Northman's Fury

Ethiopian troops and their puppet Somalis have entered Mogadishu, not long after Ethiopia began in ernest its invasion. The right has been all over itself with joy over Ethiopia's apparent success.

It’s been tough over the past couple of days not to stand up and do a little dance of joy over Ethiopia’s so far masterful efforts in Somalia.

and

This loss crushes the reputation of the Islamists as dedicated to fighting to the death. They will if they see an advantage in it, and that advantage has been gained by Western reluctance to fight an all-out war against them. Ethiopia, after having been threatened by both a traditional attack from Somalia and a guerilla/terrorist war, responded with overwhelming force, and they crumbled. Somewhere there is a lesson for the West.

It seems the right suffers from a sort of institutional amnesia. If they keep archives, they should go back to mid-Apirl 2003 and see how they crowed about the defeat of Iraq and how this would crush the Islamist will and how showing overwhelming military force would cause the enemy to crumble.

Seeing them supporting an Ethiopian despot propping up the warlords responsible for the "Black Hawk Down" incident is also one of those deliciously ironic juxtapositions that makes American foreign policy such fun to watch.

What we and the Israelis seem to lack right now, and which the Ethiopians apparently have, is the political will to win without worrying overmuch what the so-called internation community thinks. There is no Ethiopian equivalent of Joe Biden wagging a finger at the Ethiopian leadership over every little thing that isn’t perfect, and there is no Ethiopian equivalent of John Kerry comparing a days-old fight to Vietnam. And aren’t the Ethiopians lucky.

Yep, lucky them, living under a guy who closely resembles the fellow who was swinging from the gallows this morning. (Is there a certain number of despotic dictators that the US has to keep on the payroll? Kill one, prop up another?) Put your political opponents in prison under treason charges and they don't cause near as much trouble. As Bush said, a dictatorship makes things much easier, so long as you happen to be the dictator.

I'm also trying to figure out how the Ethiopians managed to destroy the Islamic Courts when the UIC basically refused to fight them? The fact that the Islamists went to ground or retreated rather than try to slug it out with a far more powerful conventional army makes them more dangerous, not less. Had they stood and fought, they would have been torn apart much like Iraq's conventional military was. They knew this. They also know what the Iraqis have managed to do since.

The BBC's Mohamed Olad Hassan in Mogadishu said the city appeared calm as night fell at the start of the Islamic Eid holiday.

But earlier there were large demonstrations, with thousands of people protesting against Ethiopians troops.

[LINK]

This wasn't the end of the regional war people have been warning the world about, it's the opening phase.

The announcement that the US government may put polar bears on the threatened list of species has some people up here quite annoyed. Charging southern big game hunters obscene sums for the right to hunt the bears is a good source of revenue for some, so the possibility that the revenue stream might be cut off has them worried.

A fairly similar story came out the day before from the NWT regarding caribou limits for the Bathurst herd. The large herd has dropped significantly from 472,000 to 128,000 in the last twenty years. The other caribou herds in the NWT have also dropped quite dramatically. I'm uncertain about the ones in Nunavut.

In both cases, the people whose livelihood depends on the animals are the ones fighting to keep the hunts going. I've never quite figured out that logic. You would think they would be the ones most interested in ensuring the long-term survival of the animals. Then again, look at the cod fishery in Newfoundland.

If they're worried about how a cutting back will affect them now, they should consider what they'll do when the herds or bears are gone entirely. This way they'll have some time to diversify.

If climate change is the reason for the decline, we might as well say good-bye to the species. The habitats will be destroyed and the hunting won't make any real difference. On the other hand, over hunting will doom them even if some of their habitat survives. Controlling what you can seems to make the most sense.

Of course, choosing what makes the most sense isn't known to be a common human trait. We'll see if short-term economic interests win out over long-term planning yet again.

Rather anti-climatic at this point, but of the people who deserve such a fate, he was certainly on the list. It would have been nice had he been tried for some of his big crimes, like the gassing and attempted genocide of Kurds. Of course, that kind of trial may have led to questions about where he got the gas and weapons in the first place.

