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Africa Core
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***Uniqueness***
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No Conflict

Africa has regained stability


The Nation 4/17/2010 (April 17 2010 http://www.nation.co.ke/News/africa/Nigeria%20stable%20for%20now/-/1066/901338/-
/m1vev1/-/index.html

After months of political turbulence, Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, has regained
relative stability and swept aside the immediate risk of chaos or even a coup, observers say. Next
year’s presidential elections, with all their attendant problems and numerous stakes, are now the next greatest challenge facing
Africa’s premier oil exporter, they said. “I would rule out the possibility of a coup now... the
country is now a bit stable,”
said Bayo Okunade, political scientist at Nigeria’s premier University of Ibadan. “We cannot compare where
we are now with where we were three months ago. That was a very dark period,” he said. Analysts
said that Nigeria, with a history of successive military coups d’etat up till 1999, was spared another one after President Umaru
After two
Yar’Adua, suffering from an acute heart ailment, was hospitalised late last year for more than 90 days in Saudi Arabia.
and a half months of political vacuum, the parliament on February 9 voted Yar’Adua’s deputy, Goodluck
Jonathan, into office as acting president, a post that was confirmed when Yar’Adua returned to Nigeria on February
24. Yar’Adua has neither been seen in public since November nor is his state of health known. Jonathan, who has assumed power
since February, has now appointed his own advisers and ministers and was this week guest of US President Barack Obama in
Washington, in his maiden foreign visit. The probability of a coup “has increased lately,” according to an expert on Nigeria at the
French Research Institute for Development, Marc-Antoine Perouse de Montclos. And even though the risk has “diminished” in recent
weeks, “it can not be ruled out” he said. Ishola Williams, a retired army major general, disagreed. “The
army is one of the
most ethnically balanced institutions. Every single ethnic group is in the military. So, to have a
consensus to make a coup d’etat, the situation would need to be very bad. “We haven’t got to
such a situation now,” he told AFP. “The military wouldn’t attempt anything right now,” said
Williams, former head of Transparency International in Nigeria. “There is some political stability
now... The test will come as we move towards the elections,” he added. Jonathan should demonstrate his capacity to put in place
the long-awaited electoral reforms ahead of the 2011 presidential poll and tackle Nigeria’s national cankerworm, corruption, Williams
said. Jonathan’s ability to consolidate a fragile peace in the oil-rich southern Niger Delta, where Yar’Adua had offered an amnesty to
militants, would also be critical. Violence resurged recently in the key region just as the country was wracked by sectarian clashes
which claimed hundreds of lives in the central part of the west African nation. Under an unwritten rule adopted by the Nigeria’s main
political party on power rotation between the mainly Muslim north and Christian-dominated south, the next elected president in 2011
should be a northerner.

Africa is stabilizing – it’s experiencing economic growth and fewer conflicts


Reuters 6-14-07. (“IMF sees post-war states as priority in Africa”, http://africa.reuters.com/top/news/usnBAN448588.html)
A general decline in conflict across sub-Saharan Africa has coincided with the region's fastest
rate of economic growth in a decade, estimated at 6.7 percent this year by the Fund. Across West Africa, guns
have fallen silent after more than a decade of intertwined civil wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone. A peace
process in Ivory Coast promises reunification of the francophone economic powerhouse, divided
since a 2002-2003 war. In Central Africa, regional giant Democratic Republic of Congo is slowly recovering from
a devastating 1998-2003 war. "Having back the DRC and Ivory Coast as important and effective players
would make a difference not just for the countries, but also for the sub-regions and finally for the
continent in general," Bio-Tchane said. ** Bio-Tchane is the director of the IMF’s Africa department

African conflict is on the decline – prefer our predictive ev


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CSM 4. (A continent at peace: five African hot spots cool down”, January 2, http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0102/p07s01-woaf.html)

As the new year begins, Africa - so often besieged by wars - is seeing a period of growing peace. For the first time
in five years, no major wars are roiling the continent, even if low-level conflicts still smolder. A deal to end Sudan's
civil war - Africa's longest - could be struck this month. And peace processes are pushing ahead in Liberia,
Burundi, Ivory Coast, and Congo. Perhaps it's just a lull between storms. Yet observers see fundamental
shifts that may create an era of relative calm for Africa's 800 million people. The biggest
new force is Africans themselves. Led by South Africa, there's growing desire to arm-twist warriors into laying down their weapons.
Also, outside powers, including the United States, are more engaged. They may be motivated by antiterror fears, need for oil, or guilt
for inaction during Rwanda's 1994 genocide, but they're increasingly supporting Africa's peaceful impulses. "The
continent as a
whole has asserted a good bit more activism about putting conflicts to rest - and has turned
down the flames of its active wars," says Ross Herbert, Africa Research Fellow at the South
African Institute of International Affairs in Johannesburg.

Africa’s conflicts are being solved and the economy is on the upswing
Xinhua 5. (“Yearender”, People’s Daily Online, December 22, http://english.people.com.cn/200512/22/eng20051222_230080.html)
Long-time hotspots in Africa's war- torn regions cooled down considerably in 2005, and political
stability in volatile places as Liberia has helped to bring the impoverished continent back to
economic growth, restoring hope in its people. Optimists might praise Africans for their own efforts to resolve their own
problems, as witnessed in the crisis of Togo, while insecurity in Somalia and stalemate in Sudan's Darfur nevertheless evidence the
Albeit uncertainties in Africa's security map, the continent has
lurking phantom of conflicts and feuds.
started to reflect on ways to achieve swifter economic turnaround, and evidences are that a
better year in 2006 is already around the corner. FEWER CONFLICTS The first positive sign emerged in January, as
the Sudanese government and southern rebel leader signed a comprehensive peace agreement,
concluding an eight-year process to stop a civil war in the south, which has cost more than 2 million lives since 1983. After establishing
a transitional federal government in Nairobi in last October, the lawless Horn of Africa nation, Somalia, in June relocated the
administration to temporary base of Jowhar. Although factions inside the government still feud with each other and pirates
terrorize the seas off its coast, the relocation is still a significant step towards the end of a 14-year civil war
between various factions and clans. Most Burundians have the reason to believe their country is on the
path to peace after a series of polls culminated in Pierre Nkurunziza's election and inauguration in August, under a UN- backed
plan to end ethnic civil war that has killed 300,000 people since 1993. The only remaining rebels, the roughly 3,000-strong
Forces for National Liberation, have also expressed the willingness to talk peace with the new government of the tiny
central African nation. The west African nation Liberia also followed the steps of peace as Ellen Johnson-
Sirleaf was elected the first postwar president in November's elections, 14 years after the civil wars, which killed 200,000
people and left a once prosperous country in shatters.
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Yes Conflict

Africa’s goin to shit—fragility of Nigeria’s democracy and its leader’s absence, combined
with political tensions, are decreasing African stability
Punch 4/6 (4/6/10, " Nigeria's democracy still fragile, US insists ", http://www.punchng.com/Articl.aspx?theartic=Art201004074355090)
The United States has again expressed concern over the political developments in Nigeria, saying
that democracy in the biggest black nation in the world is still “fragile or tenuous.” The US said
through its Assistant Secretary of State for Africa, Ambassador Johnnie Carson, on Monday night that President Umaru
Yar’Adua’s illness and the controversy generated by his long absence from office had led to
tension in Nigeria. Carson, at the second annual Africa Focus at Harvard University, Boston, also named the Democratic
Republic of Congo and Sudan as other countries in Africa with fragile democracies. Reaffirming that “the US welcomes President
Yar’Adua’s recent return to Nigeria,” he said, “Nigeria continues to experience political tensions caused by the
prolonged illness of the President (Yar’Adua).” He added that the US remained concerned that “there may be some people
in Nigeria who are putting their personal ambitions above the health of the President and more
importantly ahead of the political stability of the country.” A US-based Nigerian news agency, Empowered
Newswire, quoted the Assistant Secretary of State as also saying that Washington was concerned with Nigeria’s political health
because of its (Nigeria) importance to the world. He said, “Nigeria is
simply too important to Africa and too
important to the U.S. and the international community for us not to be concerned and engaged.
“Widespread instability in Nigeria could have a tsunami-like ripple effect across West Africa and the
global community.” Carson disclosed that during his recent visit to Nigeria, he “was encouraged by the steps Nigeria’s elected officials
at the national and state level took to elevate Dr. Goodluck Jonathan to the position of Acting President.” He warned that even though
political progress had been made, “Nigeria stillfaces significant political challenges and uncertainty in the run-
up to the presidential and National Assembly elections in 2011.” The US, according to Carson believes “it is important that
Nigeria improve its electoral system; reinvigorate its economy; resolve the conflicts in the Niger
Delta and end communal violence and impunity in Plateau State.” He advised Nigeria’s leaders to “act
responsibly and reaffirm their commitment to good governance, stability and democracy by choosing constitutional rule.” Nigeria and
other African countries, Carson pointed out ”need civilian governments that deliver services to their people; independent judiciaries
that respect and enforce the rule of law; professional security forces that respect human rights; strong and effective legislative
institutions; a free and responsible press; and a dynamic civil society.” Carson also announced that the US would start new
programmes and initiatives, ”which work to implement our policies to move our partnership with Africa forward. “We are establishing
in-depth, high level dialogues with South Africa, Angola, Nigeria, and with the African Union,” he said. A US-Nigeria bi-national
commission agreement was signed on Tuesday afternoon by the Secretary of State, Mrs Hillary Clinton, and Secretary to the
Government of the Federation Alhaji Yayale Ahmed. The agreement is expected to open up to the Federal Government, “the wide
resources and reach of the American government and society.” Carson stated before the signing of the agreement that the US
through the commission ”can help provide some answers and solution to some of Nigeria‘s power generation deficiencies.” Another
top US official said Nigeria was the first African country to earn such an agreement with the Barack Obama presidency. The source
claimed that the Obama administration was trying to pep-up the Jonathan presidency partly, in the hope of promoting democracy in
Nigeria. Commenting on the US-Nigeria bi-national commission, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs, Mr. Phillip
Crowley, said “it is a strategic dialogue designed to expand mutual cooperation across a range of shared interests, including good
governance, transparency, integrity, energy, investment, food security, agriculture, the Niger Delta, and regional security
cooperation.”

Underlying causes of war still fester in SSA – conflict could break out at any time
Xinhua 05. (“Yearender”, People’s Daily Online, December 22, http://english.people.com.cn/200512/22/eng20051222_230080.html)
But one grave worry remains. Even
in countries in peace, if the underlying causes of conflict are not
properly addressed, the specter of war is never too far away. Studies show that civil wars are more likely to
occur in countries with bad governance, stagnant economies and lots of valuable minerals, and
some argued, several wars that seem to have been extinguished are in fact only waiting to re-ignited.
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"There will be no sustainable peace in Africa as long as poverty, bad political leadership and the
many unviable states continue to exist," said Katumanga Musambayi, a political scientist based in Kenya.
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======Conflict/Instability Good======

***A2: Conflict Bad Frontlines***


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A2: Nuke War Frontline

1. African conflict is inevitable—they can’t solve all the root causes


Juma, 2 Monica Juma, former Associate at the Africa Program of the International Peace Academy, September 2002, The Infrastructure of
Peace in Africa, accessed via cioanet.org, p. 1.

Since the end of the Cold War, Africa has been embroiled in a plethora of intra- and interstate conflicts.
Most of these conflicts have a transnational character and generate consequences that have implications for regions beyond those in
which they occur. Among
the major causes of these conflicts are: the weak democratization process; deep-
seated environmental problems; competition for resources; breakdown in the rule of law; and
proliferation of private armies, militias, and the attendant problem of illicit trade in, and use of, illegal arms.
In addition, the nature and dynamics of conflicts are shaped by the interplay of features peculiar to each sub-region.

2. No risk of great power conflict over Africa


Barrett, 5 Robert Barrett, PhD student Centre for Military and Strategic Studies, University of Calgary, June 1, 2005,
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID726162_code327511.pdf?abstractid=726162&mirid=1

Westerners eager to promote democracy must be wary of African politicians who promise democratic reform without sincere
commitment to the process. Offering money to corrupt leaders in exchange for their taking small steps away from autocracy may in
fact be a way of pushing countries into anocracy. As such, world financial lenders and interventionists who wield leverage and
influence must take responsibility in considering the ramifications of African nations who adopt democracy in order to maintain elite
political privileges. The obvious reason for this, aside from the potential costs in human life should conflict arise from hastily
constructed democratic reforms, is the fact that Western donors, in the face of intrastate war would then be faced with channeling
funds and resources away from democratization efforts and toward conflict intervention based on issues of human security. This is a
problem, as Western nations may be increasingly wary of intervening in Africa hotspots after experiencing firsthand the unpredictable
and unforgiving nature of societal warfare in both Somalia and Rwanda. On a costbenefit basis, the West continues to be
somewhat reluctant to get to get involved in Africa’s dirty wars , evidenced by its political hesitation when
discussing ongoing sanguinary grassroots conflicts in Africa. Even as the world apologizes for bearing witness to the Rwandan genocide
without having intervened, the
United States, recently using the label ‘genocide’ in the context of the
Sudanese conflict (in September of 2004), has only proclaimed sanctions against Sudan, while dismissing any
suggestions at actual intervention (Giry, 2005). Part of the problem is that traditional military and
diplomatic approaches at separating combatants and enforcing ceasefires have yielded little in Africa. No
powerful nations want to get embroiled in conflicts they cannot win – especially those conflicts in which
the intervening nation has very little interest.

3. International multilateral action solves the impact to African instability


Neethling, 5 Theo Neethling, Chair of the Subject Group Political Science (Mil) in the School for Security and Africa Studies at the Faculty
of Military Science, Stellenbosch University, 2005, No. 1, African Journal of Conflict Resolution, http://www.accord.org.za/ajcr/2005-
1/AJCR2005_pgs33-60_neethling.pdf, p. 57-58

Be that as it may, it is evident that a range


of international reforms throughout the international system has taken
place to facilitate peacebuilding endeavours. Much was indeed done to facilitate a fundamental
overhaul of the UN system, while major aid agencies established conflict prevention and
peacebuilding units. Also, some Western governments aligned their foreign, security and
development policies and programmes to respond to the conflict prevention and peacebuilding
agenda and challenges of the contemporary international community. This means supporting policies, activities, programmes and
projects which facilitate war-prone, war-torn or post-war countries to recover from conflict in order to address longer-term
developmental and security goals. All in all, it could be argued that this has led to a better understanding of the political
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economy of armed conflicts, as well as a drive towards applying


appropriate strategies and priorities to deal
with developmental and security challenges in responses to violent conflict and civil war. Obviously,
this is of great importance from an African perspective given the acute need to apply relevant and constructive
measures and strategies in the search for sustainable development and long-term security on the continent.

4. Their nuclear escalation claim is empirically denied by dozens of African conflicts


Docking, 7 Tim Docking, African Affairs Specialist with the United States Institute of Peace, 2007, Taking Sides Clashing Views on African
Issues, p. 372

Nowhere was the scope and intensity of violence during the 1990s as great as in Africa. While the
general trend of armed conflict in Europe, Asia, the Americas, and the Middle East fell during the 1989-99 period, the
1990s witnessed an increase in the number of conflicts on the African continent. During this period, 16
UN peacekeeping missions were sent to Africa. (Three countries-Somalia, Sierra Leone, and Angola-were visited by multiple missions
during this time.) Furthermore, this period saw internal and interstate violence in a total of 30 sub-Saharan states. In 1999 alone,
the continent was plagued by 16 armed conflicts, seven of which were wars with more than 1,000 battle-related
deaths (Journal of Peace Research, 37:5, 2000, p. 638). In 2000, the situation continued to deteriorate: renewed heavy fighting
between Eritrea and Ethiopia claimed tens of thousands of lives in the lead-up to a June ceasefire and ultimately the signing of a peace
accord in December; continued violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Sierra Leone, Burundi, Angola, Sudan, Uganda,
and Nigeria as well as the outbreak of new violence between Guinea and Liberia, in Zimbabwe, and in the Ivory Coast have brought
new hardship and bloodshed to the continent.
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--Ext. – Conflict Inevitable

Economic conditions are the root cause of African conflict—the aff doesn’t solve
Collier, 2 Paul Collier, Professor of Economics and Director, Centre for the Study of African Economies at St Antony’s College and Anke
Hoeffler, research officer at the Centre for the Study of African Economies, February 2002, Journal of Conflict Resolution, p. 25.

In this study, we
have applied an econometric model of civil war to analyze the inci- dence of
conflict in Africa, the only region in which, according to SIPRI, conflict has been on a rising trend. We find that Africa largely
conforms to the pattern of conflict predicted by the global model. On average, over the period from 1965 to 1999, Africa had an
incidence of conflict similar to that in other developing regions. However, its structure of risk was very dif- ferent. Africa’s economic
characteristics generated an atypically high risk of conflict, but this was offset by its social characteristics, which generated an
atypically low risk. The model predicts correctly that non-African developing countries would have expe- rienced a declining trend of
conflict. The model accounts for this by their improved economic conditions. By contrast, the
model correctly predicts
the rising trend of Afri- can conflict observed by SIPRI. Again, this is fully accounted for by the
deterioration in Africa’s economic performance. The analysis suggests that the rising trend of Afri- can
conflict is not due to deep problems in its social structure, as suggested by Kaplan (2000), but rather is the
contingent effect of economic circumstances.

Weak states make African conflict inevitable


Mutisi, 6 Martha Mutisi, Lecturer and Staff Development Fellow at the Institute of Peace, Leadership and Governance, at Africa
University and Peter Tendaiwo Maregere, Programme Officer with the Centre for Peace Initiatives in Africa, 2006,
http://www.accord.org.za/ct/2006-4.htm, p. 18

Since the violent conflicts in Africa reflect the chal- lenges of weak and failed states, the search for
security and development should be accompanied by attempts to enable the states to resuscitate and
revitalise their governance structures and operational machinery such as the legislature, executive,
judiciary and security forces. It is apparent that weak states are in themselves unable to create
conditions for stability, security, development and ultimately durable peace. Successful democratisa- tion and development
depends to a large extent on state capability and strength. In Africa, the problem of weak and failed states is a
reality, with Somalia and Sudan topping the list on the weak states scale. Weak states are not only unstable, they also struggle to
address the issues of poverty, unemployment, HIV/AIDS and environ- mental degradation, the major factors in development.
Subsequently, this process leads to a “legitimation crisis”, wherein citizens become discontented with the state. Discontented citizens
usually choose from an array of options, ways of expressing their disgruntlement. In most cases, the frustration has been manifested
through rebellion, riots, crime and coups.

African conflicts are inevitable and intractable


Vogt, 5 Andreas Vogt, Programme Director for the Training for Peace (TfP) in Africa Programme at the Norwegian Institute of International
Affairs, 2005, Conflict Trends, p. 24

The media repeatedly makes us keenly aware of the ongoing and lurking conflicts on the African
continent. Reality, unfortunately, also tells us that they are not about to go away any time soon. Most of
these African conflicts are very complex and internal in nature. In fact, some are actually so protracted
that official state structures have totally collapsed. These realities indeed create daunting challenges for potential
interveners. To obscure matters even further, most African conflicts encompass deliberate targeting of local civilians and, where
present, international peacekeepers and aid personnel – a tactic which unfortunately has become a significant, and often preferred,
weapon in the toolkit of many combatants. Darfur is a sad, but true, current case in point.
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The aff doesn’t address the root causes of African conflict


Chingono, 4 Dr Mark Chingono, Senior Manager for Policy Development and Research at the Centre for Conflict Resolution (CCR), and
Guy Lamb, Senior Researcher at the Centre for Conflict Resolution, October 2004, THE NEW PARTNERSHIP FOR AFRICA’S SECURITY,
http://www.ccr.uct.ac.za/fileadmin/template/ccr/pdf/UN_Report-Africa_s_Security.pdf, p. 11

A long–term strategy needs to be developed to address the root causes of conflict which involve
economic injustice, poor governance, and lack of accountability. This strategy should focus on strengthening
civil society activists who have contributed tremendously to peacemaking and democratisation efforts in Liberia, Sierra Leone, DRC,
Mali and Zambia. In short, there
is need for more policy coherence, more equitable allocation of
resources, and a more effective regional approach to conflict resolution efforts in Africa.

The affirmative does not solve the root causes of African conflict
Elbadawi and Sambanis, 2k Ibrahim Elbadawi and Nicholas Sambanis, World Bank economists, October 2000, Journal of
African Economies, p. 253

Four factors drive Africa’s propensity toward violent conflict. First, Africa is highly dependent on
natural resources exports, which may be looted by rebels to sustain their rebellion. Other regions are
also dependent on natural resources. However, since the relationship between natural resources and civil war-proneness is quadratic,
what is important is the dispersion rather than the mean of this variable (isxp). We find that the standard deviation of African
countries’ resource-dependence is 46% smaller than the standard deviation of non-African countries. Thus, more African countries are
closer to the peak of natural resource dependence, which maximizes the threat of war. More importantly, levels of per capita
income in Africa are much lower than in the other three developing regions. Median per capita GDP in
Africa accounts for less than one-half of that of Asia and less than one-eighth of the income level of Europe and North America. The
fact that young men in Africa are very poor and not educated substantially increases the risk of civil conflict. Globally, young males are
the best recruits for rebellion, and if they have little to lose they are more likely to enlist (on this finding see Collier and Hoeffler 2000).
Thirdly Africa’s pronounced failure to develop strong democratic institutions has compounded
other problems and significantly increased the risk of political violence in the continent (see the results for the P1p variable in
the appendix).
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--Ext. – No Great Power Intervention

Outside powers won’t intervene in African conflicts


Docking, 7 Tim Docking, African Affairs Specialist with the United States Institute of Peace, 2007, Taking Sides Clashing Views on African
Issues, p. 376

Since the tragedy in Somalia, the trend has been for Western nations to refuse to send troops into
Africa's hot spots. Jordan recently underscored this point when it expressed frustration with the West's failure to commit
soldiers to the UNAMSIL mission as a reason for the withdrawal of its troops from Sierra Leone. America's aversion to peacekeeping in
Africa also reflects broader U.S. foreign policy on the continent. Africa occupies a marginal role in American
foreign policy in general (a point highlighted by conference participants).

Great powers don’t get involved in African conflicts


Bogosian et al, 1 Richard Bogosian et al, Special Coordinator for USAID Greater Horn of Africa Initiative, 2-21-01, Peacekeeping in
Africa,” http://www.usip.org/pubs/specialreports/sr66.pdf

the most serious problem facing contemporary peacekeeping


The Brahimi Report does not, however, address
missions: lack of international political will. The 1990s witnessed both the changing nature of international conflict
and the growing need for peacekeeping operations. Between 1948 and 1988 the UN undertook just 15 peacekeeping operations
around the world; between 1989 and 1999, that number jumped to 31. In 1999 the African continent was gripped by 16 armed
conflicts, 7 of which were wars with more than 1,000 battle-related deaths. Currently, the United Nations has four peacekeeping
missions in Africa: MINURSO in the Western Sahara, UNAMSIL in Sierra Leone, UNMEE in Eritrea and Ethiopia, and MONUC in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo. Today, a distinct possibility exists that more civil wars, like those that gripped Sierra Leone and
Liberia during the ‘90s, will occur on the continent . Despite
the growing discussion of African affairs in
American foreign policy circles, the United States is largely disengaged from security issues on
the continent. The United States (and the rest of the Western nations) is loath to contribute
peacekeepers to African peacekeeping missions. Conference participants agreed on the continued importance of
the democratization process in Africa . Conference participants also agreed that the agenda put forth by the Brahimi Report offers
numerous points of entry for members of the international community to promote conflict prevention on the continent .

No great power intervention


Salisu, 2 Major Yushau A Salisu, April 18, 2002, “NIGERIA’S RISING HEGEMONY IS ESSENTIAL TO PEACE AND STABILITY IN WEST-AFRICA,”
http://stinet.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA420533&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf, p. 2

The international community has of late shown lack of interest in intervening in conflicts within
sub-Saharan Africa in general and West Africa in particular as the Liberian, Sierra Leone and Burundi and Rwandan civil wars proved.
For instance the United Nation’s peacekeeping force in Africa which stood at about 40,000 in 1993 was just about 1600 as of June
19992. And during the Liberian conflicts, the then United Nation (UN) Secretary General, Javier Perez de Cuellar
categorically stated that the UN would not intervene. The United States (U.S) which had about 2000 Marines
off the Liberian coast also refused to intervene and separate the warring factions.

Western powers consider African conflicts a second tier concern-- UN peacekeeping proves
de Coning, 6 Cedric de Coning, Research Fellow at ACCORD and an advisor to the Training for Peace (TfP) in Africa and the African Civil-
Military Coordination (CIMIC) programme, 2006, Conflict Trends, http://www.accord.org.za/ct/2006-3.htm,
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While Western foreign policy, security and media attention has been focused on Iraq, Afghanistan and
the Balkans over the last decade, Africa emerged as the major arena for United Nations (UN)
peacekeeping operations.1 Of the 18 peace operations currently managed by the UN, eight are in Africa, and six of these are
large complex peace operations. This explains why 75% of the approximately 88 000 military, police and civilian UN peacekeepers
currently deployed can be found in Africa. The emphasis on Africa is also reflected in the UN peacekeeping budget. Of the
approximately US$5 billion budgeted for 2005/2006, around 77% is budgeted for operations in Africa.2 Peacekeeping is also a
dominant theme for the African Union (AU). Over the last half decade, the AU has undertaken two major peacekeeping operations of
its own in Burundi and Sudan. These operations have involved 10 000 peacekeepers at a total cost of approxi- mately US$600
million.3 Africa is, of course, also a significant troop contributor to UN peace operations, with 34 African countries contributing 28%
of the UN’s uniformed peacekeepers. In comparison with the peacekeeping missions in Africa of the mid- to late 1990s, the new
trend towards large complex peace operations represents a significant shift in the political will of the
international community to invest in peace operations in Africa. This trend should not, however, be interpreted as
signifying a new interest in the UN or in Africa. Rather, the willingness to invest more than US$5
billion in UN peace operations was generated in, and will be sustained by, the post-9/11 belief that
failed states are ideal training, staging and breeding grounds for international terrorists.4 In this context, a
kind of informal peacekeeping apartheid has come about, whereby most European and
American peacekeeping and offensive forces are deployed in NATO or European Union (EU) operations in
Europe and the Middle-East, whilst most UN peace- keeping troops are contributed by the developing
world and deployed in Africa. Whilst this division of roles reflects the macro-pattern, it masks an interesting sub- trend
that has emerged over the last three years. Almost a decade after the debacles in Somalia and Rwanda resulted in the West
withholding its peacekeepers from Africa, there is now a new willingness to consider deploying European peacekeepers to Africa.
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--Ext. – Peacekeeping Solves

Regional and multilateral peacekeeping solves the impact to African conflict


de Coning, 6 Cedric de Coning, Research Fellow at ACCORD and an advisor to the Training for Peace (TfP) in Africa and the African Civil-
Military Coordination (CIMIC) programme, 2006, Conflict Trends, http://www.accord.org.za/ct/2006-3.htm, p. 6

Over the past half decade, the AU and regional economic communities (RECs) like the Economic Community of
West African States (ECOWAS), Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) and Southern African Development Community
have significantly increased their capacity to undertake and manage peace operations.
(SADC)
The AU, in particular, has played a leading role by deploying its first two peace operations , AMIB in
Burundi and AMIS in Darfur. One of the most significant developments in the African context is the informal division of roles that has
emerged around the sequencing of peace operations. The pattern that is taking shape is that the AU, or one of the
RECs, first deploys a stabilisation operation, followed by a UN complex peacekeeping operation
within approximately 90 to 120 days.

An African peacekeeping force is being developed to manage African conflict


de Coning, 6 Cedric de Coning, Research Fellow at ACCORD and an advisor to the Training for Peace (TfP) in Africa and the African Civil-
Military Coordination (CIMIC) programme, 2006, Conflict Trends, http://www.accord.org.za/ct/2006-3.htm, p. 7

One of the most significant developments in the African peacekeeping context is the initiative to develop
an African Standby Force (ASF). It is significant because, for the first time, Africa now has a common
position and action plan for the development of its peacekeeping capacity. This means that the various
disparate donor initiatives to enhance Africa’s peacekeeping capacity can be positively channelled
to support one coherent effort.
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A2: Genocide Frontline

1. OUR IMPACTS COME FIRST


a) turns – war allows for the conditions of genocide to exist
PPU 7 (Peace Pledge Union, oldest pacifist organization of Britain. Genocide. June 16. http://www.ppu.org.uk/genocide/index1a.html)
These are horrors we want to protect children from, so why try to talk to them about it? It's a question of not hiding facts. Children
must understand what human beings are capable of. This means understanding not only the great achievements of science, culture
and society, but also how far, at times, human cruelty can go. Our children need to grow up determined to restrain and
forestall that cruelty. So, from early on, they need to start learning how it works. How else can they be fully equipped to recognise the
signs of evil, and resist it?
 
 What is our approach? We have no hidden agenda. Our argument is plain and up-front: it's
war that
makes genocide possible. This is not only because genocide is committed under cover of war or during
the conduct of it. The very acceptance of war as a legitimate practice of aggression (or, as it is
sometimes called, defence) creates a mindset, a social climate, in which war can also be envisaged as a
means of oppression and annihilation. We deliberately train and equip professional soldiers to wage war, and the spin-
off is that we also equip callous, fanatic, cold-blooded, criminal, cunning, clever, brutish men, and a few women, to commit genocide.
And they do. There are even those who get pleasure out of it.
 
 So talking with our children about genocide means talking about
things we all know, problems we all have to solve. Intolerance. Bullying. Violence. Prejudice. Hatred. Victimisation. Fanaticism and
extremism. Hunger for power. Using weapons, physical and mental. Armed conflict and war can and do grow from any or all of
these.
 
 We also have to ask ourselves whether the laws we try to make for conducting war have, or ever could have, any real bite.
Do human rights agreements have any real power to stop human rights abuses? Human rights abuses are no longer, if they ever were,
the accidents of war: they are the tools of it. War is an essentially lawless state of affairs. We need to explain this to
children.
 
 What's more,
as long as war is regarded as permissible, and prepared for, it will happen.
Its apparent 'successes' are all, without exception, short-term. Most lead on to failures (not all of them
recorded). Every act of war carries the seeds of another: wars may end, in the messy and damaging
way they do, but they don't end war. We need to explain this to children.
 
 We need to tell them that war is not a
necessary evil. If we take war out of the picture, we'll be able to discern the real anatomy of a dispute, and deal with its root causes in
nonviolent ways. There will always be conflicts, the stuff of life, but without war people will be able to disagree in safety. And genocide
will be a shame of the past.

b) genocide intervention that would provoke a larger conflict isn’t justified


Feinstein 7. (Lee, Senior Fellow with Council on Foreign Relations, “Darfur and Beyond What Is Needed to Prevent Mass Atrocities”, June
25, http://www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/DarfurCSR22.pdf )

The responsibility to protect is limited in what it can accomplish. First and foremost is the inescapable fact that the
principle will not be applied uniformly. Inevitably, the decision to take action—political,
diplomatic, or otherwise—will reflect the realities of power and circumstance. This is especially true
where, having run out of options short of force, some form of military action appears warranted. Rather than lament the inevitable
unevenness of application,
the report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS)
embeds it in a series of “precautionary criteria” for action, including, in the case of a military
response, the “reasonable prospect” that it will succeed. As the report says, “It will be the case
that some human beings simply cannot be rescued except at unacceptable cost—perhaps of a
larger regional conflagration, involving major military powers. In such cases, however painful
the reality, coercive military action is no longer justified.”19
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2. Genocide response should be framed pragmatically – absolutist frames are counter


productive
Feinstein 7. (Lee, Senior Fellow with Council on Foreign Relations, “Darfur and Beyond What Is Needed to Prevent Mass Atrocities”, June
25, http://www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/DarfurCSR22.pdf )

Overcoming these structural impediments to action requires balancing effectiveness against


expense. Genocide is a historical fact and a present danger. It is possible to identify with a degree of accuracy
where it might occur and in general terms that it is going to occur. But it is not possible to say exactly when it will happen or what will
precipitate a genuine emergency. For example, there was a thirty-five-year backdrop to the 1994 slaughter of Tutsis by Hutus in and
around Rwanda. This history alerted the world to the chronic danger of genocide in the region. It also dulled it to the acuity of the
crisis in the weeks leading up to the killings in April 1994. Thefailure to intervene militarily in Rwanda and the
frustration over inaction to the stop mass killing in Darfur has had the unhelpful effect of
framing the issue of preventing atrocities around the question of whether to “send in the
Marines.” Forcible humanitarian intervention cannot be ruled out. Nor can it be held out only as a last resort. Yet, the inherent risks
of military interventions should limit invasion and occupation to extreme cases. In most instances, political, diplomatic,
and a range of military options short of war are preferable and more effective.

3. The impact is containable -- a relatively small army could easily stop a genocide
Feil 98 (Scott- graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1973 and received an MA in political science from Stanford University.
Preventing Genocide: How the Early Use of Force Might Have Succeeded in Rwanda. Published by Carnegie Corporation
http://www.wilsoncenter.org/subsites/ccpdc/pubs/rwanda/rwanda.htm)

Based on the presentations by the panel and other research, the author believes that a modern force of 5,000 troops,
drawn primarily from one country and sent to Rwanda sometime between April 7 and 21, 1994,
could have significantly altered the outcome of the conflict. Although the organized combatant factions in
Rwanda were fairly capable light infantry and such an operation would have entailed significant risk, the introduction of a
combat force large enough to seize, at one time, key objectives all over the country would have,
in the words of one senior officer, "thrown a wet blanket over an emerging fire." More specifically, forces
appropriately trained, equipped, and commanded, and introduced in a timely manner, could have
stemmed the violence in and around the capital, prevented its spread to the countryside, and
created conditions conducive to the cessation of the civil war between the RPF and RGF.7
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--A2: Genocide Outweighs

1. The warrant in their cards is that genocide is bad because lots of people die. That’s it.
They don’t have a single piece of evidence that compares genocide with extinction. Their
evidence that says we should act regardless of consequences doesn’t assume that those
consequences result in more people being killed.

2. Their moral tunnel vision is complicit with the evil they criticize
Issac 2 (Professor of Political Science at Indiana-Bloomington, Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy and Public Life,
PhD from Yale (Jeffery C., Dissent Magazine, Vol. 49, Iss. 2, “Ends, Means, and Politics,” p. Proquest)

As a result, the most important political questions are simply not asked. It
is assumed that U.S. military intervention
is an act of "aggression," but no consideration is given to the aggression to which intervention is
a response. The status quo ante in Afghanistan is not, as peace activists would have it, peace,
but rather terrorist violence abetted by a regime--the Taliban--that rose to power through
brutality and repression. This requires us to ask a question that most "peace" activists would prefer not to ask: What
should be done to respond to the violence of a Saddam Hussein, or a Milosevic, or a Taliban
regime? What means are likely to stop violence and bring criminals to justice? Calls for diplomacy and international
law are well intended and important; they implicate a decent and civilized ethic of global order.
But they are also vague and empty, because they are not accompanied by any account of how
diplomacy or international law can work effectively to address the problem at hand campus left
offers no such account. To do so would require it to contemplate tragic choices in which moral
goodness is of limited utility. Here what matters is not purity of intention but the intelligent exercise of power. Power is not
a dirty word or an unfortunate feature of the world. It is the core of politics. Power is the ability to effect outcomes in the world.
Politics, in large part, involves contests over the distribution and use of power. To accomplish
anything in the political world, one must attend to the means that are necessary to bring it
about. And to develop such means is to develop, and to exercise, power. To say this is not to say that power is
beyond morality. It is to say that power is not reducible to morality . As writers such as Niccolo Machiavelli,
Max Weber, Reinhold Niebuhr, and Hannah Arendt have taught, an unyielding concern with moral goodness
undercuts political responsibility. The concern may be morally laudable, reflecting a kind of personal integrity, but it
suffers from three fatal flaws: (1) It fails to see that the purity of one's intention does not ensure the
achievement of what one intends. Abjuring violence or refusing to make common cause with
morally compromised parties may seem like the right thing; but if such tactics entail impotence,
then it is hard to view them as serving any moral good beyond the clean conscience of their
supporters; (2) it fails to see that in a world of real violence and injustice, moral purity is not
simply a form of powerlessness; it is often a form of complicity in injustice. This is why, from the
standpoint of politics--as opposed to religion--pacifism is always a potentially immoral stand. In
categorically repudiating violence, it refuses in principle to oppose certain violent injustices
with any effect; and (3) it fails to see that politics is as much about unintended consequences as
it is about intentions; it is the effects of action, rather than the motives of action, that is most
significant. Just as the alignment with "good" may engender impotence, it is often the pursuit of "good" that generates evil. This is
the lesson of communism in the twentieth century: it is not enough that one's goals be sincere or idealistic; it is equally
important, always, to ask about the effects of pursuing these goals and to judge these effects in
pragmatic and historically contextualized ways. Moral absolutism inhibits this judgment. It
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alienates those who are not true believers. It promotes arrogance. And it undermines political
effectiveness.

3. Exclusion is a reason to vote neg – They advocate that the group they save is more
important than the rest of humanity – Since all lives are equal, you should treat them that
way by protecting the greatest number
Dworkin 77 (Professor of Law and Philosophy at New York University (Ronald 1977, “Taking Rights Seriously” pg 274-5)
The liberal conception of equality sharply limits the extent to which ideal arguments of policy may be used to justify any constraint on
liberty. Such arguments cannot be used if the idea in question is itself controversial within the community. Constraints cannot be
defended, for example, directly on the ground that they contribute to a culturally sophisticated community, whether the community
wants the sophistication or not, because that argument would violate the canon of the liberal conception of equality that prohibits a
Utilitarian argument
government from relying on the claim that certain forms of life are inherently more valuable than others.
of policy, however, would seem secure from that objection. They do not suppose that any form
of life is inherently more valuable than any other, but instead base· their claim, that constraints on liberty are
necessary to advance some collective goal of the community, just on the fact that that goal happens to be
desired more widely or more deeply than any other. Utilitarian arguments of policy, therefore, seem not to oppose
but on the contrary to embody the fundamental right of equal concern and respect, because they
treat the wishes of each member of the community on a par with the wishes of any other, with
no bonus or discount reflecting the view that that member is more or less worthy of concern, or his
views more or less worthy of respect, than any other. This appearance of egalitarianism has, I think, been the principal source of the
great appeal that utilitarianism has had, as a general political philosophy, over the last century. In Chapter 9, however, I pointed out
that the egalitarian character of a utilitarian argument is often an illusion. I will not repeat, but only summarize, my argument here.
Utilitarian arguments fix on the fact that a particular constraint on liberty will make more people happier, or satisfy more of their
preferences, depending upon whether psychological or preference utilitarianism is in play. But people's overall preference for one
policy rather than another may be seen to include, on further analysis, both preference that are personal, because they state a
preference for the assignment of one set of goods or opportunities to him and preferences that are external, because they state a
preference for one assignment of goods or opportunities to others. But a utilitarian argument that assigns critical weight to the
external preferences of members of the community will not be egalitarian in the sense under consideration. It will not respect the right
of everyone to be treated with equal concern and respect.
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A2: Oil Shocks Frontline

1. Offshore platforms solve the impact to African instability


Goldwyn, 5 David Goldwyn, Goldwyn International Strategies, 11-15-2005, “Africa’s Petroleum Industry,”
http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA441207, p. 5

The future of Nigeria’s oil development is offshore, potentially providing considerable


insulation from onshore unrest. Platforms are so far located a considerable distance from shore,
making casual attacks by unsophisticated pirates or bandits more difficult. But rising revenues will also bring rising
expectations, and an expansive energy offshore infrastructure could become an increasingly attractive criminal target.

2. Storage and surge capacity prevent oil disruptions


Kendell, 98 James M. Kendell, National Energy Information Center, 7/22, 1998,
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/archive/issues98/oimport.html

By 1990 the United States and other governments had created emergency stockpiles of oil as a buffer
against disruption. The invasion of Kuwait showed that the United States and other governments were willing to use their
stockpiles. A noncommercial measure, “Days of Net Petroleum Imports in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve,” is published in the Annual
Energy Review. It shows that the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) peaked at 115 days of supply in 1985 and has now declined to
63 days. Assuming that the SPR does not expand or contract, coverage will decline to 35 days in 2020 as consumption grows.
Combining noncommercial and commercial stocks provides a somewhat broader measure of
the ability of inventories to respond to supply disruptions. Since 1985, available commercial stocks in the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries have fluctuated between 25 and 30 days of supply.
Assuming that commercial pressures keep stockpiles from expanding, while consumption continues to grow, the supply would slip to
20 days in 2020.8 Besides stockpiles, surge capacity
or excess world production capacity is another source
of supply. Historically, excess capacity has responded primarily to prices, building up during
periods of high prices and declining during periods of low prices. A buildup occurs during a high-
price period such as the early 1980s, as consumers conserve and producers rush to find more oil
and cash in on high prices. If oil prices remain at their current moderate levels through 2020, excess capacity can be
expected to decline from 3.4 to 2.4 million barrels per day in 2013, before rising to 3.2 million barrels per day in 20209 (Figure 4).

3. Oil isn’t key to the economy


Murphy, 2k Cait Murphy, Fortune, March 20, 2000
Relax: This is not an oil shock. It is not even an oil tremor. It is something along the lines of an
oil belch: Not particularly appealing to experience, with an unpleasant aftertaste--but hardly
threatening. How can that be? The price of a barrel of oil has tripled over the past year--surely, that has to be a problem. Ah, but
when it comes to oil, self-evident truths vaporize like a tank of gas in a '67 Chevy. The bottom line is that the recent run-up in oil prices
will hurt a few people for a little while, such as truckers and residents of drafty, old, oil-heated homes. The rest of us will shrug it off.
The price shock has been a couple of years in the making. In 1998 everything went wrong for oil exporters.
Consumption rose only 0.1%, far less than anticipated, because of a mild winter and unexpected economic crises in Asia and Russia.
OPEC, in a ludicrously awful bit of timing, had just turned on the taps, agreeing in November 1997 to increase production. Lots of
supply, low demand. The result: Prices crashed. In 1999 the opposite happened. Asia's unexpectedly robust
recovery led an increase in demand for oil; the U.S. winter was cold. And OPEC, in a remarkably adept bit of timing, had coaxed
production cuts. As supplies and inventory waned, prices rose, hitting $ 31 the first week of March. Because the oil shock of the 1970s
had such a massive effect on the public psyche, there is a knee-jerk fear whenever prices rise a lot. But this time prices tripled from
abnormally low, even derisory levels (see chart); in real life, $ 30 a barrel is not outrageous. Besides, oil ain't what it used to
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be. As a share of the U.S. economy, oil accounts for only 3% of GDP, down from almost 9% in the late 1970s. More
wealth is being generated by industries that don't use much oil, like IT. For each dollar of GDP America
generates, it uses half as much oil as a generation ago. (For more, see The Web Page.) Even manufacturing appears untroubled.
Many companies hedge their energy risks through futures contracts. Few plants use oil for
power generation anymore, and those that do often have the ability to switch to another
source (typically gas) if prices soar. "Given that we got through the Asian crisis hardly breaking stride, I think $ 30 oil isn't really
a problem," says Joe Kennedy, economist at the Manufacturers' Alliance.

4. US-China cooperation over new fuels and strategic reserves will offset shocks
Washington File, 5 (April 4, http://usinfo.state.gov/eap/Archive/2005/Apr/04-622583.html)
Working together, China and the United States can more effectively meet their own energy challenges
and make the world energy situation more stable in the process, U.S. officials say. The two countries should cooperate
because “our goals are similar and our interests converge with theirs,” said an official, who asked not to be identified, in a March 8
interview. Both countries want to reduce their reliance on oil and natural gas imports by embracing new fuels
and technologies for enhancing energy efficiency, the official said. Both also want to limit environmental problems related to the use
of fossil fuels by moving toward cleaner technologies, the official said (See related article, “U.S. Encourages China to Become
Responsible Energy Consumer.”) The United States is a leader in many fields of energy research and technology and China has
achievements of its own, for example, in high-energy physics, coal sequestration and next-generation nuclear reactors. So both sides
have something to gain from cooperation, U.S. Energy Department officials have said. However, Jane Nakano, China desk officer from
that department, says that the more the United States and China understand each other’s objectives and policies, the greater benefits
the two countries would be able to draw from bilateral cooperation. That is one of the main goals of the U.S.-China Energy Policy
Dialogue, she said. Agreed to in 2004, the dialogue aims to build upon 25 years of bilateral energy science and technology
cooperation, she said in a March 1 interview. The dialogue will encourage both sides to view demand and other energy problems as
common challenges rather than as sources of a competition in which one side's interests are advanced at the other's expense, Nakano
said. “It is a framework that will help us diminish potential for misunderstanding,” she said. The specific topics of the U.S.-China
dialogue have not been publicized, but discussions are to include energy security and regulatory issues, according to a 2004 Energy
Department news release. As for energy security, Robert Ebel said in a March 11 interview that one of the most important things the
Bush administration could do to make world energy markets more predictable would be to encourage China to
enhance its plan for strategic oil stockpiling. Ebel directs energy research at the Washington-based Center for Strategic
and International Studies (CSIS), a private, nonpartisan policy group. Government-controlled petroleum reserves have been
established by developed countries and some other major countries for emergencies such as supply disruptions. China has started
building such reserves at one of four locations designated for that purpose. Its strategic stockpiles are expected to reach full capacity
by 2008 or 2009. The unidentified U.S. official said that, indeed,
it is important for China and other Asia-Pacific countries to
establish or boost their strategic petroleum reserves. What the Bush administration also would like to see is a
clear message regarding how and under what circumstances China would use those reserves, the official said. Jeffrey Logan, a
researcher at the International Energy Agency, says that the use of strategic petroleum reserves must be coordinated internationally
to make the biggest impact on the energy markets. Hence, the need for continued international dialogue with China on the issue, he
said at a March CSIS symposium. According to U.S. officials, because
the United States and China consume so
much of the world's oil, the degree of cooperation between them could have a big effect on the
global energy market. The U.S. economy, the most dynamic in the industrialized world, and the Chinese economy, the world's
fastest growing, together account for one-third of global energy consumption. The two countries will need more energy to fuel their
economic growth in the future. However, the United States is projected to increase its share of world energy consumption only
marginally to 22 percent in 2025 while China’s portion is forecast to almost double to 15 percent in the same period, according to the
United States' Energy Information Administration (EIA). A large upsurge in the demand for oil worldwide, particularly in China and
other developing countries, is seen as the main force behind the sharp petroleum price increases in the past three years.
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--Shocks N/UQ

Link should have been triggered last August and the August before that
AP, 11 (Associated Press, 8/8/11, “Oil prices plunge to the lowest point of the year,” JPL)
Oil plunged to its lowest price of the year Monday on concerns about the slowing global
economy and future demand for oil and gas. Benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude fell $5.57, or
6.4 percent to settle at $81.31 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. That is the lowest
settlement price of the year for crude, but it's still higher than the $71.63 per barrel low of
the past 12 months. Oil hit that on Aug. 24 of last year, when a combination of disappointing economic news and
abundant supplies drove down prices. Brent crude, used to price many international varieties of crude, on Monday fell $5.63, or
5.2 percent, to settle at $103.74 per barrel on the ICE Futures exchange in London. Anxious traders pulled
money out of oil and stocks and bought assets considered to be safer during times of economic uncertainty, such as
Treasurys and gold. Gold topped $1,700 an ounce for the first time, while stocks were down more than 5 percent. Standard & Poor's
on Friday cut the Triple-A credit rating for long-term U.S. government debt. Monday's trading session was the first chance traders and
investors had to react, and many of them sold off.In the past two weeks, oil prices have dropped nearly $16
per barrel. Analysts think oil remain volatile this week as traders look for some clarity about the direction of the world economy
and demand for oil. The Department of Energy is scheduled to release its Short-term Energy Outlook on Tuesday, and OPEC is
Traders also are concerned about debt
expected to issue an updated forecast for global oil consumption as well.
problems in Europe, where the European Central Bank said it will intervene to prop up the
sagging economies of Spain and Italy.

Oil prices hit year-long low in October; should have triggered the link
Khan, 10/3 (Chris, 10/3/12, “Oil drops to lowest price since 2010,” USA Today / Associated Press, JPL)
The benchmark price dropped below $78 per barrel to its lowest level in more than a year,
as fears of another recession grew. Oil fell along with broad declines on Wall Street. If the price oil stays low, gasoline
prices could fall further. Gasoline has fallen from a peak of $3.985 per gallon May 5 to $3.417 Monday ,
according to AAA. It began the year at $3.073. Investors are concerned about a pair of recent
announcements that point to weaker demand and even lower energy prices this year. Greece, at the
center of the European debt crisis, said over the weekend that it will miss its lower spending targets despite severe cost-cutting. And
China's manufacturing sector appeared to cool off in September. "We're also at a lull in the
market" after the summer driving season, independent analyst Stephen Schork said. "This is when you tend to see
weakness" in oil prices. Benchmark crude on Monday fell $1.59, or 2%, to finish the day at $77.61 per barrel in New York.
Prices tumbled as low as $76.85 earlier in the day. Oil hasn't been that low since
September 2010. In London, Brent crude dropped $1.05 to end at $101.71 a barrel. The decline in oil markets may give U.S.
drivers a break this winter. Gasoline prices have dropped during the past few months, though at a slower pace than oil. The price of
gas has fallen 14% since peaking in May near $4 per gallon (3.8 liters). Oil
is down by more than twice as much —
32% — in that time. An ongoing worry for investors in recent months has been Greece's debt
problems and their impact on the rest of Europe. Without more financial aid, Greece will start running out of money in two weeks.
A Greek default could spread to neighboring countries and possibly trigger widespread banking problems. That would
hamper world energy demand as lending slows and businesses cut spending.
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--A2: --> Econ Collapse

Conflict doesn’t impede Chinese access to Africa


Amosu, 7 Akwe Amosu, senior policy analyst for Africa at the Washington Office of the Open Society Institute, 3-9-2007, Africa News
China has also exploited Africa's propensity to engage in civil conflict. The Congressional Research Service
in Washington estimates that between 2001 and 2004, China was the continent's third largest arms supplier
(after Russia and Germany), supplying nearly 7% of Africa's military purchases. The impact outweighs the volume, particularly because
of China's willingness to sell weapons to some of the continent's most repressive rulers, including Bashir of Sudan and Mugabe of
Zimbabwe, and to buyers who then feed them into active conflicts. Light weapons from China have flooded into the Great Lakes area,
where millions have died as a result of civil conflict. In short, corruption
and conflict do not seem to deter China;
it is hungry enough for oil and minerals to overlook these factors when making investment
decisions. Still, China's indifference does not mean that governance and related factors are not important for Africa's economic
development. Unsurprisingly, the top recipients of FDI in Africa are oil- and mineral-producing nations, with poor governance and
stability records. But also among them is South Africa, which is not a major producer of petroleum and whose mineral sector is already
intensively operated. South Africa makes it into the top rank of FDI winners because its economy is well run. The country's governance
is of a high standard. There is accountability and rule of law, corruption is relatively low, and stability is guaranteed, notwithstanding a
serious crime problem. While the bulk of FDI flows into other African nations are mostly concentrated in the extractive industries, in
South Africa they fuel a diverse array of sectors. Thus if we remove oil and China's appetite from the picture, we find South Africa's
competitive advantage is supreme and the reforms Prime Minister Meles rejects are indeed critical to capturing foreign investment.

