A Description of Harms - War and Rumors of War

Until it was displaced by the massive earthquake in Japan, the big story concerned the revolt in Libya which is shaping up to become a protracted, back-and-forth civil war. It's recent vintage and spectacular beginning as the most violent flare up in the Arab Spring made it the current War to Watch. But what about all the past Wars to Watch? Here's a summary of current, ongoing conflicts (inter-state wars, civil wars, violent insurgencies and I'm including states-in-anarchy), some of which will seem very familiar:

Africa

1. Darfur

The brutality and scale of violence against civilians - in this case African villagers barely eking out subsistence to begin with - briefly made this conflict a cause celebre on campuses throughout the West. However, not even Angelina Jolie's moving op-ed piece in the Washington Post (February 2007) could halt the violence, which continues off and on until today.

2. Chad

One side effect of war is more war - the fighting in Darfur produced over two million refugees, many of whom sought sanctuary across the border in neighboring Chad. The influx of refugees disrupted the fragile government of dictator Idriss Deby, provoking an East-West (and tribe-on-tribe) violent power struggle that has persisted since 2005. For those keeping score at home, this is the 4th Chadian Civil War since the country gained independence. In 1965. Incidentally, the bulk of the African mercenaries Qaddafi is using to fight the Libyan civil war come out of Chad.

3. Congo - Kinshasa

Just as Darfur triggered the war in Chad, the Rwandan genocides in 1994 led to the conflict in the Congo, triggered by Rwandan intervention in favor of Laurent Kabila, a Congolese rebel leader. His march on Kinshasa in 1996 brought down the Zairian state, and the country has been in conflict ever since. A weak transitional government is nominally in control of Kinshasa and the west, but the mineral rich interior and strategically valuable east remain battlegrounds for multi-sided conflict between militias, military units loyal to rogue generals, bandits... basically anyone who put together a soccer team and get their hands on some used AK-47s is in this. The war is unspeakably barbarous - rape (of women, children, men) is routine, increasing the spread of AIDS; the scale of suffering is staggering, with over 5 million dead through violence, disease and famine; and the superstitiousness of the guerrillas spread the practice of pygmy cannibalism, in which the pygmy peoples living in Congolese forests are killed and eaten in the belief that this confers magical properties.

4. Uganda (and region)

The Lord's Resistance Army of northern Uganda (although they have ranged into South Sudan, the Central African Republic and Congo - Kinshasa) is implausibly diabolical. Their leader, Joseph Kony, is a mystic who channels spirits that serve as the military and political leadership of his group, and claims to be able to cure AIDS through ablution. They recruit through child abduction, turning boys into child soldiers hopped up on drugs and girls into sexual property that redistributed at the leader's whim. Their favored targets are undefended villages, where they typically kill everyone by machete, in order to save ammunition. And they've been doing damage since 1987.

Arabia (and the war on terror)

1. Iraq

The big story for much of the 2000s, the war in Iraq has gone on long enough to fatigue even the most patient observer. And it has gotten less bloody, with fewer fatalities, lower US troop levels and less visible operations. But it's far from over - in January, two US soldiers were killed by the Iraqis they were supposed to be training, bomb attacks continue throughout the country, and the political situation remains unresolved. On top of the post-conflict difficulties, the Arab Spring has created a new source of instability, with mass mobilization against the fragile al Maliki government and provincial officials.

2. Afghanistan

Now the longest war in US history, the operation has devolved into a quagmire bogging down US forces indefinitely with no signs of progress and no prospect of a conclusion. The situation has degenerated so badly that Canadian forces are considering using armed militias - the same people responsible for the devastating civil war that brought the Taliban to power - for stability operations in the restive south, and the US forces have ended up killing the cousin and political ally of the very ruler they installed to run the country, and who has ended up turning it from a devastated blastscape to a $40 billion per year devastated blastscape.

3. Pakistan

As everyone predicted, the Afghanistan conflict has sucked in vast swathes of northern Pakistan and mobilized anti-Western forces into attacks on any members of the political elite pursuing moderate or liberal policies. On the upside, the conflict has finally allowed us to achieve a sci-fi milestone - now we get to watch remote-controlled flying robots kill with impunity from the skies, terminator style. A fragile state even at the best of times, between pressure from the Taliban, pressure from the US, a powerful military increasingly growing rogue and permanent economic and social crises, it remains to be seen how much longer Pakistan can resist turning into Afghanistan with cricket.

4. Yemen

Even before the Arab Spring reached Sanaa, Yemen was experiencing serious unrest. There is a Shi'a insurgency in the north (which spilled over into Saudi Arabian in 2010). There is a regional insurgency in the south. Al Qaeda groups - and anti-Al Qaeda US operatives - are running around killing each other everywhere. The central government relies on tribal allies, not regular security forces, to maintain its rule. Modern government - not this particular government, but the structure and operation of modern political authority as an institution - is on its last legs in Yemen, and this country is rapidly heading to Mad Max country.

