Zimbabwe

[Knowltok]

Originally posted by VoodooAce
Its too bad there isn't oil there. That would put it on the US radar, and then we might give it an attempt.

No oil? Then its not our problem. Let the EU or the African community deal with it.

Too bad indeed. Here is a perfect opportunity for the EU or African community to show that it doesn't need America's self-interested help.

It comes back to my concept of World neighborhood watch instead of World's policeman. The US is busy tonight. Will anyone else climb in the SUV with the flashing light and patrol the neighborhood? Probably not. I don't want to hear anyone blaming the US for not intervening on this one. It seems no one is seriously chalenging me on this because they know damn well that their own country could do something, but won't.

 

[Toecutter]

What a load of bollocks, rattling on about mercenaries staging a coup in Zimbabwe, it would end up in a bloodbath for the few white
untrained Executive Outcomes involved, since when has ever any mercenary action in black africa succeeded, almost NEVER! They all ended up dead, mutilated, wounded, unpaid and forgotten.
Look what happened during recent years on the Comoros and Sierra Leone. Not to mention The Congo, Biafra, Angola and the Seychelles.

Look at the size of Zimbabwe plus the fact it has no shoreline. There you have your first logistical problem, then you have the army to deal with, all 47.000 of them Versus your 150 white Executive Outcomes and their auxiliary black "mob" of 1000 men.


Lets falsely pretend, that by some twist of faith, the mercenaries make a successful infiltration, by air or land through a neighboring country, no tip offs have been made to Mugabe's regime.
All right take out the presidential Guard, storm the palace. Re-instate Dr OKoye and a loyal guard. What now are the people behind you, no their scared ****less, sitting home pissed on their bush spirit with the police "mob" holding them at bay. Another lot a cheering and tearing the streets apart Then the army and followers of mugabe moves in from the barracks surrounding the capital and the rest of the country and finishes of what's left of some wannabe gung ho mercenaries, half of them who have never even been in the army.

Let time make Mugabe's faith or a UN vote for action!

The adventure years of the mercenaries are over for good, the world is a totally diffrent place than it was in the sixties and seventies.

Most mercenaries today are just a bunch of untrained nasty killers and wannabe soldiers of fortune.

 

[Sixchan]

Speaking of Zimbabwe, check out this Email I got.

SOS

Oscar Malaba

oscarmalabaxyahoo.com

Bamako

Mali

Dear sir

I know this will come to you out of the blue as a
surprise. I write this crucial mail to solicit your
assistance in a transaction that will be very
beneficial to you, with hope that you will never let
me down either now or in future.

Please study the following account carefully and
respond urgently.

I am Oscar Malaba a Zimbabwe nationality, the eldest
son of late Honourable Adam Malaba. My father served
the President Mugabe’s government faithfully in
various capacities as a minister and chairman of
agriculture trust fund. He was however arrested on 4th
April 2001 because he was against Mugabe’s government
concerning the ongoing land dispute that erupted in
Zimbabwe since last year.

My father while in detention was humiliated and
tortured by Mugabe’s security operatives, in spite of
his falling health and as a result he died in
detention on the 28th day of April 2001.

Before his death, he confided to me and my brother the
existence of Eighteen million five hundred thousand
United State dollar (18.5M US dollar) he secretly
lodged in a vault. My brother and I are the only
people in my family who are privy to this information,
the money is now in our custody (cash).

Since his arrest, my family has been subjected to
untold hardship and harassment. All my father’s assets
has been confiscated. His accounts frozen and we were
been attacked and driven out of our family house in
Harare.

Narrowly I escaped to Mali with my family and the
boxes containing the money. On getting to Mali, we
applied for political asylum. I could not take such a
huge foreign currency to bank without raising an
eyebrow. So I quickly deposited the boxes with a
reputable security company as family valuables. I have
the depository agreement and the certificate of the
deposit issued to me by the security company.

I was waiting to have a legal status before I could
invest the money here. But last week I received a mail
from Mali government informing me that I and my family
are not eligible to obtain political asylum, that my
father was the one who had problem and not members of
his family and to that effect we should be ready to go
back to Zimbabwe soon.

