Want to Change the World? Vol. KONY 2012

[air justinxi]

- LRA/Joseph Kony driven out of Uganda around 2004
- Rest of LRA/Joseph Kony are starving in a forest somewhere in Africa
- Footage from film was all from 2004, the problem is not a problem anymore in Uganda today
- Passed a bill to support interventionism, when clearly this is a massive problem in Iraq, Basically supporting Illegal wars
- Each student who created this organization are making a huge amount of money, along with 5 million dollars from the organization's profits that have gone missing
- Organization not transparent, basically fraudin

 

[witnessmycalm21]

This absolutely blew up yesterday. 26mill views in one day.

 

[doubled productions]

Originally Posted by rayray3thousand

Originally Posted by kickz4show

I'm all about taking a stance and making a change, but what about our domestic issues? Where is the video highlighting our growing adolescent obesity? or our declining higher education rate?

Before we can attempt to change another country we have to fix home first. Where was all the foreign support when Katrina hit? But when Japan needed relief for the tsunami we were wiring money mid wave.

I understand that we have duties to help other alie countries, but it seems its a give and take relationship. This video reminds me of the eldery man who is fighting the slaughtering of dolphins in Japan. You put so much effort into helping a animal how about your fellow man?

Maybe for 2012 our youth should make you-tube videos about the change needed in our own country...

And lastly the cleaver move to show the "pyramid" upside down as if we are the majority...in a nation where 99% is a minority.

I am an 8th grade History teacher and my team is going to make this our entire 4th quarter project after spring break... wish me luck 

Good luck! I helped make youtube videos with the kids I mentored through americorps
about childhood obesity, stds and teenage pregnancy, drug use, etc etc. Helps the kids 

take ownership over these issues and sends a ripple through the community. Keep up

the good work my man.

 

[ag 47]

Originally Posted by bhergh

BrotherForReal wrote:

---

why don't we fix HOME first then worry about a coup to rid Kony from Uganda?

You made the promise, not me.

Dont mean to sound insensitive but this reeks of propaganda.

QFT, but so many problems here

 

  


Now it's an issue. Now we have to fix home. +%## that. You can't pick and choose when you decide to help other countries. Either you're consistent with your efforts where people need help or you don't bother to get involved at all. Now we have to fix home...ya'll kill me.

 

[Gill Baka Esq. LLC.]

I was out of the NT offices yesterday...what did I miss? I see people talking about sheep...people having problems sleeping again?

 

[jking0821]

Originally Posted by Air JustinXI

- LRA/Joseph Kony driven out of Uganda around 2004
- Rest of LRA/Joseph Kony are starving in a forest somewhere in Africa
- Footage from film was all from 2004, the problem is not a problem anymore in Uganda today
- Passed a bill to support interventionism, when clearly this is a massive problem in Iraq, Basically supporting Illegal wars
- Each student who created this organization are making a huge amount of money, along with 5 million dollars from the organization's profits that have gone missing
- Organization not transparent, basically fraudin

When in the documentary they said "we can't find Joseph Kony he is in the vast African jungle hiding.  I was like.....how is he enslaving millions of kids from the jungle? how is he even surviving and thriving in the middle of the jungle??
Whole thing seems sketchy.  I am going to assume we want to be in Africa and claim something and this is our way of doing it.

 

[erickm713]

I didn't even watch the vid but I stated my opinion on Fb through sarcasm, a lot of my friends know that some of the stuff I say shouldn't be taken seriously because I'm talking out of my #*% but for some reason people think I'm smart 

this is what I posted, people did get mad and just said if I don't care then I shouldn't talk about about because I'm not gonna make a difference in the world 

People really need to stop acting like they care about something that's been going on for decades, if it wasn't for the internet you all would've continued not to give a @+$%.
You're never going to accomplish anything behind a computer screen or sharing pictures or videos. This is EXACTLY like the SOPA situation, it's been going on for YEARS and only because it finally became something and got media coverage people started paying attention.
So you can continue to post "Stop Kony", but in reality it's not going to do anything, you contribute nothing to the world, because as soon as one leader steps down another's gonna step in his place and continue to do so.
Stop acting like you care, because deep deep down in your heart you know you truly do not give two !!#%+ about it.

