Biden Calls for Military Force in Darfur

[frigidmagi]

Guardian

WASHINGTON (AP) - Joseph Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a Democratic presidential candidate, called Wednesday for the use of military force to end the suffering in Darfur.

``I would use American force now,'' Biden said at a hearing before his committee. ``I think it's not only time not to take force off the table. I think it's time to put force on the table and use it.''

In advocating use of military force, Biden said senior U.S. military officials in Europe told him that 2,500 U.S. troops could ``radically change the situation on the ground now.''

``Let's stop the bleeding,'' Biden said. ``I think it's a moral imperative.''

Under U.N.-backed agreements approved last fall, a hybrid force of 22,000 African Union and U.N. peacekeepers are to be deployed in Darfur to protect and provide relief for 2.5 million Darfurians who have been forced from their homes and are now confined to camps.

``We must set a hard deadline for Khartoum to accept a hybrid U.N.-AU force,'' Biden said.

The Bush administration has always rejected use of military force in Darfur, partly because of a possible outcry, particularly in Muslim countries about hostile U.S. action in yet another Islamic country on the heels of the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Andrew Natsios, the special U.S. envoy to Sudan, said the U.S. has agreed to a request by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon for a two- to four-week delay in imposing unilateral sanctions against Sudan so negotiations can take place on whether Sudan will accept deployment of international peacekeepers for Darfur.

Natsios said the U.S. is contemplating sanctions against 29 Sudanese companies. He said they are the type of sanctions that have been imposed with some success against Iran and North Korea.

If the sanctions are applied on the Sudanese companies, he said, they could lead to the paralysis of some of their operations.

``It will have an affect on the economy,'' Natsios said in testimony to the committee.

Biden, of Delaware, and other senators expressed impatience with the lack of progress on Darfur four years after civil strife broke out between Arab and black tribes in the western Sudanese region.

Sudan's government has agreed to the initial stages of the proposed deployment. But President Omar al-Bashir has rejected full deployment, concerned that Sudanese sovereignty will be violated and the troops will arrest Sudanese officials suspected of authorizing war crimes.

Everyone's been screaming that we don't have enough troops and now he want's to plant 2500 (LESS THEN WE'VE LOST IN IRAQ) alone in a warzone the bloody size of France? Is he insane or just trying to get 2500 troops killed?

I dearly wish to stop the madness occuring in Sudan but bluntly put sending a token force of troops into this won't help at all and just increase the death count. Our effective allies would I believe desire to help but how can they without abadoning Iraq or Afghanistan? Our less than effective allies would just be meat for the grinder.

[Cpl Kendall]

Well Canada's got nothing to send unless we want to start waving the one year manditory break that every soldier is supposed to get between tours. African Union troops? Well you get what you pay for, I don't expect them to have any meaningful effect at all.

[Josh]

Just be thankful that he torpedoed his presidential campaign on day one.

[frigidmagi]

Well Canada's got nothing to send unless we want to start waving the one year manditory break that every soldier is supposed to get between tours.

No offense meant but I suspect that you would have to withdraw from Afghanistan as well. Either that or start expanding the Canadian military to a larger size then it seems the population is willing to support.

African Union troops? Well you get what you pay for, I don't expect them to have any meaningful effect at all.

From what I've heard... AU troops make UN Peacekeepers look good. Yes that's pretty damn bad. Plus these 2500 would be US troops fighting Arabic muslims, it would be damn stupid of us to think it wouldn't attract jihad fighters looking to score easy kills (Al-Q leaders admit to over 12,000 causalities in Iraq not counting suidice bombers, that means they've paid at least 4 for 1 to kill service members) on the US. Any ally that joined this forlorn hope would have to take that into account.

[Cpl Kendall]

No offense meant but I suspect that you would have to withdraw from Afghanistan as well. Either that or start expanding the Canadian military to a larger size then it seems the population is willing to support.