At this point, I am frustrated and simply tired. My
family lawyer advised me to leave Africa. For this
reason, I want you to assist me to shift and invest
this fund outside Africa. I will compensate you
generously to as much as 20% of the said amount at
stake if only you can help me. I and my family will
use the remaining 80% to start new life and seek a new
happiness in overseas.

This transaction demands expediency, secrecy and
absolute trust. Our destiny is in your hands, do not
abandon us. Please assist us to escape this spectres
of political persecution going on in Africa.

More also treat this mail with utmost confidentiality
because of my safety and the money. I eagerly await
your reply.

Thanks and God bless

Yours faithfully

Oscar Malaba

 

[Toecutter]

AHHH yes, that would do nicely, plz write a cheque out to Eddie Hitler

 

[TrailblazingScot]

What gets my goat (apart from the raging 20 year old war veterans from the 1980s when they fought in utero) is that Africans allow themselves to be run by those such as Robert Mugabwe. In Britain his orders would be ignored and he would be removed from power by general ridicule at his pretensions at absolute power.

 

[Simon Darkshade]

Yes, the golden days of mercs are well and truly in the past, but the relative difficulty of such individuals pulling it off does not invalidate the ease in which a First World country could carry out the operation.
And it most certainly does not invalidate the need for action.

But today, those lovely apparatchiks at the Commonwealth decided not to suspend Zimbabwe, which means the following action has been taken so far: Ab-so-fudgingg- lutely nothing, save some prissy diplomatic complaining, and the threat of maybe eventual economic sanctions from the EU.
Just lovely.

 

[VoodooAce]

Originally posted by Simon Darkshade
Yes, the golden days of mercs are well and truly in the past, but the relative difficulty of such individuals pulling it off does not invalidate the ease in which a First World country could carry out the operation.
And it most certainly does not invalidate the need for action.

But today, those lovely apparatchiks at the Commonwealth decided not to suspend Zimbabwe, which means the following action has been taken so far: Ab-so-fudgingg- lutely nothing, save some prissy diplomatic complaining, and the threat of maybe eventual economic sanctions from the EU.
Just lovely.

Ah, come on, Simon.

Can't you just send in some of your evil minions to take care of business, here?

 

[amadeus]

Originally posted by Knowltok


Too bad indeed. Here is a perfect opportunity for the EU or African community to show that it doesn't need America's self-interested help.

Do you really think that the EU would try to solve the problem without acting in their own interests?

 

[Knowltok]

Originally posted by rmsharpe


Do you really think that the EU would try to solve the problem without acting in their own interests?

No, but there are plenty of people who would like to think so. Voodoo points out that there is no oil, so therefore the US won't go. What will Europe do in the face of the lack of oil?

 

[Adamski]

Bit of a hot tomale this one, eh?

Perhaps the Brits will find some use for all their unemployed and send em in' :soldier:for queen and country, and re-annex Rhodesia to the empire. Good show, what! But, no, not with old snivelly-pants Blair in charge. He won't life a finger without instructions from baby Bush. Why if old "Iron Drawers" Thatcher was still in charge, they'd have Mugabe feeding the crocs in the Zambezi quicker than you can say General Belgrano. :rocket:

 

[joespaniel]

Originally posted by Whiskey Priest
Hmm... Rwanda, Ethiopia, Sierra Leone. Doesn't seems like the nations of the world care to much about what happens in Africa.

Not exactly.

Or at least its not worth losing a son/brother/father over it, to bring it into perspective.

The US is primarily feeding the people of some countries though. Europe is helping also.

Nations like Kenya, Egypt and South Africa have to step up to the plate and lead their own continent, their own neighbors, their own people. Im sure we would support them.

Anyway, the US is busy with its own low-intensity, high-tech war. There wont be alot of "peace-keeping" missions for a long time.