 

[cap1229]

Originally Posted by ErickM713

I didn't even watch the vid but I stated my opinion on Fb through sarcasm, a lot of my friends know that some of the stuff I say shouldn't be taken seriously because I'm talking out of my #*% but for some reason people think I'm smart 

this is what I posted, people did get mad and just said if I don't care then I shouldn't talk about about because I'm not gonna make a difference in the world 

People really need to stop acting like they care about something that's been going on for decades, if it wasn't for the internet you all would've continued not to give a @+$%.
You're never going to accomplish anything behind a computer screen or sharing pictures or videos. This is EXACTLY like the SOPA situation, it's been going on for YEARS and only because it finally became something and got media coverage people started paying attention.
So you can continue to post "Stop Kony", but in reality it's not going to do anything, you contribute nothing to the world, because as soon as one leader steps down another's gonna step in his place and continue to do so.
Stop acting like you care, because deep deep down in your heart you know you truly do not give two !!#%+ about it.

you sound pretty elist dude. Like holier than thou and if you truly think the Internet doesn't make difference then

 

[thorrocksjs]

Scramble for Africa 2.0 humanitarian aid dlc.

 

[elcatfisho]

Originally Posted by cap1229

Originally Posted by ErickM713

I didn't even watch the vid but I stated my opinion on Fb through sarcasm, a lot of my friends know that some of the stuff I say shouldn't be taken seriously because I'm talking out of my #*% but for some reason people think I'm smart 

this is what I posted, people did get mad and just said if I don't care then I shouldn't talk about about because I'm not gonna make a difference in the world 

People really need to stop acting like they care about something that's been going on for decades, if it wasn't for the internet you all would've continued not to give a @+$%.
You're never going to accomplish anything behind a computer screen or sharing pictures or videos. This is EXACTLY like the SOPA situation, it's been going on for YEARS and only because it finally became something and got media coverage people started paying attention.
So you can continue to post "Stop Kony", but in reality it's not going to do anything, you contribute nothing to the world, because as soon as one leader steps down another's gonna step in his place and continue to do so.
Stop acting like you care, because deep deep down in your heart you know you truly do not give two !!#%+ about it.

you sound pretty elist dude. Like holier than thou and if you truly think the Internet doesn't make difference then

I disagree; the Internet for most people that I've known has been a place for entertainment rather than education. People posting about how much they love their sororities, the new "meme" fad that almost everyone at my school has been posting (Even though NT put me onto memes way before it got spread on FB

 true story), and now they want to talk on Facebook, Youtube, etc. about how bad they want to stop Kony??? I'm shocked.
I harbor no bad feelings to those that have just started thinking about how bad the situation is in Africa; I do however have a problem with those people who follow this Kony 2012 act like a social movement rather than an injustice in society. Without even asking anyone, I promise you that 95% of those people who watched that Kony video woke up this morning not even thinking about what's wrong in DRC and what they should do to change it. I doubt hardly any of those people called their local congressmen and women after watching the video to demand action against war criminals in Africa. They support the idea, but we Americans are too lazy to actually do anything about it because our population in general truly does not care that much about what goes on in strife-ridden countries such as the DRC. I saw a meme relating Slowpoke and Africa and it is eerily the best description of some of the people I've seen promoting KONY. If it never came across to you how bad #!@% goes down in Africa until watching that video, you really do not have a valid right to tell people that they are not going to make a difference in the world. He is saying that anyone who lives a 'bubble' life of happiness should not try to enforce their opinions and even criticize those who are already well informed.

 

[rashi]

KONY = White Man's Burden


LRA has been protected by al-Bashir, who is a war criminal and has had ties to the CIA. Just another attempt to colonize Africa by the Anglo Establishment.

 

[fraij da 5 11]

[h1]Stop Kony, yes. But don’t stop asking questions[/h1]

• By Musa Okwonga
• Notebook - A selection of Independent views -
• Wednesday, 7 March 2012 at 1:05 pm

My mother’s family are members of the Acholi tribe, and they hail from Gulu, a town in Northern Uganda. Northern Uganda is a place which has experienced significant ups and downs in recent decades, but all the same I was very surprised to come home last night to find talk of it all over Twitter.  And the hashtags continued this morning – #stopkony, #Kony2012, #stopKony2012, #InvisibleChildren, #MakeKonyFamous, #CoverTheNight, #LRA, #Uganda.  All of a sudden, my family’s region was famous – or, at least, trending on Twitter.  What was all this about?

