Sudan and South Sudan: Should US Intervene?

The world’s newest country, South Sudan, says it will withdraw troops from a disputed oil field in the north, which it accuses of using the area to launch attacks.

But both Sudan and South Sudan are still toe-to-toe.

Anchor Lisa Mullins talks to Andrew Natsios of Georgetown University, who is advocating military intervention by the United States to protect the South.

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Lisa Mullins: I’m Lisa Mullins and this is The World, a coproduction of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH in Boston. The world’s newest country, South Sudan, is locked in a border dispute with its northern neighbor, Sudan. Tensions have been rising since the south’s independence, that came last July. But this week there was intense fighting over the disputed oil rich region called Heglig. Officials in the south said it was being used by the north to launch attacks across the border. They say that the north’s president, Omar al-Bashir, was the aggressor, so South Sudan invaded. It was condemned internationally for doing so and today it announced its withdrawal, but both sides remain on edge. Andrew Natsios was a US special envoy to Sudan is now a professor at Georgetown University’s school of foreign service. He says the south is America’s ally and deserves protection from the US.

Andrew Natsios: There are vast mineral resources not just oil in the south, and the southerners would prefer American firms that are not there now to be there. The best thing for us to do now is to make clear that military options are not acceptable by either the north or the south. And one of the things that the southerners will do is if we say we will protect you from northern invasion, that will empower the more moderate forces in the south against any more military incursions in the north. It will also tell the Bashir and his generals you cannot continue to try and intimidate the south militarily, it’s not acceptable.

Mullins: If the point is that military options are not acceptable in Sudan, what you’re talking about is the US having the potential of acting militarily by sending in air forces. Why would that be in US interests to do that?

Natsios: Because we have interests in Egypt, Israel, Ethiopia, large interest in Kenya, and we have interests in Southern Sudan too that are not simply humanitarian. Too many people see this as a humanitarian issue. It right now, it’s between, they’re two sovereign states here.

Mullins: So you think now the only option is air covering, providing air cover…

Natsios: I do, it’s gonna stabilize the situation. I don’t see other options available. I’ve been trying to find because my first choice is a diplomatic solution to this, but we’re at the point now where the generals are calling the hosts and those generals are not interested in diplomacy. They’re the ones that walked out of the talks, not the Southern Sudanese.

Mullins: You saying the northern generals from Sudan…

Natsios: The northern generals walked out of the talks two weeks ago, which is what lead to this crisis.

Mullins: It’s also a tough climate in the United States to be calling for more US military presence anywhere right now.

Natsios: I understand that, but we have a lot invested in Southern Sudan and we do not want a destabilization of Northeast Africa, which is what’s going to happen if a conventional war starts.

Mullins: Why not rely for instance on diplomatic efforts made by Ethiopian leaders, by other leaders?

Natsios: I think we should try. If anybody can succeed right now it’s Meles Zenawi, the prime minister of Ethiopia, and I think we should support his efforts. Princeton Lyman, our special envoy, my successor, is very capable and I have great regard for him. I’m not sure he’s been given the tools by Washington to do what he needs to do, but we should let Meles go ahead with this. If Meles can arrange a ceasefire and moving everybody back to the table, that would work.

Mullins: What are you saying, that the Meles of Ethiopia, what are you saying that the tools would be that the US special envoy…

Natsios: That’s the security guarantee.

Mullins: Does the United States have a tool to the extent that it has influence in the international criminal court, does it have a tool in trying to get Omar al-Bashir arrested, apprehended since he has been indicted by the ICC and he remains a free man?

Natsios: Well, number one, I thought the indictment was a very bad idea because Bashir was thinking of retiring in 2006 and not running for reelection. And once that indictment took place he basically privately people he’ll never retire because he has no intention of ever going on trial. Now I’m not debating whether or not they’re guilty; I think they are guilty, but the question is whether we want justice or we want peace, and I frankly think right now we should be focused on peace as the first requirement.

Mullins: I wonder if we’re letting South Sudan, this now independent country off the hook here? There is fault on both sides, is there not?

Natsios: There is fault on both sides, but it is not equal. No one is screaming at Bashir for bombing another sovereign state. That’s a violation of international, that’s an act of war to bomb another country and that’s what he’s doing.

Mullins: Andrew Natsios is a professor at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and the author of a new book entitled Sudan, South Sudan and Darfur: What Everyone Needs to Know. Thanks a lot.

Natsios: Thank you.

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