Keep Your Eyes on Sudan!!! We Have Boots on the Ground. Jihad Threat!

As some of you may remember, Obama deployed 100 or so US Spec. Ops forces in Uganda back in October in an effort to capture or kill Joseph Kony, leader of the LRA. Obama signed a law into effect to support this action back in May 2010 (Lord's Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act of 2009).

Thread on that topic
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Since that deployment, not much has been said as to the operation at hand in a volatile region that is ripe for the harvest of its natural resources (oil, ore and minerals)

Fast forward to Yesterday and this notice from the State Department. (Remember that the Obama Doctrine is now in full swing as dictated by the Responsibility to Protect group that is steering the UN, Obama and NATO).

The briefing from Ambassador Princeton Lyman, Special Envoy for Sudan

One of the issues that we are extremely concerned about is the situation in the states of Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile. These are states in the Republic of Sudan; that is, the North. But a conflict has been raging there since last May, arising from issues never fully resolved in the civil war because people in those states, particularly in the Nuba Mountains, fought with the South. And though they remained in the North, their issues were to be resolved in a process called popular consultations. Those did not get finished and a conflict broke out. A very serious armed conflict broke out last year.

Now, what we are very concerned about right now is that there are predictions of a major humanitarian crisis in those areas, particularly Southern Kordofan. You know there’s this predictive mechanism called FEWS NET, the Famine Early Warning System Network. They – if you go on their website, you’ll see they have produced two maps, one the situation now – excuse me – and one predicting for March. By March, they feel that a large number of people, a quarter of a million or more, will be – will reach what they call emergency status, which is one short of famine. And this is very alarming to us.


We have strongly urged the Government of Sudan to allow international humanitarian aid – that is, World Food Program, UNICEF, et cetera – to come in, in all parts, across lines of whoever’s holding territory. They have refused to do so. They don’t want international involvement in this area, which they think is an internal matter and a conflict area. But we have been saying and saying to our African partners that we just can’t – the world can’t stand by and watch famine take place in an area, and know nothings being done.

Keep in mind the daring rescue of two hostages(One American) the other day by our Navy Seals who are clearly in that Region and remain highly mobile. Those hostages are now out of harms way.

OIL, OIL, OIL Things are heating up

So we’ve been working very hard, leading up the Africa Union meeting at the end of this month, to urge the Government of Sudan to open up international access and to do so soon. We’re under a lot of pressure if that doesn’t happen to look at other alternatives, but they all contain serious risks in doing so. So our preferred alternative – very far first alternative – is for the Government of Sudan to do this. The UN has made proposals to the government, but they haven’t been accepted yet.

The second issue that I would like to touch on is a – ongoing negotiation and dispute between Sudan and South Sudan over the distribution of oil revenues and financing. You’ll recall that after the secession of the South, 70 percent of the oil was in the South but all the infrastructure for exporting it – pipelines, et cetera – are in the North. So the two countries really are dependent on each other in the oil sector. It was also understood that when the North, now the Republic of Sudan, lost that much revenue there would be a transitional financial arrangement in which the South would ease that transition.

They’ve been negotiating and arguing over this for some time. The negotiations reached a very serious point in the last few weeks when the Republic of Sudan, in the North, began to divert Southern oil from the pipeline and to block ships with Southern oil from leaving the port, claiming this is a way to collect transit fees that they claim the South wasn’t paying. And they imposed a fee of $32 a barrel, which is quite high, for that.

After negotiations, which are still going underway, failed to reach an agreement, South Sudan said, okay, we’re going to shut off the oil, we’re going to start closing the wells, and we’ll suffer until we build a new pipeline through Kenya but we just can’t take this anymore; they’re stealing our oil.

Famine and Calamity on the Horizon

QUESTION: And what are some of the environmental factors that may have led to this near-famine situation?

AMBASSADOR LYMAN: Two things in particular. The nature of the conflict – the Sudanese armed forces has done a great deal of bombing, and the bombing has hit the civilian population and has prevented them from planting this last year. It also forced many of them to live in caves rather than be able to tend their farms, et cetera. So they lost the planting season.

And second, because international access hasn’t been allowed, all the stocks that were there from the World Food Program, UNICEF, et cetera, are exhausted. So those two factors are the main ones.

There’s about 50,000 refugees in South Sudan and Ethiopia already from these two areas, but we see in these predictions a quarter of a million people or more who might be affected. This could be a major, major calamity. And for Africa, it seems to me this is something that shouldn’t be tolerated.

Our troops were rapidly pulled from Iraq for a Reason!!

Obama has a Responsibility to Protect. www.responsibilitytoprotect.org...

