The Devil Comes on Horseback, is a film that was made by the former observer, Brian Steidle, who spent 6 months in Darfur observing the ceasefire. I saw the film this afternoon at a showing at Luther College where I am a sophomore. I learned somethings that probably not a whole of people know and there was stuff in that film that I did already. What I didn't know was that the government of Sudan trains the Janjaweed militia's in the Lagawa Province, which is in the south-eastern part of Darfur near an oil pipeline that is run by the Chinese. The most effective images that were included in this film was actually seeing footage of the Janjaweed riding through as village, spent mortars and bombs and empty magazine clips and bullet casings scattered among dead bodies.
Africans in the refugee camps in Chad have said that what is happening in Darfur is genocide at the hands of the Arabs. The Arabs are systematically slaughtering Africans. Just Africans and no Arabs. One man in a refugee camp in Chad said that he has never seen any Arabs in the refugee camps.
Steidle, during the time that he was in Darfur took hundreds of photos and sent 80 reports to the African Union but the American government only received 4 of them. How is our government supposed to do anything when they don't have all of the information? They do now thanks to Brian Steidle. He gave all of his reports and his photos to the Hague so that they could prosecute those that are responsible for this genocide in Darfur.
The Bush administration knows what is happening in Darfur. It has even called what is happening in Darfur a genocide yet the response has been largely political. Mostly just to keep up appearances. Steidle went to go see Condelezza Rice with his photos and all that she told him was that what he had done was very appreciated and that he could have his photos back. That was just the poltical response. Make people feel okay with what you did say but not actually do anything about what you have been told. As Barack Obama said in paraphrase, is that the reason that the U.S. has failed to act on the Darfur genocide is that the American people are not saying anything to their congressman and other leaders about it and so the leaders end up getting away with not doing anything about the genocide and the other reason that Obama named as a cause for the inaction of the U.S. to end the genocide in Darfur is that our current foreign policy under the Bush administration has focused on Iraq. Obama said , "If we care the world will care." We the American people have to show our leaders that what is happening in Darfur is unacceptable and that the world must act.
By the international community, including the U.S. not acting i showing the government of Sudan and its Janjaweed militia's that it accepts what is happening. Our inaction emboldens the government of Sudan and the Janjaweed militia to keep on doing what it has been doing. Raping women, killing thousands, and burning villlages, will go unchecked. The U.S. must act now to end the genocide in Darfur, by sending a greater amount of humanitarian aid and we must deploy troops to Darfur. In order for that to happen the focus must shift from Iraq. Troops need to be taken out of Iraq and sent to Darfur so that the civilians in Dafur can be protected against the attacks by the Sudanese government and the Janjaweed militia's. Without security, thousands will continue to die. The U.S has been silent on the genocide in Darfur and that is shameful.

We have been hearing in the news alot about how China sells weapons to Sudan and not so much about Russia selling weapons to Sudan. What you probably haven't heard is that China and Russia have been selling weapons to the Sudanese government for years. In 1993 Russia and Sudan signed a military cooperation deal and from there Russia began selling weapons to the Sudanese government. In April and May 1996 Russia supplied 32 Sukhoi bombers delivered in Ilyshin cargo planes that landed in Khartoum and in that same time span Russia sold the Sudanese government 10 Mi-24 helicopter gunships. Human Rights Watch got all of that information from a defected military officer of the Sudanese army Addis Ababa who they interviewed in 1997. Also Russia supplied between 20 and 40 T-55 tanks by the end of 1996. Russian experts have maintained and repaired other equipment, including MiG-19 and MiG-21 fighter aircraft. Russia also supplied the Sudanese government with large numbers of military vehicles, mainly trucks and jeeps. Russia gave the Sudanese government all of the tools that they have used in the past 5 years in the genocide in Darfur.
China's weapons sales to the Sudanese government are far more extensive that Russia's although it doesn't diminish Russia's sales to Sudan. China has sold weapons to the Sudanese government since the 1980's. That's 13 years before Russia started selling weapons to the Sudanese government. By 1994, China was one of Sudan's principal arms suppliers and remained so until 1998. In exchange for the weapons China received money and oil concessions. In 1996, China sold the government of Sudan, SCUD missiles in a deal underwritten by a $200 million loan from the Malaysian government against future oil extraction. SCUD missiles are notorious inaccurate medium-range rockets that have been used against civilian population centers in past conflicts such as the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war and the 1991 Gulf War. Since 1995, weapons sales from China to Sudan have also included ammunition, tanks, helicopters, and fighter aircraft, 50 Z-6 helicopters, 100 82mm and 120mm mortars, and other equipment. Sudan bought 6 Chinese Chengdu F-75 (MiG-21) financed by Iran. In 1997 the government of Sudan had the Chinese version of the Russian SpG-9 which is mounted on wheels and pulled by hand by soldiers. And China was a major supplier of antipersonel and antitank mines after 1980, but Sudan hasn't received any new land mines since 1993. China and Russia gave the Sudanese government all the tools that the government of Sudan now employs in the genocide in Darfur.

