I sometimes get a little curious. I'm on this crazy diet, so my number one choice of fun activities to engage in, eating, has been struck from my list of things I would normally be doing, and I'm left with this empty place in my life. It sounds really sad I know, but my hunger seems to pale in comparison with the things I've been reading about Africa lately. If you were to google "poor nations" on the top twenty list, you would most likely find African nations. Since I think that we've already established the fact that much of Africa is resource rich, it makes me wonder why it's citizens are so poor, and on the very verge of extinction.
There are so many factors outside of our control that contribute to hunger and poverty. In Africa, there are a multitude of problems. Drought, locusts, disease, all of these issues are beyond our control. As undeveloped as most African nations are today, the economic ideas of those of us who don't face certain starvation on a daily basis don't really cut it in Africa. The phrase "get a job" does nothing to alleviate hunger that has gone beyond the occasional pangs that you and I feel when we skip a meal. National health care is not an option for people south of the Sahara, a vaccine might be nice, but how do you get the medicines to people most in need when the leadership is corrupt, and war is everywhere? The problems of hunger and disease are exasperated exponentially when you throw arms into the mix.
What are we doing to curb war in Africa? We're selling arms.
While the millions of dollars being spent on U.S. military aid and sales to Africa pale in comparison to the billions being expended in the Middle East and South Asia, all of the major U.S. bilateral aid and sales programs have increased sharply in recent years. Funding to sub-Saharan Africa under the largest U.S. military aid program, Foreign Military Financing, doubled from $12 million in fiscal year 2000 to a proposed $24 million in the FY 2006 budget proposal, and the number of recipient nations has grown from one to nine. The Pentagon's International Military Education and Training (IMET) program has increased by 35% from 2000 to the 2006 proposal, from $8.1 million to $11 million, and from 36 participating nations to 47. Foreign Military Sales, the largest U.S. arms transfer program, more than quadrupled from fiscal year 2000 to fiscal year 2003 (the most recent year for which full statistics are available), from $9.8 million to $40.3 million. And Commercial Sales (CS) of arms licensed by the State Department grew from .9 million to $3.8 million over the 2000 to 2003 period.
And it's not only the sale of automatic weapons to unsavory elements of outlaw African society. We are actually training and participating in conflicts in Africa, with that great American mercenary company, Dynacorps, providing support to dubious organizations in Africa. This is sold to members of Congress and the American people as part of the global war on terrorism, but you might just as well rename that war as The Global Struggle for Oil.
These bilateral programs are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of overall U.S. military aid commitments going forward. The U.S. European Command has requested $125 million over five years for the Pan-Sahel Initiative, for training and exercises with Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger and other nations in the region. U.S. engagement under the program has gone far beyond traditional training to include involvement in combat operations. Craig S. Smith of the New York Times ("U.S. Training African Forces to Uproot Terrorists," May 11, 2004) offers the following description of the role of U.S. forces in a 2004 operation against the Salafist terrorist organization and its leader, Ammari Saifi: "The United States European Command sent a Navy P-3C Orion surveillance aircraft to sweep the area, relaying Mr. SaifiÂÂs position to forces in the region. Mali chased him out of the country to Niger, which in turn pushed him into Chad, where, with United States Special Forces support of an airlift of fuel and other supplies, 43 of his men were killed or captured."
By the year 2020, Africa will supply the US with 25 percent of it's foreign oil. We are now laying the groundwork for a new regional conflict over oil, by 2020, the Middle East will have depleted it's oil reserves, and now we are looking for our next supplier, our addiction to this harmful energy source is driving us beyond the diplomatic approach, we are like junkies preparing for a breaking and entering on a much larger scale. We will do anything to get our fix. And if you think that the war in Iraq is really all about terrorism, I'm sorry sorry to put it this bluntly, but you're either naive or stupid. We are about to lay the groundwork for our next regional crisis, this time in the Niger Delta where oil abounds, and children die of starvation and malaria.
While we are planning for this next fix, the supply of African oil, the guns and the training we give our suppliers may very well prevent the good intentions of Americans who truly feel something for the dying in Africa. Our donations, the lessons we try to teach our children about compassion for those who are more unfortunate, those dollars and quarters that those children collect just as we once did in grade school will not reach those people truly in need because of the Pentagon's gift of automatic weapons and paid mercenary soldiers.
When I pray, to some unknowable deity somewhere out there in space, I pray that we will someday stop dealing in guns and oil, and begin to sell peace and sustenance to those countries that need it most. I pray that some child in Africa will not receive the kindness of my donation because the US has supplied a group of thugs with guns ands bullets. I hope that by some miracle our energy jones will become alleviated by another cleaner and more renewable source.
Most of all, I pray that our solutions to future needs are not solved with weapons.
