Somalia: not piracy catch all thread

[davidbfpo]

A quick point the old country of Somalia is no more. In the north east and essentially the old British Somaliland is a separate country, albeit not recognized by the UN or AU. Last time I looked it was stable and leaning towards a democracy.

davidbfpo

[abduljrus]

A quick point the old country of Somalia is no more. In the north east and essentially the old British Somaliland is a separate country, albeit not recognized by the UN or AU. Last time I looked it was stable and leaning towards a democracy.

davidbfpo

i think you are exaggerating that "split" factor. Puntland and Somaliland are making it on their own because there is no government and the Somali federal charter allows for one or more states to form regional governments so once the 2009 elections happen, their will be or can be easily integrated and they will benefit for a federal state.

they are split along clan lines now and even then, they are split along sub clan lines and it still split along sub sub clans. so i am not sure how solid these unions are.

and the current "president" of somaliland has been there since forever, arrested journalist, killed opposition and even one time banned it. you call that democracy?

[Rex Brynen]

Somalia sinks into greater chaos as Islamist insurgents gain ground, International Herald Tribune, 28 March 2008.

The trouble started when government soldiers went to the market and, at gunpoint, began helping themselves to sacks of grain.

Islamist insurgents poured into the streets to defend the merchants. The government troops got hammered, taking heavy casualties and retreating all the way back to the presidential palace, supposedly the most secure place in the city. It, too, came under fire.

Mohamed Abdirizak, a top government official, crouched on a balcony at the palace, with bullets whizzing over his head. He had just given up a cushy life as a development consultant in Springfield, Virginia. His wife thought he was crazy. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

"I feel this slipping away," he said.

[jcustis]

Islamist insurgents poured into the streets to defend the merchants. The government troops got hammered, taking heavy casualties and retreating all the way back to the presidential palace, supposedly the most secure place in the city. It, too, came under fire.

I have a problem with the use of language like this. We have Islamist and insurgent slapped together so casually, and both have become part of popular terminology and carry a certain meaning to perhaps 75% of the general American population out there...Yet in this case it would appear that the "Islamic insurgents" did a bit of good against some heavy hands. It's a new story so I read it with a grain of sand, but Somalia is all at once terribly complex and yet so simple (the economics of hunger driving violence quicker than ####).

Even with the arrival on stage of the Ethiopians, the remainder of the story reads just like Mogadishu circa May 1994, when I was watching that place fall further apart with my own eyes.

I don't know, maybe the "Islamists" can be the only ones to get things right, but you will never, ever be able to find one faction, tribe, or religious side that can do so without resorting to the way of the gun. We might as well get used to the fact that it is going to came as a result of violence. We need to get the engagement piece figured out, and spend more time drafting the operational risk management worksheet on this one, with a focus on mitigation. Realize however, that the overall risk factor remains EXTREME, and just deal with it.

Rant hat off