African countries will expel China—the impact is inevitable


Economy, 6 Elizabeth C. Economy, Director for Asia Studies at the CFR and Karen Monaghan, visiting fellow at the CFR, 11-2-2006,
International Herald Tribune,
http://www.cfr.org/publication/11886/perils_of_beijings_africa_strategy.html?breadcrumb=%2Fregion%2Fpublication_list%3Fid%3D143

Burgeoning economic ties also belie the challenges that have arisen from greater economic integration. Beijing’s
unwillingness to press its state-owned firms on issues of good governance and social responsibility is
producing a backlash in several African countries. Last month, Gabon ordered the Chinese energy firm,
Sinopec, to halt exploration in Loango national park, designated a nature reserve in 2002 with funding from international
donors, after a US conservation group accused it of desecrating the forest and operating without an
approved environmental impact study. In Zambia, mineworkers rioted at a Chinese run-mine over poor working conditions and a
Anecdotal evidence also suggests simmering grass roots resentment of the
failure to pay wages.
growing Chinese presence. Legal and illegal Chinese immigrants are moving to Africa by the tens
and sometimes hundreds of thousands. Chinese laborers are brought in to work in extractive industries, construction and
manufacturing projects fueling charges that Chinese investors are taking rather than creating jobs. In Angola, a Chinese $2 billion dollar
credit line is contingent on Chinese firms getting 70% of the contracts. In South Africa, where an estimated one hundred to two
hundred thousand Chinese dominate the retail and wholesale clothing industry, unions
have pressed Pretoria to put
quotas on Chinese apparel and textiles imports to protect local industry and jobs.
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A2: Terrorism Frontline

1. Alt cause – disease spread increases terrorist cell recruitment from the SSA
Whitman 6. (Christine Tood, former administrator of EPA in the Bush admin, “More Than Humanitarianism: A Strategic U.S. Approach
Toward Africa”, Center for Foreign Relations, January 23, http://www.cfr.org/publication/9695/more_than_humanitarianism.html)

And of course, we
have a growing concern of terrorists emanating from the Sub-Saharan.
Obviously, our focus has been more to the Middle East and North Africa to date, but we also know that
a lot of terrorist cells have started to find a place in Africa—in Nigeria and the Sudan and other
areas. And when you look at the poverty—the issue of the devastation wrought by HIV/AIDS, the kinds of
things that all go to create a feeling of despair, particularly among young people, those are the
very kinds of confluence of influences that can make it easier to recruit people to terrorist
movements.

2. Terrorists are not primarily from Africa – empirically proven


Tripathi 5. (Salil, London based journalist, “Debunking the Poverty-Terrorism Myth”, Asian Wall Street Journal, lexis)
Think of the millions of poor people who live in abject conditions in Africa and Asia. They suffer from
widespread diseases and persistent malnutrition. Parents can't assume that their children will have a better future than their own.
Many of these countries have experienced strife and violence. But the poor there do not
routinely blow up buses or turn their bodies into bombs. To suggest that the poor will become terrorists unless
their plight is addressed is gratuitous; worse, it insults them -- most poor lead dignified lives, trying heroically to improve their lives
when they have little control over their destinies. The poor value life -- their own, of their families, and of their neighbors and others
around them. Terrorists don't. Consider
that 15 of the 19 hijackers involved in the Sept. 11 attacks were
from one of the wealthiest countries in the world (Saudi Arabia), and were from middle class, if
not rich families; their leader, Osama Bin Laden, a Saudi billionaire. They didn't lack material wealth; they
lacked the sensitivity to value human life.

3. No impact to terrorism – attacks will be small


Roberts 02
Brad Roberts, member of the research staff at the Institute for Defense Analyses, and Michael Moodie, president of the Chemical and Biological Arms Control Institute, July
2002, “Biological Weapons: Toward a Threat Reduction Strategy, Defense Horizons, http://www.ndu.edu/inss/DefHor/DH15/DH15.htm

The argument about terrorist motivation is also important. Terrorists generally have
not killed as many as they
have been capable of killing. This restraint seems to derive from an understanding of mass casualty attacks
as both unnecessary and counterproductive. They are unnecessary because terrorists, by and large, have
succeeded by conventional means. Also, they are counterproductive because they might alienate key
constituencies, whether among the public, state sponsors, or the terrorist leadership group. In Brian Jenkins' famous words,
terrorists want a lot of people watching, not a lot of people dead. Others have argued that the lack of mass casualty terrorism
and effective exploitation of BW has been more a matter of accident and good fortune than capability or intent. Adherents of
this view, including former Secretary of Defense William Cohen, argue that "it's not a matter of if but when." The attacks of
September 11 would seem to settle the debate about whether terrorists have both the motivation and sophistication to
exploit weapons of mass destruction for their full lethal effect. After all, those were terrorist attacks of unprecedented
sophistication that seemed clearly aimed at achieving mass casualties--had the World Trade Center towers collapsed as the
1993 bombers had intended, perhaps as many as 150,000 would have died. Moreover, Osama bin Laden's constituency
would appear to be not the "Arab street" or some other political entity but his god. And terrorists answerable only to their
deity have proven historically to be among the most lethal. But this debate cannot be considered settled. Bin Laden and his
followers could have killed many more on September 11 if killing as many as possible had been their primary objective. They
now face the core dilemma of asymmetric warfare: how to escalate without creating new interests for the stronger power and
thus the incentive to exploit its power potential more fully. Asymmetric adversaries want their stronger enemies
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fearful, not fully engaged--militarily or otherwise. They seek to win by preventing the stronger partner from exploiting
its full potential. To kill millions in America with biological or other weapons would only commit the United States--and
much of the rest of the international community--to the annihilation of the perpetrators.
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--Ext. – No Impact

High risk aversion means no motivation for WMD


Maerli (Science Program Fellow, Center for Int’l Security &Cooperation, Stanford Univ.) 2K [Morten Bremer, “Relearning the ABCs:
Terrorists and “Weapons of Mass Destruction,” The Nonproliferation Review, Summer, pp. 108-119// -delo]

Furthermore, a group’s interest in ABC weaponry is not the same as obtaining such capabilities. Before any decision to deploy either
conventional or non-conventional weapons, a terrorist group will have to judge its competence to use the weapon effectively. This will
involve practical assessments of the level of training, skills, and technical and logistical capabilities requires. Terrorists
are
dependent on success, as failure could threaten the cohesiveness or the very existence of the
group. This creates an environment of risk aversion where known and proven tactics will be
preferred. Surely, if the stakes are high, terrorists , as others, can accept further risks. But there have always been
enormous gaps between the potential of a weapon and the abilities and/or will to employ it by
terrorists. Most terrorist groups, even those pursuing suicidal ends, protect their resources.
Wasting personnel and money will inevitably harm the group and its long-term goals. Consequently,
new means and methods of violence with unknown outcomes would be less appealing.

Their evidence relies on a misinformation campaign.


Adam Dolnik, Center for Nonproliferation Studies, ‘3 (Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 26.1)
Groups Motivated Predominantly by Islamist Ideology (al Qaida, PIJ).

Groups in this category are even less discriminatory in their suicide bombings than those of the preceding category. But despite the
religious justifications that allow them to dehumanize civilians more effectively, the CBRN involvement of thes e groups remains on
the level of declared interest. And even though many open-source reports and court testimonies document Al
Qaida’s attempts to acquire CBRN agents, no hard evidence of Al Qaida’s CBRN capabilities exists.91 Further,
the fact that Al Qaida’s attempted acquisition of CBRN is public knowledge suggests that not much effort was invested
into concealing this information; quite the contrary. Under Lesson 9 subsection d) of the Al Qaida training manual,
the group’s members are instructed exactly on what to say when captured and interrogated. 92 It is
quite possible that the existing claims of CBRN activities by the group’s members are part of a
deliberate misinformation campaign designed to spread fear and to divert the U.S. government’s attention from other
forms of attack. In terms of agent selection, it is interesting to note that these groups tend to claim possession of all types of CBRN
weapons.
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A2: Water Wars Frontline

1. There is no scenario for escalation -- too many limiting factors


Harpers, 2k 00. (July 1, lexis)
Yet such wars haven't quite happened. Aaron Wolf, an Oregon State University specialist in water conflicts,
maintains that the last war over water was fought between the Mesopotamian city states of Lagash and Umma
4,500 years ago. Wolf has found that during the twentieth century only 7 minor skirmishes were
fought over water while 145 water-related treaties were signed. He argues that one reason is
strategic: in a conflict involving river water, the aggressor would have to be both downstream
(since the upstream nation enjoys unhampered access to the river) and militarily superior. As Wolf puts it, "An upstream
riparian would have no cause to launch an attack, and a weaker state would be foolhardy to do so." And if a powerful
downstream nation retaliates against a water diversion by, say, destroying its weak upstream neighbor's dam, it still
risks the consequences, in the form of flood or pollution or poison from upstream. So, until now,
water conflicts have simmered but rarely boiled, perhaps because of the universality of the need for water. Almost two fifths of the
world's people live in the 214 river basins shared by two or more countries; the
Nile links ten countries, whose
leaders are profoundly aware of one another's hydrologic behavior. Countries usually manage
to cooperate about Water, even in unlikely circumstances. In 1957, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and South Vietnam
formed the Mekong Committee, which exchanged information throughout the Vietnam War. Through the 1980s and into the 1990s,
Israeli and Jordanian officials secretly met once or twice a year at a picnic table on the banks of the Yarmuk River to allocate the river's
water supply; these so-called picnic-table summits occurred while the two nations disavowed formal diplomatic contact. Jerome Delli
Priscoli, editor of a thoughtful trade journal called Water Policy and a social scientist at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, believes the
whole notion of water conflict is overemphasized: "Water irrigation helped build early communities and bring those communities
together in larger functional arrangements. Such community networking was a primary impetus to the growth of civilization. Indeed,
water may actually be one of humanity's great learning grounds for building community.... The
thirst for water may be more persuasive than the impulse toward conflict."

2. There’s no internal link to nuclear war – no countries with WMD would care about
African water shortages. It’s their burden to prove they would be drawn in.

3. Deterrence checks water wars


IPS 99. (Inter Press Service, August 8, lexis)
Economic and military might play a role too. Poor and arid countries such as Jordan or the Palestinian territories, no
matter how desperate, cannot afford to launch a war against powerful neighbors, who, in turn, use
their control of water sources into bargaining weapons. Around 90 percent of the water from the West Bank is
consumed by Israel, yet the Israeli government demands Palestinians to cut back on their
consumption and cuts agreed supplies to Jordan.

3. Super beetle going to solve for shortages now

BBC 1. (“Beetle could solve water shortages”, November,


http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/sci_tech/newsid_1632000/1632936.stm)

A super beetle could be the answer to water shortages in the desert. The beetle has a special
kind of shell on its back that attracts tiny water droplets from the air. When enough of the tiny droplets
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collect together to form a bigger drop, it runs down the beetle's back towards its head. The special shape of the beetle's back guides
the water to its mouth, which means it always has enough to drink.And now top scientists are hoping to steal its
success to help those living in places where water's short. They have made a special kind of material that's like
the beetle's back and collects water in the same way.

4. ALT CAUSE –
a) poor water management
USA Today 3. (“Water shortages will leave world in dire straits”, January 26, http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2003-01-26-
water-usat_x.htm)

More than half of humanity will be living with water shortages, depleted fisheries and polluted coastlines
within 50 years because of a worldwide water crisis, warns a United Nations report out Monday. Waste and
inadequate management of water are the main culprits behind growing problems, particularly
in poverty-ridden regions, says the study, the most comprehensive of its kind. The United Nations Environment Programme,
working with more than 200 water resource experts worldwide, produced the report.

b) increased consumption
Info for Health.Org 98. (“Facing Water Shortages”, Population Reports, Vol. XXVI, Number 1, September,
http://www.infoforhealth.org/pr/m14/m14chap3.shtml)

Years of rapid population growth and increasing water consumption for agriculture, industry,
and municipalities have strained the world's freshwater resources. In some areas the demand for water
already exceeds nature's supply, and a growing number of countries are expected to face water shortages in the near future.

5. Water wars are empirically denied


Journal of Commerce 99. (March 31)
So far the often-repeated prediction that ""the next war in the Middle East will be over water' '
has yet to come true. When disputes have arisen, the states involved have shown a willingness
to reach agreement and conclude details. The economics underlying water issues demonstrate
the futility of any military conflict that is purely over water. The victor would still not gain all
the water needed to satisfy national requirements.

6. Seriously. You’re wrong.


Peña 7. (Fransisco, writer at the Institute of Development studies, ID 21 Natural Resources Highlights 4, Transboundary water conflicts in
the Middle East and North Africa,
http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache:i6dGHFsZA8MJ:www.id21.org/publications/Water_4.pdf+%22water+wars%22+africa+intervention&hl=
en&ct=clnk&cd=7&gl=us, June 28, 2007)

Predictions of ‘water wars’ have generally been incorrect, despite increasing water shortages.
This is not due to cooperation among the countries involved, as many low-intensity conflicts
demonstrate. Instead, the stronger countries in a region manage water for their own benefit,
often at the expense of weaker countries. The authors use the concept of ‘hydro-hegemony’ to analyze how
countries exploit power inequalities to stake their claims to water resources. This concept is best
described as somewhere between positive regional leadership that emphasizes cooperation, and regional dominance.
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***Hotspots Frontlines***
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A2: Democracy Frontline

1. African democratization is strong now


Wegner, 6 Lucia Wegner, Associate Expert with the OECD and Henri-Bernard Solignac Lecomte, head of the External Co-operation and
Policy Dialogue unit at the OECD Development Centre, Policy Insights No. 20, May 2006, http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/52/56/36702028.pdf

There is an impression that conflict is endemic in Africa and that any improvement in the political climate can
only be temporary. Indeed, conflicts and political unrest linger in Uganda, Ethiopia, the east of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)
and in Côte d’Ivoire. Does this mean that no progress is being made towards political stability and democracy? Are things getting
worse or better? The focus on war and anecdotal evidence hide real progress towards more stable and
open political systems in Africa. A detailed monitoring of the daily events and decisions that make up the reality of
political life and government attitudes in 30 African countries shows the breadth of this change. The annual African
Economic Outlook 2005-2006 provides such a systematic screening of political events, using three
categories to see what is going on: domestic political trouble, government repression and government softening. According to the
African Economic Outlook ’s indicators, political repression has lessened over the last decade, as more
governments have adhered to the rule of law and respect for human rights. The upholding of civil
rights and liberties has improved in countries which were very fragile at the beginning of the decade, including Algeria, Nigeria
and South Africa. In parallel, political instability has been declining, though important exceptions remain in Chad, DRC
and Côte d’Ivoire, where the authorities have countered raising political instability by hardening their political stance. A number of
presidential and/or legislative elections took place in 2005 and 2006 as did important referendums. Tanzania and Benin joined
Mozambique in the still limited, but growing, number of countries enjoying a peaceful passage of presidential powers. Egypt held its
first-ever multi-party elections, in which the opposition made substantial gains. In Uganda, 92.5 per cent of voters approved the re-
establishment of the multiparty system. More positive developments are hoped for as Chad, the DRC, Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia either
conclude or engage in delicate political transition programmes in 2006. Political troubles tend to increase around election time. In
2005, public demonstrations and riots, clashes with the security forces were recorded in Egypt, Ethiopia and Gabon. Political tensions
have also increased in Chad, as well as in Kenya following the rejection of a governmentbacked new constitution, which prompted the
President to suspend Parliament. In a way, the surge of tensions can be seen as a sign of growing maturity, where people dare to
express themselves and become more vocal. Of course, one must be careful interpreting this data: tensions may decrease as a result of
continuous hardening of repression – as in the case of Zimbabwe. The African Economic Outlook’s close monitoring
of
political activity did not produce any evidence of contagious effects of political instability in
Western and Southern Africa. Despite mounting tensions in Côte d’Ivoire and the deterioration of the political stance in
Zimbabwe, neighbouring countries have resisted well and continued as in Mali, their progress towards stability and democracy.

2. New studies prove democratization doesn’t stop war


Henderson, 2 Errol Henderson, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Political Science at the University of Florida, 2002, Democracy and War The
End of an Illusion?, p. 146

Are Democracies Less Likely to Fight Each Other? The replication and extension of Oneal and Russett (1997), which is one of the most
important studies on the DPP, showed that democracies are not significantly less likely to fight each other.
The results demonstrate that Oneal and Russett’s (1997) findings in support of the DPP are not robust and that joint democracy
does not reduce the probability of international conflict for pairs of states during the postwar
era. Simple and straightforward modifications of Oneal and Russett’s (1997) research design generated these dramatically
contradictory results. Specifically, by teasing out the separate impact of democracy and political distance
(or political dissimilarity) and by not coding cases of ongoing disputes as new cases of conflict, it
became clear that there is no significant relationship between joint democracy and the
likelihood of international war or militarized interstate dispute (MID) for states during the postwar era. These findings
suggest that the post—Cold War strategy of “democratic enlargement,” which is aimed at ensuring peace by enlarging the community
of democratic states, is quite a thin reed on which to rest a state’s foreign policy—much less the hope for international peace.
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3. Turn – Refugees
a. African democratization undermines refugee protection
Crisp, 2k Jeff Crisp, head of evaluation and policy analysis in the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2000,
Journal of Contemporary African Studies, p. 164

The hostile reception received by refugees in some African states is also related to political developments at the national level. Indeed,
there is growing evidence of a linkage between the process of democratization on one hand and the
decline in refugee protection standards on the other. Prior to the 1990s, authoritarian governments
and one-party states in Africa were relatively free to offer asylum to large refugee populations when
they considered such a policy to be consistent with their own interests. But with the end of the cold
war and the introduction of pluralistic systems of government in many parts of the continent, the refugee
question has assumed a new degree of political importance. As in the industrialized states, both
governments and opposition parties are prone to encourage nationalistic and xenophobic
sentiments, and to blame their country’s ills on the presence of refugees and other foreigners. In countries where large
numbers of people are living below the poverty line and where income differentials are wide (South Africa
provides a good example) such messages can have a potent appeal, irrespective of their veracity.

b. Refugee flows cause war


Salehyan, 6 Idean Salehyan, PhD Candidate in Political Science at the University of California San Diego, and Kristian Gleditsch, Associate
Professor of Political Science at the University of California San Diego Spring 2006, International Organization, p. 335

Certain regions of the world experience more conflict than others. Previous analyses have shown that a civil
war in one country significantly increases the likelihood that neighboring states will experience conflict. This finding, however, still
remains largely unexplained. We argue that population movements are an impor tant mechanism by which
conflict spreads across regions. Refugee flows are not only the consequence of political turmoil—the presence of
refugees and displaced populations can also increase the risk of subsequent conflict in host and origin countries. Refugees
expand rebel social networks and constitute a negative externality of civil war. Although the vast majority of refugees
never directly engage in violence, refugee flows may facilitate the transnational spread of arms, combatants, and
ideologies conducive to conflict; they alter the ethnic composition of the state; and they can exacerbate
economic competition. We conduct an empirical analysis of the link between refugees and civil conflict since the mid-
twentieth century, and we find that the presence of refugees from neighboring countries leads to an
increased probability of violence, suggesting that refugees are one impor tant source of conflict
diffusion.
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--Ext. – Democracy Now

African democracy up
WPO 4. (“Perceptions of Democracy in Africa”, World Public Opinion.Org, http://www.americans-
world.org/digest/regional_issues/africa/africa4a.cfm)

Most Americans are not aware that democracy in Africa has grown over the least 10 years. A
majority supports aid to help promote democracy in Africa. Among observers of Africa, there has been a general
consensus that democracy in Africa has shown clear growth and improvement since the end of
the Cold War. However, most Americans are not aware of this. A January 2003 PIPA poll asked, "Do you think the number of
democratic countries in Africa over the last ten years has increased, decreased, or stayed about the same?" Less than one in five--18%-
-knew that the number of African democracies has increased. Seventy percent believed that the number of democracies had either
stayed the same (48%) or decreased (22%). [1]
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A2: DRC Frontline

1. The DRC is getting better.


Fowler, 6 Megan Fowler, refugees international worker, October 17, 2006 (Refugees International generates lifesaving humanitarian
assistance and protection for displaced people around the world and works to end the conditions that create displacement-
http://www.refugeesinternational.org/section/aboutus/)

As the situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo improves, increasing security for civilians is the
most pressing humanitarian priority, says a new report by Refugees International. Seizing This Moment of Hope: Towards
a Secure Future in the Democratic Republic of the Congo calls on the international community and the Congolese government to end
the violence by rehabilitating the Congolese armed forces, expanding the UN peacekeeping force in the country and enforcing an
existing embargo on arms and natural resources. The report also provides recommendations on how the country can continue to
maintain progress after the presidential runoff election on October 29 by offering concrete steps for improving humanitarian
assistance, funding and coordination.“There is a
real sense of hope that things are getting better in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo. The elections are moving forward, fighting has slowed down
in the east, and refugees are starting to return home,” said Rick Neal, Advocate for Refugees International and
author of Seizing This Moment of Hope. “But this is a long process, and now is not the time to turn our backs and walk away. Doubling
our efforts at this crucial moment will have a tremendous impact towards ensuring that the Congolese people have the food, shelter
and security they need to get home and restart their lives.”Fighting
in many parts of the D.R. Congo has
dramatically decreased, largely due to the expansion of the UN peacekeeping force (MONUC), withdrawal of
foreign troops and the formation of a transitional government in July 2003. On July 30, seventy percent of the electorate voted in the
first democratic election for president in four decades. However, pockets of extreme insecurity and acute need persist. To address this,
the report recommends strengthening the new Congolese national army (the FARDC) by giving troops a living wage, improving
training, and holding soldiers and their superiors accountable as necessary for human rights abuses, particularly rape.

2. Conditions in the Democratic Republic are improving


Donnelly, 5 John Donnelly, Globe Staff, July 10, 2005 (The Boston Globe- World News-
http://www.boston.com/news/world/africa/articles/2005/07/10/congo_rising_from_chaos_isolation)

Now, nudged by other governments, the Democratic Republic of the Congo has a chance -- a slender chance --
to undo the devastation wrought by generations of conflict and despotic rulers and begin to live
up to its name. The transitional government in Kinshasa -- a tense coalition led by President Joseph Kabila, 33, last month
shepherded through a new constitution that supports democratic ideals. Most important, the government is beginning to
register voters in Kinshasa, the first steps toward holding nationwide elections, some time in the next
year. And, after two years of the transitional government and an official ceasefire, several regions of the Congo have
stabilized, including the area around central Kindu -- a town of roughly 50,000 people about 600 miles east of Kinshasa, the capital.
The fighting is largely limited to the still-dangerous Ituri region in the northeast.These are intimations of progress -- but
only intimations. It is hard to imagine a more challenging place to build a working government or hold an election.
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A2: Economy Frontline

1. SSA economic decline doesn’t spread worldwide


Beichman, 2k . (Arnold, research fellow at the Hoover Institution, “Descent to tragedy and chaos”, Washington Times, pg. A17, lexis)
Sub-Saharan Africa shouldn't be a basket-case. After all in four decades, Western official aid and
development assistance to Africa totalled $410 billion. (In 1998, sub-Saharan Africa had the highest per capita
foreign aid - $21 - of any geographical region; the Middle East & North Africa with a per capita of $18 was second.) The
economies of sub-Saharan Africa are of little consequence in the global economy.

2. Alt. Cause
a. Brain drain
Ploch, 9 (Lauren, Congressional Research Service, May 1, Congressional Research Service (CRS) Reports and Issue Briefs, May 1)
As Africa's largest economy, South Africa has been affected by therecent global economic
downturn, and its retail, mining, and manufacturing sectors have declined. Economists warn
that South Africa's unemployment rate could rise in 2009, with the country losing up to 300,000 jobs. (52) As
discussed above, however, the economy is expected to rebound in 2010. Some analysts have
highlighted the country's executive "brain drain" as one of greatest threats to South Africa's
economic progress. They also suggest that the outcome of the debate over the role of state assistance may have the greatest
effect on the country's capability to meet ASGISA goals.

b. Weak infrastructure
The Star, 11 THE STAR 7-5-2011 (“Africa needs $930bn capex this decade; zz AfDB spells out infrastructure shortages,” lexis)
Africa needs an estimated $93 billion (R621bn) a year, over the next 10 years, to spend on
infrastructure, according to the African Development Bank (AfDB). That amount is needed in addition to the $45bn a
year countries are already spending on capital investment and maintenance. The figures appear in a
report entitled Telling Africa's Development Story, which was launched at a presentation in Johannesburg yesterday. To make matters
worse, inefficiencies in implementing infrastructure projects cost $17bn annually, the report says. It
notes that efforts to upgrade technical and managerial skills should minimise costs, along with the creation of institutional, legal and
regulatory frameworks for public-private partnerships. According to the report, inadequate infrastructure leaves more than 60 percent
of Africa's population without access to electricity, about two-thirds of the rural population with no roads and 95 percent of
agriculture without irrigation. "The
poor state of infrastructure in sub-Saharan Africa cuts economic
growth by 2 percentage points a year and reduces productivity by as much as 40 percent," the AfDB
report says.

3. Doomsday predictions about African debt default are misplaced – sanctions and
retaliation threats check back
Conybeare 90. (John A.C., prof of Poli Sci @ U Iowa and author of Trade Wars, “On the repudiation of sovereign debt: sources of
stability and risk”, Columbia Journal of World Business, Vol. 25, No. 1-2, Pg. 46, March 22, lexis)

A SPECTER HAUNTS the world's bankers, the specter of massive debt default and repudiation,
leading to a collapse of the international banking system and possibly world recession. An
Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report in 1983 identified sovereign risk as one of the two main
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problems in international banking today (the other being exchange risk),(1) and recent
interruptions of interest
payments by Argentina, Brazil, Peru and several African countries appear to confirm this view.(2) It has
been argued that lenders to developing countries face an unprecedented challenge due to the
unforeseen circumstances of oil prices, recession, terms of trade, etc.; developing country borrowers with
(in the most charitable view) short time horizons, and the historically aberrant folly of bankers unwilling to analyze country risks
carefully. Anyone who follows the financial press has been reading such prophesies of doom for
the past fifteen years; the widespread acceptance of such forecasts is reflected both in bank share prices and in the secondary
market value of developing country debt.(3) Yet, barring renegotiations or reschedulings, the system stands intact. The
innocent observer might wonder if there is not something missing from these pessimistic prognoses. The thesis offered here is a more
sanguine one, and is presented in two parts. First, I believe that the
doomsday forecasts are misplaced. High risk
loans are a rational strategy of portfolio diversification, and historically there is little to distinguish current
sovereign risk lending from that which has occurred in past centuries. The banks versus debtor country bargaining problem is
analogous to a "Prisoners' Dilemma" game in which both sides can achieve joint gains through non-cooperation or joint losses through
non-cooperation. Mutual
agreement is achieved through "tit-for-tat" tactics of retaliation: default by
the debtors, and penalties imposed by the banks. The first conclusion is that sanctions have, as in the past,
been sufficient to prevent a breakdown of the system. The sanctions for modern debtor countries are similar to
those imposed on medieval kings: loss of assets rather than reputation.

4. IMF is already solving


Reuters 6-14-07. (“IMF sees post-war states as priority in Africa”, http://africa.reuters.com/top/news/usnBAN448588.html)
DAKAR (Reuters) - The
International Monetary Fund is prioritising financial aid and technical
assistance for African countries emerging from conflict, in the hope it will help re-energise the
economy of the world's poorest continent.
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--Ext. Alt. Cause

Alt. cause – mining dependence


The Star, 11 THE STAR 7-5-2011 (“Unrest to slash growth in north Africa,” lexis)
Unrest in north Africa will leave that region with growth of less than 1 percent this year,
according to Mthuli Ncube, the chief economist at the African Development Bank (AfDB). At a presentation
in Johannesburg yesterday Ncube said, if north Africa had grown at last year's pace of 4.7 percent, overall
growth in Africa would have reached 5.1 percent this year, instead of the 3.7 percent currently
projected. The occasion was the launch of the African Economic Outlook (AEO), compiled by the AfDB, the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development and the UN Economic Commission for Africa. Ncube said Africa
faced a two-track growth
path, with the best outcome in east Africa which would surge 6.7 percent, followed by west Africa with growth of 5.9
percent, central Africa 5.3 percent and southern Africa 4.5 percent. A country comparison shows the outlook is worst in Libya, where
rebel forces are attempting to oust embattled leader Muammar Gaddafi. Ncube estimated that the Libyan economy would contract 19
percent. And he predicted that Ivory Coast, also prey to political turmoil, would also be in negative territory, shrinking 7.3 percent.
Growth estimates for Tunisia and Egypt are put at 1.1 percent and 1.6 percent,respectively. The star performer, according to
the AEO, will be the west African country of Ghana which recently struck oil, with projected growth of 12 percent this year. The
resource-rich Democratic Republic of Congo will follow with growth of 8.4 percent. Among the other strong performers, will be
Zimbabwe, now climbing out of an economic pit after many years of economic contraction, with growth of 7.8 percent; Mozambique
7.7 percent and Botswana 6.9 percent. South Africa will grow a projected 3.6 percent. Africa's expected performance contrasts with
that in the developed world. Last month the International Monetary Fund predicted the advanced economies would grow 2.2 percent,
while global growth would average 4.3 percent. Much of the impetus for Africa's growth is coming from high
commodity prices. A report which forms part of the AfDB development series, says Africa has about 30 percent of global
mineral reserves and is a major producer of gold, platinum group metals, copper, nickel, diamonds, aluminium, uranium,
manganese, chromium, bauxite and cobalt. It noted that, while resources underpinned growth, resource
dependence brought economic and political problems and could threaten the livelihood of
indigenous communities.

Alt. cause - Agriculture and fertilizer access are key to African economic growth and
stability
EILITTÄ 6 (Marjatta, International Center for Soil Fertility and Agricultural Development, “Achieving an African Green Revolution: A
Vision for Sustainable Agricultural Growth in Africa” http://www.africafertilizersummit.org/Background_Papers/01%20Eilitta--
Achieving%20an%20African%20Green%20Revolution.pdf)

Africa’s food security situation is quickly worsening, and if not addressed through concerted, large-scale
international ef-forts, the situation will become critical, requiring increasingly greater investments. • Soil nutrient
mining, caused by continuous cropping in the ab-sence of fertilizer inputs, is an important
contributor to food insecurity, poor agricultural productivity, deforestation, and loss of wildlife
habitats, and is making many of Africa’s formerly more productive farmlands nearly uncultivable. • Agriculture needs to
be the number one priority in Africa’s development agenda. Agricul-ture employs at least 65%
of the labor force and its performance has a direct impact on the food security and economic
wellbeing of this large segment of the society, and numerous more indirect impacts on the
performance of national economies. • Productivity-enhancing in-puts, particularly fertilizers, have an
indispensable role in achieving agricultural growth in Africa. African farmers will use fertilizer if
it is available to them at a price they can af-ford and when appropriate fer-tilizer blends and amounts are used, their crops do
respond to it. Worldwide and in countries that benefited from the Green Revolution, fertilizers have fueled the
growth of agricul-tural productivity.
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Too many alt causes preclude solving


NetAid 6-29-07. (NetAid is a Mercy Corps Initiative, www.netaid.org/global_poverty/global-poverty)
Effectively tackling global poverty demands a multi-pronged approach and there is no single
cure-all. Issues of poverty are many and complex: Initiatives must address interwoven but
distinct issues such as children's rights, women's rights, epidemics such as HIV/AIDS, access to
clean water and sanitation, and preservation of the world's natural resources—just to name a
few.
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A2: Environment Frontline

1. There’s no Africa key warrant – it’s not a global biodiversity hotspot.

2. Empirically denied – 3 species die every hour


Planetark.org 7. (“UN Urges World To Slow Extinctions: 3 each hour”, May 23,
http://www.heatisonline.org/contentserver/objecthandlers/index.cfm?ID=6429&Method=Full)

OSLO - Human activities are wiping out three animal or plant species every hour and the world must do more to slow the worst spate
of extinctions since the dinosaurs by 2010, the United Nations said on Tuesday. Scientists and environmentalists issued reports about
threats to creatures and plants including right whales, Iberian lynxes, wild potatoes and peanuts on May 22, the International Day for
Biological Diversity. "Biodiversity is being lost at an unprecedented rate," UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement.
Global warming is adding to threats such as land clearance for farms or cities, pollution and rising human populations. "The global
response to these challenges needs to move much more rapidly, and with more determination at all levels -- global, national and
local," he said. Many experts reckon the world will fail to meet the goal set by world leaders at an Earth Summit in 2002 of a
"significant reduction" by 2010 in the rate of species losses. "We are indeed experiencing the greatest wave of
extinctions since the disappearance of the dinosaurs," said Ahmed Djoghlaf, head of the UN Convention on
Biological Diversity. Dinosaurs vanished 65 million years ago, perhaps after a meteorite struck. "Extinction rates are rising
by a factor of up to 1,000 above natural rates. Every hour, three species disappear. Every day,
up to 150 species are lost. Every year, between 18,000 and 55,000 species become extinct," he
said. "The cause: human activities."

3. Humans will survive—we can isolate ourselves from the environment


Powers, 2
(Lawrence, Professor of Natural Sciences, Oregon Institute of Technology, The Chronicle of Higher Education, August 9)

Mass extinctions appear to result from major climatic changes or catastrophes, such as asteroid
impacts. As far as we know, none has resulted from the activities of a species, regardless of predatory voracity, pathogenicity, or any
other interactive attribute. We
are the first species with the potential to manipulate global climates and
to destroy habitats, perhaps even ecosystems -- therefore setting the stage for a sixth mass
extinction. According to Boulter, this event will be an inevitable consequence of a "self-organized Earth-life system." This Gaia-like
proposal might account for many of the processes exhibited by biological evolution before man's technological intervention, but ... the
rules are now dramatically different. ... Many
species may vanish, ... but that doesn't guarantee, unfortunately,
that we will be among the missing. While other species go bang in the night, humanity will
technologically isolate itself further from the natural world and will rationalize the decrease in
biodiversity in the same manner as we have done so far. I fear, that like the fable d cockroaches of
the atomic age, we may be one of the last life-forms to succumb, long after the "vast tracts of
beauty" that Boulter mourns we will no longer behold vanish before our distant descendants' eyes.

4. Extinctions good - Complex Systems Are More Prone To Total Failure—Simple Ones
Are Stable
Heath, 99
(Jim Heath, 1999, Orchids Australia, December, http://www.orchidsaustralia.com/whysave.htm)
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Some people say we can’t afford to lose any species, no matter what species they are. Everything needs
everything else, they say, to make nature balance. If that were right, it might explain why the six orchid
species should be saved. Alas, no. We could pour weedkiller on all the orchids in Australia and
do no ecological damage to the rest of the continent’s biology. But wouldn’t the natural ecological systems
then become less stable, if we start plucking out species - even those orchids? Not necessarily. Natural biological systems
are hardly ever stable and balanced anyway. Everything goes along steadily for a time, then
boom - the system falls apart and simplifies for no visible reason. Diverse systems are usually
more unstable than the less diverse ones. Biologists agree that in some places less diversity is
more stable (in the Arctic, for example). Also, monocultures - farms - can be very stable. Not to mention
the timeless grass of a salt marsh. In other words, there’s no biological law that says we have to save
the orchids because they add diversity, and that added diversity makes the biological world
more stable.
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--Ext. – Humans Survive

Extend humans will survive mass extinctions – our technological innovation will allow us to
separate ourselves from the environment – that’s Powers.

We don’t need animals to keep us alive—human evolution guarantees that we will never
wipe ourselves out by destroying the environment
SIMON 96
(Julian, Robert H. Smith School of Business, University of Maryland, The
Ultimate Resource II: People, Materials, and
Environment, http://www.rhsmith.umd.edu/faculty/jsimon/Ultimate_Resource/)

Let us begin by going beyond the trends in particular resources. The


greatest and most important trend, of which these
particular trends are a part, is
the trend of this earth becoming ever more livable for human beings. We
see the signs of this in our longer life expectancy, improved knowledge of nature, and greater
ability to protect ourselves from the elements, living with ever more safety and comfort . But
though this larger trend buttresses the particular resource trends, it still provides no causal explanation of the phenomenon we seek to
understand. Evolutionarythinking, however, and (more specifically in economics) the sort of analysis suggested by Friedrich
Hayek, offers an explanation of the observed long-term trend. Hayek (following upon Hume) urges upon us that
humankind has evolved sets of rules and patterns of living which are consistent with survival
and growth rather than with decline and extinction, an aspect of the evolutionary selection for survival among
past societies. He assumes that the particular rules and living patterns have had something to do with chances for survival--for
example, he reasons that patterns leading to higher fertility and more healthful and productive living have led to groups' natural
increase and hence survival-- and therefore the patterns
we have inherited constitute a machinery for
continued survival and growth where conditions are not too different from the past. (This is consistent with a biological
view of humankind as having evolved genes that point toward survival. But no such genetic evolution is presupposed by Hayek, in part
because its time span is too great for us to understand it as well as we can understand the evolution of cultural rules. It may be
illuminating, however, to view mankind's biological nature as part of the long evolutionary chain dating from the simplest plants and
animals, a history of increasing complexity of construction and greater capacity to deal actively with the environment.) Let us apply
Hayek's general analysis to natural resources. Such resources
of all sorts have been a part of human history
ever since the beginning. If humankind had not evolved patterns of behavior that increased
rather than decreased the amounts of resources available to us, we would not still be here. If,
as our numbers increased (or even as our numbers remained nearly stationary), our patterns had led to
diminished supplies of plants and animals, less flint for tools, and disappearing wood for fires
and construction, I would not be here to be writing these pages, and you would not be here to
be reading them.
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--Ext. – Extinctions Good

Extend causing species extinctions is key to simplifying global biodiversity, which makes
bioD as a whole more sustainable – that’s Heath.

The Impact Is Extinction


Boulter, 2 (Michael, professor of paleobiology at the University of East London, Extinction: Evolution and the End of Man, p. 67)
If biological evolution really is a self-organized Earth-Life system there are some very important consequences. One is that
life on
this planet continues despite internal and external setbacks, because it is the system that
recovers at the expense of some of its former parts. For example, the end of the dinosaurs enabled
mammals to diversify. Otherwise if the exponential rise were to reach infinity, there would not be
space or food to sustain life. It would come to a stop. Extinctions are necessary to retain life on
this planet.

Mass extinctions are key to life on earth—they allow evolution and prevent everything
from dying
Scully, 2
(Malcolm, Editor at Large of the Chronicle, The Chronicle of Higher Education, July 5)

His analyses of earlier extinctions lead him to conclude that nature


is a self-organized system that, when
disrupted, will correct itself. One way it does so, he writes, is through extinction. Species vanish,
but the system survives. Citing Per Bak, a physicist now at the Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine in
London, who first described self-organized systems in 1987, Boulter says that the best way to understand such systems is to envision a
sand pile to which a steady stream of grains is added. The stream creates a cone that grows larger and steeper, and at some point
collapses in an avalanche. Then the process starts again. In such systems, there
are long periods of relative calm and
infrequent large disruptions. "If biological evolution really is a self-organized Earth-life system,
there are some very important consequences," he says. "One is that life on this planet continues
despite internal and external setbacks, because it is the system that recovers at the expense of
some of its former parts. For example, the end of the dinosaurs enabled mammals to diversify.
Otherwise if the exponential rise were to reach infinity, there would not be space or food to
sustain life. It would come to a stop. Extinctions are necessary to retain life on this planet." His
research provides "more evidence to support the idea that evolution thrives on culling," he says. "The planet did really well
from the Big Five mass-extinction events. The victims' demise enabled new environments to develop and more diversification took
In just this same way the planet can take
place in other groups of animals and plants. Nature was the richer for it.
advantage from the abuse we are giving it. The harder the abuse, the greater the change to the environment. But it
also follows that it brings forward the extinctions of a whole selection of vulnerable organisms."

No significant negative effects from mass extinctions – scientific consensus


Simon, 98
(Julian, world-renowned economist, The Ultimate Resource II, Feb 16
http://www.juliansimon.com/writings/Ultimate_Resource/TCHAR31.txt)
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Starting in the early 1980s I published the above critical analysis of the standard extinction estimates. For several years these
criticisms produced no response at all. But then in response to questions that I and others raised, the
"official" IUCN (the
World Conservation Union) commissioned a book edited by Whitmore and Sayer to inquire into the
extent of extinctions. The results of that project must be considered amazing. All the authors - the very
conservation biologists who have been most alarmed by the threat of species die-offs - continue to
be concerned about the rate of extinction. Nevertheless, they confirm the central assertion; all agree that the rate of
known extinctions has been and continues to be very low. I will tax your patience with lengthy quotations
(with emphasis supplied) documenting the consensus that there is no evidence of massive or increasing rates
of species extinction, because this testimony from the conservation biologists themselves is especially convincing;
furthermore, if only shorter quotes were presented, the skeptical reader might worry that the quotes were taken out of context.
(Even so, the skeptic may want to check the original texts to see that the quotations fairly represent the gist of the authors'
arguments.)
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A2: Ethnic Conflict Frontline

1. Ethnic conflict inevitable


Beichman 2k. (Arnold, research fellow at the Hoover Institution, “Descent to tragedy and chaos”, Washington Times, pg. A17, lexis)
The Western concept of nation was well summarized by Edmund Burke: "A nation is a moral essence, not a geographical
arrangement." Colonialism's geographical arrangements obviously do not a post-colonial nation make. It may be that even
if
there were world enough and time to overcome sub-Saharan Africa's ethnic divisions and
crazyquilt boundaries, little would be settled because the idea of strong government would be
acceptable only to the top functionaries whose legitimacy would be rejected by ethnic rivals
with their own ethnic armies.

2. No scenario for escalation – ethnic conflicts remain within Africa and are exaggerated by
the West
FPA 5. (“Recently in Focus”, Foreign Policy Association,
http://www.fpa.org/newsletter_info2482/newsletter_info_sub_list.htm?section=Ethnicity)

In Great Decisions 2001, I. William Zartman poses the following question about conflict resolution in Africa: "can it succeed?" In a
continuing series of reflections on this piece, In Focus looks at ethnicity in Africa and its role in fomenting conflict. Zartman notes that
"Africa's conflicts are mainly internal" and ethnic conflict is a substantial component in many of
these conflicts. However, even when the ethnic dimension is not culpable or is a minor constituent
in a struggle, ethnicity is often blamed. Such reductionism has been a core value of western
attempts to label and to describe Africa since the dawn of the European encounter. By placing
conflicts and disagreements in a simple framework, external viewers are spared the tedium and the
concentration of having to make sense of situations that may have no clear good guys or bad
guys, and which also may show no signs of imminent resolution. This is not say that conflict along ethnic lines is not serious, rather
that observers with ulterior motives have skewed its importance.

3. African ethnic conflicts are impossible to solve – too many exacerbating factors
Maninger 97. (Stephen, Parliamentary Researcher, “Ethic Confrontation - Security Implications of Policies Towards Ethnic Minorities”,
African Security Review, Vol. 6, No. 4, http://www.iss.co.za/ASR/6No4/Maninger.html)

Both Western and East-bloc military establishments have experienced the durability of nationalist insurgency during their military
involvement in Vietnam and Afghanistan respectively. Former US Defense Secretary Robert McNamara conceded that during the
Vietnam war the US overestimated the ideological – Communist – threat while having "totally underestimated the nationalist aspect of
Ho Chi Minh's movement. We were wrong, terribly wrong."26 The old wisdom of guerrilla warfare, namely that the insurgents need to
avoid losing in order to win, while governments need to win in order to avoid losing, also retains its relevance in the ethnic conflict
scenario. Ethnically
motivated insurgents seldom have any desire to take over the entire state, and
it generally remains their objective to gain control of a familiar region or a territory to which
they feel historically attached, wherein they seek to establish a state of their own. The military pressure is merely a
method of reaching a settlement which would make state-formation, with international recognition and formal, as well as normal
relations with the rump state, possible. Heterogeneous military formations and states are almost always at a disadvantage when
engaging in counter-insurgency operations against nationalist sub-groups.27 Cohesion becomes a problem as loyalties and
communication are put to the test. The durable nature of ethnic conflict suggests that almost nothing,
short of genocide, can overcome the will to resist. Sri Lanka's drawn out ethnic war shows that to defeat ethnic
insurgents today is to face their sons tomorrow. In Africa's case, additional factors may also play a role in
such a scenario, namely: the natural proclivity to combat, which follows many years of
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liberation wars and concomitant oversupply of illegal weapons, along with a considerable familiarity with military
weapons and tactics which is quite prevalent among ethnically conscious groups, i.e. Zulus and Boers. Many African ethnic groups or
tribes pride themselves on relatively deep-seated military tradition; the fragility of some countries' infrastructures, which have
difficulty sustaining their populations; and the limited resources of developing countries to combat
insurgencies, as demonstrated in Zaire, Rwanda, Burundi,i etc.
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A2: Famine Frontline

1. African famine will be solved -- US already upped donations


Reuters 6-29-07. (“Generous US Donations to sustain millions of hungry in Africa and Asia”,
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/WFP/1130ecb9780910e45c4ed77f4e3839d8.htm)

The United Nations World Food Program (WFP) on Friday welcomed US government contributions in June
totaling $62 million to feed people confronting humanitarian crises across 13 countries in Africa
and one in Asia. US contributions will target refugees and other food-insecure populations in Kenya, the
Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zimbabwe, Uganda, Swaziland, Lesotho, Mozambique, Rwanda, Burundi,
Liberia, Djibouti, Cameroon and Nepal. The latest series of major donations, from the Office of Food for Peace at the US Agency for
International Development (USAID), bring total American contributions to WFP operations for the year to $727.6 million. The
United States is WFP’s single largest donor. Lifeline “Once again, the United States government has
thrown a lifeline to people who desperately need assistance in situations of conflict, prolonged
drought and poverty exacerbated by the onslaught of HIV/AIDS,” said Jordan Dey, Director of US Relations for WFP.

2. There is no scenario for escalation – great powers would not be drawn in to fight over
African famine. At best, they can claim a small regional conflict.

3. ALT CAUSE–
a) locusts destroy 80% of crops
Reuters 4. (“Fears of Famine as Locusts Advance Across W. Africa”, Global Policy Forum, August 8,
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/hunger/2004/0808locusts.htm)

Nearly a
million people in West Africa face famine unless they get international aid to battle swarms of
locusts devouring their crops in the region's worst plague in 15 years, farmers and government experts
warned. The locusts are sweeping into crop-growing areas of the Sahel, on the Sahara's southern fringe, a region whose people are
A fraction of a swarm can eat
mostly subsistence farmers and whose governments lack the means to fight the infestation.
the same amount in a day as 10 elephants, 25 camels or about 2,500 people, experts say, destroying
subsistence crops such as sorghum and millet as well as money earners like water melons and groundnuts. "We
have to expect a deficit in our cereal crop of around 80 percent. What's more, 600,000-800,000
people will be affected by famine," Mohamed Lemine, an official from Mauritania's national
agriculture federation, told reporters late on Saturday. "If steps are not taken we can't hope for any harvest this year,"
another senior federation official said. The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation warned as long ago as October that locust swarms
threatened to wreak havoc on the region after exceptional rains and humidity following several years of drought allowed the insects to
flourish. But the response has fallen woefully short. The FAO said two weeks ago that damage from the airborne
invasion could triple to $245 million within a year if no emergency aid is provided soon.

b) erratic weather jacks SSA supply


WFP 7. (“Southern Africa Braces for Poor Harvests”, World Food Programme, March 8,
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/hunger/relief/2007/0308poorharvests.htm)

WFP has expressed deep concern over erratic weather patterns in southern Africa which have
devastated harvest prospects for millions of people, and could spell yet another year of
widespread food shortages. Parts of Angola , Madagascar , Mozambique , Namibia , and Zambia ,
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have been struck by devastating floods which have destroyed tens of thousands of hectares of
crops during the most critical growing stage. In stark contrast, Lesotho, Namibia, southern Mozambique,
and much of Swaziland and large swathes of Zimbabwe’s cropland, have all been affected by prolonged dry
spells which have withered and killed crops or reduced their development.
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--Ext. – Alt. Cause

Lack of agriculture and fertilizer access prevent solvency


EILITTÄ 6 (Marjatta, International Center for Soil Fertility and Agricultural Development, “Achieving an African Green Revolution: A
Vision for Sustainable Agricultural Growth in Africa” http://www.africafertilizersummit.org/Background_Papers/01%20Eilitta--
Achieving%20an%20African%20Green%20Revolution.pdf)

Africa’s food security situation is quickly worsening, and if not addressed through concerted, large-scale
international ef-forts, the situation will become critical, requiring increasingly greater investments. • Soil nutrient
mining, caused by continuous cropping in the ab-sence of fertilizer inputs, is an important
contributor to food insecurity, poor agricultural productivity, deforestation, and loss of wildlife
habitats, and is making many of Africa’s formerly more productive farmlands nearly uncultivable. • Agriculture needs to
be the number one priority in Africa’s development agenda. Agricul-ture employs at least 65%
of the labor force and its performance has a direct impact on the food security and economic
wellbeing of this large segment of the society, and numerous more indirect impacts on the
performance of national economies. • Productivity-enhancing in-puts, particularly fertilizers, have an
indispensable role in achieving agricultural growth in Africa. African farmers will use fertilizer if
it is available to them at a price they can af-ford and when appropriate fer-tilizer blends and amounts are used, their crops do
respond to it. Worldwide and in countries that benefited from the Green Revolution, fertilizers have fueled the
growth of agricul-tural productivity.
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A2; Nigeria Frontline

1. They can’t solve alt causes to Nigerian stability


A. Unstable federal structure
ICG, 6 International Crisis Group, October 2006, http://www.crisisgroup.org/home/getfile.cfm?id=2590&type=word&tid=4464&l=1
Nevertheless, many of Nigeria’s internal conflicts are manifestations of the structural and political flaws
of its federalist framework. This report examines three specific crises and how the manipulation of constitutional provisions
has helped fuel them. The heated debates over control of resources and allocation of revenues, as well as the environmental abuse
and neglect visited upon the Niger Delta over four decades, have spawned the youth militancy and gangland-style violence that grips
the region. The application of the federal principle, which has historically emphasised “indigeneity” at the expense of
residency, has legitimised a logic that fuels Plateau State’s inter-communal violence and less-reported conflicts
elsewhere. The sense of political marginalisation and economic deprivation among ethnic groups,
the government’s encouragement of ethnic and religious identity politics and the deepening
problems of the security sector have all contributed to the rise of ethnic militias, religious vigilantes and separatist
groups in various parts of the country. A common feature of these groups is that they owe little or no allegiance to the Nigerian state;
some call for the outright break-up of the federation. The Nigerian government cannot resolve these dilemmas by skirting the issue of
resource control, trying ethnic militia leaders for treason and otherwise assuming that the army and federal police can contain the
internal tensions. Failure
to address the core issues that have fuelled these crises risks proving the
“prophets of doom” right.

