Friday, January 1, 2010

Thoughts on Nation Building


A blogger I respect suggested that the US needed to become involved in nation building in places like Yemen and Somalia. While I understand the sentiment that those countries have people not that different from us who will embrace our concept of nation building - that sentiment is wrong.

Inside every Somali there is NOT an American screaming to get out. In both Somalia and Yemen, male children are often used in human cock-fights where the children, pitted against each other are the subject of wagers. Sometimes a wounded, partially blinded or maimed child has a weapon advantage over a healthy child. I suggest that another viewing of the feature film "Blackhawk Down" is in order. The international community's failure at nation building in these places that are no more than open sewers has been well documented.

Establishing the Rule of Law (as generally understood outside Islam) in places such as Mogadishu is futile unless you sterilize the place and start from scratch. It's also true in hell holes such as Darfur. In places such as those, the strong-man version of Islam holds sway and Darwinian selection is the rule when evaluating who will life and who will die. Our track record, as with those of other civilized nations (including Islamic Countries) is universally dismal.

Nobody will care for my solution: Reciprocity.

If the inhabitants of an African nation outside the law (Somalia comes to mind) engages in piracy on the high seas or some other contemptible act, we respond by destroying a piece of Somali infrastructure. True, there is not all that much worth the price of a bomb. But that sort of conduct is understood in the barbaric nations - where OUR success requires a pagan (practical) ethos. Nothing else seems to work.

4 comments:

Teresa said...

I love your alternative to nation building. As much as I think we should help out other countries that are in neeed, I don't think Yemen or Somalia are places to do nation building. I think sometimes places need to start anew, and that is probably what both Somalia and Yemen need to happen since they are overrun by terrorists and pirates. I think we need to make sure we kill as many terrorists as we possibly can in order to give others a new and safe start there.

Opus #6 said...

Makes sense. Don't crime and punishment go together?

WoFat said...

Oddly enough I was just thinking of Somali hijacking and hostage taking. I feel, deep in my compassionate heart, that the area surrounding captured vessels - say a square mile - be destroyed, along with everyone living there. This would be followed by a hearty and well meant, "Have a nice day," from the lead aircraft.

Nation building? Yo mama.

LL said...

Teresa, in Somalia, for example, the place is so rotten that the definition of citizen is "criminal". They are forced by circumstances into that mindset and no amount of "love" from the US or from civilized nations will change that. Your solution of removing them from the gene pool, combined with WoFat's selective nature provides something that they would understand.

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