From: Hank Roth <odin@halcyon.halcyon.com>
Subject: THE TRUTH ABOUT SOMALIA
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: The 23:00 News and Mail Service
Date: Wed, 13 Jan 1993 03:27:26 GMT

<<< via P_news/p.news >>>
{From LIVING MARXISM, January 1993}
THE TRUTH ABOUT SOMALIA
by Kenan Malik
 
A land where millions starve while warlords pillage and kill. A 
country in which bandits and common criminals loot Western aid 
before it can reach those dying from hunger. A nation of anarchy  
in thrall to ruthless gunmen. These are the images of Somalia in 
the West. When US president George Bush announced that he was to 
dispatch 30,000 troops to guard aid convoys most people welcomed 
the move. "At least somebody is doing something about it", was 
the general reaction.  
 
In fact the picture of Somalia as a country which is being torn 
apart by warlords, and desperate for Western intervention, has 
been manufactured to provide a pretext for just such an 
intervention. Western intervention, far from solving the 
country's terrible problems, was responsible for causing them in 
the first place---and can only exacerbate Somalia's plight now.
 
SUDDEN CONCERN
 
Somalia is certainly a desperately poor country whose economy has 
been destroyed, whose infrastructure is in tatters and whose 
population is haunted by hunger. But the whole country is not 
ravaged by famine and nor are two million people in danger of 
dying from starvation. 
 
The famine is restricted to the south-west corner of the 
country. According to independent observers about 150,000 have 
died so far and another 100,000 are at risk, more from disease 
than starvation. All this amounts to a terrible toll of 
suffering. But the situation in Somalia is no worse than that in 
other parts of Africa---such as Angola or Mozambique--which for 
years have been ignored by Western journalists and politicians. 
The sudden concern about Somalia has little to do with the real 
sufferings of the people there. 
 
Somalia is not in the grip of anarchy. Most of the country is 
relatively peaceful and stable. Central authority in Somalia has 
certainly collapsed. But this has been caused not by feuding 
`warlords', but by American interference. The current civil 
conflict and fragmentation of the country are the direct 
consequences of America's political manoeuvrings in Africa during 
the Cold War. 
 
Accoring to the GUARDIAN'S Martin Walker `as much as 80 percent 
of relief supplies are being stolen by the warlords', But as 
Rakiya Omaar and Alex de Waal of the Africa Watch organization 
have observed, the Save the Children Fund `have distributed 4000 
tons in Mogadishu without losing a single bag' (GUARDIAN, 6 
December 1992). Other relief agencies, they say, have lost 
between two and 10 percent of supplies. The one organization to 
suffer higher losses has been the United Nations. This is because 
unlike the other agencies, the UN has ridden roughshod over local 
people and is widely regarded with suspicion and contempt.
 
"THE OPERATION STINKS OF ARROGANCE. ALL THIS BULLSHIT ABOUT 80 
PERCENT OF FOOD BEING LOOTED AND ALL THAT---IT'S ALL VERY STAGE-
MANAGED BY THE UNITED STATES...THIS WHOLE OPERATION IS A TEST 
CASE FOR FUTURE CONFLICT RESOLUTION. IT'S AS IF THE US HAD A NEW 
VACCINE THEY WANTED TO TEST. NOW THEY HAVE FOUND AN ANIMAL TO 
TEST IT ON." (United Nations Ofical in Mogadishu, as the U.S. 
marines came ashore on 8 December 1992)
 
REAGAN EXPLAINS
 
Why should the USA want to manipulate the facts about Somalia in 
order to justify an invasion? American intervention has nothing 
to do with Somalia itself. It is a result of the uncertain nature 
of the New World Order.
 
While the marines were on their way to Somalia, former US 
president Ronald Reagan admitted in a speech in Britian that the 
end fo the Cold War`has robbed much of the West of its common, 
uplifting purpose'. How could it find such common purpose again, 
asked Reagan. By uniting, he said, `to impose civilised standards 
of behaviour on those who flout every measure of human decency'--
-and pointed to Somalia as an example.
 
This is the real reason for the US invasion of Somalia. 
Washington needs a `common, uplifting purpose' which, like the 
fight against the Soviet `evil empire', can be used to assert 
America's international leadership against potential rivals 
within the Western Alliance. Somalia, and the rest of the third 
world, has been set up as `civilised' in an attempt to provide 
America with a new moral authority.
 
What we are witnessing in Somalia is not a humanitarian mission, 
but a new colonialism. It has become widely accepted that the 
West is morally superior to, and more civilised than, the third 
world. But the West is the cause of, not the solution to, the 
problems of the third world. And, however worthy the motives that 
inform the call for more Western intervention, the consequences 
for the peoples of the third world will ultimately be 
devastating. 
 
The Americans might be able to show the world some quick pictures 
of marines handing food to hungry Somalis. But in the end, the 
record shows that Western intervention, motivated as it always is 
by great power politics, can only make things worse for those on 
the receiving end.
 
---------------------------------------------------------------
LIVING MARXISM is the monthly review of the Revolutionary 
Communist Party. Published in England by Junius Publications Ltd, 
BCM JPLTD, London, WC1N 3XX.
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