We're expanding the CF from 60,000 to 75,000 but running into a recruiting crisis at the moment. Time will tell if we get the numbers or not. Recent attempts to attract educated recruits by giving them their Corporals and a signing bonus upon completion of trades training has met with widespread resentment and resistance.

From what I've heard... AU troops make UN Peacekeepers look good. Yes that's pretty damn bad. Plus these 2500 would be US troops fighting Arabic muslims, it would be damn stupid of us to think it wouldn't attract jihad fighters looking to score easy kills (Al-Q leaders admit to over 12,000 causalities in Iraq not counting suidice bombers, that means they've paid at least 4 for 1 to kill service members) on the US. Any ally that joined this forlorn hope would have to take that into account.

Most UN troops are drawn from shit nations anyhow. Bangladesh and Malaysia don't have the best troops for example. What was the nation in East Timor who's troops were raping goats?

[Dartzap]

Lets just hope that Blair/Brown don't do something stupid and deploy British troops there. The last time British Soldiers were in the Sudan..things reaaaallllyy didn't go very well, and, as you know, these people tend to have rather long memories.


That, and the fact we don't have enough troops anyway.

[frigidmagi]

And you've been cutting your forces down since the invasion.

[Dartzap]

And you've been cutting your forces down since the invasion.

Yeah, and not to mention the several thousand troops who have gone AWOL as well....

[frigidmagi]

You got a source for thousands there man?

[Dartzap]

You got a source for thousands there man?

Recent BBC Panorama show - something around 2300 men have got AWOL in the last two years. I'll try and find if there's any of it online....

[frigidmagi]

That's about 2% roughly of your army. Whose offical strength is somewhere around 100,000, or so.

[Dartzap]

BBC Panorama

Army fails 'traumatised' soldiers
Soldiers are going absent without leave (AWOL) because the army cannot cope with those suffering combat stress, the BBC has learned.

A Panorama investigation has discovered that frontline trauma is one of the main reasons soldiers turn deserter.

Academic Steven Walker, from the University of Essex, says army support services are over-stretched and a culture change is needed in army attitudes to soldiers with mental health problems.

One soldier who is permanently on the run told the BBC anything was preferable to serving in Iraq.



According to some analysts, there are an estimated 2,700 incidents a year of soldiers going AWOL either temporarily or permanently.

An estimated 1,100 are currently on the run, some since 2001.

The Ministry of Defence said this figure was now about 2,300 a year, compared with 2,700 in 2004.

Mr Walker, who has interviewed ex-soldiers, said soldiers left traumatised by service in Iraq were not deterred from going AWOL.

"The nature of the conflict is stressful - soldiers work inside civilian populations where they don't really know who the enemy is.

"The young soldiers I interviewed had traumatic experiences in Iraq and developed emotional and mental health problems that weren't acknowledged or dealt with properly and that prompted them to go AWOL," he said.




One of the 1,100 soldiers on the run tracked down by Panorama said the change in his state of mind alarmed his friends on his return from Iraq.

"My friends were like you're in a mess man," he told the BBC. He admits that avoiding the authorities and military police is making him paranoid, but added, "As bad as my life is constantly on the run, I wouldn't be able to accept going back to Iraq or Afganistan."

Richie Livingston, from Glasgow, went AWOL after a childhood friend and fellow soldier was killed in Iraq.

He tried a drugs overdose and was later found carving his friend's name into his own chest with a scalpel.

Mental health

Richie told an army psychiatrist who said he was fit to return to duty.

He then went AWOL again.

"I felt they did not pay attention to what was going on and they thought I was basically putting it on," he said.

But not everyone is convinced that mental health issues drive soldiers to go AWOL.

'Immature soldiers'

Amayas Godfrey, former captain and intelligence officer with two tours of duty in Iraq, had first hand experience of runaway soldiers.

"In my experience why the majority of soldiers went absent without leave was down to the fact that they were young, inexperienced and sometimes immature and they didn't know how to face their problems.

