"Chad displays rebel "mercenaries", blames Sudan" From Reuters, with thanks to Marisol Seibold:
N'DJAMENA - Chad's government on Friday paraded captured rebels it said were recruited by Sudan as the capital N'Djamena recovered from a surprise raid by insurgents fighting President Idriss Deby.The government said it repulsed Thursday's early morning attack in fighting that killed around 100 people and wounded 200, according to officials. But rebel leaders vowed to continue their campaign to oust Deby and disrupt elections next month.
Ms. Seibold point out the following:
-This is more than a localized conflict, in proximity to Darfur. The rebels in this article were active in N'Djamena, the capital city, which is in the southern half of the country near the western border with Cameroon.
-Chad has a makeup highly similar to Sudan-- including a 35% Christian population, mostly in the south.
-Chad is also a petroleum-producing country. The oilfields? They're in the south, as well.
-Though Muslim, the target of the coup attempt, President Idriss Déby Itno, is a member of the Zaghawa tribe, which, interestingly, is found mainly in Eastern Chad and Western Sudan, including Darfur. Moreover, the Zaghawa are the dominant political force in Chad, but a local minority in Sudan. And yes, like the victims of the government-backed janjaweed in Sudan, they're not Arabs.
-This isn't the first time Chad has been targeted by an Arab neighbor, with Libya seizing and holding the Aozou Strip in the north of the country from 1976 to 1987.
It's not difficult to connect the geopolitical dots. Chad is seen as ripe for the sort of activity that has plagued Sudan; if it falls to sympathizers with Khartoum, only mostly Christian/animist Cameroon stands in the way of creating an unbroken chain of Islamist territory from northern Nigeria to Sudan, and paving the way to spread Arab influence in North Africa further south.
The development of Chad thanks to the petroleum and the refusal of the islamist Sudan is necessary and very important. But like forever, Western only want oil, not who gives him.
Sad!!
Hate to break it to ya, Franze, but its not only Western nations that get their oil from islamic countries. I know its fun to blame the "greedy Westerners" for propping up mohammedan regimes, but there is plenty of guilt to go around outside of Europe and the US.
Keep that in mind, please.
"... only mostly Christian/animist Cameroon stands in the way of creating an unbroken chain of Islamist territory from northern Nigeria to Sudan, and paving the way to spread Arab influence in North Africa further south."
Get out a good map of Africa, and notice that there is a major trade route running from northern Nigeria, the city of Kano (which is where most of the Islamic violence in Nigeria is centered), east all the way to the Port of Sudan. Recognize that opposite the Red Sea from the Port of Sudan is Jeddah, the main Saudi port. Know that Saudis treat Sudan like it's their back yard, suitable for carrying on that messy stuff they don't want to clean up after in their own yard. Muslims from further south, say Somalia, Kenya et al, don't pass through Port of Sudan, but Muslims from that waist of Africa all do, on their way to Mecca. They all mix and merge in Jeddah, although Mecca is the veritable Ronco Bass-o-Matic of Islam. Rebecca is absolutely right to notice the links, per the quotation above, including Darfur, which is not an isolated genocide, but a calculated effort to remove a population that interferes with a larger plan. Observers throughout Africa have noted an incredible building boom--mosques popping up everywhere, roughly equally spaced apart, often empty, but maintained by minimal crew of the faithful. We know who pays for these mosques and their maintainers, and we know what it means--Saudi Arabia plans to expand its sway down the east coast of Africa, and deep into the inlands. What is left after AIDS, they plan to incorporate.
On the good side, at least, Cameroon is not all that stands in the way of untrammeled expansion into Africa, but this area will become one of the most hotly contested over the "long war" to come. We ignore Africa at our own peril.
"We should also arm the non-muslims in Ethiopia, Cameroon,Kenya,Nigeria and Uganda as well. Make life a living hell for jihadist filth.The more of them that die, better off everyone else is."
-abdulalshirk at April 14, 2006 08:09 AM
Seems like time for Congress to blow the dust off of the concept of the "Letter of Marque and Reprisal". There is plenty of former military talent out there, no longer on the rich Uncle's payroll. Sponsorship is most often the problem. Certainly would be interesting to see how the jihadis would deal with Western soldiers who were not bound by Geneva or Hague Convention rules and unaffected by the politicking of pasty, self-righteous leftists and libertines.
Hmm. Seems that abdulalshirk's posts are getting deleted.
Get out a good map of Africa, and notice that there is a major trade route running from northern Nigeria, the city of Kano... - longtimelurker
There's a lot of Cameroon interrupting the contact between Chad-- potential Sudan that it is-- and Nigeria, where the length of the border is only a small wedge. The amount of land that juts northward between Chad and Nigeria does imperil Cameroon in a unique way.
That's the thrust of the argument; I suspect a decent map, if not a "good map" was consulted, as your average blogger probably can't pull the location of N'Djamena off the top of their head.
Indeed, though, as you noted, we ignore Africa at our own peril.
(And not "just a little peril" in a Monty Python/Sir Galahad sense.)
Update from AP: "Chad Breaks Ties With Sudan After Assault"
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060414/ap_on_re_af/chad
It won't happen. Chad, like much of west-central Africa, is in effect a French protectorate, and the French have never stinted the use of their fearsome Foreign Legion troops (who, as mercenaries, are expendable) to preserve governments they liked in the region. When the Lybians tried it on, it was the Legion that drove them out - I spoke myself with a British former legionnaire who told me about it, including the comical incompetence of the Chadian troops. The story this time is that a few French aircraft overflew the fighting areas but did not take part in the fighting. Hmmmm.....
French Foreign Legion are technically not mercs. They are soldiers of the Republic. But yes, the Frenchies don't really lose sleep over Legionnaire KIAs. Fortunately for France, most of the guys in La Legion don't give much of a rat's a.. what the average Jacques thinks of them.
It's nice to see the French Foreign Legion being of use somewhere. Just hope that it's still what it always used to be, and hasn't been infiltrated by the Mahgrebins, otherwise Chad would be a lost cause as well.
Oil in Chad and Nigeria, Uranium in Niger, there are a lot more reasons other than the humanitarian one of rescueing Africans from Islam that ought to be factors while formulating African policy.
It's high time that the Arab empire is rolled back in Africa. There's still hope here - see this article from faithfreedom on an interview between al Jazeera and Maher Abdullah, where they, away from infidel viewers, spell out their real concern about the de-Islamization of North Africa
http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/sina31103.htm
This process needs to be accelarated. If the number of even nominal Muslims can be reduced by 150m through enlightenment, that's a major dent in their bravado about being a huge faith, and threatens to push their numbers below that magical 1b mark.
"It's nice to see the French Foreign Legion being of use somewhere."
-- from a posting above
You might be surprised to find out where some members of the French Foreign Legion have recently been serving.
France tends to keep the FFL pretty steadily deployed and rotates the different units through various hotspots. The Kepi Blanc is a pretty familiar sight in many of the world's neighborhoods where people have a problem getting along and the occasional skull needs a crackin'.
Where?