There are two things that must happen before there is peace in Darfur. First there must be security. Women need to be able to leave a refugee camp to get firewood without having to worry about getting raped. Darfurians need to be able to leave the refugee camps and their villages to gather food without worrying about one of the Janjawiid militias murdering them. Darfurians need to be safe from the political ideology of Arab supremacism which motivates the Janjawiid militias and the Sudanese government soldiers to burn the African villages, bomb them, slaughter Africans in Darfurian villages by the thousands and not even bat an eye, cause famine by destroying food stores, cause drought by contaminating wells with dead bodies, rape women, and take away their homes. The Janjawiid and the Sudanese governments' army are in league to bring about the destruction of the African race in Darfur and bring to reality a Sudanese state that is ruled by Arab Muslims with the Africans that remain being powerless. Many of the Arabs in Darfur that they have been marginalized which is true. For years the Fur dominated the Darfur region and the Arabs were given limited amounts of land and the area where the Arab nomads camels could graze was limited. The Arabs Muslims have now turned the tables on the Africans and are making the Africans in Darfur marginalized.
The way in which the Africans in Darfur are being marginalized is far different from the way in which the Arabs in Darfur were marginalized. Arabs in Darfur were given limited amounts of land and they did not hold many positions in the Sudanese government. But the Africans did not commit genocide or any human rights violations against the Arabs of Darfur. During the famine in Darfur in 1984-1985, the Sudanese government denied that there was a famine in Darfur and sent no aid. Then in 1994 the Sudanese government elected 9 Arabs amirs to the Darfur region. Omar al Bashir had taken over in 1989 which set a foundation for the Arabs in Darfur/Sudan to come to a position of dominance in Darfur. And now the Sudanese government in addition to the human rights violations and the acts of genocide, the Sudanese government is making it extraordinarily difficult for the humanitarian aid workers to get into Darfur. The humanitarian aid workers are required to get all sorts of permits and a visa but the visa that the Sudanese government does allow them to have are for ridiculously short periods of time. Medicines have been shipped off to Khartoum on the pretense that they must be tested before being distributed in Darfur. The Sudanese government has also tried to block journalists from accessing Darfur. Some have been thrown in jail in Khartoum and some have just simply been denied access.

Everyone is saying how the U.N. needs to step up and send more peacekeepers but nations such as the U.S. don't ever talk about sending their own troops as peacekeepers to Darfur. The U.S. has the power to send in troops to provide the much needed security to the people of Darfur and to the humanitarian aid workers that are in Darfur. Without the necessary security and without the adequate amount of humanitarian aid, the number of genocide related deaths will continue to rise in Darfur. Khartoum and Darfur are not going to make peace by themselves because of the long standing ethnic divisions between the Arabs and the Africans. The Arabs fought their way out of a marginalized status which included not a whole lot of land for the Arabs and low government representation. After the publication of the Black Book there was a huge movement among the Arab population in Darfur to take over pieces of land in Darfur. The Arabs in Darfur want to drive the Africans out of Darfur. The Arabs want to create an Islamic state. Either President Bush or the next president must send in U.S. ground troops. If we just wait for the U.N. to send in more peacekeeprs, more people will die of the Sudanese government sponsored genocide/ethnic cleansing. If the U.S. isn't part of a real solution then it is part of the problem. A book on Darfur that I recommend for everybody to read is called Darfur: A Short History of a Long War by Julie Flint and Alex de Waal.