 

[joespaniel]

Originally posted by kittenOFchaos
What gets my goat (apart from the raging 20 year old war veterans from the 1980s when they fought in utero) is that Africans allow themselves to be run by those such as Robert Mugabwe. In Britain his orders would be ignored and he would be removed from power by general ridicule at his pretensions at absolute power.

Yes, maybe so.

But, the people with tanks and machine guns do make a convincing show of "absolute power" to the ones that dont .

 

[animepornstar]

i think it´s more likely that the uk and eu will do something about zimbabwe then the u.s. because zimbabwe is a former colony. however, military actions performed by eu are very unlikely.

another problem is that too hard economic sanctions will only strengthen mugabe´s power. supporting the opposition will might help a bit but they will still have the weapons against them.

 

[Knowltok]

Originally posted by animepornstar
i think it´s more likely that the uk and eu will do something about zimbabwe then the u.s. because zimbabwe is a former colony. however, military actions performed by eu are very unlikely.

As well they should IMO. If they want to ask the US for some help that is fine. Logistical support is one of the US's specialties, but they should be able to do it on their own.

I just doubt that they will. It may very well all fall apart, and five years from now America bashers will list Zimbabwe below Somalia, Rhawanda, and all the others in their lists of American failures. This is a perfect opportunity for a nation or group of nations to step to the plate and take leadership in dealing with this problem. Hell, I'm surprised China doesn't do it for the PR value alone. (Okay, not really, but they could make huge PR points if they did)

 

[TrailblazingScot]

The problem is the Britain will get labled as "neo-colonialists" if we intervened and as Zimbabwe is land-locked we'd need some African country to let us have access...and I don't see South Africa etc doing that for us

 

[Knowltok]

Originally posted by kittenOFchaos
The problem is the Britain will get labled as "neo-colonialists" if we intervened and as Zimbabwe is land-locked we'd need some African country to let us have access...and I don't see South Africa etc doing that for us

Why won't South Africa let you have access? What about Mozambique, Botswana, or Zambia? I know that the latter two are landlocked themselves, but why won't the other nations help?

 

[VoodooAce]

Well, I have a question.

Were there oil there, would/should the US get involved? If there were oil there, we would. But since it doesn't, or at least in qty's that would make it 'worth our while', we won't touch it. Since it doesn't, we'll say it's not our problem.

This just seems hypocritical to me. Whether or not something is in our best financial interest shouldn't be the primary determining factor in whether or not we go into someplace to try to help in ending some human suffering. But it is. I guess I should just learn to deal with it.

 

[Knowltok]

Originally posted by VoodooAce
Well, I have a question.

Were there oil there, would/should the US get involved? If there were oil there, we would. But since it doesn't, or at least in qty's that would make it 'worth our while', we won't touch it. Since it doesn't, we'll say it's not our problem.

This just seems hypocritical to me. Whether or not something is in our best financial interest shouldn't be the primary determining factor in whether or not we go into someplace to try to help in ending some human suffering. But it is. I guess I should just learn to deal with it.

I agree that it is hypocritical. That it why I hate the fact that we could never just say, "Yeah, we're going to Kuwait because there is a lot of oil there and we don't want Saddam to have it all. What's your point?" Unfortunately we feel the need to dance around issues and even deny that we went for oil. Poppycock. Everyone knew we were there because of oil, why couldn't we just say so?

Voodoo, what should be our primary determining factor?

 

[Apollo]

Originally posted by Sixchan
Speaking of Zimbabwe, check out this Email I got.

Do you think this is real or just somebody trying to scam you? If it is real, why'd they contact you?

 

[andycapp]

Whilst in full agreement about the evils of Prez Mugabe and his bunch of thugs, people are fooling themselves if they think there will be any Western intervention.

With the focus on (Islamic) terrorists there simply won't be the will to alienate most of Africa by intervening in Zimbabwe.

If Mugabe starts indulging in genocide then the possibility of intervention increases but don't hold your breath waiting for the EU to show leadership in that regard.

My tip is an even greater exodus of whites and educated black Zimbabweans after Mugabe wins another 'election'.