B. Oil dependence
ICG, 6 (International Crisis Group, 7-19-2006,
http://www.crisisgroup.org/library/documents/africa/west_africa/113_nigeria___want_in_the_midst_of_plenty.pdf

Oil has plunged Nigeria into “Dutch disease” – the phenomenon whereby an increase in revenues
from a natural resource raises the exchange rate, making other export industries uncompetitive
and possibly leading to deindustrialisation. In May 2006, Nigeria’s crude oil output was about 2.1 million barrels per day,
though attacks on pipelines in July have lowered it somewhat.104 In addition to its oil wealth, the country has proven natural gas
reserves estimated at 184 trillion cubic feet, which makes it the seventh largest source in the world.105 The reserve-production ratio,
assuming no additions to proven reserves in the future, is estimated at 240 years for gas, compared with about 40 years for oil,
reflecting the relative under-exploitation of natural gas. The mono-commodity economy has been sustainable, though at a staggering
social cost and great risk to national unity. However, in
the long run it is probably unviable and certainly undesirable:
The economic record since the oil boom is one of lacklustre growth, increasing poverty,
widening inequality and a secular decline in performance. From 1980 to 2002, economic growth averaged just 2 per
cent annually, and real income per capita stands today at about one third the level achieved in 1980….Nigeria’s once-thriving
agricultural and solid mineral exports are moribund; manufacturing today constitutes a smaller proportion of the economy (about 6
per cent) than at independence. The economy drifts on a sea of oil, blown by the capricious winds of international energy markets.106

2. Offshore platforms solve the impact to Nigerian instability


Goldwyn, 5 David Goldwyn, Goldwyn International Strategies, 11-15-2005, “Africa’s Petroleum Industry,”
http://handle.dtic.mil/100.2/ADA441207, p. 5

The future of Nigeria’s oil development is offshore, potentially providing considerable


insulation from onshore unrest. Platforms are so far located a considerable distance from shore,
making casual attacks by unsophisticated pirates or bandits more difficult. But rising revenues will also bring rising
expectations, and an expansive energy offshore infrastructure could become an increasingly attractive criminal target.
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A2: South Africa Frontline

1. South Africa completely disarmed all nuclear weapons and destroyed all files having to
do with the ability to create more in 1994. It took 3 years to destroy these records and
bombs. It would take decades to put them back together.
Sublette 1 (Carey Sublette is the creator of The Nuclear Weapon Archive, Septermber 2001. “South Africa's Nuclear Weapons Program.”
http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Safrica/SADisarming.html)

Along with the destruction of the bombs themselves, and the tooling required to produce them, South
Africa also destroyed all design, production, and other technical documentation generated by
the weapons-related part of the program. This makes it impossible for subsequent (black-led)
governments to recreate the arsenal without duplicating much of the research and
development work. It also makes it difficult or impossible to investigate or verify many claims about the program, and
questions that remain. In particular it appears that much of information about the collaboration with Israel is lost. South Africa
officially entered the NPT with its ratification on 10 July 1991. The NPT safeguards entered into force immediately on 16 September
1991 with the signing of a Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement (INFCIRC/394). On 30 October 1991 South Africa submitted its initial
inventory of nuclear materials and facilities to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the first verification team from the
Agency arrived on site in November 1991. IAEA inspectors found an inventory of about 400 kg of weapon-grade enriched uranium at
Pelindaba (roughly 100 kg enriched to about 80 percent; the rest enriched to 90-95 percent). Suspicion immediately arose that this
highly enriched material had been previously used in nuclear weapons. But - to encourage full disclosure - the IAEA inspections are
conducted confidentially and are not disclosed the details of the inspections publicly. South Africa insisted on strict secrecy but hints of
their findings soon began leaking out [Baeckmann et al 1995], [Albright 1994a]. By late 1992, as preparations for South Africa's first all-
race elections proceeded, the African National Congress (ANC) was pressing the government for full disclosure of its previous weapons
activity. In a 24 March 1993 speech, President de Klerk revealed that South Africa had produced nuclear weapons. De Klerk claimed -
incorrectly - that the arsenal had been destroyed before 10 July 1991, when South Africa joined the NPT. In fact the destruction
process was not complete at that point, although it was by the time the NPT actually entered force. The
IAEA declared in late
1994, after it had completed its inspection around the end of August, that it had verified that
South Africa's nuclear weapons facilities had been dismantled.

2. South Africa is tightening its anti-proliferation laws and is developing a nuclear energy
program that focuses on peaceful purposes.
Lacey, 6 ( “Country Profile 12: South Africa.” Jennifer Megan Lacey, November 2006. FirstWatch International a research consultancy that
conducts open-source assessments on nuclear fuel cycle programs and nuclear safeguards
technologies.http://www.sipri.org/contents/expcon/cnsc1sa.html)

The South African government has made clear that its nuclear programme will focus on peaceful purposes
and its membership and active role in numerous nonproliferation regimes signals this peaceful intent. South Africa’s upcoming
chairmanship of the NSG also confirms its nonproliferation credentials. SouthAfrica is strengthening the
enforcement of its anti-proliferation laws, and urging more international cooperation in enforcement efforts.(5)
Under President Mbeki, the country has taken an active role in promoting peaceful nuclear energy developments for all nations.(6) In
August 2005, African National Congress (ANC) National Executive Committee member and Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz
Pahad emphasized ‘the basic and inalienable right of all NPT states’ to develop research and production capabilities for the peaceful
use of nuclear energy without discrimination.(7) Pahad and the South African Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs have both commented
on occasions that the problems related to Iran’s nuclear programme are primarily due to the unequal implementation of the delicately
balanced rights and obligations contained in the NPT itself.(8) At the end of an October 2006 IAEA Nuclear Safeguards Symposium,
Abdul Minty concluded that ‘What we should strive for is not to place further limitations on the peaceful application of the atom by
those who have already committed themselves not to pursue the nuclear weapons option.’(9)

3. South Africa isn’t key to regional stability


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Juma, 2 Monica Juma, former Associate at the Africa Program of the International Peace Academy, September 2002, The Infrastructure of
Peace in Africa, accessed via cioanet.org, p. 13-14

There is also a naive tendency on the part of many analysts to overstate South Africa’s leverage. In this view,
South Africa is economically more powerful than its weaker neighbors and should be able to translate this power into political clout
and leadership. While South Africa’s dominance has engendered fear, distrust and jealousy among other SADC member
states, it remains a giant with serious limitations. Its govern- ment presides over a deeply divided
society with acute poverty levels, making processes of domestic political and economic transformation difficult.
Although it is an emerging market and undisputed regional power, South Africa is still largely inexperienced in
regional diplomacy and has a relatively weak administrative capacity.

***Conflict Good***
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1NC – War

Continuing war brings peace


LUTTWAK 99 ( Edward N. Luttwak is Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. , Foreign Affairs,
July/August, http://isuisse.ifrance.com/emmaf/base/give_war_a_chance.html)

Today cease-fires and armistices are imposed on lesser powers by multilateral agreement -- not to avoid
great-power competition but for essentially disinterested and indeed frivolous motives, such as television audiences' revulsion at
harrowing scenes of war. Butthis, perversely, can systematically prevent the transformation of war
into peace. The Dayton accords are typical of the genre: they have condemned Bosnia to remain divided into three rival armed
camps, with combat suspended momentarily but a state of hostility prolonged indefinitely. Since no side is threatened by
defeat and loss, none has a sufficient incentive to negotiate a lasting settlement; because no
path to peace is even visible, the dominant priority is to prepare for future war rather than to
reconstruct devastated economies and ravaged societies. Uninterrupted war would certainly
have caused further suffering and led to an unjust outcome from one perspective or another,
but it would also have led to a more stable situation that would have let the postwar era truly
begin. Peace takes hold only when war is truly over. A variety of multilateral organizations now make it their
business to intervene in other peoples' wars. The defining characteristic of these entities is that they insert themselves in war
situations while refusing to engage in combat. In the long run this only adds to the damage. If
the United Nations helped
the strong defeat the weak faster and more decisively, it would actually enhance the
peacemaking potential of war. But the first priority of U.N. peacekeeping contingents is to avoid casualties among their
own personnel. Unit commanders therefore habitually appease the locally stronger force, accepting
its dictates and tolerating its abuses. This appeasement is not strategically purposeful, as siding
with the stronger power overall would be; rather, it merely reflects the determination of each
U.N. unit to avoid confrontation. The final result is to prevent the emergence of a coherent
outcome, which requires an imbalance of strength sufficient to end the fighting.

Solving peace artificially encourages worse wars


LUTTWAK 97 (Edward, Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies Boston Review, Oct/Nov,
http://www.bostonreview.net/BR22.5/luttwak.html)

1. To"work for peace" in her sense causes war, more so when working "energetically," whereas it is the
destructions of war (or the expenses and moral fatigue of war-preparation in cold wars) that brings about peace, by
exhausting the resources and will to persist in war (or war-preparation). To say that Reagan's SDI ended the Cold
War is at least exaggeration, but had Forsberg and those of like minds succeeded in cutting US defense spending when it was still
useful (not for self-defense, admittedly), the USSR--in its later, military aggrandizement phase (prompted by the loss of all hope in
ideological victory)--would have lasted longer, and the peoples of Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States might still be
imprisoned in it. And before then, the arms race that Forsberg & Co. systematically opposed greatly helped to keep the peace, by
venting acute insecurities into harmless "overkill" weapon programs in lieu of far more dangerous attempts to conquer strategic
depth, the standard prenuclear remedy. 2. More generally, war-preparation by those actually willing to fight (not
just ritualistic preparations, as is mostly the case in advanced countries nowadays) may avert war by dissuading others'
hopes of easy victories--even Bosnia might have done it, had it raised a good army before declaring independence--
whereas wishing for peace, marching for peace, etc., is as relevant as wishing and marching for
good weather--except if it interferes with concrete war-preparations, when it may be
counterproductive. 3. "Peacekeeping institutions" commonly perpetuate war, by freezing the
processes that would exhaust it (consider the effect of imposed cease-fires in Arab-Israeli wars). The various UN
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peacekeeping forces everywhere are symbolically and frictionally useful only when other factors (exhaustion, great-power pressure)
are dissuading war. In all other cases they are either ineffectual or, much more often, counter-productive (as in ex-Yugoslavia).
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--Ext. – Solves War

War is peace—allowing conflicts to burn themselves out is key to long-term stability and
these conflicts don’t escalate
LUTTWAK 99 ( Edward N. Luttwak is Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. , Foreign Affairs,
July/August, http://isuisse.ifrance.com/emmaf/base/give_war_a_chance.html)

An unpleasant truth often overlooked is that although


war is a great evil, it does have a great virtue: it can
resolve political conflicts and lead to peace. This can happen when all belligerents become
exhausted or when one wins decisively. Either way the key is that the fighting must continue
until a resolution is reached. War brings peace only after passing a culminating phase of
violence. Hopes of military success must fade for accommodation to become more attractive
than further combat. Since the establishment of the United Nations and the enshrinement of great-power politics in its
Security Council, however, wars among lesser powers have rarely been allowed to run their natural
course. Instead, they have typically been interrupted early on, before they could burn
themselves out and establish the preconditions for a lasting settlement. Cease-fires and armistices have
frequently been imposed under the aegis of the Security Council in order to halt fighting. NATO's intervention in the Kosovo crisis
follows this pattern. But
a cease-fire tends to arrest war-induced exhaustion and lets belligerents
reconstitute and rearm their forces. It intensifies and prolongs the struggle once the cease-fire
ends -- and it does usually end. This was true of the Arab-Israeli war of 1948-49, which might have come to closure in a
matter of weeks if two cease-fires ordained by the Security Council had not let the combatants recuperate. It has recently been true in
the Balkans. Imposed cease-fires frequently interrupted the fighting between Serbs and Croats in Krajina, between the forces of the
rump Yugoslav federation and the Croat army, and between the Serbs, Croats, and Muslims in Bosnia. Each
time, the
opponents used the pause to recruit, train, and equip additional forces for further combat,
prolonging the war and widening the scope of its killing and destruction. Imposed armistices,
meanwhile -- again, unless followed by negotiated peace accords -- artificially freeze conflict and perpetuate a
state of war indefinitely by shielding the weaker side from the consequences of refusing to
make concessions for peace. The Cold War provided compelling justification for such behavior by the two superpowers,
which sometimes collaborated in coercing less-powerful belligerents to avoid being drawn into their conflicts and clashing directly.
Although imposed cease-fires ultimately did increase the total quantity of warfare among the
lesser powers, and armistices did perpetuate states of war, both outcomes were clearly lesser
evils (from a global point of view) than the possibility of nuclear war. But today, neither
Americans nor Russians are inclined to intervene competitively in the wars of lesser powers, so
the unfortunate consequences of interrupting war persist while no greater danger is averted. It
might be best for all parties to let minor wars burn themselves out.
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--A2: It’s Immoral

Our argument is moral—lack of intervention is done out of concern for human welfare
LUTTWAK 99 ( Edward N. Luttwak is Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. , Foreign Affairs,
July/August, http://isuisse.ifrance.com/emmaf/base/give_war_a_chance.html)

Too many wars nowadays become endemic conflicts that never end because the transformative
effects of both decisive victory and exhaustion are blocked by outside intervention. Unlike the
ancient problem of war, however, the compounding of its evils by disinterested interventions is a new malpractice that could be
curtailed. Policy
elites should actively resist the emotional impulse to intervene in other peoples'
wars -- not because they are indifferent to human suffering but precisely because they care
about it and want to facilitate the advent of peace. The United States should dissuade multilateral interventions
instead of leading them. New rules should be established for U.N. refugee relief activities to ensure that immediate succor is swiftly
followed by repatriation, local absorption, or emigration, ruling out the establishment of permanent refugee camps. And although it
may not be possible to constrain interventionist NGOs, they should at least be neither officially encouraged nor funded.
Underlying these seemingly perverse measures would be a true appreciation of war's
paradoxical logic and a commitment to let it serve its sole useful function: to bring peace.
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--A2: De Mello

De Mello is wrong—negotiated solutions come only after military victory


LUTTWAK 2k (Edward, Senior Fellow, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Foreign Affairs, March/April)
Vieira de Mello states that I neglected to mention the wars in Namibia, El Salvador, and Mozambique, all of
which ended through negotiations, rather than through conclusive wars. Really? True, there were
negotiations in which the U.N. played a large role alongside others, such as Rome's Community of San Egidio and less-dubious
NGOS. But as I noted, South Africa's war with the South West Africa People's Organisation was finally stopped by
U.S. pressure, against the background of the Soviet-Cuban intervention in Angola. As for El
Salvador, its guerrilla war did end through negotiation -- but only after the insurgents were
denied any chance of winning by the increasingly strong army and the Defensa Civil militia, conjoined with the
diminishing hope of Sandinista-Cuban-Soviet assistance. Only then did the insurgents want to try the ballot box instead of the gun, but
they were defeated electorally as well. As for Mozambique, the government's rival -- the Mozambique National Resistance (MNR) --
was born as a Rhodesian covert operation and lived on as a South African proxy. Once the MNR's creator had disappeared and its
replacement patron cut off further support, the Mozambique Liberation Front (Frelimo) won the war. Only then did undoubtedly
useful mediation play its small role; so that too was a war ended by victory. The rest of Vieira de Mello's contentions can be answered
by my response to Crocker, especially in the case of Sierra Leone, whose own war was inconclusive because, amid many atrocities
against civilians, it was hardly fought by the supposed combatants. Outside multilateral intervention was notably ineffectual. Vieira de
Mello notes that "U.N. officials in such places as eastern Angola, northern Sierra Leone, and the eastern areas of the Democratic
Republic of Congo face the fact that rebels fight not for victory but because fighting itself offers power and wealth." U.N.
officials
may "face the fact" but can do nothing about it, other than to legitimize grotesque entities that
call themselves states because a U.N. seat has their name on it. Those officials are not earning
their keep, because they neither kill rebels nor help them win on the sound calculation that war
itself is more savage than the most savage of belligerents.
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--A2: Crocker

Crocker is wrong—civil wars will burn out if they are allowed to escalate
LUTTWAK 2k (Edward, Senior Fellow, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Foreign Affairs, March/April)
Chester Crocker's thoughtful critique of my article, "Give War a Chance," warrants broader consideration, but here I can only try to
respond to his main objection ("A Poor Case for Quitting," January/February 2000). While describing the paradoxical logic of the
strategy presented in my article as "compelling," Crocker notes major exceptions to the proposition that wars
themselves establish the preconditions for peace, if uninterrupted by outsiders -- including the cases of Chechnya,
Sudan, Kashmir, Sri Lanka, and Angola. He is, of course, correct. In all those areas, warfare has persisted for
decades, yet there is no peace in sight. But war can become its own remedy only by consuming
and destroying the material and moral resources needed to keep fighting. It follows that the
speed with which war destroys itself depends on its intensity and scale. In civil wars, the intensity of the
fighting is usually low and the scale very limited, except for short (often seasonal) explosions of violence that, in most cases, are very
localized. That leaves unaffected the wider environment, whose undestroyed resources can fuel war endlessly. As Crocker notes,
Chechen resistance to the Russians began in the 1830s. But during the last 170 years there have been only a few months of truly
intense large-scale fighting. Otherwise, the Russians would long ago have achieved an imperial peace through genocide or forced
dispersal. Acting Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to achieve peace through all-out victory. But he is unlikely to do so because
his war is not destroying the essential war-making resource of the Chechens -- their warrior youth. With Russia's democracy
sufficiently established to make genocide or mass deportation impossible, Putin's choices are restricted to an endless war inside
Chechnya or the republic's isolation behind a well-guarded perimeter. In Sudan, the fighting has been limited to some areas of the far
south, and even there it has been mostly seasonal. Neither a war restricted by outside interference nor a war so limited in scope can
create the preconditions for peace. Kashmir exhibits both the Chechen phenomenon of an imperial power unwilling to destroy or
accommodate a rebellious nationality and the interrupted-war syndrome. None of the Indo-Pakistan wars persisted long enough to
bring peace to Kashmir (in 1971, Pakistan was spared total defeat by American intervention). Now a nuclear stalemate has inaugurated
a protracted cold war. In Sri Lanka, ethnic war has continued for decades in the northeast, while foreign tourists continue to frequent
tranquil beaches in the south-west. Had the intensity of the fighting in the Jaffna peninsula been replicated throughout the island, the
war would have ended long ago. Angola has seen periods of intense fighting, mainly when the Luanda government had allies or
mercenaries fighting its battles, but the war with the rebels has been mostly localized and desultory. The
logic of strategy is
no more than a theoretical formulation of an almost physical process. Had World War II been
fought in fits and starts and in secondary theaters far from Germany and Japan, it would still
continue. That the paradoxical logic of strategy cannot exceed its limits is no excuse for the
current practice of systematically sabotaging war's peace-making potential by outside
interventions that are disinterested and therefore both arbitrary and usually inconclusive. Nor is it
an excuse for the U.N. and nongovernmental organizations (NGOS) to provide refugee assistance by permanent encampment, instead
of providing immediate humanitarian relief followed by a natural dispersion when quick repatriation is impossible. Such
an
intervention guarantees the perpetuation of refugee polities, the only possible ideology of
which is revanchist. This, in turn, guarantees perpetual war -- as in Rwanda's recent case. Again, had the U.N.
and today's plague of irresponsible, self-seeking NGOS existed in Europe's past, the continent would contain no stable states but only
vast camps of unreconciled refugees, still battling their ancient enemies.
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1NC – AIDS

Ending small wars increases the spread of AIDS


POST-GAZETTE.COM 5 (July 19, http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05200/540074.stm)
Her report asserts that the
AIDS pandemic began with armies using mass rape as a weapon. But
Garrett's research found that "it is the peace following a long period of war that poses the
greatest risk." "It is in the euphoria of peace, with the demobilization of thousands of
combatants, return of refugees, opening of borders and sudden influx of trade, that HIV is
spread," Garrett wrote in the report.

AIDS will spread globally and cause extinction


Muchiri, 2k (Michael, Staff Member at Ministry of Education in Nairobi, “Will Annan finally put out Africa’s fires?” Jakarta Post, March 6,
lexis)

The executive director of UNAIDS, Peter Piot, estimated that Africa would annually need between $ 1 billion to $ 3 billion to combat
the disease, but currently receives only $ 160 million a year in official assistance. World Bank President James Wolfensohn lamented
that Africa was losing teachers faster than they could be replaced, and that AIDS was now more effective than war in destabilizing
African countries. Statistics show that AIDS is the leading killer in sub-Saharan Africa, surpassing
people killed in warfare. In 1998, 200,000 people died from armed conflicts compared to 2.2
million from AIDS. Some 33.6 million people have HIV around the world, 70 percent of them in
Africa, thereby robbing countries of their most productive members and decimating entire
villages. About 13 million of the 16 million people who have died of AIDS are in Africa, according to the UN. What barometer is used
to proclaim a holocaust if this number is not a sure measure? There is no doubt that AIDS is the most serious
threat to humankind, more serious than hurricanes, earthquakes, economic crises, capital
crashes or floods. It has no cure yet. We are watching a whole continent degenerate into ghostly
skeletons that finally succumb to a most excruciating, dehumanizing death. Gore said that his new
initiative, if approved by the U.S. Congress, would bring U.S. contributions to fighting AIDS and other infectious diseases to $ 325
million. Does this mean that the UN Security Council and the U.S. in particular have at last decided to remember Africa? Suddenly, AIDS
was seen as threat to world peace, and Gore would ask the congress to set up millions of dollars on this case. The hope is that Gore
does not intend to make political capital out of this by painting the usually disagreeable Republican-controlled Congress as the bad guy
and hope the buck stops on the whole of current and future U.S. governments' conscience. Maybe there is nothing left to salvage in
Africa after all and this talk is about the African-American vote in November's U.S. presidential vote. Although the UN and the Security
Council cannot solve all African problems, the AIDS challenge is a fundamental one in that it threatens to wipe out man. The
challenge is not one of a single continent alone because Africa cannot be quarantined. The trouble is
that AIDS has no cure -- and thus even the West has stakes in the AIDS challenge. Once sub-Saharan Africa is wiped out,
it shall not be long before another continent is on the brink of extinction. Sure as death, Africa's
time has run out, signaling the beginning of the end of the black race and maybe the human race.
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--Disease O/W

Disease outweighs nuclear war


Dalton 1 (Alastair, journalist, “Deadly Virus Will Destroy Life on Earth,” THE SCOTSMAN, October 17, 2001, LN.)
HUMANS will have to move to other planets to survive a biological catastrophe that will hit the Earth within the next 1,000 years,
Professor Stephen Hawking warned yesterday. The world's most famous physicist said he was more worried
about a virus than nuclear weapons destroying life and said future generations would have to face living in space.
Prof Hawking said he was optimistic life would continue, but warned the danger of extinction remained because
of man's aggressive nature. Other leading scientists agreed that humans would have to take action to
avoid being wiped out like previous dominant Earth species, such as the dinosaurs, but said there was
no need for any immediate panic.

It independently causes extinction


Discover 2k (“Twenty Ways the World Could End” by Corey Powell in Discover Magazine, October 2000,
http://discovermagazine.com/2000/oct/featworld)

If Earth doesn't do us in, our fellow organisms might be up to the task. Germs and people have
always coexisted, but occasionally the balance gets out of whack. The Black Plague killed one European in
four during the 14th century; influenza took at least 20 million lives between 1918 and 1919; the AIDS epidemic has produced a similar
death toll and is still going strong. From 1980 to 1992, reports the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, mortality from
infectious disease in the United States rose 58 percent.
Old diseases such as cholera and measles have
developed new resistance to antibiotics. Intensive agriculture and land development is bringing
humans closer to animal pathogens. International travel means diseases can spread faster than
ever. Michael Osterholm, an infectious disease expert who recently left the Minnesota Department of Health,
described the situation as "like trying to swim against the current of a raging river." The
grimmest possibility would be the emergence of a strain that spreads so fast we are caught off
guard or that resists all chemical means of control, perhaps as a result of our stirring of the
ecological pot. About 12,000 years ago, a sudden wave of mammal extinctions swept through the Americas. Ross MacPhee of the
American Museum of Natural History argues the culprit was extremely virulent disease, which humans helped transport as they
migrated into the New World.
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--AIDS Bad – Deforestation

AIDS causes deforestation and destroys the environment


Oglethorpe and Gelman, 6 (Judy, World Wildlife Fund; Nancy, Africa Biodiversity Collaborative Group, Frontiers in Ecology and Environment,
April 2006)

Behind these broad population figures, the impacts of AIDS on demographic structure are seriously
worsening the imbalances between population and natural resource consumption/land use in sub-
Saharan Africa. The most economically active age group (15–49 years old) is most impacted by AIDS (UNAIDS 2004). When
individuals in this age group succumb to the disease, wages and agricultural labor are lost. Rural households
are forced to change their livelihood strategies in an ever-deepening spiral of poverty. They often
cultivate less labor-intensive but also less nutritious crops (Barnett and Whiteside 2002) and increase natural
resource consumption. Activities such as hunting, fishing, wild food-plant collection, and fuel-wood
extraction increase as families struggle to maintain diets and generate alternative income (Barany et al. 2001; Africa
Biodiversity Collaborative Group 2002). The subsequent increase in resource use is often unsustainable.
Indigenous knowledge of agriculture and resource management is often lost when parents die
before passing it on to their children. For example, using fire for agricultural clearing can increase as
indigenous knowledge of agricultural production disappears and less labor is available for farming. Uncontrolled fires
destroy natural resources such as forest foods and building materials (M Jurvelius pers comm) and can
accelerate erosion. As AIDS orphans grow up, they often have little indigenous knowledge and a
weak attachment to land and resources. This could result in unsustainable mining of natural
resources and future insecurity, both locally and nationally. Compounding this, law enforcement
capacity is being weakened by the epidemic, as is the ability of governments and non-governmental
organizations to provide technical support for rural development and resource management. At a
local level, AIDS can result in shifts in land and resource control, as traditional governance structures break down and power relations
change. Inefficient and unsustainable use can increase, particularly if knowledge of sustainable practices is lost or
there is less commitment to sound use. In addition, in some societies, widows and orphans cannot inherit land when the male head of
a household dies, because of patriarchal laws and traditions. Even if there is a legal basis for inheritance, land-grabbing may occur
(International Center for Research on Women 2004).

Deforestation causes extinction


Watson 6 (Captain Paul, Founder and President of Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, Last Mod 9-17, http://www.eco-
action.org/dt/beerswil.html)

The facts are clear. More


plant and animal species will go through extinction within our generation
than have been lost thorough natural causes over the past two hundred million years. Our single
human generation, that is, all people born between 1930 and 2010 will witness the complete obliteration of one third to one half of all
the Earth's life forms, each and every one of them the product of more than two billion years of evolution. This
is biological
meltdown, and what this really means is the end to vertebrate evolution on planet Earth. Nature is under
siege on a global scale. Biotopes, i.e., environmentally distinct regions, from tropical and temperate rainforests to coral reefs and
coastal estuaries, are disintegrating in the wake of human onslaught. The
destruction of forests and the proliferation of
human activity will remove more than 20 percent of all terrestrial plant species over the next fifty years.
Because plants form the foundation for entire biotic communities, their demise will carry with it
the extinction of an exponentially greater number of animal species -- perhaps ten times as
many faunal species for each type of plant eliminated. Sixty-five million years ago, a natural cataclysmic event resulted in
extinction of the dinosaurs. Even with a plant foundation intact, it took more than 100,000 years for
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faunal biological diversity to re-establish itself. More importantly, the resurrection of biological
diversity assumes an intact zone of tropical forests to provide for new speciation after
extinction. Today, the tropical rain forests are disappearing more rapidly than any other bio-
region, ensuring that after the age of humans, the Earth will remain a biological, if not a literal desert
for eons to come. The present course of civilization points to ecocide -- the death of nature. Like a run-a-way train,
civilization is speeding along tracks of our own manufacture towards the stone wall of extinction. The
human passengers sitting comfortably in their seats, laughing, partying, and choosing to not look out the window. Environmentalists
are those perceptive few who have their faces pressed against the glass, watching the hurling bodies of plants and animals go
screaming by. Environmental activists are those even fewer people who are trying desperately to break into the fortified engine of
greed that propels this destructive specicidal juggernaut. Others are desperately throwing out anchors in an attempt to slow the
monster down while all the while, the authorities, blind to their own impending destruction, are clubbing, shooting and jailing those
who would save us all. SHORT MEMORIES Civilized humans have for ten thousand years been marching across the face of the Earth
leaving deserts in their footprints. Because we have such short memories, we forgot the wonder and splendor of a virgin nature. We
revise history and make it fit into our present perceptions. For instance, are you aware that only two thousand years ago, the coast of
North Africa was a mighty forest? The Phoenicians and the Carthaginians built powerful ships from the strong timbers of the region.
Rome was a major exporter of timber to Europe. The temple of Jerusalem was built with titanic cedar logs, one image of which adorns
the flag of Lebanon today. Jesus Christ did not live in a desert, he was a man of the forest. The Sumerians were renowned for clearing
the forests of Mesopotamia for agriculture. But the destruction of the coastal swath of the North African forest stopped the rain from
advancing into the interior. Without the rain, the trees died and thus was born the mighty Sahara, sired by man and continued to grow
southward at a rate of ten miles per year, advancing down the length of the continent of Africa. And so will go Brazil. The precipitation
off the Atlantic strikes the coastal rain forest and is absorbed and sent skyward again by the trees, falling further into the interior.
Twelve times the moisture falls and twelve times it is returned to the sky -- all the way to the Andes mountains. Destroy the coastal
swath and desertify Amazonia -- it is as simple as that. Create a swath anywhere between the coast and the mountains and the rains
will be stopped. We did it before while relatively primitive. We learned nothing. We forgot. So too, have we forgotten that walrus once
mated and bred along the coast of Nova Scotia, that sixty million bison once roamed the North American plains. One hundred years
ago, the white bear once roamed the forests of New England and the Canadian Maritime provinces. Now it is called the polar bear
because that is where it now makes its last stand. EXTINCTION IS DIFFICULT TO APPRECIATE Gone forever are the European elephant,
lion and tiger. The Labrador duck, gint auk, Carolina parakeet will never again grace this planet of ours. Lost for all time are the Atlantic
grey whales, the Biscayan right whales and the Stellar sea cow. Our children will never look upon the California condor in the wild or
watch the Palos Verde blue butterfly dart from flower to flower. Extinction is a difficult concept to fully appreciate. What has been is
no more and never shall be again. It would take another creation and billions of years to recreate the passenger pigeon. It is the loss of
billions of years of evolutionary programming. It is the destruction of beauty, the obliteration of truth, the removal of uniqueness, the
scarring of the sacred web of life To
be responsible for an extinction is to commit blasphemy against the divine. It is
the greatest of all possible crimes, more evil than murder, more appalling than genocide, more
monstrous than even the apparent unlimited perversities of the human mind. To be responsible for the
complete and utter destruction of a unique and sacred life form is arrogance that seethes with evil, for the very opposite of evil is live.
It is no accident that these two words spell out each other in reverse. And yet, a reporter in California recently told me that "all the
redwoods in California are not worth the life on one human being." What incredible arrogance. The rights a species, any species, must
take precedence over the life of an individual or another species. This is a basic ecological law. It is not to be tampered with by
primates who have molded themselves into divine legends in their own mind. For each and every one of the thirty million plus species
that grace this beautiful planet are essential for the continued well-being of which we are all a part, the planet Earth -- the divine entity
which brought us forth from the fertility of her sacred womb. As a sea-captain I like to compare the structural integrity of the
biosphere to that of a ship's hull. Each species is a rivet that keeps the hull intact. If I were to go into my engine room and find my
engineers busily popping rivets from the hull, I would be upset and naturally I would ask them what they were doing. If they told me
that they discovered that they could make a dollar each from the rivets, I could do one of three things. I could ignore them. I could ask
them to cut me in for a share of the profits, or I could kick their asses out of the engine room and off my ship. If I was a responsible
captain, I would do the latter. If I did not, I would soon find the ocean pouring through the holes left by the stolen rivets and very
shortly after, my ship, my crew and myself would disappear beneath the waves. And that is the state of the world today. The political
leaders, i.e., the captains at the helms of their nation states, are ignoring the rivet poppers or they are cutting themselves in for the
profits. There are very few asses being kicked out of the engine room of spaceship Earth. With the rivet poppers in command, it will
not be long until the biospheric integrity of the Earth collapses under the weight of ecological
strain and tides of death come pouring in. And that will be the price of progress -- ecological
collapse, the death of nature, and with it the horrendous and mind numbing specter of massive
human destruction.
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--AIDS Bad – Failed States

AIDS causes failed states


Singer, 2 (Peter, John M. Olin Post-doctoral Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, Survival, Spring. This is not the bioethicist/activist
Peter Singer.)

The manner in which AIDS can hollow out already weak states parallels that of its effect on militaries. In contrast to
other historic disease epidemics, which tended to kill off the weak and infirm first, AIDS in the developing world has
tended to claim the lives of the more productive members of society, who are not easily
replaced. The reason is that educated and well-off citizens are more mobile, and thus have often contracted the disease first. Many
states have clusters of the disease in the middle and upper levels of management in both business and government and AIDS is already
being blamed for shortages of skilled workers in a number of countries.27 For example, 10% of all African teachers are expected to be
killed by AIDS by 2005, while between 25-50% of health care workers in stricken states such as Malawi will similarly die from the
disease.28 In the words of Peter Piot, the head of UNAIDS, thedisease “…is devastating the ranks of the most
productive members of society with an efficacy history has reserved for great armed
conflicts.”29 The impact is felt not just in governance, but also the economy and development in
general. Besides acting as a new sort of tax on society, by increasing the health care costs of
business across the board, the disease also stymies foreign investment. Workforce productivity
is decreased, while prospective revenues also go down, as the local consumer base becomes
more impoverished.30 The disease also increases budgetary needs at the same time as it shrinks
the tax base. The consequence could well be shattering for already impoverished states. The
World Bank considers the disease to be the single biggest threat to economic development in
Africa, as it is expected to reduce GDP in many states by as much as 20%, in just the next
decade. The rapid spread in poverty-stricken post-Soviet states, including those in Central Asia newly important to the war on
terrorism, could be equally catastrophic.31 The precise security threat here is that AIDS causes dangerous
weaknesses in the pillars of a stable state, its military, its governing institutions, and its
economy. The disease is accordingly no longer just a symptom of a state crisis, as usually thought, but
actually a catalyst of them.32 As public institutions crumble and senior officials also suffer from
the disease, public confidence in governing bodies is further threatened.33 The weakening of
state bodies at point of crisis has repeatedly been the spark for coups, revolts, and other
political and ethnic struggles to secure control over resources. As the recent collapse of the DRC illustrates,
warlords, plunderers, and other violent actors effortlessly fill the void left by a failing state.
That the disease is concentrating in areas, such as Africa and the former Soviet Union, already
undergoing tenuous political transitions only heightens the risks of instability and state failure.

State collapse creates unique scenario for regional war in Africa that threatens vital
interests of great powers and causes global terrorism
Singer, 2 (Peter, John M. Olin Post-doctoral Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, Survival, Spring. This is not the bioethicist/activist
Peter Singer.)

The security danger of failed states extends beyond the simple human tragedy that is then
played out in the ensuring chaos and collapse. While stable states outside the region might
imagine themselves secure and able to stand aside from failed states, the realities of the global
system no longer permit this. At the very first brush, many of the regions that are most vulnerable to state
failure spurred by disease are of clear national interest concern to major state powers. The US,
for example, has greater economic investments in at risk areas in Africa than either the Middle
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East or Eastern Europe. Equally, a number of individual states at risk, such as Angola, Nigeria, and South
Africa, are core regional allies, as well as critical suppliers of oil (roughly 1/5th of all US imports) and
strategic minerals.34 The threats of economic and/or political collapse from the disease can also
lead to new refugee flows. Besides facilitating the spread of the disease, time and time again,
sudden and massive population movements prompted by these factors have led to heightened
regional-wide tensions and destabilization.35 With the likely increase to pandemic levels on their doorsteps in the
Caribbean and the former Soviet Union, American and European fears of past refugee crises (such as the 1990s Balkans wars and
Haitian collapse) could be revisited. Perhaps more important, in a direct security sense, is that failed
state zones tend to
become havens for the new enemies of global order. As the UN Special Envoy Lakhdar Brahimi noted, the events
of Sept. 11th were “…A wakeup call, [leading many]…to realize that even small countries, far away, like Afghanistan cannot be left to
sink to the depths to which Afghanistan has sunk.”36 Decaying
states give extremist groups freedom of
operation, with dangerous resulting consequences a world away. This hazard applies even to
seemingly disconnected state failures. Sierra Leone’s collapse in the 1990s, for example,
certainly was of little concern to policymakers in Washington and had little to do with radical
Islamic terrorist groups. The tiny West African state, nonetheless, has since served as a critical
node in the fundraising efforts of Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network.37
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--AIDS Bad – Heg/Child Soldiers

AIDS creates a huge number of orphans who become child soldiers—this causes war,
makes it bloodier, and causes peace efforts to fail
Singer, 2 (Peter, John M. Olin Post-doctoral Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, Survival, Spring. This is not the bioethicist/activist
Peter Singer.)

A more direct mechanism by which the


new demographics of AIDS can heighten security risks is through
its creation of a new pool of orphans, magnifying the child soldier problem. By 2010, over 40 million
children will lose one or both of their parents to AIDS, including 1/3 of all children in the hardest hit countries. These include 2.7
million in Nigeria, 2.5 million in Ethiopia, and 1.8 million in South Africa.40 India, alone, already has 120,000 AIDS orphans. Because of
both the stigma of the disease, as well as the simple fact the sheer numbers of victims will overwhelm the communities and extended
families that would normally look after them, this cohort represents a new “lost orphan generation.”41 Its prospects are heartrending,
as well as dangerous. Besides being malnourished, stigmatized, and vulnerable to physical and sexual
abuse, this mass of disconnected and disaffected children is particularly at risk to being
exploited as child soldiers. Children in such straights are often targeted for recruitment, either
through abduction or voluntary enlistment driven by desperation. The ramifications are quite
dangerous to stability.42 With recent changes in weapons technology that allow them to be
effective fighters in low-intensity warfare, children represent an inexpensive way for warlords,
guerilla groups, and other violent non-state actors to build up substantial forces irregardless of their
own political agendas and local support, or lack their of. This new ease of force generation means a likely
increase in the number of internal rebellions and conflicts. Moreover, the unique features of
the doctrine behind turning children into soldiers means that those conflicts in which they are
introduced will be inherently “messier.” These wars prevalently feature atrocities and attacks
on civilians. At the same time, the lives of the child soldiers themselves are considered cheaper
by those that utilize them; they tend to be employed in a loose manner, making their own
losses much higher. Finally, children’s entrance into warfare is damaging to social fabric as well
as their individual psyches, creating future problems down the road, even after initial conflict
resolution. Child soldiers have appeared on contemporary battlefields without AIDS being present. The prevalence of a
new, globalized mass of orphans, as well as a hollowing of local states and militaries, will make
them ever more widespread. The ultimate result is that violent conflicts will be easier to start,
greater in loss of life, harder to end, and lay the groundwork for recurrence in the following
generations.

Widespread use of child soldiers kills US warfighting capability – turns heg


Singer, 3 ( P.W., Olin Fellow in Foreign Policy Studies at The Brookings Institution and director of the Project on U.S. Policy Toward the Islamic World, Military
Review May 2003)

Because of the overwhelming advantage U.S. forces have, Iraq's child soldiers will not change the final strategic outcome. However,
experiences from around the globe demonstrate that children make effective combatants and
often operate with terrifying audacity, particularly when infused with religious or political
fervor or when under the influence of narcotics. In general, children on the battlefield add to the overall
confusion of battle. Such units can slow down the progress of U.S. forces, particularly in urban
areas, and needlessly add to casualty totals on both sides. For professional forces, child soldiers present the
essential quandary, perhaps even more difficult than the issue of civilian casualties. Children are traditionally considered outside the
scope of war. Yet, now they are potential threats to soldiers' lives and missions. Using children as soldiers presents two added
concerns. First, children are not seen as hated enemies. U.S. soldiers usually exhibit a great amount
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of empathy toward children in war-torn counties. Consequently, engagements with child soldiers
can be incredibly demoralizing for professional troops and can also affect unit cohesion. For
example, there was little official dilemma or controversy over Allied actions against the Hitler Jugend in 1945. The youths were fighting
to defend an absolutely evil regime, and the general agreement among the Allies was that Hitler's regime had to be completely
defeated. Yet, the experience of fighting against the Jugend was so unsettling to U.S. Armed Forces
that troop morale fell to some of the lowest points of the entire war.(12) Likewise, British forces
operating in West Africa in 2001 faced deep problems of clinical depression and post-traumatic
stress disorder among individual soldiers who had faced child soldiers. (13) A second
consideration is the public-affairs nightmare that surrounds the use of child soldiers. In the
reports on the initial engagements with child soldiers, both the Arab and international press
focused on the immediate act of U.S. soldiers shooting Iraqi children, rather than on the context that led
them to be forced into such a terrible dilemma. The children were portrayed as heroic martyrs defending their
homes, facing the American Goliath. This image obviously damages U.S. public information efforts to
demonstrate the rightness of a cause or the special care U.S. and allied forces take to protect
innocents. The potential backlash could imperil already tenuous support from regional
allies and harden attitudes elsewhere against giving aid to the United States in the
broader war on terrorism. The backlash could increase popular support and recruiting for
terrorist groups, such as al-Qaeda, who could claim to be avenging the youth. Finally, the effect caused by
seeing photographs of tiny bodies could become potent fodder for congressional criticism and
antiwar protestors.(14) These points underscore the general proviso that military force should only be used when and
where objectives warrant.
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--AIDS Bad – Resources

AIDS increases resource consumption and destroys the environment


Oglethorpe and Gelman, 7 (Judy, World Wildlife Fund; Nancy, Africa Biodiversity Collaborative Group, “HIV/AIDS and the Environment:
Impacts of AIDS and Ways to Reduce Them” http://www.worldwildlife.org/phe/pubs/hivaids.pdf)

As AIDS-affected rural households lose salary earners and agricultural labor, many are turning
to natural resources as a safety net. Activities such as hunting, fishing and charcoal making
increase as families seek alternative livelihoods. More water, firewood and medicinal plants are consumed
by households caring for the sick and timber logging has accelerated in many areas to supply
the growing coffin industry (Africa Biodiversity Collaborative Group 2002, Barany et al. 2005). These widely
reported increases in resource use may not be sustainable and pose a long-term threat to
communities and their ecological wellbeing.
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--AIDS Bad – US Econ/Trade

AIDS in Africa hurts US economy and trade


Barks-Ruggles, 1 (Erica, International Affairs Fellow with the Council on Foreign Relations and a guest scholar at The Brookings Institution. She was
previously a director for African Affairs at the National Security Council, Brookings Institution Policy Brief #75, April,
http://www.brook.edu/comm/policybriefs/pb75.htm)

The economic unit hit hardest by HIV/AIDS, however, is the family—especially as businesses and
governments under stress reduce benefits and shift costs to them. Studies in several countries in Africa have
shown that in families with an HIV/AIDS-infected adult, children eat less and are less likely to attend school, because they must work
to replace lost income and care for the sick adult. In one study of Cote d'Ivoire households experiencing HIV/AIDS-related deaths,
spending on schooling dropped by 50 percent and food consumption decreased by 41 percent, while health care costs quadrupled.
The cost to families and individuals will also reduce discretionary spending and the demand for
consumer goods, which could affect American exporters as well as local producers. In South Africa, JD
Group, a leading local manufacturer of small appliances and furniture, found that increased spending on HIV/AIDS-related expenses
would reduce discretionary spending on durable consumer goods. To ensure its market base, it opened retail outlets in Eastern
Europe. Shrinking
markets in AIDS-affected countries in the developing world could reduce investment
and increase inflation, further slowing already sluggish growth and reinforcing the
macroeconomic downturn predicted by the World Bank. With 42 percent of American exports destined
for developing countries, the effect of HIV/AIDS on some of the largest developing markets in
the world could harm U.S. exporters.

Nuclear war.
Friedberg and Schoenfeld, 8
[Aaron, Prof. Politics. And IR @ Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School and Visiting Scholar @ Witherspoon
Institute, and Gabriel, Senior Editor of Commentary and Wall Street Journal, “The Dangers of a Diminished
America”, 10-28, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122455074012352571.html]

With the global financial system in serious trouble, is America's geostrategic dominance likely
to diminish? If so, what would that mean? One immediate implication of the crisis that began on Wall Street and spread across
the world is that the primary instruments of U.S. foreign policy will be crimped. The next president will face
an entirely new and adverse fiscal position. Estimates of this year's federal budget deficit already show that it has jumped $237 billion
from last year, to $407 billion. With families and businesses hurting, there will be calls for various and expensive domestic relief
programs. In the face of this onrushing river of red ink, both Barack Obama and John McCain have been reluctant to lay out what
portions of their programmatic wish list they might defer or delete. Only Joe Biden has suggested a possible reduction -- foreign aid.
This would be one of the few popular cuts, but in budgetary terms it is a mere grain of sand. Still, Sen. Biden's comment hints at where
we may be headed: toward a major reduction in America's world role, and perhaps even a new era of financially-
induced isolationism. Pressures to cut defense spending, and to dodge the cost of waging two wars, already
intense before this crisis, are likely to mount. Despite the success of the surge, the war in Iraq remains deeply unpopular.
Precipitous withdrawal -- attractive to a sizable swath of the electorate before the financial implosion -- might well
become even more popular with annual war bills running in the hundreds of billions. Protectionist sentiments are sure to grow
stronger as jobs disappear in the coming slowdown. Even before our current woes, calls to save jobs by restricting imports had begun
to gather support among many Democrats and some Republicans. In a prolonged recession, gale-force winds of
protectionism will blow. Then there are the dolorous consequences of a potential collapse of the world's financial
architecture. For decades now, Americans have enjoyed the advantages of being at the center of that system. The worldwide use of
the dollar, and the stability of our economy, among other things, made it easier for us to run huge budget deficits, as we counted on
foreigners to pick up the tab by buying dollar-denominated assets as a safe haven. Will this be possible in the future? Meanwhile,
traditional foreign-policy challenges are multiplying. The threat from al Qaeda and Islamic
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terrorist affiliates has not been extinguished. Iran and North Korea are continuing on their
bellicose paths, while Pakistan and Afghanistan are progressing smartly down the road to
chaos. Russia's new militancy and China's seemingly relentless rise also give cause for concern. If
America now tries to pull back from the world stage, it will leave a dangerous power vacuum.
The stabilizing effects of our presence in Asia, our continuing commitment to Europe, and our
position as defender of last resort for Middle East energy sources and supply lines could all be
placed at risk. In such a scenario there are shades of the 1930s, when global trade and finance ground nearly
to a halt, the peaceful democracies failed to cooperate, and aggressive powers led by the remorseless fanatics
who rose up on the crest of economic disaster exploited their divisions. Today we run the risk
that rogue states may choose to become ever more reckless with their nuclear toys, just at our
moment of maximum vulnerability. The aftershocks of the financial crisis will almost certainly
rock our principal strategic competitors even harder than they will rock us. The dramatic free fall of the
Russian stock market has demonstrated the fragility of a state whose economic performance hinges on high oil prices,
now driven down by the global slowdown. China is perhaps even more fragile, its economic growth depending heavily on
foreign investment and access to foreign markets. Both will now be constricted, inflicting economic pain and perhaps even sparking
unrest in a country where political legitimacy rests on progress in the long march to prosperity. None
of this is good news if
the authoritarian leaders of these countries seek to divert attention from internal travails with
external adventures. As for our democratic friends, the present crisis comes when many European nations are struggling to
deal with decades of anemic growth, sclerotic governance and an impending demographic crisis. Despite its past dynamism, Japan
faces similar challenges. India is still in the early stages of its emergence as a world economic and geopolitical power. What does this
all mean? There is no substitute for America on the world stage. The choice we have before us is between the
potentially disastrous effects of disengagement and the stiff price tag of continued American leadership. Are we up for the task? The
American economy has historically demonstrated remarkable resilience. Our market-oriented ideology, entrepreneurial culture,
flexible institutions and favorable demographic profile should serve us well in whatever trials lie ahead. The American people, too,
have shown reserves of resolve when properly led. But experience after the Cold War era -- poorly articulated and executed policies,
divisive domestic debates and rising anti-Americanism in at least some parts of the world -- appear to have left these reserves
diminished. A recent survey by the Chicago Council on World Affairs found that 36% of respondents agreed that the U.S. should "stay
out of world affairs," the highest number recorded since this question was first asked in 1947. The economic crisis could be
the straw that breaks the camel's back.
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--AIDS Bad – War

Aids causes genocide, ethnic cleansing, and economic collapse—this both makes war more
likely and magnifies its impact
Singer, 2 (Peter, John M. Olin Post-doctoral Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies at the Brookings Institution, Survival, Spring. This is not the bioethicist/activist
Peter Singer.)