5. Israel-Palestine

Yes, this is still going on. No, it's not getting any better.

6. Libya

Qaddafi has managed to reverse the momentum of the opposition and push their forces back towards Benghazi. It is unclear how this will develop - the French have recognized the opposition government, and have a track record in the region that suggests and appetite for meddling. On the other hand, the US has made defeatist noises about the revolt and the rebel's pleas for a no-fly zone have so far fallen on deaf ears. This may be over in a week, with victory for either side a possibility, or I may be including this conflict the next time I make another catalog of horrors.

The Americas

1. Mexico

Unlike many of the other countries on this list, Mexico is in many ways a functional, modern state. Poor compared to its norther neighbor, it's comfortably middle income by global standards, and boasts all of the trappings of modern civilization - sound infrastructure, increasingly free elections, a functional though imperfect economy. But even such a country is not immune from massive violence and instability. The remarkably thing is that the source is not a political movement, a separatist group or even a terrorist network, but simply ruthless and well organized criminal syndicates. Conservative President Felipe Calderon made waging a war on drugs one of his campaign promises, and drugs responded with a full-scale offensive, pushing the government and the police out of large swathes of territory, especially in the crucial border zone around the US. The victory of the cartels has been so complete that newspapers have declared unconditional surrender, and ballads are commissioned by capos recounting their bloody exploits on Mexican radio. Police and military units are considered to be pawns of cartels, if not mini-cartels in their own rights, and any victories against criminal groups are chalked up to the sub rosa maneuverings of other criminal groups. Also, someone - either connected to the cartels or the government, either way protected by the police - has been ritually murdering dozens of young women around Juarez.

2. Colombia

On the other end of the cocaine pipeline, Colombia has been fighting against an insurgency by the unfortunately acronymed FARC, nominally Marxist guerrillas who control the north and the east of the country. They've lost a number of fighters and leaders over the last few years, but continue to hold territory, kidnap victims (especially foreigners) for ransom, and set off car bombs in population centers.

Asia

1. India

India, the billion-man tiger economy with its tech companies and expansive cultural reach, seems like an anomaly on this list - the stories we get tend to be optimistic about its future, celebratory sometimes, even a little anxious at the rapid ascent of this future super power - but the truth of the matter is that this is still a desperately poor, brittle country beset by conflict internal and external. If you follow developments on the subcontinent, you may think that it's the tense stand-off with Pakistan and it's periodic eruptions into spectacular terrorist or conventional military attacks that puts India in this company. Or you may think that this is due to the strife in Kashmir, whose population has never fully accepted Indian rule, and chafes under a corrupt and sometimes brutal occupational authority. You'd be right, but you'd also be missing the big one - since 1967 the Naxalites, a Marxist-inspired alliance between tribal groups and the rural poor, have prosecuted a violent, large scale insurgency against the Indian government across a large swathe of territory (the so-called "red corridor," reaching north-west from central India) and turning much of the forested interior into a no-go region for police and government forces. This year is shaping up to be particularly bloody as government forces are planning a large-scale offensive to destroy the rebels and open up the region for economic development.

Anarchy

The conflicts above fit into a conventional definition of war or insurgency - two or more sides, relatively organized and disciplined, struggling for political domination of a territory. Some conflicts have a different, more terrifying character. Without any actor or alliance of actors controlling a region, there is no limit on who can commit violence, and force is contained not by law but by greater force. The closest I've come to experiencing this first hand is a midnight viewing of Mad Max - that's the closest I want to come.

1. Haiti

From its very beginnings, when Napoleon's forces smashed the first black republic, things haven't really gone Haiti's way. Before the 2010 earthquake government was tenuous, with gang control over Port-au-Prince only curtailed thanks to heavy urban fighting done by the UN. The earthquake shattered state institutions, and they have never been reestablished. Gangs and criminals run the capital and other cities, and what remains of the government structure is shot through with corruption and abuse. Extreme poverty - meaning poverty up the limits of survival - has shred social cohesion to the point where getting by means every man for himself. NGOS provide a lifeline keeping regular Haitians alive, but nothing is bringing back the state or rebuilding the country.

2. Somalia

Ah, Somalia, the gold standard for the end of the world. How is it that everyone has normalized the situation there, in which marauding bands of teenagers with assault rifles represent established authority, each section of Mogadishu boasts its own warlord, and the number one national industry is piracy? Currently there are at least two well-organized break-away republics on Somali territory, no government in Mogadishu, and no prospect of a return to regular political life. Anarchy is the new normal - perhaps that's why we're all used to it.

Honorable Mentions:

I have tried to limit myself to the most active and large-scale conflicts going on (saving less instabilities for another post), but there are a few other cases that would fit in here that should be mentioned in passing. Cambodia and Thailand are facing off over border disputes, with occasional lethal flare ups. The Korean War, frozen since the 1953 armistice, erupted briefly into a shooting match two months ago. Venezuela and Colombia have in the past year mobilized forces along their common border. Ethnic militias, poppy growers and break-away regions run most of interior Burma.