On January 31 2007, I wrote a post titled They Want What?. It was about a group of Niger Delta militants who kidnapped an American and a Briton and were demanding N1.8 billion and 100 cases of whiskey. At the time I said that it was stuff like this that would lead the Nigerian Government to get enough cover to ignore the human rights, ethnic and political tangles and move to crush the militants.

It turns out that it took two and a half more years of "provocation" for the Nigerian government get to that point and start the "war in the creeks". Things have changed in those years with the "militants" for the most part resembling organized crime rings and not freedom fighters. The politicians and a significant proportion of the populace in the Niger Delta have turned against the militants, which has given the Federal Government the political cover to move in with force. The Senate even got into the act urging the military to widen the scope of the campaign, though the less said about our august senators the better.

MEND's great response was to threaten the families of the soldiers and to blow up a pipeline in a completly unrelated area, which forced Chevron to stop pumping oil from a major flow station. The fact that they hit an a soft target outside the conflict region shows that even MEND knows that they can't defeat the military in a stand up fight. However their actions are also giving the military more political cover to expand the scope of the campaign. I have no sympathy for the "serious" militant groups such as MEND. From where I sit, I think they have ignored or sabotaged all serious attempts to make inroads into solving the crisis - attacking Julius Berger comes to mind, as does insisting that Jimmy Carter chair the Niger Delta sumit. They have also been discredited by the criminal elements in the "struggle" regardless of how many hostages they "rescue" from the criminals.

Everybody and their mother should know that the Niger Delta solution has to be a political one not a military one, so after the bombs have stopped falling I hope there is enough of a will to tackle the problems that underly the Niger Delta struggle. There is a commitment to stop the environmental degredation, but the jury continues to be out on the seriousness of the state and federal governments to address the development challenges. If they don't do it, we will find ourselves right back where we started in a few years.

A cursory glance at the news landscape over the last month would have brought one face to face with one of the many policy debates going on in the United States. The debate I'm referring to is the one on torture.

This debate is particulary interesting because in most debates the Republicans are the absolutists arguing black and white, and the Democrats are the relativists arguing shades of gray while in this one the sides have switched.

The Republicans are the relativists in this debate preferring to focus on the effectiveness of torture as the standard, while Democrats are the absolutists arguing about the morality of tortue.

The Republicans are basically saying three things. One - all tortue is not equal, that they are not for pulling fingernails of people or anything, just for things like controlled waterboarding, sleep deprivation in stress positions, loud eminem and what not. Two - these things should be judged on their effectiveness. Three - tortue should only be used in two extreme cases - the ticking bomb scenario or to save an innocent life.

The Democrats are saying were saying two things at first. One - Tortue is wrong. Two - torture is ineffective so even if it wasn't wrong (which it is) there is still no point.

Here is my problem with the republican position. They are cool with fact that America tortured because it provided actionable inteligence and saved American lives. However they are against admiting to the torture because it will put American lives at risk. So while admitting that torture can save lives, they also admit that it can endanger lives. This is where the effectiveness argument can fall down. It may be a net positive, but it also may be a net negative and there is no way they can credibly know that.

Here is my problem with the democratic argument, arguing that tortue is ineffective is a non-starter. While it is entirely possible that for everytime someone spills his guts someone else dies with a smile on his lips, it doesn't change the fact that it is impossible to prove the negative that tortue is ineffective. The other problem the democrats have is that they cannot admit that their alternative to tortue is uncertain that the refusal to torture could result in another terrorist attack (saying this of course is akin to political suicide in America).

Having outlined both positions, and poking holes in each it's time to move on to my opinion of who's right. First off, torture is one of those "I'll know it when I see it" things and judging by the full descriptions of what went on, what the US did is one of those things. Now the reason why I do not think you should torture is that deciding to tortue is a classic example of subordinating strategy to tactics. For example, in a war where one of the objectives is to win the "hearts and minds" of a population that is in danger of being radicalised for terrorism, torture is a dumb move that goes against this. Another one I have already mentioned is that it can put American lives (soldiers at risk)

So there you have it folks, regardless of the effectiveness of a particular piece of torture it was a dumb tactic that interfered with the overall US strategy. Feel free to prove me wrong.