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| South Sudan President Salva Kiir, wearing the hat given to him by George Bush |
Nationhood for the beleaguered people of Southern Sudan seemed a distant fantasy a few years ago, when Muslim Janjaweed routinely raped, robbed and murdered southern animists and Christians by the tens of thousands. Even more incredible, the UN has declared Sudan president and bloody tyrant Omar Hassan Ahmad Al-Bashir a war criminal guilty of genocide.
All this with nary one US boot on the ground. It was a shared marshaling of moral and political force, as well as some money to pay for the African UN peacekeepers
The United States gains a great ally with the birth of the Republic of Southern Sudan.
It is a largely Christian nation whose official language is now English. It sits at a strategic mid-point in east Africa along the banks of the Nile. Many Sudanese sought asylum in the United States when the civil war was ongoing. There is a deep affinity between our two nations, despite the distance.
As his trademark, President Salve Kiir proudly wears a black cowboy hat given to him by President George W. Bush. Likewise, President Obama is revered, at least in part because he made stopping the genocide in Darfur one of his signature issue during the time he was in the Senate. (Daily Beast)This is a victory we can all enjoy: The UN as well as the UN bashers. Liberals like Bono, George Clooney, and Nicholas Kristof, as well as Republican George Bush, who does not get enough credit from liberals (other than Bob Geldoff) for what he's done for Africa.
Most of all, it is a victory for the people of South Sudan, who now have a place they can call their own. To paraphrase Ben Franklin, they have a republic, if they can keep it. There are nefarious forces who will work hard for their failure. I hope the US and Europe will continue to push hard against those evil forces, and I will pray for the people of South Sudan.
CBS - US Welcomes Birth of a New Nation
FOX - South Sudan Celebrates Birth
NY Times - South Sudan becomes New Nation
13 comments:
As one who is familiar with "the lost boys" and personally know some Christian Sudanese, I rejoice for the people of South Sudan.
We should also remember THIS: "Another New Nation, South Sudan = Another Nation Created Because Muslims Can Not Play Well With Others." I note that the mainstream media don't want to address the information in that post.
before we break out champagne, the peaceful jihaadis are already persecuting them !
Amen to What AOL said.......
I wish them well but all must remember this is on the continent of Africa and the history of any "republic" or any perceived democratic state is very short lived there, or at the very least our definition of it.
Africa is a tribal culture to this very day and usually a warring one setting up a new welfare state of the U.S.
For those who wish our troops all come home from around the world and abhor foreign aid this is not a good day.
It is good, change that, great for South Sudan not to be misunderstood but in no way, shape or form will this help us at all but rather be a further drain on what is already strained being our economy.
The UN? Blind hogs and acorns come to mind. But, I'll take these kind of result any way I can get them. Frnaklin's words are an important reminder of how fragil a democratic republic is without continued vigilence by its citizens. Maybe we should send some our conservatives over there to explain the things that can go wrong.
I certainly wish them well, but can't help wondering why the United States in this post-colonial world should have any official interest in what happens anywhere in sub-Saharan Africa?
If we believed in self-determination, as we like to think we do, we ought to BUTT OUT, and stop trying to influence and direct the internal affairs of foreign nations.
As a country whose very sovereignty is threatened from within, we have plenty of problems of our own to confront before we start trying to put out fires in other corners of the world.
Interference, intervention, attempts to refashion others in an image we believe would be better for them -- and ore agreeable to us -- is a hallmark of PROGRESSIVISM. Marxists, Communists, Socialists, Statists, Liberals, Progressives -- whatever you want to call them -- are all born BUSYBODIES.
Eleanor Roosevelt remains prototypical of the breed. She was, as some may remember, an individual who kept herself so busy Saving the World by trying to tell others what to do and how to do it, that she made a train wreck of her marriage, was incompetent in the performance of her domestic duties, and had a sad excuse for a personal life. Eleanor couldn't deal with her domineering bitch of mother-in-law, so she went out to reform mankind, instead.
Typical liberal logic in play there.
Until our very own Harlem and Detroit get straightened out, we have no business trying to call the shots in Africa, Asia or South and Central America.
George W. Bush may have run as Republican, but we need to understand that he was first and foremost a LIBERAL, and because of that we owe much of the difficulty we're in today to GWB and his immediate predecessors. Obama is carrying on and expanding the disastrous policies of many who came before him. Obooboo is nothing more than Bush on Speed.
Let Patience form her perfect work. And let Christianity sell itself and flourish or fail on its own merits.
~ FreeThinke
I'm happy that this change has come, but I'm not sure it's the foothold of hope in Eastern Africa that it's being cracked up to be. It leaves a hardliner Islamic regime with al-Qaeda affiliated Janjaweed militias to their north, as well as al-Qeda friendly Ethiopia and Somalia to their east and Muammar Gadhafi-friendly central African Marxist regimes to their west.
Without southern Sudan to concentrate on, the Islamic nutcases of northern Sudan can turn their attentions northward... to chaos-filled Egypt, aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood / al-Qaeda nutcases there. Even without friendly airdrops of weapons for the Janjaweed courtesy of the world's greatest shit-disturber France from UN bases in Chad, the vulnerable and largely defenseless Christians of southern Egypt are now a juicy target for the Islamic madmen.
Meanwhile, al-Qaeda is getting direct air support against Gadhafi in Libya from us in a coalition led by guess who...
Wouldn't it be more to the point for us to just go to war with France, instead of participating in their African gang rapes?
Haiti, Vietnam, West Africa... France's sloppy seconds really stink.
Thank you Silver for writing this post tonight. The major news outlets barely mentioned it. It is extreemly important, but at yet very tenuous. It is a very complex situation, and it's a lot more than just 'Jihadis' or "evil forces" in the way of progress for the new Republic of South Sudan.
And thank you for reminding us that the results thus far do prove some wisdom in the way we've engaged this situation over the past twenty years, regardless of administration or congress. We simply could not have heavily imposed ourselves on the Sudan. It wouldn't have worked.
I always felt terrible about the troubles in the Sudan. But I never could imagine a way we could get involved in a benefit-positive way.
More importantly though is what needs to happen now in the RSS. Here's a little reminder of the hurdles that remain: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/10/us-sudan-secession-idUSTRE76928420110710
JMJ
While this seems like a great step. Get ready for war. The North has been clear that they will not give up the oil.
Best of luck to Republic of Southern Sudan. As Ben Franklin once said "A republic – if you can keep it."
@ JMJ-----
There are so many "we's" and "I's" ihn your comment it begs as too who you speak of?
Care to clarify ?
Don't be surprised when obama screws them over in favor of the muslim savages. Mark my words, it's what he'll do, it's in his nature.
MK: You know, I was thinking that if there's some way to screw this up, Obama will manage it...
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