Blogotional

The crisis in Darfur is extreme, and unfortunately without simple solution. On Monday, I presented a list of resources that can help you come to understand the conflict in general. This site provides an introduction to the humanitarian crisis and notes

There is a crisis in Darfur. As with all wars the fighting has resulted in a humanitarian crisis. This crisis has escalated as the conflict spiralled out of control. The April 2004 humanitarian ceasefire has allowed for vital international access to those communities severely affected by the war. This is only a stopgap.

In other words the solution to the humanitarian crisis is to resolve the underlying political conflict.

I am not sure those in the West can understand the roots of a conflict like this one. It is really about hatred. In the West we war out of self-interest. That's not what is going on here, in my opinion. This, much like the conflict in the Balkans where I have been, is about one side thinking that the other side is not worthy of life, so they try to take it. Oh sure, the aggressor usually sees some material benefit from the conflict, but from their perspective it is a side effect, not the reason.

That's why I think the UN is really making a muddle of this. Negotiated solutions only work if you can give both sides at least part of what they want. If all one side wants is for the other side to die, negotiated peace usually won't work. That also means that from the perspective of the aggressor, there is no humanitarian crisis, that's just a means to achieving their goal. If they allow aid it is only as a means to leverage something out of the international aid community.

Thus, you run into stories like this and this. The aid workers themselves become targets and pawns in the war.

So what can be done?

Well, for one thing anything that is done will be long term. It will take several generations of peace and retraining to do away with the ancient mindsets. Thus whoever it is that ultimately maintains the peace must be committed for the long term -- that takes building quite a bit of political will.

Secondly, I think that until there is significant reform in the UN; otherwise, they are going to continue to muddle through at best. The now well documented Oil For Food Scandal is likely just one symptom of a much larger dysfunction. Ultimately, I think it will take a single nation making up it's mind to fix this situation. Given he criticism the US and allies have gotten for their actions in Iraq, I think that it would be terribly difficult for them to act unilaterally in Sudan. Particularly since the proper action is probably to overthrow the existing government for a more moderate one.

So again, what do to?

This is the UN relief information for the country. Contributions are always the answer in a situation like this. I am not big on UN NGO's but they are leading the humanitarian efforts at the moment. There are also the usual suspects like World Vision and the links I gave in the Monday post.

I think; however, that Milblogger Dadmanly captured my feelings on Darfur best in this post.

God, grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

The Serenity Prayer. That's it. Cynics may dismiss the notion of such a simple concept driving major decisions with national security implications, but is it really so fantastic an idea?

Millions of Americans who have changed their lives in dramatic ways rely on this simple prayer to help them navigate between the struggles which they can overcome, and those forces and realities on the ground that are unbending to human will, or at least out of the individual's power. And so they learn sanity and readjust thinking that had run down a squirrel hole.

Had not our strategic thinking in Foreign Policy suffered from an addiction to a kind of appeasement of status quo power balances, resulting from the unique challenges that two nuclear Superpowers presented? Weren't we far too comfortable enabling the very sovereign dysfunctions, in remediation of which all our diplomatic efforts were focused?

Of course, we must do everything possible to relieve the suffering that exists in this region, but we need also know that there is much suffering that it is simply beyond our power to relieve, as painful as that realization may be.

And more, until, as Dadmanly suggests, the UN can learn to think as described in that last paragraph from the pull quote, they will be ineffective. So we need to pray the Serenity Prayer not only for our own peace of mind, but for the world's as well.