Did I mention Oil?? The door will open under the guise of humanitarian aid

I only have the general outlines of the proposal. They’re being presented today to the parties. But my information is that this proposal will address the basic concerns of the North and South; that is, how to assure that there’s enough oil for the refinery in the North, which is a major concern of theirs, and a prospect of this transitional assistance while recognizing that the South has a legitimate claim about all this diverted oil and that has to be costed, and that the fees for transit are – that there’s a mutual basis for determining those.

I haven’t seen the details of the proposal. We think it’s going to address all these things, and we hope once it’s on the table that both sides will refrain from these kind of unilateral steps.

Let me just say one more thing on the humanitarian issue, because I’ve told you what I think are the arguments from Sudan, but let me tell you the arguments we have advanced on the other side. We think it would look very bad for the Government of Sudan to deny international assistance when the world is watching and a major famine could take place. We don’t think this is in the interest of the Government of Sudan, it’s not in their interest in world opinion, it’s not in the interest of them as a protector of their own citizens. These are all their own citizens.

m.state.gov...

continued

Second, we think that – and this goes beyond the immediate humanitarian situation – ultimately there has to be a political solution here. They have fought in the Nuba Mountains before during the civil war. It never ended. So it – there has to be eventually a political solution. Making the humanitarian gesture now may create an atmosphere for that, but the most important is for the government to recognize they have this responsibility and the world will respond positively if they say yes, we have this responsibility, we’ll bring in agencies that we can trust – World Food Program and UNICEF, and monitor – and have it monitored and do the right thing.

QUESTION: I’m just wondering if you could tell us a little bit about your – the tenor of your conversation with Khartoum these days. I mean, we have another report this morning that aircraft, presumably Sudanese aircraft, have bombed a refugee camp in South Sudan. This seems to be recurring practice. How are you reacting to that, and what’s your message to them? And are they – what are they telling you?

AMBASSADOR LYMAN: Well, we are concerned about this. This is the second bombing of a refugee camp in South Sudan. It violates all the rules regarding refugees. And we have raised that, raised that in the UN Security Council as well as with the government in Khartoum. Their reaction has been mixed on the first incident. I haven’t seen their reaction to this incident yesterday. But they went through a number of explanations on the last one, which – some of which were not credible, et cetera.

This is, again, as we’ve said to the government in Khartoum, an example of why this war is bad for everybody. And bombing South Sudan is only going to aggravate the situation. The Republic of Sudan claims that South Sudan is feeding this rebellion, and if that were stopped, the rebellion would end. That’s just not accurate. Even if there were assistance from the South, that isn’t what’s at the heart of this conflict.

m.state.gov...

It is a delicate situation in that region and we already have boots on the ground who have been "hunting down" Kony. What else have they been doing? We certainly know that they have been training the locals and developing strategies as they lay in wait for the next big call from Obama.

This is the course that Obama has planned for our military.

Now there are new threats of Jihad based on our pending actions in Sudan. They see us as occupiers.

Sources are reporting that Americans should expect to be in the bull’s-eye of jihad, once again, after Islamist leaders and terrorist groups have been quoted saying they are likely to oppose any foreign forces intervening in Sudan, according to a report by Ryan Mauro in Joseph Farah’s G2 Bulletin.

And Obama administration officials have confirmed to press outlets the U.S. is planning a humanitarian intervention in the Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile provinces within weeks.

Islamist leaders repeatedly have accused the West of trying to divide Sudan in order to weaken the Muslim world.

Sheikh Yousef al-Qaradawi, a leading Muslim Brotherhood cleric, also released a fatwa ordering Muslims to vote against independence for South Sudan, which became a new country on July 9.

He accused the West of “seeking [the] separation and partition” of the Muslim world.

The Shariah Association of Scholars and Preachers in Sudan said, “Zionist Western” enemies were trying to conquer the Islamic world and that “it is unlawful to cede any part of Sudan’s land, which belongs to the whole ummah [Muslim world].”

www.wnd.com...

Interesting point to note that the Muslim Brotherhood now holds the majority of power in Egyptian Parliament and we opened the door for that.

I don't like how this is developing....

A little more on the R2P group and the International Crisis Group that now seems to be calling the shots around the world.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

One more thing to be aware of brought to you by the International Crisis Group. Parent of R2P.

Also from yesterday this pairs well with the State Dept. briefing

Somalia’s growing Islamist radicalism is spilling over into Kenya. The militant Al-Shabaab movement has built a cross-border presence and a clandestine support network among Muslim populations in the north east and Nairobi and on the coast, and is trying to radicalise and recruit youth from these communities, often capitalising on long-standing grievances against the central state. This problem could grow more severe with the October 2011 decision by the Kenyan government to intervene directly in Somalia. Radicalisation is a grave threat to Kenya’s security and stability. Formulating and executing sound counter-radicalisation and de-radicalisation policies before it is too late must be a priority. It would be a profound mistake, however, to view the challenge solely through a counter-terrorism lens.