A recurring themes at all of these meetings was the new danger presented by the epidemic, not just in terms of direct victims of the
disease itself, but also to international security. Speaking at the UN Security Council session, James Wolfensohn, the head of the World
Bank, stated, “Many of us used to think of AIDS as a health issue. We were wrong…nothing we have seen is a greater
challenge to the peace and stability of African societies than the epidemic of aids…we face a major
development crisis, and more than that, a security crisis.”2 Peter Piot, chairman of the Joint UN Program on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS),
similarly noted that “Conflicts and AIDS are linked like evil twins.”3 In fact, this connection made between the
epidemic of AIDS and the danger of increased instability and war was also one of the few continuities between the way the Clinton and
Bush administration foreign policy teams saw the world. Basing its assessment on a
CIA report that discussed an increased
prospects of “revolutionary wars, ethnic wars, genocide, and disruptive regime transitions”
because of the disease, the Clinton Administration declared it a “national security threat” in 2000.4 While it was originally
accused of pandering to certain activist groups, by the time of Secretary Powell’s confirmation hearings the next year, the lead foreign
policy voice of the new administration had also declared it a “national security problem.” He later affirmed that it
presented “a
clear and present danger to the world.”5 Similarly, US Under Secretary of State Paula Dobriansky stated that
“HIV/AIDS is a threat to security and global stability, plain and simple”6 The looming security implications of AIDS,
particularly within Africa, are thus now a baseline assumption of the disease’s danger. However, this threat has barely been fleshed
out and the mechanisms by which experts claim that “AIDS has changed the landscape of war” are barely understood. 7 This article
seeks to fill this space. AIDS
not only threatens to heighten the risks of war, but also multiply its
impact. The disease will hollow out military capabilities, as well as state capacities in general,
weakening both to the point of failure and collapse. Moreover, at these times of increased
vulnerability, the disease also creates new militant recruiting pools, who portend even greater
violence, as well putting in jeopardy certain pillars of international stability. In isolation, this
increased risk of war around the globe is bad enough, but there are also certain types of cross-
fertilization between the disease and conflict, intensifying the threat. The ultimate dynamic of
warfare and AIDS is that their combination makes both more likely and more devastating. It is
no overstatement that AIDS is “…the greatest disease challenge that humanity has faced in
modern history.”8 More people will die from the disease than any other disease outbreaks in
human history, including the global influenza epidemic of 1918-9 and the Bubonic Plague in the
1300s. Over 22 million worldwide have already been killed and it is projected that, at current
rates, another 100 million more will be infected just by 2005.9
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1NC – BioD

War preserves biodiversity—peace destroys it


McNEELY 2 (Jeffrey, Chief Scientist at IUCN, Conserving the Peace, www.iisd.org/pdf/2002/envsec_conserving_overview.pdf)
So while war is bad for biodiversity, peace can be even worse: in the 1960s, when Indonesia and
Malaysia were fighting over border claims on the island of Borneo, they did relatively little
damage to its vast wilderness, but in the 1990s they peacefully competed to cut down and sell
its forests; in Indonesia, the 1997–1998 forest fires that caused US$4.4 billion in damage were set primarily
by businesses and military to clear forests in order to plant various cash crops. Ironically, the prices of
these commodities that were to be grown have fallen considerably in recent years, making them even less profitable. Vietnam’s
forests are under greater pressure now that peace has arrived than they ever were during the
country’s wars; Nicaragua’s forests are now under renewed development pressures; and Laos is
paying at least part of its war debts to China and Vietnam with timber concessions; I was told in Laos
that the Chinese and Vietnamese timber merchants and logging companies are able to operate with impunity in Laos, irrespective of
logging regulations, protected area boundaries, or any other considerations. This is perhaps not surprising given the dependence of
the Pathet Lao on the support of Vietnam and China during the IndoChina wars. The
motivations may be more noble in
times of peace, but the impacts of inappropriate development on biodiversity following the end
of hostilities often are even worse than the impacts of war. Market forces may be more
destructive than military forces

Environment collapse Increases risk of extinction


Diner, 4 Major David N. Diner , JAG – US Army, MILITARY LAW REVIEW, Winter 1994,
http://www.stormingmedia.us/14/1456/A145654.html

By causing widespread extinctions, humans have artificially simplified many ecosystems. As biologic simplicity increases,
so does the risk of ecosystem failure. The spreading Sahara Desert in Africa, and the dustbowl conditions of the 1930s
in the United States are relatively mild examples of what might be expected if this trend continues. Theoretically, each
new
animal or plant extinction, with all its dimly perceived and intertwined effects, could cause total
ecosystem collapse and human extinction. Each new extinction increases the risk of disaster.
Like a mechanic removing, one by one, the rivets from an aircraft's wings, mankind may be edging closer to the abyss.
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--Ext. – Solves BioD

War prevents environmental destruction—peace accelerates it


McNEELY 2 (Jeffrey, Chief Scientist at IUCN, Conserving the Peace, www.iisd.org/pdf/2002/envsec_conserving_overview.pdf)
The impact of war on biodiversity is often decidedly mixed, with a complex combination of
damages and benefits. Nicaragua provides an outstanding example. Engaged in civil war for
over 20 years, nearly half of the country’s population was relocated in one way or another, and nearly 100,000 casualties
resulted. The human tragedy was immense, but biodiversity was able to recover from a long history of
exploitation, as trade in timber, fish, minerals, and wildlife was sharply reduced. The domestic
cattle population, which was roughly equivalent to the human population when the war started, was reduced by two-
thirds, freeing pastures for recolonization by forests, enabling the recovery of animal
populations such as white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), peccaries (Tayassu angulatus), four species of monkeys (Cebidae),
crocodiles (Caiman Crocodilus), iguanas (Iguana iguana), large birds and various mammalian predators. Fishing boats were destroyed
and fishermen fled, leading to drastic declines in the catches of fish, shrimp and lobsters, which in turn revitalized these fisheries. On
the other hand, some hunting by soldiers had at least local negative impacts on wildlife, and new military bases and roads were
established in formerly-remote areas, opening them up to exploitation. Further, the country’s once outstanding system of protected
areas fell into neglect, and new areas planned were not established; the collapsing economy forced villagers into environmentally
destructive activities, including clearing forest for firewood and harvesting wildlife for food. Nietschmann (1990b) concludes that a
significant portion of this conflict was over resources and territory, not ideology. Biodiversity rejuvenated by the war came under
renewed threat by people whom the war had impoverished; the
post-war period saw a great acceleration of such
impacts and now that peace has broken out, biodiversity is under renewed pressure.

War is on balance good for biodiversity


McNEELY 2 (Jeffrey, Chief Scientist at IUCN, Conserving the Peace, www.iisd.org/pdf/2002/envsec_conserving_overview.pdf)
As one of the world’s last remaining strongholds of unexploited resources, tropical forests often
serve as a point of contention as they become the focus of social, ecological, political and economic changes. Poor
management of forest resources and the absence of an established set of equitable sharing principles among contending parties lead
to shifts in resource access and control. Resulting tensions and grievances can lead to armed conflict and even war. Many governments
have contributed to conflict by nationalizing their forests, so that traditional forest inhabitants have been disenfranchised while
national governments sell trees to concessionaires to earn foreign exchange. Biodiversity-rich tropical forests in Papua New Guinea,
Indonesia, Indochina, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Central Africa, the Amazon, Colombia, Central America and New Caledonia have all been
the sites of armed conflict, sometimes involving international forces. While
these conflicts have frequently, even
invariably, caused negative impacts on biodiversity, peace is often even worse, as it enables
forest exploitation to operate with impunity. Because many of the remaining tropical forests are along international
borders, international cooperation is required for their conservation; as a response, the concept of international “peace parks” is being
promoted in many parts of the world as a way of linking biodiversity conservation with national security. The Convention on Biological
Diversity, which entered into force at the end of 1993 and now has nearly 180 State Parties, offers a useful framework for such
cooperation.

War is good for biodiversity—prevents civillian exploitation of the environment


McNEELY 2 (Jeffrey, Chief Scientist at IUCN, Conserving the Peace, www.iisd.org/pdf/2002/envsec_conserving_overview.pdf)
But war, or the threat of war, can also be good for biodiversity, at least under certain conditions. As Myers (1979: 24) put
it, “In some respects, indeed, wildlife benefits from warfare: combatant armies effectively designate
war zones as ‘off limits’ to casual wanderers, thus quarantining large areas of Africa from
hunters and poachers.” Of course, any benefits of war to biodiversity are incidental, inadvertent and accidental rather than a
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planned side-effect of conflict. But even so, it is useful to review some cases where war, or preparations for war, has benefited
biodiversity, perhaps supporting the views of some anthropologists that war helps societies adapt to their environmental constraints.
For example, the border between Thailand and Peninsular Malaysia was a hotbed of insurgency during the mid-1960s to the mid-
1970s. On the Malaysian side of the border, the military closed off all public access and potential logging activity in the Belum Forest
Reserve. As a result, this extensive area of some 160,000 ha has remained untouched by modern logging pressures and therefore is
rich in wildlife resources. Malaysia is now converting this into a national park that will form a transboundaryprotected area with
matching protected areas in southern Thailand. While the second Vietnam War was an ecological disaster, it also led to
some important biological research, such as the extensive, long-term review of migratory birds in eastern Asia carried
out by the Migratory Animals Pathological Survey (McClure, 1974). The excuse for this research was its relevance to
the war effort, but it has yielded data that are useful for numerous civilian conservation
applications. And the watersheds through which ran the Ho Chi Minh trail, some of the most
heavilybombed parts of Indo-China during the second Vietnam War, have more recently been
remarkably productive in discoveries of previously unknown species. The discoveries of new large
mammals include two species of muntjak or barking deer (Megamuntiacus vuquangensis and Muntiacus truongsonensis), a unique
variety of forest antelope (Pseudoryx nghetinhensis), and a bovid ultimately related to wild cattle (Pseudonovibos spiralis) (Dillon and
Wikramanyake, 1997) as well as the rediscovery of a species of pig that formerly was known only by a few fragmentary specimens.
That such species could survive in such a heavily-bombed area is testimony to the recuperative
power of nature and the ability of wildlife to withstand even the most extreme kinds of human
pressure during warfare. Interestingly, these species now are even more severely threatened by
the peacetime activities of development than they were by the Indochina wars. Some other species
are likely to have benefited from the war in Vietnam. Orians and Pfeiffer (1970: 553) say that tigers “have learned to
associate the sounds of gunfire with the presence of dead and wounded humanbeings in the
vicinity. As a result, tigers rapidly move toward gunfire and apparently consume large numbers
of battle casualties. Although there are no accurate statistics on the tiger populations past or present, it is likely that the
tiger population has increased much as the wolf population in Poland increased during World
War II.” Fairhead and Leach (1995) report that parts of the Ziama region of Guinea, which includes an extensive biosphere reserve,
became forested following a series of wars that affected the area from 1870 to 1910. The resident Toma people first fought with
Mandinka groups from the north and subsequently with the French colonial armies, causing major depopulation and economic
devastation that in turn allowed the forest to reclaim agricultural land. The human disaster of war enabled nature to
recover.
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--BioD O/W

Biodiversity loss outweighs all other considerations – there’s no point of return


Coyne and Hoekstra, 7 - *professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Chicago AND ** Associate
Professor in the Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University (Jerry and Hopi, The New Republic, “The Greatest
Dying,” 9/24, http://www.truthout.org/article/jerry-coyne-and-hopi-e-hoekstra-the-greatest-dying)

Aside from the Great Dying, there have been four other mass extinctions, all of which severely pruned life's diversity. Scientists agree
that we're now in the midst of a sixth such episode. This new one, however, is different - and, in many ways, much worse. For, unlike
earlier extinctions, this one results from the work of a single species, Homo sapiens.We are relentlessly taking over the planet, laying it
to waste and eliminating most of our fellow species. Moreover, we're doing it much faster than the mass extinctions that came before.
Every year, up to 30,000 species disappear due to human activity alone. At this rate, we could lose
half of Earth's species in this century. And, unlike with previous extinctions, there's no hope that
biodiversity will ever recover, since the cause of the decimation - us - is here to stay. To scientists,
this is an unparalleled calamity, far more severe than global warming, which is, after all, only one of many threats to biodiversity. Yet
global warming gets far more press. Why? One reason is that, while the increase in temperature is easy to document, the decrease of
species is not. Biologists don't know, for example, exactly how many species exist on Earth. Estimates range widely, from three million
to more than 50 million, and that doesn't count microbes, critical (albeit invisible) components of ecosystems. We're not certain about
the rate of extinction, either; how could we be, since the vast majority of species have yet to be described? We're even less sure how
the loss of some species will affect the ecosystems in which they're embedded, since the intricate connection between organisms
means that the loss of a single species can ramify unpredictably. But we do know some things. Tropical rainforests are disappearing
at a rate of 2 percent per year. Populations of most large fish are down to only 10 percent of what they were in 1950. Many primates
and all the great apes - our closest relatives - are nearly gone from the wild. And we know that extinction and global warming act
synergistically. Extinction exacerbates global warming: By burning rainforests, we're not only polluting the atmosphere with carbon
dioxide (a major greenhouse gas) but destroying the very plants that can remove this gas from the air. Conversely, global warming
increases extinction, both directly (killing corals) and indirectly (destroying the habitats of Arctic and Antarctic animals). As extinction
increases, then, so does global warming, which in turn causes more extinction - and so on, into a downward spiral of destruction.
Why, exactly, should we care? Let's start with the most celebrated case: the rainforests. Their loss will worsen global warming -
raising temperatures, melting icecaps, and flooding coastal cities. And, as the forest habitat shrinks, so begins the inevitable contact
between organisms that have not evolved together, a scenario played out many times, and one that is never good. Dreadful diseases
have successfully jumped species boundaries, with humans as prime recipients. We have gotten aids from apes, sars from civets, and
Ebola from fruit bats. Additional worldwide plagues from unknown microbes are a very real possibility. But it isn't just the
destruction of the rainforests that should trouble us. Healthy
ecosystems the world over provide hidden
services like waste disposal, nutrient cycling, soil formation, water purification, and oxygen
production. Such services are best rendered by ecosystems that are diverse. Yet, through both intention and accident, humans
have introduced exotic species that turn biodiversity into monoculture. Fast-growing zebra mussels, for example, have outcompeted
more than 15 species of native mussels in North America's Great Lakes and have damaged harbors and water-treatment plants. Native
prairies are becoming dominated by single species (often genetically homogenous) of corn or wheat. Thanks to these developments,
soils will erode and become unproductive - which, along with temperature change, will diminish agricultural yields. Meanwhile,with
increased pollution and runoff, as well as reduced forest cover, ecosystems will no longer be
able to purify water; and a shortage of clean water spells disaster. In many ways, oceans are the most
vulnerable areas of all. As overfishing eliminates major predators, while polluted and warming waters kill off phytoplankton, the
intricate aquatic food web could collapse from both sides. Fish, on which so many humans depend, will be a fond memory. As
phytoplankton vanish, so does the ability of the oceans to absorb carbon dioxide and produce oxygen. (Half of the oxygen we breathe
is made by phytoplankton, with the rest coming from land plants.) Species extinction is also imperiling coral reefs - a major problem
since these reefs have far more than recreational value: They provide tremendous amounts of food for human populations and buffer
coastlines against erosion. In fact, the global value of "hidden" services provided by ecosystems - those services, like waste disposal,
that aren't bought and sold in the marketplace - has been estimated to be as much as $50 trillion per year, roughly equal to the gross
domestic product of all countries combined. And that doesn't include tangible goods like fish and timber. Life as we know it
would be impossible if ecosystems collapsed. Yet that is where we're heading if species extinction continues at its
current pace. Extinction also has a huge impact on medicine. Who really cares if, say, a worm in the remote swamps of French
Guiana goes extinct? Well, those who suffer from cardiovascular disease. The recent discovery of a rare South American leech has led
to the isolation of a powerful enzyme that, unlike other anticoagulants, not only prevents blood from clotting but also dissolves
existing clots. And it's not just this one species of worm: Its wriggly relatives have evolved other biomedically valuable proteins,
including antistatin (a potential anticancer agent), decorsin and ornatin (platelet aggregation inhibitors), and hirudin (another
anticoagulant). Plants, too, are pharmaceutical gold mines. The bark of trees, for example, has given us quinine (the first cure for
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malaria), taxol (a drug highly effective against ovarian and breast cancer), and aspirin. More than a quarter of the medicines on our
pharmacy shelves were originally derived from plants. The sap of the Madagascar periwinkle contains more than 70 useful alkaloids,
including vincristine, a powerful anticancer drug that saved the life of one of our friends. Of the roughly 250,000 plant species on
Earth, fewer than 5 percent have been screened for pharmaceutical properties. Who knows what life-saving drugs remain to be
discovered? Given current extinction rates, it's estimated that we're losing one valuable drug every two years. Our arguments so far
have tacitly assumed that species are worth saving only in proportion to their economic value and their effects on our quality of life, an
attitude that is strongly ingrained, especially in Americans. That is why conservationists always base their case on an economic
calculus. But we biologists know in our hearts that there are deeper and equally compelling reasons to worry about the loss of
biodiversity: namely, simple morality and intellectual values that transcend pecuniary interests. What, for example, gives us the right
to destroy other creatures? And what could be more thrilling than looking around us, seeing that we are surrounded by our
evolutionary cousins, and realizing that we all got here by the same simple process of natural selection? To biologists, and potentially
everyone else, apprehending the genetic kinship and common origin of all species is a spiritual experience - not necessarily religious,
but spiritual nonetheless, for it stirs the soul. But, whether or not one is moved by such concerns, it is certain that our future is bleak
if we do nothing to stem this sixth extinction. We are creating a world in which exotic diseases flourish but natural medicinal cures are
lost; a world in which carbon waste accumulates while food sources dwindle; a world of sweltering heat, failing crops, and impure
water. In the end, we
must accept the possibility that we ourselves are not immune to extinction. Or,
if we survive, perhaps only a few of us will remain, scratching out a grubby existence on a
devastated planet. Global warming will seem like a secondary problem when humanity finally
faces the consequences of what we have done to nature: not just another Great Dying, but
perhaps the greatest dying of them all.
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--BioD Good – Disease

Biodiversity is key to stop catastrophic pandemics—malaria and lyme disease prove


Huang 9, “Rise of the Bugs”, Newsweek, http://www.newsweek.com/id/202865/page/1
The most important question not raised during the swine-flu panic could have been asked by a 6-year-old: where do viruses come
from? The answer, it turns out, is simple, and scary: viruses come from a giant wellspring of diseases—also known as the
environment—that grown-ups should be very careful not to disturb. Pathogens—viruses,
bacteria and a wide
variety of other parasites—appear in nature as unpredictable, minimalist terrors equipped with
little genetic material of their own but the ability to make things up as they go. A bird-flu virus
can rest coolly in pigs, then flare up in humans, scrambling genes from all three species in ways
impossible to fully anticipate with vaccines. The SARS virus bided its time among palm civets (a kind of mongoose)
and horseshoe bats before killing humans in 2002. And possibly the most diminutive of all, the retrovirus HIV emerged from the blood
of wild monkeys to become the most efficient destroyer of the human immune system. With strong enough poison and infinitely
transmutable genes,a single pathogen could lay deadly siege to the rest of the living world. The
reason this has yet to happen in our lifetimes is that, brilliant as nature is at devising ways to
kill, it has also come up with countless ways to cope and survive. Put all the living species
together and you have an impressive array of mechanisms to fend off pathogens or contain
them in particular ecosystems that have defenses built in. This arrangement, however, is now under serious
threat: humans, moving ever deeper into the wild to level forests, extract minerals and plant crops, are changing the balance of
ecosystems the world over and taking these defenses apart. These warped ecologies become ground zero for new and deadly
infectious diseases, which emerge and spread at an ever-greater rate. This amounts to "Armageddon in slow motion," says Eric
Chivian, head of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School. Chivian, who shared the Nobel Peace
Prize in 1985 for alerting the public to the dangers of nuclear proliferation, now says the danger to human health posed by a degraded
planet is "no less devastating than a nuclear war … the ultimate impact might be just as catastrophic." The evidence is already in.
Malaria, currently the most prevalent cause of death in the world, can be ascribed almost
entirely to human acts of deforestation, which produces stagnant pools of water and allows
more sunlight to reach water surfaces. This intensifies the growth of algae and forms the
perfect nursery for Anopheles mosquitoes, potent vectors for the malaria parasite. Anopheles
barely had a foothold in the ecosystem in its former state, but when conditions changed—as in
the Amazon, East Africa and Southeast Asia—vector mosquitoes quickly displaced other benign
species. The spread of other diseases has followed a similar trajectory. Some snails, for
instance, harbor parasitic worms called schistosomes, which infect the human bladder or
intestines. In the Senegal River basin, populations of vector snails exploded upon construction
of the Diama Dam in 1985, which made the water less saline. The region became a hotbed for
schistosomiasis where it didn't exist before; currently, more than 200 million people are
victims. Among flies, too, malignant species are winning out: as a result of deforestation, sand
flies have surged into human populations in South America and South Asia, infecting millions
each year with leishmaniasis, a protozoan parasite that causes skin ulcers and attacks the liver,
spleen, and bone marrow. With ecological collapse, the rapid proliferation of disease agents is
only half of the gruesome picture; the other is the demise of nonthreatening species. In recent
years, disease ecologists Richard Ostfeld and Felicia Keesing have shown how a diversity of
species in an ecosystem actually works to suppress infectious diseases. Since not all animals are good
reservoirs or vectors for pathogens, the more species there are, the better the chances for a
pathogen to be blocked. Ostfeld and Keesing call this the "dilution effect." In healthy
ecosystems—say, one with a high diversity of snails or mosquitoes where the dilution effect is
strong and infectious disease is better contained—competition from nonvector snails or
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mosquitoes keeps the vector populations in check. So the loss of biodiversity is itself a
threat to public health, and not only in the deforested Amazon; the denatured suburbs of the
United States bear increasing risks, too. Throughout the U.S., the patchy woodlands interspersed
among suburban homes are breeding grounds for Lyme disease, a flulike illness that can
produce neurological disorders and become impossible to cure. The ideal incubator for the
Lyme bacterium is the white-footed mouse, a remarkable survivor in fragmented habitats.
Infected mice don't get sick, but they allow the pathogen to multiply and pass it on to ticks who
feed on all the local mammals, including humans. Other kinds of forest life—opossums,
thrushes, flying squirrels—don't transmit the disease as well to ticks (they're "incompetent
hosts"), but fewer and fewer of them remain in the forests. The rising incidence of Lyme disease—27,000 cases
in the U.S. in 2007—is a direct result of disappearing forests and the decline of species. "The more nonmouse hosts you have in an
ecosystem," Ostfeld says, "the more of the ticks' blood meals will be taken off a host that will not infect them. That will make more of
the ticks harmless." Instead, ticks are finding their way to more disease-bearing mice because the mice are increasingly rid of both
their competitors and their predators—foxes, weasels, owls. A one- or two-acre scrap of forest poses five times more risk for Lyme
disease than a habitat of even five or six acres, with just a few more diverse species. A similar lack of ecological complexity is
responsible for the respiratory disease caused by hantavirus—which has a staggering mortality rate of one in three cases—and the
neurological disease caused by West Nile virus. These are not risks limited to bushwhackers and remote rice farmers. West Nile virus
landed in New York City in 1999 and, by 2004, reached the West Coast, having found ready reservoir hosts in several common bird
species and effective mosquito carriers. "We had vectors, in a sense, sitting in wait," says Ostfeld. "All we needed was the virus to jump
the pond." The risk of infection rises as the number of bird species falls: living in a town with more than just the common run of
birds—American robins, house sparrows, blue jays and common grackles—makes you 10 times less likely to be infected. But there's a
reason that most populated areas don't have much more than the common run, Ostfeld explains. "Those happen to be the bird species
that do really well in human-disturbed landscapes."

Uncontained disease leads to extinction


Toolis, 9, the director of a major television series on the history of plagues, 09 (Kevin, The Express,
April 28, 2009 U.K. 1st Edition “Pandemic Pandemonium” lexis)

It destroyed the Roman Empire, wiped out most of the New World and killed millions in
Europe. How disease - not just Mexico's swine fever - has shaped the planet SCIENTISTS call it the
Big Die Off, when a terrifying new virus rips through a species and kills up to a third of the entire population.
And we all now could be facing a new apocalypse, though no one yet knows how potent the new strain of Mexican
swine fever will be, or how many millions could die. Yet if history teaches us anything it tells us that the greatest
danger the human race faces is not some crackpot North Korean dictator but a six-gene virus
that could wipe out one third of the global population. Our real enemy, a new plague virus, is so
small you can barely see it even with an advanced electron microscope. It has no morality, no
thought or no plan. All it wants to do is reproduce itself inside another human body. We are
just another biological opportunity, a nice warm place to feed and replicate. Viruses are as old as life itself.
What is startling though is how vulnerable our globalised societies are to the threat of a new deadly plague. Before World Health
Organisation scientists could identify this new H1N1 virus it had travelled halfway across the world
via international flights.
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--BioD Good – Econ

We’re on the brink now-Biodiversity loss leads to a growing drain on the economy and
poorest people in the world losing their livelihood
Dugan 8, “Loss of biodiversity threatens livelihoods of world's poorest”, The Independent,
http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/nature/loss-of-biodiversity-threatens-livelihoods-of-worlds-poorest-836754.html

Mass extinctions of plants and animals could have a severe impact on the living
standards of the poorest people on the planet and cost up to £40bn a year, the first
major report into the economic impact of biodiversity loss has found. Scientists say biodiversity
is facing its greatest threat in millions of years, with three species dying out every hour. Now,
the economic cost of such destruction has been assessed. The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity
(Teeb) review analyses the financial impact of the loss of natural life. It is hoped that, like the Stern Review of Climate Change, which
revolutionised the way countries looked at the economics of global warming, this report will galvanise government support for tackling
the problem. Mankindis causing almost £40bn-worth of damage to land ecosystems each year,
which is directly responsible for crises such as rocketing food prices. "Urgent remedial action is essential
because species loss and ecosystem degradation are inextricably linked to human well-being," said the report's author Pavan Sukhdev.
The Earth could lose 11 per cent of its natural areas by 2050 if we fail to combat loss of species
diversity. Agriculture, the expansion of infrastructure and climate change would all contribute
to this decline. "The loss of biodiversity and ecosystems is a threat to the functioning
of our planet, our economy and society," the study, funded by the EU and the German
government, warns. Environmentalists welcomed the report's "Stern-like" recognition of biodiversity. The subject has failed
to draw the same funding and interest as climate change despite links between the issues. "Biodiversity is not just a green
issue – it is life support, providing food, fuel, fibre, medicines, pollination, soil fertility and
water, said Gordon Shepherd, WWF International's director of international policy. "We have
to integrate biodiversity in all policies. The loss of biodiversity is now affecting the economy
through the depletion of fish stocks from overfishing and illegal fishing to agricultural activities
polluting river basins. The Teeb report recognises the economic value of biodiversity for the
millions of people directly dependent on natural resources for their livelihoods." Overfishing is
one of the key areas explored in the study, which says all of the world's fisheries are likely to
have collapsed within 50 years if current trends are not reversed. For the billion people who
rely on fish protein, this would have a devastating impact. Deforestation, by those seeking a
profit from the woodlands, also causes a decline in species by destroying their habitats. It
makes the ground less productive for cultivation and fewer trees results in less CO2 being
absorbed, thus aiding global warming. This week, 60 countries meeting in Bonn pledged to halt
net deforestation by 2020.

Nuclear war.
Friedberg and Schoenfeld, 8
[Aaron, Prof. Politics. And IR @ Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School and Visiting Scholar @ Witherspoon
Institute, and Gabriel, Senior Editor of Commentary and Wall Street Journal, “The Dangers of a Diminished
America”, 10-28, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122455074012352571.html]

With the global financial system in serious trouble, is America's geostrategic dominance likely
to diminish? If so, what would that mean? One immediate implication of the crisis that began on Wall Street and spread across
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the world is that the primary instruments of U.S. foreign policy will be crimped. The next president will face
an entirely new and adverse fiscal position. Estimates of this year's federal budget deficit already show that it has jumped $237 billion
from last year, to $407 billion. With families and businesses hurting, there will be calls for various and expensive domestic relief
programs. In the face of this onrushing river of red ink, both Barack Obama and John McCain have been reluctant to lay out what
portions of their programmatic wish list they might defer or delete. Only Joe Biden has suggested a possible reduction -- foreign aid.
This would be one of the few popular cuts, but in budgetary terms it is a mere grain of sand. Still, Sen. Biden's comment hints at where
we may be headed: toward a major reduction in America's world role, and perhaps even a new era of financially-
induced isolationism. Pressures to cut defense spending, and to dodge the cost of waging two wars, already
intense before this crisis, are likely to mount. Despite the success of the surge, the war in Iraq remains deeply unpopular.
Precipitous withdrawal -- attractive to a sizable swath of the electorate before the financial implosion -- might well
become even more popular with annual war bills running in the hundreds of billions. Protectionist sentiments are sure to grow
stronger as jobs disappear in the coming slowdown. Even before our current woes, calls to save jobs by restricting imports had begun
to gather support among many Democrats and some Republicans. In a prolonged recession, gale-force winds of
protectionism will blow. Then there are the dolorous consequences of a potential collapse of the world's financial
architecture. For decades now, Americans have enjoyed the advantages of being at the center of that system. The worldwide use of
the dollar, and the stability of our economy, among other things, made it easier for us to run huge budget deficits, as we counted on
foreigners to pick up the tab by buying dollar-denominated assets as a safe haven. Will this be possible in the future? Meanwhile,
traditional foreign-policy challenges are multiplying. The threat from al Qaeda and Islamic
terrorist affiliates has not been extinguished. Iran and North Korea are continuing on their
bellicose paths, while Pakistan and Afghanistan are progressing smartly down the road to
chaos. Russia's new militancy and China's seemingly relentless rise also give cause for concern. If
America now tries to pull back from the world stage, it will leave a dangerous power vacuum.
The stabilizing effects of our presence in Asia, our continuing commitment to Europe, and our
position as defender of last resort for Middle East energy sources and supply lines could all be
placed at risk. In such a scenario there are shades of the 1930s, when global trade and finance ground nearly
to a halt, the peaceful democracies failed to cooperate, and aggressive powers led by the remorseless fanatics
who rose up on the crest of economic disaster exploited their divisions. Today we run the risk
that rogue states may choose to become ever more reckless with their nuclear toys, just at our
moment of maximum vulnerability. The aftershocks of the financial crisis will almost certainly
rock our principal strategic competitors even harder than they will rock us. The dramatic free fall of the
Russian stock market has demonstrated the fragility of a state whose economic performance hinges on high oil prices,
now driven down by the global slowdown. China is perhaps even more fragile, its economic growth depending heavily on
foreign investment and access to foreign markets. Both will now be constricted, inflicting economic pain and perhaps even sparking
unrest in a country where political legitimacy rests on progress in the long march to prosperity. None
of this is good news if
the authoritarian leaders of these countries seek to divert attention from internal travails with
external adventures. As for our democratic friends, the present crisis comes when many European nations are struggling to
deal with decades of anemic growth, sclerotic governance and an impending demographic crisis. Despite its past dynamism, Japan
faces similar challenges. India is still in the early stages of its emergence as a world economic and geopolitical power. What does this
all mean? There is no substitute for America on the world stage. The choice we have before us is between the
potentially disastrous effects of disengagement and the stiff price tag of continued American leadership. Are we up for the task? The
American economy has historically demonstrated remarkable resilience. Our market-oriented ideology, entrepreneurial culture,
flexible institutions and favorable demographic profile should serve us well in whatever trials lie ahead. The American people, too,
have shown reserves of resolve when properly led. But experience after the Cold War era -- poorly articulated and executed policies,
divisive domestic debates and rising anti-Americanism in at least some parts of the world -- appear to have left these reserves
diminished. A recent survey by the Chicago Council on World Affairs found that 36% of respondents agreed that the U.S. should "stay
out of world affairs," the highest number recorded since this question was first asked in 1947. The economic crisis could be
the straw that breaks the camel's back.
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--BioD Good – Famine

Fewer species means crops are more susceptible to being wiped out by a single disease
causing mass starvation—Ireland proves
Bryant 94, “BIODIVERSITY: VARIETIES ARE THE SPICE OF LIFE; As rich and poor countries lock horns over who has the right to exploit the
world's plant resources, we look at the risks of ignoring a vital lesson of nature”, The Guardian, Lexis

Second, there is the danger of relying on fewer species for our food. The world now relies on
only 30 plant species for 95 per cent of its food needs. The huge variation within those few plant species is
important. Different varieties are adapted to dealing with different pests, diseases and growing
conditions, so seeds can be chosen to suit particular conditions. Losing diversity means reducing
a variety's ability to adapt to changing conditions and therefore making it vulnerable to disease.
Once a genetic variation within a variety is lost, it cannot be recaptured - it is lost forever. Take
the potato again. This vegetable originated in the Andes mountains in Latin America, and one
variety of potato was introduced to Spain and then to Britain in the late 1570s. For 250 years all the
potatoes grown in Europe were descendants of these two introductions. In Ireland, the potato became the staple
crop of the poor, and one-third of the population was totally dependent on it for food. When
the potato blight (Phytophtora infestans) struck in 1845, it wiped out Ireland's entire crop; that
particular variety of potato had no resistance to the disease. Between one and two million
people died of starvation partly because of this lack of biodiversity.

Food crisis triggers global war.


Hume, 8 Stephen Hume, 4/16/2008. Senior writer for the Vancouver Sun. “World Food Crisis Threatens Rich Nations (That's Us), Too,”
Vancouver Sun, http://miami.indymedia.org/news/2008/04/10852.php

In Rome, Reuters reported Jacques Diouf, head of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, warning
that with 37 countries already in crisis, each day brings greater risk of global famine . "I'm surprised
that I have not been summoned to the UN Security Council," Diouf said. "Naturally people won't be sitting dying of
starvation, they will react." India's finance minister was more direct. "It is becoming starker by the day," Palaniappan
Chidambaram said. "Unless we act fast for a global consensus on the price spiral, the social unrest
induced by food prices in several countries will conflagrate into a global contagion, leaving no
country -- developed or otherwise -- unscathed."
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--BioD Good – War

Biodiversity is vital to preserve natural resources and prevent poverty, hunger, and war.
Justforests.org 08, www.justforests.org/.../Wol%20PRESS%20RELEASE%20mullingar.doc
Biodiversity includes the living resources we all use for food, fuel, shelter, medicine, crafts and
tools – such as trees, wild animals, crops, livestock, mushrooms and so on. It is fundamental to
human development and the well-being of us all. It is now clearly established that the loss of
biodiversity leads to poverty, hunger, dependency and in some countries, conflict and war.
Biodiversity is all forms of life on our planet –including plants, fungi, insects, fish, reptiles,
amphibians, birds, and mammals –and their habitats.
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1NC – China War

China finds small arms key to its sphere of influence


Taylor and Williams 4 – Senior Lecturer in the Department of Political and Administrative Studies AND Lecturer in Department of
Political Science and International Studies – 2004 (Ian and Paul, Africa in International Politics: External involvement on the Continent, ed. By I.
Tayler and P. Williams, p. 83-102, Questia)

In other parts of Africa, China


plays a leading role in the provision of weaponry, often during times of
conflict. China can thus be held responsible - alongside others - for the death and destruction that
Africa's various wars have visited upon the continent's peoples. This behaviour has been cynical in the
extreme. For instance, while Ethiopia and Eritrea were edging towards war, Chinese corporations transferred a substantial share of
US$1 billion in weapons dispatched to both countries between 1998 and 2000. In 1995 a Chinese ship carrying 152 tonnes of
ammunition and light weapons was refused permission to unload in Tanzania: the cargo was destined for the Tutsi-dominated army of
Burundi, and Tanzania was concerned that ethnic conflict there would be exacerbated by the arms shipment (Agence France-Presse
International News (Paris), 3 May 1 995). This was not an isolated shipment, however. Human Rights Watch released a recent report
that showed that at least thirteen covert shipments of weapons (three of which were in violation of regional or international arms
embargoes) were delivered by China to Dar-es-Salaam, with the final destinations mislabelled and the weapons disguised as
agricultural equipment (Overseas Development Institute 1998). In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Chinese exporters
furnished Laurent Kabila with arms in 1997 and have been supplying Kinshasa with weapons, frequently through Zimbabwean
middlemen.
Sierra Leone's brutal civil war was fuelled by extensive shipments of Chinese arms: China
was Sierra Leone's main arms supplier and stepped up shipments once the civil war began. In short, Chinese
arms deals have
repeatedly broken UN sanctions and have substantially helped damage the continent's
aspirations for peace and development.

Collapse of China’s sphere of influence leads nuclear conflagration


Eland 5 Ivan Eland - Director of the Center on Peace & Liberty at The Independent Institute, Former Director of Defense Policy Studies at
the Cato Institute - 4/11/05 (“Coexisting with a Rising China,” http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=1494)

Although China is an autocratic state, it still has legitimate security interests. The United States
would be smart to show some empathy with those concerns. In recent years, as the United States has become
alarmed at China’s expanded military spending, the Chinese have also become alarmed at large increases in the U.S. defense budget
and U.S. attacks on the sovereign nations of Serbia and Iraq. Many Chinese see the threat of an expanding U.S. empire that aims at
encircling China and preventing its legitimate rise to great power status. To lessen such perceptions and reduce the chance of conflict
between the two nuclear-armed nations, the United States should retract its forward military and alliance posture in Asia, including
repudiating any implied commitment to defend Taiwan. With
large bodies of water as moats and the most
formidable nuclear arsenal in the world, the United States hardly needs a security perimeter
that stretches across the entire Pacific Ocean to protect it from China. If the United States
continues to maintain an outdated Cold War-style empire, it is bound to come into needless
conflict with other powers, especially China. Instead of emulating the policies of pre-World War I Britain toward
Germany, the United States should take a page from another chapter in British history. In the late 1800s, although not without tension,
the British peacefully allowed the fledging United States to rise as a great power, knowing both
countries were protected by the expanse of the Atlantic Ocean that separated them. Taking advantage of that same kind separation by
a major ocean, the
United States could also safely allow China to obtain respect as a great power,
with a sphere of influence to match. If China went beyond obtaining a reasonable sphere of
influence into an Imperial Japanese-style expansion, the United States could very well need to
mount a challenge. However, at present, little evidence exists of Chinese intent for such
expansion, which would run counter to recent Chinese history. Therefore, a U.S. policy of coexistence, rather than
neo-containment, might avoid a future catastrophic war or even a nuclear conflagration.
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--Ext. – Arms Sales Key

African conflicts key to Small arms market


BOUTWELL 2k, (JEFFERY BOURWELL, FROM THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, "A SCOURGE OP SMALL ARMS,")
Most media accounts of the 1994 Rwandan genocide emphasized the use of traditional weapons—clubs, knives, machetes—by
murderous gangs of extremist Hutu. As many as one million Tutsi and moderate Hutu perished, many of them women and children. To
outsiders, it
appeared as if the people of Rwanda had been caught up in a violent frenzy, with
common farm implements as their favored instruments of extermination. But this isn't the
whole story. Before the killing began, the Hutu-dominated government had distributed
automatic rifles and hand grenades to official militias and paramilitary gangs. It was this firepower that made the
genocide possible. Militia members terrorized their victims with guns and grenades as they rounded them up for systematic slaughter
with machetes and knives. The murderous use of farm toots may have seemed a medieval aberration,
but the weapons and paramilitary gangs that facilitated the genocide were all too modern. The
situation there was far from unique. Since the end of the cold war. from the Balkans to East Timor and throughout Africa, the
world has witnessed an outbreak of ethnic, religious and sectarian conflict characterized by
routine massacre of civilians. More than 100 conflicts have erupted since 1990, about twice the number for previous
decades. These wars have killed more than five million • people, devastated entire geographic regions, and left tens of millions of
refugees and orphans. Little
of the destruction was inflicted by the tanks, artillery or aircraft usually
associated modern warfare; rather most was cameo' out with pistols, machine guns and
grenades. However beneficial the end of the cold war has- been In other respects, it has let loose a global
deluge of surplus weapons into a setting in which the risk of local conflict appears to have
grown markedly.
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--Ext. – Africa Key

China will increase arms sales to Africa


Vines 7 (Alex, head of the Africa program at Chatham House, the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London, Current History, May,
“China in Africa: A Mixed Blessing?,” ebsco)

Chinese-made weapons and ammunition are plentiful in Africa, and China does not usually
impose political, human rights, or humanitarian conditions on arms sales, though it has refused to
supply un-sanctioned states such as Ivory Coast. Countries like Sudan and Zimbabwe are reportedly major
recipients of Chinese weapons. China has supplied 12 fighter jets and 100 trucks to the army in Zimbabwe, a country
subject to an arms embargo by the United States and the EU, though Beijing has turned down other Zimbabwean requests. China has
supplied the Khartoum govern- ment with arms since at least 1985, with transfers between 1985 and 1989 totalling $50 million.
China became Sudan’s principal arms sup- plier around 1994 and remains so to this day. It is estimated that as much as 80 percent
of the revenue generated by Sudan’s oil fields has been invested in fighting the recently resolved north- south civil war, the ongoing
conflict in Darfur, and the mounting conflict in the country’s northeast. China has threatened to use its veto on the un Security
Council to protect Khartoum from pro- posed oil sanctions and has been able to dilute every resolution on the killing in Darfur in
order to protect its interests. This is not surprising, since China is against sanctions in principle . Assistant
Foreign Minister Zhai Jun in January was clear: “Using pressure and imposing sanctions is not practical and will not help settle the
issue.” Sudan exported 14 million barrels of crude to China in 2006 and is currently the only country in Africa where oil is produced
by Chinese companies. (All the other imports result from production-sharing agreements with other companies.)
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1NC – Oil

African instability key to increasing oil prices


Thompson 7 (Christopher, reporter for the Black Agenda Report, a journal about African American political thought and action. The
Scramble for Africa’s Oil. June 20, http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=255&Itemid=37)

"Within a decade, the US will be heavily dependent on African oil. Little wonder the Pentagon is preparing a
strategy for the region." This article originally appeared in The New Statesman (UK). The Pentagon is to reorganize its military
command structure in response to growing fears that the United States is seriously ill-equipped to fight the war against terrorism in
Africa. It is a dramatic move, and an admission that the US must reshape its whole military policy if it is to maintain control of Africa for
the duration of what Donald Rumsfeld has called "the long war." Suddenly
the world's most neglected continent is
assuming an increasing global importance as the international oil industry begins to exploit
more and more of the west coast of Africa's abundant reserves. The Pentagon at present has five geographic
Unified Combatant Commands around the world, and responsibility for Africa is awkwardly divided among three of these. Most of
Africa - a batch of 43 countries - falls under the European Command (Eucom), with the remainder divided between the Pacific
Command and Central Command (which also runs the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). Now the Pentagon - under the Joint Chiefs of Staff
and the defense department - is working on formal proposals for a unified military command for the continent under the name
"Africom." This significant shift in US relations with Africa comes in the face of myriad threats: fierce economic competition from Asia;
increasing resource nationalism in Russia and South America; and instability in the Middle East that threatens to spill over into Africa.
"The US must reshape its whole military policy if it is to maintain control of Africa ." The Pentagon
hopes to finalize Africom's structure, location and budget this year. The expectation is that it can break free from Eucom and become
operative by mid-2008. "The break from Europe will occur before 30 September 2008," Professor Peter Pham, a US adviser on Africa
to the Pentagon told the New Statesman. "The independent command should be up and running by this time next year." A Pentagon
source says the new command, which was originally given the green light by the controversial former US defense secretary Donald
Rumsfeld, is likely to be led by William "Kip" Ward, the US army's only four-star African-American general. In 2005, Ward was
appointed the US security envoy to the Middle East and he is reportedly close to President George W. Bush. He also has boots-on-the-
ground experience in Africa: he was a commander during Bill Clinton's ill-fated mission in Somalia in 1993 and he served as a military
America's new Africa strategy reflects its
representative in Egypt in 1998. Ward is now the deputy head of Eucom.
key priorities in the Middle East: oil and counter-terrorism. Currently, the US has in place the loosely defined
Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Initiative, incorporating an offshoot of Operation Enduring Freedom that is intended to keep terrorist
networks out of the vast, unguarded Sahel. But the lack of a coherent and unified policy on Africa is, according to some observers,
hampering America's efforts in the Middle East. US military sources estimate that up to a quarter of all foreign fighters in Iraq are from
Africa, mostly from Algeria and Morocco. Moreover, there is increasing alarm within the US defense establishment at the creeping
"radicalization" of Africa's Muslims, helped along by the export of hardline, Wahhabi-style clerics from the Arabian peninsula. "The
terrorist challenge [has] increased in Africa in the past year - it's gotten a new lease on life," according to Pham. But it is the west's
increasing dependency on African oil that gives particular urgency to these new directions in the fight against terrorism. Africa's
enormous, and largely untapped, reserves are already more important to the west than most Americans recognize. In March 2006,
speaking before the Senate armed services committee, General James Jones, the then head of Eucom, said: "Africa
currently
provides over 15 per cent of US oil imports, and recent explorations in the Gulf of Guinea region
indicate potential reserves that could account for 25-35 per cent of US imports within the next
decade." "Africa's enormous, and largely untapped, reserves are already more important to the
west than most Americans recognize." These high-quality reserves - West African oil is typically low in sulphur
and thus ideal for refining - are easily accessible by sea to western Europe and the US. In 2005, the
US imported more oil from the Gulf of Guinea than it did from Saudi Arabia and Kuwait
combined. Within the next ten years it will import more oil from Africa than from the entire
Middle East. Western oil giants such as ExxonMobil, Chevron, France's Total and Britain's BP and Shell plan to invest
tens of billions of dollars in sub-Saharan Africa (far in excess of "aid" inflows to the region). But though the Gulf of
Guinea is one of the few parts of the world where oil production is poised to increase exponentially in the near
future, it is also one of the most unstable.
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High energy prices leads to development of renewable energy


Braml 7 Josef Braml is editor-in-chief of the Yearbook on International Relations at the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP) in
Berlin. The Washington Quarterly • 30:4 pp. 117–130. 2007 Can the United States Shed Its Oil Addiction?

Higher energy prices will provide strong


In the long run, however, U.S. markets may adapt to these challenges.
market incentives to find alternative sources of energy, to develop new technologies, and to
improve energy efficiency. For these effects, there is an additional driving force: increasing
public concern about environmental damage caused by traditional forms of energy
consumption.

Shift to renewables or extinction


Reynolds 3 James Reynolds June 18 2003 “EARTH 'IS HEADING FOR MASS EXTINCTION IN JUST A CENTURY”, The Scotsman
THE worst mass extinction in the history of the planet could be replicated in as little as a
century if global warming continues, according to new evidence. Researchers at Bristol University have discovered that a
six-degree increase in the global temperature was enough to annihilate up to 95 per cent of species which were alive on Earth at the
end of the Permian period, 251 million years ago. Up to six degrees of warming is now predicted for the next century by United
Nations scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) if nothing is done about emissions of the greenhouse
gases, principally carbon dioxide, which cause global warming. The
end-Permian mass extinction is now thought
to have been caused by gigantic volcanic eruptions, which triggered a "runaway greenhouse
effect" and nearly put an end to life on Earth. Conditions in what geologists have termed this
"post-apocalyptic greenhouse" were so severe that only one large land animal was left alive,
and it took 100 million years for species diversity to return to former levels. The new finding is revealed
in a book by Professor Michael Benton, the head of Earth sciences at Bristol University. Prof Benton said: "The end-Permian crisis
nearly marked the end of life. It's estimated that fewer than one in ten species survived. "Geologists are only now coming to
appreciate the severity of this global catastrophe and to understand how and why so many species died out so quickly." Tropical
latitudes were the first areas of the Earth to feel the effect of the warming, and loss of species diversity spread out from there.
Reduction of vegetation, soil erosion and the effects of massively increased rainfall wiped out the lush diverse habitats of the tropics,
which would today lead to the loss of animals such as hippos, elephants and all of the primates, according to Prof Benton. He added:
"Theend-Permian extinction event is a good model for what might happen in the future
because it was fairly non-specific. "The sequence of what happened then is different from today
because then the carbon dioxide came from massive volcanic eruptions, whereas today it is
coming from industrial activity. However, it doesn't matter where this gas comes from; the fact is that if it is pumped into
the atmosphere in high volumes, then that gives us the greenhouse effect and leads to the warming with all the other consequences."
Modern predictions of the apocalyptic consequences of global warming and climate change due to increases in carbon dioxide first
began to circulate in the early 1980s. Carbon dioxide is, like oxygen, translucent to sunlight but opaque to infra -red radiation. After
the sun's rays have warmed the Earth and sea, the heat produced can therefore not be re-radiated back into space. When the
industrial revolution began about 200 years ago, there were roughly 280 parts per million (ppm) of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Today, there are 350ppm. More carbon dioxide is being pumped into the atmosphere as the human population grows and turns to
heavy industry, and less is being removed by the rest of nature because, possibly due to human activity, global vegetation which
removes the damaging gas is in retreat. In the mid-1980s, scientists first started to predict that temperatures would increase
somewhere in the order of between four and six degrees by 2080. Sea levels were also predicted to rise 20cm by 2030, and 45cm by
2070. In the light of modern records, these estimates were a little overstated. Dr Ian Brown, a senior researcher with the Tyndall
Climate Research Centre at the University of East Anglia, said: "More or less every year now we have a temperature which is higher
than the previous year and the Met Office has predicted this year that there is a 50 per cent chance it will be the warmest on record.
"Each year is now pretty much an exceptional one by previous standards. "Sea-level rise is more complicated because we have a
shorter record. At the moment, in global terms, it is probably in the order of about one and a half millimetres per year. "By the end of
the century, the rise in sea level could then be a lot more than five or even ten centimetres. "Certainly in the past two decades we
have now recorded rises in sea levels in the region of one or two millimetres a year which are measured by tide gauges at various sites.
"These instruments are quite precise and show that predictions of the consequences of global warming are certainly observable." He
added: "Much land has in the past been reclaimed from the sea, such as in the Forth estuary, and those areas are now looking
increasingly vulnerable." Climate experts and environmentalists said yesterday they were appalled that
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a disaster of such magnitude could be repeated within this century because of human activities.
Mark Lynas, an author who has written extensively on global warming and recently travelled around the world cataloguing impacts of
climate change, said the findings must be a wake-up call for politicians and citizens alike. "This
is a global emergency," he
said. "We
are heading for disaster and yet the world is still on fossil fuel autopilot. There needs to
be an immediate phase-out of coal, oil and gas, and a phase-in of clean energy sources. "People
can no longer ignore this looming catastrophe."
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--Ext. – War Key Oil

1. Our Thompson 07 ev says the US has become reliant on African oil. In years, it will
account for 35% of supply, usurping the Middle East – but SSA instability threatens the
global market.

2. African instability makes it an unreliable source for oil


Widdershoven 4 (Cyril, editor of Global Energy Security Analysis and Institute for the Analysis of Global Security (IAGS) associate
fellow. West African Oil: Hope or Hype? http://www.iags.org/africa.html.)

