Armageddon: 2013

Chapter Five Armageddon: 2013 Reynold Jay

Chapter Five

February  21—10:02 A.M. The West Wing, Washington, D.C.

Robinson settled into one of the conference rooms along with Melissa Farnsworth, the Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs and Kenneth Fegan, a Junior Assistant that he had taken in under his wing. Ahmed bin Al-Awzai, an assistant to the Prime Minister in Somalia, sat at the head of the conference table. Coffee and tea were served, introductions were made and Al-Wazai led the discussion. “I must apologize that the Prime Minister Sharmarke is not present today, however urgent matters in our home country require that he remain there. I know your time is precious and thank you for agreeing to meet with me today. As you know the situation in my home country is precarious at best. If the United States could offer some troops, we would give them locations of suspected terrorist camps and rebel militias and we would give them freedom to carry out missions at their own discretion.”

He brought out a map. “Here, for example, in the south is an Al-Nakbah stronghold. The Al-Shabaab has taken over most of our country and has overrun Mogadishu. Our own militias are unable to take back control and over a million of our citizens now line the outskirts of the city, living in tents. We estimate that the Al-Shabaab commit hundreds of atrocities each day upon the refugees. The Marka terrorists operate north of Mogadishu along with another organization called the Puntland Group. A ruthless killer Mustafa Mahdi has taken over the Somalia Marines and is responsible for the recent wave of tanker pirating. They are heavily armed and we have little means to deal with them. I could go on, but I think you get the idea.”

Discussion ran on for a half-hour and Ms. Farnsworth summed it up. “We will recommend this to the president and any final decision is up to him. It is good that you would give our troops freedom to conduct missions as they see fit and that may help. Oftentimes multi-national forces are at odds with one another and that is not the instance here. We could protect the refugee camps as an alternative. You have our sympathy of course and can only hope that the president will respond to your plea.”

Five minutes was set aside to discuss the proposal that afternoon with Landenberger. Robinson and Ms. Farnsworth sat in the Oval Office and briefly ran it by him. “It’s not likely I can do anything,” said the president. “This is a low priority and getting tied up with this becomes one more problem on the plate. It is unfortunate the country is poverty stricken and overrun like this. All I need is a body count and everyone would question why we were there in the first place. Let’s hope they can find someone who can take an interest in their plight.”

“A thousand troops are all he asks. Certainly—”

“It would take a larger commitment than that—a hundred thousand would not be enough to get it started on the smallest scale. There are eighty five hundred multinationals there tripping over one another for lack of clear direction. We would be sitting ducks. The Red Cross is in there offering humanitarian aid and if they were being attacked, the rep would have mentioned it. The UN multinationals probably have their hands full protecting them. Let’s let this die on the vine, however I thank everyone for meeting with him. Goodwill is needed wherever we can find it.” 

~*~

  The Prime Minister Paul Baudelaire of France summed it up briefly as he discussed a hodge-podge of concerns that afternoon. “…Although we recognize the problems of Somalia, we feel that France alone cannot be of much assistance. In view of the crisis in the world economy we can understand not launching into this right now. Perhaps in the near future resources will be available to address this growing problem.  A large multi-national force must be considered….”

~*~

  At two in the morning, Robinson lay awake staring at a spider that was busy crawling up the wall.