The question has generated a lot of discussion at Winds of Change. Some expressed dissatisfaction with my "bashing the UN and Islam." But Darfur is one result of a much larger pattern, which is why I posted the pictures above, and an effective response cannot ignore that pattern. Bin Laden hid out in the Sudan for four years.

Sudan made itself a target by harboring bin Laden from 1992 to 1996 while he plotted the embassy attacks. Sudan also welcomed terrorists Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, better known as "Carlos the Jackal," and Abu Nidal, a Palestinian militant who founded the Fatah Revolutionary Council.

. . . . According to U.S. government reports, bin Laden first internationalized his terror network while he lived in Sudan. He brought in foreign fighters who were looking for a new home after battling the Soviets in Afghanistan. He provided many of these men with jobs and kept them trained in terrorist tactics by setting up training camps in remote parts of Sudan.

The aggressive and reactionary and powerful Wahabist sect, empowered by Saudi money and official status, sends imams everywhere to marginalize whatever local version of Islam exists; this is globalization and imperialism with a vengeance, and one of the main complaints of the Africans of all religions. Arabs began enslaving black Africans long before white Europeans came and continue long after the West abolished slavery. The Arab League has steadfastly refused to condemn the Sudanese government. This expansionism is not limited to Arab Muslims, but featured in the Armenian genocide as well. As historian Richard Landes points out in this comment, about a lecture by Andrew Bostom:

one of his main points was that the very effort of the Armenians to relieve themselves of their dhimmi status (by appealing to the Russians) provoked the genocidal rage of the Turkish government which used Jihad rhetoric extensively.

Another post at Winds of Change generated a multi-post discussion about how to deal with Islamism. The original catalyst for this post was the editorial by Todd Beamer's father on his viewing of the film which depicted his son's response to the hijackers of Flight 93.

There are those who would hope to escape the pain of war. Can't we just live and let live and pretend every thing is OK? Let's discuss, negotiate, reason together. The film accurately shows an enemy who will stop at nothing in a quest for control. This enemy does not seek our resources, our land or our materials, but rather to alter our very way of life.

On Sunday I saw Ayaan Hirsi Ali speak as part of the PEN Festival here in NYC (which I will write more about later). She of all people understands the threat of Islamism, and in fact, does not distinguish between radical Islam and mainstream Islam. She said (this is a paraphrase, because I can't find my notes right now):

"A Muslim reformer said to me, "Not all Muslims are terrorists, but almost all terrorists are Muslims." You don't support the reformers by making excuses for the extremists. Europeans think everything can be solved by talking. The Islamist says, "I want to kill you. The European says, 'Let's sit down and talk about why you want to kill me."

Since our progressive activists have similar views to most Western Europeans, I think it's fair to apply this critique to them as well. David Beamer doesn't distinguish among all those different groups either.

I've read many accounts of the Darfur rally which express frustration that most of the proposed solutions were vague and amounted to "let's talk some more." (Sending a UN peacekeeping force - a group with a mixed record of effectiveness to say the least - will require a lot of talk, and given the economic interests of some of the UNSC members, is not guaranteed to be successful.)

Confederate Yankee expresses the same frustration with the antiwar march in New York which took place the same weekend.

Show me how to stop bin Laden's planes and Zarqawi's swords with Peace and Love and warm squishy visions of Equality and Justice. Show me how a hug can stop an IED. Explain how constantly apologizing for simply being who I am will stop their lust for killing me for simply wanting to exist.

Please do that. Find a solution. Go beyond your recycled rhetoric and show me how to co-exist with those who will murder the whole world for their thuggish god.

Michael Reynolds approves of military action but thinks we have spent our credibility (and badly) in Iraq:

People who oppose the Iraq venture often do so on grounds that we have no right to “impose” our world view. Some oppose the war in Iraq on grounds that we failed to build international consensus. Well, what’s needed in Darfur is for us to impose our world view — the one that says, “don’t throw babies onto bonfires, don’t gang-rape women.” And international consensus is hard to achieve when major world players like China and Russia have no moral objection to genocide . . . .

. . . . the United States has the right to pre-emptively defend itself, and the moral obligation to use its power to get between people like the Janjaweed and their victims, is correct. We have the right to defend ourselves, even if it means striking first, and we have the moral obligation, where possible, to shoot the man who would murder a child. Those ideas have both been damaged almost beyond repair by the arrogant, reckless, swaggering stupidity of this administration.

Anyone who reads this blog knows that I disagree with this assessment of our administration's actions in Iraq, but the truth is that many in the West feel this way. In that case, do they approve of military action by others? Pillage Idiot thinks that would be a useful division of labor. But then how to get other countries to take the lead on Darfur?

Then there is the Seven Samurai solution: buying the Darfurians some mercenaries. In addition to making the case for war as a lesser evil than a "peace" which allows rampant violence and destruction of whole communties, it describes a successful mercenary project in Sierra Leone. This article examines the pros and cons and also the track record of some of these companies, and gives more case histories of their work with African countries. The Glittering Eye makes the case against mercenaries, arguing that there is no oversight or accountability.

But the decision to hire and send mercenaries has to be made by someone besides the Darfurians, because they don't have any money, and given the warped values of much of the "international community," it is conceivable that they would be prevented from exercising this option because of some idea about appropriate use of military force. And that decision - like any other option in this crisis - will be determined by understandings of what is at stake, and the will to meet the aggressor with conviction.

At some point those who really care about Darfur need to recognize that we are in World War IV, that the Sudan is one of the battlegrounds of that war, and that the war will not be won by talking.