Despite the optimism, the possible impact of the West African oil and gas reserves should however not be overestimated. The West
African oil province (the so-called Ecowas region or Gulf of Guinea) holds 33.8 bln barrels of proven oil reserves, 3.1% of the global
total. Taking into account unproven reserves increases West Africa's share to around 7% of the world's total. In comparison to known
oil reserves in the Middle East - 690 bln barrels - West Africa is at present nothing more than a
minor player. Much of
West Africa's oil reserves are offshore and thus more expensive to extract. While analysts look to the
potential of West African oil to stabilize the international oil markets by adding a new layer of supply under the current volatile oil
sector, giving traders and consumers more leeway to cope with crisis such as strikes in Venezuela or an Iraq war, current optimism is
based on prerequisites of stability in the region, increased foreign investment, transparency and liberalization in the domestic
Revolutions, violence, ethnic unrest and
petroleum sectors of West Africa and geo-strategic considerations.
corruption undermine the growth potential of the petroleum sector in this vast region. Domestic
political strife brought several African countries to a standstill this past year. In March, international oil majors
ChevronTexaco and Shell were forced to suspend production in the Niger Delta region following violent clashes
and even outright kidnapping of international personnel. The 266,000 barrels per day (bpd) of lost oil
represented approximately 13% of Nigeria's total average production of 2.1 million bpd. International oil markets felt the pressure.
The ever-growing illicit small-arms trade has added fuel to the fire. Warlords have wreaked
havoc in huge countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Angola, parts of Nigeria and Liberia. Over the last
months, international security services from the U.S, the EU and Asia, have turned their attention to al-Qaeda operatives in West
African countries, such as Mauritania, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Burkina Faso. Illegal finance schemes involving diamonds, arms and
terrorist networks have also surfaced. Bi- or even multilateral border disputes over control of potentially
oil rich territories pose a threat to on- and offshore developments. Congo and Angola are in
conflict over access to offshore oil; according to Congo the dispute is depriving it of as much as 200,000 bpd.
Nigeria has multiple disputes with other states, of which the disputed Bakassi peninsula is the most pressing one. Since West African
oil producing states are almost solely dependent on oil income, volatile international oil prices have profound impact on local
economies, leading, as in the case of Nigeria, to potentially
paralyzing national strikes. Oil related corruption
is rampant in the region. According to Transparency International, Nigeria is the world's second most corrupt
country, and corruption is growing in Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Ghana, and various other West
African countries, including oil newcomers such as Sao Tome, whose government was just toppled by a military coup. In an effort
to combat this problem, a push for transparency and liberalization has increased pressure on international oil operators, such as Shell
or BP, to open their books. The "Publish What You Pay" campaign, sponsored by George Soros' Open Society Institute and Global
Witness, and supported by over 130 NGOs, has called on international extraction companies to "publish net taxes, fees, royalties, and
other payments made so civil society can more accurately assess the amount of money misappropriated and lobby for full
transparency in local government spending." Underlining the effort, British Prime Minister Blair announced the Extractive Industries
Transparency Initiative, endorsed by a coalition of institutional investors, during the World Summit on Sustainable Development in
Johannesburg this past September. Nigeria, by far the largest West African producer, provides a concrete
example of the risks of relying on the region. Nigeria was the fifth largest crude exporter to the US in 2002, behind
Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Canada and Venezuela. According to the DOE's Energy Information Administration (EIA,) Nigeria's exports to
the U.S. declined from 842,000 bpd in 2001 (9.03% of total U.S. imports) to around 567,000 bpd in 2002 (6.27% of
U.S. imported crude oil.) Increased reliance on Nigeria means increased exposure to unrest, disputes and
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instability in this volatile country. Since Nigeria is a member of OPEC its crude oil exports are also limited by the oil
cartel's policy restrictions, which already constrain further expansion of production.

3. Specifically, Nigerian instability threatens US and China’s oil hopes.


Wolfe 6 (Adam, senior analyst and editor for Africa and Asia at PINR, Power and Interests News Reports. The Increasing Importance of
African Oil. March 20. http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=460)

In Nigeria, political corruption, criminal networks, violent Islamist groups, and domestic rebels
threaten to take the world's eighth-largest oil exporter off the market. It is estimated that 70,000 to
300,000 barrels of oil are stolen daily in Nigeria. Even at the low end of this estimate, this would generate more
than $1.5 billion every year -- more than enough capital to buy arms and political influence and
threaten the government's survival. Another 500,000 bpd have been taken off the market by the recent kidnappings
and violence perpetuated by the Movement for the Emancipation of the People of the Niger Delta. [See: "Intelligence Brief: Iran,
Nigeria"] In the midst of this instability, the world's largest and second-largest oil importers are playing an increasingly dangerous
game of power politics. For both Washington
and Beijing, the nightmare of rebel groups halting oil
extraction in the delta -- which will dry up revenues on which the northern elites depend, potentially leading to
a northern Muslim general ousting the president -- appears distinctly possible.
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--Ext. – Prices Key Alt Energy

High oil prices cause a transition to alternative energy


Rivlin, 11 (Paul Rivlin has a PhD from the University of London and is a Senior Research Fellow at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle
Eastern and African studies, specializing in the Middle East economy and its historical development, “High Oil Prices and the Middle East
Strategic Balance,” on March 16,2011 from http://www.dayan.org/pdfim/TA_Notes_RIVLIN_Oil_MAR16_11.pdf)

Does it make sense for


the US and other Western countries to reduce oil consumption? High oil prices
will do this automatically if they are maintained, because they will encourage the use of
alternative fuels and technologies that use less fuel. Stimulating this by government action would
reduce exposure to oil price rises/shortages and would encourage the development of new
technologies. These could help to stimulate economic growth and be exported to China and other fast growing, oil
importing countries. They would also have beneficial environmental effects. It is too late to avoid the effects of the current predictable
and predicted crisis; any measures undertaken now would only affect the demand for oil in the medium term.

The price of oil is what investors look to when making investment decisions – high oil
prices cause alternative energy investment
Huang et. al 11 (Alex YiHou, Department of Finance, Yuan Ze University, Taiwan, Chiao-Ming Cheng Graduate School of Management, Yuan Ze University,
Taiwan, Chih-Chun Chen Graduate School of Management, Yuan Ze University, Taiwan, Wen-Cheng Hu Graduate School of Management, Yuan Ze University, Taiwan “Oil
Prices and Stock Prices of Alternative Energy Companies: Time Varying Relationship with Recent Evidence” http://www.southwesternfinance.org/conf-
2011/swfa2011_submission_30.pdf kdej)

In sum, whileprice uncertainty of crude oil rises and green energy gains greater deal of attention
in recent years, the interrelationships between oil prices and stock performances of alternative
energy companies become more significant. For Periods I and II, time before the Lebanon War from 2001 to
late 2006, no causality is shown from oil prices to ECO index or vice verse, implying that the movements of crude oil prices
do not affect how the investors trade with the stocks of alternative energy industry. In the most recent period, when
oil
prices reach historical high and crash back with volatile dynamics, oil price behavior becomes
responsible for stock performances of alternative energy companies. Also only recently, the
dynamics in oil trading also depend on how stocks of oil companies perform. These results add to
literature showing that investors of alternative energy companies conduct their trading decisions
upon observation of crude oil price shocks. The two markets, i.e. crude oil market and stock market
for green energy sector, seem to be more closely interactive with each other. The full picture of how the
crude oil markets react to the development of green energy, however, requires additional examinations and is certainly an
area worthy of future exploration.
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--Warming O/W
Warming causes all scenarios for war and makes them more destructive
Schwarts, 3 Peter Schwartz, chair of the Global Business Network, and Doug Randall, co-head of the Global Business Network’s
consulting practice, October ‘3 (An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and Its Implications for United States National Security, p. Google)

Today, carrying capacity, which is the ability for the Earth and its natural ecosystems including social, economic, and cultural
systems to support the finite number of people on the planet, is being challenged around the world. According to the
International Energy Agency, global demand for oil will grow by 66% in the next 30 years, but it’s unclear where the supply will come
from. Clean water is similarly constrained in many areas around the world. With 815 million people receiving insufficient sustenance
worldwide, some would say that as a globe, we’re living well above our carrying capacity, meaning there are not sufficient natural
resources to sustain our behavior. Many point to technological innovation and adaptive behavior as a means for managing the global
ecosystem. Indeed it has been technological progress that has increased carrying capacity over time. Over centuries we have learned
how to produce more food, energy and access more water. But will the potential of new technologies be sufficient when a crisis like
the one outlined in this scenario hits? Abrupt
climate change is likely to stretch carrying capacity well
beyond its already precarious limits. And there’s a natural tendency or need for carrying capacity to become realigned.
As abrupt climate change lowers the world’s carrying capacity aggressive wars are likely to be
fought over food, water, and energy. Deaths from war as well as starvation and disease will decrease population size,
which overtime, will re-balance with carrying capacity. When you look at carrying capacity on a regional or state level it is apparent
that those nations with a high carrying capacity, such as the United States and Western Europe, are likely to adapt most effectively to
abrupt changes in climate, because, relative to their population size, they have more resources to call on. This may give rise to a more
severe have, have-not mentality, causing resentment toward those nations with a higher carrying capacity. It may lead to finger-
pointing and blame, as the wealthier nations tend to use more energy and emit more greenhouse gasses such as CO2 into the
atmosphere. Less important than the scientifically proven relationship between CO2 emissions and climate change is the perception
that impacted nations have – and the actions they take. The Link Between Carrying Capacity and Warfare Steven LeBlanc,
Harvard archaeologist and author of a new book called Carrying Capacity, describes the relationship between carrying
capacity and warfare. Drawing on abundant archaeological and ethnological data, LeBlanc argues that historically humans
conducted organized warfare for a variety of reasons, including warfare over resources and the environment. Humans fight
when they outstrip the carrying capacity of their natural environment. Every time there is a choice
between starving and raiding, humans raid. From hunter/gatherers through agricultural tribes, chiefdoms, and early complex societies,
25% of a population’s adult males die when war breaks out. Peace occurs when carrying capacity goes up, as with
the invention of agriculture, newly effective bureaucracy, remote trade and technological breakthroughs. Also a large scale die-back
such as from plague can make for peaceful times---Europe after its major plagues, North American natives after European diseases
decimated their populations (that's the difference between the Jamestown colony failure and Plymouth Rock success). But such
peaceful periods are short-lived because population quickly rises to once again push against carrying capacity, and warfare resumes.
Indeed, over the millennia most societies define themselves according to their ability to conduct war, and warrior culture becomes
deeply ingrained. The most combative societies are the ones that survive. However in the last three centuries, LeBlanc points out,
advanced states have steadily lowered the body count even though individual wars and genocides
have grown larger in scale. Instead of slaughtering all their enemies in the traditional way, for example, states merely kill enough to
get a victory and then put the survivors to work in their newly expanded economy. States also use their own bureaucracies,
advanced technology, and international rules of behavior to raise carrying capacity and bear a more
careful relationship to it. All of that progressive behavior could collapse if carrying capacities
everywhere were suddenly lowered drastically by abrupt climate change. Humanity would
revert to its norm of constant battles for diminishing resources, which the battles themselves would further
reduce even beyond the climatic effects. Once again warfare would define human life.

Warming is comparatively more destructive


The New York End Times ‘6 (http://newyorkendtimes.com/extinctionscale.asp)
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We rate Global Climate Change as a greater threat for human extinction in this century. Most
scientists forecast disruptions and dislocations, if current trends persist. The extinction danger is more likely if we
alter an environmental process that causes harmful effects and leads to conditions that make
the planet uninhabitable to humans. Considering that there is so much that is unknown about
global systems, we consider climate change to be the greatest danger to human extinction.
However, there is no evidence of imminent danger. Nuclear war at some point in this century might happen.
It is unlikely to cause human extinction though. While several countries have nuclear weapons,
there are few with the firepower to annihilate the world. For those nations it would be suicidal to exercise that
option. The pattern is that the more destructive technology a nation has, the more it tends
towards rational behavior. Sophisticated precision weapons then become better tactical
options. The bigger danger comes from nuclear weapons in the hands of terrorists with the help
of a rogue state, such as North Korea. The size of such an explosion would not be sufficient to
threaten humanity as a whole. Instead it could trigger a major war or even world war. Under this
scenario human extinction would only be possible if other threats were present, such as disease and
climate change. We monitor war separately. However we also need to incorporate the dangers here .

Even if we don’t win a 100% risk of warming vote to stop warming - need to avoid large
impacts.
Goodman, 7 Sheri Goodman [et al.], Executive Director of the Military Advisory Board, The CNA Corporation, ‘7 (National security and
the threat of climate change, The CNA Corporation Military Advisory Board, Google)

Adm. Bowman notes that today, a raging debate is underway over a potential set of climate-induced global
changes that could have a profound impact on America’s national security interests. Our Military Advisory Board has heard the
arguments, some depicting neardoomsday scenarios of severe weather and oceanic changes exacerbated by man-made emissions of
greenhouse gases to our environment, others depicting a much less severe outcome as merely one in many observed cyclic weather
patterns over time, with virtually no man-made component. Adm. Bowman concludes that regardless of the probability of
the occurrence, the projected weather-driven global events could be dire and could adversely
affect our national security and military options significantly. He therefore argues that the prudent course is to
begin planning, as we have in submarine operations, to develop a similar defense in depth that would reduce national security
risks even if this is a low probability event, given the potential magnitude of the consequences. He
feels that as the debate over cause, effect, and magnitude continues, we in the military should begin now to take action to provide a
resilient defense against the effects of severe climate change, not only within our own borders, but also to provide resiliency to those
regions of unrest and stress that already are threatening our national security today.
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--Oil Good – Heg

Oil drop collapses the Mexican economy


Agren 11 (6/01/11, David Agren, covers politics and national affairs for The News, Mexico City's English-language daily, The Globe and
Mail, “Oil: The Mexican Cartel’s other deadly business”, http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/americas/oil-the-mexican-cartels-
other-deadly-business/article1845378/page1/)

The Mexican government depends on oil revenue for approximately 40 per cent of its budget.
Politicians have preferred to depend heavily on Pemex revenue instead of raising other taxes, leaving the
company indebted and lacking adequate funds in past years for exploration and maintenance. Non-oil tax revenue
amounts to approximately 10 per cent of GDP, one of the lowest rates in Latin America.

That kills heg


Westhawk ‘8 private investor. Formerly, the global research director and portfolio manager for a large, private, U.S.-based investment
firm. Former U.S. Marine Corps officer: infantry company commander, artillery battalion staff officer December 21, 2008, "Now that would
change everything," http://westhawk.blogspot.com/2008/12/now-that-would-change-everything.html)

Yes, the “rapid collapse” of Mexico would change everything with respect to the global security
environment. Such a collapse would have enormous humanitarian, constitutional, economic,
cultural, and security implications for the U.S. It would seem the U.S. federal government,
indeed American society at large, would have little ability to focus serious attention on much
else in the world. The hypothetical collapse of Pakistan is a scenario that has already been well discussed. In the worst
case, the U.S. would be able to isolate itself from most effects emanating from south Asia. However, there would be no
running from a Mexican collapse.

That causes great power conflict


Khalilzad, 11
(Zalmay, The Economy and National Security, Feb 8, http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/259024/economy-and-national-security-zalmay-khalilzad?page=1)

The stakes are high. In modern history, the longest period of peace among the great powers has been the era of U.S. In modern
history, the longest period of peace among the great powers has been the era of U.S.
leadership. By contrast, multi-polar systems have been unstable, with their competitive dynamics
resulting in frequent crises and major wars among the great powers. Failures of multi-polar
international systems produced both world wars. American retrenchment could have devastating consequences.
Without an American security blanket, regional powers could rearm in an attempt to balance
against emerging threats. Under this scenario, there would be a heightened possibility of arms races,
miscalculation, or other crises spiraling into all-out conflict. Alternatively, in seeking to accommodate the
stronger powers, weaker powers may shift their geopolitical posture away from the United States. Either way, hostile states
would be emboldened to make aggressive moves in their regions. As rival powers rise, Asia in
particular is likely to emerge as a zone of great-power competition. Beijing’s economic rise has
enabled a dramatic military buildup focused on acquisitions of naval, cruise, and ballistic missiles, long-range stealth
aircraft, and anti-satellite capabilities. China’s strategic modernization is aimed, ultimately, at denying the
United States access to the seas around China. Even as cooperative economic ties in the region have grown,
China’s expansive territorial claims — and provocative statements and actions following crises in Korea and incidents at
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sea — haveroiled its relations with South Korea, Japan, India, and Southeast Asian states. Still, the
United States is the most significant barrier facing Chinese hegemony and aggression.
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--Oil Good – Iran

High oil prices now key to Iran economy


Mohamedi 11 (Fareed Mohamedi, PBS frontline, March 7 2011, “Rising Oil Prices Create Political Cushion for Iran”
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tehranbureau/2011/03/rising-oil-prices-create-political-cushion-for-iran.html#ixzz1QV14e2E4

What impact do higher oil revenues have on Iran economically? Higher oil prices will result in increased
revenues and a bigger national budget, allowing Iran to increase its foreign exchange reserves .
Oil money accounts for about 27 percent of Iran's total revenues, while crude oil accounts for 83 percent
of the total value of exports. What impact do higher oil revenues have on Iran politically? Higher oil revenues may
help the regime increase its welfare services and thereby improve its political position in the
country. The government has recently implemented a subsidy reform program that compensates price hikes with cash
subsidies to the bulk of the population. More oil revenues can help ensure the flow of cash handouts, at
least in the early stages of implementation. But the government will need to avoid a spending spree, which
can lead to inflation. Iran has the world's third largest oil reserves and the second largest gas
reserves. It is also the fifth largest global producer of oil, after Saudi Arabia. What role is Iran playing or
likely to play as oil increasingly becomes a factor in the regional crises? The regional situation and the threat for
greater oil supply disruption and oil prices may reduce the enthusiasm with which Europe and the
United States push for an oil embargo on Iran. Iran's main gas field -- and the world's largest -- is
the offshore South Pars field in the Persian Gulf, a shared field with Qatar. But parts of the field are still under construction.
Are the events in the Gulf a source of concern for Iran when it comes to the development of South Pars? Political events in
the Gulf are unlikely to affect development of the South Pars gas field. The pace of that development depends on Iran's
funding ability and its relations with foreign companies. Iran's main problem is the declining interest by foreign companies
to invest in the South Pars project. China's CNPC remains the sole non-Iranian company known to be working on the field.
CNPC replaced France's Total, which left in 2009.

Drop in oil prices causes Iranian adventurism


Peters 8 – retired United States Army Lieutenant Colonel and degree in international relations from St. Mary’s University (Ralph, “Bankrupt
Rogues: Beware Failing Foes”, NY Post, 10/29/08, http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/item_Sq6rxuaQjf2dV655mfdh9M)

Of all the pleasures to be found in the pain of others, though, none seems more justified than smugness over the panic in Moscow,
Caracas and Tehran as oil prices plummet. We may need to be careful what we wish for. Successful states
may generate trouble, but failures produce catastrophes: Nazi Germany erupted from the bankrupt Weimar Republic;
Soviet Communism's economic disasters swelled the Gulag; a feckless state with unpaid armies enabled Mao's rise. Economic
competition killed a million Tutsis in Rwanda. The deadliest conflict of our time, the multi-sided civil war in Congo, exploded into the
power vacuum left by a bankrupt government. A resource-starved Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. The crucial point: The more a
state has to lose, the less likely it is to risk losing it. "Dizzy with success," Russia's Vladimir Putin may have
dismembered Georgia, but Russian tanks stopped short of Tbilisi as he calculated exactly how much he could get away with. But now,
while our retirement plans have suffered a setback, Russia's stock market has crashed to a fifth of its value last May. Foreign
investment has begun to shun Russia as though the ship of state has plague aboard. The murk of Russia's economy is ultimately
impenetrable, but analysts take Moscow's word that it entered this crisis with over $500 billion in foreign-exchange reserves. At least
$200 billion of that is now gone, while Russian markets still hemorrhage. And the price of oil - Russia's lifeblood - has fallen by nearly
two-thirds. If oil climbs to $70 a barrel, the Russian economy may eke by. But the Kremlin can kiss off its military-modernization plans.
Urgent infrastructure upgrades won't happen, either. And the population trapped outside the few garish city centers will continue to
live lives that are nasty, brutish and short - on a good day. Should oil prices and shares keep tumbling, Russia will slip into polni bardak
mode - politely translated as "resembling a dockside brothel on the skids." And that assumes that other aspects of the economy hold
up - a fragile hope, given Russia's overleveraged concentration of wealth, fudged numbers and state lawlessness. Should we rejoice if
the ruble continues to drop? Perhaps. But what incentive would Czar Vladimir have to halt his tanks short of Kiev, if his economy were
a basket case shunned by the rest of the world? Leaders with failures in their laps like the distraction wars provide. (If religion is the
opium of the people, nationalism is their methamphetamine.) The least we might expect would be an increased willingness on
Moscow's part to sell advanced weapons to fellow rogue regimes. Of course, those rogues would need money to pay for the weapons
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(or for nuclear secrets sold by grasping officials). A positive side of the global downturn is that mischief-makers such as Iran and
Venezuela are going to have a great deal less money with which to annoy civilization. Some
analyses calculate that, for
Caracas and Tehran to sustain their already-on-life-support economies, the price of oil needs to
stay above $90 a barrel. But average prices will probably remain below that for at least two years. Iran and Venezuela may
respond very differently to impoverishment, however. Tehran could turn to regional military aggression in an
attempt to keep the population behind the regime - and may the Lord help Israel, if a dead-
broke Iran gets nukes. On the other hand, even devout Muslim businessmen don't like to go bankrupt.
Iran's power-broker mullahs have relied on the support of the (much bribed) bazaaris, the nation's
merchants. While we obsess about feeble student protests, the bazaaris form the constituency the mullahs
dare not alienate. Regime change may come from within. By contrast, Venezuela's power is a charade. The
regime of Hugo Chavez can't survive without a constant transfusion of petrodollars. Chavez buys votes - and you can't buy votes with
empty pockets. Chavez is far more bluster than bravery. Facing empty coffers, his rhetoric will intensify - but he's not going to invade
anyone (he'd lose). And the left-wing regimes that rely on him will have to find a new sugar daddy. A bankrupt Chavez won't survive
long - he's no Fidel Castro. The question is whether he'd respect a popular vote that went against him or go out in a splash of blood.
Bottom line on bankrupt enemies: Russia's dangerous; Iran's dangerous, but vulnerable; Venezuela's just vulnerable. There
may be serious trouble ahead. For now, though, it's satisfying to watch the wicked suffer.

Iranian adventurism causes WWIII


Bosco 6 - Senior Editor at Foreign Policy Magazine (David, 7/23/2006.. “Could This Be the Start of World War III?”
http://usc.glo.org/forums/0016/viewtopic.php?p=403&sid=95896c43b66ffa28f9932774a408bb4b)

ARMAGEDDON Could This Be the Start of World War III? As the Middle East erupts, there are plenty of
scenarios for global conflagration. IT WAS LATE JUNE in Sarajevo when Gavrilo Princip shot Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife.
After emptying his revolver, the young Serb nationalist jumped into the shallow river that runs through the city and was quickly seized.
The understanding
But the events he set in motion could not be so easily restrained. Two months later, Europe was at war.
that small but violent acts can spark global conflagration is etched into the world's
consciousness. The reverberations from Princip's shots in the summer of 1914 ultimately took the lives of more than 10 million
people, shattered four empires and dragged more than two dozen countries into war. This hot summer, as the world watches the
violence in the Middle East, the awareness of peace's fragility is particularly acute. The bloodshed in Lebanon appears to be part of a
broader upsurge in unrest. Iraq is suffering through one of its bloodiest months since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Taliban militants
are burning schools and attacking villages in southern Afghanistan as the United States and NATO struggle to defend that country's
fragile government. Nuclear-armed India is still cleaning up the wreckage from a large terrorist attack in which it suspects militants
from rival Pakistan. The world is awash in weapons, North Korea and Iran are developing nuclear capabilities, and
long-range missile technology is spreading like a virus. Some see the start of a global conflict.
"We're in the early stages of what I would describe as the Third World War," former House Speaker
Newt Gingrich said last week. Certain religious websites are abuzz with talk of Armageddon. There may be as much
hyperbole as prophecy in the forecasts for world war. But it's not hard to conjure ways that
today's hot spots could ignite. Consider the following scenarios: • Targeting Iran: As Israeli troops seek
out and destroy Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon, intelligence officials spot a shipment of
longer-range Iranian missiles heading for Lebanon. The Israeli government decides to strike the
convoy and Iranian nuclear facilities simultaneously. After Iran has recovered from the shock,
Revolutionary Guards surging across the border into Iraq, bent on striking Israel's American
allies. Governments in Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia face violent street protests
demanding retribution against Israel — and they eventually yield, triggering a major regional
war.
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--Oil Good – Russia

Strong oil industry key to Russian economy


CIA 11Central Intelligence Agency, The World Factbook, JUNE 15 2011, https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/rs.html, ZBurdette)
Russia has undergone significant changes since the collapse of the Soviet Union, moving from a globally-isolated, centrally-planned
economy to a more market-based and globally-integrated economy. Economic reforms in the 1990s privatized most industry, with
notable exceptions in the energy and defense-related sectors. The protection of property rights is still weak and the private sector
remains subject to heavy state interference. Russian industry is primarily split between globally-competitive commodity producers - in
2009 Russia was the world's largest exporter of natural gas, the second largest exporter of oil,
and the third largest exporter of steel and primary aluminum - and other less competitive heavy industries that remain dependent on
the Russian domestic market. This reliance on commodity exports makes Russia vulnerable to boom and
bust cycles that follow the highly volatile swings in global commodity prices. The government
since 2007 has embarked on an ambitious program to reduce this dependency and build up the
country's high technology sectors, but with few results so far. The economy had averaged 7% growth since
the 1998 Russian financial crisis, resulting in a doubling of real disposable incomes and the emergence of a middle class. The
Russian economy, however, was one of the hardest hit by the 2008-09 global economic crisis as oil
prices plummeted and the foreign credits that Russian banks and firms relied on dried up. The Central Bank of Russia spent
one-third of its $600 billion international reserves, the world's third largest, in late 2008 to slow the devaluation of the ruble. The
government also devoted $200 billion in a rescue plan to increase liquidity in the banking sector and aid Russian firms unable to roll
over large foreign debts coming due. The economic decline bottomed out in mid-2009 and the economy began to grow in the first
quarter of 2010. However, a severe drought and fires in central Russia reduced agricultural output, prompting a ban on grain exports
for part of the year, and slowed growth in other sectors such as manufacturing and retail trade. High oil prices buoyed
Russian growth in the first quarter of 2011 and could help Russia reduce the budget deficit inherited from the lean years of
2008-09, but inflation and increased government expenditures may limit the positive impact of these revenues. Russia's long-term
challenges include a shrinking workforce, a high level of corruption, difficulty in accessing capital for smaller, non-energy companies,
and poor infrastructure in need of large investments.

Russian economic decline causes nuclear war


FILGER 9 (Sheldon, author and blogger for the Huffington Post, “Russian Economy Faces Disastrous Free Fall Contraction”
http://www.globaleconomiccrisis.com/blog/archives/356)

In Russia historically, economic health and political stability are intertwined to a degree that is
rarely encountered in other major industrialized economies. It was the economic stagnation of the former Soviet
Union that led to its political downfall. Similarly, Medvedev and Putin, both intimately acquainted with their nation’s history,
are unquestionably alarmed at the prospect that Russia’s economic crisis will endanger the
nation’s political stability, achieved at great cost after years of chaos following the demise of the Soviet Union. Already,
strikes and protests are occurring among rank and file workers facing unemployment or non-payment of their salaries. Recent polling
demonstrates that the once supreme popularity ratings of Putin and Medvedev are eroding rapidly. Beyond the political elites are the
financial oligarchs, who have been forced to deleverage, even unloading their yachts and executive jets in a desperate attempt to raise
cash. Should the Russian economy deteriorate to the point where economic collapse is not out of the question, the
impact will go far beyond the obvious accelerant such an outcome would be for the Global
Economic Crisis. There is a geopolitical dimension that is even more relevant then the economic context. Despite its economic
vulnerabilities and perceived decline from superpower status, Russia remains one of only two nations on earth
with a nuclear arsenal of sufficient scope and capability to destroy the world as we know it. For that
reason, it is not only President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin who will be lying awake at nights over the prospect that a
national economic crisis can transform itself into a virulent and destabilizing social and political
upheaval. It just may be possible that U.S. President Barack Obama’s national security team has already briefed him about the
consequences of a major economic meltdown in Russia for the peace of the world. After all, the most recent national intelligence
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estimates put out by the U.S. intelligence community have already concluded that the Global Economic Crisis represents the greatest
national security threat to the United States, due to its facilitating political instability in the world. During
the years Boris
Yeltsin ruled Russia, security forces responsible for guarding the nation’s nuclear arsenal went without
pay for months at a time, leading to fears that desperate personnel would illicitly sell nuclear weapons to
terrorist organizations. If the current economic crisis in Russia were to deteriorate much
further, how secure would the Russian nuclear arsenal remain? It may be that the financial impact of the
Global Economic Crisis is its least dangerous consequence.
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--Oil Good – Saudi Arabia

High oil prices now key to the Saudi economy


Carey, 11 (Glen, writer and producer for Bloomberg Media/Financial Market, “Saudi Arabia’s Economy Will Expand 5.3% on Oil Prices,
NCB Says,” on May 15, 2011 from http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-15/saudi-arabia-s-economy-will-expand-5-3-on-oil-prices-ncb-
says.html)

Saudi Arabia’s economy will expand 5.3 percent this year, powered by higher oil prices and
more government spending in the Arab world’s largest economy, National Commercial Bank said. The kingdom, which
depends on oil for 86 percent of its revenue, announced increases in government spending in March as protests
calling for more job opportunities and democracy engulfed the Middle East. The package included $67 billion on housing and funds for
the military and religious groups that backed the government’s ban on domestic protests, and followed a $36 billion handout
announced on Feb. 23. With higher oil prices, Saudi Arabia will record a budget surplus of 62.8 billion
riyals ($16.8 billion), National Commercial said. Oil revenue this year is expected at 828.2 billion riyals, it said. The break-even
oil price required to balance the budget this year will increase to $84 a barrels this year from $65 a barrel last
year, the bank said. Oil prices have increased 8.8 percent this year. Crude oil for June delivery gained 68 cents to $99.65 a barrel on
May 13 on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Decreased oil prices cause Iranian nuclearization and Saudi civil war
Arena Resources 7. (“Why Flooding the Worldwide Market Place with Oil Will Not Stop Iran from Achieving their Nuclear Ambitions,”
on January 11, 2007 from http://doktorstocks.blogspot.com/2007/01/why-flooding-worldwide-market-place.html)

Iran vs. OPEC. OPEC would be badly damaged. Any price cuts would not only bring down the Iranian economy but also the
economy of Saudi Arabia and all the rest of the OPEC countries. The OPEC countries are not willing to allow self inflicted
wounds to their economies. Damage to the Saudi Economy would do more harm to their economy than Iran. A damaged Saudi
economy could drive their citizens to revolt and a more dangerous radical regime could emerge
to power in that country. FSU and Lower Prices Sharply lower oil prices could create incentive for the FSU
to sell some of their nuclear warheads on the black market. Iran would be a customer. In summary,
lower oil prices will not stop Iran from building a nuclear arsenal. Investors should doubt any conspiracy
theories that surround Saudi Arabia opening the wellheads to flood the worldwide marketplace with oil in order to drive down prices
and bankrupt Iran. Such
a move would increase instability within Saudi Arabia, threaten the very
existence of the Saudi monarchy and would not stop Iran from becoming a nuclear power. The only way to prevent Iran
from becoming a nuclear power is the use of military force.

A Saudi Civil War would crush the Global Economy


David 99 (Steven R.; Professor of Political Science – Johns Hopkins) Foreign Affairs Jan/Feb l/n wbw
In a Saudi civil war, the oil fields will be a likely battle site, as belligerents seek the revenue and international
recognition that come with control of petroleum. For either side to cripple oil production would not be
difficult. The real risk lies not with the onshore oil wells themselves, which are spread over a 100-by-300 mile area, but in
the country's dependence on only a few critical processing sites. Destruction of these facilities
would paralyze production and take at least six months to repair. If unconventional weapons such as biological
agents were used in the oil fields, production could be delayed for several more months until workers were convinced it was safe to
return. Stanching the flow of Saudi oil would devastate the United States and much of the world
community. Global demand for oil (especially in Asia) will increase in the coming decades, while non-Persian Gulf supplies are
expected to diminish. A crisis in the planet's largest oil producer , with reserves estimated at 25 percent of the world's
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total, would have a massive and protracted impact on the price and availability of oil worldwide.
As the disruptions of 1973 and 1979 showed, the mere threat of diminished oil supply can cause panic
buying, national hysteria, gas lines, and infighting. Prices for oil shot up 400 percent in 1973, 150 percent in 1979,
and 50 percent (in just 15 days) in 1990. The oil shocks of the 1970s threw the United States into recession, causing spiraling inflation
and a decline in savings rates that plagues the U.S. economy even now. Trillions of dollars were lost worldwide. And all this occurred at
a time when the United States was less dependent on foreign petroleum than it is now. Cutting
the Saudi pipeline today
would cause a severe worldwide recession or depression. Short of physical attack, it is the
gravest threat imaginable to American interests.

Middle Eastern conflict goes global and nuclear


Steinbach, 2 (John, Researcher for the Centre for Research on Globalisation, “Israeli Weapons of Mass Destruction: a Threat to Peace,”
on March 3, 2002 from http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/STE203A.html)

Meanwhile, the existence of an arsenal of mass destruction in such an unstable region in turn has
serious implications for future arms control and disarmament negotiations, and even the threat
of nuclear war. Seymour Hersh warns, "Should war break out in the Middle East again,... or should any Arab
nation fire missiles against Israel, as the Iraqis did, a nuclear escalation, once unthinkable except as a last resort, would
now be a strong probability."(41) and Ezar Weissman, Israel's current President said "The nuclear issue is gaining
momentum(and the) next war will not be conventional."(42) Russia and before it the Soviet Union has long been
a major(if not the major) target of Israeli nukes. It is widely reported that the principal purpose of Jonathan Pollard's spying for Israel
was to furnish satellite images of Soviet targets and other super sensitive data relating to U.S. nuclear targeting strategy. (43) (Since
launching its own satellite in 1988, Israel no longer needs U.S. spy secrets.) Israeli
nukes aimed at the Russian
heartland seriously complicate disarmament and arms control negotiations and, at the very least, the
unilateral possession of nuclear weapons by Israel is enormously destabilizing, and dramatically lowers
the threshold for their actual use, if not for all out nuclear war. In the words of Mark Gaffney, "... if the familar pattern(Israel refining
its weapons of mass destruction with U.S. complicity) is not reversed soon- for whatever reason- the deepening Middle East
conflict could trigger a world conflagration." (44)
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1NC – Overpopulation

1. Halting overpopulation in Africa is key to stability for the rest of the world.
Hira, 7 Anil Hira, Professor of Political Science at Simon Fraiser University. The Futurist, May 1, 2007. Pg. 27(6) Vol. 41 No. 3 ISSN: 0016-
3317. “Time for a global welfare system?”

Healthy families where women have the opportunity to work have fewer children. This means slower
population growth,
which reduces pressures on immigration, the creation of new terrorists, and competition linked
to weak labor and environmental standards. The slash-and-burn agricultural practices that are
destroying the rain forests and the desperate turn to narcotrafficking or to jobs in sweatshop conditions
to support oneself would all be diminishing enterprises, if we treated one of the chief causes
rather than symptoms of global problems. Reducing population pressure is a chicken-and-egg problem. Urbanization
reduces family size, as do access to contraceptives, education, and health care. Ensuring female access to education and health care
are the surest ways to reduce population growth without controversy over abortions or contraceptive use. More-prosperous families
are healthier and provide a productive contribution, rather than a drain or threat, to the global economy. However, huge
populations in developing countries, even at a reduced pace, make such transformations seem glacially
slow and overwhelming. The fastest-growing populations, indeed, are in the poorest regions, including South
Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. A global system is needed to accelerate the change to a low-
population, high-quality-of-life economy. Without such attention, the average American,
Japanese, European, and Canadian will find it impossible to compete with the thousands of hungry, hard-
working, and, in Asia, well-educated growing middle classes. Such a system would ensure that no one starves, that
labor has reasonable bargaining rights, that a policy that respects the environmentis enforceable, and that basic
human rights are afforded to all. Indeed, the one major global welfare transfer, namely, the Marshall Plan, set the world on a growth
spree for two decades, simultaneously creating new markets while lifting millions out of poverty. By recognizing that we are now living
in a global economy, we simply move to regulate that economy so it can thrive. Not only do we reduce the costs of such problems as
terrorism, pandemics, and environmental degradation, but we can create a whole new generation of consumers.

2. Overpopulation sparks global conflict and escalating war


Thomas, 94 Steve Thomas, a member of Global Population Concerns. Global Population Concerns, November 1994, “Overpopulation and
Violence, 6/27/07. http://perc.ca/PEN/1994-11/s-thomas.html)

The world's population is increasing at a rate of over 1.5 million people a week—95 million people a year—equivalent to a country the
size of Mexico. Population
is the key to the matrix of environmental degradation, scarcity of
resources and political disorder. It is the most easily controlled factor and therefore should be
the highest priority on any agenda. Overpopulation results in a scarcity of water, a scarcity of
arable land, deforestation and depletion of fish stocks in the oceans. Because of population pressures, especially
in the third world, the environment is being continually despoiled. There are limits to the resources needed to satisfy basic human
needs: food, shelter, education and health care. Poverty, ignorance, fear and hunger exacerbate ethnic conflict and political instability.
The inevitable result is violence, civil war and inter-state strife. Anwar Sadat of Egypt and King Hussein of
Jordan both stated that the only reason they would go to war would be over water. Both countries have high birthrates and a pressing
need for water. Syria and Iraq both rely on water from the Euphrates. This river originates in Turkey and its flow is now being altered
by the Turkish southeast Anatolia project. This will have serious consequences for the region. India and Bangladesh both have
increasing population pressures on their shared river, the Ganges. China with 23% of the earth's people has only 8% of the world's
water. Butas much of a tinderbox is the paucity of arable land on our precious planet. This is the
root cause of many explosive situations around the world. Some recent examples are Haiti,
Central America and Rwanda. As land is subdivided because of inheritance, farmers are no
longer able to support themselves on family farms and so migrate to the cities. The scarcity of
land is often a conflagration point for ethnic and tribal warfare. Moreover, landowners in certain countries
are under pressure to share ownership of the land with the tenants who traditionally farmed for them. As good land gets scarcer, the
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common crop and grazing land owned by the whole village is disappearing, leaving more destitution. Inequity and poverty breed
violence. Another factor festers. In countries such as Haiti and Somalia the depletion of forests leads to soil erosion and lack of fuel for
cooking fires. Internecine
strife and tribal warfare results when agrarian people are forced to move
and they encroach on others' land. In the African Sahel and West Africa deforestation causes
erosion, crop failure and famine. There are vast migrations of indigents, destabilizing neighbouring countries and sparking
civil wars. Finally (and this example hits home to Canadians), because of overfishing, climactic changes and technological innovation in
fishing methods, fish stocks are fast declining in many areas of the world. Two notable examples are the Philippines and Canada's
Grand Banks. As we know in Canada, shortages of fish result in a change of lifestyle for many, much international bickering and more
significantly the occasional use of gunboats to further national interests. A shortage of fish cannot help but displace a large number of
gainfully employed families who have fished the seas for generations. Bitterness, economic despair and frustration follow, increasing
international tensions. Shortages of this valuable foodstuff only serve to increase pressure for other sources of food in a world of
already increasing demand. We now see finite limits to the vast bounty of the ocean. These finite resources of water,
land, forests and fish are being consumed at an alarming rate by an ever-increasing population.
The most cost-effective method of dealing with this environmental deterioration and
diminution of scarce resources is to ease the population growth in developing countries. Some suggest
that the level of population in the world today is not sustainable at the high levels of consumption. We may be faced with
apocalyptic images of starving and emaciated people killing each other in anarchic chaos that
could well reach our own borders. Even today millions of people are on the move, struggling to avoid war, famine,
plagues and other catastrophes in their homelands.
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1NC – Russia

Africa Conflict Is A Key Export Market For Russian Arms


OXFORD ANALYTICA 3 (l/N)
Russia's arms industries are re-establishing structured relationships — military-technical agreements' --
with former client states in Africa, covering maintenance and after-sales support as well as new or used
military equipment sales. Russia's penetration of the African market, and the scale and type of
arms transfers it has signed, can be seen as both a symptom and a potential cause of inter-slate
tension on the continent.

ARMS SALES KEY TO THE RUSSIAN ECONOMY


STRATFOR 99 (7-30. hllp://www.aumcs.com/globa]-ccon/AG31Dj02 html)
Moscow has begun floating bailer schemes for international iradc and for the repayment of
debts to Russia . This comes on top of a report that Russia's industrial output has risen, though serving only domestic consumers
who cannot afford imports. The only major export growth being experienced, by Russia is m arms sales .
Finally, Moscow has made it clear that it is simply unable to service its international debt. Russia's economy is
introverting, reverting to a model reminiscent of the old Soviet Union. Closed off by inefficiency and lack of
foreign capital, it is focusing its domestic economy on meeting domestic needs, limiting its
interaction with the global economy for the most part to barter,in machinery and raw materials, and earning
its foreign currency with arms. The seal on this introversion mav arrive in the form of default on
international loans.

Russian economic decline causes nuclear war


FILGER 9 (Sheldon, author and blogger for the Huffington Post, “Russian Economy Faces Disastrous Free Fall Contraction”
http://www.globaleconomiccrisis.com/blog/archives/356)

In Russia historically, economic health and political stability are intertwined to a degree that is
rarely encountered in other major industrialized economies. It was the economic stagnation of the former Soviet
Union that led to its political downfall. Similarly, Medvedev and Putin, both intimately acquainted with their nation’s history,
are unquestionably alarmed at the prospect that Russia’s economic crisis will endanger the
nation’s political stability, achieved at great cost after years of chaos following the demise of the Soviet Union. Already,
strikes and protests are occurring among rank and file workers facing unemployment or non-payment of their salaries. Recent polling
demonstrates that the once supreme popularity ratings of Putin and Medvedev are eroding rapidly. Beyond the political elites are the
financial oligarchs, who have been forced to deleverage, even unloading their yachts and executive jets in a desperate attempt to raise
cash. Should the Russian economy deteriorate to the point where economic collapse is not out of the question, the
impact will go far beyond the obvious accelerant such an outcome would be for the Global
Economic Crisis. There is a geopolitical dimension that is even more relevant then the economic context. Despite its economic
vulnerabilities and perceived decline from superpower status, Russia remains one of only two nations on earth
with a nuclear arsenal of sufficient scope and capability to destroy the world as we know it. For that
reason, it is not only President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin who will be lying awake at nights over the prospect that a
national economic crisis can transform itself into a virulent and destabilizing social and political
upheaval. It just may be possible that U.S. President Barack Obama’s national security team has already briefed him about the
consequences of a major economic meltdown in Russia for the peace of the world. After all, the most recent national intelligence
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estimates put out by the U.S. intelligence community have already concluded that the Global Economic Crisis represents the greatest
national security threat to the United States, due to its facilitating political instability in the world. During
the years Boris
Yeltsin ruled Russia, security forces responsible for guarding the nation’s nuclear arsenal went without
pay for months at a time, leading to fears that desperate personnel would illicitly sell nuclear weapons to
terrorist organizations. If the current economic crisis in Russia were to deteriorate much
further, how secure would the Russian nuclear arsenal remain? It may be that the financial impact of the
Global Economic Crisis is its least dangerous consequence.
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--Russia Econ UQ

Russian economy high now


Russia & CIS Banking & Finance Weekly 10 (“Russian GDP up estimated 2.9% in Q1 – Rosstat,” 5/14/10, Lexis)
Russian GDP grew around 2.9% year-on-year in Q1 2010, the Federal State Statistics Service (Rosstat)
said in its preliminary estimate for the period. Economic Development Minister Elvira Nabiullina also said on May 14 that GDP rose
something like 2.9% in the quarter. The Russian Economic Development Ministry said at the end of April, though, that GDP might have
grown 4.5% year-on-year in Q1. The Rosstat said it estimates GDP shrank 7.9% in 2009. The Econ Ministry forecasts at
least 4% growth in 2010.

Russian economy stable now


Bloomberg, 10 [“Russia Leaves Rates Unchanged as Economy Gathers Pace”, http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-06-30/russia-
leaves-rates-unchanged-as-economy-gathers-pace.html]

June 30 (Bloomberg) -- Russia’s


central bank left its main interest rates unchanged today, ending a 14-
month easing cycle as the economic recovery gathers speed and inflation slows. Bank Rossii kept the
refinancing rate at a record low 7.75 percent, it said on its website today, as forecast by all 15 economists in a Bloomberg survey. It
also left the repurchase rate charged on one- and seven-day loans unchanged at 6.75 percent. The regulator last trimmed rates on
May 31. “The main trends in economic activity, monetary and credit spheres remain the same,” the bank said in a statement.
“Industrial activity, employment and domestic demand” are recovering. “The continued gradual recovery
of bank lending, which began in March, and decreasing interest rates on loans to the real sector are positive factors.” The
economy may expand 7 percent this year, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Chief Global Economist Jim O’Neill said on June
19, compared with the government’s 4 percent forecast. Higher commodity prices and domestic demand are
helping the world’s biggest energy exporter recover from last year’s 7.9 percent slump, the biggest on
record. Inflation this year will slow to between 5.5 percent and 6.5 percent, the government estimates.
Inflation risks are “at an acceptable level” and the regulator will “likely keep interest rates unchanged in the coming months,”
according to the statement. The inflation rate remained at 6 percent in May, the lowest level in 12 years. No Rush “Given the benign
inflation dynamics, we expect the central bank not to rush to tighten policy, although the bank would likely continue to withdraw anti-
crisis support measure to the banking sector,” Anna Zadornova, a London-based economist at Goldman Sachs, said by e-mail today.
Russian stocks erased gains after the decision and the ruble remained little changed. The Micex Index slipped than 0.5 percent to
1,316.29 as of 2:40 p.m. in Moscow, after rising as much as 0.4 percent. The ruble traded at 31.1900 per dollar, from 31.2675
yesterday. “All the necessary conditions for a swifter economic recovery are emerging,” Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin said at a Cabinet meeting on June 2. The 14 rate cuts in as many months helped boost lending, he said. Lending
Growth Corporate lending grew at the fastest pace this year in May as the economic recovery
gained momentum, central bank data show. Corporate loans rose 1.9 percent, compared with 0.9
percent in the previous month, Bank Rossii said in a report on its website today. Retail loans advanced 1.2 percent in
May, compared with 1 percent the month before, it said. Retail deposits increased 1.7 percent, according to the report. “The
refinancing rate won’t have a significant influence because it is lowered to increase liquidity on the market,” Finance Minister Alexei
Kudrin said on June 19. “There is currently a lot of liquidity. The key, fundamental factors for lending are industry risks, the potential
for growth.” There is enough liquidity in the system as banks have 2 trillion rubles ($64 billion) of liquid assets, half of which is held in
central bank bonds, Bank Rossii’s First Deputy Chairman Alexei Ulyukayev said yesterday. Capital Flows Russian lending rates are “too
low” and “do not reflect the real risks” in the economy, German Gref, chief executive officer of OAO Sberbank, the country’s biggest
bank, said on June 1. Still, Sberbank doesn’t have immediate plans to raise the interest rates it offers on loans, according to Gref.
“Rates at the current level don’t create significant preconditions for capital inflow,” the central bank said in a statement last month.
Net capital inflow reached $10 billion in March through May and probably continued in June, Ulyukayev said. There will be no net
capital inflow for the year as a whole, after a $52.4 billion outflow last year, according to government estimates. Bank Rossii’s
“commitment” to a flexible exchange rate and free capital movement means inflows will make the ruble’s appreciation “inevitable,”
ING Groep NV analyst Stanislav Ponomarenko said last month. The central bank has reduced the extent to which it steers the ruble to
lessen the effects of currency moves on producers. Ruble Policy While the bank will continue to intervene on currency markets to
“smooth out the volatility” of the ruble, “we will not set a target for the ruble’s nominal or real exchange rate,” Ulyukayev said
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yesterday. The
ruble may strengthen to 28 versus the dollar by the end of 2012 and maintain a
“trend toward appreciation” in the next three years, according to a government report this month. The ruble may gain 20
percent in the next three years against the currencies of Russia’s major trading partners with the effects of inflation stripped out, the
report said.
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--Ext. – Arms Sales Key

Weak rule of law is key to Russian small arms sales


Hiltermann 1 Joost, Executive Director of Small Arms division of human rights watch, January, 8, 2001,
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/0709-03.htm

In fact, none of the arms-controls treaties and military cooperation agreements signed between
Moscow and Western capitals requires small arms to be counted, according to arms-control experts. "The
West was worried about nuclear missiles, tanks and aircraft, not hand-held weapons," explained
Dosim Sapayev, an analyst from the International War and Peace Institute, a London-based think tank. Without accurate statistics,
there can be no adequate controls. And without adequate controls, corruption flourishes and arms transfers are easily carried out
under a veil of secrecy. Such a case occurred in February, when the Anastasia, a freighter flying the flag of the former Soviet republic
of Georgia, set sail from the Ukrainian Black Sea port of Oktyabarskii and docked at Spain's Canary Islands to refuel. Its manifest said it
was carrying auto parts, but the destination was illegible. Intrigued, the port authority demanded access to the ship to inspect the
cargo. What they found was 650 tons of assault rifles, ammunition and infantry gear. After Spanish authorities complained, Russia's
Rosoboronexport claimed the shipment was part of a legal sale from Moscow to Angola, thus giving the Anastasia a green light to
leave port once the ship's captain had paid a small fine. After its departure, Spanish officials said they had no legal basis to monitor its
journey, and the ship's owners could not be found in the Georgian town where it was registered. Rosoboronexport officials, agreeing
to talk only after the ship had sailed, told Cox Newspapers that the details of the deal were "a commercial secret." When pressed
whether the sale was to the government of Angola or the rebel group UNITA, the agency refused further comment. The group is under
international sanctions, which makes arms shipments illegal. Not surprisingly,
the main destinations for Kalashnikov
rifles are developing nations in which central governments are weak, civil conflict is rife, and
rule of law is thin, at best.

Competitive arms exports are key to the Russian economy and defense
RIVLIN 5 (Dr. Paul, Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies. Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern & African Studies, The Russian Economy
and Arms Exports to the Middle East, November, www.tau.ac.il/jcss/memoranda/memo79.pdf)

Russia’s military exports played a vital role in its economic turnaround. Acritical part of the Soviet legacy
was a large arms industry, a function of the Soviet Union's political isolation and its experiences in the Second World War and the Cold
War. Soviet policy meant that arms transfers were made primarily for political reasons and the economy paid the price through large
government subsidies. When the Cold War ended and Russia emerged as an independent state, local
demand for its defense products collapsed. Russia could no longer afford to give away arms as the Soviet Union had
done, and its ability to buy influence decreased. The need to export arms for economic reasons increased at the
same time as the ideological imperative declined. For Russia, selling arms thus became a vital source of
foreign economic exchange and a way of financing defense industries threatened with closure.
As such, the industry, part of which is relatively technologically advanced, preserves
employment at home, especially of key personnel, and helps to maintain markets and influence
abroad.

