Conspiracy Theories

From a discussion on Facebook, I reproduce my extensive comment:

Sibel Edmonds has pretty much told us what is going on. For several years, she talked around a gag order, then she was ordered to do a deposition, and she named names. I have the links at my blog. The Sibel Edmonds Deposition
The first many minutes of the deposition are objections and so on, but then it gets interesting.

Sibel Edmonds was a low-level interpreter at the FBI's Washington, DC, Field Office; she speaks Turkish, among other important languages. She had applied to do work for the FBI, but only in the wake of 9/11 did they suddenly want to get caught up on their backlog of untranslated information.

In the information she translated, there was a great deal to clue us in that blueprints of US skyscrapers had been sent to the Middle East, and that Al Qaeda was going to crash airliners into US skyscrapers - not surprising, since Al Qaeda had been toying with the idea for a decade.

However, the information on this came in through channels that collect intelligence on narcotics and money-laundering operations, not on terrorism. The cartels that trafficked heroin through Turkey at the time, tied in to the Turkish Deep State, were connected to Al Qaeda, and that is how the information got passed; Al Qaeda, like other terrorist organizations since the end of the Cold War, funds its terrorist operations through organized crime, and trafficking Afghan heroin is a major aspect of this.

On the other end, though, the connections went to very important US officials, both elected and appointed, from both major parties, who were on the payroll of these Turkish organized crime groups.

Consequently, a serious investigation into 9/11 would have connected key Washington politicians to transnational organized crime and even to Al Qaeda itself. These officials derailed any attempts at such investigations by using State Secrets Privelege, telling the FBI that an investigation would hurt sensitive national security and foreign relations interests, when in fact the intervening officials were protecting their own criminal activity.

None of this is now secret; do an internet research, and you can confirm everything written here.

What I find interesting is her assertions that she saw papers that showed we knew Al Qaeda was going to attack with airplanes, and that she knew blueprints of skyscrapers had gone to the Middle East.
9/11 theories have it either 1) it was the Muslims, and stop being a conspiracy-theorist, the Musims are a threat, or 2) it was an inside job, and the Muslims were just the fall guys.

The truth is that Islam lends itself to terrorism, and, while there are good people who are Muslims, a disproportionate number of the world's terrorists are Muslims. They hate infidels, and they did attack us; the intelligence community was following the development of their plans to use aircraft to attack us for a decade prior to 9/11. Documents to support this were made available during the trial of Zacarias Moussaoui, and I have copies.

But, the Twin Towers were designed to be able to withstand multiple airliner hits per tower; yet, two hits took down the Twin Towers and WTC-7.

Islamic terrorists did indeed attack, but the hijacking of the aircraft and their crashing into buildings was only part of the plan; it succeeded against all odds, and did far more damage than was even remotely possible.

It is my belief they laundered drug money through computers in the towers that were still running while the people who were supposed to be operating them were contemplating jumping out of windows to escape the fire. The buildings were imploded; I believe this was in part to destroy the computers and cover up the evidence of money-laundering.

To do this required some inside help, but, as we established from the Sibel Edmonds case, there is enough corruption in the US tied to friends of Al Qaeda for the help to be available.

I have more information, and more theories that fit the facts.

The Plame case is connected to the Edmonds case; both cases give us a glimpse of the same iceberg by looking at different parts of it that broke the surface of the water.

The Terrance Yeakey case is more remote, and at first does not appear to be connected, but I believe very similar dynamics are involved.

Investigative reporter and author Jayna Davis connected the OKBOMB to the Middle East, specifically to Iraq intelligence operatives.

In my opinion, a thorough investigation of the OKBOMB would have connected the Clinton Administration to narcotics traffickers. Instead, Clinton declared that it was only right-wing terrorists, covering up the Middle East connection, and used the attack for domestic political purposes; he then won re-election, just barely.

Terrance Yeakey was a sergeant with the OKPD, a first responder at the OKBOMB. He saw something very suspicious, and was brutally murdered for what he saw. The OKBOMB and the TiNRATs, Part 1.

Do your own research. My theories are my theories, but the facts can be readily confirmed, and I tried to clearly identify what were my theories and hypotheses, and what are verifiable facts.

Text of the Declaration of Independence

The full text of the Declaration of Independence:

In Congress, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new guards for their future security — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. — The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our People, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free system of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislature, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

If these guys in Washington knew anything about America, this country they think they rule, and if they knew anything about our history, they would not push us as much as they do.

The reckoning came once beginning on April 19, 1775, and is coming again.

Happy Birthday, America!

May we do what pleases our Creator, so He will again establish us as a beacon of hope to all humanity.

For When Words Fail

From OKC Police: Meth-Smoking Mom Delays Abused Child's Medical Care, June 23, 2011:

Police collected evidence from the LaQuinta Inn after the toddler was taken to Children's Hospital.

Police said the child had numerous bruises and an injury on the base of his skull.

A family member said the boy had lye burns on his throat, face and eyes, signs of sexual abuse, bleach poisoning, and at one point, was hanging from a ceiling with a dog collar.

From OKC Drug Addicts Prostitute Toddler For Meth, June 24, 2011:

She has been accused of allowing two men to rape and abuse a 3-year-old boy in exchange for drugs.

From London protesters: 'Behead those who insult prophet', February 3, 2006:

Placards calling for anyone who insults the prophet Mohammed to be beheaded have been waved during an angry protest outside the Danish Embassy in London.

Surah 2:191:

And kill them wherever you find them, and drive them out from whence they drove you out, and persecution is severer than slaughter, and do not fight with them at the Sacred Mosque until they fight with you in it, but if they do fight you, then slay them; such is the recompense of the unbelievers.

Surah 9:5:

So when the sacred months have passed away, then slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them captives and besiege them and lie in wait for them in every ambush, then if they repent and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate, leave their way free to them; surely Allah is Forgiving, Merciful.

