The Solutions News

Will Ethiopia be the next Afghanistan?

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Pinterest
Pocket
WhatsApp

By Lawrence Freeman

On August 27 in the midst of global display of the limits of American power in Afghanistan, the Washington Post editorial board called on President Joe Biden to issue additional sanctions against Ethiopia. The Post asserted that the government of Ethiopia is responsible for atrocities including civilian massacres, using rape as a weapon, and “causing the world’s worst hunger crisis in a decade.” No proof was provided other than reports from Amnesty International and comments by Samantha Power, Chief of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Readers of the Post editorial are expected to have accepted all the allegations by the media against Ethiopia over the last ten months as true and factual. However, a leaked video conversation by United Nations representatives in August, revealed an admission of no real evidence-data-to support the media’s unsubstantiated claim that Ethiopia used rape as a weapon of war. Also, recent reports from USAID officials, indicate that the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) have been stealing food intended to feed Ethiopians.

The editorial continued, “If Eritrean officials deserve sanctions, the U.S. government must consider them for Ethiopian government officials, too.” Conspicuously, while the Post asserts the alleged crimes of Ethiopia as genuine, they merely allude to “accusations” of atrocities by the TPLF.

Failed Foreign Interventions

It will be ill-advised for President Biden to allow Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Samantha Power, and others in his administration to lead the U.S. into another foreign disaster, after twenty years of failed interventions in the Middle East? This remains to be seen.

History often provides us with a real time juxtaposition of events that exposes an underlying reality, that might otherwise go unexamined by those who are habituated to regurgitating media induced popular opinion.

A week before the Washington Post publicly joined the public campaign to weaken the government of Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed,in favor of separatist forces, Tony Blair defended the British-U.S. disastrous Afghanistan policy. Remember, Blair was British Prime Minister and Labor Party leader from 1997-2007.

In his wordy defense for geo-political motivated interventions, Blair castigated President Biden for pulling U.S. troops out of Afghanistan. Blair arrogantly insisted that it is the responsibility of the West to intervene militarily around the world in the guise of promoting the so called democratic values. He wrote on August 21, “If the West wants to shape the 21st century, it will take commitment…we in the West represent values and interests worth being proud of defending.”

Blair attempts to justify a generation of Western intervention that has produced nothing but death, destruction, and suffering around the world.

The duo of Prime Minister Blair, President George W Bush launched the invasion into Afghanistan, under the pretext of chasing down the terrorists responsible for the “9/11” bombings in the U.S. Except that the majority of those responsible were citizens of Saudi Arabia, the geo-political ally of the U.S. in the Gulf region. Less than two years later, the U.S. invaded Iraq with claims it was searching for the non-existent weapons of mass destruction. Thousands of men, women, and children lost their lives or suffered horrible conditions because of the ill-fated Western adventure to destroy Iraq, a then relatively stable nation in the region.

Former President Obama’s overthrow and elimination of President Muammar Gaddafi almost ten years ago, purportedly to protect the Libyan people, has led to untold suffering of millions of Africans across the Sahel. This reckless intervention by Obama, transformed the nation of Libya into a failed state, and has led to an expansion of violent extremist movements throughout the nations of the Sahel; still ongoing today. Obama’s support for “regime change” against Syrian President, Bashar al-Assad, has done nothing but created more devastation in the Middle East.

How many nations dedicated to the principles of American republicanism were nurtured into existence during this generation of U.S. and Western intervention? The answer is zero. The US must help and not hurt the development agenda by the Ethiopian people. As recent events in Afghanistan have shown, power belongs to the people and not the interventionists.

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Pinterest
Pocket
WhatsApp

Never miss any important news. Subscribe to our newsletter.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recent News

Editor's Pick