Given the kangaroo court proceedings leading to the conviction, this looks like little more than victor's justice. They probably should have just put a bullet in him when the found his spider hole.

I've read a few articles over the last couple of days regarding the so-called plan to "surge" US forces in Iraq to accomplish some semblance of stability in Baghdad, which will then somehow magically transform the rest of the country into a peaceful, prosperous. pro-US utopia, after which it can began its magical effect of transforming the rest of the Middle East.



The first and probably best was by W. Patrick Lang and Ray McGovern from whom the title to this post is borrowed. Some excerpts:

A generation from now, our grandchildren will have difficulty writing history papers on this oxymoronic debate on how to surge/withdraw our troops into/from the quagmire in Iraq. Historians will have just as much trouble, especially those given to Tolstoy’s theory that history is ruled by an inexorable determinism in which the free choice of major historical figures plays a minimal role.

. . .

A “surge” of the size possible under current constraints on U.S. forces will not turn the tide in the guerrilla war. Reinforcement of Bagdad several thousand U.S. troops last summer simply brought on more violence. Those who believe still more troops will bring “victory” are living in a dangerous dream world and need to wake up.

Moreover, major reinforcement would commit the US Army and Marine Corps to decisive combat in which there are no more strategic reserves to be sent to the front. It will be a matter of win or die in the attempt. In that situation, everyone in uniform on the ground will commit every ounce of their being to a hope of “victory,” and few measures will be shrunk from.

Analogies come to mind: the Bulge, Stalingrad, the Battle of Algiers. It will be total war with all the likelihood of excesses and mass casualties that come with total war.

Fred Kaplan at Slate gave one of the most succinct summaries of the whole idea with this:

The upshot is that Kagan's surge involves more troops than the United States can readily mobilize and fewer troops than it needs for the kind of victory he has in mind.

That's it in a nutshell, particularly considering they aren't even talking about actual additional troops here. They don't have any. They'll just be sending some sooner than planned while keeping others there from going home. The US can't win with the troops they have and they can't even sustain a small increase for very long. As even Bush said, they're not winning and not losing. They're stale-mated, and Bush is hoping he can keep it that way until January 2009 when his successor can lose the war he can't win.

No big surprise here. It's always easier to criticize the actions of others than impose controls on yourself.

When the Conservatives were in opposition, they used Gomery and the Sponsorship Scandal to advance their agenda and sink the Liberal government, and justifiably so in my opinion. Now that Harper is in power, putting the controls in place that would limit the PMO's control is far less attractive.

This is why the Federal Government never gets any more accountable. Power once given never seems to be returned.

couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

So NATO is set to launch another major offensive down the Panjwaii valley to "take out" the Taleban. The article is nice enough to reference the previous major offensive led by the Canadians in September called Operation Medusa. I asked when that operation was underway whether or not it was a sign it was time to leave. This new offensive answers my question eloquently.

I'm guessing slightly here, since I haven't read a detailed brief of what the commanders are saying this current mission will actually accomplish, but my guess is that the storyline will be something like this: NATO forces, backed by heavy artillery and airpower, will clear out the area of Taliban forces, and then hand it over to Afghan National Army forces to provide the security that will eventually allow the reconstruction teams in rebuild what we blew up and repair all the other damage from nearly three decades of warfare.

Its actually quite easy for me to predict this particular storyline, because it is the same one used in September for Operation Medusa. The story in September referenced the previous operation in June, which had the same storyline as well. The other article I referenced from William Lind was talking about the same kind of American operations in the same area before the Canadians took over. (Go read it, it's still instructive, which is an unfortunate indication of how little we've learnt.)

Sometime in the late spring or early summer, we'll be reading about the next big offensive to root out the Taliban from the Panjwaii. We have failed on the strategic level and no amount of tactical brilliance by our forces can reverse that. Since it is unlikely that a major strategic shift is even possible, keeping our forces there only delays the inevitable, and possibly makes the coming defeat even worse.

