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Equatorial Guinea is a tiny country roughly the size of Maryland. Humid, jungle covered, and rife with unpleasant diseases, natives call it Devil Island. Its president in 2004, Obiang Nguema, had been accused of everything from cannibalism, belief in witchcraft, mass murder, billion-dollar corruption, and terrorism. With so little to recommend it, why in March 2004 was it the target of a group of salty British, South African, and Zimbabwean mercenaries, traveling on an American-registered ex-National Guard plane? The real motive? Oil. In The Dogs of War, Frederick Forsyth described a 1972 attempt by mercenaries to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea. The chain of events surrounding March 7, 2004 is a rare case of life imitating art--or at least, life imitating a 1970s thriller--in almost uncanny detail. The Wonga Coup is a shocking tale of venality, overarching vanity, and greed whose example speaks to the problems of the entire African continent....
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In contrast to the common perception that the United Nations is, or should become, a system of collective security, this paper advances the proposition that the UN Security Council embodies a necessarily selective approach. Analysis of its record since 1945 suggests that the Council cannot address all security threats effectively. The reasons for this include not only the veto power of the five permanent members, but also the selectivity of all UN member states: their unwillingness to provide forces for peacekeeping or other purposes except on a case-by-case basis, and their reluctance to involve the Council in certain conflicts to which they are parties, or which they perceive as distant, complex and resistant to outside involvement. The Council’s selectivity is generally seen as a problem, even a threat to its legitimacy. Yet selectivity, which is rooted in prudence and in the UN Charter itself, has some virtues. Acknowledging the necessary limitations within which the Security Council operates, this paper evaluates the Council’s achievements in tackling the problem of war since 1945. In doing so, it sheds light on the division of labour among the Council, regional security bodies and states, and offers a pioneering contribution to public and governmental understanding of the UN’s past, present and future roles. ...
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It is 1848 and the British Empire has grown rich exploiting Lilliputian slaves—the finesse of their working allowing unheard of feats of miniature engineering; even Babbage's computing device has been made to work. But now the French have formed a regiment of previously peaceful Brobdingnagian giants and invasion looms. In a world where humanity is both smaller and larger than it once was, love and hate loom large. Mankind discovers itself at the center of scale. Lilliputians are 12 times smaller than us but there are those 12 times smaller than them, and 12 times smaller again and so on. And the scale of being goes up from Swift's giants, as well. This Wellesian sequel to Gulliver's Travels is a unique piece of sci-fi literature. ...
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It is 1848 and the British Empire has grown rich exploiting Lilliputian slaves—the finesse of their working allowing unheard of feats of miniature engineering; even Babbage's computing device has been made to work. But now the French have formed a regiment of previously peaceful Brobdingnagian giants and invasion looms. In a world where humanity is both smaller and larger than it once was, love and hate loom large. Mankind discovers itself at the center of scale. Lilliptians are 12 times smaller than us but there are those 12 times smaller than them, and 12 times smaller again and so on. And the scale of being goes up from Swift's giants, as well. This Wellesian sequel to Gulliver's Travels is a unique piece of sci-fi literature. ...
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