NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #1/NN_1993_1.iso/spool/misc/activism/progress/9905

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From: [e-mail] (Workers World Service)
Subject: US Seeks Puppet Regime in Somalia
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Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit


U.S. seeks puppet regime in Somalia

By Leslie Feinberg

Washington and the Pentagon are trying to establish a government
subservient to their interests in Somalia. This effort is taking
place on several fronts.

Bush's special envoy Robert Oakley is attempting to negotiate a
settlement between different Somali clan leaders. The discussions
take place under the weight of the current reality--a military
occupation led by 20,000 Pentagon troops armed to the teeth. The
goal in these "negotiations" is a settlement in which the U.S.
emerges as the top boss in the country.

While cloaked in talk of "peace," U.S. military spokesperson Col.
Fred Peck said it plainly: "We always have the stick and we try to
use the carrot." Some soldiers are even more blunt.

"It's weird being on a humanitarian mission," Lt. Andrew Milburn of
San Clemente, Calif., told reporters. "And the most constructive
thing you've done is kill two people." (New York Times, Dec. 26)

Pentagon-led forces have seized eight cities in central and
southern Somalia: Belet Uen, Gailalassi, Hoddur, Bale Dogle,
Baidoa, Afgoi, Bardera and Kismayu, as well as Mogadishu.

According to a report in the Jan. 3 New York Times: "The United
States forces have also helped to create `interim security
councils' in small towns to grapple with issues related to
disarmament. There is some thought that the councils, broadly
inclusive, could grow into interim governing groups."

Meanwhile, the United Nations is "mediating" a similar political
conference between clan leaders currently under way in Addis Ababa,
the capital of Ethiopa.

WHO'S THE BOSS?

While the UN served as a fig leaf for Pentagon military
intervention, the U.S. appears to be helping to discredit any
independent UN authority in the region.

The Jan. 3 Mogadishu demonstration against UN Secretary-General
Boutros Boutros-Ghali was a case in point. Hundreds of protesters
hurled rocks at the UN compound, trapping UN officials and
reporters and effectively barring Boutros-Ghali from attending a
meeting and news conference scheduled at the site.

Somalis resent the UN because of the role it has played over the
last two years. After the collapse of the Siad Barre in January
1991 and the subsequent rise of civil war the UN pulled out of
Somalia. When the UN re-entered Somalia to conduct a "humanitarian
and emergency aid campaign," its efforts were viewed as largely
ineffective.

Boutros-Ghali himself was criticized after he forced Mohammed
Sahnoun, the previous UN representative to Somalia, to resign.
Sahnoun was critical of the UN's relief role in that country.

But the real issue is why the U.S. military allowed the
demonstration against Boutros-Ghali to happen. Why did the U.S. sit
by and allow Boutros-Ghali and the UN staff to be nearly
overwhelmed when thousands of Marines were right there?

The New York Times noted on Jan. 4 that the Marines finally
intervened, "but not before arousing suspicions that they might
quite enjoy prolonging the discomfort of a United Nations entourage
trapped here."

When trapped UN personnel called the Pentagon commanders for help,
their appeal was refused. "In desperation," the Times reported,
"officials called New York and pleaded with United Nations
headquarters to request help from the Pentagon."

Finally, "the Marines relented and said they would escort the group
to the airport. It took a couple of hours before four open trucks
with Marines riding shotgun in the back turned up. By this time,
most of the crowd had gone home."

LORD BUSH

Compare this to the protection given U.S. President George Bush.
The fanfare when "Great White Father" Bush arrived in Somalia for
a two-day New Year's publicity stunt was so outrageous that the
French press dubbed it "Showmalia."

Food distribution lines and an orphanage--quite a photo opportunity
for exiting President Bush. The sight was reminiscent of
19th-century colonialism.

But more important, the massive media circus provided a showcase to
prove the Pentagon's "usefulness and capabilities" in the post-Cold
War epoch. According to the Jan. 4 Wall Street Journal, arms
merchants are eagerly lobbying to experiment with new high
tech-weapons in Somalia.

The media have paved the way for world opinion by waiting in the
sand to film the Dec. 4 landing of U.S. troops. Bush has been
photographed ad nauseam patting African children on their heads.
Now the news agencies have begun dramatically scaling back their
staff and operations in Somalia. "The hiss you heard," the
Associated Press wryly noted on Jan. 3, "is the sound of air going
out of a story."

OPERATION? DOMINATION!

The sign hanging outside the orphanage Bush visited was
conveniently inked in English: "Your arrival is the key for peace
and stability." In reality, the arrival of Bush and the forces he
commands has been anything but.

Bush didn't spend much of his two-day visit to Somalia inside the
country--in fact he only spent a total of 10 hours on that
territory. The rest of the time he was hustled away by military
choppers or floated aboard the aircraft carrier Tripoli offshore.

Security for the visit was tight. Rooftops bristled with armed
lookouts. In Mogadishu, Marines evicted squatters from a building
that was once part of the abandoned U.S. Embassy complex. Military
checkpoints blocked the streets.

"The crowded thoroughfare was made virtually impassable as convoys
of Marines in trucks, jeeps and armored vehicles vied for the right
of way with dilapidated buses." (New York Times, Dec. 31)

The Third Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion seized the Afgoye
bridge and searched passing vehicles. Later in the day a Marine
captain said the Marines had "acted on their own" in the searches.

The big brass assures the press that the presence of U.S. troops
has been seen as a "godsend" by the Somalis. But Rhodri Wynne-Pope,
the head of CARE International in Mogadishu, admitted to the New
York Times on Dec. 30, "The military told us there was a rising
tension against U.S. forces."

The Times added, "The increase in violence coincides with an
announcement by the United States military authorities of a more
aggressive policy of disarming the Somalis."

In addition to stepped-up resistance in Somalia, on Dec. 29 two
bombs exploded in hotels in the nearby country of Yemen, where
Marines en route to Somalia were staying. Yemen is allowing the
Pentagon to use its air and sea installations as a launch pad.

In some ways, Operation Restore Hope is phase two of Operation
Desert Storm. The U.S. seeks to secure and dominate the vast
oil-rich region of the Middle East and has set up military bases
throughout the Persian Gulf. The Pentagon is now likely to procure
strategic military facilities in Somalia, the back door of the
Arabian peninsula.

(Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted
if source is cited. For more info contact Workers World, 46 W. 21
St., New York, NY 10010; via e-mail: [e-mail] or
[e-mail] or [e-mail].)

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