Nigeria 2013-2017

[davidbfpo]

Just to add that religion features heavily in the run up to the 2015 elections here. Massive whisper campaign - opposition party (Muslim dominated) is being painted as "Muslim Brotherhood", allusions to "Boko Haram", "Worldwide Jihad"...

These undercurrents tend to be ignored by Western analysts, but they do matter.

Given the variety of approaches within the Mulsim Brotherhood (MB) over recent years, I cannot see this 'whisper' being that effective. Is it the MB led by Morsi in Egypt or those who rose in the 80's against the Assad regime?

There is a long running thread on the MB:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...read.php?t=891

[davidbfpo]

Two stories about an Australian Dr Davis, a self-described "amateur peacemaker" from Perth, with some experience of negoitations in Nigeria, tried to rescue the kidnapped girls - taken in April 2014:http://www.smh.com.au/world/how-amat...#ixzz3CN8yQOK6

He is not an optimist:

When Boko Haram links up with ISIL - and there is interaction between the two - and with [terrorist group] al-Shabbab, that triangle is going to be the new home of terrorism like the world has not seen....The guys before - there was no kidnapping, no rape. They wouldn't kidnap women or children, because that was contrary to the Koran. Now these guys will do anything, they are a totally different breed.

Second story (they are different):http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-08-2...-girls/5699676

[KingJaja]

Given the variety of approaches within the Mulsim Brotherhood (MB) over recent years, I cannot see this 'whisper' being that effective. Is it the MB led by Morsi in Egypt or those who rose in the 80's against the Assad regime?

There is a long running thread on the MB:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...read.php?t=891

It will work VERY WELL with Nigerian Christians. Sometimes you forget the dynamics are a bit different in Nigeria.

[KingJaja]

Review of interesting book dealing with the history of religious tensions in Northern Nigeria:

It points out that while the British colonized Muslim northern Nigeria indirectly through the region’s pre-existing centralized feudal traditional and administrative institutions, it colonized non-Muslim northern Nigeria even more indirectly through “native aliens,” that is, Hausa-Fulani Muslims whom British colonialists placed atop their self-created African civilizational hierarchy. “This resulted in a subcolonial bureaucracy driven at the grass roots by thousands of Hausa chiefs, scribes, tax agents, and their own Hausa-Fulani agents, who initiated much of the colonial agenda in these Middle Belt districts” (p. 2).

Thus, the Hausa-Fulani became “subcolonials,” or proxy colonialists, who in turn appointed “lesser chiefs, aides, tax collectors, scribes, and enforcers” mostly from among their kind but sometimes from among the “natives” in order to prepare the Middle Belt for the kind of indirect colonial rule that was successful in the Muslim north. The motive force for this arrangement stemmed from the colonial construction of the people of the Middle Belt as benighted cultural inferiors who needed the civilizational tutelage of their Hausa-Fulani cultural superiors preparatory to British indirect colonial rule. This invidious social differentiation wasn’t a simple case of the divide-and-rule tactic for which (British) colonialists were infamous. On the contrary, the book argues, the policy of “proxy colonialism” was driven by the “pursuit of sameness in the crucible of preparatory proxy rule” (p. 8).

http://www.farooqkperogi.com/2014/09...-northern.html

[KingJaja]

Interesting comparison of the similarity in behaviour of the Nigerian Army in Sierra Leone/Liberia & in its present operations against Boko Haram.

The most striking and worrying similarity between the current conflict and the operations in Liberia and Sierra-Leone is the fluid stalemate that has now developed between the military and Boko Haram. By this I mean that on the one hand the insurgency is now in strategic stalemate – Boko Haram’s aspiration of an Islamic State in Nigeria remains a pipe dream; similarly, a comprehensive military victory against the sect seems unlikely for now. On the other hand however, battlefield conditions on the ground is characterised by tactical fluidity. The frequent loss and recapture of towns and villages by the military, and Boko Haram’s ability to move heavily armed operatives in large convoys with impunity in significant sections of the northeast illustrate this fluid and rapidly changing situation on the ground.

The outcome of Nigeria’s armed interventions in Liberia and Sierra-Leone can also be described as fluid stalemates. In neither country was the military able to achieve its strategic objective of breaking the rebels’ war-fighting resolve. In both countries while the Nigerian army controlled the capitals; in Liberia the rebels controlled the rest of the country, whilst in Sierra-Leone it was the northern half by December 1998. And in both missions, despite the strategic stalemate – i.e. neither the rebels nor the Nigerian military completely vanquished the other – the tactical situation on the ground was highly fluid as battlefield fortunes ebbed and flowed.

http://janguzaarewa.blogspot.co.uk/2...rrent-war.html

[AdamG]

Nigerian Army Kills Boko Haram Leader, Rounds Up Hundreds of Fighters
Startling comeback for Abuja’s armed forces
https://medium.com/war-is-boring/nig...s-dfb58579fae7

http://www.france24.com/en/20140925-...eria-military/

[davidbfpo]

This graphic is enough for some, but SWC needs more. So a couple of passages:

The data makes clear that Boko Haram-related violence is the most lethal conflict that Nigeria has confronted in decades. Since 1998, at least 29,600 Nigerians have been killed in more than 2,300 incidents reflecting a wide range of ethnic, religious, political and economic tensions across large portions of the country. Since July 2009, when the Boko Haram conflict escalated, at least 11,100 people have died on all sides of the insurgency.

Then there's always WAWA:

Political rulers, when confronted by an approaching existential threat, might normally be expected to mobilize national resources to aggressively confront the insurgency. Yet Nigeria’s elites seem to be detached, mired in political infighting, or distracted by opportunities to profit from poorly monitored security budgets.

Link:http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...y-the-numbers/



The linked article explains the origin of the data

[davidbfpo]

For months the Nigerian government has denied being in talks with Boko Haram, over the kidnapped schoolgirls in particular. Now it appears they have been talking, with the Red Cross visiting jails to identify those to be "swooped". Now whether this is a real success is arguable.

Link:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...ire-deal.html?