The previous afternoon, I had received a message from a friend, the Nigerian poet and playwright Inua Ellams, asking if I had seen a video with a very moving message.  I clicked on the link that he’d sent through, and what emerged was a painfully familiar tale.  The video, created by Invisible Children, an American NGO, tells the story of Joseph Kony, and his horrific activities in Northern Uganda.  For over twenty years, he and his Lord’s Resistance Army (or LRA) have been abducting children from villages there – boys so they can fight as soldiers in his army, girls so they can be subjected to rape and sexual enslavement.  The video is part of a campaign, coming to a head this year, which aims to use a series of vigils to raise awareness of Kony’s atrocities.  In doing so, Invisible Children aim to encourage the powers that be to stop this brutality and blood-letting.

Invisible Children has had some success already: late last year, President Barack Obama committed 100 US troops to provide “advice and assistance

 

[lexflex81]

Originally Posted by ksteezy

I don't even know what to think anymore, all I know is a i donated with my own good intentions at heart...sort of when you hand that bum on the side of the highway a dollar and he uses it to fund his drug habit....I gave him a dollar to help him out, it's out of my control what he does with it, that's something the receiving end should carry on their conscience

And that's why I never give junkies money. 
It usually goes like: 
junkie: "Spare some change?"

me: "For what?"

junkie: "I need to eaaatttt mayne"

me: "You want some money for food? Fine, walk with me to McDonalds or whatever and I'll get you a burger and some fries."

junkie: "Nah, i'm cool...keep it moving please"

About 99% don't take me up on the offer. 

And I think that's how you should approach charitable donations. Best to make sure you know how the full 100% of your donation is being used.

And yes, I think KONY2012 reeks of scam

 

[thunderchunk69]

Originally Posted by lexflex81

And that's why I never give junkies money. 
It usually goes like: 

I doubt many people die from hunger in the US 

you're basically paying someone to beg, this now makes it their job, why would they fix their life if they're getting paid to do nothing?

I think if they went hungry they'd be more inclined to do an oddjob or 2.

edit:

yes, I'm agreeing with you, they're not going to spend easy money wisely, most of us wouldn't either

 

[midwestrzn458]

they posted a response on their website regarding all of the questions people have been bringing up. Interesting read. http://www.invisiblechild...onaws.com/critiques.html

 

[lexflex81]

Originally Posted by ThunderChunk69

Originally Posted by lexflex81

And that's why I never give junkies money. 
It usually goes like: 

I doubt many people die from hunger in the US 

you're basically paying someone to beg, this now makes it their job, why would they fix their life if they're getting paid to do nothing?

I think if they went hungry they'd be more inclined to do an oddjob or 2.

Eeehhhmmmm, yeah....so we're saying the same thing basically, right?
You see, I don't give them money. Only food if that is what they really want/need, which is almost never the case.

 

[sundoobie]

Originally Posted by Nappy

Wow I'm impressed and happy that there are people out there that can make real change.

 Propaganda is a powerful tool isn't it? 
This video reminds me of all those ads back during WW2

 

[cap1229]

Originally Posted by ElCatfisho

Originally Posted by cap1229

Originally Posted by ErickM713

I didn't even watch the vid but I stated my opinion on Fb through sarcasm, a lot of my friends know that some of the stuff I say shouldn't be taken seriously because I'm talking out of my #*% but for some reason people think I'm smart 

this is what I posted, people did get mad and just said if I don't care then I shouldn't talk about about because I'm not gonna make a difference in the world 

you sound pretty elist dude. Like holier than thou and if you truly think the Internet doesn't make difference then

I disagree; the Internet for most people that I've known has been a place for entertainment rather than education. People posting about how much they love their sororities, the new "meme" fad that almost everyone at my school has been posting (Even though NT put me onto memes way before it got spread on FB

 true story), and now they want to talk on Facebook, Youtube, etc. about how bad they want to stop Kony??? I'm shocked.

talking promotes awareness regardless of the platform. I guess I just have a different outlook on the web because I develop and design for it. I've seen ideas be shared and expanded upon. Like whole platforms have been developed through free sharing of information. I'm not gonna get too technical but the internet is what you make it. If ppl are just using it for meme's thats on them...if people are using it for spreading hate thats on them...if people are using it to learn that's another way.