Russian defense exports are key to the economy


RIVLIN 5 (Dr. Paul, Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies. Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern & African Studies, The Russian Economy
and Arms Exports to the Middle East, November, www.tau.ac.il/jcss/memoranda/memo79.pdf)

With the exception of arms, Russia has never been a major exporter of manufactured goods.
Traditionally, the USSR exported raw materials and this trend has been reinforced in Russia in recent years because of the increase in
oil prices.1 The
sale of arms, therefore, represents one of the few areas where Russia’s
manufacturing industry has a competitive international position. It also provides employment
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for skilled workers and scientists otherwise unemployed by the economy. Arms production and
exports is a means of keeping this vital manpower in the country and funding research and
development.
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--Ext. – Africa Key

African conflicts key to Small arms market


BOUTWELL 2k, (JEFFERY BOURWELL, FROM THE AMERICAN ACADEMY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES, "A SCOURGE OP SMALL ARMS,")
Most media accounts of the 1994 Rwandan genocide emphasized the use of traditional weapons—clubs, knives, machetes—by
murderous gangs of extremist Hutu. As many as one million Tutsi and moderate Hutu perished, many of them women and children. To
outsiders, it
appeared as if the people of Rwanda had been caught up in a violent frenzy, with
common farm implements as their favored instruments of extermination. But this isn't the
whole story. Before the killing began, the Hutu-dominated government had distributed
automatic rifles and hand grenades to official militias and paramilitary gangs. It was this firepower that made the
genocide possible. Militia members terrorized their victims with guns and grenades as they rounded them up for systematic slaughter
with machetes and knives. The murderous use of farm toots may have seemed a medieval aberration,
but the weapons and paramilitary gangs that facilitated the genocide were all too modern. The
situation there was far from unique. Since the end of the cold war. from the Balkans to East Timor and throughout Africa, the
world has witnessed an outbreak of ethnic, religious and sectarian conflict characterized by
routine massacre of civilians. More than 100 conflicts have erupted since 1990, about twice the number for previous
decades. These wars have killed more than five million • people, devastated entire geographic regions, and left tens of millions of
refugees and orphans. Little
of the destruction was inflicted by the tanks, artillery or aircraft usually
associated modern warfare; rather most was cameo' out with pistols, machine guns and
grenades. However beneficial the end of the cold war has- been In other respects, it has let loose a global
deluge of surplus weapons into a setting in which the risk of local conflict appears to have
grown markedly.
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--Sales Good – Ax Launch

Arms exports are key to Russian conventional power


WEITZ 7 (Richard, Senior Fellow and Director, Project Management at Hudson Institute, “Russia’s military-industrial complex” June 4,
http://cffss.hudson.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=publication_details&id=4947)

The primary purpose of this increased spending is to push new weapons systems from the
research and development stage to actual procurement for Russia’s armed forces. Over the course of
2007-2015, Russia’s army and navy will replace almost half (45 percent) of their military equipment. In the past, poor government and
industry practices frustrated similar plans to supply large numbers of advanced conventional weapons to Russia’s armed forces. The
country’s military-industrial sector suffers from limited domestic orders and extensive
overcapacity. Purchases for the Russian army and navy have been increasing, but still only
sustain about one-fourth of Russia’s existing military production capacity. The Russian government now
spends more on new Russian-made conventional weapons than do foreign purchasers. Yet, persistent inefficiencies in the Russian
defence procurement system result in foreign buyers receiving more new systems than the Russian military. As a result,
Russia’s leading defence firms remain heavily dependent on foreign sales. Although Russia’s arms exports
have decreased considerably since the Soviet period, its revenue per transaction is now greater because Russian firms have yielded
much of the lower-end market to less expensive suppliers like China, India, and other former Soviet bloc allies. Moreover, where the
USSR transferred much weaponry under easy commercial terms or without charge (e.g., under long-term loans not expected to be
repaid), Russia now discounts arms only for its closest allies. On March 27, 2007, the
Defence Ministry announced that
Russia’s annual arms exports increased by 50 percent, from $4 billion to $6.5 billion, from 2001 to 2006. In an
effort to both maximise foreign revenue and strengthen Russia’s own military potential , former
Russian defence minister Sergei Ivanov, who now oversees Russia’s military-industrial complex and is one of the two leading
candidates to succeed Putin as president, stressed the need for “the national defence industry to find a
balance between a commitment to arm the Russian military and an opportunity to export arms
to countries not subject to UN sanctions”. Besides helping to sustain the health of Russia’s military
industrial complex, many Russian officials think that arms sales will promote Russia’s diplomatic interests
by strengthening ties with recipient states.

Russian conventional weakness increases reliance on nuclear weapons—this increases the


chance of accidental or deliberate nuclear war
LAMBERT AND MILLER 97 (Stephen and David, USAF Institute for National Security Studies, “Russia’s Crumbling Tactical
Nuclear Weapons Complex: An Opportunity for Arms Control” April www.usafa.af.mil/inss/OCP/ocp12.pdf)

To compensate for Russia’s current conventional weakness, Russian strategists have explicitly sought
to “extend the threshold for escalation downward,”28 thereby increasing the likelihood of tactical
nuclear release in the face of hostilities. Thus there are two distinct concepts at work: (1) the procedure of pre-
delegating the launch codes; and (2) the operational doctrine of lowering the nuclear threshold. These trends are corroborated by
interviews with Russian officials familiar with nuclear weapons strategies. Dr. Nikolai Sokov, an expert on the Soviet delegation to
START I as well as other US-Soviet summit meetings, affirms that with such a doctrine in place, one “cannot rule out that a
local
commander could individually take the authority to launch a weapon.”29 The assumption that
the Russian weapons control system is more stable during peace-time is also suspect. Due to the
lack of technical safeguards, especially on air-delivered weapons (cruise missiles and gravity bombs), individual
attempts to acquire these weapons even during times of peace are possible. Moreover, the lack of
adequate locking mechanisms on these weapons would then make them deliverable, with a full
nuclear yield, even without launch authorization. Media attention has been overwhelmingly dedicated to the apex
of the control system; this focus seems to be at least partially misplaced. While it is largely true that the absence of a stable political
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system and the reliance on a control system with the potential for sudden shifts in allegiances could cause a breakdown of control, the
most important dangers of misuse of Russia’s nuclear weapons are not to be found at the apex, but at the lower echelons of the
command system. The
Russian practice of pre-delegation carries with it the dangers of a premature
weapons release or the employment of a nuclear weapon because of the judgment of a local
military commander.
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--Russia Good – Econ

Russian economic collaspe would destroy the world economy


AUSTRALIAN FINANCIAL REVIEW, 2k
As a big debtor nation, Russia’s ability to meet its financial obligations also matters to world
markets – as the Russian rouble’s collapse and accompanying loan default in August 1998
starkly revealed. The crisis raised fears of a domino effect across emerging markets that could
ultimately push the global economy into recession. That, in the end, didn’t occur. But an economist specialising in
Russia at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Ivan Szegvari, says the confidence of international
investors in emerging markets, and in transitional economies as a whole, is affected by what
happens in Russia. In addition, Russia remains one of the most important clients of
international financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund. “These
organisations are the major players in the whole institutional set-up of the world economy –
and they are strongly preoccupied with what happens in Russia,” says Szegvari. “What happens in
Russia has, and will have, a large impact on the credibility of these institutions… “So I see many, not
directly economic, issues which makes me say that Russia’s importance for the rest of the world is
incomparably more than the current size of its GDP should suggest.”

Economic collapse leads to nuclear war


The Baltimore Examiner 9 [“Will this recession lead to World War II,” 2/26, http://www.examiner.com/x-3108-Baltimore-
Republican-Examiner~y2009m2d26-Will-this-recession-lead-to-World-War-III]

Could the current economic crisis affecting this country and the world lead to another world
war? The answer may be found by looking back in history. One of the causes of World War I was the economic
rivalry that existed between the nations of Europe. In the 19th century France and Great Britain became wealthy through
colonialism and the control of foreign resources. This forced other up-and-coming nations (such as Germany) to be more competitive
in world trade which led to rivalries and ultimately, to war. After
the Great Depression ruined the economies of
Europe in the 1930s, fascist movements arose to seek economic and social control. From there fanatics like
Hitler and Mussolini took over Germany and Italy and led them both into World War II. With most of North America and Western
Europe currently experiencing a recession, will
competition for resources and economic rivalries with the
Middle East, Asia, or South American cause another world war? Add in nuclear weapons
and Islamic fundamentalism and things look even worse. Hopefully the economy gets
better before it gets worse and the terrifying possibility of World War III is averted. However
sometimes history repeats itself.
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--A2: Resilient

Russian economy is not resilient—incomplete privatization makes it vulnerable to shocks


BBC WORLDWIDE MONITORING 8 (Text of report by popular Russian newspaper Moskovskiy
Komsomolets on 6 October)
Over the almost two decades that have passed since the collapse of the USSR, our economy, it would seem, has changed
unrecognizably. But the scourge of the Soviet planned economy -monopoly-operation -is still alive, as if
no one had ever fought it. "Our economy has turned into a giant state corporation where officially
private structures are playing the role of mere cogs," a former important official in the government apparatus told
me. "And not just a state corporation but a retro-style state corporation. Moreover, the monopoly that exists at a
federal level is reproduced in each region and in each specific settlement. Look, for example, at
the extent to which small and medium-sized businesses are hemmed in, despite all the solemn
statements from the very top! Such a system kills competition and in the long term is not
competitive under crisis conditions."

======Conflict/Instability Bad======
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***Conflict Bad***
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1NC – Yes Escalation

The impact is global nuclear war


Deutsch, 2 (Jeffrey, Political Risk Consultant and Ph.D in Economics, The Rabid Tiger Newsletter, Vol 2, No 9, Nov 18,
http://list.webengr.com/pipermail/picoipo/2002-November/000208.html)

The Rabid Tiger Project believes that a nuclear war is most likely to start in Africa. Civil wars in the Congo (the
country formerly known as Zaire), Rwanda, Somalia and Sierra Leone, and domestic instability in Zimbabwe, Sudan and other
countries, as well as occasional brushfire and other wars (thanks in part to "national" borders that cut across tribal ones) turn into a
really nasty stew. We've got all too many rabid tigers and potential rabid tigers, who are willing to push the button rather than risk
being seen as wishy-washy in the face of a mortal threat and overthrown. Geopolitically speaking, Africa is open range. Very few
countries in Africa are beholden to any particular power. South Africa is a major exception in this respect - not
to mention in that she also probably already has the Bomb. Thus, outside powers can more easily find client
states there than, say, in Europe where the political lines have long since been drawn, or Asia where many of the
countries (China, India, Japan) are powers unto themselves and don't need any "help," thank you. Thus, an African war can
attract outside involvement very quickly. Of course, a proxy war alone may not induce the Great Powers to fight each
other. But an African nuclear strike can ignite a much broader conflagration, if the other powers
are interested in a fight. Certainly, such a strike would in the first place have been facilitated by outside help - financial,
scientific, engineering, etc. Africa is an ocean of troubled waters, and some people love to go fishing.
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--Ext. – Yes Escalation

African instability is the most likely scenario for WMD spread and use
Henk 98. (Dan, Director of African Studies at Africa Center for Strategic Studies and former professor at U.S. Military Academy, “US
National Interests in Sub-Saharan Africa”, Parameters, Winter 1997-98, pp. 92-107)

The term "weapons of mass destruction" (WMD) refers to nuclear, chemical, or biological
agents designed to kill or incapacitate human populations, or to render livestock, crops, and water unfit for
human consumption. Almost by definition, but reinforced by recollections of the nuclear terror of the Cold War,
nonproliferation of such weapons is a vital national interest. The Clinton Administration unambiguously
asserts that "weapons of mass destruction pose the greatest potential threat to global security."[22]
Not surprisingly, the Administration has strongly promoted, in Africa as elsewhere, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Sub-Saharan
Africa has not been a significant venue for development or deployment of weapons of mass destruction. Save for South Africa, no
country in the region is known to have possessed nuclear weapons, or even to have indicated a serious desire to possess them.[23]
Only a handful of Sub-Saharan African countries are known to have chemical weapons. No country in
the region is known to have a current interest in the development of biological weapons. Unfortunately, technology
at the
end of the 20th century is sufficiently advanced that some forms of WMD could be developed
surreptitiously and relatively rapidly anywhere in the world. Such weapons may be attractive to
future leaders of rogue states, including those that might emerge in Sub-Saharan Africa. The most
remote areas of the world probably also provide the best protection against discovery, and could thus be
attractive to outside terrorist groups or criminal organizations willing to pay for locations for covert
laboratories. Africa also could be the venue for the development of natural WMD. As one of the world's
"hot-zones," Central Africa seems to have been the origin of several virulent diseases, particularly
hemorrhagic fevers, with the potential to develop into pandemics of tremendous lethality. Such
diseases pose a threat not only to residents of the region, but to the world beyond the continent as well. At the end of the 20th
century, any disease is but a plane ride away from the population centers of the world.[24]
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1NC – China

Instability undercuts Chinese oil supplies, leading to economic collapse


Pan, 7 Esther Pan. “China, Africa, and Oil,” Council on Foreign Relations, 1/26, 2007
http://www.cfr.org/publication/9557/china_africa_and_oil.html

China's booming economy, which has averaged 9 percent growth per year for the last two
decades, requires massive levels of natural resources to sustain its growth. Once the largest oil exporter in
Asia, China became a net importer of oil in 1993. By 2045, China is projected to depend on imported oil for 45
percent of its energy needs. The country needs to lock in supplies from relatively low-cost
African or Middle Eastern sources, experts say. But after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and the subsequent
upheaval throughout the Middle East, China is actively trying to diversify its supply lines away from Middle
Eastern crude. Experts say China has adopted an aid-for-oil strategy that has resulted in increasing
supplies of oil from African countries.

Chinese economic decline causes a US/China war


Kane, 1 Dr. Thomas M. Kane, prof at the University of Hull, UK and Dr. Lawrence W. Serewicz, Ph.D., University of Hull Fall 2001,
Parameters

Despite China's problems with its food supply, the Chinese do not appear to be in danger of widespread starvation. Nevertheless, one
cannot rule out the prospect entirely, especially if the earth's climate actually is getting warmer. The consequences of general famine
The effects of oil shortages and industrial
in a country with over a billion people clearly would be catastrophic.
stagnation would be less lurid, but economic collapse would endanger China's political stability
whether that collapse came with a bang or a whimper. PRC society has become dangerously fractured. As the
coastal cities grow richer and more cosmopolitan while the rural inland provinces grow poorer, the political interests of the two
regions become ever less compatible. Increasing the prospects for division yet further, Deng Xiaoping's administrative reforms have
strengthened regional potentates at the expense of central authority. As Kent Calder observes, In part, this change [erosion of power
at the center] is a conscious devolution, initiated by Deng Xiaoping in 1991 to outflank conservative opponents of economic reforms in
Beijing nomenclature. But devolution has fed on itself, spurred by the natural desire of local authorities in the affluent and increasingly
powerful coastal provinces to appropriate more and more of the fruits of growth to themselves alone. [49] Other social and economic
developments deepen the rifts in Chinese society. The one-child policy, for instance, is disrupting traditional family life, with
unknowable consequences for Chinese mores and social cohesion. [50] As families resort to abortion or infanticide to ensure that their
one child is a son, the population may come to include an unprecedented preponderance of young, single men. If common gender
prejudices have any basis in fact, these males are unlikely to be a source of social stability. Under these circumstances, China
is
vulnerable to unrest of many kinds. Unemployment or severe hardship, not to mention actual starvation, could
easily trigger popular uprisings. Provincial leaders might be tempted to secede, perhaps openly or
perhaps by quietly ceasing to obey Beijing's directives. China's leaders, in turn, might adopt drastic
measures to forestall such developments. If faced with internal strife, supporters of China's
existing regime may return to a more overt form of communist dictatorship. The PRC has, after all, oscillated
between experimentation and orthodoxy continually throughout its existence. Spectacular examples include Mao's Hundred Flowers
campaign and the return to conventional Marxism-Leninism after the leftist experiments of the Cultural Revolution, but the process
continued throughout the 1980s, when the Chinese referred to it as the "fang-shou cycle." (Fang means to loosen one's grip; shou
means to tighten it.) [51] If order broke down, the Chinese would not be the only people to suffer. Civil
unrest in the PRC would
disrupt trade relationships, send refugees flowing across borders, and force outside powers to
consider intervention. If different countries chose to intervene on different sides, China's struggle
could lead to major war. In a less apocalyptic but still grim scenario, China's government might try to ward
off its demise by attacking adjacent countries.
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1NC – Oil

1. African instability wreaks havoc on the oil market – and the US is dependent on its
supply
Thompson 7 (Christopher, reporter for the Black Agenda Report, a journal about African American political thought and action. The
Scramble for Africa’s Oil. June 20, http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=255&Itemid=37)

"Within a decade, the US will be heavily dependent on African oil. Little wonder the Pentagon is preparing a
strategy for the region." This article originally appeared in The New Statesman (UK). The Pentagon is to reorganize its military
command structure in response to growing fears that the United States is seriously ill-equipped to fight the war against terrorism in
Africa. It is a dramatic move, and an admission that the US must reshape its whole military policy if it is to maintain control of Africa for
the duration of what Donald Rumsfeld has called "the long war." Suddenly
the world's most neglected continent is
assuming an increasing global importance as the international oil industry begins to exploit
more and more of the west coast of Africa's abundant reserves. The Pentagon at present has five geographic
Unified Combatant Commands around the world, and responsibility for Africa is awkwardly divided among three of these. Most of
Africa - a batch of 43 countries - falls under the European Command (Eucom), with the remainder divided between the Pacific
Command and Central Command (which also runs the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan). Now the Pentagon - under the Joint Chiefs of Staff
and the defense department - is working on formal proposals for a unified military command for the continent under the name
"Africom." This significant shift in US relations with Africa comes in the face of myriad threats: fierce economic competition from Asia;
increasing resource nationalism in Russia and South America; and instability in the Middle East that threatens to spill over into Africa.
"The US must reshape its whole military policy if it is to maintain control of Africa." The Pentagon
hopes to finalize Africom's structure, location and budget this year. The expectation is that it can break free from Eucom and become
operative by mid-2008. "The break from Europe will occur before 30 September 2008," Professor Peter Pham, a US adviser on Africa
to the Pentagon told the New Statesman. "The independent command should be up and running by this time next year." A Pentagon
source says the new command, which was originally given the green light by the controversial former US defense secretary Donald
Rumsfeld, is likely to be led by William "Kip" Ward, the US army's only four-star African-American general. In 2005, Ward was
appointed the US security envoy to the Middle East and he is reportedly close to President George W. Bush. He also has boots-on-the-
ground experience in Africa: he was a commander during Bill Clinton's ill-fated mission in Somalia in 1993 and he served as a military
America's new Africa strategy reflects its
representative in Egypt in 1998. Ward is now the deputy head of Eucom.
key priorities in the Middle East: oil and counter-terrorism. Currently, the US has in place the loosely defined
Trans-Sahara Counter-Terrorism Initiative, incorporating an offshoot of Operation Enduring Freedom that is intended to keep terrorist
networks out of the vast, unguarded Sahel. But the lack of a coherent and unified policy on Africa is, according to some observers,
hampering America's efforts in the Middle East. US military sources estimate that up to a quarter of all foreign fighters in Iraq are from
Africa, mostly from Algeria and Morocco. Moreover, there is increasing alarm within the US defense establishment at the creeping
"radicalization" of Africa's Muslims, helped along by the export of hardline, Wahhabi-style clerics from the Arabian peninsula. "The
terrorist challenge [has] increased in Africa in the past year - it's gotten a new lease on life," according to Pham. But it is the west's
increasing dependency on African oil that gives particular urgency to these new directions in the fight against terrorism. Africa's
enormous, and largely untapped, reserves are already more important to the west than most Americans recognize. In March 2006,
speaking before the Senate armed services committee, General James Jones, the then head of Eucom, said: "Africa
currently
provides over 15 per cent of US oil imports, and recent explorations in the Gulf of Guinea region
indicate potential reserves that could account for 25-35 per cent of US imports within the next
decade." "Africa's enormous, and largely untapped, reserves are already more important to the
west than most Americans recognize." These high-quality reserves - West African oil is typically low in sulphur
and thus ideal for refining - are easily accessible by sea to western Europe and the US. In 2005, the
US imported more oil from the Gulf of Guinea than it did from Saudi Arabia and Kuwait
combined. Within the next ten years it will import more oil from Africa than from the entire
Middle East. Western oil giants such as ExxonMobil, Chevron, France's Total and Britain's BP and Shell plan to invest
tens of billions of dollars in sub-Saharan Africa (far in excess of "aid" inflows to the region). But though the Gulf of
Guinea is one of the few parts of the world where oil production is poised to increase exponentially in the near
future, it is also one of the most unstable.
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2. A surge in oil prices threatens the US economy


Tepperman, 4 Jonathan Tepperman, senior editor at Foreign Affairs, 5/1/2004, Charleston Daily Mail
A surge in oil prices would hurt everyone: consumers, by making transportation and heating far
more expensive; and producers, by increasing the cost of their energy and other raw materials. This
would raise the price of finished goods, decreasing sales and hitting consumers yet again.
Worse, as we saw in the 1970s, a sudden jump in oil prices could also cause interest rates to
skyrocket, setting off a dangerous inflationary spiral.

3. Nuclear war.
Friedberg and Schoenfeld, 8
[Aaron, Prof. Politics. And IR @ Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School and Visiting Scholar @ Witherspoon
Institute, and Gabriel, Senior Editor of Commentary and Wall Street Journal, “The Dangers of a Diminished
America”, 10-28, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122455074012352571.html]

With the global financial system in serious trouble, is America's geostrategic dominance likely
to diminish? If so, what would that mean? One immediate implication of the crisis that began on Wall Street and spread across
the world is that the primary instruments of U.S. foreign policy will be crimped. The next president will face
an entirely new and adverse fiscal position. Estimates of this year's federal budget deficit already show that it has jumped $237 billion
from last year, to $407 billion. With families and businesses hurting, there will be calls for various and expensive domestic relief
programs. In the face of this onrushing river of red ink, both Barack Obama and John McCain have been reluctant to lay out what
portions of their programmatic wish list they might defer or delete. Only Joe Biden has suggested a possible reduction -- foreign aid.
This would be one of the few popular cuts, but in budgetary terms it is a mere grain of sand. Still, Sen. Biden's comment hints at where
we may be headed: toward a major reduction in America's world role, and perhaps even a new era of financially-
induced isolationism. Pressures to cut defense spending, and to dodge the cost of waging two wars, already
intense before this crisis, are likely to mount. Despite the success of the surge, the war in Iraq remains deeply unpopular.
Precipitous withdrawal -- attractive to a sizable swath of the electorate before the financial implosion -- might well
become even more popular with annual war bills running in the hundreds of billions. Protectionist sentiments are sure to grow
stronger as jobs disappear in the coming slowdown. Even before our current woes, calls to save jobs by restricting imports had begun
to gather support among many Democrats and some Republicans. In
a prolonged recession, gale-force winds of
protectionism will blow. Then there are the dolorous consequences of a potential collapse of the world's financial
architecture. For decades now, Americans have enjoyed the advantages of being at the center of that system. The worldwide use of
the dollar, and the stability of our economy, among other things, made it easier for us to run huge budget deficits, as we counted on
foreigners to pick up the tab by buying dollar-denominated assets as a safe haven. Will this be possible in the future? Meanwhile,
traditional foreign-policy challenges are multiplying. The threat from al Qaeda and Islamic
terrorist affiliates has not been extinguished. Iran and North Korea are continuing on their
bellicose paths, while Pakistan and Afghanistan are progressing smartly down the road to
chaos. Russia's new militancy and China's seemingly relentless rise also give cause for concern. If
America now tries to pull back from the world stage, it will leave a dangerous power vacuum.
The stabilizing effects of our presence in Asia, our continuing commitment to Europe, and our
position as defender of last resort for Middle East energy sources and supply lines could all be
placed at risk. In such a scenario there are shades of the 1930s, when global trade and finance ground nearly
to a halt, the peaceful democracies failed to cooperate, and aggressive powers led by the remorseless fanatics
who rose up on the crest of economic disaster exploited their divisions. Today we run the risk
that rogue states may choose to become ever more reckless with their nuclear toys, just at our
moment of maximum vulnerability. The aftershocks of the financial crisis will almost certainly
rock our principal strategic competitors even harder than they will rock us. The dramatic free fall of the
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Russian stock market has demonstrated the fragility of a state whose economic performance hinges on high oil prices,
now driven down by the global slowdown. China is perhaps even more fragile, its economic growth depending heavily on
foreign investment and access to foreign markets. Both will now be constricted, inflicting economic pain and perhaps even sparking
unrest in a country where political legitimacy rests on progress in the long march to prosperity. None
of this is good news if
the authoritarian leaders of these countries seek to divert attention from internal travails with
external adventures. As for our democratic friends, the present crisis comes when many European nations are struggling to
deal with decades of anemic growth, sclerotic governance and an impending demographic crisis. Despite its past dynamism, Japan
faces similar challenges. India is still in the early stages of its emergence as a world economic and geopolitical power. What does this
all mean? There is no substitute for America on the world stage. The choice we have before us is between the
potentially disastrous effects of disengagement and the stiff price tag of continued American leadership. Are we up for the task? The
American economy has historically demonstrated remarkable resilience. Our market-oriented ideology, entrepreneurial culture,
flexible institutions and favorable demographic profile should serve us well in whatever trials lie ahead. The American people, too,
have shown reserves of resolve when properly led. But experience after the Cold War era -- poorly articulated and executed policies,
divisive domestic debates and rising anti-Americanism in at least some parts of the world -- appear to have left these reserves
diminished. A recent survey by the Chicago Council on World Affairs found that 36% of respondents agreed that the U.S. should "stay
out of world affairs," the highest number recorded since this question was first asked in 1947. The economic crisis could be
the straw that breaks the camel's back.
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--Ext. – Kills Oil

1. Our Thompson 07 ev says the US has become reliant on African oil. In years, it will
account for 35% of supply, usurping the Middle East – but SSA instability threatens the
global market.

2. African instability makes it an unreliable source for oil


Widdershoven 4 (Cyril, editor of Global Energy Security Analysis and Institute for the Analysis of Global Security (IAGS) associate
fellow. West African Oil: Hope or Hype? http://www.iags.org/africa.html.)

Despite the optimism, the possible impact of the West African oil and gas reserves should however not be overestimated. The West
African oil province (the so-called Ecowas region or Gulf of Guinea) holds 33.8 bln barrels of proven oil reserves, 3.1% of the global
total. Taking into account unproven reserves increases West Africa's share to around 7% of the world's total. In comparison to known
oil reserves in the Middle East - 690 bln barrels - West Africa is at present nothing more than a
minor player. Much of
West Africa's oil reserves are offshore and thus more expensive to extract. While analysts look to the
potential of West African oil to stabilize the international oil markets by adding a new layer of supply under the current volatile oil
sector, giving traders and consumers more leeway to cope with crisis such as strikes in Venezuela or an Iraq war, current optimism is
based on prerequisites of stability in the region, increased foreign investment, transparency and liberalization in the domestic
Revolutions, violence, ethnic unrest and
petroleum sectors of West Africa and geo-strategic considerations.
corruption undermine the growth potential of the petroleum sector in this vast region. Domestic
political strife brought several African countries to a standstill this past year. In March, international oil majors
ChevronTexaco and Shell were forced to suspend production in the Niger Delta region following violent clashes
and even outright kidnapping of international personnel. The 266,000 barrels per day (bpd) of lost oil
represented approximately 13% of Nigeria's total average production of 2.1 million bpd. International oil markets felt the pressure.
The ever-growing illicit small-arms trade has added fuel to the fire. Warlords have wreaked
havoc in huge countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra Leone, Angola, parts of Nigeria and Liberia. Over the last
months, international security services from the U.S, the EU and Asia, have turned their attention to al-Qaeda operatives in West
African countries, such as Mauritania, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Burkina Faso. Illegal finance schemes involving diamonds, arms and
terrorist networks have also surfaced. Bi- or even multilateral border disputes over control of potentially
oil rich territories pose a threat to on- and offshore developments. Congo and Angola are in
conflict over access to offshore oil; according to Congo the dispute is depriving it of as much as 200,000 bpd.
Nigeria has multiple disputes with other states, of which the disputed Bakassi peninsula is the most pressing one. Since West African
oil producing states are almost solely dependent on oil income, volatile international oil prices have profound impact on local
economies, leading, as in the case of Nigeria, to potentially
paralyzing national strikes. Oil related corruption
is rampant in the region. According to Transparency International, Nigeria is the world's second most corrupt
country, and corruption is growing in Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Ghana, and various other West
African countries, including oil newcomers such as Sao Tome, whose government was just toppled by a military coup. In an effort
to combat this problem, a push for transparency and liberalization has increased pressure on international oil operators, such as Shell
or BP, to open their books. The "Publish What You Pay" campaign, sponsored by George Soros' Open Society Institute and Global
Witness, and supported by over 130 NGOs, has called on international extraction companies to "publish net taxes, fees, royalties, and
other payments made so civil society can more accurately assess the amount of money misappropriated and lobby for full
transparency in local government spending." Underlining the effort, British Prime Minister Blair announced the Extractive Industries
Transparency Initiative, endorsed by a coalition of institutional investors, during the World Summit on Sustainable Development in
Johannesburg this past September. Nigeria, by far the largest West African producer, provides a concrete
example of the risks of relying on the region. Nigeria was the fifth largest crude exporter to the US in 2002, behind
Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Canada and Venezuela. According to the DOE's Energy Information Administration (EIA,) Nigeria's exports to
the U.S. declined from 842,000 bpd in 2001 (9.03% of total U.S. imports) to around 567,000 bpd in 2002 (6.27% of
U.S. imported crude oil.) Increased reliance on Nigeria means increased exposure to unrest, disputes and
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instability in this volatile country. Since Nigeria is a member of OPEC its crude oil exports are also limited by the oil
cartel's policy restrictions, which already constrain further expansion of production.

3. Specifically, Nigerian instability threatens US and China’s oil hopes.


Wolfe 6 (Adam, senior analyst and editor for Africa and Asia at PINR, Power and Interests News Reports. The Increasing Importance of
African Oil. March 20. http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=460)

In Nigeria, political corruption, criminal networks, violent Islamist groups, and domestic rebels
threaten to take the world's eighth-largest oil exporter off the market. It is estimated that 70,000 to
300,000 barrels of oil are stolen daily in Nigeria. Even at the low end of this estimate, this would generate more
than $1.5 billion every year -- more than enough capital to buy arms and political influence and
threaten the government's survival. Another 500,000 bpd have been taken off the market by the recent kidnappings
and violence perpetuated by the Movement for the Emancipation of the People of the Niger Delta. [See: "Intelligence Brief: Iran,
Nigeria"] In the midst of this instability, the world's largest and second-largest oil importers are playing an increasingly dangerous
game of power politics. For both Washington
and Beijing, the nightmare of rebel groups halting oil
extraction in the delta -- which will dry up revenues on which the northern elites depend, potentially leading to
a northern Muslim general ousting the president -- appears distinctly possible.
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--Ext. – Africa Key US

Africa key to US oil supply


Geotimes 4. (“Global Oil Hot Spots”, December, www.geotimes.org/dec04/feature_hotspots.html)
Advances in deepwater technology have recently increased the economic feasibility of
recovering previously unreachable resources, in part fueling the oil boom that began offshore in the mid-
1990s. Since then, the region has continued to be attractive to petroleum companies as an alternative to
the Middle East, even though that oil wealth has not translated into better living conditions for the people of West Africa. Citing
resources in South America and West Africa, the USGS report notes the apparent emergence of a major energy-producing region in the
South Atlantic. “This could lead to a significant strategic change in the intercontinental import-
export flow of petroleum,” wrote geologist Ron Charpentier, coordinator for sub-Saharan Africa
for the USGS World Energy Resources Team, and his colleagues. In testimony last July before the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, David L. Goldwyn, former U.S. assistant energy secretary for international affairs, predicted that the non-
OPEC countries in the west-Africa Gulf of Guinea region could provide up to 20 percent of U.S. energy
needs in the coming years. He noted that governments there are open to Western investment and
have good relationships with the United States. By and large, the United States would prefer to
get oil from non-OPEC countries for “easy supply,” says Tony N. Enyia, a petroleum economist with
Royal Dutch/Shell in Lagos, Nigeria. And compared with the Middle East as a development region, he says that
West Africa’s political and religious climates play “salutary roles.” But the region is far from being geopolitically
stable. “Political risk is fairly high in a lot of African countries,” Charpentier says. “That’s almost always a consideration.”

African oil exports to US growing increasingly important as we move away from the
Middle East.
BBC News 3 (How Important is Africa Oil. July 9 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3054948.stm)
The US imports two thirds of
But his visit has also highlighted the growing importance of oil imports for the United States.
its oil needs. About 15% of that amount comes from West Africa and that figure is projected to rise to 25% in the
next 10 years. The oil sector in Sub-Saharan Africa is one of the fastest growing in the world. Click
here to see a map of Africa's oilfields Production has taken off in the Gulf of Guinea which includes Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea,
Cameroon, Gabon, Angola and Congo. By the end of 2003, hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude will be
flowing from oil fields in Chad, through rain forests in Cameroon to tankers docked off the
Atlantic coast. Political problems are much more localised in Africa Douglas Mason, EIU An American company has
secured a concession in the neighbouring Central African Republic. In the aftermath of 11 September 2001, America
is seen as looking to reduce its dependence on the Middle East by looking elsewhere for energy supplies.
Despite a reputation for political and economic instability, oil flows from Africa can be reliable, especially as production
often takes place off-shore. "Usually oil production takes place in enclaves, so continues regardless of
what goes on around," said Douglas Mason, Africa specialist at the Economist Intelligence Unit. "Political problems are much
more localised in Africa." US military involvement America may even eventually increase its military presence in the region to secure
its oil supplies. Sao Tome - which has big oil reserves - has invited the US Navy to build a port from which to
patrol the Gulf of Guinea.

Global leaders all share an interest in Africa’s oil.


Wolfe 6 (Adam, senior analyst and editor for Africa and Asia at PINR, Power and Interests News Reports. The Increasing Importance of
African Oil. March 20. http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=460)
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Africa is becoming an increasingly important factor in global energy markets. By the end of the decade, the continent's
significance will rise dramatically. Africa currently contributes 12 percent of the world's liquid hydrocarbon production,
and one in four barrels of oil discovered outside of the U.S. and Canada between 2000 and 2004 came from
Africa. IHS Energy, an oil and gas consulting firm, calculates that Africa will supply 30 percent of the world's growth in
hydrocarbon production by 2010. West Africa's low-sulfur oil is highly desirable for environmental reasons, is
readily transported to the eastern U.S. seaboard, and can be easily processed by China's refineries.
Fifteen percent of U.S. oil imports come from Africa; by 2010 this could reach 20 percent. In this decade, US$50 billion
will be invested in the Gulf of Guinea's energy sector, according to a recent report by the Council on Foreign Relations. While U.S.
companies will account for 40 percent of this investment, other major players -- particularly state-owned energy companies -- will play
a critical role in determining the shape of Africa's energy industry. From 1995 to 2005, national oil companies more than
doubled the number of licenses they hold in Africa, from 95 to 216. China's energy firms are the largest state-owned investors, but
India has also made significant investments and is looking to expand its presence in the region.

African oil imports to the US are matching Middle Eastern imports and other countries.
Joannidis 3 (Marie- French ministry of foreign affairs. Oil: A regional and global issue. http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/en/country-
files_156/subsaharan-africa_1962/oil-regional-and-global-issue_2073.html.)

Soaring crude oil prices as a result of sabre-rattling in the Middle East have increased the
importance of Africa’s oil and gas reserves. Those of the Gulf of Guinea, in particular, have triggered sharp competition
among the consumers, led by the United States. The Africans want to take advantage of this to strengthen their regional cooperation
and give a boost to their development projects. The Americans, the world’s biggest consumers of energy, recognised
after
September 11, 2001, the strategic value of the continent’s hydrocarbon reserves, which explains
their renewed interest for African countries. US crude imports from Nigeria and Angola - the two
leading sub-Saharan producers - are already matching those of purchases from Venezuela and Mexico,
their closest oil-exporting neighbours. And the United States imports as much oil from the west coast of Africa as
it does from Saudi Arabia.
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--Oil Key Econ

Oil shocks destroy US economic growth.


Conraria, and Wen, 5, Luis Aguiar, and Yi, Department of Economics at Cornell University, 2005, Working Papers from the Federal
Reserve Bank of St. Louis, June

In this paper, we provide further empirical


evidence for the importance of oil shocks in driving U.S.
economic fluctuations. Our results strengthen the previous findings of the empirical literature, showing that the oil crises
in the early 1970s are the culprit of the deep recession in the mid-1970s. However, standard models are not able to
quantitatively account for this oil-driven recession despite the common belief that oil shocks in the 1970s are responsible for that
recession. In fact, it is common for textbooks and the literature to cite the oil crises in 1973 as a leading example of productivity-shocks
that drive post-war business cycles. We argue that the failure of standard models hinges on a missing multiplier-accelerator
mechanism that serves to amplify and propagate the impact of oil shocks on the U.S. economy.
We construct such a multiplier-accelerator mechanism using a general equilibrium model featuring capacity utilization and
externalities; we show that the mechanism is capable of explaining the important features of the data.
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1NC – Terrorism

Anarchy in Africa undermines the global war on terrorism and causes nuclear terror
Dempsey, 6 Thomas Dempsey ‘6 Director of African Studies at Army War College, April 2006 [“Counterterrorism in African Failed States,”
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub649.pdf]

Failed states offer attractive venues for terrorist groups seeking to evade counterterrorism
efforts of the United States and its partners in the Global War on Terror (GWOT). State failure entails, among its other
features, the disintegration and criminalization of public security forces, the collapse of the state administrative structure responsible
for overseeing those forces, and the erosion of infrastructure that supports their effective operation. These circumstances make
identification of terrorist groups operating within failed states very difficult, and action against such groups, once identified,
problematic. Terrorist groups that are the focus of the current GWOT display the characteristics of a network organization with two
very different types of cells: terrorist nodes and terrorist hubs.1 Terrorist nodes are small, closely knit local cells that actually commit
terrorist acts in the areas in which they are active. Terrorist hubs provide ideological guidance, financial support, and access to
resources enabling node attacks. An
examination of three failed states in Sub-Saharan Africa— Liberia, Sierra
Leone, and Somalia—reveals the presence of both types of cells and furnishes a context for assessing
the threat they pose to the national interests of the United States and its partners. Al Qaeda
established terrorist hubs in Liberia and Sierra Leone to exploit the illegal diamond trade, laundering money, and
building connections with organized crime and the illegal arms trade. In Somalia, Al Qaeda and Al Ittihad Al
Islami established terrorist hubs that supported terrorist operations throughout East Africa. A new organization led by Aden Hashi
’Ayro recruited terrorist nodes that executed a series of attacks on Western nongovernment organization (NGO) employees and
journalists within Somalia. Analysis of these groups suggests that while the terrorist nodes in failed states pose little threat to the
interests of the United States or its GWOT partners, terrorist hubs operating in the same states may be highly dangerous. The hubs
observed in these three failed states were able to operate without attracting the attention or
effective sanction of the United States or its allies. They funneled substantial financial
resources, as well as sophisticated weaponry, to terrorist nodes operating outside the failed states in
which the hubs were located. The threat posed by these hubs to U.S. national interests and to the interests of its partners
is significant, and is made much more immediate by the growing risk that nuclear Weapons of Mass
Destruction (WMD) will fall into terrorist hands. The burgeoning proliferation of nuclear weapons and the
poor security of some existing nuclear stockpiles make it more likely that terrorist groups like Al
Qaeda will gain access to nuclear weapons. The accelerating Iranian covert nuclear weapons program, estimated to
produce a nuclear capability within as little as one year, is especially disturbing in this context.2 A failed state terrorist hub
that secures access to a nuclear weapon could very conceivably place that weapon in the hands
of a terrorist node in a position to threaten vital American national interests.

Terrorism Causes Extinction


Sid-Ahmed, 4, political analyst 04 (Mohamed, Managing Editor for Al-Ahali, “Extinction!” August 26-September 1, Issue no. 705,
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/705/op5.htm)

What would be the consequences of a nuclear attack by terrorists? Even if it fails, it would
further exacerbate the negative features of the new and frightening world in which we are now living.
Societies would close in on themselves, police measures would be stepped up at the expense of human rights, tensions
between civilisations and religions would rise and ethnic conflicts would proliferate. It would
also speed up the arms race and develop the awareness that a different type of world order is imperative if humankind is to
survive. But the still more critical scenario is if the attack succeeds. This could lead to a third world war, from
which no one will emerge victorious. Unlike a conventional war which ends when one side triumphs over another, this
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war will be without winners and losers. When nuclear pollution infects the whole planet, we will all be
losers.
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--Ext. – Key Terrorism

1. Extend our 1NC Lyman ev – Africa exhibits all the preconditions for terrorism. Failure
to solve there allows recruits and financing to ignite global terrorism. Alexander impacts
this with extinction.

2. More ev that Africa is the lynchpin for global terrorism – multiple reasons

a) vulnerability**
Carfano and Gardener 3. (James Jay, PhD and Senior Research Fellow at Institute for Int’l Studies, and Niles, PhD and Fellow at
the Heritage Foundation, Heritage Backgrounder #1697, http://www.heritage.org/Research/Africa/bg1697.cfm)

Africa's troubles are many, and they have global implications. Sub-Saharan Africa remains the world's
poorest region, with a GDP per capita income of just $575 in 2002.4 Average life expectancy is only 48 years. In addition, an
estimated 30 million Africans are infected with HIV/AIDS.5 Among the disease's many victims are the continent's military forces, whose
weakened ranks are rife not only with those who have contracted HIV/AIDS, but also with those who spread it.6 The spread of global
infectious disease will become a more significant problem in the 21st century if Africa becomes the source of deadly pathogens that
could plague American shores.7 Nor is disease the only African crisis that could draw in the United States. Of even more immediate
concern are political, economic, and environmental stresses that could well lead to internal violence and resulting demands for U.S.
intervention. The civil war in Liberia prompted widespread international calls for Washington to put U.S. troops on the ground.
Eventually, 200 U.S. soldiers were sent into the Liberian capital, Monrovia, in August 2003 to help facilitate the arrival of a larger West
African peacekeeping force. The United States must also be vigilant for its own security, remaining alert to the rise of African
"enabler" or "slacker" states that might foster global terrorism. Enabler states are countries willing to facilitate
transnational terrorism, share intelligence, or sell weapons or weapons technologies to those who in turn might threaten the United
States. Libya, for example, has a long history of support for terrorist groups in the Middle East and more than 30 terrorist groups
worldwide.8 Slacker states are nations with lax laws or poor law enforcement, which unintentionally allow transnational terrorist
groups to operate within their borders or permit state or non-state groups to obtain weapons or support illicitly from the private
sector. Somalia offers a case in point. With a dysfunctional central government, chronic instability, and porous
borders, it serves as a potential staging ground for international terrorists.9 While poverty and instability alone
do not breed terrorists or weapons proliferators,10 African nations with weak civil societies and poor law enforcement and
judicial systems are vulnerable to penetration and exploitation by transnational terrorist groups.
Enabler and slacker states are potentially important components of the global terrorist threat
because such countries can expand the resource base of lesser states and terrorist groups,
making it possible for them to field more substantial threats than they might represent
otherwise. Transnational terrorism already has a prominent foothold in Africa. It is no coincidence that Osama bin Laden found
safe haven in Sudan in the 1990s.11 The al-Qaeda threat continues to grow in countries such as Kenya and Tanzania. Al-Qaeda cells are
also operating in neighbouring Somalia.

b) al Qaeda links
Lyman et al. 4. (Princeton N., former U.S. Ambassador to South Africa and Nigeria; Ralph Bunche, Senior Fellow and Dir. of Africa
Policy Studies @ Council for Foreign Relations; J. Stephen Morrison, Dir. of Africa Program @ CSIS, “The Terrorist Threat in Africa”, Foreign
Affairs, January-February, pg. 75, lexis)

Outside of Nigeria, therefore, the terrorist threat in West and Central Africa comes less from religion and politics than from lack of
sovereign control and general debility. The Bush administration acknowledged this link in its 2002 National Security Strategy, which
argued that "poverty,
weak institutions, and corruption can make weak states vulnerable to
terrorist networks and drug cartels within their borders." Both Central and West Africa are
exceptionally anarchic zones. Interrelated wars have occurred in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Cote
d'Ivoire, and Guinea. Nine African countries were drawn into the war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, during the late
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1990s. This highly unstable situation has given rise to a dangerous chaos in which criminal syndicates partner with rogue leaders
(Charles Taylor in Liberia, Blaise Campaore in Burkina Faso, and Muammar al-Qaddafi in Libya, for example) and al Qaeda. Al Qaeda
has used the region less to foment terrorism than to protect and expand its finances, a challenge for the organization since the U.S.
campaign against it went into high gear after September 11. As documented by Global Witness, The Washington Post, and the UN, al
Qaeda started marketing gems through its East Africa networks and has subsequently taken
advantage of the civil war and chaos in the Democratic Republic of the Congo to extend its activities
into that mineral rich-country. With attention focused on the Middle East, the horrific war in the Congo -- which took nearly 3 million
lives -- went almost unnoticed in U.S. media and political circles. But figuring out how to take advantage of the conflict was clearly on
al Qaeda's agenda.

C) Conflict diamonds ignite civil wars and fund terrorism


Warah 4. (Sept. 04, Rasna, Illicit Diamonds: Africa's Curse,
http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=0&did=746806101&SrchMode=1&sid=3&Fmt=4&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&RQT=309&VName=PQD
&TS=1176314564&clientId=14606)

Just as the history of Arab States is intimately tied to the discovery of oil in the region, the
discovery of diamonds in
Africa has not only impacted the continent's history, but has been one of the leading causes of conflict. The link
between diamonds and conflict in Africa and the role of international players in the illicit diamond trade were recently discussed at a
seminar in Nairohi, Kenya, on resource-based conflicts organized by the Society for International Development's East Africa Chapter. It
is interesting to note that Africa's
most conflict-ridden countries-Angola, Sierra Leone and the
Democratic Republic of the Congo-are also the most diamond-rich countries on the continent,
as well as the most poor and underdeveloped. Conflict or "blood" diamonds have fuelled wars
and led to the massive displacement of civilian populations in many African nations. While conflict
diamonds represent a small proportion of the overall diamond trade, illicit diamonds constitute as much as 20 per cent of the annual
world production. The level of illegality gives an opportunity and a space for conflict diamonds. The
link between
diamonds, poverty and conflict is evident in countries such as Sierra Leone, where the rich alluvial
diamond fields of the Kono District and Tongo Field were among the most prized targets of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF). In
2000, Partnership Africa Canada (PAC) published a report entitled "The Heart of the Matter: Sierra Leone, Diamonds and Human
Security", which placed much of the blame for the civil war in the country on diamonds, describing them as "small bits of carbon that
have no intrinsic value in themselves, and no value whatsoever to the average Sierra Leonean beyond their attraction to foreigners".
The report recounts the corrupting of Sierra Leone's diamond industry, from peak exports of 2 million carats a year in the 1960s to less
than 50,000 carats by 1998. The country's despotic President during much of this time, Siaka Stevens, had tacitly encouraged illicit
mining by becoming involved in criminal or near-criminal activities himself. When the RUF began waging a war in 1991, Liberian leader
Charles Taylor acted as mentor, trainer, banker and weapons supplier for the movement. The RUF also took on the role of
diamond supplier to the illicit international trade. "It is ironic", says the report, "that enormous
profits have been made from diamonds throughout the conflict, but the only effect on the
citizens of the country where they were mined has been terror, murder, dismemberment and
poverty". The PAC report supports the idea that there was virtually no oversight of the international movement of diamonds. In
later years, civil war often revolved around the control of this illicit trade. In 2002, a UN Expert Panel reported
that the then "interim" leader of the RUF, Issa Sesay, had flown to Abidjan late in 2001 with 8,000 carats of diamonds that he had sold
to two traders of undisclosed identity, who were apparently using a Lebanese businessman to run errands for them between Abidjan
and the Liberian capital, Monrovia. Some reports suggest that the
UN peacekeeping force in Sierra Leone may
have also become involved in the RUF illicit diamond trading. In 2001, shortly after the 11 September attacks
in New York and Washington, D.C., the Washington Post found another link in this most secretive and
highly lucrative trade-that of international terrorists. In an article published on 2 November 2001, war
correspondent Douglas Farah stated that the Al Qaeda network "reaped millions of dollars in the past three
years from the illicit sale of diamonds mined by rebels in Sierra Leone" and that three senior Al Qaeda
operatives had visited Sierra Leone at different times in 1998 and later. He further claimed that the West African Shi'ite Lebanese
community was sympathetic to Hezbollah and often served as a link between the RUF rebels and Al Qaeda.
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d) failed states
VOA 5. (“African Terrorism”, Voice of America, Sept. 8, http://www.voanews.com/english/archive/2005-09/2005-09-08-
voa46.cfm?textmode=0)

Martha Crenshaw, a professor of government at Wesleyan University and an authority on terrorism, says it is not surprising that some
African countries could be used as launching grounds for terror. "These are areas in which the states
are extremely weak, they often don't like to be called 'failed states,' but they're certainly states in which
there are large, 'lawless zones,' as we call them, where the authority of the central government is
non-existent, and therefore where training, recruitment, conspiratorial plotting can all take place.
Furthermore, these are areas in which there has been conflict and fighting."

e) rise of conservative Islam


Carson, 4 Johnnie Carson, Senior Vice President at the National Defense University and former US Ambassador, September 2004,
“Shaping U.S. Policy on Africa: Pillars of a New Strategy,” http://www.ndu.edu/inss/strforum/h6.html p. 4

Future terrorism in Africa is almost certain. Africa is a soft target, and most African states lack
the security necessary to prevent well- coordinated terrorist attacks. This fact—coupled with the
existence of several failed or weakened states in various parts of the continent with significant Muslim
populations, the rise of conservative Islam in northern Nigeria (the most populous state in Africa and the eighth
largest Muslim state in the world), and the continued growth and spread of Islam through- out much of west,
central, and northeastern Africa—could see Africa emerge in the months and years ahead as a new regional battleground in the war
on terrorism. Conservative and some-
times radical Islamic organizations have been able to make
enormous headway among Muslim populations in some African states affected by poverty,
economic deprivation, and political alienation. This has happened outside of Africa, and it can also happen on the
continent. It is in the interest of both Africa and the United States to prevent this, but it can only be stopped through strong
collaborative efforts, not through unilateral action.

