Operation Restore Hope
Feeding the hungry in Somalia may be the easy part for America. Getting out may be tougher
Even before the first marines landed in Somalia last week their presence could be felt. In the gun market in downtown Mogadishu, the price of Soviet-made AK-47s and American-made M-16s dropped from $200 each to less than $100 as some Somalis began selling off their weapons in anticipation of American disarmament. Mohammed Ragi, a 30-year-old gunman for hire, wasn't quite ready to part with his Belgian-made FAL rifle, but he was thinking about it. "If the American people come I will lay down my gun and go back to my farm," he declared.
When the United Nations Security Council voted unanimously last week to authorize a U.S.-led military relief mission to Somalia, it was with precisely that effect in mind. But even a multinational force led by an expected 28,000 American troops may find it hard to break the death grip of Somali warlords and thousands of teenage bandits. For the past two years, these parasites have raped and plundered their own country and unleashed a horrifying famine that has already killed more than 300,000 people.
But banditry is lucrative work, and Somalia's bandits are not likely to give it up easily. Ali Hersi, a fighter for the country's No. 1 warlord, Soviet-trained Gen. Mohammed Farah Aidid, explains just how lucrative: "When relief convoys leave the southern town of Baidoa, 20 bags of food from each vehicle are given to the 'technicals' "--the teenage escorts driving trucks mounted with machine guns. Other "technicals" at self-declared checkpoints are paid off along the way. When a convoy reaches a village, the local elders, the village committee and the local gunmen all take a cut. "Of the 120 bags which leave Baidoa," Hersi says, "only 20 will reach needy people."
President Bush explained his decision to send American troops to Somalia last week and issued a warning to the bandits. "Our mission is humanitarian," Bush said, "but we will not tolerate armed gangs' ripping off their own people, condemning them to death by starvation." At the same time, Bush assured the American people that the military's mission in Somalia will be both limited and brief. "This operation is not open-ended," the president declared, promising to bring American troops "home as soon as possible."
Another Beirut? But others, including Bush's own ambassador in Kenya, are less certain. "If you liked Beirut, you'll love Mogadishu," warned Ambassador Smith Hempstone in a classified and at times racist-sounding diplomatic cable obtained by U.S. News (box, Page 30). Hempstone upbraided the Bush administration for embracing what he called "the Somali tarbaby" with no "realistic plan" for getting out again.
White House officials say Bush and Joint Chiefs Chairman Colin Powell would never have accepted the Somali mission if they didn't believe it could be done quickly and at comparatively low cost. Powell predicated his endorsement on two key conditions. The first is that the military's mission in Somalia must be well-defined and of limited duration. The second is that a commitment in Somalia would not obligate the United States to attempt similar rescue missions elsewhere--particularly in Bosnia, which Powell has repeatedly warned could turn into a quagmire.
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