Terror on the High Seas

Much has been made about the recent developments on the seas and the waterways in Eastern Africa. The United States media has recently taken a keen interest in the affairs of that region of the world. Sadly and unfortunately many of these same outlets only seem to tell one side of the story. Rarely, if ever, does that side tend to be from the African point of view. As the Navy Seals are celebrated and the Maersk Alabama's captain is returned to the United States, key questions such as why and how that were not asked or answered in the mainstream media must be answered here.

The why and how that I seek to answer are less related to the efforts of the Somali pirates in their attempt to take the Maersk Alabama, but rather why they feel the need to patrol the seas and oceans of that area anyway. Initially one's first line of reasoning would be why would pirates patrol an area. Many will rightly say that's the navy's job. However for a country such as Somalia that has been in turmoil as long as it has it has no standing navy. Once we acknowledge that, then we can see a myriad of problems that will develop for Somalia because of a lack of a navy.

One main problem that has served as a key spark in this pirating epidemic is the dumping of nuclear waste. Because Somalia is a nation in chaos and lacks the ability to organize a standing navy to combat foreign navies, many countries (including some western countries) dump their nuclear waste in Somali waters. What this does is pollute the Somali air quality and shorten the life expectancy of Somali citizens. If this isn't bad enough, when other nations don't want to over fish their waters, they send their fishermen to Somali waters. This takes work away from the Somali fisherman and food away from the Somali people. In turn many western "aid" groups step in to provide essentials like food for the Somali people when it is these same aid groups governments that are a factor in causing the starvation of the Somali people in the first place.

The Somali people's response to this is to fight back. As has been belabored the Somalis do not have a navy to formally fight with, so they fight with improvised tactics. The United States first faced improvised tactics with the Vietnamese and guerrilla warfare. Since then other organizations such as Hezbollah, Hamas and Al-Qaeda have fought back using improvised techniques because they lacked proper armed forces. All of these groups have also been labeled as terrorist mind you. Sadly what happens in these cases is that otherwise innocent people are are the victims of the loose organizations (Al-Qaeda, Hamas, Pirates) on account of the policy decisions these innocent people's government have made. The United States mind you is the same government that armed and trained the Afghan people to fight against the Russians during the cold war in the 1980's. Then they were freedom fighters fighting off oppression. When they fight the United States they are called terrorist. What has changed? Nothing but the oppressor.

This is not in any way to condone or excuse violent behavior against innocent people. Perhaps (and one can only hope) the crew members of the Maersk Alabama were not on the high seas to dump nuclear waste and were there in fact as reported to deliver aid. If that is the case it is terrible that innocent people had their lives threatened. It was a shame that there were innocent victims in the numerous attacks across the world. In no way is this meant to praise the work of the Somali pirates or the Middle Eastern fighters. All we want to do, and it is our responsibility as citizens to do this, is look a little deeper than the obvious and find out the truth. The west and particularly the United States have never had clean hands when dealing with "third-world" or undeveloped countries. It is unlikely they'd start now.

Change on the Continent

With the nation being in such dire economic conditions very few Americans take the time to observe the international world around them. Depending on how you look at the world though, one would think that economic crisis sums up the events of the world at large. This isn't exactly true, particularly when looking at the continent of Africa. There is a lot happening there and with the continent's abundant resources, many eyes will be on the United States to see how President Obama and his administration responds to the changing world and environments. Ironically (or perhaps not so considering the abundance of resources the land is blessed with) there are a good numbers of African markets that are doing more than merely surviving as the world around it flounders and fails. But at this moment we are better suited examining the politics on the continent.

We can first start by looking at the new head of the African Union which is Muammar al-Gaddafi. He has been vocal about the need for African nations to control their own resources, and be the ones who sell the goods created by those resources on the world market. He is also an advocate for socialism. Most recently upon being named head of the African Union he has promised to not waver in his quest for both one form of African currency and for a United States of Africa. Mr. Obama's relationship with figures across the continent like Mr. Gaddafi will tell whether or not a true change is coming to the United States and the world. Observers will be able to see this by examining the way the United States does business with Africa. One of the points Mr. Gaddafi touched on was the need for nations to control their own resources.

Right now, Ghana is in a modest debate as to whether or not to increase rice production domestically to avoid paying for a crop that could be grown at home. Mr. Obama needs to come out and adamantly encourage the West African nation to work to be self sufficient. In the U.S. many have made good points questioning why the United States should continue to spend money to import energy when it can be found or generated here in the United States. If it is good for the U.S. to be self reliant, it should also be good for Ghana to be. Another issue Mr. Obama needs to be pro-active on is supporting the peace sharing agreements taking place in Zimbabwe. He should instruct his ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to remain silent observers as the people of Zimbabwe settle their own conflicts. Both Mr. Mugabe and Mr. Tsangvari leave much to be desired but the hope is that they can both contribute their strengths to a well functioning government that serves the people of Zimbabwe free from Western influence.

Still Mr. Obama will have to act courageously on the criminalization of Omar al-Bashir. Although this may be years late in coming, Mr. Obama needs to ensure that all who were responsible for the atrocities in Darfur (both implicitly and explicitly) are held accountable and punished according to international law. In keeping with respect for international law and organziations, it is imperative that the President be not only vocal but supportive on the United Nations World Racism Conference. The President has said that the United States would not participate on account of language from the last conference that condemned Israel and came off anti-Semitic. However the UN's top human rights official called the boycotts and negative media unwarranted. Ironically, this is exactly what U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder was calling for. A frank and earnest discussion about race. It seems though if truth is told about the U.S. and their allies on the matter of race; the U.S. doesn't want to hear it. Now is the time that Mr. Obama should break through the notion of false racial transcendence. He should send a delegation to the conference and allow all parties to truthfully speak their piece.

On November 4, 2008 the entire continent of Africa rejoiced because a native son was elected to the highest office in the strongest empire in the west. This brought with it great pride, but also an expectation that things would be different. An expectation that a native son would not allow capitalist interest to pillage the welfare of his homeland. With the awesome task of saving the U.S. form of capitalism already on his plate. Mr. Obama must also balance that with the responsibility to provide fair trade agreements for African nations as well as allow them the room to be self-sufficient, self determining people who can be PARTNERS WITH rather than PUPPETS TO the United States.