Fad's come and go but the influence of the internet is here to stay and Invisible Children did an amazing launch of there product. Whatever this is. I don't really care about the message so much but the influence that it had in such a short period of time.

 

[sundoobie]

Originally Posted by midwestRZN458

they posted a response on their website regarding all of the questions people have been bringing up. Interesting read. http://www.invisiblechild...onaws.com/critiques.html

Here's the information for the CPA firm that prepared their audited financial statements.  

1501 Fifth Avenue
Suite 400
San Diego, CA 92101-3297
Main Number 619-231-1977
Fax 619-231-8244 

Be transparent and release the accounting records like a General Ledger so we can see exactly what they spent.  I am sure there are thousands spent on first class airline tickets for their Executives as part of their .. ahem.. Program Travel Expense totaling how much? only $852,800 

  

Ridiculous. 

 

[Kimchi Papi]

Bought my wife & I some t-shirts, the bracelet, & donated some dough...We've donated to the Invisible Children's Fund a lot over the years. It's very close to our hearts being the parents of a beautiful 8 year old boy. It hurts my soul & heart knowing these children & those like them all around the world have to live like this...I hope they finally get Kony. It's sad that he's been in power for so god damn long. It sickens me...

 

[chicagos finest 23]

 

[xbiker47]

The video has hit 36 million views in the last 3 days

 

[cap1229]

DIRECTOR: Jason Russell
LEAD EDITOR: Kathryn Lang
EDITORS: Kevin Trout, Jay Salbert, Jesse Eslinger
LEAD ANIMATOR: Chad Clendinen
ANIMATOR: Jesse Eslinger
3-D MODELING: Victor Soto
VISUAL EFFECTS: Chris Hop
WRITERS: Jason Russell, Jedidiah Jenkins, Kathryn Lang, Danica Russell, Ben Keesey, Azy Groth
PRODUCERS: Kimmy Vandivort, Heather Longerbeam, Chad Clendinen, Noelle Jouglet
ORIGINAL SCORES: Joel P. West
SOUND MIX: Stephen Grubbs, Mark Friedgen, Smart Post Sound
COLOR: Damian Pelphrey, Company 3
CINEMATOGRAPHY: Jason Russell, Bobby Bailey, Laren Poole, Gavin Kelly, Chad Clendinen, Kevin Trout, Jay Salbert, Shannon Lynch
PRODUCTION ASSISTANT: Jaime Landsverk
LEAD DESIGNER: Tyler Fordham
DESIGNERS: Chadwick Gantes, Stephen Witmer

 

[sreggie101]

Originally Posted by 8H2i9Frs

Originally Posted by kickz4show

But when Japan needed relief for the tsunami we were wiring money mid wave.

short but huge amount of truth here. i will not believe for a second the U.S didn't know about Kony. However america, as history dictates, only gets involved to protect its foreign interests, and when it comes to foreign interests they don't +!$% around. but when it comes time to stand up for the sake of humanity and life, we tend to shy away from it. no1 in their right mind could argue that the war on terror is more important than saving kids from becoming child rebel soldiers, makes no sense, word to fleece johnson. we've seen the U.S try to "aid" africans in need, but it never pans out to much success (somalia), yet we invaded a massive country known as Iraq, and captured its dictator in a storm drain n +#**.

Its Africa, and the U.S. almost never does anything significant for it in the name of...life. we always play the hesitation game when it comes down to saving lives, word to rwanda. I don't know much, but i knew enough to make me not want to reshare that kony video (which i have yet to watch btw).

Sometimes i think those who want to be vocal about it should be vocal...but what's the point of talking if no1 ever listens? this country is run by some who think dinosaurs don't exist, and that plan b and birth control is the same thing as abortion. What reason is there to think they'd give a +#** about africa...

