At the northeast tip of the African continent, less than 100 miles across the Gulf of Aden from the oil-rich Arabian peninsula, lies Somalia, an oddly shaped, desolate country where over half the people are nomads. Until December 1992, when Somalia rocketed to the top of America's foreign-policy agenda, its very name was unfamiliar to many Americans. But it is here, of all places, that the first prominent battle was fought over the purpose of America's post-Cold War foreign policy. At issue: Is there a humanitarian component to American foreign policy, and, if so, is it appropriate in certain circumstances to commit U.S. military forces toward these ends? vbcrlfThe Somalia story now is a familiar one: In the summer of 1992, as Americans were focusing on other events--a looming presidential election, Russian President Boris Yeltsin's first official visit to Washington, and the Olympics in Barcelona--a crisis of extraordinary proportions began developing there. Three thousand Somalis a day were dying from starvation, and nearly two million were threatened by an unrelenting famine exacerbated by warlords who refused to allow safe passage of relief supplies. With these supplies blocked at the capital port of Mogadishu, the crisis unquestionably would deepen. vbcrlfSlowly, word began reaching the West: Somalia was dying, and only assertive foreign engagement, probably including military involvement, could save it. But, given these terms, should it be saved? By late November, just weeks after George Bush's defeat by Bil...
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...merican Security Ties to Somalia," Backgrounder no. 745, Heritage Foundation, Washington, D.C., December 26, 1989. vbcrlfEdward Sheehan, "In the Heart of Somalia," New York Review of Books, January 14, 1993. vbcrlfThomas Sheehy, "No More Somalias: Reconsidering Clinton's Doctrine of Military Humanitarianism," Backgrounder no. 968, Heritage Foundation, Washington, D.C., December 20, 1993. vbcrlf
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