Saviors and Survivors: Darfur, Politics, and the War on Terror

This is a new book put out by Columbia University professor of government, Mahmood Mamdani. I've read excerpts and the journal article it was based on. Here is a good short description of the book:

Mahmood Mamdani challenges the fabricated stats and fraudulent history popularized by the Save Darfur Coalition and the advocates of robust U.S. military intervention in Sudan. The Save Darfur Coalition, he argues is not a peace movement but a war dance, blocking a peaceful settlement by spreading falsified casualty figures, groundless charges of genocide, and offering the U.S. public an appealing but misleading case for military intervention.

http://www.amazon.com/Saviors-Survivors-Darfur-Politics-Terror/dp/0307377237

Here is the journal article (It's long, but well worth it):

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v29/n05/mamd01_.html

I think this is the best and most well-informed interpretation of the conflict in Darfur that I've read to date. He uses facts and evidence to show that there is no genocide going on and that the Save Darfur Coalition and elements in the media have been dishonest in their portrayal of the situation. It's certainly a perspective you won't hear in mainstream circles in the West.

One question of particular importance that I thought he raised was how come there is no similar type of concern (on the same level and scale as there is for Darfur) over what is going in the neighboring Congo. The conflicts are similar, but in the Congo 10 times as many people have died for the same reasons and causes as in Darfur. Yet no real attention is being paid by western governments, the media, celebrities, and civil society organizations that are quick to talk about Sudan and jump on the Darfur bandwagon.

As Mamdani states: Could the reason be that in the case of Congo, Hema and Lendu militias – many of them no more than child soldiers – were trained by America’s allies in the region, Rwanda and Uganda? Is that why the violence in Darfur – but not the violence in Kivu – is named as a genocide?

Here is a review of the book:

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10581.shtml