From Dad kills 20-yr-old for talking to boyfriend on cellphone, June 3, 2011:

The girl's boyfriend has her heart-rending screams recorded on his cellphone. However, he could not muster the courage to approach police.

From Luby's Massacre Remains Among Nation's Worst Mass Shootings, April 16, 2007:

(April 16, 2007)—Fifteen years ago last October, 35-year-old George Hennard of Belton drove his pickup truck through the widow of the Luby's cafeteria in Killeen, got out and opened fire on 80 terrified noon-hour diners with a pair of semi-automatic pistols.

Armed with a Glock 17 and a Ruger P-89, Hennard worked his way methodically through the restaurant, sparing some and killing others.

The gunfire continued for an agonizing ten minutes until four police officers arrived and opened fire on the gunman, leaving him wounded and cornered.

For people who can be reasoned with, there are words;
for people who can't, there's Smith & Wesson...

and Kalashnikov.

(With this post, I begin a new label: Firearm Ownership.)

Unity and Faith, Part 4

In Part 1 we had an overview of Nigeria and introduced the various angles of the north/south split in the country. Then in Part 2 we considered some of the various factors in the unrest in Nigeria. Next, in Part 3 we examined the jihad and counterjihad aspects of this unrest a little more closely, encountering reason to suspect Nigeria's security forces of committing excesses, including extrajudicial killings, in dealing with the trouble.

We now review excerpts from 'Nigeria's Taliban': How Big a Threat?, dated July 30, 2009. With the ongoing violence in Nigeria today, it is important to keep in mind this article is from two years ago.

The immediate crisis may be over in Nigeria, but the threat of violence remains. Government security forces today attacked a mosque filled with Islamist militants, killing scores of fighters and forcing more to flee. The militants, blamed for days of violence across the country's north, belong to a group known as Boko Haram, which aims to overthrow the federal government in Abuja and impose a strict version of Islamic law. The sect's leader Mohammed Yusuf escaped the raid along with some 300 of his men, but was later arrested and then died in custody according to police. Four days of clashes, sparked by attacks on police stations and government buildings, have killed at least 300 people.

The Boko Haram leader died in police custody; interesting in light of the allegations against Nigeria's security forces that we considered in Part 3.

Continuing:

Also known as Nigeria's Taliban, Boko Haram formed about eight years ago. A huge government operation against the group in 2004 ended with the police claiming victory. But five years on and the militants are back, stronger and more vicious. In the latest outbreak of violence, in Maiduguri, the capital of northeastern Borno state, militant gunmen assaulted police stations and engaged armored-personnel backed troops.

Africa's most populous country sits on a religious fault line. Its 150 million people are split almost evenly between Muslims in the north and Christians in the south. For many years, the northern Muslim élite have dominated Nigerian politics, using their positions to enrich themselves and their families.

The allegations are that it was a "northern Muslim élite" responsible for much of the corruption.

Skipping down a little:

Over the past few years a new breed of young Muslim activists, most of them educated and from the middle class, have aggressively embraced a stricter version of Islam, rejecting anything Western and Christian.

It seems this sect may have been founded by younger Muslims who were angry at corruption among their parents. Regardless, as if often the case, the terrorist organization has its foundation among educated, middle class Muslims.

The article concludes pointing out the concern that al Qaeda might gain a foothold here, and calling attention to a special place Osama bin Laden had assigned Nigeria in the world's jihad.

A month later, Nigeria's Vanguard reported that Boko Haram ressurects, declares total Jihad:

The Islamic sect Boko Haram has declared total Jihad in Nigeria, threatening to Islamise the entire nation by force of war.

[snip]

WE SPEAK AS BOKO HARAM
For the first time since the Killing of Mallam Mohammed Yusuf, our leader, we hereby make the following statements.

1) First of all that Boko Haram does not in any way mean "Western Education is A sin" as the infidel media continue to portray us. Boko Haram actually means "Western Civilisation" is forbidden. The difference is that while the first gives the impression that we are opposed to formal education coming from the West, that is Europe, which is not true, the second affirms our believe in the supremacy of Islamic culture (not Education), for culture is broader, it includes education but not determined by Western Education.

[snip]

2) That the Boko Haram is an Islamic Revolution which impact is not limited to Northern Nigeria, in fact, we are spread across all the 36 states in Nigeria, and Boko Haram is just a version of the Al Qaeda which we align with and respect. We support Osama bin Laden, we shall carry out his command in Nigeria until the country is totally Islamised which is according to the wish of Allah.

[snip]

Having made the following statement we hereby reinstate our demands:

1) That we have started a Jihad in Nigeria which no force on earth can stop. The aim is to Islamise Nigeria and ensure the rule of the majority Muslims in the country. We will teach Nigeria a lesson, a very bitter one.

[snip]

3) That we shall make the country ungovernable, kill and eliminate irresponsible political leaders of all leanings, hunt and gun down those who oppose the rule of Sharia in Nigeria and ensure that the infidel does not go unpunished.

It is not uncommon that analysts point to economic disparities as a source of the violence in Nigeria. But, the terrorists themselves point to Islamic ideology. Furthermore, at least some of the economic disparity is the fault of a corrupt "northern Muslim élite". Consequently, any analysis that does not factor in jihadist Islamic ideology is inadequate.

Fast forward to June 15, 2011, when an article in the Nigeria Daily News entitled Nigerian Islamist sect, Boko Haram vows fiercer, wider attacks quoted Boko Haram as declaring:

"Very soon, we will wage jihad...We want to make it known that our jihadists have arrived in Nigeria from Somalia where they received real training on warfare from our brethren who made that country ungovernable...," said the group in a handwritten statement.

