Is US interested in Joseph Kony or regional resources?

Of late western media, social networks and US Congressional hearings are ablaze with talk about major U.S. military deployment into central Africa to eliminate Joseph Kony. Mr. Kony is the leader of Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), a rebel group that operates in an area the size of France across several African nations. The LRA is ostensibly fighting for religious freedom for Uganda's underdeveloped north.

Mr. Kony's murderous gang has been responsible for incalculable massacres, rapes, tortures and civilian suffering since 1989. So, why is there a sudden push by the Pentagon, western media and certain NGOs to send U.S. troops into central Africa?

Well, all considerations about whether or not to release the dogs of war begin and end with the spoils. Uganda sits atop the geo-strategically important intersection of five oil rich African nations. Senior US Department of Energy Analyst Sally Kornfeld has called this region "the future Gulf."  Ms. Kornfeld  says: "I am amazed by what I have seen in Uganda, it might rival Saudi Arabia."

Are hundreds of highly trained US Navy SEALs running around the African bush to stop Kony or are they there to secure the biggest African onshore oil discovery in history? Two billion barrels no less, found right in Mr. Kony's backyard. The proximity of this discovery to newly independent and equally oil rich South Sudan is also crucial to war considerations in the Pentagon.

It is worth remembering that U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) was created for two main reasons:  oil and China. This century America will look to cart three Cs out of Africa: Crude, Capital and China. The sudden push to stop Joseph Kony is as much about killing an evil man as it is about stopping China’s advance into the most resource rich continent on the planet.

China controls 97 percent of the Rare Earth Element (REE) market. The US Geological Survey says Central Africa is home to high-grade full spectrum REEs, not to mention diamonds, gold, platinum, copper, cobalt, tin, phosphates, tantalite, magnetite and uranium amongst forty two other exploitable minerals.

Some argue that it is possible to do the right thing for the wrong reasons. That, despite America's ulterior resource driven motives, it is right to deploy U.S. troops to stop the murderous Joseph Kony. The problem with this argument is that the three previous U.S. military operations in central Africa - Operation North (1991); Operation Iron Fist (2002;) and Operation Lightning Thunder (2008-2009) - have been unmitigated disasters. American intervention has been the military equivalent of poking a bee’s nest with a stick – Mr. Kony escaped, and in the ensuing reprisal and rampage 1,900 civilians were butchered and over 100,000 were displaced.

As a consequence, local tribal, religious and community leaders all unanimously oppose U.S. military intervention. From bitter experience Ugandans know that Mr. Kony is bad, but they also know that Mr. Tomahawk will only make things worse. Local leaders propose five nation stakeholder talks, a regional force, pressure on Mr. Kony and eventual dialogue to end the nightmare. But alas, this solution remains a dream so long as President Museveni, President Obama and the most sophisticated propaganda machine in history, work in concert to drown out local voices of reason.

Further north in Libya, one cherished British imperial rule handed down to the American Empire that displaced it, is being employed: When in doubt, break it up. At the behest of the west, tribal leaders recently declared oil-rich eastern Libya a semi-autonomous state – Barqa. This new state will have its own parliament, police force, courts and capital, Benghazi, to run its own affairs. Never mind Colonel Gaddafi's dream of African unity, what of Libyan unity?

In typical divide-and-loot fashion, the west is more concerned with how many barrels of crude it can ship out of Libya than stopping the marauding militia turning neighbourhoods into fiefdoms. Sadly, the Obama Administration has not publicly condemned or taken action over UN reports documenting widespread cases of blacks being murdered, tortured and kept in Zoos.

African-Americans at home are just as disappointed with Mr. Obama's presidency as Africans are abroad. Mr. Obama may be the first black President but Mr. Kennedy was the first President for blacks. Mr. Obama may be the first President of African descent but Mr Bush Jr was the first President for Africa. George W Bush championed the AIDS programme – PEPFAR,  as well as the Millennium Challenge for Africa. In stark contrast, Mr. Obama has been more concerned with invading his Mother Africa north, right and centre.

Seeing an African American at the pinnacle of power in the land of slavery would be exciting if only black equality indicators were not tumbling. In fact, during the Dark Age of Obama: the black-white median household wealth gap is down to seven black cents on the white dollar. The spread between black unemployment and white unemployment has also widened by 4 points since President Obama took office.

As Mr. Obama rushes from one opulent, 1% campaign fundraiser to another - to raise the $1,000,000,000 he needs for re-election - he must realise the farcical tragedy of it all. Half of his people (150 million) are now wallowing in poverty or near poverty low-income status. A disproportionate amount of whom are black. A disproportionate amount of whom voted 91% in his favour.

For most Americans the ongoing economic crisis is a Recession. However, levels of poverty and unemployment in black neighbourhoods suggest it is a Great Depression for blacks.

Amidst this Great Depression for blacks, Mr. Obama and his advisers have chosen not to put forward concrete policies targeted at blacks, for fear of the President looking “too black.” The White House has opted instead for “post racialism.” Consequently, African Americans are stuck between a President that can’t be seen to be “too black” and an alternative that is too ghastly to contemplate.

Sadly, Mr. Obama has put a black face on Martin Luther King Jr's three interrelated evils: economic exploitation (unbridled capitalism at home), militarism (unprecedented imperialist expansionism abroad) and racism (post racialism.)

No one would have doubted Mr. Obama’s ability to govern had he lost the 2008 election. No one would have doubted President Obama's desire to ameliorate the plight of the black man - at home and abroad – had he remained Senator Obama. That said, a probable second term for President Obama still offers Africans and African Americans hope for change they can truly believe in.

By Garikai Chengu

The author is a research scholar at Harvard University's Faculty of Arts and Sciences.