F) Corruption allows illegal immigration of terrorists into Africa


Holt 4. (Andrew, Southeast Asia political analyst, “South Africa in the War on Terror”, Global Terrorism Analysis, Volume 2, Issue 23)
Finally, corruption at many levels of government opens up opportunities to infiltrate the state security apparatus,
bypass formal immigration and customs procedures – particularly at already highly porous
checkpoints along the Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho and Mozambique borders – and obtain /stockpile logistical
materiel. Corruption appears to have played an especially important role in facilitating the acquisition of
passports. According to local law enforcement and intelligence officials, syndicates operating within the Department of Home
Affairs have been selling identity documents on the black markets for several years – often for as little as $77 – many of which are
now being used by al-Qaeda members to illegally enter South Africa as well as facilitate visa-free travel to other parts of
the continent and prominent European hubs such as the United Kingdom. [8]

Africa is a breeding ground for terrorists**


Lyman et al.4. (Princeton N., former U.S. Ambassador to South Africa and Nigeria; Ralph Bunche, Senior Fellow and Dir. of Africa Policy
Studies @ Council for Foreign Relations; J. Stephen Morrison, Dir. of Africa Program @ CSIS, “The Terrorist Threat in Africa”, Foreign Affairs,
January-February, pg. 75, lexis)

At the same time, however, the


United States has failed to recognize the existence of other, less visible,
terrorist threats elsewhere on the African continent. Countering the rise of grass-roots extremism
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has been a central part of U.S. strategy in the Middle East, but the same has not generally been
true for Africa. In Nigeria, for example, a potent mix of communal tensions, radical Islamism, and
anti-Americanism has produced a fertile breeding ground for militancy and threatens to tear
the country apart. South Africa has seen the emergence of a violent Islamist group. And in West
and Central Africa, criminal networks launder cash from illicit trade in diamonds, joining forces
with corrupt local leaders to form lawless bazaars that are increasingly exploited by al Qaeda to
shelter its assets. As the war on terrorism intensifies in Kenya and elsewhere, radicals might
migrate to more accessible, war-ravaged venues across the continent. The Bush administration must deal
with these threats by adopting a more holistic approach to fighting terrorism in Africa. Rather than concentrate solely on shutting
down existing al Qaeda cells, it must also deal with the continent's fundamental problems --
economic distress, ethnic and
religious fissures, fragile governance, weak democracy, and rampant human rights abuses --
that create an environment in which terrorists thrive. The United States must also eliminate the obstacles to
developing a coherent Africa policy that exist in Washington. Counterterrorism programs for the region are consistently
underfinanced, responsibilities are divided along archaic bureaucratic lines, there is no U.S. diplomatic presence in several strategic
locations, and long-term imperatives are consistently allowed to be eclipsed by short-term humanitarian demands. The war on
terrorism might make officials realize what they should have known earlier: that Africa cannot be kept at the back of
the queue forever if U.S. security interests are to be advanced.
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--Terror O/W

Terror outweighs aff impacts


Krieger, 2/7 (David, 2/7/11, “Ten Serious Flaws in Nuclear Deterrence Theory,” Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, professor at University
of Minnesota, JPL)

Nuclear deterrence is based upon the threat of retaliation. Since it is not possible to retaliate
against a foe that you cannot locate, the threat of retaliation is not credible under these
circumstances. Further, terrorists are often suicidal (e.g., “suicide bombers”), and are willing to die to inflict
death and suffering on an adversary. For these reasons, nuclear deterrence will be ineffective in preventing
nuclear terrorism. The only way to prevent nuclear terrorism is to prevent the weapons
themselves from falling into the hands of terrorist organizations. This will become increasingly difficult if
nuclear weapons and the nuclear materials to build them proliferate to more and more countries.

***Hotspots Impacts***
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African Democracy

1. Continuing the rise of democracy in Africa is key to regional stability and is the root of
all harms
Diamond 98. (Larry, Snr. research fellow @ Hoover Institute, Hoover Digest, http://www.hooverdigest.org /983/diamond.html)
The common root cause of economic decay, state collapse, ethnic violence, civil war, and
humanitarian disaster in Africa is bad, abusive governance. Because most states lack any
semblance of a rule of law and norms of accountability that bind the conduct of those in
government, their societies have fallen prey to massive corruption, nepotism, and the personal
whims of a tiny ruling elite. In such circumstances, every political clique and ethnic group struggles for
control of a stagnant or diminishing stock of wealth. There are no institutions to facilitate trust,
cooperation, or confidence in the future. Every competing faction tries to grab what it can for
the moment while excluding other groups. THE SOLUTION The only real antidote to this decay is a
constitutional framework that facilitates the limitation, separation, devolution, and sharing of
power so that each group can have a stake in the system while checking the ruling elite and one
another. In essence, this means a democratic political system, to one degree or another. Given Africa’s
authoritarian history, many changes in beliefs and institutions will be necessary for democracy to emerge. A growing segment of
African elites and the public realize that every type of dictatorship on the continent has been a disaster. Thus, there
is
increasing hunger for economic and political freedom and the predictability of a democratic
constitution. As Hoover Institution senior fellow Barry Weingast pointed out in the American Political Science Review, ethnic
groups will not trust and tolerate one another and cooperate for a larger national good unless
there are credible limits on the state. Democracy cannot be stable unless rulers see that it is in
their interest to abide by the rules. What makes it in their interest is the overriding
commitment of all major ethnic groups, parties, and interest organizations to a constitution.

2. Democracy checks extinction


Diamond 95. (Larry, Snr. research fellow @ Hoover Institute, Promoting Democracy in the 1990's, p 6-
7)

This hardly exhausts the list of threats to our security and well-being in the coming years and decades. In the former Yugoslavia
nationalist aggression tears at the stability of Europe and could easily spread. The flow of illegal drugs intensifies through increasingly
powerful international crime syndicates that have made common cause with authoritarian regimes and have utterly corrupted the
institutions of tenuous, democratic ones. Nuclear,
chemical. and biological weapons continue to proliferate.
The very source of life on Earth, the global ecosystem, appears increasingly endangered. Most of
these new and unconventional threats to security are associated with or aggravated by the weakness or
absence of democracy, with its provisions for legality, accountability, popular sovereignty, and
openness.
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--Environment Module

African democracies check environmental catastrophe


Diamond 97. (Larry, Senior Research Fellow @ Hoover Inst., Prospects for Democratic Development in Africa, p. 11)
Also to be reckoned with is the frightening environmental decay – deforestation,
desertification, pollution - that is associated with growing population density on the land. All this needs to be
acknowledged. The more rapidly population growth and environmental decay proceed, the more they will undermine the ability
of fragile African states to cope with all the challenges they face, not least maintaining political order. Nevertheless (at least in the
short to medium term), the negative political implications of these demographic and ecological changes for democracy should not be
overstated. Three points needed to be recognized. First, these
challenges put a premium on effective
governance. Second, democracy can cope with these problems more efficiently than authoritarian
rule because democracy generally provides great political accountability and responsiveness
and is more likely to deliver “good” governance in Africa. Only though open and responsible
governance are the perquisites for lowering fertility rates – especially improving the education, status, job
prospects, and income of women and facilitating their access to basic health care and birth control technology – likely to be
attained, In fact, one element of hope in Africa’s “second liberation” is the degree to which women’s groups in civil society are
mobilizing and education women to become actively involved in the political process, which is bound to yield policy outputs conducive
global comparative statistical evidence shows that populations grow more
to lower fertility. Moreover,
rapidly under authoritarian regimes than under democratic ones. Third these demographic and
environmental problems are likely to put increasing pressure on authoritarian states in Africa, meaning that autocratic and
psuedodemocratic regimes in counries like Kenya, Cameroon, and Zimbabwe will face rising prospects of protests and even antiregime
violence in the future. This brings us back to one of the core political trheats to democracy in Africa, the gernal deterioration there.

Loss of African environments causes planetary extinction


Strieker 2k. (Gary, CNN, February 21)
There have been rhetorical advances as of late in African rainforest conservation. It remains to
be seen whether talking the talk leads to walking the walks. Planetary survival depends upon making it so.
Commercial logging consumes nearly 40,000 square kilometers of African forest each year, an area the
size of Switzerland. Much of it falls to chainsaws in the vast central African rainforest. Second in size only to the Amazon, is Africa’s
wild plants and animals. Many endangered species face certain extinction if destruction on this scale
continues
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--Small Arms Module

1. African democracy solves small arms trade


Ward 6 (Olivia, Foreign Affairs correspondent, “Fuelling Africa’s Turmoil”, Toronto Star, May 27,
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/smallarms/2006/0527toronto.htm)

In countries that have managed to embrace democracy, Hutchful said, the odds on reducing
violence are better. In northern Mali, a bitter five-year conflict between the settled population and the nomadic Tuareg ended
in 1995, followed by integration of Tuareg fighters into the regular army. Mali's military dictatorship was ousted and democratic
elections held in 2002. But as a sign of how difficult it is to quell armed conflicts once they have begun, Tuareg attacks on two
northeastern towns have left several people dead, and a group of Tuareg army deserters made off with a cache of government
weapons and ammunition. Nevertheless, says Hutchful, "Mali has had real success in disarmament after its Tuareg conflict, because it
did democratize. It's poor, but in spite of its difficulties it's a transformed society and people have more hope." But Hutchful warns
the failure of democracy in many African countries has also compounded the problem of
violence — and complicates peace efforts in hotspots like Darfur in Sudan. "You need regional
co-operation if you're going to stop the flow of arms. That means transparency and
accountability. "But there's no real trust in regional relationships where you have rogue
governments existing side by side with more democratic ones. When trouble ignites, it also migrates — just as
weapons do."

** Eboe Hutchful is the chair of the African Security Sector Network

2. Small Arms outweigh Nuclear Weapons -- certainty of use & systemic impacts make
them a higher priority.
Wood ‘94 (DAVID WOOD; NEWHOUSE NEWS SERVICE -- Plain Dealer – March 20th – lexis)
From Somalia to Sarajevo and in dozens of lesser-known conflicts, a relentless proliferation of
small arms is fueling a global wave of mayhem, and is beyond the ability of authorities to control or even monitor.
A flood of excess Cold War weapons, together with a recent boom in exports from new arms factories around the
world, has combined to lethal effect with a virulent new form of conflict ideally suited to small
arms: ethnic and religious terrorism and violence, spurred by economic and environmental deterioration and
overpopulation. "A fully loaded fighter plane is obviously more deadly than a rifle, but there are a lot
more rifles in the world and they are used with much less discretion," said Aaron Karp, a political scientist
at Old Dominion University in Virginia and one of a handful of arms analysts who are beginning to study the problem. In the Persian
Gulf war of 1991, 5,000 to 10,000 Iraqis are believed to have been killed, mostly by American bombers, guided missiles and long-range
artillery. By contrast, Karp said, a dozen "minor" conflicts around the world at the same time - in Angola and Cambodia, for instance –
While the world's
each produced more than 10,000 deaths, most of them the result of rifles, hand grenades and mines.
arsenals of missiles, long-range bombers and nuclear weapons bear watching, Karp said, "the greater danger
certainly comes from the weapons used in ethnic conflict."
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African Econ Impact

African economic growth is critical to prevent war, AIDS, deforestation, global warming,
ozone depletion, pandemics, and world economic collapse
Stetter, 9 (Ernst, Secretary General of Federation for European Progressive Studies, “Why Africa matters! – The economic crisis and
Africa,” Contribution to the Shadow GN 2009, February 4 and 5, http://www.feps-
europe.eu/fileadmin/downloads/globalisation/090204_Stetter_Africa.pdf)

If there is no doubt that Africa is endowed with abundant natural resources, it is also true that Africa
is still struggling to
address the multiple challenges facing the continent, this includes poverty, under-development, protracted
conflicts, environmental degradation, HIV/AIDS pandemic, tuberculosis and malaria. It has been
suggested that all over Africa, poverty is a common denominator and it is not surprising that people’s immune
systems have been damaged. Reports on Africa’s HIV/AIDS pandemic have all come to the conclusion that HIV/AIDS on the continent is
closely associated to poverty. It is clear that the absence of technological investment and the contemning human resource capacity has
the new
prevented Africa from making optimal use of its abundant resources for the benefit of its people. Nevertheless,
scramble for natural resources in the continent is likely to create a new awareness of the
geopolitical importance of the African region. Therefore, Africa remains a critical partner for the
world’s economic viability. However, for Africa to benefit more from its vast natural resources it must be finally enabled to
add value to these products rather than export them raw to Europe and elsewhere in the developed world. Africa needs to be helped
in manufacturing value-added products that yield higher profit and income to African economies. In addition, there are, at least, five
significant factors that provide a plausible explanation as to why Africa matters, especially concerning Europe: Firstly, it is the history of
Africa and its relationship with Europe. The
history of Africa has been a history of integration into the
European economy and markets. Therefore, Africa has historically held a significant place in the
European economy, trade and investments. If Africa matters to Europe it matters also to the
globalised world. Secondly, there is also the inherent link between environment and sustainable development. While the
history of Africa and its integration into the European economy is clearly defined by historical circumstances, the environmental
aspects are not clearly discernible. Environmentally, Africa matters to the world because it provides the
largest capacity in the world necessary for maintaining equilibrium in the biosphere and avoid
further depletion of the ozone layer. At the same time the raid of depletion of Africa’s
biodiversity including its tropical forests, medicinal plants remain threatened by the levels of
poverty on the continent. Africa’s most prevailing source of energy is biomass which means depletion and an exponential
raid of its forestation. If this is left to continue, the World will suffer serious climate change which is likely
to erode its socio-economic prosperity and a consequent negative impact to its population. This is an area which needs a strong
partnership with the rest of the world, to protect its environment and avoid further depletion of the ozone layer. Thirdly, Africa
matters because it still provides easy market access to Europe, the US and China and can give, in
some cases, extraordinary investment opportunities with high rates of return. With the changing political
climate in the continent towards democracy, respect for the rule of law and protection of human and people’s rights the investment
climate in Africa could rapidly change. The historical and cultural links, geographical proximity, and deep knowledge and understanding
of the continent gives international European investors a comparative advantage over Northern America and Asia, including China.
With these investments the average rate of growth in Africa has been increasing most significantly in
most African countries ranging from 3% to 7% in many countries during recent years. The income disparities in the continent
have been narrowing and the purchasing power parity increasing. This, coupled with the population of the
continent, provides a market with huge potential especially for European goods. Indeed, any visitor to Africa would
quickly realize that there is still a very significant quantity of European products traded in the continent. However, if you are in Europe
you can hardly see the presence of African products on the market. This is mainly because Africa cannot compete in the European
market either because of European subsidies or other protectionist measures that stifle Africa’s competitiveness and ability to sell in
the European market. This problem needs to be addressed to ensure the sustainability of African-European partnership. Fourthly,
Africa matters because of its abundance nature of human resources which provided the back-bone of industrialisation in Europe.
Africa is a rich continent and not as poor as it is depicted elsewhere in the world. Africa is richly endowed with mineral
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reserves. The continent ranks first in terms of the amount of global reserves of bauxite,
chromites, cobalt, diamond and gold. It also ranks first in terms of palladium, phosphates,
platinum group metals, titanium minerals, vanadium and zircon. Africa was, and still is, among the
world’s largest exporters. An ecological survey realised by the mineral industries of Africa has estimated that production in
Africa alone accounts as much as 80 % of the world’s platinum group metals, 55% of chromites, 49 % of the palladium, 45% of the
vanadium and up to 55 % of the world’s gold and diamond. Moreover, Africa has emerged as a critical exporter of cheap and skilled
labor that has been instrumental in moving Europe’s economy forward.

The impact is global nuclear war


Deutsch, 2 (Jeffrey, Political Risk Consultant and Ph.D in Economics, The Rabid Tiger Newsletter, Vol 2, No 9, Nov 18,
http://list.webengr.com/pipermail/picoipo/2002-November/000208.html)

The Rabid Tiger Project believes that a nuclear war is most likely to start in Africa. Civil wars in the Congo (the
country formerly known as Zaire), Rwanda, Somalia and Sierra Leone, and domestic instability in Zimbabwe, Sudan and other
countries, as well as occasional brushfire and other wars (thanks in part to "national" borders that cut across tribal ones) turn into a
really nasty stew. We've got all too many rabid tigers and potential rabid tigers, who are willing to push the button rather than risk
being seen as wishy-washy in the face of a mortal threat and overthrown. Geopolitically speaking, Africa is open range. Very few
countries in Africa are beholden to any particular power. South Africa is a major exception in this respect - not
to mention in that she also probably already has the Bomb. Thus, outside powers can more easily find client
states there than, say, in Europe where the political lines have long since been drawn, or Asia where many of the
countries (China, India, Japan) are powers unto themselves and don't need any "help," thank you. Thus, an African war can
attract outside involvement very quickly. Of course, a proxy war alone may not induce the Great Powers to fight each
other. But an African nuclear strike can ignite a much broader conflagration, if the other powers
are interested in a fight. Certainly, such a strike would in the first place have been facilitated by outside help - financial,
scientific, engineering, etc. Africa is an ocean of troubled waters, and some people love to go fishing.

Loss of African environments causes planetary extinction


Strieker 2k. (Gary, CNN, February 21)
There have been rhetorical advances as of late in African rainforest conservation. It remains to
be seen whether talking the talk leads to walking the walks. Planetary survival depends
upon making it so. Commercial logging consumes nearly 40,000 square kilometers of African
forest each year, an area the size of Switzerland. Much of it falls to chainsaws in the vast central African rainforest. Second in
size only to the Amazon, is Africa’s wild plants and animals. Many endangered species face certain extinction if
destruction on this scale continues

AIDS will spread globally and cause extinction


Muchiri, 2k (Michael, Staff Member at Ministry of Education in Nairobi, “Will Annan finally put out Africa’s fires?” Jakarta Post, March 6,
lexis)

The executive director of UNAIDS, Peter Piot, estimated that Africa would annually need between $ 1 billion to $ 3 billion to combat
the disease, but currently receives only $ 160 million a year in official assistance. World Bank President James Wolfensohn lamented
that Africa was losing teachers faster than they could be replaced, and that AIDS was now more effective than war in destabilizing
Statistics show that AIDS is the leading killer in sub-Saharan Africa, surpassing
African countries.
people killed in warfare. In 1998, 200,000 people died from armed conflicts compared to 2.2
million from AIDS. Some 33.6 million people have HIV around the world, 70 percent of them in
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Africa, thereby robbing countries of their most productive members and decimating entire
villages. About 13 million of the 16 million people who have died of AIDS are in Africa, according to the UN. What barometer is used
to proclaim a holocaust if this number is not a sure measure? There is no doubt that AIDS is the most serious
threat to humankind, more serious than hurricanes, earthquakes, economic crises, capital
crashes or floods. It has no cure yet. We are watching a whole continent degenerate into ghostly
skeletons that finally succumb to a most excruciating, dehumanizing death. Gore said that his new
initiative, if approved by the U.S. Congress, would bring U.S. contributions to fighting AIDS and other infectious diseases to $ 325
million. Does this mean that the UN Security Council and the U.S. in particular have at last decided to remember Africa? Suddenly, AIDS
was seen as threat to world peace, and Gore would ask the congress to set up millions of dollars on this case. The hope is that Gore
does not intend to make political capital out of this by painting the usually disagreeable Republican-controlled Congress as the bad guy
and hope the buck stops on the whole of current and future U.S. governments' conscience. Maybe there is nothing left to salvage in
Africa after all and this talk is about the African-American vote in November's U.S. presidential vote. Although the UN and the Security
Council cannot solve all African problems, the AIDS challenge is a fundamental one in that it threatens to wipe out man. The
challenge is not one of a single continent alone because Africa cannot be quarantined. The trouble is
that AIDS has no cure -- and thus even the West has stakes in the AIDS challenge. Once sub-Saharan Africa is wiped out,
it shall not be long before another continent is on the brink of extinction. Sure as death, Africa's
time has run out, signaling the beginning of the end of the black race and maybe the human race.
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--Ext. – South Africa Key

Independently, South African decline alone triggers escalating conflict and economic
collapse that goes global
Chase ‘96 (Robert S., PhD Candidate – Economics Yale U., Et Al., Foreign Affairs, Jan/Feb, Lexis)

There are indications, however, that South Africa could succumb to political instability, ethnic strife, and economic
stagnation. Power-sharing at the cabinet level belies deep ethnic divisions. Any one of several fissures could
collapse this collaboration, plunging the country into civil war. Afrikaner militias may grow
increasingly intransigent, traditional tribal leaders could raise arms against their diminished influence, and when Mandela no
longer leads the African National Congress, the party may abandon its commitment to ethnic reconciliation. As
Mandela's government struggles to improve black living standards and soothe ethnic tensions, the legacy of apartheid creates a
peculiar dilemma. It will be hard to meet understandable black expectations of equity in wages, education, and health, given the
country's budget deficits and unstable tax base. As racial inequalities persist, blacks are likely to grow impatient. Yet if whites feel they
are paying a disproportionate share for improved services for blacks, they might flee the country, taking with them the prospects for
increased foreign direct investment. While the primary threats to South Africa's stability are internal, its effectiveness in
containing them will have repercussions beyond its borders. Even before apartheid ended, South Africa had
enormous influence over the region's political and economic development, from supporting insurgencies
throughout the "front-line states" to providing mining jobs for migrant workers from those same countries. If South Africa
achieves the economic and political potential within its grasp, it will be a wellspring of regional
political stability and economic growth. If it prospers, it can demonstrate to other ethnically tortured
regions a path to stability through democratization, reconciliation, and steadily increasing living standards.
Alternatively, if it fails to handle its many challenges, it will suck its neighbors into a whirlpool of self-
defeating conflict. Although controlling the sea-lanes around the Cape of Good Hope would be important, especially if
widespread trouble were to erupt in the Middle East, American strategic interests are not otherwise endangered in southern Africa.
Yet because South Africa is the U nited S tates' largest trading partner in Africa and possesses vast
economic potential, its fate would affect American trading and financial interests that have invested
there. It would also destabilize key commodity prices, especially in the gold, diamond, and ore markets. More
generally, instability in South Africa, as in Brazil and Indonesia, would cast a large shadow over confidence
in emerging markets.
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--Democracy Module

African growth is key to democracy


Rugasira, 7 (Andrew, Founder and Chairman Good African Coffee, Uganda, “Africa needs trade not aid: the case for a new paradigm,”
February 1, www.rsa.org.uk/acrobat/rugasira_010207.pdf)

There is need for a new paradigm. One that reflects a fairer and just global trading regime, one where the African political elite is
accountable to their populations and commits to playing its role on development within a pro-poor, pro-democracy and pro-enterprise
framework. Withnot much of an economic interest to protect and with little in the way of
meaningful economic clout, the African private sector has a minimal influence on the political
direction of their nations. The private sector in Africa, as it has been elsewhere, is the engine for
growth and must be empowered. Democracy without the development of a vibrant economic
base is like building a sand castle and hoping to live in it - an exercise in futility.

Democracy checks extinction


Diamond 95. (Larry, Snr. research fellow @ Hoover Institute, Promoting Democracy in the 1990's, p 6-7)

This hardly exhausts the list of threats to our security and well-being in the coming years and decades. In the former Yugoslavia
nationalist aggression tears at the stability of Europe and could easily spread. The flow of illegal drugs intensifies through increasingly
powerful international crime syndicates that have made common cause with authoritarian regimes and have utterly corrupted the
institutions of tenuous, democratic ones. Nuclear,
chemical. and biological weapons continue to proliferate.
The very source of life on Earth, the global ecosystem, appears increasingly endangered. Most of
these new and unconventional threats to security are associated with or aggravated by the weakness or
absence of democracy, with its provisions for legality, accountability, popular sovereignty, and
openness.
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--Disease Module

Health care in Africa will collapse without economic growth


Schaefer, 3 (Brett, Jay Kingham Fellow in International Regulatory Affairs in the Center for International Trade and Economics at The Heritage Foundation,
“Economic Freedom: The Path to African Prosperity,” Feb 20, http://www.heritage.org/Research/Africa/hl778.cfm)

I believe the central pillar of development is increased economic growth. The focus on growth
should not be interpreted as a dismissal of the importance of investment in education, health, or
other worthy efforts. Investment in those areas, in a manner appropriate to the individual situations, is prudent. But the bottom
line is that without economic growth, governments and the private sector would soon lack the
resources to support those efforts.

African disease spread causes extinction


Muchiri, 2k (Michael, Staff Member at Ministry of Education in Nairobi, “Will Annan finally put out Africa’s fires?” Jakarta Post, March 6,
lexis)

The executive director of UNAIDS, Peter Piot, estimated that Africa would annually need between $ 1 billion to $ 3 billion to combat
the disease, but currently receives only $ 160 million a year in official assistance. World Bank President James Wolfensohn lamented
that Africa was losing teachers faster than they could be replaced, and that AIDS was now more effective than war in destabilizing
African countries. Statistics show that AIDS is the leading killer in sub-Saharan Africa, surpassing
people killed in warfare. In 1998, 200,000 people died from armed conflicts compared to 2.2
million from AIDS. Some 33.6 million people have HIV around the world, 70 percent of them in
Africa, thereby robbing countries of their most productive members and decimating entire
villages. About 13 million of the 16 million people who have died of AIDS are in Africa, according to the UN. What barometer is used
to proclaim a holocaust if this number is not a sure measure? There is no doubt that AIDS is the most serious
threat to humankind, more serious than hurricanes, earthquakes, economic crises, capital
crashes or floods. It has no cure yet. We are watching a whole continent degenerate into ghostly
skeletons that finally succumb to a most excruciating, dehumanizing death. Gore said that his new
initiative, if approved by the U.S. Congress, would bring U.S. contributions to fighting AIDS and other infectious diseases to $ 325
million. Does this mean that the UN Security Council and the U.S. in particular have at last decided to remember Africa? Suddenly, AIDS
was seen as threat to world peace, and Gore would ask the congress to set up millions of dollars on this case. The hope is that Gore
does not intend to make political capital out of this by painting the usually disagreeable Republican-controlled Congress as the bad guy
and hope the buck stops on the whole of current and future U.S. governments' conscience. Maybe there is nothing left to salvage in
Africa after all and this talk is about the African-American vote in November's U.S. presidential vote. Although the UN and the Security
Council cannot solve all African problems, the AIDS challenge is a fundamental one in that it threatens to wipe out man. The
challenge is not one of a single continent alone because Africa cannot be quarantined. The trouble is
that AIDS has no cure -- and thus even the West has stakes in the AIDS challenge. Once sub-Saharan Africa is wiped out,
it shall not be long before another continent is on the brink of extinction. Sure as death, Africa's
time has run out, signaling the beginning of the end of the black race and maybe the human race.
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--Econ Module

African economic decline causes them to default on their debt


Jackson 85. (Henry F., Prof of Poli Sci @ Hunter College in NY, “The African Crisis: Drought and Debt”, Foreign Affairs, Summer,
http://fullaccess.foreignaffairs.org/19850601faessay8444/henry-f-jackson/the-african-crisis-drought-and-debt.html)

Africa’s current debt problem is inextricably connected to severe setbacks in other economic
sectors. Surely the most painful has occurred in agriculture, the traditional backbone of Africa’s
predominantly rural societies. Among the mineral-rich countries, the decline is mainly attributable to government policies that
neglected agricultural productivity in the vain hope that rising revenues from mineral exports, particularly oil, would assure ample
income for consumer purchases abroad. State control of agriculture in most African nations undermined productivity by fixing farm
wages so low that peasant farmers frequently abandoned the countryside, leaving cultivable land fallow and farm marketing in
decline. The
result was a sharp drop in Africa’s share of world trade, even in the commodities in
which the continent had a comparative advantage—coffee, tea, groundnuts, sugar, sisal, cocoa and cotton. After
the 1960s, when most of Africa acquired political independence, agricultural output grew by more than three percent annually in only
six countries (Ivory Coast, Kenya, Cameroon, Malawi, Swaziland and Rwanda), and it had begun to decline in some of these by the early
1980s. To escape the debt burden, several countries have raised the possibility of forming a
debtors’ cartel. Some African countries, such as Algeria and Nigeria, are among the biggest debtors in
the Third World; four other countries (Zambia, Ghana, Malawi and Sudan) were among the 11 largest recipients of International
Monetary Fund (IMF) loans as of March 1985. Deliberate default by a group of debtors would inflict visible
damage on the financial institutions of major Western creditors. On the other hand, the chances for a
cartel’s success are lessened by the official nature of the African debt, which denies these countries the collective influence they would
have if their debts were concentrated among private banks. To formulate a common platform for negotiating loans and repayment of
their foreign debts, the OAU states have scheduled a special summit meeting in Addis Ababa during July 1985.

2. African debt default would trigger a global economic collapse


Rollnick 84. (Roman, former senior correspondent at The European and editor-in-charge at UN-HABITAT, “OAU head urges African
nations to default on their $150 billion debt”, United Press International, November 16, lexis)

African states should default on a collective foreign debt of $150 billion to make the West take notice of their
economic misery, Tanzanian president and new OAU chairman Julius Nyerere said today. ''We have this debt power and we simply do
not use it,'' said Nyerere, who also is president of Tanzania. ''I believe now the poor countries of the world have this power and, oh
boy, if my country owed $100 billion we would simply refuse to pay it back.'' Nyerere, elected chairman of the Organization of African
Unity at the organization's 20th summit this week, told his first formal news conference the Organization of Petroleum Exporting
Countries ''had power and they just squandered it.'' ''If we sit there and say we are just not going to pay, Europe will take note. We
have that power. Just imagine if we used it,'' he said. Diplomats
said worldwide economic chaos would result if
Africa defaulted on its debt. ''We are talking about the collapse of the world economy,'' said
one Western diplomat. Most of Africa's foreign debt is owed to Western countries and banks.

Economic collapse leads to nuclear war


The Baltimore Examiner 9 [“Will this recession lead to World War II,” 2/26, http://www.examiner.com/x-3108-Baltimore-
Republican-Examiner~y2009m2d26-Will-this-recession-lead-to-World-War-III]

Could the current economic crisis affecting this country and the world lead to another world
war? The answer may be found by looking back in history. One of the causes of World War I was the economic
rivalry that existed between the nations of Europe. In the 19th century France and Great Britain became wealthy through
colonialism and the control of foreign resources. This forced other up-and-coming nations (such as Germany) to be more competitive
in world trade which led to rivalries and ultimately, to war. After the Great Depression ruined the economies of
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Europe in the 1930s, fascist movements arose to seek economic and social control. From there fanatics like
Hitler and Mussolini took over Germany and Italy and led them both into World War II. With most of North America and Western
Europe currently experiencing a recession, will
competition for resources and economic rivalries with the
Middle East, Asia, or South American cause another world war? Add in nuclear weapons and
Islamic fundamentalism and things look even worse. Hopefully the economy gets better before
it gets worse and the terrifying possibility of World War III is averted. However sometimes
history repeats itself.
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--Terror Module

African growth solves terrorism and the world economy


BBC News, 5 (July 5, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/4653149.stm)
Helping Africa to help itself is not an act of generosity or altruism, they argue, but a pragmatic strategy which
offers attractive returns. They argue that if Africa prospers, the world will prosper too - in part since
poverty reduction is a powerful fillip to reduce resentment and hence the risk of terrorism. For
foreign investors, the rewards could be even more obvious. "The returns in Africa are among
the highest in the world," observes Mr Rugasira. "We need to say that."

Terrorism Causes Extinction


Sid-Ahmed, 4 Sid-Ahmed, political analyst 04 (Mohamed, Managing Editor for Al-Ahali, “Extinction!” August 26-September 1, Issue no.
705, http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2004/705/op5.htm)

What would be the consequences of a nuclear attack by terrorists? Even if it fails, it would
further exacerbate the negative features of the new and frightening world in which we are now living.
Societies would close in on themselves, police measures would be stepped up at the expense of human rights, tensions
between civilisations and religions would rise and ethnic conflicts would proliferate. It would
also speed up the arms race and develop the awareness that a different type of world order is imperative if humankind is to
survive. But the still more critical scenario is if the attack succeeds. This could lead to a third world war, from
which no one will emerge victorious. Unlike a conventional war which ends when one side triumphs over another, this
war will be without winners and losers. When nuclear pollution infects the whole planet, we will all be
losers.
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African Environment Impact

1. Loss of African environments causes planetary extinction


Strieker 2k. (Gary, CNN, February 21)
There have been rhetorical advances as of late in African rainforest conservation. It remains to
be seen whether talking the talk leads to walking the walks. Planetary survival depends upon
making it so. Commercial logging consumes nearly 40,000 square kilometers of African forest each
year, an area the size of Switzerland. Much of it falls to chainsaws in the vast central African rainforest. Second in size only to the
Amazon, is Africa’s wild plants and animals. Many endangered species face certain extinction if destruction on this
scale continues

2. Disad turns the case –African forests provide key herbs for disease treatment
Business Day 7. (“Pax Herbals calls for the conservation of forest resources”, http://www.businessdayonline.com/?c=55&a=14080)
Adodo noted that the African forests house 95 percent of herbs and roots used for the
production of herbal medicine, which is gaining both national and international acceptance
because of its proven efficacy for treatment of various ailments. He decried the high rate of
deforestation and environmental pollution which are detrimental to the forest and its natural
resources.
** Adodo is the director of the Pax Herbals workshop on the Principles of African Medicine

3. Biodiversity key to solve famine and food security in Africa


M2 Presswire 4. (“UN”, October 20, lexis)
MARJATTA RASI (Finland), President of the Economic and Social Council, said despite progress in many
countries toward achieving the Millennium Goal of halving the number of people suffering from hunger by 2015,
less than 20 per cent of sub-Saharan African countries would meet that target. Malnutrition was
increasing in some countries. The interaction of biodiversity and food security was complex, she said.
Education, national and global policy-making and legal frameworks were needed for local communities to protect ecological diversity,
develop diversity protection policies and determine the ownership and use of humanity's genetic reservoir of knowledge. Men and
Biodiversity decreased farming risks,
women played different roles in the maintenance of dependence on biodiversity.
increased food security and improved the genetic potential of crops and animals. Safeguarding
biodiversity also meant safeguarding traditional agricultural knowledge and management systems.
Policy-makers and implementers must develop long-term thinking that took into account the links between economy and ecology,
society and environment, politics and long-term security. LOUISE FRECHETTE, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations,
delivering a message from Secretary-General Kofi Annan, noted that some 840 million people in the world suffered from chronic
hunger, which should be unacceptable in today's world of plenty. The international community must do better - politically,
economically, scientifically, and logistically - to reduce by half the proportion of people suffering from hunger by 2015. She said that
Biodiversity provided
this year's World Food Day theme highlighted the essential role of biodiversity in combating hunger.
the plant, animal and microbial genetic resources for food production and agricultural productivity. It provided
essential ecosystem services, such as fertilizing the soil, recycling nutrients, regulating pests and
disease, controlling erosion and pollinating many crops and trees. Knowledge of biodiversity
could ensure the availability of food during crisis periods like civil conflict, natural catastrophes
or disabling diseases. The unprecedented loss of biodiversity over the past century should raise the loudest of alarms, she
said. Several freshwater fish species had become extinct, and many of the world's most important marine fisheries had been
decimated.Food supplies had also been made more vulnerable by the reliance on a small number of
species. Just 30 crops species dominated food production and 90 per cent of the animal food
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supply came from just 14 mammal and bird species. There had been a substantial reduction in
crop genetic diversity in the field and many livestock breeds were threatened with extinction.
Individuals and institutions alike must pay greater attention to biodiversity as a key theme in efforts to
fight the twin scourges of hunger and poverty.
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African Ethnic Conflict Impact

1. Ethnic nationalism causes regional instability, igniting a power keg


Emeh 4. (Okechukwu, analyst at Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, “Africa and the Crisis of Instability”, Vanguard, March 30,
http://www.globalpolicy.org/nations/sovereign/failed/2004/0330crisis.htm)

Ethnic/micro nationalism is also a potent force to reckon with in the crisis of instability in Africa.
In this regard, Nigeria is, in recent years, becoming volatile, a kind of powder keg, on account of frequent
nasty inter-ethnic and religious riots, fuelled by years of bubbling communal discontent and
frustration across the country. In Western Sahara, Sudan (in the South), Senegal (in Casamance), Angola (in Cabinda),
Ethiopia (in Oromoland, Ogaden and Haud), Comoros (in Anjou an), Niger (in Agadez) and Mali (in Alawak), disaffected ethnic
nationalities have been waging armed separatist struggles for autonomy or outright
independence. In recent years, Namibia and Cameroun have increasingly become volatile since the
beginning of the agitation for national self-determination by San people of the Caprivi Strip and English-
speaking Camerounians respectively. Inter-state conflicts have added to the sources of violence and
instability in Africa. Such conflicts include the long time standoff between Nigeria and Cameroun over the oil-rich Bakassi
Peninsula and the continued tension between Ethiopia and Eritrea over the Badme territory. Such conflict has often had
the ominous implication of undermining African unity.

2. Ethnic conflicts escalate to nuclear war


Shehadi ’93. (Kama, Research Associate – International Institute for Strategic Studies, Ethnic Self-Determination and the Break Up of
States, p. 81)

This paper has argued that self-determination conflicts have direct adverse consequences on
international security. As they begin to tear nuclear states apart, the likelihood of nuclear
weapons falling into the hands of individuals or groups willing to use them, or to trade them to
others, will reach frightening levels. This likelihood increases if a conflict over self-
determination escalates into a war between two nuclear states. The Russian Federation and
Ukraine may fight over the Crimea and the Donbass area; and India and Pakistan may fight over
Kashmir. Ethnic conflicts may also spread both within a state and from one state to the next.
This can happen in countries where more than one ethnic self-determination conflict is
brewing: Russia, India and Ethiopia, for example. The conflict may also spread by contagion
from one country to another if the state is weak politically and militarily and cannot contain the
conflict on its doorstep. Lastly, there is a real danger that regional conflicts will erupt over
national minorities and borders.
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African Famine Impact

1. African famine places 40 million people at risk and makes entire countries extinct
Morris 3. (James T., Executive Director of the World Food Programme at UN, “Testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations
Committee”, FDCH Political Transcripts, February 23, lexis)

Ten years ago, the World Food Programme had a huge focus on development -- 80 percent in development. Today, it is 80 percent in
responding to emergencies. These emergencies are all around the globe, but the issues in Africa are
particularly difficult. I have the responsibility of serving as Kofi Annan's special envoy for southern Africa -- the
countries of Mozambique and Malawi and Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho and Swaziland. I have spent a lot of time in this part of the
world and I report to you that there are more than 15 million people at risk of starvation. Half of the people
live in Zimbabwe. This is caused by very difficult weather patterns, complicated in ways that you could hardly find words to describe by
the HIV-AIDS issue and then further complicated by very tough issues of governance and poor choices of macroeconomic policy. The
world has responded generously in this part of southern Africa and we have been able to get food with the help of some remarkable
NGOs. Some of them are in the room this morning. We have been able to get food positioned throughout the region so that people
have not died. But we are faced with a comparable year again this year. Hopefully then we will be on top of the food issue, that the
HIV-AIDS issue will change this part of the world forever. I've met with presidents
and prime ministers in this part of
the world frequently and they talk about their countries being at risk of extinction. They talk about the
future of their countries in the most desperate, dramatic terms possible. The impact of these issues on women and children and
the elderly is almost beyond comprehension. Unfortunately, we have a comparable situation of different dimension, of
different causes in the Horn of Africa again, but we now have 13.2 million people at risk of starvation in
Ethiopia and Eritrea, two countries that depend on rain- fed agriculture had no rain last year and in part because of not very good
efforts at prevention and development, they find themselves in tough circumstances. The issues in
West Africa, you understand
the problems in Liberia and Guinea and Sierra Leone -- huge numbers of internally displaced people floating
about. Maybe the number could approach 5 million. The issues in the western Sahel, once again, a drought in Mauritania, Mali, Cape
Verde, Senegal. This issues in Angola, in the Sudan, in the Congo and northern Uganda simply say that there are
nearly 40 million people at risk of starvation, of terrible food deficits in Africa.

2. Food shortages lead to World War III


Calvin 98. (William, theoretical neurophysiologist @ U Washington, “The Great Climate Flip-Flop”, Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 281, No. 1,
January, p. 47-64)

The population-crash scenario is surely the most appalling. Plummeting crop yields would cause some powerful
countries to try to take over their neighbors or distant lands -- if only because their armies,
unpaid and lacking food, would go marauding, both at home and across the borders. The better-
organized countries would attempt to use their armies, before they fell apart entirely, to take
over countries with significant remaining resources, driving out or starving their inhabitants if
not using modern weapons to accomplish the same end: eliminating competitors for the remaining food. This would be a
worldwide problem -- and could lead to a Third World War -- but Europe's vulnerability is particularly easy to
analyze. The last abrupt cooling, the Younger Dryas, drastically altered Europe's climate as far east as Ukraine. Present-day Europe has
more than 650 million people. It has excellent soils, and largely grows its own food. It could no longer do so if it lost the extra warming
from the North Atlantic.

3. Famine is the biggest risk Africa faces – prefer our comparative ev


McLaughlin and Purefoy 5. (Abraham and Christian, writers for the Christian Science Monitor, “Hunger is spreading in Africa”,
August 1, lexis)
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Yet amid the growing focus on Niger's woes, the broader fact is that the country's 2.9 million hungry people are just a fraction of
Africa's 31.1 million food-deprived masses, scattered across Sudan's Darfur region, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Uganda, and elsewhere.
Despite progress in boosting democracy, ending wars, and economic growth, Africa is the only
region in the world becoming less and less able to feed itself. Reasons include the relentless
spread of desert and drought, high population growth, bad governance, and the world community's flawed hunger-
response system. In all, "Things are moving in the wrong direction," says Marc Cohen of the International Food Policy Research
Institute (IFPRI) in Washington. "If we look at sub-Saharan Africa as a whole, all the projections are that poverty and
hunger are going to get worse."

4. Food shortages turn the case – starvation weakens the body, allowing viruses to spread
Lewis 03. (Stephen, UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, “PanAfrica”, Africa News, May 28, lexis)

When the body has no food to consume, the virus consumes the body. That's the essential meaning of the
New Variant Famine. For millions of Africans already infected by HIV, the onset of full-blown AIDS, and the rapid descent to
death is the inescapable finale of a shortage of food. And the shortage of food, in its turn, opens
up new pathways for the virus to spread.
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--War Module

African famine sparks wars


Carter 99. (Jimmy as in the former Prez, ‘First Step Toward Peace is Eradicating Hunger”, September)
Why has peace been so elusive? A recent report sponsored by Future Harvest and generated by the International Peace
Research Institute in Oslo examines conflicts around the world and finds that—unlike that in Kosovo—most of today’s wars are
fueled by poverty, not by ideology. The devastation occurs primarily in countries whose economies
depend on agriculture but lack the means to make their farmland productive. These are
developing countries such as Sudan, Congo, Colombia, Liberia, Peru, Sierra Leone and Sri Lanka—places
with poor rural areas where malnutrition and hunger are widespread. The report found that poorly
functioning agriculture in these countries heightens poverty, which in turn sparks conflict . This
suggests an obvious but often overlooked path to peace: Raise the standard of living of the millions of rural people who live in poverty
by increasing agricultural productivity. Not only does agriculture put food on the table, but it also provides jobs, both on and off the
farm, that raise incomes. Thriving
agriculture is the engine that fuels broader economic growth and
development, thus paving the way for prosperity and peace. The economies of Europe, the United States,
Canada and Japan were built on strong agriculture. But many developing countries have shifted their priorities away from farming in
favor of urbanization, or they have reduced investments in agriculture because of budget shortages. At the same time, industrialized
countries continue to cut their foreign aid budgets, which fund vital scientific research and extension work to improve farming in
developing countries. Unfortunately, much of the farming technology developed in industrialized nations does not transfer to the
climates and soils of developing nations. It is not a priority for agricultural giants in affluent nations to focus on the poor regions of the
world or to share basic research advances with scientists from poor nations. This neglect should end. Leaders of developing nations
must make food security a priority. In the name of peace, it is critical that both developed and developing countries support
agricultural research and improved farming practices, particularly in nations often hit with drought and famine. For example, the
report finds that India,one of the world’s largest and poorest nations, has managed to escape
widespread violence in large measure because the Indian government made food security a
priority. Beginning in the 1960s, farmers in India were given the means to increase their agricultural output with technology
packages that included improved seeds, fertilizers, irrigation and training. Today India no longer experiences famines as it did in the
first half of this century. India’s food security contributes to its relative political stability. While food is taken for granted in
industrialized countries, many parts of the world—sub-Saharan Africa and large parts of Asia, for example—suffer serious food
shortages. Today,
per capita food production in sub-Saharan Africa is less than it was at the end of
the 1950s. The report concludes that new wars will erupt if the underlying conditions that cause
them are not improved. The message is clear: There can be no peace until people have enough
to eat. Hungry people are not peaceful people. The Future Harvest report is a reminder that investments in agricultural research
today can cultivate peace tomorrow.
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--Econ Module

1. African hunger skyrocketing, contributing to worldwide starvation


People’s Daily Online 7. (“854 million starving people over the world”, http://english.people.com.cn/6210545.html)
The World Food Programme (WFP), The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and the International Fund for
Agriculture Development (IFAD), announced on July 4th at a joint press conference, that there
are currently 854 million
hungry people in the world. The situation is most serious in Africa: in the past 15 years, the
number of people who are malnourished has increased by 45 million. In a report from the UN website,
David Harcharik, the deputy general director of FAO, says that the global fight against hunger is not hopeful. Harcharik
said that regardless of population or absolute figures; the world has not yet met the needs
required to achieve the goal of cutting the population of starving people in half by 2015. Although
some countries have made progress; overall global hunger still continues to rise rather than fall.

2. Food shortages jack the global economy


Tierramérica 4. (“Global Food Prices a Warning Beacon”, Global Policy Forum, November 23,
http://www.globalpolicy.org/socecon/hunger/environment/2004/1123globalfood.htm)

Global demand for food will grow an estimated 60 percent by 2030 and, unless urgent action is taken,
the crisis in the farming sector will push the world economy to the edge, warned experts from
60 countries gathered in the northern Mexican city of Monterrey. According to United Nations projections, there will be
some 78 million people added to the global population each year. ''It is not a trivial issue. We are
talking about adding an equivalent of 2.5 Canadas each year. How will we possibly feed them?'' asks Lester
Brown, a U.S. activist and one of the standout voices in the global environmental debate. ''The current world grain stocks
are the lowest in 30 years. Continued expansion of food production faces two big threats:
falling water tables and rising temperatures,'' said Brown, founder of the Earth Policy Institute and the Worldwatch
Institute, two major environmental think-tanks in the United States. Within the next few years, said the expert, rising
food prices may be the first global economic indicator to signal serious trouble in the
relationship between the world's 6.3 billion people and the Earth's natural systems and resources on
which we depend. The author of ''Plan B: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilisation in Trouble'', participated Nov. 15-16 in
Monterrey in the eighth High-Level Seminar on Sustainable Consumption and Production, organised by the United Nations
Environment Program (UNEP).

3. Collapse of the economy leads to death of billions


Lewis 98. (Chris, Instructor @ Sewall American Studies Program @ U of Colorado at Boulder, The Coming Age of Scarcitv: Preventing Mass
Death and Genocide in the Twentv-first Century, p. 56)

Most critics would argue, probably correctly, that instead


of allowing underdeveloped countries to withdraw
from the global economy and undermine the economies of the developing world, the United States. Europe.
and Japan and others will fight neocolonial wars to force these countries to remain within this
collapsing global economy. These neocolonial wars will result in mass death, suffering, and even
regional nuclear wars. If First World countries choose military confrontation and political repression to maintain the global
economy, then we may see mass death and genocide on a global scale that will make the deaths of World War I1 pale in comparison.
However, these neocolonial wars, fought to maintain the developed nations' economic and political hegemony, will cause the final
collapse of our global industrial civilization. These
wars will so damage the complex economic and trading networks
and squander material, biological, and energy resources that they will undermine the global economy and its
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ability to support the earth's 6 to 8 billion people. This would be the worst-case scenario for the collapse of global
civilization.
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African Genocide Impact

1. African genocides spillover and bring in superpowers


Penketh 6 (Anne, Diplomatic Editor for The Independent, a British news service. As the genocide in Darfur goes on, chaos and killing
spread to Sudan's neighbours. April 21, http://news.independent.co.uk/world/africa/article359112.ece)

It has been called a genocide in slow motion, its gruesome details unfolding while the world looks the other way. And it
is spreading. There are pictures, there are witness accounts, there are the Western visitors who go home with harrowing tales of rape,
scorched earth and horseback attacks on helpless villagers. Yet, three years after the beginning of the Sudanese
government crackdown against black African rebels, killing more than 70,000 people and displacing two million
others through its allied Arab militias, the world is still wringing its hands while Sudan's western region
burns. A UN force for Darfur is still in the planning stages, an attempt to punish Sudanese leaders with sanctions has been blocked,
and relief agencies have been denied access to 300,000 people desperately in need of emergency supplies. "It's a big failure for the
international community," said the UN high commissioner for refugees, António Guterres. But the
poison from Darfur
threatens to engulf the entire central African region. Chadian rebel attempts to overthrow
President Idriss Déby in lightning strikes launched from across the border in Darfur last week have brought
accusations that the Sudanese government was behind the insurgency. Chinese-made equipment - China is a major oil client of
Khartoum and its diplomatic ally - seized by the Chadian army fuelled the charges which Khartoum has denied. According to Mr
Guterres, the
Chad fighting, which also involved the Central African Republic, means that "Darfur
is the epicentre of what could be potentially a very damaging earthquake in the whole
region." A total 200,000 Sudanese refugees have fled to camps in Chad. Rebels of the Lord's
Resistance Army, based in northern Uganda, send fighters into Central African Republic, and
into Democratic Republic of Congo and are complicating efforts to return refugees into
southern Sudan, according to Mr Guterres. The regional crisis could further worsen if Ethiopia and Eritrea
rekindle their border war. "I do believe this has the potential to become the most dramatic humanitarian
catastrophe in the world," Mr Guterres told The Independent. The chief UN humanitarian co-ordinator, Jan Egeland, was
expected to inform the UN Security Council yesterday that the Darfur crisis had reached a turning point. While a few months ago the
violence had seemed to be abating as the Sudanese responded to international pressure, the tide is now turning again with
atrocities on the rise, people being forced from their villages by marauding militias and relief
workers given ever shrinking access to the local people. Since last summer, Mr Guterres said, "the international
community was not active enough, and the African Union was left a bit alone, and now the situation has become unbearable". In the
past few months, Sudan has played for time while it drove a wedge between the veto-holding powers on the UN Security Council, and
while under-resourced African Union "ceasefire monitors" struggled to carry out their mandate in Darfur. On Monday, Russia and
China, which both have economic interests in Sudan, blocked the imposition of a US and UK-backed travel ban and assets-freeze against
four Sudanese leaders. Their veto prompted the US to force a public vote on the issue later. The two countries argued that sanctions
would send the wrong message at a time when a new deadline of 30 April has been set by UN envoy Salim Ahmed Salim for securing a
comprehensive ceasefire between the Sudanese government and Darfur rebel groups. Sudanese government leaders used the same
argument to bar a UN team from travelling to Darfur this week in order to assess prospects to transfer peace-keeping in the region from
the African Union to the UN later this year. Sudan says that UN peacekeepers should only move in to monitor a peace settlement. But
analysts argue that external pressure on the Sudanese government had to be an essential part of the UN arsenal. "This is
a vicious
regime. Without external pressure, nothing will happen," said one African analyst. "We're not talking about a
nice government, one that cares about its people." A former member of the African Union mediating team, a South African, Laurie
Nathan, believes that the repeated deadlines set by the international community, which systematically slide, are pointless. "This deadline
diplomacy adds an element of farce to the deadly conflict raging in Darfur. It is intended to constitute pressure on the belligerent parties
and convey the international community's seriousness about resolving the conflict," he said. "But since the deadlines come and go
without any negative repercussions for the parties, they are not an effective form of pressure and they undermine the seriousness of the
international community." Mr Nathan believes that for both the government and the rebel groups, whose factions are now fighting each
other in Darfur, "the battlefield remains the strategic area of struggle." Although the mediator, Mr Salim, was reported to be upbeat
earlier in the week when he briefed the Security Council on his efforts, he has told colleagues he has never come across parties so
unwilling to negotiate with each other as in the Darfur negotiations. With theDarfur conflict now pushing into Chad -
raising fears that the chronically unstable country might go the same way as Somali a - prospects for
UN action have been further complicated. "It's very worrying," said one UN diplomat. The spreading ethnic conflict that,
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broadly speaking, pits black Africans against Arab fighters - has also raised fears of a broader war
in an oil-rich region that could mirror the civil war in Democratic Republic of Congo where big powers
were in the background on opposing sides. In the case of Darfur, the lines are now drawn with China and Russia
firmly on the side of Khartoum.