"This time round, our attacks will be fiercer and wider than they have been," it said, adding it would target all northern states and the country's capital Abuja. The statement in Hausa, a widely spoken language in the North, was anonymously delivered to journalists in the North-eastern city of Maiduguri, capital of Borno State, where the attacks were concentrated.

The sect admitted links with a foreign Islamist group connected to Al-Qaeda, although security experts had already speculated that it had established ties with Islamists in North Africa.

Maiduguri featured in an attack only days later.

From Nigerian Boko Haram Islamists 'kill nurse' in Maiduguri, June 20, 2011:

Gunmen from Nigeria's radical Islamist sect Boko Haram have killed a nurse who was playing cards in the north-eastern city of Maiduguri, according to police.

Police said four people were also wounded in the shooting at a bus stop in the city.

Of interest is the connection to foreign terrorist groups; this is an international Islamic extremist ideology that is manifesting itself locally in Nigeria. Boko Haram's statement specifically mentioned Somalia, and there are reasons to suspect other connections.

First, we look at excerpts from Boko Haram Declares War, dated June 27, 2011:

Few seem convinced by President Goodluck Jonathan's assurances that the security situation is under control following the bombing on 16 June of Louis Edet House, the national police headquarters in Abuja. It killed at least two people and wounded seven. Agents of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation arrived to help investigate claims of international terrorist links.

[snip]

Some immediate questions emerge from the latest round of attacks: Who is behind Boko Haram? How much foreign support has it got and how can it best be confronted? After downplaying its importance and regional ties for some years, Nigerian security officials now point to cross-border links.

[snip]

It seems their tactics are working: security sources speak of training camps of Hausa-speaking Nigerians in Burkina Faso and Niger as well as a wave of new recruits to Boko Haram across northern Nigeria. It's harder to trace the international links, but some officials are taking seriously claims from Boko Haram that their militants, including bomb-makers, have been training in Somalia alongside Al Shabaab and Al Qaida operatives. There are also small, highly mobile affiliates of Al Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb across the Sahel, which could provide the training and the materiel to launch the type of bombings and guerrilla attacks that Boko Haram favours.

Also, in Part 2 we began reviewing a paper entitled Key Issues in Nigeria's 2011 Elections, dated March 29, 2011, by Sola Tayo. We now pick up with an excerpt from page 7:

Concerns about internal security are common during electoral periods, but the possible action of outsiders is also causing concern within the government. In November 2010 a shipment of arms was intercepted in Lagos. The intended destination of the shipment was unclear, although it is claimed it was to be re-exported to The Gambia. However the trafficked rockets and explosives, which came from Iran, were the responsibility of a Nigerian and two Iranians who have been charged with the importation of prohibited firearms. The incident caused a diplomatic storm which resulted in Nigeria reporting Iran to the UN Security Council for a possible arms violation. Although Nigeria has not severed diplomatic ties with Iran, the relationship (on the Nigerian side at least) is tense.

Whatever the intended destination of that shipment, the Nigerian government is understandably wary of arms shipments entering the country and ending up in the possession of militant groups. It is equally suspicious of direct interference by outsiders. In March 2010 the Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, suggested that Nigeria be split in two to end the violence between Muslims and Christians. His comments provoked a strong reaction from the Nigerian government, with Abuja recalling the Ambassador in Tripoli and accusing Libya of trying to destabilize the country. The issue of partitioning the country into a Muslim north and Christian south is a deeply sensitive subject in Nigeria.

Gaddafi is not the only one to suggest this division of Nigeria; there are calls among Nigerians for a north/south (= Muslim/infidel) "divorce" and I am sure recent events in Sudan will fuel these calls. Also, the situation in Côte d'Ivoire, where a "northerner" of questionable Ivoirian credentials was installed by force by the international community, in violation of Ivoirian law, may set a precedent that worries the southerners in Nigeria.

The arms shipment addressed in the quoted passage above was quite substantial, too.

In fact, it was so substantial that some analysts suggested it was a new way to supply anti-Israeli terrorists forces. From Nigerian arms seizure may indicate new Iran-Hamas route, October 29, 2010.

Weapons discovered in 13 shipping containers in the Port of Lagos earlier this week could signify that Iran is trying to develop a new route to smuggle arms and explosives to Hamas in the Gaza Strip, defense officials said on Thursday.

The ship, apparently from Iran, reportedly docked in the Lagos Port on Tuesday and, according to the bill of lading, was supposed to be carrying construction supplies. On inspecting the 13 containers, customs officials discovered rockets, mortars, bombs, rifles and heavy machine guns hidden among crates of building tiles.

Nigerian officials were quoted in the media claiming that the cargo had been under surveillance for some time. It was possible that the intelligence on the cargo was supplied by Western sources.

"On opening the first container, the service operatives discovered rocket launchers, grenades and other explosives; the weapons were concealed among crates of floor tiles," Nigerian State Security Service spokeswoman Marilyn Ogar was quoted as saying.

The largest rocket appeared to be a 107-mm. Katyusha, which Iran is known to manufacture and which makes up the backbone of Hizbullah's and Hamas's arsenals.

Even if most of the weapons, including the rockets, are intended for Palestinian terrorists, it is not unreasonable to expect that local Nigerian jihadists might take a cut for helping move them.

So, we have Iranian arms smuggled into Nigeria, resulting in an international incident reported to the UN.

But, the report previously quoted above, Key Issues in Nigeria's 2011 Elections, only mentions the smuggled arms; why don't we hear about the heroin?

From From Iran: Customs intercept container of heroin at Tin-Can port, November 19, 2010 (I fixed misspellings of "heroin"):

LAGOS—Nigerian Customs Service has intercepted a large quantity of heroin concealed in a 40-foot container, which was believed to have originated from Iran. The container which was brought into the Tin-can Island Port [Nigeria's Tin Can Port - EL] was concealed among machine parts.

