Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Somalia

Why did we drop bombs on Somalia -- killing many innocents -- in an (alleged) effort to kill suspected members of Al Qaeda? After all, the real Al Qaeda retirement community is in Pakistan. We know they're in Pakistan because we allowed them to escape to that nation after our invasion of Afghanistan.

Larisa summarizes the sitch very well:
Pakistan is also directly and intimately connected to the attacks of September 11. Remember that day? I know, it is difficult to recall something so tragic when we are in a war with a country that has nothing to do with that tragedy whatsoever.

The few funding routes that were traced (not that our other ally the UAE would allow us heathen to touch their banking records in order to track down the murderers behind the murder of nearly 3,000 American souls) showed that Pakistani intelligence,the ISI, transfered money directly to the lead 911 hijacker, Atta. The transfer was carried out by Omar Sheikh Mohammad, an ISI agent on the orders of then ISI head, Lieutenant-General Mahmoud Ahmed.

It was also Omar who assassinated US journalist Danny Pearl. Yet this administration welcomed their leadership and intelligence officers with open arms and continue to do so. Hunting Al Qaeda? Hardly!
So why Somalia? Perhaps because Somalia may have oil.
Somalia's fledgling government welcomes approaches by firms keen to hunt for oil or gas on its territory but has yet to open any such discussions, President Abdullahi Yusuf said.

Somalia's oil and gas potential attracted attention from Western major oil producers before the country collapsed in chaos in 1991, and diplomats say Asian firms have shown recent interest amid efforts to stabilise the Horn of Africa country. Somalia lies across the Gulf of Aden from the Arabian peninsula and next to Ethiopia's Ogaden region, which has proven reserves of natural gas.

Yusuf, trying to build an effective central government following his election by lawmakers at peace talks last year, told: "Any company that is interested in the natural resources of Somalia can come (to talk) to the government, no matter from which country."

"After all, we will look after our interest. Let them compete, and the best company will win," he said during a visit to Nairobi en route to Saudi Arabia to discuss possible aid for Somalia.
Somalia officially has no proven oil reserves. But a number of countries, including China, have taken a keen interest in that nation's potential as an energy provider.

What I'm about to say is rank speculation. One could fairly call my thoughts a conspiracy theory.

I suspect that behind the scenes, word has gotten out that Somalia has a big future as an oil provider. And I suspect that Bush wants the Somalis to know who's in charge.

Those bombs may have been Dubya's way of saying: "Screw that 'May the best company win' crap."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Joe,
you may be right about oil in Somalia, but not everything is about oil all of the time.
However, everything is about dominance all of the time.
Clark gave a speech that was on C-SPAN tonight which shed some light on many of the ME issues. You may want to watch his speech.
You are right about China and that may be the real motivation behind the bombings (dominance as oppose to oil), although all roads lead to Rome eventually!
p.s.
I would miss you a lot if you were gone for good!

Anonymous said...

joe, there's also this really creepy factor that i don't see mentioned much. namely, consider the countries we've attacked under bush. every last one of them has been seriously weakened by civil war or our sanctions against them or were deprived all along.

in our drive to complete hegemony, we are going for sure things and picking off the feeble. n. korea is out because china would defend them to the death and s. korea would be pretty ticked as well.

just like a predator, consistent with their ironically darwinian notions about survival of the baddest.

Anonymous said...

PNAC and Rebuilding America's Defenses ie. Chapter V, entitled "Creating Tomorrow's Dominant Force" which has the line about a "catastrophic and catalyzing event — like a new Pearl Harbor (PDF)" are about American dominance.... which i don't particularly mind unless it means becoming a nation-state serial killer to do it. The dollar is collapsing... (did we ever find the Trillions the crooks at the Pentagon stole?) and the only way we can survive is blow shit up.

F%$%ing criminals.