Politics: Power to the People (The Other Twin)

Somewhere, something has been lost.

If you've read the first twin, you may, like me, have noted a possible root cause of the horrifying saga of violence that followed, in 4 to 6 different countries, depending on geopolitical lines.

Simply put: the UN had no business or call to be in Somalia in 1993.  The food crisis presented no threat to international peace or security, only to the country itself.  Now I realise that may sound incredibly harsh, given that the local warring factions were slowly starving their fellow countrymen and women to death.  But in a purely logical fashion the statement is correct.  The fact that the chaos in Somalia continues to this day, including an internationally unrecognised government and Somali pirates patrolling international waters, is a testament to it.

So why was the UN there?  Why did the US end up there?

The UN was there because of the Security Council, having no choice in the matter.  The US was there because of the American people.

As I have noted before, in my post of "Half the Sky", politicians rarely - if ever - follow morals; they follow votes.  Understandably, people saw the news flash images of myriads of starving Somali people and the pressure mounted.

Here then is the true power and the true peril of politics: one way or another, both are in the hands or at the mercy of the people.

When American sentiment pressured its government, the administration sent 37,000 troops to Somalia.  When British indifference did not pressure its government, it was the UN that picked up the slack for trying to contain the untenable situation during the Serbo-Croat conflict in the early 90s.

And when horror at these errors began to be evident, global indifference stood back from Rwanda and did nothing.

What I am writing about in these posts is HUMAN rights.  Not politics, not law, not theories: human beings.  And in order for those who lack these rights through the tyranny of others, it is encumbent on the rest of us to be educated about the world we inhabit, and wield what power we still hold as a demographic collective for what is right, and what needs to be done.

Had the US openly confronted the warlords of Somalia, things might have been very different, but again, they left the UN to pick up the slack, and blamed the UN for failing.

If ever there has been a period of political indifference: it is here and now and it has been abounding for the last 20 years.  It is still my view that which party holds power is utterly irrelevant: in Britain parties go in cycles, in America the only difference is how long it takes the administration to attack the latest non-compliant, oil-rich nation on the list once "diplomacy" has failed.

Read, my friends.  Read and write for rights: the rights of those who have never had them, and the rights of the next generation, who will have their rights stolen by your government, if you do not speak up.