Why isn't the US helping Darfur?

Question

Why Iraq and not Darfur? There is no doubt the genocide in Darfur is worse than what the Iraqi people went though. We now know there was no immediate threat to the US from Iraq. Seems like either they have nothing to gain from Darfur so they are ignoring it, OR, they really just honestly just messed up by acting on false intelligence and don't have the resources to help Darfur because they are obliged to stay in Iraq now. I realize other countries and the UN need to step up too, but since the US was so willing to act without the UN before, shouldn't one of the worse genocides since WWII evoke swift action? Bush has repeatedly said the US is there to help the world, yet he ignores Darfur. What do you think?

No, I am not a left wing radical. My views are not partisan. I am conservative on some issues, and liberal on others. Just because you are conservative and I disagree with you on one issue doesn't make me a "radical". No one ideology will ever explain everything, that is the truth. And yes, I stand by the fact that there was no immediate threat in Iraq to go in without the UN. The US has been the #1 country to implement these rules for the world to follow, and yet they break them. The threat against the US was in Afghanistan, not Iraq. I support the mission there, it's Iraq I have trouble with.

My point is not that the US should be responsible for everyone. Obviously not. Obviously, as I said the first time, the UN and other countries should help.
WIth that said...

What I am more concerned with WHO they choose to assist and WHY. There was no immediate threat to go against UN sanctions. Therefore either the US had bad intelligence and were well meaning or they had ulterior motives. Please don't oversimplify, this isn't a partisan question.

James --> Thanks for the only balanced asnwer so far. I don't know what Britain's problem is, but I know Canada simply doesn't have the ability to invade another country. They don't have much military power, and the little they have is being used to help the US in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Answer 1

Excellent question. I can only assume it is because we have so many other irons in the fire (Iraq, Iran, North Korea, Afghanistan, etc.) and not because we are ignoring the dire situation there.

Another good question, though... where are the other nations of the world? Why is it always the USA first? Is Canada and Great Britain otherwise engaged at this time?

Answer 2

Please do remember that the USA is engaged (whether willingly or not, in the name of freedom or oil is entirely dependent on your point of view) in many other parts of the world. Honestly though I tend to think that Darfur is being ignored deliberately because it really does have nothing to offer the USA in terms of the USA's strategic goals. It once again reminds me of Rwanda in 1994 when the USA and the world ignored the poor Tutsis in that nation until 800000 of them murdered. Rwanda, just like Darfur means nothing to the USA's overall national interests. You can also say that the US will not go to Darfur because with the problems in Iraq and Afghanistan (and recently North Korea) the US is not willing to go to another place which could end in a repeat of "Blackhawk Down". And while we are at it where is the UN...while the USA may not care about Darfur, as representative of the civilized world the UN should at least motion people to act because it has the imperative to do so...yet for some reason are not doing it. Yes...its looking a lot again like 1994.

Answer 3

Afghanistan was for Revenge, Iraq was for the Oil. Darfur has no natural resources the world cares about; so why risk it? The liberal elitists will give a bunch of lip service just like the Konservatives, but niether side will take any real or substainial action.

Answer 4

If you want to help, Get a plane ticket and go. Hell, I'll let you borrow my gun if you wish. There are A hell of a lot of other nations in the world and in Africa who could do something if they wished. Go ask Egypt or South Africa? Or France or Italy? Frankly the last time we went to Africa did not go so well. ( see Black hawk down) Let somebody elses troops pick up the slack for a change. And we have not ignored Darfur. The problem is the we can find any one else to do the job or care. I think between taking care of tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes, Kosovo, Bosnia, Afganistan, Iraq and New Orleans we have done more than our fair share of helping others.

Answer 5

The biggest issue with Darfur is the lack of any sort of idea on how to do something that would make any real long-term difference.

Everybody keeps saying that we should do 'something' - but we need some sort of realistic plan that addresses the realities of the situation (such as logistics).

Hint: Look at a map and ask yourself - how would we get food, fuel, ammunition and parts over there to support the number of troops that Darfur would require.

Answer 6

assisting in Darfur will be for humanitarian applications. Had the reason we invaded Iraq been for some noble reason like status up for human rights, truly of a lie then i do not imagine such an excellent style of people would have a situation with that one both, even if the ends do not continually justify the skill.

Answer 7

The UN ruled that while there are murders & rapes, it was not a genocide. It was a large slave trade area & only the size of 1/3 of Texas. Until it is classified as genocide, we will not stretch ourselves further. We have issues to watch with Iran & North Korea, plus troops fighting in Afghanistan & Iraq. Dafur will have to wait. There are lost of dangerous countries to their citizens including Mexico.

Answer 8

The USA is sending food and medicine, but Muslim murderers are robbong the shipments before they get to the needy. The UN, and the African Union do not want the USA interefering into the matter because they know that we would put a stop to the genocide.