"They didn't know they could go to their commander and say 'I'm really worried about my wife or the situation with my parents.'

"Usually they react badly and say 'It is all too much and I'm not going to come back.'"

Speaking on behalf of the Ministry of Defence, Col John Donnelly said the number of soldiers going AWOL was reducing and most of the cases involved family issues.

He rejected suggestions that frontline trauma caused soldiers to desert: "There's nothing we have that will suggest it is a particularly big issue."

Col Donnelly added: "We make great demands on our people but we also put in place a very strong welfare network to support the soldiers who need to take advantage of it."

The Ministry of Defence issued the following statement on Monday 26 March before transmission of Panorama but while the story was running on BBC News.

"It has been inaccurately reported in the media that mental health problems caused by operations in Iraq have had a detrimental impact on absent without leave (AWOL) rates within the British Army.

"In fact, operations in Iraq have had no discernable impact on the overall AWOL rate. The number of new AWOL cases has declined over the past two years. In 2006, the military had its lowest number of AWOL cases for seven years.

"There are a number of reasons why soldiers go AWOL, but current evidence suggests that most incidents are caused by soldiers' domestic circumstances, such as difficulties with families or partners. Confidential advice is available to all soldiers from the Army Confidential Support Line on 0800 731 4880.

"The Army has a comprehensive welfare structure in place that provides practical and emotional assistance for soldiers and their dependants. This includes direct access to mental health services, including 15 military Departments of Community Mental Health, across the UK and overseas.

"Some individuals abscond on multiple occasions. As a result, the total number of AWOL cases is higher than the number of individuals who go AWOL."

[Cpl Kendall]

While I don't doubt that some soldiers that go AWOL are shitbags (I've met plenty of shitbags myself, though none went AWOL), I have to wonder why the US and UK are having such trouble with keeping up with the mental health problems of their soldiers while Canada and Australia are doing relatively well. Part of the UK's problem may be traditional, soldiers with mental health problems were for the longest time considered malingerers. But what's the US's excuse beyond crippling red tape?

[frigidmagi]

But what's the US's excuse beyond crippling red tape?

There are several reasons, I do not feel they are good excuses for the failures but they are there.

Size: At over 1 million people under arms sheer size is an issue. To be blunt there are alot more of us in the danger zones. This is not to degrade the contribution of allies, merely an observation of the populations involved. There are more Americans than Canadians (30mil) and Australians (20 mil) combined, therefore it makes perfect sense that there are more Americans and therefore more Americans suffering from these problems.

Budget Cuts: Has I have repeatly mentioned the post cold war budget cuts were not met with reductions in responisibilities in the US military. In order to preserve combat power, support groups and facilities got the shaft. Many were moved completely into the national guard or the reserves. This is not to blame past Presidents and Congresses. The current batch of leaders have expressed no interest in trying to correct this problem either by helping to bring support inferesturct back up or by reducing responsibilities.

Powell Doctrine: I'm gonna be blunt, Powell is a fucking hero and should be treated has such, got it? Okay. That said, his doctrine was of fast, massive, firepower intenstive interventions backed by shittons of allies (see Gulf War I) and the military built around that for over a decade. The current combat zones in Iraq and Afghanistan are anything but the conflicts invisioned by Powell and his officers, who were heavily influenced by their experiences during and after Vietnam. In short the infersturcture was cut because we need the money (See Budget Cuts) and we were never gonna need most of it anyways.... Right?

Transformationalist: These are the guys who believe in shiney toys over all. As such if you buy us the new set of wonder weapons you won't need to fight wars like Vietnam because you'll isolate and overwhelm all oppotents in days or weeks (see invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan, Gulf War I, Panama). Since all wars will be over quickly and everything depends on gear anyways, we don't need this silly infersturcture. (As you may guess I am not a transformationalist, I have a blog post on the matter, if you like PM me and I'll link you to it).

Any Questions?