.
- The Horn of Africa is
the "horn" part referring to the fact that the African coastline in the
northeast takes that shape. Looking at the region strategically,
Sudan belongs to the Horn as well.
I take full responsibility for my own part in what has occurred in the
Horn, having served as U.S. ambassador and special envoy to
Somalia during the relatively ruinous years of 1994 and 1995, but
there is a fundamental problem for the United States in devising
policy toward the area: The people there have an unfortunate,
pronounced predisposition to settle problems among themselves by
warfare and violence.
They are fractious and heavily armed. If they ever lack arms, they
do not hesitate to sell whatever they have to sell to get them --
including their allegiances or humanitarian food deliveries from
abroad intended for their hungry populations. The regime of
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, a sometime-favorite of
American leaders, provided the most recent example.
The people of the Horn are also enterprising in getting assistance,
including military assistance, from American administrations. It took
the Ethiopians and some of the Somalis no time to figure out that
America's hot button since 9/11 has been "Islamic terrorism."
Suggesting that one's enemy was infected by -- or even in touch
with -- al-Qaida or some other radical Islamic group was enough
not only to get U.S. military aid, but even to get the Americans to
attack the enemy in question.
That particular vulnerability on America's part has become even
more severe in recent years as the U.S. military has come to play a
large role in determining and carrying out U.S. policy in the Horn.
Part of this phenomenon is an accident of history.
For many years the United States had no military command
dedicated to Africa. When I was deputy commandant of the U.S.
Army War College in Carlisle, Pa., in 1993-1994 I wrote a
monograph in which I noted that there were military commands for
Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and South Asia but
none for Africa. This, I argued, was to slight Africa: It showed a
lack of respect that there was no military-to-military contact and
none of the ample Department of Defense resources flowing to
Africa.
The Pentagon, certainly not because of my advocacy, created an
African Command in 2008. Because none of the African countries
where AFRICOM might have liked to have been located wanted its
headquarters, AFRICOM continues to be based in Germany. Its
one base in Africa is in Djibouti, in the Horn.
In late 2006, claiming radical Islamic activity in Somalia, Ethiopia,
backed by U.S. arms, aircraft, intelligence and possibly special
operations forces, invaded Somalia. The Somalis hate the
Ethiopians a lot, dating in part from the 1970s when the United
States supported the Ethiopians against them, then switched sides
and supported the Somalis in a Cold War-era regional war.
Eventually the Somalis "convinced" the Ethiopians to go home in
2009.
The bad part for the Somalis came in the fact that the only stable
government it's had since its armies forced dictator Mohamed Siad-
Barre out in 1991 was an Islamic Courts regime that was in power
in Mogadishu for the six months preceding the Ethiopian invasion.
This government was relatively moderate in Islamic terms. (When I
was in Somalia in the 1990s, Somalis in general were moderate
Sunni Muslims. The women did not go veiled, wore bright colors
and played public roles in society.)
By the time the Ethiopians had been driven out, the Islamic Courts
had morphed into the more radical and religiously rigid al-Shabab.
In the meantime, the world had organized a Somali "transitional"
government in Kenya -- after years of arm-twisting and bribes --
that was installed in Mogadishu under foreign, African Union
protection. The members of this "government," busily fighting among
themselves, are now cornered in a few square blocks in Mogadishu,
and the African Union troops, from Uganda and Burundi, are
cursing the day they got dragged into the intra-Somali conflict.
My guess is that pretty soon al-Shabab will overrun the transitional
government enclave, forcing the flight of the fickle government
forces and obliging the AU to leave. I fervently hope the Americans
at the base in neighboring Djibouti do not intervene to help the
government hold on against the al-Shabab forces. But I don't rule
that out.
In the meantime, elsewhere in the Horn, Ethiopia and Eritrea, both
with undemocratic, heavy-handed governments, continue to quarrel
with each other as they have since Eritrea's breakaway from
Ethiopia in 1993. Djibouti hangs on -- a tiny, reasonably democratic
state of 850,000 living like a chihuahua sleeping among pit bulls.
Sudan is what needs to be watched now. The basic problem there
is that an agreement brokered in 2005, including by the United
States, provides for the people in the south to vote on
independence in 2011. The South undoubtedly will choose
independence. But the current government is based in the north, in
Khartoum, and most of the country's oil wealth is located in the
south -- a recipe for conflict. The Obama administration is having
internal policy differences over what U.S. policy toward Sudan
should be.
I would suggest that Sudan's fate is, almost entirely, none of
America's business. Last of all should U.S. military resources based
in Djibouti come into play in seeking to determine one outcome or
another in Sudan.
Just because you think you can do something doesn't mean you
should, particularly in the Horn of Africa.
Dan Simpson, a former U.S. ambassador, is a Post-Gazette
associate editor (dsimpson@post-gazette.com
Courtesy
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