Left wing radicals are afraid that Bush would protect the Christians who are being slaughtered. They are fearful of starting a war.

Iraq? no immediate threat? Are you a LWR/

Answer 9

I don't think the USA should be responsible for every solving crisis in the world. How about the Muslim countries putting pressure on the Muslim people causing this problem. I don't think they will because if you don't convert to Islam you die as is going on in Darfur.

Answer 10

(apologies for the dyslexic spelling.. Yahoo's checker wouldn't work and it didn't support Googles well either)

The US is helping in Darfur... The US is an open market capitalist representative republic. What that means is the the Government unlike in Socialist or Communist systems is not the sole owner of the economic power.

The US as a nation is donating millions of dollars through charities to Darfur. One of the often missed problems with Official US aid is that is has to go through Official channels.

It is given from the US goverment to the local government. In many cases this aid is converted to cash to keep opressive goverments in power and makes the problem worse.

Private aid can be given to charities on the ground helping people.

The US is helping Dafur.. I bet the US is the number one supplier of aid. As to fixing the political problems that is another question.

The honest truth is Dafur is a human tragedy, it is not a threat to world stability. The US right now is trying to figure out how to create a long-term future in the unstable Middle East because its two major exports do affect the world and if you screw the US / World Economy.. that will also affect the flow of donations to places like Dafur.

The middle east exports oil and terrorism. Oil flows best from stable systems and Terroism suffers when people feel they have options provided by stable democracies. No one can know the success, but the mess in Iraq is about remodling a key nation into a place where people have options, so that it makes less and less sense to sacrifice ones self to make a point.

If it works others will want it just like we saw in the 80's when the Soviet model collapsed. And while there are many factors, look to Poland's workers challenging the communists power and wining to being the start of a change of mindset across Eastern Europe. That is what the US hopes Iraq can be for the middle east. I don't know if it will work. I can only hope.

The human lives in Dafur are as valuable as any one the planet, however their politlcal problems are not as dangerious to the planet. Thus the ultimate extended risk to lives globally is lower. Thus fixing the political system by force is a much lower priority.

To answer the sub questions about Iraq:

1) There were mulitple stores of non-WMD weapons the size of Manhattan Island. Iraq was always a threat to a key region

2) There were labs found working on deploying nerve agents in perfume bottles and food. See the DUELFER report. Iraq had long been supporting terrorism in the middle east. And they were willing to have Al Qaeda working in Iraq even if there wasn't a top level agreement between Sadam and Osama. and no I have never seen nor assumed Iraq directly supported 911. I am informed in my opinions

3) The world thought Iraq had active stores of WMD beceause Iraq wanted them too. Iraq's own military until the US invasion assumed they too had them.

4) Iraq is a threat to the US if you can think beyond a Miltion Bradly RISK game board. Iraq sits dead center of a key energy researve that if cut off would though the world economies into chaos and that would clearly dry up free capital being sent to places like Dafur. And would trigger larger scale conflicts fighting over dimished resources.

5) Iraq is in the center of an area spawning terrorism due to a meeting of extreme political and religious philosphies and no open Islamic democracies before Iraq. Iraq was probably more about creating a model for stable open goverment in the middle east as it was about WMD. But many assumed the self-centered US public would only support serious action to protect itself now, not a long-term plan to change a region

6) Iraq's government fell easily and the problems persist because it has degenerated into local guerilla warfare, Darfur is already there...battles of this kind as we are seeing in Iraq are not easy to win or manage. At least in Iraq the new Goverment is working to be the solution, it is not the problem.

7) There are no easy answers, nor do simple assumptions work. The US is helping Dafur, just in a different way than it is working in places like Iraq.

8) Under UN sanctions and the corrupt Oil for Food Program.. over 100,000 Iraqis died each year, 60,000 of them young children accourding to UNICEF numbers do to conditions or direct actions of the regime. Iraqibodycount.net puts casualties over the three years of since the US liberation of Iraq at 39,000 to 43,000. That means uisng these numbers an UN numbers prior to 2003. There are likely over 200,000 more living Iraqis now than if we had left it as is, and while the Duelfer report didn't find large WMDs stores, it clearly found the moment sanctions would have been removed Saddam was ready to start WMD again, meaing the choices were:
1) Remove Saddam
2) Continue to let him run Iraq as a poor dungeon and watch 100,000 plus die needlessly each year
3) lift sanctions reduce death in Iraq until he rebuilt his WMD and then be fored to do #1 when he next used WMD again.

It wasn't all parks and kite flying as Michael Moore's lies would have you believe.

Hate Bush..fine by me, the man has lots of flaws.. but understand the real problems and costs continuing to let Iraq fester would have meant. We replaced a giant silent mess with a big well reported mess. Things are not as good as they should be, they are better than they were...