The continent has been in the news again as Ethiopia has bombed its neighbor Somalia, that tragic war-torn country that seems ever more to be under the grip of the next batch of Islamic radicals. The United States, with its ever-dwindling strength and world influence, is backing Ethiopia, a country with a largely christian population, which has faced attacks and growing hostility from Somalia in recent months. Add to this Eritrea, who seems destined to get in on the fight, because, why the hell not? It is more complicated than that, of course, but to sum it up, "The Horn of Africa" is one tough neighborhood. Now, it is the next front on the War on Terror, as Al-Queda is suspected to be backing the Somali Islamic faction, which aims at setting up a Taliban-styled regime in this poor, blood-stained African country.
What we will be able to do with our troops already stretched thin in Iraq remains to be seen. Only a time machine seems to be able to save that fiasco. But we can't go back in time and our resources are there.
And God help the people who live in this region. While their governments and armies fight, what will happen to the people? The children, the few elderly who have managed to grow elderly? We in the West are aware of the horrific famines that periodically sweep this region and cruelly starve huge numbers to miserably long deaths, but what of those that don't die? An article in the New York Times today, "Malnutrition Is Cheating Its Survivors, and Africa's Future" by Michael Wines, highlights the lingering after-effects of malnutrition. Many of the regions children have stunted growth, are sickly, tired and have IQs so diminished that they cannot even focus on a lesson let alone learn it. In some parts of Ethiopia many of the mothers are so malnourished themselves that they suffer night blindness during their pregnancies and then are unable to produce enough milk to feed their children.
The government of Ethiopia has recently been focused on this problem and is adding nutritional supplements to the food supply. Poor as the country is, it has made great strides considering all that is against it, and its reaction to the problem and the program it has put in place is seen by many as an example for other countries in the region to follow. But now, at war yet again, I fear that the focus on this problem, which threatens the long-term bettering of the country's lot, will be neglected or abandoned all together.
Elsewhere in Africa, the HIV-AIDS scourge continues to wreak havoc on an already vulnerable population, with children, some infected themselves, being orphaned daily. Child slavery and sexual abuse is almost epidemic in some regions of the continent, with desperately poor families unable to protect or support their children. Overstretched and corrupt governments are unable to unwilling to care for their most imperiled citizens.
Where do we begin? We can't even seem to take care of our own citizens--Katrina finally shoved that reality into our faces. But the people of Africa are our neighbors, too. If even the tunnel-visioned Bush administration is willing to pick a dog in one of the continent's fights, then Americans have to sit up and realize that in this global age, we all live in the same neighborhood. You can only hide in your walled communities so long. One way or another, the horrors of the children of Africa will end up on your doorstep.
Like war-torn, impoverished Afghanistan before it, Somalia is ripe for order. Who will deliver it to that country? Al-Queda? Who will stop them? Malnourished children in Ethiopia? AIDS orphans who dropped out of school to care for younger siblings?
We cannot look inward. We must love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
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