Time for a strategic withdrawal, which is a polite euphemism, I know, but still accurate.

Global Warming. John Robb has a little blurb about what he thinks can be done. Basically, forget trying to prevent it and start preparing to survive its effects.

The unfortunate truth is that he is probably right. The BBC had this story on their site this morning:

Asia's greenhouse gas emissions will treble over the next 25 years, according to a report commissioned by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

The report provides detailed analysis of the link between transport and climate change in Asia.

It says that its estimate of future levels of greenhouse gas could even be an optimistic assessment.

China and India are the main reason for the increase, and neither has any obligations under Kyoto since they are technically developing countries. Add to that the oil men in the US White House who aren’t to keen on cutting emissions and our own PM’s plan to get started on things in a couple of decades and you can see why prevention is probably a lost cause and preparation for the effects is probably the right course for people now.

Hey, why worry? It's not like anything is really happening that might make an actual strategy shift important. Sure it's taken over three and a half years to get to this point, but it doesn't mean they've learnt enough to make any decisions.

A situation that probably bears watching. I don’t have a complete understanding of the situation, but the broad basics are relatively clear. Somalia is predominantly Muslim, Ethiopia predominantly Christian, which matters to the US but is probably far less important in the region. The Bush administration likes to lump together everything Muslim into one big basket whether they’re actually related or not.

The Somali conflict is better understood as a tribal or ethnic one. The last paragraph alludes to the “Greater Somalia” movement, which is a large part of Ethiopia’s fear of the UIC. There is a good sized chunk of Ethiopia where the people are Somali. There has to be a not entirely unreasonable fear by the Ethiopian government that this area may decide to split off and join their cross-border brethren, much like Turkey fears a independent Kurdistan in Northern Iraq causing their own Kurdish population to (re)attempt a breakaway.

I have no idea how popular or widespread the whole pan-Somali movement is, but reading a bit of the history of the region gives some idea of the forces at work. At the centre of things is the Ogaden region in eastern Ethopia. Its people are mainly Somali Muslims. It was colonized by the British and after the Second World War, it was originally supposed to be joined with British and Italian Somaliland’s in a Greater Somalia. Instead, it was annexed by Ethiopia. Eritrea also found itself annexed by Ethiopia with the backing of Western powers, which led to a thirty year war of independence, and a couple of wars since.

Somalia fought two wars with Ethiopia trying to claim Ogaden as part of Somalia, and there is apparently still a separatist group fighting the Ethiopian government in the area.

The current fighting got going thanks to the US backing of a group of warlords opposed to the UIC. Current US complaints of parties violating arms embargoes when they sent equipment in themselves is a classic example of why people don’t trust the US anymore. When Somalis learned that foreigners were interfering with the conflict, they quickly moved to support the other side. As a result, the UIC quickly crushed the warlords in a few months of heavy fighting.

The US then shifted its backing to the virtually powerless, isolated, and internationally appointed and recognized transitional government, whose current survival depends almost entirely on support from Ethiopia, where, according to the Economist, the CIA is taking over large blocks in hotels to house their advisors to the Ethiopian government.

Whatever the sins of the Somali Islamists, the Ethiopian government is hardly any prize itself. Again from the Economist:

Mr Zenawi has turned Ethiopia into a police state. Many of the opposition are in prison on trumped-up charges carrying the death penalty. Tens of thousands of young Ethiopians were sent to prison camps after last year’s poll. A few still languish there; others have fled abroad. Several judges have defected, fearing for their safety.

The press has been crushed, foreign correspondents expelled and many journalists and editors put in jail. The government has hired foreign specialists to help it shut down dissident websites, tap telephones and track e-mails.

Ethiopia still has troops in Eritrea from their last border war, despite agreements that they were supposed to pull them out. Put everything together and a regional war begins to look likely.

The whole thing reeks of opportunism, at best, with a fair shake of much worse things, and I like a quote at the bottom of the BBC story:

Many Iranians must be wondering why they have the right to deny the Holocaust with impunity, but not to question their own leaders without risking jail, our correspondent says.