 

[True Blues]

---

November 15, 2011

SNAPSHOT
[h1]Obama Takes on the LRA[/h1]
Why Washington Sent Troops to Central Africa
Mareike Schomerus, Tim Allen, and Koen Vlassenroot
MAREIKE SCHOMERUS is Research Consortium Director of the Justice and Security Research Programme at the London School of Economics. TIM ALLEN is a professor in Development Anthropology at the London School of Economics, and KOEN VLASSENROOT is a professor in the Conflict Research Group at the University of Ghent. They are part of the Justice and Security Research Programme, based at the LSE.

A rare photo of Kony from 2008. Read more of Foreign Affairs' coverage on Africa [1], sign up for our newsletter [2], or subscribe [3].

As a United Nations staffer said recently, while attending an internal briefing on the Lord's Resistance Army, the violent central African rebel group, earlier this fall, "November is LRA month." Indeed, the LRA and its notorious leader, Joseph Kony, are suddenly everywhere: several non-governmental organizations have held advocacy briefings about it at the United Nations, and the Security Council met on November 14 to discuss them. Meanwhile, journalists in the United States, Europe, and elsewhere are suddenly seized with the mission of finding out what is really happening on the ground in central Africa.

Two events underlie the renewed interest. First, in October, U.S. President Barack Obama announced that he would be sending "combat-equipped troops" on a kill-or-capture mission to take out Kony in Uganda. Second, on November 2, Hollywood released Machine Gun Preacher, a movie billed as the true story of an American missionary's Rambo-esque crusade against the LRA. Curiosity about the events depicted in the film will soon subside, if early reviews are anything to go by, but Obama's decision, which he pitched to the American public as a dramatic new development, is another matter.

The LRA conflict goes back to the late 1980s. After toppling the regime of Tito Okello, the victorious forces of Uganda's new president, Yoweri Museveni, sought to impose his authority on the Acholi population in northern Uganda, which had been closely associated with Okello. A diverse range of resistance groups emerged at that time; all were eventually defeated, except for the LRA, which proved more resilient than anyone might have imagined. In the decades that followed, the outside world largely looked the other way as Uganda's north sunk into violence and deprivation. That changed in the early 2000s, when images of thousands of children taking refuge in the town of Gulu, Uganda, first hit mainstream television. Various celebrities began to speak out about the war, mostly focusing on shocking incidents associated with Kony's rebels; the Ugandan government's aggressive counterinsurgency measures, however, were shocking as well. For example, the government forced the region's population to relocate into what were effectively concentration camps. There, they were poorly protected from attacks, and faced dreadful living conditions. A study carried out under the auspices of the World Health Organization in 2005 found that there were 1000 excess deaths per week in the Acholi region.

Growing recognition of the scale of the crisis within the humanitarian system was coupled with occasional intense periods of media attention that brought awareness to a wider audience. Media reports mostly covered LRA atrocities and were prompted by particular events, such as when, in 2005, the newly created International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants -- its first ever -- for the LRA's top commanders; when Kony announced his interest in peace negotiations in 2006; and when he repeatedly failed to sign the subsequent agreement in 2008. There has been rather less media concern about events after that failure.

Obama's apparent sudden escalation of U.S. engagement in Uganda, then, came as quite a surprise. His announcement did not publicize the fact that U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) has had an unspecified number of soldiers deployed in the area to assist the Ugandan army for years. In late 2008, AFRICOM was even involved in a military push to take out the LRA once and for all. It is easy to understand why Operation Lightning Thunder, the mission aimed at capturing or killing Kony at his main base in Garamba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo, goes unmentioned. Kony and his commanders had vacated the area well in advance. The mission was beset with other problems, too. U.S. military personnel helped in planning, but they appear to have held back when it came time for carrying those plans through. Meanwhile, Ugandan military officers lacked the necessary training and equipment, and in some cases ignored U.S. direction.

Operation Lighting Thunder, and other such missions to fight the LRA in the Central African Republic and in southern Sudan, served mostly to kill efforts to keep beleaguered peace talks going. And, far from neutralizing the LRA, they prompted a strategically effective and ferocious response. In January and February 2009, the LRA abducted around 700 people, including an estimated 500 children, and killed almost 1,000. At present, the LRA operates in an area as big as France, stretching from southern Darfur to parts of South Sudan and northern Congo. All this, and the plight of local populations, who are caught between a rebel group with nothing to lose and armies that have not prioritized civilian protection, has been mostly overlooked.