[snip]

Also confirming the interception of the large quantity of hard drugs at the Tin-Can Island Port, Customs spokesman, Mr. Wale Adeniyi, said that about ten wraps of heroin each weighing 112kg had been off-loaded from the container.

It was also gathered that CMA-CGM, the shipping company that brought in the 13 containers of arms and ammunition intercepted recently at the Apapa Port, also brought the heroin-laden container.

The heroin and the arms were being moved via the same smuggling route, it appears.

Nigeria is a major oil-producing country. We now see arms- and heroin smuggling from Iran, and connections to international Islamic terrorist groups. Where have we seen this combination before: oil, heroin, and Islamic terrorists?

A November, 2009, NATO research paper entitled An assessment of crime related risks in the Sahel touches on the role played by Nigerian organized crime cartels, and points to increasing movement of marijuana and cocaine across the Sahel region. Of course, I have been pointing to the movement of arms, terrorism and heroin through this region, and alluding to (though not yet establishing) connections between events in Côte d'Ivoire and cocaine trafficking from South America to Europe.

Boko Haram is connected to international Islamic terrorists who, in turn, are connected to international arms- and narcotics traffickers. These connections run to Iran, to Somalia, and across the Sahara/Sahel region to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. They of course run through nearby countries; Burkina Faso was specifically mentioned. Burkina Faso is a significant player in the world of transnational smuggling, and is implicated in the situation in Côte d'Ivoire; in fact, Côte d'Ivoire's new strongman, Ouattara, is from Burkina Faso. Nigerian groups are also connected to movement of South American cocaine.

Boko Haram's ideology is shared with terrorists all over the world; the "Religion of Peace" is in fact an ideology of terrorism. But, it would be cut off at the knees without all the transnational organized crime activities that fund it, via smuggling of cocaine, heroin, arms and other commodities, and that supply it with potent weapons.

Unfortunately, though, our "War on Terror", or whatever they call it these days, will only deal the most superficial aspects of terrorism. Political correctness will not allow us to connect terrorism to Islam, and corruption and illicit money which finds its way to important officials in Washington from transnational organized crime will not allow us to effectively address terrorism in any case.

The Inter-Sudan War, Part 3

Before continuing, you may wish to be familiar with the contents of Land of the Blacks, Part 5, as well as Part 1 and Part 2 of this series.

We begin this post reviewing Sudan's South Kordofan governor says life back to normal in region, dated June 26, 2011.

KHARTOUM, June 25 (Xinhua) -- Sudan's South Kordofan State Governor Ahmed Haroun said Saturday that life in the region has been restored to its normal course after clashes it has witnessed since June 6.

Haroun, who was speaking through a video conference Saturday from the state's capital Kadogli, reiterated that the situation was stable and that the Sudanese army were maintaining the initiative in all parts of the region.

"The humanitarian conditions are stable thanks to the efforts of the Humanitarian Aid Commission and the UN agencies, top of them the World Food Program (WFP) and UNICEF besides the Sudanese Red Crescent," said Haroun.

"The citizens who deserted the region have started to return," he added.

On June 6, military clashes broke out in South Kordofan State on the border between north and south Sudan between the Sudanese army and military groups belonging to Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA)-Nuba Mountains' sector, in what the army termed as "rebellion."

It is important to keep in mind that Governor Ahmad Muhammad Harun (and I spell his name the way the International Criminal Court does) is under indictment for a long list of crimes, and has an international warrant out for his arrest (see Land of the Blacks, Part 5).

He was President Bashir's main guy in charge of genocide in Darfur; Bashir moved him to South Kordofan in 2009, with an intention that was obviously to prepare to do the same thing there; and that is what is now happening.

Sudan's President Omar Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir

We now consider excerpts from Plight of the Nuba of Kordofan, by El-Tahir El-Faki:

June 20, 2011 — During the height of the Darfur crisis the Islamic regime of President Bashir lead massive ethnic and genocide campaigns against the indigenous Africans to replace them with Arabs from countries such as Chad, Central Africa, Niger, Mauretania and Mali. While the international community was concentrating on the Darfur crisis, the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) was reminding all concerned that the issue was national requiring holistic solutions. Furthermore it stressed that it would only be a matter of time before Bashir would repeat the same scenario in Kordofan. The indicators were clear and copious. The Nuba of Kordofan are indigenous multi-religious Africans who are mostly supporters of the SPLM and perceived by Islamic regime of Bashir as infidels whose rich and fertile lands must be evacuated and given to the Arabs. Thanks to the intervention of the international community and SPLM for not allowing the Islamic Jihadists project to materialise. A period of relative peace and stability ensued until the recent events on the 5th of June 2011.

When the Darfur problem broke out in 2003, Kordofanese with farsighted vision rushed and joined (JEM) and have overtime grown to a sizable group within the movement. What concerned them was its manifesto that categorised the Darfur crisis as part of an all Sudanese problems and has always included Kordofan in every aspect of its negotiations with the Government of Sudan (GoS). The international community was in no mood to mandate the inclusion of Kordofan parallel with the solution to the Darfur crisis. At every level JEM has been considered an intransigent element and a spoiler of the peace processes due to its nationalist aspirations and on its stance regarding Kordofan. In 2006 in Abuja and for the last two years in Doha, Kordofan has been utterly excluded on the same grounds even though Thabo Mbeki's report unambiguously stated the problem a Sudanese one that requires holistic approach.

We now consider excerpts from Crisis in Sudan: Allegations of Ethnic Cleansing in the Nuba Mountains, June 24, 2011, by Rebecca Hamilton. The first part of the article, at the end of which I begin the excerpt, is an italicized introduction to a letter that Hamilton got from a Western journalist and "long-time Sudan analyst" who had been in Southern Kordofan and just got out. His identity has been protected to prevent retaliation against people back in Sudan.

