Stop The Anarchy, Stop The Piracy

Obviously, the three shots to the head have not deterred the pirates in the Gulf of Aden from continuing their pillage. They hijacked four more ships on Tuesday and attempted to board another US boat, but failed. They are armed with not just guns but rockets, according to the report from the Liberty Sun.

Obviously the US Navy has superior equipment and skills and can deal with such attacks and hijackings if needed. But it's simply impractical to guard the entire ocean when the problem remains on land, in the lawless region of Somalia where piracy represents the only economic opportunity. Russ Feingold wrote to the President yesterday asking him to address the root causes of this piracy, unlike the Bush Administration, who exacerbated them.

As you know, piracy off the coast of Somalia is a symptom of the state collapse and instability on land; thus, any military actions we take will only be stopgap measures. In recent Congressional testimony, Director of National Intelligence Blair and Defense Intelligence Agency Director Army Lt. General Michael Maples cited lawlessness and economic problems on land for the rise in piracy at sea. The ultimate solution to the problem of piracy, then, is the establishment of a functional government that can enforce the rule of law. During the rule of the Council of Islamic Courts in 2006, there was a notable decline in piracy that can be attributed, in large part, to the rise of a central authority in southern Somalia. Without replicating the repressive rule of the Courts, we must keep in mind that establishing a central governing structure in Somalia is critical to resolving, not just stopping, the problem of piracy [...]

I met with President Sheik Sharif during a trip to the region this past December, just before his election, and met last month with the new government’s Foreign Minister here in Washington D.C. In both meetings we discussed the importance of an inclusive process to unite Somalia and the importance of U.S. support to achieve that goal.

Just as you have personally become engaged in the problem of piracy off Somalia’s coast, it is essential that you personally engage in U.S. efforts to address its origins on land. As a first step, I urge you to call President Sheik Sharif and indicate a clear commitment to work with his government not only on maritime insecurity issues, but also to help establish security and functional, inclusive governance within the country. This should be coordinated with other levels of engagement and complemented by ongoing discussions with our regional and international partners on a comprehensive plan to support this transitional government and stabilize Somalia.

I actually disagree with Feingold in part, and I think he disagrees with himself. President Sheik Sharif is a moderate member of the ICU, and has some manner of legitimacy in the country despite his ties to that "repressive" regime. Anyone with legitimacy is favored over Ethiopian invaders or a puppet transitional government. You have to make peace with the group that can secure it.

Matthew Yglesias has a good piece laying out the historical markers at The Daily Beast. Military action by the Bush Administration has CONTRIBUTED to the rise of piracy in the region, and it should not be replicated. Instead, we need to support, or just leave alone, those who can move the country into some semblance of stable governance. Jeffrey Gettleman has more.

How We Doin'?

It's bad enough how much respect the United States has lost in the past six years under the current junta. What's worse is that they're still trying to make it all better, and in the process continuing the non-stop fuckitude not unlike a baby who knocks over her milk, and when they see you angry about it knocks over the applesauce too. Consider:

• After knocking off the only enemies to Iran in the Middle East, and weakening two Sunni governments while allowing a Shiite Crescent to flourish, we're now advising a Pakistani militant group to undertake terrorist strikes inside Iran. Pakistanis are mainly Sunnis, and a militant group of this stripe almost certainly has ties to at least the ISI, if not Al Qaeda themselves. In fact, the leader of the group used to fight WITH the Taliban. This is the same kind of tactic that caused the blowback which installed the Taliban in Afghanistan in the first place. We actually PAY PEOPLE to do this shit.

• We wanted to take military action to rescue the 15 British sailors who were eventually freed last week, including military strikes and moving naval carriers into position. It took Tony Blair to essentially put the US in the timeout chair to get the neocons to stop:

In the first few days after the captives were seized and British diplomats were getting no news from Tehran on their whereabouts, Pentagon officials asked their British counterparts: what do you want us to do? They offered a series of military options, a list which remains top secret given the mounting risk of war between the US and Iran. But one of the options was for US combat aircraft to mount aggressive patrols over Iranian Revolutionary Guard bases in Iran, to underline the seriousness of the situation.

The British declined the offer and said the US could calm the situation by staying out of it. London also asked the US to tone down military exercises that were already under way in the Gulf. Three days before the capture of the 15 Britons , a second carrier group arrived having been ordered there by president George Bush in January. The aim was to add to pressure on Iran over its nuclear programme and alleged operations inside Iraq against coalition forces.

This, of course, is exactly the course of action geniuses like Bill Kristol wanted the country to take, which shows that news of the neocon's demise are greatly exaggerated, and that they still run the foreign policy show inside the White House. It's just that they're making things so impossible for our allies that Britain has to practically beg them to shut up.

• Another return performance for this crowd is allowing supposed enemies to arm friends:

Three months after the United States successfully pressed the United Nations to impose strict sanctions on North Korea because of the country’s nuclear test, Bush administration officials allowed Ethiopia to complete a secret arms purchase from the North, in what appears to be a violation of the restrictions, according to senior American officials.

The United States allowed the arms delivery to go through in January in part because Ethiopia was in the midst of a military offensive against Islamic militias inside Somalia, a campaign that aided the American policy of combating religious extremists in the Horn of Africa.

Is this not Iran-Contra all over again, regardless of the more recent efforts to get a deal out of North Korea? Ethiopia is killing the people we want killed, so they can negotiate and do commerce with the same despots we assail in speeches.

It's not comforting to know that, not only has the bumbling foreign policy decisions of the White House not changed since the 2006 election, it hasn't changed since the mid-80s, still using the same belligerence, the same shady arms deals, the same pretexts for blowback, the same means to dig the same holes that have grown bigger than ever.