In recent months, newspapers have been closed, journalists jailed and students penalised for engaging in any sort of political activity in Iran.

It gives you a pretty good idea about just how much free speech actually means to the Iranian leadership. This is about “firing up the base” as they say, and nothing fires up a base constituency like the hatred of somebody else. The Israelis are basically the gays of the Middle East for the Arab regimes. (The gays themselves being the one thing both sides agree on.)

Anyway, the quote that I found to be quite an interesting one is this:

"Just as the USSR disappeared, soon the Zionist regime will disappear,"

Now I know that sounds bad, but once I got to thinking about it for awhile, I realized this may be an opportunity to solve the whole Arab-Israeli problem. Bear with me as I give you my simple (simplistic?) solution.

Many people have assumed that when Ahmadinejad calls for Israel to be "wiped off the map", he's talking about finishing what the Nazis started. However, when the USSR disappeared, it didn't take the people with it, it just dissolved the ruling government and the various territories under its control went their own ways under older names.

All the Israelis have to do is dissolve their government, leave the West Bank and Gaza to their own devices, and reform a new government and call themselves Judea.

The Palestinians get their own country, the Iranians and Arab leaders get to say Israel is "no more", and the Jewish people keep their homeland and military intact. Everybody gets what they say they want. Happy times all around.

Now I'll just sit back while they work out the details and wait for the Noble committee to give me a call.

Stéphane Dion emerged from his stunning convention victory with early signs that his win places the party ahead of the governing Conservatives for the first time since the Liberals' election defeat in January.

The Liberals have moved six percentage points ahead of Stephen Harper's Tories, while a sizable majority of Quebeckers say the Liberals made a good choice, according to the survey conducted by the Strategic Counsel for The Globe and Mail and CTV.

The poll was taken in the hours after the dramatic convention, where Mr. Dion, teaming up in an alliance with fellow candidate Gerard Kennedy, surged past front-runner Michael Ignatieff and Bob Rae to claim the Liberal crown.

It shows that if an election were held today, the Liberals led by Mr. Dion would garner 37 per cent of the vote, compared with 31 per cent for the Conservatives. The NDP polled 14 per cent, the Bloc Québécois 11 per cent, and the Green Party 7.

That’s a bit of a surprise to me, and it is still early. Harper’s Conservatives haven’t had the chance to get the attack machine targeted at Dion yet. I’m guessing they, like most, expected to be facing either Rae or Ignatieff. Once they turn their guns on Dion and start painting him as part of the Chretien/Martin/Sponsorship Scandal Liberals, we’ll see how well the lead holds up.

Another article I read mentioned that Dion would have difficulty getting support out West due to the fact that he’s from Quebec. I’m guessing that’s only important if there was some other Liberal candidate that could get support in the West. As it stands, I don’t think a Liberal leader from Quebec is any worse than one from southern Ontario would have been.

More to the point, Dion is a strong federalist, so strong that his supporters are worried it may alienate Quebec voters, while Harper just pushed through a motion giving Quebec nationhood status. As a (at least former) Westerner, I know which position pisses me off more. Whether Western voters will remember that come the next election is debatable, but I know I will.

Just how bad is your environmental record when an oil executive is scolding you about it?

I was watching the Liberal Leadership Convention yesterday. There were two things I noticed. the first was that Belinda Stronach has dyed her hair. I grant that has little to do with politics, but it was a bit striking when I first saw it.

On a serious note, after the second ballot, when Gerard Kennedy dropped out and backed Dion, basically sealing the deal for him, the CBC crew was interviewing delegates. One of them mentioned that Dion was part of the "old" Liberal Party, and that was why he was doing so well.

Maybe it's just me, but if Canadians were all that impressed with the old Liberal Party, they would still have their old leader, and they wouldn't be in opposition right now. As a result, while I'm not sure if Dion was the Conservative's first choice to run against, I highly doubt they're worried.

Oh well, I have a feeling he's still a better choice than Ignatieff would have been.