Joe Biden Chooses His Civil Wars

Originally posted at Maggie's Notebook

Let me get this straight: Joe Biden wants us out of Iraq because

"...we cannot sustain 150,000 Americans in Iraq without extending deployment times, sending soldiers on fourth and fifth tours, or mobilizing the National Guard. Even if we could, our large military presence -- while still the only guarantor against a total breakdown -- is increasingly counterproductive..."

and he wants our military forces in Darfur to

"...end the suffering..."

and he

would use American force [in Darfur] now"

Biden

"...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."

According to Wikipedia:

Sudan has two distinct major cultures-- Arabic-speaking Black Africans and non-Arabic speaking Black Africans--with hundreds of ethnic and tribal divisions and language groups between them, which makes effective collaboration among them a major problem.

According to About.com:

Darfur is a region in Western Sudan, the vast majority of whom are black and Muslim. Darfur, roughly the size of France, is home to 8 million people, and dozens of different ethnic groups.

The most important divisions in terms of understanding the conflict in Darfur are between the sedentary farmers and the so-called "Arab" nomadic herders.

And more from About.com on political conflict in the Darfur region:

These local rebel groups, composed primarily of African Sudanese, accuse the Sudanese government of neglecting the Darfur region and of favoring Arabs over non-Arabs. Their aim is to overthrow Bashir's regime in Khartoum.

Bashir, according to About.com:

...has a strong Arab character and derives most of its support from the north of the country, which is largely Arab.

According to MSNBC news, a proposed force of 22,000 U.N. Peacekeepers and African Unions forces have been approved to be deployed to Darfur but... U.N. Secretary Gen. Ban Ki-Moon has imposed a delay to determine whether the Sudan will ACCEPT international peacekeepers.

Sudanese President Bashir is a politician. He has refused the deployment, fearing a violation of Sudanese sovereignty and fearing that he will be arrested and tried for war crimes.

Then there's the issue of rape in Darfur; alleged rape by Bashir's "Arab-militia" and alleged rape by U.N. Peacekeepers.

Back to Biden's call for American troops in Darfur: On April 3, 2007, The Weekly Standard reports

Biden is saying that Iraq is currently experiencing a civil war and that our troops should have no part in it.

and, Biden muses:

What if our troops become targets in the Iraqi civil war?

Senator Biden, are you the "decider" about who is in a civil war, and a discriminator of civil wars, now? Some are okay, some are not?

I believe Darfur is in a desperate state. They need serious help and the United States of America is more than capable of doing the job. But, oh my, can't you just hear it all now? We go in and not long after, the Left and the world will excoriate this great country. We don't go in, and nothing changes, the Left and the world will excoriate this great country. It's deja vu.

Were it not for the wussification-factor of American Liberals, we would just quietly take care of Darfur, and we would have boldly taken care of Iraq.

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