What can be done to return the Nigerian school girls home? (wage, soldiers)

[Bideshi]

Originally Posted by mountainrose

I'd like to see a group of Muslims actually try to save these girls. It's time they stand up to these Muslim atrocities that they keep saying are "hijacking" their religion. Put their action where their mouth is.

Most Moslems do not disagree that Western education teaches things contrary to the teachings of islam.

[middle-aged mom]

Originally Posted by ellemint

The U.S. and Great Britain are sending a small contingent of negotiators and hostage release experts. I think they're dreaming.

Today Boko Haram attacked a Nigerian town in which military personnel had been stationed and slaughtered over 150 people. They attacked the police station, and after the police fought them off, they bombed the roof of the station, killing all officers inside. They killed many civilians who fled from a marketplace to nearby stores; they torched the stores, burning people alive.

And we think this group will reason with negotiators? They'll sit down and talk? These are crazed terrorists who are as violent as they come---I can't see anything but military action against them succeeding.

And where is the Nigerian Government on all of this?

[kovert]

Originally Posted by kovert

"When AFRICOM was first launched, headed up by Kip Ward, an African-American, we were told that AFRICOM would be primarily concerned with humanitarian issues—digging wells and training and providing support in disaster areas. But we quickly saw with the NATO onslaught in Libya that that was led by the Africa Command. And so we see that the guise of the U.S. militarization of the African continent under humanitarianism is nothing but that, a ['ʃɪbəlɪf], let's say.

What we are clear about and understand: that the driving push, you know, for AFRICOM is for the United States to protect its strategic and economic interests on the African continent, especially in the face of competition for access to natural resources that United States in particular and the West in general is getting from China's expansion on the African continent and the economic ties that the Chinese are establishing.

And we haven't seen any indication where the Chinese would look to go in and overturn a government or back a coup in order to protect its economic interests, which just to the contrary we see, whether it's with the United States, the European nations. They will certainly go in to try and change the political equation so that it works in their benefit."

And again, NOT IN SUPPORT OF ATTACKS ON CIVILIAN NON-COMBATANTS.

More on AFRICO(LONIALIS)M.

"Two things remain to be said: first, beneath the detailed critique and response that follows lies an obvious difference of opinion that seems worth highlighting. Like a number of other TomDispatch writers, I believe that the U.S. military should not be responsible for Planet Earth; that it is not in our interest for the Pentagon to be dividing the globe, like a giant pie, into six “slices” covering almost every inch of the planet: U.S. European Command, or EUCOM (for Europe and Russia), the U.S. Pacific Command, or PACOM (Asia), CENTCOM (the Greater Middle East and a touch of North Africa), NORTHCOM (North America), SOUTHCOM (South America and most of the Caribbean), and AFRICOM (almost all of Africa). Nor should the U.S. military be garrisoning the planet in the historically unprecedented way it does. This imperial role of ours has little or nothing to do with “defense” and creates many possibilities for future blowback. Instead, it seems far more sensible to begin to shut down or cut back radically on our vast array of global bases and outposts (rather than, as in Africa, expanding them), and downsize our global mission in a major way. AFRICOM would obviously disagree, as would the Pentagon and the Obama administration, and the results of that basic disagreement about the role of the U.S. military in the world can be seen in what follows."

[Bideshi]

The US has eliminated itself from this issue by passing sanctions against Nigeria because they outlawed homosexual acts. The US can't provide financial or military aid to Nigeria by our own law. When the admistration spokespersons say "Human Rights" issues in Nigeria they are referring to the ban on homosexual behavior.

[ChestRockwell]

I agree, hashtags get nothing done....

except open you up to opportunities to get clowned.

[Driller1]

Isn't there any missing children in the US to find???

[Redraven]

So, what IS that thing, REALLY??
Is it a "hashtag" (whatever that means), or is it a number sign, or is it a pound sign?
Actually, it depends on how and where it is used.
BUT, do any foreign nationals understand what it means?
Probably not. It is probably totally meaningless to them!
The statement is (or should be) enough, without the silly "hashtag"!
Those girls might be, by some stretch of the imagination, Michelle's girls, but they are not mine. The "village" that it takes to raise a child, IMO, does not extend that far!

[Delahanty]

Notwithstanding the horror of that kidnapping, personally I think that a wife and mother (of a U.S. citizen) who's chained to wall in Sudan and about to be hanged, is more "ours" than the girls are.

Just a little something to think about.

[kovert]

Originally Posted by kovert

And again, NOT IN SUPPORT OF ATTACKS ON CIVILIAN NON-COMBATANTS.

That said, there is good reason to be suspicious of so called military interventions even if they are supposedly based on good intentions.

Frankly IF the situation is more than the Nigerian gov't can handle then the African Union should step in before opening up to outside troops.

"Well, Shell, along with Mobil, Chevron, Texaco, all have enormous material interests in Nigeria. And as a consequence of those interests and the reaction from Nigeria, the Nigerian population [incompr.] what they see as the unfair exploitation of their resources and the collaboration between these oil companies and the Nigerian government exporting the natural resources, not really investing back into the country.

While there may not be a direct connection between what we are seeing in northern Nigeria and the role of the oil companies, there is the indirect connection, in the sense that many of us believe that the main objective of U.S. policy in Nigeria is less so connected to their concerns about these Nigerian girls that have been kidnapped, but looking for a pretext to further entrench themselves in the internal politics of Nigeria.

So this situation has provided a sort of propaganda bone for U.S. policymakers to again cloak themselves in the wrapper of humanitarian concerns, to generate real support on the part of the American people for a closer involvement in the affairs of Africa. So, yes, I think that this is a convenient situation for U.S. policymakers to slowly introduce the American public to the fact that they have been expanding their activities in Africa for the last few years and to give it a sense of normalcy and acceptance on the part of the American population."

[highcotton]

USA Deploys 80 Troops to Locate Missing Nigerian Girls...