2006/09/21
Sudão, África e o intervencionismo
"If America is indeed the "new Rome", then it has been rising to this role over the last few years, with Britain by its side.
Virgil once wrote that Rome's "imperial art" was (in Dryden's translation) "to tame the proud; the fettered slave to free."
Since the Kosovo war we've seen many proud men tamed: Saddam, Slobbo, the warlords of Sierra Leone. Good. Sadly, we've also found that the "fettered slave" once freed is not necessarily particularly grateful, or even likeable.(...)
And in the midst of what is effectively just yet another complex African civil war, what could UN forces - especially Western ones - hope to achieve? There are basically three outcomes:
1) They get dragged into a shooting conflict themselves.
2) A botched Rwanda/Srebenica-style situation.
3) Managing somehow to hold Khartoum forces out of an area that will in all likelihood become a de facto rebel state.
Unfortunately this is just another chapter in the endless book of inter-tribal conflict. This was of course exacerbated by European powers carving the continent up into unwieldy mongrel states, but such conflicts had been going on long before their arrival.(...)
Like most people in most places on earth, the different tribes and peoples of Africa have rarely needed to be given additional reasons to fight." Bloging The inhumane folly of our interventionist machismo Anyone can call for action to end fighting. Few consider what this usually involves: people dying to no good purpose
Virgil once wrote that Rome's "imperial art" was (in Dryden's translation) "to tame the proud; the fettered slave to free."
Since the Kosovo war we've seen many proud men tamed: Saddam, Slobbo, the warlords of Sierra Leone. Good. Sadly, we've also found that the "fettered slave" once freed is not necessarily particularly grateful, or even likeable.(...)
And in the midst of what is effectively just yet another complex African civil war, what could UN forces - especially Western ones - hope to achieve? There are basically three outcomes:
1) They get dragged into a shooting conflict themselves.
2) A botched Rwanda/Srebenica-style situation.
3) Managing somehow to hold Khartoum forces out of an area that will in all likelihood become a de facto rebel state.
Unfortunately this is just another chapter in the endless book of inter-tribal conflict. This was of course exacerbated by European powers carving the continent up into unwieldy mongrel states, but such conflicts had been going on long before their arrival.(...)
Like most people in most places on earth, the different tribes and peoples of Africa have rarely needed to be given additional reasons to fight." Bloging The inhumane folly of our interventionist machismo Anyone can call for action to end fighting. Few consider what this usually involves: people dying to no good purpose
// posted by CN @ 8:44 AM 
