Sunday, February 08, 2015

The Mess of South Sudan and the Darfur groupies

"What did happen is that some governments succeeded in creating South Sudan and some celebrities, like George Clooney and Nicholas Kristof, succeeded in making it the world's emotional petting zoo. And it has also become a cash cow for NGOs and international aid workers.

But the main thing to note here is that South Sudan was basically created because Susan Rice, now the United States National Security Advisor (?), decided that because of what happened in Rwanda, when the U.S. did nothing to prevent one of the worst genocides of recent times, that the U.S. should do more to save the world.

But South Sudan was not a good place to save the world because it is a big mess. Also, the U.S. never really wants to save the world; like every great power it seeks to accrue more power and wealth and acts primarily to protect and expands its interests. It doesn't give a shit about anything else. (See, not necessarily in chronological order, Iran, Guatemala, Vietnam, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Iraq and on and on and on. The idea that the United States has some sort of special role/mission in the world and is a unique force of good unlike any force of good previously known in human history is so laughable that no one serious could consider it, yet Barack Obama and every other president [and the entire media, from the New York Times to Ron Burgundy] treats it as an accepted fact.)"