Commenting on what media coverage of the crisis he has read since he left the area, he had one message to convey: "This is not a north/south war. This is not an Arab/black war. This is not a Muslim/Christian war. This is a war against one of the minority groups in northern Sudan."

Here is his letter:

Dear friends,

Sorry to have been so out of touch. Just got out of Nuba a couple of days ago by which time it was already a full-on war zone. Twenty-five days there seemed like a lifetime. While I was there, it was obvious the election process had become so seriously flawed that despite great efforts to inform voters and put forward candidates, the government simply wants no even democratic opposition. Making Haroun, an indicted war criminal wanted for genocide, the governor was a clear message to the people of South Kordofan.

Then in the first week of June, Bashir's forces started an operation to "remove" any local people who had sided with the opposition during the recent elections. There was an enormous build-up of troops, artillery, tanks, and machine gun carriers. And now they've started ground attacks with strong air support. All access is cut off, official statements that any United Nations planes will be shot down, no commodities, going in or out, no humanitarian access, roads mined, large numbers of militias armed.

With the invasion of troops in Kadugli, people began to run. Before Nuba became completely cut off we started working with local people and the remaining local staff of NGOs to respond to the enormous needs of the displaced. We were bombed by Antonovs and strafed by MiGs. Heavy shelling was never far away but we never ran into trouble except from the air. It seems that there is an overt operation to completely "neutralise" (either by killing or by terrifying) any likelihood of opposition. There are very brutal and aggressive attacks with new weapons. We heard stories (we are not sure) of what sounded like phosphorous bombs that cause fires that never go out and horrible burning. People are terrified. There are many civilian casualties already and I fear it is going to get much worse.

What can only be called ethnic cleansing, when an ethnic group is targeted for extermination, started in Kadugli and Dilling while we were there. Door to door executions of completely innocent and defenseless civilians, often by throat cutting, by special internal security forces. We don't know how many yet; hundreds seems for sure, but could be much worse. Terrible accounts of civilians – friends – attempting to find safety in the UNMIS (United Nations Missions of Sudan) compound being pulled out of vehicles and executed immediately. And now we hear that all the displaced who had been seeking some form of security alongside the perimeter fence of UNMIS are being forced to move by the government authorities. What will happen to them? So we just had to stay focused and get things moving on the ground. Incredibly brave and impressive locals both experienced aid workers and villagers leading the response; freed up by the immediate exit of all expats before thingswent wrong. Probably over 100,000 already displaced and more coming.

The ethnic cleansing is not just a war against one of the ethnic groups; it is very much an effort on behalf of Bashir make Sudan an Arab Islamic state where sharia is the law.

The method of conducting this jihad is the same that the Bashir/Harun team developed for Darfur: aerial attacks with Sudan's obsolete aircraft (against which unarmed civilians are unable to defend), attacks by government-sponsored militias (janjaweed in Darfur), and support by regular Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) units.

Skipping down, we come to the explanation as to why the analyst says it is not Muslim/Christian, Arab/black or North/South:

So you know, this is not a war about south versus north, nor Christian against Muslim, or black against Arab. There are as many Muslim Nuba as Christian (and a healthy percentage of traditional spirituality), they see their future in the north, they are intermarried and have been living along side Arab nomadic groups and northern communities for centuries. There are nomadic Arab communities in southern Kordofan who also voted for the SPLM (Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement) and many of the Misseriya and Hawazma groups remain as marginalised as the Nuba ; and as vulnerable to the policies of the center. The Nuba SPLM are not the same as the southern SPLM/A. They are fighting to resist a regime that refuses them basic rights and a voice – access to justice and even basic social and economic rights. This is so important because the Nuba offer a vision for Sudan that builds on religious tolerance and a local understanding of democracy – relevant for so many areas of the world right now.

If you are a Muslim, and you advocate religious tolerance, then you are takfir, and no better than infidels. In fact, you are worse; infidels might still submit, but as takfir, you have fallen into apostasy: you are under sentence of death, and prior to that, the jihadists can and will do anything they want to you, with Allah's approval. (Those are the rules; I didn't make them up.)

Consequently, this is very much a Muslim/infidel thing.

We next examine the first part of Southern Kordofan: Ethnic cleansing under our watch by Parek Maduot, June 15, 2011:

(Washington, DC) - The current fighting in Southern Kordofan is playing out exactly as designed by the brutal strategists of the National Congress Party in Khartoum, and unless the discourse around it and the reaction to horrors we are hearing are reversed, they will achieve almost all their devious strategic aims at minimal cost. The international community has fecklessly resorted to the use of vague exhortations for cessation of hostilities in the Nuba Mountains without explicitly condemning what are incontrovertible acts of ethnic cleansing by the regime against innocent civilians.

The US and other leading guarantors of the CPA find themselves mediating another manufactured crisis by Khartoum according to dubious terms that ignore the fact that it wantonly violated the CPA, and is engaged in brutal killing and displacement of tens of thousands in the border regions. Taking advantage of the sensible restraint shown by the SPLM when Abyei was invaded, and sensing that the focus on reaching July 9th in one piece has become an albatross on the neck of its peace partner and the international community, the NCP calculated that pushing the envelope might win it a few more prizes in these remaining weeks.

It could try to redraw the balance of power in the longest border point with South Sudan along Southern Kordofan by crushing the SPLA elements from that region under the pretext of asserting national sovereignty over Northern territories, while confident that the usual dilly-dallying by mediators and the slow pace of UN security council action will afford it enough time to decimate the SPLA, eliminate as many of the active cadres of the SPLM, and alter the demographic character of Nuba areas by instigating and accelerating resettlement by Arab tribes. Achieving this will certainly give it an upper hand suppressing the nascent political opposition represented by the SPLM in the North; grant it an advantage negotiating post-independence issues with South Sudan, and as a bonus, find another excuse to blackmail the international community over allowing the independence of the South to proceed unhindered.