The reactions to Obama's recent statement underscore how little Americans -- journalists included -- know about the United States' involvement in Uganda. In the rush to say something, newspapers and television shows seem to have largely based their material on the somewhat confused Wikipedia entry on the LRA. That may be where the conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh found what he called the "Lord's Resistance Army objectives," which appear on the site and which he used in a bizarre defense [4] of Kony's group on U.S. television. (His apparently supposed that the LRA is a group of Christians fighting Muslims in Sudan.) Journalists who contacted me for interviews seemed equally misinformed. Once initial inquiries along the lines of "Who are the LRA?" and "What do they want?" are out the way, the most common questions are "Why intervene now?" and "What is in it for the United States?"

Obama claimed [5] that he decided to act because it "furthers U.S. national security interests and foreign policy." Yet it is not entirely clear how that could be true, since Kony and the LRA have not targeted Americans or American interests and are not capable of overthrowing an allied government. It is worth noting that support for the Ugandan military does coincide with the broad thrust of the Obama administration's African alliances and strategic agenda. The Ugandan army's help in Somalia through AMISOM was much appreciated, and Uganda is paying a considerable price for it. The number of its own troops killed has reached several hundred, according to some sources, and al Shabaab has launched attacks on Kampala, Uganda's capital. So the U.S. mission might be viewed as a kind of payback for Uganda's cooperation in the war on terror. In addition, geologists recently discovered oil in and around Lake Albert -- another reason for closer cooperation and for stabilizing the area. But even so, for obvious reasons it is unusual to publicize the movements of special forces in advance of their deployment. To a cynical observer, then, Obama's announcement seems to have been aimed at achieving some other goal.

During the past decade, U.S.-based activists concerned about the LRA have successfully, if quietly, pressured the George W. Bush and Obama administrations to take a side in the fight between the LRA and the Ugandan government. Among the most influential of advocacy groups focusing specifically on the LRA are the Enough project, the Resolve campaign, the Canadian-based group GuluWalk, and the media-oriented group Invisible Children. Older agencies, from Human Rights Watch to World Vision, have also been involved. In their campaigns, such organizations have manipulated facts for strategic purposes, exaggerating the scale of LRA abductions and murders and emphasizing the LRA's use of innocent children as soldiers, and portraying Kony -- a brutal man, to be sure -- as uniquely awful, a Kurtz-like embodiment of evil. They rarely refer to the Ugandan atrocities or those of Sudan's People's Liberation Army, such as attacks against civilians or looting of civilian homes and businesses, or the complicated regional politics fueling the conflict.

Thanks to the efforts of those organizations, in 2004 U.S. President George W. Bush placed the LRA on the U.S. Terrorist Exclusion List, a list of groups involved in "terrorist activity" whose members are banned from entering the country. Six years later, after activists camped out for eleven days in front of the house of Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn, who had objected to U.S. legislation against the LRA due to funding concerns, Obama signed into law the Lord's Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act [6], which called for "increased, comprehensive U.S. efforts to help mitigate and eliminate the threat posed by the LRA to civilians and regional stability," and requires regular official reporting to Congress on how the fight against the LRA is proceeding.

Predictably, activists have claimed [7] Obama's decision to send in troops as a victory, or, more specifically, as "a huge victory for the hundreds of thousands of young Americans who have been lobbying Washington to take action." And, in any event, for congressmen wanting to score a few human rights points with their constituents, making statements opposing a violent faction in Africa is an easy stance to take. Perhaps, too, the administration estimated that potential U.S. losses would be minimal, and that Kony would be a good addition to the list of international thugs removed during Obama's time in office.

So domestic political agendas, which at least did not conflict with broad U.S. strategic interests, are the most probable explanations for Obama's decision. It will be a big miscalculation if the operation does not go well.

There are some reasons for optimism. The U.S. military has gathered strong evidence about Kony's whereabouts in the last few months. Greater numbers of surveillance flights over LRA-afflicted areas are said to have pinpointed Kony's position in the Central African Republic. Washington also has a better understanding of the Ugandan military's strengths and weaknesses. Obama stated explicitly that, this time, U.S. forces would be available to help carry through the mission. If they are deployed effectively, they could indeed have an impact.

