It Is One Thing To Fact-Check Trump’s Ignorance About Omar And Somalia, But Another To Fact-Check Permanent War
Article by WN.Com Correspondent Dallas Darling
Critics and the mainstream media wasted no time fact-checking President Donald Trump’s racist and nationalistic attacks against Representative Ilhan Omar and Somalia, but another to fact check is a war economy.
To be sure, Somalia’s strategic position in the Horn of Africa, right next to assorted major sea routes, not only guaranteed America’s long-standing interest in the place but led to numerous military interventions by a permanent war economy causing a series of unprecedented refugee crises, Ilhan Omar being the victim of one.
President Trump launched into a racist and nationalistic diatribe last week against Rep. Omar (D-Minn.), saying the United States was not her country and mocking her birthplace. “She’s telling us how to run our country! He said at a rally in Pennsylvania. “How did you do where you came from? How is your country doing?” (1) Rep. Omar was born in Somalia and immigrated to America as a child when her family fled the violence there. Both her and the media fact-checked the president, reminding him that she has been a US citizen for 20 years.
Fact-Checking Permanent War
It is one thing to fact-check President Trump’s ignorance about international affairs and racist remarks, but another to fact-check a permanent war economy and military interventions that tear a country in two. America’s first major involvement in Somalia occurred as early as 1977 during the Cold War. As war broke out between rival ethnic groups, the U.S. used it as a pretext to offer support to one group in the form of military advisers and weapons in gaining a foothold to counter the Soviet Union and guard its strategic interests in the Persian Gulf.
During the 1980s, the US fueled more violence in the region by supplying arms to assorted militias and guerillas, some of them clan-based, which led to the total collapse of Somalia.
Operation Eastern Exit not only involved a series of chaotic battles to get US diplomats out of the country, but to embed military advisors into certain tribal factions to ensure Somalia remained under America’s control. Somalia turned more violent and chaotic for a short time with people starving, until UN relief operations in the country arrived and improved the situation.
With fighting on the wane, the harvest looking good, and famine nearly over in Somalia-thanks to the Red Cross, there was talk in Washington of cutting war spending to provide a “peace dividend” in the wake of the Cold War. The US suddenly decided Somalia represented a threat to international peace and pushed through the UN Security Council a resolution to send troops. Washington, consequently, sends the Marines to wage gun battles in the streets with tribal clans, killing hundreds to rid Somalia of an evil “warlord.”
The last remaining superpower moreover assaulted hospitals, bombarded political meetings, shot into protesting crowds, and bulldozed homes to make free fire zones. In the meantime, they encounter Somalis, who raise shoes over their head in a ritual gesture of contempt, showing their invaders a sea of heels, and yell in broken English: “Go home!” and “Murderers!” (2) Whiles Americans only see images of jeering crowds dragging two dead Marines through the dusty streets, General Colin Powell comments that the invasion is great for public relations.
Fact-Checking a War Economy
The invasion was also great for America’s permanent war economy. Not only did Wall Street and defense contractors profit from the sale of weapons to tribal factions in Somalia, but they earned trillions of dollars by supplying advanced weaponry systems and other war related materials to the Pentagon and its outpost in Somalia. The US later linked Somalia to the 9/11 attacks and Global War on Terror, declaring the country a haven for jihadists. The US continues to man military posts as it battles Islamist clans like al-Shabaab and Somali pirates in the region.
President Trump has repeatedly showed his ignorance of both Somalia and Rep. Omar-including three other women of color serving in Congress who are formally known as “The Squad,” telling her last hear to “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places,” adding that “you can’t leave fast enough.”
The attacks drew condemnation from Democrats and Republicans alike, revealing a weak-minded leader who attacks a person instead of debating policies.
The end of America’s “peace dividend” and rise of a permanent war economy and its continued military presence in Somalia and many other places is rarely criticized, let alone fact-checked. This past year, the US has secretly stepped up its war in Somalia by conducting at least 39 airstrikes in Somalia, killing more innocent civilians in the process. Amnesty International reported the deaths of 14 civilians in just five airstrikes that it was able to investigate. The US has acknowledged 131 lethal air strikes in Somalia since 2007. (3)
The civil war in Somalia that Rep. Omar fled when she was eight was largely the result of the US and its long-standing policy to dominate the region through military interventions, and its need for America’s arms industries to profit from supplying weapons-no matter how many innocent civilians are killed or how many refugees like Rep. Omar are created. Since 2006, the US has given Somalia $3 billion a year, most of it in military aid. In 1993 when the US sent Marines, 10,000 Somalis were killed. (4) Starvation has led to the deaths of at least 265,000. (5)
If Only Refugees Could Vote
Rep. Ilhan fired back saying,
“Firstly, this is my country and I am a member of the House that impeached you. Secondly, I fled civil war when I was eight. An eight-year-old doesn’t run a country even though you run our country like one.”
She then added: “This refugee is going to vote you out of office.” But not only is President Trump running the country like an eight-year-old, so is Wall Street, the Pentagon, and arm manufacturers. If refugees fleeing America’s war economy and interventions could vote in our elections, all three would be voted out.
Dallas Darling (darling@wn.com)
(2) Smith, Michael K. Portraits of Empire. Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press, 2003., p. 297.
(4) https://www.nytimes.com/1993/12/08/world/somali-war-casualties-may-be-10000.html.
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