Give war a chance......it's not as horrible as people say it is

                                          (I can't believe I found a relevant video that is also related to current pop-culture)

"Paradoxically, an all-out civil war in Sudan may be the best way to permanently oust Mr. Bashir and minimize casualties. If a low-intensity conflict rages on, it will lead to a humanitarian disaster."

Seriously Gerard Prunier? I now imagine you're the type of person to put out a grease fire with an RPG.
You sound like an artificial intelligence robot that developed consciousness and calculated the conclusion that the only way to solve humanities problems is to eradicate humanity itself.

Polemic bullshit like this really gets on my nerves......all I hear is an endless barrage of emotionally driven irrational rhetoric that is more destructive than helpful. High-intensity conflict is not the solution. Its a nice thought, but clearly not one that has been very well though through.

For instance, how can one be sure that an all-out civil war won't simply be stretched out over a long period time with innumerable casualties on all sides? Is it really fair to throw those who may not necessarily have a desire to fight into a  full-scale war? Irrelevant of which side of the battlefield they stand on, in an all-out civil war, everyone is thrown into the line of sight. Furthermore, Prunier assumes that the dynamics of an all-out civil war is will be so simple, with one united front clashing against Bashir and his henchmen. Rather, we have long seen the complications of the group dynamics within the various conflict afflicted regions. These complications arise from distinctly differing reasons for their rebellion in the first place and more importantly, differences in their end game or vision for the conflict. For example the various Darfuri rebels have always had problems agreeing on issues. More recently, there was this. In an all-out civil war, it really wouldn't be that hard to imagine that Bashir, being true to his diabolical Bond-villain-like nature, would simply exploit these differences to cause internal clashes, thus weakening any united alliances. We've seen it happen in South Sudan with the apparent financing of rebel groups by Khartoum during and after the war.


More importantly, even if somehow the rebels were able to stay united and manage to oust Bashir.........what then? With so many differing visions of what Sudan should be, coming from a range of peoples who are typically ethnically and culturally distinct from each other, can it be assumed that they would all just sit down be able to come up with a clear plan as to how the country will be ruled and by whom? Or is it just as likely that the these various rebels representing their community will continue to fight and will continue to increase the death toll, long after Bashir is gone?

I realise that I sound extremely pessimistic......but thats because I am. I will always be pessimistic towards the war option, especially when I am still very optimistic about a peaceful option.

"The status quo is not working, regardless of what American and United Nations officials might believe."

Yes, the status quo may not be working......but that doesn't mean that we give up and simply start shooting. It means that we change the status quo. For example, Prunier argues that;

"Whenever foreign leaders demand greater respect for human rights or peace talks, Sudan always agrees, because agreeing makes the international community happy"

 Well, equally valid is the fact that foreign leaders also always promise Sudan that they would finally ease up on all the sanctions if Sudan did "X", but when Sudan does "X", foreign leaders do not follow through. More on this point here.

"Indeed, without some moral common ground, “negotiations” are merely a polite way of acquiescing to evil, especially when one’s interlocutors are pathologically incapable of respecting their own word. And in the case of a murderer like Mr. Bashir, there is no moral common ground."

Only fools hold negotiations based on moral common ground. Negotiations need to bring about mutual agreements that reflect a sense of interdependence for all parties. You can't expect people to be motivated to work together when there is no strong reason for them to do so. I think that with more time, investment/commitment from foreign leaders and with a continued preservation of hope for a peaceful solution, the war option can be kept under the bed along with all the other childish fantasies.

And in regards to Prunier himself.......it is so fucking easy for you to sit there in your armchair and talk of war when the saliency of the suffering, sacrifices and casualties of conflict is so far from your arrogant mind. Place your life and the lives of those you love on the front line and then we'll see if your strong support for war persists. In the future, be more careful with your sentiments, as your words are likely to influence the opinion of those that read it, and this world does not require anymore warmongers..........unless your solution to humanities problems is in fact to eradicate humanity itself.

............now I need to go wash the taste of hippy off my mouth.


h/t: Roving Bandit

Bow-Chika-Wow-WAR!!!!

From the BPS research blog:

Across four experiments Lei Chang and his team showed that pictures of attractive women or women's legs had a raft of war-relevant effects on heterosexual male participants, including: biasing their judgments to be more bellicose towards hostile countries; speeding their ability to locate an armed soldier on a computer screen; and speeding their ability to recognise and locate war-related words on a computer screen. Equivalent effects after looking at pictures of attractive men were not found for female participants.

The effects on the male participants of looking at attractive women were specific to war. For example, their ability to locate pictures of farmers, as opposed to soldiers, was not enhanced. Moreover, the war-priming effects of attractive women were greater than with other potentially provocative stimuli, such as the national flag. Finally, the men's faster performance after looking at women's legs versus flags was specific to war-related words, as opposed to merely aggressive words.

Now I wonder if level of attraction can alter the strength of effect.....

So I was wrong.....(updated - again) - Khartoum attacks the South

Remember how I told Roving Bandit to chill out?

Well, maybe that has changed as reports are coming in that the Northern military has just bombed an SPLA base in Northern Bahr El Ghazal.......
Stay tuned, I will hopefully have more on this later.....well, no....hopefully this all gets resolved and we never hear about it.

Update: The story has now made it to the news, though in a couple of versions:
While most reports (more)I have heard claimed that the two helicopters bombed an SPLA base, Voice of America reports that the bombings were targeting a referendum registration centre. What it is agreeable is that the attack was conducted in Northern Bahr el Ghazal by helicopters and that the North outright denies the event.

What I don't get is SAF's intentions. If they had in fact bombed a registration centre, then it could be that their intention was to scare people from going to the registration centres with the idea that they may just get bombed by helicopters. It is heavily dependent on 'availability heuristics' but is a common terror tactic.

However, if they had bombed the SPLA base for 2 hours (between 10 am and 12pm), injured 6 people and then simply went home, then I am very confused and very worried as to what piece of information is being left out of the story from either sides. The North outright denies any attack taking place and the South has yet to kick up a massive storm about the whole incident (as would typically be expected if the North openly attacked a Southern military base).

I'm not quite worried yet, just very confused and suspicious of everyone. Especially the Reuters reporter who covered the story......McDoom (she must get that all the time).

Update 2: I just got another one.....Maybe, everything happened as ST and Reuters reported, but the South has not produce such a great reaction because they are fully aware that the North is simply trying to provoke and so the South has decided to be the big man. Now the fact that I didn't interpret the event this way the first time indicates how little faith I have in either side to act maturely......either that, or being bored in post-conflict is pushing my mind to want to create conspiracy theories.

Update 3: I should really just wait until incidences are fully over before I post things.....
So it turns out the VOA story holds some truth as the 2 civilians that were injured were on their way to the registration post when they were attacked. Furthermore, the President of the South has released a statement that the South will not conduct any reprisal attacks. This is a real strong sign of hope for peace. Clearly Khartoum is aware of the international backlash that will come from an all out offensive on the South. And the South is not falling for any provocation to drag it back into a very messy war. There is somewhat of an element of the mutually assured destruction doctrine at play and hopefully it will stay in play throughout the process.

Panic averted, carry on.....