It appears that the al-Shabaab inspired if actually indigenously conducted bombings during the World Cup finals which littered Kampala with blood and body parts has convinced you that al-Qaeda and its ilk have no respect for the "lives of Africans." This particular outrage, unlike all the others perpetrated by practitioners of violent political Islam during your administration's life, has persuaded you that they "do not regard African life as valuable in and of itself."
The spectacle of maimed and murdered black bodies has moved you, Mr President, to violate your own prohibition against naming names and pointing the finger of guilt at those who deserve it--the jihadists, the suicide bombers, the exploders of remote controlled lethal machines, the people who believe above all else that their particular and perverted notions of the Will of Allah both makes right and necessary the killing of any convenient civilian target--provided the killing garners headlines and invokes fear. The innumerable deaths, the countless wounded resulting from other attacks directed against Israelis, Westerners, Arabs, Afghans, Pakistanis, and oh so many others may not have rubbed your nose in the reality of the war declared by the True Warriors of The One True Faith, but this time they went too far--they slaughtered people of black skin.
Well, Mr President, get a firm grip on this ground truth: War is race neutral. The Mighty Men of the Koran are equally willing to kill regardless of race, creed, national origin, age, or any of the other federally recognized categories for defining victims in need of protection. The Always Brave And Victorious Fighters Of Islam know no exempt classes--any who are not of us are against us is their motto.
The devotees of political Islam, regardless of name, place of origin, or specifics of agenda are linked by the web of hatred for any and all who oppose them, any who refuse to submit to the True Faith as they define it. They make no distinctions between Americans and Ugandans, between Africans and non-Africans. For the jihadis, all infidels are equally deserving of death.
(Of course, historically, Arabs, and al-Shabaab is predominantly comprised of Arabs, have shown a particular predilection for holding black Africans in contempt. Black Africans were for many centuries seen only as fit candidates for enslavement. The terrible trade in human flesh was conducted by Arabs for generations before the Europeans arrived. And, there is powerful evidence that the Arab lust for purchasing black Africans as chattel continues to the present day. This gives a real piquancy to your remarks on South African television. African life is of value to Arabs only insofar as it is a marketable commodity.)
The reality which you have yet to admit is that the war being waged against us by the jihadi and those states which harbor, facilitate, and to some extent direct and control their actions is global in nature. It is not limited to Afghanistan. Nor is a simple and necessary extension of the war's area to Pakistan sufficient. Even adding Somalia to the list of war zones is insufficient.
As today's attacks in southern Yemen makes manifest, the new, improved, and renamed al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula (AQAP), has a very real capacity to kill and, by so doing, further destabilize the very fragile country of Yemen. Given the several armed threats confronting the corrupt, inefficient, broke central government of which AQAP is far from the least, there is a great likelihood that Yemen will soon join Somalia in the roster of failed states.
When, not if, that happens, the jihadis will have a stranglehold on the entrance to the Red Sea with the negative implications for global trade that ability brings with it. As a failed state, Yemen will provide a safe haven for the jihadis who hold the House of Saud in the greatest contempt as an apostate regime with a record of truckling to the infidels of the West. This potential is guaranteed to perturb the sleep not only of the Saudi royals but the equally apostate heads of states throughout the Gulf region.
And--need it be written?--as a failed state Yemen will prove a fertile ground for the Iranians. The mullahs have an unsurpassed record in effectively developing proxies. Adding AQAP to the roster would provide a new level of flexibility and horizontal escalation potential to Tehran's quiver.
The dark potentials resident in the collapse of Yemen will demand that some state or group of states intervene. The most directly threatened are Saudi Arabia and other Gulf littoral countries, but, the notion of actually fighting a war, particularly one with the jihadis of AQAP, may be more than the very cautious Saudis can stomach.
The US has not been directly threatened by the imminent success of al-Shabaab in Somalia. It will be only indirectly threatened when Yemen goes down the Islamist tubes. But, as Mr Obama noted in his indignation on South African national television, the US was attacked indirectly when its embassies in Tanzania and Kenya were bombed during the Clinton years. The line between indirect and direct threats in thin, wavy, and hazy.
This implies that the US does have a palpable stake in both Yemen and Somalia. When the responsibility of the US during both the Clinton and W. Bush administrations for the creation of current Somalia is considered, the nature of the stakes is enhanced.
We and the rest of the Civilized States created Somalia in its present form by a combination of ill-considered intervention and even less well advised retraction. The dynamic behind the Somalian mess is essentially identical to that which assured the creation of Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan--robust intervention followed by hasty retraction. In recent months the same pattern has been clearly observable in US policy toward Yemen. The result is virtually foreordained.
Wars--like foreign policy generally--are successful only if there is a clearly stated goal, a definition of success which is organic to the goal, and a resolutely followed consistent focus on orchestrating the instruments of national power to achieve the goal. Hesitation, irresolution, vacillation, the alternating tough words and outreach are each and all guaranteed to assure failure.
The US under several successive administrations has followed the same route--the way of robust entrance and hasty exit, the avenue of tough words and soft deeds. The result has been the creation and strengthening of the advocates of violent political Islam. The consequence has been a war which has deepened and widened until it comprises much of the world.
Unless President Obama is willing to enlarge his personal "teachable moment" and see that the US is engaged in a war which we most assuredly did not seek but absolutely must win, there is no hope of reversing the dangerous trend of the past twenty plus years. While there is little realistic reason to conclude the current man in the Oval will see the light, it must be hoped (prayed?) that he do so as time is not on the side of the good guys in this war to the death.
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