I have been saying this for some time now - since before Madout's piece was published. This is all going exactly according Khartoum's plan.

Picking up where we left off in Crisis in Sudan: Allegations of Ethnic Cleansing in the Nuba Mountains:

And the war is in a large part our fault again. The UN “peace-keeping” forces are not only totally ineffective (summary executions going in front of blue berets in Kadugli) but may even add to the problem. The diplomatic efforts are too often driven by ill-informed strategies or self-serving policies more related to economic gain for us rather than any sense of humanity or justice. This return of a horrific war needn’t have happened if only there had been much stronger international support for the planned political process. There was never enough international pressure to promote a genuine chance for a just peace.

If a Republican were in office, he would be called a racist for allowing this genocide to occur against people of color. But, since it is a Democrat President of partial African descent who is violating campaign rhetoric to allow the genocide to proceed, the media is silent.

"UN peacekeeping" - a big part of the problem, if for no other reason, because they provide a false sense of security to the locals and make the limousine liberals think something is being done.

Finishing Sudan's South Kordofan governor says life back to normal in region:

The governor, meanwhile, refuted the claims that the Sudanese army has committed ethnic cleansing in South Kordofan, saying "the incidents which took place because of the Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) did not have any ethnic nature."

"What happened in South Kordofan was a rebellion by a limited groups of the SPLM/SPLA. We do not mix matters when dealing with the groups involved in the incidents from the SPLM. Nobody was targeted on ethnic bases."

Thus says the man with an international warrant out for his arrest on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in what the international community called a genocide in Darfur.

Please read the rest of all the articles quoted above.

A Special Place in the World

A comment in a debate on Facebook:

At the risk of sounding arrogant, we saved Europe before, and it looks like they didn't learn their lesson, so we will have to do it again.

Those who seek to destroy the United States do not understand how difficult that task is.

Despite modern rhetoric that disputes this position, the United States is a special country; whereas other nations derived their authority from royalty, in other words from a human, our nation recognized that its authority is derived from the people who, ultimately, derive their authority from their Creator. The fact that we recognize our Creator as Supreme, Lord over the people, and the people as lords over governments instituted by the people to serve at the pleasure of the people to codify and protect Divinely-provided rights is what makes the United States special.

Elsewhere in the world, too many people somehow see their rights as being granted by people; thus, those rights can be taken away by people. In America, though, there is a critical mass of people that still understands that our rights are given to us by our Creator and that these rights are inalienable; thus, there is a critical mass of people willing to fight to defend those rights against oppression, whether from corrupt government or from corrupt religion as, ultimately, all such corrupt oppression stems from a common source.

Until Europeans stop acting "European" and start to recognize their Creator and give Him His due, they will be sheep for the slaughter of any tyranny that comes along.

Any time another nation chooses to recognize humanity's Creator and give Him His due, that nation can be special, as well, as the Lord shows no favoritism, but opens wide His arms to embrace all who would seek Him.

The Inter-Sudan War, Part 2

In Part 1 we began looking at the violence in Sudan, which I believe may very well lead to a new war. Since South Sudan is expected to declare its independence on July 9, this unrest could easily become what I call an Inter-Sudan war, though currently it is being billed as a potential new civil war.

We will review reports regarding the current situation, recent background reports and news, and background information, beginning with Signs point to northern Sudan's targeting of civilians in border region by Laura Heaton, dated June 16, 2011. A short way into her article we find the following; I have included the links in the original:

An internal UN memo, the ethnic make-up of the displaced, and accounts by those who fled indicate a campaign by the Sudanese government to deliberately target civilians, with the aim of depopulating the Abyei area of residents that identify as southerners.

As I pointed out in Land of the Blacks, Part 5, this is obviously a premeditated, deliberate move by Bashir. He has for two years been getting people and forces in place to deal with the situation in the Nuba Mountains and the Abyei regions. What we are seeing now is a plan that worked for him in Darfur, implemented by the same people.

Sudan's President Omar Hassan Ahmad al-Bashir

Skipping down in Signs point to northern Sudan's targeting of civilians in border region:

With South Sudan's independence from the north just weeks away, the northern government led by President Omar al-Bashir, notorious for its targeting of civilians based on ethnicity and use of local militias to flame local tensions, seems set on destabilizing the border area in a last-ditch effort to back the southern government into a wall. Diplomats have been clear that the recent violence won't derail the South's secession, but much is still at stake in negotiations between the two sides over arrangements on combustible issues such as oil, citizenship, debt, and boundaries, including the status of Abyei.

As we saw in Land of the Blacks, Part 2 Bashir uses conflict as a bargaining tool, to improve his negotiating position. He's not trying to stop the south's secession. He has promised that if the south secedes, the north will revise its constitution, implementing sharia. (North) Sudan will definitely be in the Arab/Muslim camp. There are reports of members of Bashir's government referring to the fighting as a jihad, and Khartoum calls its bandit militias mujahideen, while the rest of the world refers to them as janjaweed (see Land of the Blacks, Part 2). However, I wonder how committed Bashir himself is to jihad for the sake of Allah; my bet is he is more concerned about taking care of himself, and will use whatever is available for that purpose.

For more backgrouned, we consider some excerpts from Sudan's Bashir threatens a repeat of Abyei and S. Kordofan "lessons", dated June 19, 2011:

The oil-rich state of Southern Kordofan, on the ill-defined border with the south, is among several flashpoints as Sudan's south prepares to secede on July 9.

Fighting between SAF and SPLA in the state erupted on June 5th under mysterious circumstances. The Northern army said that the SPLA launched an attack on a police station and stole weapons prompting a response.

