Originally Posted by
Tom Odom
Gents,
Small wars as defined by the USMC are already taking place. Darfur , Sudan has seen US airlift transporting my old friends, the Rwandan Patriotic Army, as peacekeepers. The "small war" in the Congo has claimed more than 3 MILLION dead since 1997; periodic flare ups are routine. Zimbabwe is headed toward the abyss; look for bloodletting there in the near to mid term.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict morphs and bubbles as it has since the mid-1930s. I fervently hope that we stay out of that one. Distance and balance are our only friends in that long struggle.
Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Syria are all candidates for a fiction writer's potential best seller on turmoil. Such fiction would hardly be a stretch.
I won't go into Iraq; the schisms before the war are there after the war. They will be there when we leave.
Those are my regions: Asia, South Asia, Latin America, Eurasia all have their flarepoints.
The commonality between small wars to me has always been they only surprise policy makers; the locals and others who know the regional issues can usually see them coming.
Best
Tom Odom
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