Even so, it is hard to set aside fears that the new effort will be no more than a repeat of previous ones. Such an expectation has certainly been expressed by many of the region's religious leaders, who openly oppose [8] U.S. engagement. And reports about growing fatigue within the Ugandan army are alarming. Of the more than 4,000 Ugandan troops that were originally sent to LRA-affected areas, less than 2,000 remain. They are operating in three different countries, leaving very limited capacity on the ground. To just break even with those losses, Obama would have to send far more troops than the planned 100. Any high expectations in Uganda for the new U.S. soldiers, meanwhile, where dashed when information trickled out of Washington that the troops would probably stay in Kampala and give advice, rather than go into combat.

According to local sources, the LRA has already announced that it is ready for a fight, and is said to have called on its members to gather and "celebrate" Christmas and New Year's -- a reference to the string of violent retaliatory attacks it carried out on December 25, 2008, and in the days that followed. Increasingly fearful local populations have started to create their own protection forces. Leaving aside the general problems associated with the militarization of civilian societies, it is unrealistic to believe that such units will be able to respond effectively to LRA retaliations. And, although the United States has committed itself to protecting civilians in Uganda, it appears to have no plans to do so. This is rather baffling, since much of the pressure on the administration comes from groups asking it to do exactly that. There also seems to be no consideration of the broader implications of strengthening the national army of Museveni, who is apt to use those forces to maintain power, and of the long-term plague of the continued militarization of Central Africa.

Even if all these concerns could be set aside -- assume, for a moment, that the military intelligence is good; lessons of the past have been learned; mechanisms to protect the population will be put in place; the armies of Uganda, Congo, and South Sudan are controlled; and U.S. special forces are able to find and kill Kony -- would the effort bring peace? The answer is probably not.

To be sure, Kony's death would be welcomed at home and abroad. But the mission would not be entirely satisfactory if troops killed him instead of bringing him to trial at the International Criminal Court. Only there could his crimes -- and those of others -- be examined in detail. The United States has not, of course, ratified the statute of the ICC, and did Obama not make reference to trying Kony in his announcement. If U.S. armed forces do engage in combat, it will be revealing to see whether they facilitate the LRA leader's capture or his killing.

Beyond the ins and outs of dealing with Kony, the political challenges in the region are simply too massive for Obama's new operation to yield much fruit. The violence in Uganda, Congo, and South Sudan has been the most devastating -- anywhere in the world -- since the mid-1990s. Even conservative estimates place the death toll in the millions. And the LRA is, in fact, a relatively small player in all of this -- as much a symptom as a cause of the endemic violence. If Kony is removed, LRA fighters will join other groups or act independently.

Until the underlying problem -- the region's poor governance -- is adequately dealt with, there will be no sustainable peace. Seriously addressing the suffering of central Africans would require engagement of a much larger order. A huge deployment of peacekeeping troops with a clearly recognized legal mandate would have to be part of it. Those forces would need to be highly trained, have an effective command structure, be closely monitored, and be appropriately equipped with sophisticated surveillance equipment and helicopters, among other things. It would require a long-term commitment and would be targeted not only at chasing the LRA. Moreover, it would make the protection of the local populations a key priority. Finally, the deployment of such a force would need to have emerged from concerted efforts in international diplomacy -- including with the African Union, the United Nations, the ICC, and governments in the region -- not as a knee-jerk reaction to the most recent media splash.

Such a mission is unlikely to come about. Nonetheless, it underlines the point that a superficial focus on the activities of one man and a few of his commanders largely sidesteps the point. Kony and his colleagues lead a dreadful but relatively small organization that punches above its weight. If achieving stability and relative prosperity in this blighted region of Africa is the real objective, devoting the month of November to the LRA will obviously not be anything like enough.

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[3] http://www.foreignaffairs..._takes_on_the_lra-030712
[4] http://thelede.blogs.nyti...?ref=lordsresistancearmy
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[7] http://blog.invisiblechil.../tag/official-statement/
[8] http://allafrica.com/stories/201111130058.html