However, the SPLA claimed that SAF attempted to disarm their units by force. The North gave SPLA in the Blue Nile and South Kordofan until June 1st to evacuate the two states and head South of the 1956 borders.

But officials in the south's dominant party said that fighters in these border regions are Northerners and therefore cannot be asked to migrate southwards.

Prior to that the SAF moved on May 21st to seize the contested region of Abyei in retaliation for an ambush on its forces near the area that was blamed on the SPLA.

In both cases thousands of civilians have been displaced creating a humanitarian crisis that has partially spilled into the soon to secede south. Furthermore, several reports have alleged that the conflict in South Kordofan has taken an ethnic dimension.

This is exactly what is going on - Bashir is replacing people sympathetic to the south with people loyal to Khartoum. He wants to win against insurgents in the Nuba Mountains, and he wants Abyei to have enough pro-Khartoum people in it so any referendum results in Abyei staying with the north.

Back to Signs point to northern Sudan's targeting of civilians in border region:

Reports mount daily of atrocities carried out against civilians from the Nuba Mountains, northerners who sided with the South during the civil war. In addition to aerial bombardments – often with rudimentary explosives made of oil drums pushed out the back of Antonovs – government-aligned militias are reportedly going door-to-door abducting or executing people sympathetic to the South's ruling party. In one particularly harrowing account, a UN security report described smuggling out Sudanese staff in commercial vehicles because the northern army wasn't allowing them to be evacuated.

This is exactly how he did in in Darfur and, as I explained in Land of the Blacks, Part 5, he has the same guy doing it.

There is another interesting spin to this.

We consider excerpts from Sudan re-accuses Darfur rebel groups of fighting on side of Libyan leader, dated June 21, 2011; please see the original for links which I did not reproduce.

June 20, 2011 (KHARTOUM) – Sudan Foreign Minister Ali Karti has reiterated accusations that armed groups from his country's western region of Darfur are fighting alongside the beleaguered regime of Libyan leader Muammar Al-Gaddafi.

[snip]

Sudan's relationship with its neighbour Libya has seen ups and downs, but it plummeted in May last year after Libya provided sanctuary to the leader of Darfur rebel group Justice and Equality Movement, Khalil Ibrahim, after he was shunned by his erstwhile allies in Chad. Sudan closed its shared borders with Libya in response to the harbouring of Khalil, only to re-open them again to receive citizens fleeing the unrest in eastern Libya.

Sudanese officials only summoned the courage to come out with their accusation against Libya of supporting Darfur rebel groups after the uprising against Gaddafi started.

Karti told the parliament that the government had known for a long time that Libya was the main supporter of rebellion in Darfur, saying that Tripoli had supplied them with arms and setup training camps for them in eastern and southern Libya.

So, Gaddafi's government has allegedly been helping the rebels in Darfur. In Darfur, Bashir is backing militias which the Khartoum government calls mujahideen. The rebels against Gaddafi include militant Islamic extremists. And, as we saw in Land of the Blacks, Part 2, Bashir has spoken of Sudan becoming an Islamic state in the wake of any secession of the south - no room for "diversity".

This is shaping up as a fight between 1) bad guys like Bashir and jihadists and 2) infidels and takfir like Gaddafi.

So, why is Obama supporting the rebels against Gaddafi who, by extension, may very well find themselves allied to Bashir?

And, why is Obama doing essentially nothing about Bashir's ethnic cleansing in Abyei and Southern Kordofan?

From Obama's Second "Rwanda Moment" (please see the original for an extensive chronicle of Obama's failed efforts in Sudan, as well as the footnoted background of the author):

President Obama failed to make good on his campaign commitments to Darfur; unless he takes strong action, urgently, he will have failed in the face of the second genocide on his watch, currently accelerating in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan

Eric Reeves*

June 13, 2011

Recalling President Bill Clinton's massive moral failure in the face of the Rwandan genocide of spring 1994, many spoke of Darfur as President Obama's "Rwanda moment" - the moment in which he was obliged to choose whether or not to commit truly substantial American diplomatic and political resources to halt the ethnically-targeted human destruction that has raged for more than eight years. As I've recently noted, candidate Obama virtually invited such a framing of his actions, declaring: "The government of Sudan has pursued a policy of genocide in Darfur. Hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children have been killed in Darfur, and the killing continues to this very day" (April 2008). But more than three years later the situation has not improved in Darfur; rather, a grim genocide by attrition continues, and Obama's incompetent special envoy, former Air Force General Scott Gration, made no progress on the key issues. He failed to secure a peace agreement (or even the trust of Darfuris), and he produced no improvement in access for humanitarians or freedom of movement for the UN/African Union peacekeeping force. Conditions are if anything worse than when candidate Obama spoke, and his "Rwanda moment" has passed. He has failed.

But the consequences of General Gration's incompetence extend to critical issues that remain unresolved between Khartoum and Juba, the capital of what will be in less than a month the independent Republic of South Sudan. Most pressing is the genocidal violence that has exploded in South Kordofan over the past week and threatens to take all of Sudan back to civil war. There are increasingly ominous reports of mass executions and the ethnic targeting of civilians, especially those with origins in the Nuba Mountains - including women and children. Arab militias armed by and allied with the Khartoum regime are going house-to-house, searching out "SPLM (Southern) sympathizers," who are either summarily executed or detained. The fate of a great many of these people is unknown. Numerous reliable accounts from the ground make clear that Khartoum's military aircraft are again engaged in the indiscriminate bombing of civilian targets throughout the Nuba. Churches have been burned in Kadugli (the capital of South Kordofan) and church staff murdered. Most terrifyingly, a humanitarian situation that is already desperate is deteriorating rapidly: Khartoum has engineered a security crisis that has produced mass evacuations of humanitarian personnel from South Kordofan, and if this is not very quickly reversed, vulnerable populations that have fled up into the mountains will die from exposure, malnutrition, and dehydration.

