Clinton had another problem with the Somalia operation. Remember, the US was supposed to be there on a humanitarian mission. Fact of the matter is I don't think any US president would have attended funeral services of soldiers who were supposed to be helping to feed people, but instead went on a covert military operation. You do agree that Bush also wouldn't have gone to such a funeral, don't you?
Here's some background to Somalia:
>>>The Baidoa military arrival was part of Operation Restore Hope - a UN-sanctioned operation to open roads and towns devastated by two years of fighting, so that international relief aid could reach an estimated 2million Somalis in danger of dying of starvation within two months.
At least 400,000 Somalis had already died of hunger during the second half of 1992, with the hills and fertile plains around Baidoa among the worst affected. At the time of the UN intervention, bodies littered the streets of Baidoa and aid agency refugee camps overflowed.
Just before the US State Department agents arrived on his doorstep, Mr Morrisey expressed concerns that the military part of the UN operation might be overshadowing relief efforts.
There seems to be this feeling that once the Stars and Stripes get here everything will be fine, Mr Morrisey told the Herald in December 1992.
But if the arrival of the marines slows our work down by even a day, that is a lot of lives that are still being lost.
The important thing, he said, was for the US forces to remember they were in Somalia to help distribute food. It seems to have gone from Operation Restore Hope and getting the food up the road from Mogadishu to Baidoa, to a ’let’s get the rebel military and disarm the population’ attitude."
hartford-hwp.com
hartford-hwp.com |