Because of the policy immediacy relating to Kenya’s intervention in Somalia, this briefing focuses on Kenyan Somali radicalisation. The growth of Islamic extremism among Kenyan and Tanzanian Muslims on the coast will be the subject of a future study. The recommendations, nonetheless, apply to all of Kenya.

www.crisisgroup.org...

BOOM!

The White House said the U.S. forces will join the United Nations mission in the capital of Juba and focus on strategic planning and operations. They are not expected to engage in combat operations, but will be armed for personal protection.

Obama issued a memorandum Tuesday declaring that the U.S. officers could not be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court during their deployment because South Sudan is not a party to the ICC. The White House said prior administrations used similar designations when sending U.S. forces to United Nations missions in Haiti and Liberia.

The first of the small group of U.S. forces is expected to depart for South Sudan later this week. The Pentagon said there were no plans to expand the U.S. contribution to the U.N. mission.

Isn't this how it always starts out??

More talk of oil again by Obama's administration

The U.S. strongly supported South Sudan's drive for independence and sought to boost the fledgling nation, in part through agriculture assistance and private investment. The Obama administration also has authorized American investment in South Sudan's oil sector.

The small deployment of U.S. forces to South Sudan is in contrast to Obama's decision in October to send about 100 U.S. troops to Africa to help fight the Lord's Resistance Army guerrilla group in Uganda and elsewhere in Central Africa. The bulk of that deployment was of special operations troops to provide security and combat training to African units as they tried to hunt down the LRA's leader, Joseph Kony.

www.boston.com...

Official Decree

MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF STATE

SUBJECT: Certification Concerning U.S. Participation in the United Nations Mission in South Sudan Consistent with Section 2005 of the American Servicemembers' Protection Act

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and consistent with section 2005 of the American Servicemembers' Protection Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-206; 22 U.S.C. 7421 et seq.), concerning the participation of members of the Armed Forces of the United States in certain United Nations peacekeeping and peace enforcement operations, I hereby certify that members of the U.S. Armed Forces participating in the United Nations Mission in South Sudan are without risk of criminal prosecution or other assertion of jurisdiction by the International Criminal Court (ICC) because the Republic of South Sudan is not a party to the ICC and has not invoked the jurisdiction of the ICC pursuant to Article 12 of the Rome Statute.

You are authorized and directed to publish this determination in the Federal Register.

BARACK OBAMA

www.whitehouse.gov...

Can we please get out of the U.N.now ? please?
Where's "Cindy Sheehan (and the rest of the antiwar protestors) now?

Originally posted by 46ACE
Can we please get out of the U.N.now ? please?
Where's "Cindy Sheehan (and the rest of the antiwar protestors) now?

edit on 26-1-2012 by 46ACE because: (no reason given)

how about...

can we please get out of the middle east? why cant we just leave those people alone? they are a world away from us...

besides the only terrorists attacks we've ever had came from OUR OWN government!

Originally posted by k1k1to

Originally posted by 46ACE
Can we please get out of the U.N.now ? please?
Where's "Cindy Sheehan (and the rest of the antiwar protestors) now?

edit on 26-1-2012 by 46ACE because: (no reason given)

how about...

can we please get out of the middle east? why cant we just leave those people alone? they are a world away from us...

besides the only terrorists attacks we've ever had came from OUR OWN government!

Sudan is not the Middle East. Obama is closing the doors on the middle east and moving his attention to Central Africa and eastward out to the Horn. In 6 months you'll never know that we ever had troops in Iraq. The tide is shifting rapidly. Just look at the upheaval in Egypt, Libya and Syria. We have new oil interests to explore in a new realm that needs to be secured in order to harvest the resources. It's changing faster than I ever thought it would.

Afghanistan will soon be a distant memory also. All those years, lives lost and soldiers maimed for life for nothing.

And so it goes. Spec. Ops are going to be very busy in months to come. We have more hostages to free in Somalia before things really heat up. MIddle East?? I don't think so.

The U.S. Navy is working to place a 'mothership' for Special Operations Forces in the Middle East, Fox News confirms.

The USS Ponce, which was most recently being used as a dock in the Mediterranean Sea for the Libyan operation, was scheduled to be decommissioned in December. Navy officials now tell Fox News that the ship will be transformed into a flotilla to be used by Navy SEALs.

The move comes in response to a standing request from the U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, to the Pentagon for the base. The commando teams will be able to to use it for high speed boats and helicopters.

A market survey posted by the Military Sealift Command in December asked that ship be able to support mine counter measures.

Sea mines are a concern in the Strait of Hormuz should Iran make good on its threats to close the vital oil passage way, an official told Fox News.

The ship could be ready in four to five months time, officials said.

The U.S. Special Operations Command has sought a transportable floating base for several years, The Washington Post reports.

The 'mothership' would reportedly help expand the range of commando squads operating from small speedboats in remote coastal areas, The Washington Post reports.

Read more: www.foxnews.com...