The Inter-Sudan War, Part 1

Yes, a new series on Africa. And, notice the ominous title.

I was reviewing Sudan in Transition, a blog by Rebecca Hamilton, who is an author and special correspondent now in Sudan covering the situation there. Specifically, I was reading her article What Sparked the Attack on Abyei? from June 1, 2011.

The specific part of the article that most caught my attention was this:

Press statements from the Government of South Sudan do not deny there was an incident but they do deny that there was an intentional ambush. The most detailed account I have received of Juba's version of events so far comes from the General Army Chief of Staff of the SPLA, Lt-Gen James Hoth Moi, whom I interviewed on May 27.

According to Moi, the SAF JIU was being escorted up to Goli following an incident on May 15 where an SPLA contingent of a JIU was attacked by northern-allied militia, resulting in the death of four SPLA soldiers. After this incident, Moi says that both sides agreed to move the SAF JIUs further north and the SPLA JIUs further south to avoid further problems, with the SAF accompanying the SPLA units from north to south to ensure their security and the SPLA accompanying the SAF units from south to north for the same reason. Moi says that this was the process that was under way when the incident in Dokura occurred.

According to Moi, the SAF JIU, with an SPLA commander and UN escort, was a convoy of five trucks. At Dokura, some of the SPLA JIU who had been in the group who were attacked on May 15 began arguing about whether it was wise to provide SPLA accompaniment to the SAF JIU as they headed further north from Dokura. In the midst of the argument, a shot was fired into the air from the group who were arguing (Moi says he has not confirmed who fired that shot). When a SAF soldier on the truck closest to the group heard the gunshot, Moi says he must have thought he was being attacked. Moi says the SAF soldier then overreacted, launched an RPG-7 which set a nearby car alight. After that chaos ensued. SAF troops, believing the burning car was part of an ambush, all jumped from the truck. Although the trucks at the head of the convoy continued heading north, the trucks at the back were caught up in the violence. Moi says that both SAF soldiers and some Ngok Dinka civilians were killed, although he could not confirm numbers.

Moi also places the Sudanese government's seizure of Abyei into a broader context – though it is a different contextualization than the one given by Khartoum. According to Moi, the Sudanese government had been planning to invade Abyei for many months and the May 19 incident, far from being a trigger, was instead a useful pretext.

My comment was as follows:

The version Lt. Gen. Moi gave you seems to make some sense, in that it appears that Khartoum has had contingency plans in case of southern secession. For example, the appointment of Harun as governor of Southern Kordofan two years ago, coupled with the military build-up in the region during this same time frame, indicates that perhaps Bashir is planning to use his Darfur strategy to secure the Nuba mountains area. It seems logical that he might want to apply similar methods to ensure Abyei had a higher proportion of people favorable to Khartoum so that whenever a referendum is held, the area will go to the north.

International Criminal Court Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo has stated that Bashir invents conflict to create a better negotiating position, according to March, 2009 Wikileaked cable. Consequently, we could expect Bashir to generate some kind of crisis, through a false-flag operation if necessary; however, given the tensions, he really only needs to wait for an inevitable incident, then blow it out of proportion.

A conflict with the south would play into Bashir's hands up to a point. The north seems to have its deals cut with Middle Eastern countries for arms shipments via Sudan to be smuggled through Egypt to Gaza. Khartoum also has useful relations with China. Consequently, as long as oil can be exported via Port Sudan, there is a way to channel foreign arms to groups friendly to Khartoum along what will soon be the Inter-Sudan Border. (Ambassador Williamson talked a little about Khartoum's support for these groups with Chinese-made weapons in testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee back in January.) Even if the flow of Sudanese oil should somehow be cut, Bashir may still get what he needs from allies in the Middle East; Iran could easily supply Sudan enough to ensure Bashir finishes any conflict in an advantageous position, and might do so as a quid-pro-quo for smuggling arms to Gaza. In any case, Darfur has become a hub of arms smuggling across the Sahara/Sahel region. The opportunity is there, in the absence of an effective international response.

If the goal is not a thorough military defeat of the south, but rather a conflict to improve his negotiating position, and in particular a conflict under somewhat ambiguous circumstances so as to not galvanize any kind of international response, Bashir could pull this off quite easily. Such a scenario would be consistent with what we have seen in Sudan, it would be consistent with what we know of Bashir, and it would be consistent with Lt. Gen. Moi's observations. This might be leveraged by Bashir into more control over Sudan's oil exports which, coupled with a growing gold-mining industry in the north, would seem to secure Khartoum's position for the foreseeable future.

And, I think this is what is happening. As Governor Taban Deng said back in May, South Sudan is already at war.

It would take very minimal support to place Bashir's forces in check. For example, supplying the south with some man-portable air defense missiles could negate Bashir's use of cargo planes and vintage fighters to attack civilians. The missiles need not be state-of-the-art; thirty-year-old technology, the kind China has made widely available in the world arms market, would be perfectly adequate, as Bashir's air force likely has neither the equipment nor the training to effectively counter such a threat. (The attack helicopters would likely be a little more difficult to deal with.)

I'm betting this will all get worse before it gets better.

Thanks for the excellent work you are doing there. Please be careful.

Considering how extensive the comment became, I decided to make it the core of a new post at my blog. And, considering the conclusions I have been coming to regarding Sudan recently, especially at my previous post on Sudan, Land of the Blacks, Part 5, I decided to begin a new series.

In less than a month, the southern parts of Sudan are supposed to officially secede from Sudan, creating a new country, South Sudan.

When this happens, there will be a border between the two new daughter countries of Sudan; I am calling this the Inter-Sudan Border.

Along this border, a war is about to be fought.

(I hope I am wrong; I hope this will be a short series.)