2. Genocides spread rapidly in Africa – dictators and economic crisis allow


Murphey 5 (Dwight- Wrote this review of the book written by Martin Meredith, historian and journalist who focuses extensively on the
state of Africa. Seeing Africa Clearly. http://dwightmurphey-collectedwritings.info/BkRev-Meredith-original.htm)

The cessation of the Cold War at the end of the 1980s changed the mix, and there was again a
resurgence of hope. Marxism-Leninism instantly lost its attraction and outside support; and there was a radical
redirection toward free-market reforms and democratization. Or at least those were the aspirations of the international donor
community, the International Monetary Fund, and the western democracies. The results were disappointingly
cosmetic. “A new breed of dictators emerged, adept at maintaining a façade of democracy
sufficient for them to be able to obtain foreign aid.” The effect was that “democratic change
brought no amelioration to the economic crisis that virtually all African states faced.” Wars and
genocides spread like cancers. “In 2000 there were more than ten major conflicts
underway in Africa.” And now, as the denouement of it all, Meredith says, “In reality, fifty years after the
beginning of the independence era, Africa’s prospects are bleaker than ever before” (emphasis added).
Except that there can really be no denouement as such; the play cannot simply come to an end, with the actors and audience packing
up and leaving. The wretched millions will continue to eke out their lives, while continuing to multiply, and the outside world at least
in part recoils, not without reason, with “aid fatigue.”

3. Genocide spreads rapidly and systemically kills millions – Sudan proves


Smith 5 (James- Chief executive of Aegis, an independent, international organisation, dedicated to eliminating genocide. Darfur: the status
quo is not an option. Oct 12 http://www.aegistrust.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=286&Itemid=88)

A picture of deep concern regarding the situation in Darfur has been presented by Juan Mendez, Kofi Annan’s Special Advisor on
Genocide Prevention. Current policies of developed nations toward the crisis in Western Sudan appear to rely on there being a status
quo in Darfur while a settlement between the Government of Sudan and the African Darfur rebels is reached through political
mediation. This dynamic must radically change, or Darfur will spiral into an even greater tragedy whilst we
tinker on the sidelines. First of all, nations must accept that the status quo, if there is one, is unacceptable. The
genocidal actions to get rid of African tribes from the Land of the Fur is almost complete. Let us be
reminded that around a quarter of a million people were killed in the violence of the past two years there. A further two million
people have been displaced from their villages and are corralled in camps. They are vulnerable
to attack by Arab militia at night, are ridden with disease and rape is rife. Aegis stated in clear terms
during the past year that the protection strategy in Darfur must be more robust. Recalling the lessons from Bosnia and from Rwanda
that half-baked protection mandates and half-strength protection forces lead to failed protection missions, the Protect Darfur
campaign was launched. This was not a criticism of the African Union. They have taken an appropriate and rightful lead as a regional
organisation to respond rapidly to the crisis. There is no doubt they have saved lives by their presence. But they have not been given
all the support they need by major donors. Last month they ran out of cash for fuel and salaries. To the shame of wealthy western
governments who spoke piously about assistance to Africa this summer in Edinburgh, independent grassroots organisations are trying
to raise money to help the African Union mission in Sudan. A quarter of a million dollars has been raised by the student movement
Genocide Intervention Fund in the US, to pay for Rwandan policewomen to go to Darfur. If the Security Council of the UN constrains
the African Union protection force with its current mandate and current strength, it will be tantamount to maintaining a situation that
the Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic defined as ethnic cleansing. In Kosovo we reversed it, but in Darfur we maintain it. In our
briefings in June this year, Aegis warned that the apparent improvement in security was due to the near-completion of the operation
of the Janjaweed and Government of Sudan and that the situation would not remain stable. It was predictable that factions of the
rebel groups would seek to aggravate the conflict, as they will not tolerate such a status quo: "Reduction
of direct violence
during May 2005 is misleading the international community into believing there is improvement in
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The harder the international community make it for refugees to return and the more
security. […]
marginalized we allow the African population to become, the greater the risk that rebel groups
will convert this largely one-sided genocidal crisis into another protracted African civil war.
Without increased protection then, the less likely it will be to find a political solution to the crisis." Aegis Briefing 15 June 2005 “The
frustration of keeping the status quo in Darfur is likely to lead to greater attacks from the rebel groups, who have a rich source of
young recruits from the IDP camps. There is a
high probability that the genocidal conflict organized by the
Arab militia and the GOS in the past three years may convert into a prolonged civil war that the small AU
force would not be able to contain.” Aegis Briefing, 30 June 2005 Indeed, the rebels are now their own worst enemies, attacking not
only Janjaweed Arab militia and Government of Sudan positions, but detaining African Union mission workers. Three African Union
personnel have been killed in the past week. Darfur is spiralling into further tragedy that may engulf the
entire country. Millions have already perished in Sudan’s multiple genocidal wars over the past two decades and there are
warnings that this vast country could soon fragment further. In addition to deterioration of the Darfur crisis in the West, other
regions of Sudan have growing tensions. In the East of Sudan, marginalised African tribes are also
reaching tipping point with the Government of Sudan. Sheikh Ali, a senior member of one political party in the East, the Beja
Congress, referring to the lessons of Darfur last week said “the Government only listens to people who carry guns.” I heard exactly
the same comments from Darfur rebel commanders when I was in Chad and Darfur 16 months ago, referring to the lessons from the
South of Sudan. Then, prospect for peace in the South looked hopeful, but the recent death of John Garang, the Southern leader, is
another wound to the peace efforts in Sudan. The
scene is being set for millions more to face death,
destruction and unimaginable suffering.
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--Disease Module

Genocide turns the case – causes refugee flows which spread diseases
Mageria 1 (David-Reuters author, writes lots of articles about Africa such as Poor Africans hit hard by rising world oil prices. AIDS Orphans
Confront 'Silent Genocide' in Rwanda. November 29. http://www.aegis.com/news/re/2001/RE011147.html)

Scores of young Rwandan boys and girls crowd into a dimly lit classroom and painstakingly put the finishing touches to paintings
daubed on worn-out pieces of brown paper. Many are AIDS orphans, learning the skills to cope with the legacy of an epidemic made
harsher by the devastating impact of the country's 1994 genocide. "The AIDS problem is big in Rwanda, call it a
silent genocide," said Robert Limlim, the United Nations Children's Fund's HIV/AIDS programme officer in Kigali. For thousands of
children forced to survive in the streets after AIDS or the killings claimed their parents, centres operated by churches or civic groups
and supported by aid agencies such as UNICEF teach carpentry and painting and offer education on the AIDS pandemic. "HIV is a big
problem by now, because among our beneficiaries, we have around 20% who are orphans due to the HIV problem," said Epimaque
Kanamugire, the coordinator of the Tabakunde Centre in Kigali, which cares for 169 children. The centres offer the only hope for a
better life in a country where the epidemic ravaging Africa has an even more sinister twist, with the
effects of the genocide speeding the spread of infection. Roughly one in nine Rwandans have HIV/AIDS, or about
11% of the population of 8 million. The prevalence was put at 1.6% in 1987. During 100 days of killing, millions of
people were displaced as they crossed the tiny country's green hillsides to escape bands of murderous militiamen. Children
lost parents and health services were shattered, making access to information on AIDS difficult. "With the war and genocide
people were forced to live in refugee camps. There was a lot of uncontrolled sex and that
increases the chances of infection," David Awasum, the resident representative for the Johns Hopkins University centre
for communication programmes in Kigali, told Reuters. Hutu extremists who massacred up to 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and Hutu
moderates used mass rape as a weapon. Young girls looking for protection sometimes paid with
sexual favours. "Most of those who were raped have now been found to be HIV-positive and
many people are dying every day," Limlim said.
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African Landmines Impact

Landmines are a major threat to public health – they jeopardize entire societies in Africa
Taylor 2. (Sarah B., December, “Upsetting Lives: The Public Health Impact of Landmines in Africa,”
http://maic.jmu.edu/journal/6.3/focus/taylor/taylor.htm)

Landmines are an immense problem throughout the continent of Africa, specifically in the way
they affect public health; the International Federation of Red Cross (IFRC) and Red Crescent Societies (RCS) estimate that as
many as 140 million Africans live in countries where the threat of injury or death due to landmines
is high or very high. These menaces are found in villages, towns, and fields, and around roads, wells, schools, and health clinics.
Both directly and indirectly, landmines have many adverse effects on the public health of the people of Africa. It is not only the
physical injuries that affect the inhabitants of these nations; even the threat of landmines slows development. In Angola, studies
illustrate that more individuals have died from poor water and sanitation, disease and malnutrition than direct injuries. By
affecting water safety, agricultural development, public health campaigns and the socio-
economic and emotional state of many inhabitants, landmines certainly hinder the well-being
of entire African societies, while also killing, injuring and disabling over 12,000 African people per year.

Landmines jack food production and the local economy – Angola proves
Ukabiala 99. (Jullyette, “Impetus towards a mine-free world,”
http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/afrec/vol12no4/mines.htm)

In conflicts, APMs are mostly deployed by being buried in the ground, and are detonated when stepped upon or moved in any way.
They are designed to kill or disable their victims permanently, often by shattering one or both limbs beyond repair. The
International Committee of the Red Cross states that there are some 250,000 land mine
amputees in the world, comprising mostly civilians, including children. The most severe impact
in Africa has been on Angola, which has about 23,000 amputees (one out of every 470 people)
and Mozambique, where land mines have claimed over 10,000 lives. Casualties are still mounting, mainly
because many mined areas are unmarked and the mines remain active for many decades. The economic impact is such
that food production in affected Angolan cities has been reduced by more than 25 per cent, yet
Angola has had to keep a relatively low profile regarding the Convention, says Mr. Arcanjo Maria Do
Nascimento, an Angolan diplomat at the United Nations. "Mozambique has peace and can concentrate on the issue more actively.
Right now, we have war going on," he notes. Mr. Do Nascimento points out that Angola
has done a lot of mine
clearing, working with UN teams and concerned non-governmental organizations (NGOs).
"Following renewed fighting, however, the process is now hampered," he told Africa Recovery. He said his
country would be sending a "high-powered" delegation to the Maputo meeting, to explore how participants could increase support for
land mine victims, in such areas as rehabilitation, medical supplies and special education.
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African Small Arms Impact

Small arms accesses all your impacts – it causes war, jacks the economy, and increases
disease spread
Ward 6. (Olivia, Foreign Affairs correspondent, “Fuelling Africa’s Turmoil”, Toronto Star, May 27,
http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/smallarms/2006/0527toronto.htm)

Arms dealers are Africa's birds of prey, picking the bones of countries already destitute from
years of murderous violence. But an African security expert says the burgeoning trade in small
arms — those which can be carried by individuals — has also created a dangerous new scenario in which
battle-hardened young gunmen [gunholders] infiltrate borders across the continent, providing
ready firepower for conflicts that migrate to new territory even as peace deals are signed. The
career fighters, he says, are part of a broad-based gun culture that makes the demand for
weapons a steadily increasing factor in Africa's destructive arms trade — and decreases the
hope for peace in such conflict-ridden areas as Darfur. "Youth unemployment is horrific in most of Africa," said Eboe
Hutchful, chair of the African Security Sector Network, an umbrella group of politicians, security experts and academics working for
security sector reform. "There are many young men who see no alternative to offering their services to whoever wants to hire them to
fight. They may not start conflicts, but they're available to anyone who is ready for a war." The "hired guns" take their weapons with
them, but sometimes barter them for cash along the way, said Hutchful. In Africa's huge arms bazaar, there are many opportunities to
rearm. "(Demobilized fighters) may be offered $300 in Liberia, but $900 in Ivory Coast. They'll take the money and move on
somewhere else," Hutchful said. According to the London-based International Action Network on Small Arms, there are 8 million
firearms in the West Africa alone, and millions of people have been killed by them in Central and East Africa, in spite of regional
accords meant to halt the flow of weapons. Hutchful, a Ghanaian political scientist and University of Toronto grad, heads the Ghana-
based African Security Dialogue and Research, and is professor of African Studies at Wayne State University in Detroit. In Africa, he
says, demand is catching up with supply as a fundamental factor in the floodtide of arms sweeping the continent. "Eradicating the
demand may be even more difficult than getting rid of the supply," Hutchful said in a telephone interview during a recent visit to
Ottawa. "In some African countries guns are now part of the culture. You have to have a personal weapon," he said. Once
acquired, small arms — defined as deadly weapons that can be carried by individual
combatants — flow easily across Africa's porous borders, Hutchful said. "Many African countries aren't in a
good position to address the problem. There are initiatives, but they're difficult to enforce. Small arms are simply out of
control." The multi-million-dollar international arms trade is responsible for many of the weapons
that plague Africa today, despite tracking efforts and arms embargoes. Reports show that guns are
invading territory where they were once almost unknown, such as western Kenya, where an influx of automatic weapons has turned
cattle theft among the impoverished Pokot tribe into civil war. However, Hutchful says, foreign-made arms are only part of the
problem. Africa's black market weapons manufacturers are now taking a cue from importers. "In West Africa, there are a number of
producers of small arms. But there's a sense of denial about locally manufactured weapons — (governments) don't want to admit that
they themselves might be proliferators." Many of the producers, Hutchful says, are ordinary blacksmiths looking to boost their small
incomes: "They produce routine agricultural implements and guns for hunting. But the guns end up in the hands of criminals. In Ghana
and Nigeria there is a lot of armed robbery done with locally made weapons." Some local producers are trying to "go legitimate" by
declaring their businesses and operating under government rules. But Hutchful says, "there are huge amounts of dirt-cheap arms
As long as arms are cheap and available, experts say, there is
already circulating. It may not be worth their while."
scant hope of solving the deep and deadly problems that beset Africa, from the brain drain of its
most capable people to the huge death toll from HIV-AIDS, which is at its worst in conflict zones.
International organizations and aid agencies stress development can only go hand in hand with
disarmament, Hutchful says. But without investment that creates jobs for millions of armed and
hungry young men [people], countries recovering from wars can too easily slip back into conflict.
* this evidence has been edited for gendered language

** Eboe Hutchful is the chair of the African Security Sector Network


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African Water Wars Impact

1. African water wars spark global conflict


Business & Finance Magazine, 7, June 15, 2007. “Water, Water, Not Everywhere” Lexis.
This sudden scarcity of an element whose symbolic and spiritual importance matches its
centrality to human life will cause stress and exacerbate conflicts worldwide. Africa, the Middle East,
and Central Asia will be the first to be exposed. The repercussions, however, will be global.

2. It goes nuclear
Weiner 90. (Jonathan, Prof at Princeton U, The Next 100 Years. p.270)
If we do not destroy ourselves with the A-bomb and the H-bomb, then we may destroy ourselves with the C-bomb, the Change Bomb.
And in a world as interlinked as ours, one explosion may lead to the other. Already in the Middle East,
tram North Africa to the Persian Gulf and from the Nile to the Euphrates, tensions over dwindling water supplies and rising
populations are reaching what many experts describe as a flashpoint A climate shift in that single battle-scarred nexus
might trigger international tensions that will unleash some at the 60.000 nuclear warheads the world has
stockpiled since Trinity.

3. Prefer our impact – water wars are the most probable threat in Africa
Smith 99. (Russell, Africa’s Potential Water Wars, November 15, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/454926.stm)
The main conflicts in Africa during the next 25 years could be over that most precious of commodities - water, as countries fight for
access to scarce resources.
Potential 'water wars' are likely in areas where rivers and lakes are shared
by more than one country, according to a UN Development Programme (UNDP) report. The possible flashpoints
are the Nile, Niger, Volta and Zambezi basins. The influential head of environmental research
institute Worldwatch, Lester Brown, believes that water scarcity is now "the single biggest threat to
global food security".

4. We control the vital internal link to your impacts -- water scarcity causes conflict,
pollution, poverty, food shortages and deforestation
NYT 6. (“Need for Water Could Double in 50 Years, UN Study Finds”, New York Times, August 22)
More than two billion people already live in regions facing a scarcity of water, and unless the world
changes its ways over the next 50 years, the amount of water needed for a rapidly growing population will
double, scientists warned in a study released yesterday. At the worst, a deepening water crisis would fuel violent conflicts,
dry up rivers and increase groundwater pollution, their report says. It would also force the rural poor to clear ever more grasslands and
forests to grow food and leave many more people hungry.

5. SSA water conflicts spread across borders


Tatlock 6. (Christopher, Council on Foreign Relations, “Water Stress in Sub-Saharan Africa”, August 7,
http://www.cfr.org/publication/11240/water_stress_in_subsaharan_africa.html?breadcrumb=%2Fbios%2F12290%2Fchristopher_w_tatlock)
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While water stress occurs throughout the world, no region has been more afflicted than sub-
Saharan Africa. The crisis in Darfur stems in part from disputes over water: The conflict that led
to the crisis arose from tensions between nomadic farming groups who were competing for
water and grazing land — both increasingly scarce due to the expanding Sahara Desert. As Mark Giordano of the International Water
Management Institute in Colombo Sri Lanka says, “Most water extracted for development in sub-Saharan
Africa — drinking water, livestock watering, irrigation — is at least in some sense
‘transboundary.’” Because water sources are often cross-border, conflict emerges.
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DRC – Proliferates

The DRC is a potential source of fissile material for would be proliferators


Crail and Bergenas, 7 Peter Crail and Johan Bergenas, Nonproliferation Studies workers, April 3, 2007 (The Center for
Nonproliferation Studies (CNS) strives to combat the spread of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) by training the next generation of
nonproliferation specialists and disseminating timely information and analysis http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/other/ wmdi070403a.htm)

On March 6, 2007, Kinshasa authorities arrested two senior nuclear officials of the Democratic Republic
of Congo (DRC) for their joint involvement in illicit uranium exports. [1] According to press accounts, the
accusations levied against Fortunat Lumu, the Commissioner General for Atomic Energy, and Bere Bemba Paulin, the Head of
the Center for Nuclear Studies, involve each official in two different episodes: the disappearance of
unspecified quantities of low-enriched uranium fuel from the Regional Center for Nuclear Studies in Kinshasa;
and an illegal operation to export uranium ore from the country’s uranium mines. [2] While the two suspects were
released four days after their arrests, they remain under investigation by DRC authorities, and the International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA) has also expressed interest in examining the situation. [3] The
allegations of uranium smuggling are only the latest
reminder of long-standing international concerns regarding the poor physical protection and
accounting measures in the DRC’s nuclear sector. While these episodes may ultimately prove to be false alarms,
the continued vulnerability of nuclear material in the DRC poses a significant risk of exploitation
by states seeking a clandestine source of uranium for weapons or by terrorists seeking material
for a radiological dispersal device (“dirty bomb”). Alleged Missing Uranium Fuel from the Kinshasa Research Reactor
Initial, unconfirmed, reports from the DRC newspaper Le Phare indicated that the arrests were in response to the
disappearance in recent years of “more than 100 bars of uranium” and an additional unknown quantity of uranium
contained in 25 helmet-shaped casings from the Regional Center for Nuclear Studies in Kinshasa (CREN/K).
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Nigeria Impact
Nigerian dissolution would be devastating – it would trigger massive oil shocks and the U.S.
would intervene in an attempt to protect oil supplies
Gardner, 6 Dan Gardner, “Western world ignoring demise of Nigeria”, The Ottawa Citizen, 3/23/06, lexis
Imagine a country that is one of the world's largest exporters of oil. Imagine a country in which ethnic and
sectarian violence has killed thousands and driven millions from their homes, a country so fragile that a recent report commissioned by
the CIA concluded there is a good chance it will collapse. Imagine a country that Osama bin Laden has declared to be "ripe for
This country is not in the Middle East. It's also not on the minds of western media or politicians, despite the
liberation."
almost unimaginable havoc that would be unleashed if the feared collapse comes. It is Nigeria. A British invention, Nigeria is a
country made up of some 250 ethnic groups and countless tribal subdivisions sharing only a weak national identity. It is
also a country of intense and growing religious passions whose 132 million people are divided almost equally between Christians and
Muslims. Violent earthquakes can erupt along any of these fault lines. In February, Muslims in the north murdered 50 Christians.
Christians in the south retaliated by murdering Muslims. Thousands fled in terror. These latest clashes started with protests against
the Danish cartoons, but most have less exotic origins. People fight for land or God. They fight to control local governments. They fight
to avenge insults. In the Niger Delta, they fight for control of oil. Dozens die in one clash. Hundreds in another. It's low-grade warfare
but the toll steadily climbs. By one estimate, 20,000 Nigerians have been killed in fighting since 1999, when democracy was restored
after 16 years of military rule. And for every corpse, more than a hundred people have been driven from their homes. "The
magnitude, scope, character and dimension of internally displaced persons in Nigeria is frightening," declared a report released last
week by Nigeria's National Commission for Refugees. Since 1999, the commission says, three million people have fled. Their plight
represents one of the gravest humanitarian crises in the world. It is also one of the most unrecognized. The bloody clashes in Nigeria
almost never rate a mention in the western media and western politicians pay even less attention to the country than they do to other
African hot spots. As a result, very few people in Canada realize how dangerous the situation has become. "While currently Nigeria's
leaders are locked in a bad marriage that all dislike but dare not leave," states a 2005 report commissioned by the CIA, an event such
as acoup attempt could spark open warfare and "outright collapse." AN OIL SHOCK The
consequences would be immense. "If Nigeria were to become a failed state," the report concluded, "it
could drag down a large part of the West African region." Millions would flee. There's also the matter
of oil. Even now, world oil prices jump every time a bullet is fired in the Niger Delta. If Nigeria were to collapse, there
could be an oil shock the like of which we haven't seen since the Iranian Revolution. And since the long-
term energy strategy of the United States assumes rising African oil production, chaos in the
Niger Delta would almost certainly bring in the Marines.

Nigerian disintegration causes massive oil price spikes


Widdershoven, 6 Cyril Widdershoven, editor of Global Energy Security Analysis (GESA) and Institute for Analysis of Global Security
associate fellow, 4-12-2006, Resource Investor, http://www.resourceinvestor.com/pebble.asp?relid=18746

Analysts should be keeping a closer eye on the developments in the Gulf of Guinea, West Africa. A possible doomsday
scenario
could be the disintegration of Nigeria, which is currently battling growing instability and militancy in the Niger Delta.
Not only are militants in the Niger Delta a source of concern, growing ethnic and religious tension throughout the
country could lead to a total stand-still. The Nigerian government has already put into place several military
contingency plans to counter a possible military confrontation with the different militant groups in the Delta region. Reports have also
been published indicating that the latter militant groups have changed overall tactics the last days. International operators in Nigeria
have stated that the militants have increased their operations against offshore deepwater projects. If
targeted, this could result in a total standstill of the Nigerian oil and gas production , which would take
around 2.5-2.8 million bpd out of the constellation. The fact that Nigeria has become one of the main oil exporters
to the U.S. and several European markets could be a main issue of concern. To counter a potential gap in
supply of 2.5 million bpd in a market of constraint would be impossible. No other third party
supply will be able to counter this, resulting in exponentially high crude oil price increases.
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--Spills Over

Nigerian democratization leads to continent-wide stability


Booker, 3 Salih Booker, executive director at Africa Action and William Minter, senior research fellow at Africa Action, Winter 2003, The
U.S. and Nigeria: thinking beyond oil, accessed via ciaonet.org

Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, is also the most important state in U.S.- Africa relations today.
Nigeria is America’s major trading partner in Africa. It plays the largest role of any country in peacekeeping
efforts on the continent. Nigeria’s attempt to build democracy from the ashes of authoritarian rule will arguably
have even more consequential effects for the continent than South Africa’s victory over
apartheid in 1994. Although it is oil that attracts Washington’s attention the most, the ramifications of Nigeria’s success or failure
will extend far beyond the energy sector. In past centuries, Nigeria’s territory was home to a series of powerful and technically
advanced societies, renowned for their artistic, commercial and political achievements. It was also a pioneer in the movement for
African independence. But since independence its growth has been stunted by internal conflict and military misrule. Yet today, Nigeria
is again one of Africa’s most influential countries. Its
unique human resources and vast oil reserves create the
capacity for enormous prosperity and regional leadership. In 2002, Nigeria was the fifth-largest supplier of oil to
the U.S., ranking behind only Canada, Saudi Arabia, Mexico and Venezuela. Along with Royal Dutch Shell, a British-Dutch firm, U.S. oil
supermajors ChevronTexaco and Exxon Mobil Corp. dominate oil production in the oil-rich Niger Delta. Since emerging from military
dictatorship in 1999, its nascent democratic institutions have survived huge challenges but have performed disappointingly in the eyes
of tens of millions of Nigerians. Their capacity to deliver the peace and prosperity Nigerians want is still unproved. The
fate of
Nigeria has profound implications for the entire continent: both the potential and the obstacles are on
the giant scale of the country itself.

Nigerian stability is key to continental stability


Tsai, 2 Thomas Tsai, Associate Editor of HIR, Fall 2002, Harvard International Review
Two future for Africa are possible—one with a democratic and stable Nigeria, and one with a
Nigeria stricken by autocratic rule, corruption and intermittent coups. An entire continent awaits the
result of the Nigerian experiment with democracy. Nigeria has the resources and can provide
the leadership to foster greater regional and international cooperation, leadership that many of
Nigeria’s neighbors need. A successful Nigerian democracy would provide hope for many of
Africa’s other burgeoning democracies.

A strong Nigeria is key to peacekeeping and continental stability


Campbell 6. (John is the United States ambassador to Nigeria, “Peacekeeping for Decision Making Seminar,” August 21)
http://abuja.usembassy.gov/sp_09212006.html

The topic, “Peacekeeping for Decision Makers,” could not be more important given Nigeria’s positive, indeed essential, role
in promoting stability, democracy and good governance in this region, and throughout the world. Ethnic and religious conflict
continues to result in humanitarian suffering of great magnitude throughout the world, as well in Africa. And, the decisions leaders
make about Peacekeeping Operations often determine the success or failure of efforts to stem the suffering and displacement of
millions of refugees. So, the topic of this seminar could not be more timely. And my
government is proud to be
associated with Nigeria’s leadership role in peacekeeping. To cite only a few examples: Nigeria is playing
an exemplary role in the efforts of the African Union and the international community to end the strife and
bloodshed in Darfur. The Nigerian Armed Forces played a critical role in Peacekeeping Operations
and the introduction of democracy in Liberia. Indeed, the Nigerian Military’s superb efforts in maintaining
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peace and stability in Sierra Leone set the standard for Peacekeeping in the region. Nigerian troops
have distinguished themselves by providing Peacekeeping support to Operations in Lebanon, Yugoslavia,
Kuwait, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Rwanda, and presently Sudan. And, no doubt, Nigeria will respond positively to
future requests from the international community. This distinguished audience has gathered here this week to discuss such
Peacekeeping topics such as: The Use of Force, Rules of Engagement, Use of Non-Lethal Weapons, Coordination with Non-
Governmental Organizations, and Human Rights. Through open and honest dialogue, we hope to share key ideas, and our experience,
that will enable leaders in this audience to make the decisions that will be critical to the success of future Peacekeeping missions.

Nigerian ability to solve social problems sets a model for the rest of Africa
Booker, 3 Salih Booker, executive director at Africa Action and William Minter, senior research fellow at Africa Action, 2003, The U.S. and
Nigeria: thinking beyond oil, accessed via ciaonet.org

Nigeria, whose almost 130 million people make up nearly one sixth of Africa’s population, reflects virtually all the major
problems confronting the continent. Its success or failure will resonate far beyond its
immediate neighbors in West Africa. The HIV/AIDS pandemic, the crippling debt burden, protection of
the environment against corporate greed, the need to break out of dependence on raw-
material exports, the establishment of peaceful Muslim- Christian and ethnoregional relations
and balancing national and local government accountability are all cases in point.

Nigerian democratic consolidation is key to continental stability


Lloyd, 4 Robert Lloyd, assistant professor of international relations at Pepperdine University, May 2004, Current History
"If democracy firmly establishes itself in this African giant and economic reform leads to increasing wealth and
stability, Nigeria could serve as a beacon of inspiration for a continent many view as hopeless." In April 2003
Nigerians reelected President Olusegun Obasanjo to a second term in polling generally accepted as free and fair, though marred by
serious voting irregularities. Obasanjo's reelection marked the first time the country had successfully carried out a back-to-back
election of a civilian government. Will the country's transition to democracy continue? Or will it, like past attempts to install elective
governments, abort amid ethnic conflict or military coups? Much depends on the answer. DIVIDED IT STANDS Located on Africa's
western shore, Nigeria has the potential to become one of the continent's powerhouses. Its
population of 130 million is expected to nearly double to 245 million by 2015. Lagos, Nigeria's commercial capital, is
itself home to an estimated 11 million people-edging out Cairo as the largest urban center on the African continent. The country
possesses vast reserves of oil and natural gas, with estimates of proven oil reserves ranging from 24 billion to 32
billion barrels. Nigeria today produces about 2 million barrels of oil per day, the majority of which it exports to markets in the United
Already Nigeria has taken
States, Europe, and Asia. In 2002 it was the fifth-largest exporter of crude oil to the United States.
a leading role in the continent's political affairs. It has supplied peacekeeping troops both in
Sierra Leone and Liberia to help stabilize those two failed states in West Africa. Along with South Africa and Australia,
Nigeria has taken the lead in addressing Commonwealth concerns regarding the current political crisis in
Zimbabwe. President Obasanjo, working closely with South Africa, also played a critical role in creating the New
Partnership for African Development as a way to spur economic growth on the continent. A large
and growing population, abundant energy resources, and a regional leadership position might suggest a prosperous and peaceful
country. Yet Nigeria has a troubled history of economic malaise, political and religious strife, and debates over the viability of the
Nigerian federation. Nigerians have had to grapple with postcolonial nation-building in one of the most diverse states in the world.
Approximately 500 languages are spoken, and the country remains deeply divided among three major ethnolinguistic groups. In the
north are the Hausa-Fulani, who comprise nearly a third of the population. In southwestern Nigeria, including Lagos, are the Yoruba.
Igbos, the third-largest group, live in southern Nigeria. These last two groups each comprise one-fifth of the population. Moreover, a
stark religious divide splits the country roughly in half. Northern Nigeria is Muslim; the south is predominantly Christian.

Nigerian stability is key to African stability


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Esimai, 6 Chinwe Esimai, an attorney in New York, former editor with the Harvard Human Rights Journal, May 2006, Current History
The recent violence is cause for concern because a
stable Nigeria is essential to the peace and security of the
entire African continent. The Nigerian army has led peacekeeping efforts in Liberia, Sierra
Leone, and the Darfur region in Sudan. The nation also provides leadership in regional bodies such as
the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States, which has provided peacekeeping forces in West Africa
through its armed monitoring group, ECOMOG. Beyond the confines of the continent, Nigeria's importance as a dependable oil
producer is growing in the face of turmoil in the Middle East. With a prominent position in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting
Countries, Nigeria is Africa's largest oil producer, the world's eleventh-largest producer, and the fifth-largest supplier of America's
crude oil imports. A stable and democratic Nigeria would serve a great many interests-including, obviously, those of most Nigerians.
But unless the country succeeds in mending its religious and ethnic divides, preventing a resurgence of secessionist
movements, and blocking a rumored bid by President Olusegun Obasanjo to stay in power, the likelihood of major turmoil
and civil conflict will inexorably increase.

Nigerian stability is key for African democracy—it’s a stronger model than South Africa
Unegbu, 3 Carl Unegbu, Nigerian-born American lawyer and journalist, Spring 2003, World Policy Journal
But unlike its sub-Saharan neighbors, Nigeria is not your typical African country. Before the advent in 1994 of majority rule in South
Africa under Nelson Mandela, Nigeria was unrivaled as the dominant regional power, with respectable credentials in its decolonization
efforts in the 1970s, and then in peacekeeping operations in Sierra Leone and Liberia in the 1990s. Today, even
with South
Africa as a partner in continental affairs, Nigeria provides the more credible litmus of democracy's
future in sub-Saharan Africa. Not only does Nigeria have a longer history of acceptable
involvement in African affairs, but its economic and social conditions are more representative
of the deplorable situation in other African countries than those in South Africa. Indigenous black Africans have
dominated Nigeria's social, political, and economic affairs since independence. By contrast, despite the recent political dominance of
black South Africans, their country's social and economic sectors continue to be dominated by whites. Thus by strengthening
its own fledgling democracy, Nigeria can take the first step to fortifying the same impulse
elsewhere. Yet success in Nigeria this fourth time around hinges critically on how well the country and its political class address
the familiar demons that have wrecked democracy three times previously. It was the failure of past civilian administrations to organize
credible elections that provided the proximate trigger for the abolition of democracy by the Nigerian military in 1966 and 1983.
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Somalia Impact

Results of the conflict in Mogadishu will engulf the Horn of Africa


Ward, 7 Olivia Ward, Toronto Star, April 29,2007
Starved and terrified civilians fleeing their homes. The stench of death hovering over the steaming streets.
Tanks and missiles blasting through the night. Cholera victims dying in the dust. A plague of war
has descended on the Somali capital, Mogadishu, claiming more than a thousand lives and displacing
an estimates 300,000 people, as the country's transitional government, backed by Ethiopian
troops, continues to battle for power with supporters of an ousted Islamist regime. It's one of
those complex regional wars that attract little international attention - but this conflict is closely watched
in Toronto and other centres of the Somali diaspora. What much of the world doesn't realize is that this little war
threatens a humanitarian catastrophe that could have spillover effects in the region, and the
West, for years to come. "It's a genocide in the making," says Mohamad Elmi, an Ottawa-based
partner in Mogadishu's independent HornAfrik broadcasting network. "People are fleeing in
every direction, but they're being wounded and killed and there's nobody to help them. Now, all the political agendas
are merging, and everything we've feared is happening. If it continues this way the whole Horn
of Africa will be in flames."

Fighting in Mogadishu has spread East


Ward, 7 Olivia Ward, Toronto Star, April 29,2007
So far, most
of the slaughter has occurred in Mogadishu, which lies on the western shore of the Indian Ocean: a
chaotic city of 1 million where a United Nations-backed Transitional Federal Government had been unable to take control
since the TFG was set up in 2004. Last June, the clan-based Islamic Courts Movement seized the city, imposing order until it was
ousted six months later by Ethiopian troops backing the government, with military support from the United States, which feared
Somalia would become a beachhead for Islamic extremism. Now, as
the fires of the Somali conflict burn higher,
sparks are spreading to other volatile areas. "This brings us right back to the surrogate politics
of the Cold War," says University of Winnipeg president Lloyd Axworthy, a former UN envoy for Ethiopia and Eritrea.
"You have all the same elements: lack of settlement, special interests and international players
trying to carve out their own requirements for the region." Last Tuesday in the eastern Ogaden
region of Ethiopia bordering Somalia, an ethnic Somali militia attacked a Chinese energy facility,
slaughtering more than 70 people and kidnapping eight Chinese oil workers. Somalia has laid claim to the Somali-
speaking Ogaden region since the late 1970s. The grandfather of Bashir Makhtal, the Somali-born Canadian being detained
incommunicado in Ethiopia, was once a leader of the separatist Ogaden National Liberation Front that carried out Tuesday's attack.
Makhtal, a former Toronto resident, was deported from Kenya to Somalia and then to Ethiopia in January. Although his lawyer says
Makhtal's has not been in Ethiopia since he was 11, the detention is a sign of the Ethiopian government's concern about unrest within
its borders. David Shinn,
a former U.S. ambassador to Ethiopia and U.S. State Department co-
ordinator for Somalia, say the Ogaden attack was the largest the separatist militia has
undertaken in many years. "I think the timing is more than coincidental. They can see that the
Ethiopian forces are tied up in Somalia, so it's a good time for them to strike." While the Ogaden
attack was taking place, suicide bombers targeted Ethiopian troops fighting in Somalia. The
bombers were part of the Young Mujahideen Movement, which has adopted the jihadist tactics
of international terrorist groups. Although some foreign fighters have joined the Somali war, experts say it would be a
mistake to simplify such complex regional conflicts by labelling them religious-based ideological clashes - a view taken by U.S.
President George W. Bush's administration, which sees them as part of the worldwide "war on terror."
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Gangland violence on Somalia threatens to spillover an engulf the region


Ward, 7 Olivia Ward, Toronto Star, April 29,2007
Analysts who study Somalia argue that fierce clan-based struggles have created something
more akin to a gangland state than a battleground for Muslim extremism. "The current fighting is a
combination of the former Islamic Court people and a more important group, the Ayr sub-clan (of the major Hawiye clan), which feels
it hasn't been given enough power," says Shinn. "There are a lot of business interests at stake and Somalis are consummate
Those caught in Mogadishu's deadly crossfire see the new conflict as a flashback to
businessmen."
16 years of warlord rule, which ended when the Islamic Courts - formed from the large Hawiye clan and backed by powerful
business leaders - restored order in the capital. The TFG had been unable to get a grip on the fragmented country but kept a foothold
in Baidoa outside Mogadishu. When the Islamists took the capital, many people rejoiced, although warily. "What most Somalis want is
peace and security," says Khadija Ali, a former TFG minister and now a graduate student at George Mason University in Virginia. "But
The Islamists were at first
they will never have it unless the parties are willing to solve their problems peacefully."
welcomed for their crackdown on violence and criminality in Mogadishu, but their strict
application of sharia law, media censorship and clan nepotism soon caused resentment. They also
outraged Ethiopia by threatening to seize the Ogaden region. The Islamic Courts' ouster has
brought only more bloodshed to Somalia, in spite of declarations of victory by Somali Prime Minister Ali Mohamed
Gedi. Corpses are rotting the streets of Mogadishu and hospitals have all but collapsed. As the
city is reduced to rubble, the impoverished towns to which residents have fled are unable to
cope with their needs. Humanitarian agencies have been largely unable to help war victims, and
the UN has warned of a disaster if fighting continues. "Ethiopia is caught in an unwinnable war, and there's no
end in sight unless it and the transitional government have a paradigm shift in the way they deal with each other," says David
Mozersky, Horn of Africa project director for the International Crisis Group. "But now the fighting has gone so far that neither side
wants to make an effort at conciliation." Clan and land issues have fuelled an already volatile mix of
hostilities, says Andrew McGregor, director of Toronto-based Aberfoyle International Security Analysis. "The troops in the TFG are
from the large Darod clan. And as far as the Hawiye are concerned, they're simply an occupying army," he says. The clans have fought
Complicating things further,
bitterly in the past, and now the Hawiye "see their old enemies back in the streets."
Ethiopia's dedicated foe, Eritrea, has reportedly offered training and support for Ogaden rebels
and has harboured Somali fighters opposed to the TFG. Ethiopia has accused it of sponsoring
terrorism, making the prospects for peace between the two neighbouring, and still warring,
countries more remote. Eritrea labels the charges a politically motivated smear. As the Somalia conflict rages
on, says Axworthy, "this is the seedbed of an entire breakdown in the region. What's happening here
will push back into Eritrea, Sudan, Djibouti and the whole region." But it is the Somalis who are suffering
most, after losing up to 1 million people in more than a decade of fighting. As they pray for an end to the killing, the few overtures for
peace between the warring sides have failed. Says HornAfrik's Elmi: "Somalis just want to get on with their lives. They say: 'Show us
the buck, not the bullet.' If as much effort was put into peace as war, Somalia would be paradise instead of hell on Earth

Political crisis in Somalia can spark a regional war


Lyons 6 (Terrence, Professor of Conflict Analysis and Resolution George Mason
University,http://www.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/Ethiopia_EritreaCSR21.pdf, December 2006)

The border conflict also exacerbates a rapidly escalating domestic political crisis in Somalia.
Ethiopia has supported the TFG and has sent its military into Somalia to defend its regional ally.
Consistent with a deeply ingrained pattern of supporting the enemy of one’s enemy, Eritrea has
provided arms to a wide range of anti-Ethiopian forces operating from Somalia, hoping to tie
Ethiopian forces down in the Ogaden, a region of Ethiopia predominatly inhabited by ethnic
Somalis and Muslims. Ethiopia may be provoked into a much larger intervention in Somalia, a
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move that in turn would tempt Eritrea to press its border claims with Ethiopia through military
means. The deteriorating situation in Somalia is already derailing U.S. counterterrorism efforts
by the Combined Joint Task Force-Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA), scuttling early hopes that regional
cooperation would be possible. In this way, the Ethiopian-Eritrean proxy conflict increases the
opportunities for terrorist infiltration of the Horn and East Africa and for ignition of a larger
regional conflict.

Ongoing Eritrea-Ethiopia conflict will spill over to Somalia, causing a wide regional
conflict.
The Hague 6 (November 29, Eritrea and Ethiopia Given One Year to End Border Stalemate, Agence France-Presse,
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/RWB.NSF/db900SID/STED-6VZLY3?OpenDocument)

Eritrea and Ethiopia both last week rejected plans by the panel, the Eritrea Ethiopia Boundary Commission, to demarcate their
contentious frontier on paper. The stalemate has left the status of the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) border
unclear six years after a peace deal and raised tensions, heightened by UN reports that both
nations are militarily active in Somalia. Continued… The commission's warning comes amid growing tension
between the two countries that many fear could lead to a renewal of their war and spill over into
Somalia, threatening a wider regional conflict.

Regional conflict will arise from the Somalia proxy war fought by Ethiopia and Eritrea.
Baldauf 6 (Scott, December 12, staff writer of the Christan Science Monitor, Global Jihad’s New Front in Africa, The Christian Science
Monitor, http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1212/p01s02-woaf.html)

As a country with no central government for more than 15 years, Somalia has become a dangerous playground for other people's
Eritrea and Ethiopia, use Somalia as a proxy war to fight each other,
wars. Neighboring countries, such as
placing their own troops in Somalia supporting opposing sides of the internal civil war.
Ethiopian separatist groups such as the Ogaden National Liberation Front and the Oromo
Liberation Front use Somalia as a base to fight for independence from Ethiopia. Most
worrisome to the Western world, however, is that the lack of central control has allowed
extremist groups to bring their pro-Al Qaeda agenda into Africa. But the increasingly open movements of
Ethiopian troops in Somalia are fast becoming an emotional unifying force for the Islamists, who are calling on Somalis to defend their
national sovereignty. Continued… But more troublesome is that foreign troops will play into the hands of the Islamists. In any case,
many Ethiopian officials
and experts say that they have no choice but to fight. The looming war in
Somalia is part of the unfinished business of Ethiopia's two-year border war with Eritrea, which
ended in exhaustion rather than a negotiated peace treaty. Ethiopian officials allege that the rise of Somalia's Islamists was made
possible by Eritrean logistical support, and a UN Monitoring Group report has charged that Eritrea, Egypt, Djibouti, Iran, Saudi Arabia,
Yemen, Libya, and Sudan have all contributed funds, arms, and technical support to help Somalia's Islamists take control. Continued…
Abdikarim Farah, ambassador of the Somali transitional government, welcomed last week's UN resolution to arm his government and
provide peacekeepers. "Whether
this is a proxy war or not, it will happen, and if the Islamists succeed,
it is going to be a regional conflict," he says.

Regional conflict spillover will be the effect of the looming Ethiopian-Eritrean war.
Terfa 7 (Solomon, June 24, Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Mississipi State University, Only a
Legitimate Government Should Commit Ethiopians to War, Ethiomedia, http://www.ethiomedia.com/atop/zenawi_and_badme.html)

In the meantime, the United


Nations Mission in Ethiopia and Eritrea began to warn the Universal organization
about a war that was in the making inside the borders of both countries beginning the year 2004. The
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Head of the Mission Joseph Legwaila said: “The stalemate could lead to the conflagration of
another war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, and could obviously spill over to other parts of the
region. Lately, troops and instruments of war that include tanks and missiles are being
deployed. The Eritrean government has not only imposed a helicopter ban but also restricted the movement of the 2,800
peacekeeping troops that are stationed to patrol the Temporary Security Zone (TZS)”.
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South Africa Impact

Even if South Africa does not have nuclear weapons, it is capable of turning it’s newly
enriched uranium into weapons quickly, even without the threat from North Korea or help
from Abdul Khan.
New York Times,6. (“A 'race' to head off nuclear disaster.” By William J. Broad and David E. Sanger The New York Times.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/10/15/news/arms.php. Published: October 15, 2006)

The declaration by North Korea that it has conducted a successful atomic test brought to nine the number of nations believed to have
nuclear arms. But atomic officials estimate that as many as 40 more countries have the technical skill, and in some cases the required
material, to build a bomb. That
ability, coupled with new nuclear threats in Asia and the Middle East, risks a
second nuclear age, officials and arms control specialists say, in which nations are more likely to abandon
the old restraints against atomic weapons. The spread of nuclear technology is expected to
accelerate as nations redouble their reliance on atomic power. That will give more countries the
ability to make reactor fuel, or, with the same equipment and a little more effort, bomb fuel - the hardest part of the
arms equation. Signs of activity abound. Hundreds of companies are prospecting for uranium where
dozens did a few years ago. Argentina, Australia and South Africa are drawing up plans to begin
enriching uranium, and other countries are considering doing the same. Egypt is reviving its program to
develop nuclear power. Concern led the International Atomic Energy Agency to summon government officials and experts from
around the world to Vienna in September to discuss tightening curbs on who can produce nuclear fuel. "These dangers are urgent,"
Sam Nunn, a U.S. expert on the politics of nuclear proliferation, told the group. "We are in a race between cooperation and
catastrophe and, at this moment, the outcome is unclear." The International Atomic Energy Agency itself exemplifies some of the
underlying tensions inherent in the development of nuclear energy. It is the primary United Nations agency charged with detecting
proliferation, but it has another mandate as well: to promote safe nuclear power. For decades, it has done so by running technical aid
programs with roughly a hundred states. Some of that knowledge could be useful in a weapons program, though the aid is meant
exclusively for civilian use. Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the agency, has estimated that as many as 49 nations now
know how to make nuclear arms, and he has warned that global tensions could push some over the line. "We are relying," he said,
"primarily on the continued good intentions of these countries - intentions which are in turn based on their sense of security or
insecurity, and could therefore be subject to rapid change." In the United States, Democrats and Republicans spent the past week
arguing over who lost control of North Korea: Bill Clinton or George W. Bush. But seeds of the problem were planted by President
Dwight Eisenhower, just months after the armistice ended the fighting on the Korean Peninsula in 1953. His program was called
Atoms for Peace, and it soon involved dozens of nations, all seeking to unlock the magic of nuclear power. Almost from the start,
evidence accumulated that countries were using civil alliances and reactor technologies to make bombs. By 1960, France had joined
the United States, Britain and the Soviet Union as a nuclear weapons state. China held its first test in 1964. Israel had the bomb by
1967 (though it still does not admit to it), India by 1974, South Africa by 1982 (it has since given up its weapons) and Pakistan by 1998.
Six of those countries built their weapons by exploiting at least some technologies that were ostensibly civilian, nuclear analysts say.
They enriched uranium beyond the low level needed for power reactors. Or they mined the spent fuel of civil reactors for plutonium -
the path that North Korea started taking in the late 1980s or early 1990s, according to U.S. intelligence officials. The International
Atomic Energy Agency has worked hard to fight this kind of cheating while also helping with the basic technology. In the 1980s, it aided
The hardest
Iran's hunt for uranium. Even now, Iranian technicians fly to Vienna and agency experts go to Iran to lend a hand.
part, experts agree, is not acquiring the weapons blueprints but obtaining the fuel. Abdul Qadeer
Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear arms program, who went on to establish the world's largest atomic black
market, sold the secrets of how to make centrifuges for enriching uranium to Libya, Iran and North Korea. Investigators are still
trying to learn where else Khan may have planted his nuclear seeds. They discovered outposts of his network in
Dubai, Malaysia and South Africa and found that before his fall in 2004 he had visited at least 18 countries, including Egypt,
Niger, Nigeria, Sudan, Syria and Saudi Arabia.

South Africa is a threat to re- proliferate – has the scientists and uranium reserves
Malone, 7 Paul Malone, Canberra Times, May 2, 2007, staff writer
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South Africa, which abandoned its nuclear weapons program, was listed as a country of concern because of its
uranium reserves and the ability of its former regime to get round safeguards. South Africa also
had scientists who had previously been involved in its nuclear weapons programs and now had
the potential to pose a risk of nuclear proliferation.

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