Why did Somalia collapse in the early 90s? They were known as

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>>3173185

The same reason most African countries collapse into civil war. Their leader was an authoritarian shithead who was more concerned with enriching his bank account and playing the tribes off each other than with actually leading his people.

Also, post rare Operation Restore Hopes

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>>3173185
>They were known as the "Switzerland" and even settled disputes across Africa.
u wot m8

They actively sponsored terrorist groups in Kenya and Ethiopia, squandered all their foreign aid on weapons for a (failed) war with Ethiopia, and managed to piss off the Soviets so badly that they launched the largest airlift effort they'd conducted since the Second World War to help Ethiopia slap their shit.

They're practically the antithesis of Switzerland.

>>3173205
Was that from the Ogaden War?

>>3173185
Somalians society centers around clans and clan coalitions with most of the population holding much more alliance to said clans then any government however for a brief time they united under a idea of a 'greater Somalia' ie invading surrounding country's to liberate Somalian minority's but in the middle of there invasion Ethiopia who were distracted with dealing with Eritrean rebels, the soviets decided to stop giving them weapon shipments and started massively supporting Ethiopia (both claimed to be "Marxist states" at the time) and thus completely btfoed the Somalia army within a few months. This shattered the brief Somalian unity and it quickly decended into the cronyism, corruption and tribalistic favoritism that afflicts most African failed states

Sorry If this is formatted poorly it was written on a iPad

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>>3173205

Siad Barre was basically Saddam Hussein but with no oil and WMDs, and less hair.

He played both sides of the Cold War, regularly massacred disobedient minorities and suspected opposition, fancied himself a military genius when he was barely competent as a civilian leader, and managed to squander his country's hard earned wealth and prestige on a unnecessary stalemated conflict with his neighbor to the point where they are now basically the bitch of said neighbor.

socialism

It's pretty crazy to think about now; just how powerful the soviet union really was. Sometimes its easy to forget with Russia in 2017 seemingly trying to recapture that feeling and failing time and again.

>>3173274
It was also the Warsaw Pact which were pretty much soviet puppets... Like fuck dude

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>>3173255

Oh yeah and let's not forget America's and it's puppets have had to invade his country (twice) because he made such a fucking mess of things

>>3173255
He lost his grip after invading Ethiopia.
Somalia was doing well before that.

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>>3173288

Same could said of Saddam before he got conned into invading Iran.

>>3173294
That's a good point.

>>3173255
>dat pic

I knew a Master Gunnery Sergeant whose first deployment was being a amtrack driver during Operation Restore Hope, said those were some wild times

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>>3173302

Tell us some veterans' story

>>3173205
>managed to piss off the Soviets so badly that they launched the largest airlift effort they'd conducted since the Second World War to help Ethiopia slap their shit.

source on the airlift thing? sounds like a good read

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>>3173321

http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a082219.pdf

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>>3173274
>>3173277

>mfw reading about how the Soviets basically used the Cubans as a mercenary army, sending them in droves to die in wars in shitholes they didn't want their hands dirty in.

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>>3173185
Alas all was not ideal in the Siad Barre era. The drawing is of street kids who sniff glue washing cars and running from the police circa 1987. A common scene in many parts of the world.
https://mogadishuimages.wordpress.com/2013/04/10/mogadishu-street-kids-circa-1987/

There was a documentary on YT that made mention of what a clusterfuck the first elections were with some people who were illiterate being duped into choosing whichever candidate or party campaigned stronger to them and it ultimately ended up in a strong man seizing power.

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>>3173346
This.
Siad Barre was usurper.

>>3173205
>a (failed) war with Ethiopia
>mfw Somalia is black Italy

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>>3173255
>Siad Barre was basically Saddam Hussein but with no oil and WMDs, and less hair.

oh lawd that got me good

>>3173279
>>3173294

90's US military most aesthetic

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>>3173670

Bingo

>>3173328
cheers

>>3173185
Didn't Somalia lose a war with Ethiopia?
Didn't Somalia have both USA and USSR backing, basically like divorced parents trying to bribe the child to be on their side with gifts, and then the dumb nigs attacked Ethiopia and both USA and USSR shifted support there?
Didn't Somalia have it all and piss it all away?

>>3173715

You're welcome

>>3173663
Italy is black Italy.

>>3173211
Yup.

>Barre invades Ethiopia without any warning
>Ethiopians don't even realize they're being invaded until they see Somali planes over their skies because they're so used to Barre-backed insurgents fucking things up
>Ethiopians get rekt on the ground
>5 EtAF F-5Es slap the Somalis' shit in the air
>Somali offensive takes almost all of Ogaden but bogs down
>Soviets ask Barre to maybe tone it down a little
>Barre responds by ejecting the tens of thousands of Soviet advisors and their families almost overnight
>Soviets turn around and back Ethiopia
>Largest Soviet airlift effort since WW2 launched
>Soviets divert a spy satellite launch specifically to help Ethiopia
>planes landing in Addis Ababa as fast as possible for a span of several months
>Soviet advisors, Cuban and Yemeni soldiers, and more materiel than the entire Somali army pours into Ethiopia
>Barre builds up his forces along the new frontline completely unaware of what is happening
>Finally, Barre unleashes his offensive
>literally hours before the Ethiopian/Soviets planned to launch theirs
>Somalis run headlong into massive troop concentrations
>Ethiopians launch their offensive, routing Somalis
>Somalis fall back to a village further east and dig in
>Cubans launch the only armored helicopter assault in history to support assault on the town
>Ethiopians advance from front, Cubans come from behind with paratroopers and armor
>Somali army annihilated
>Somali air force annihilated


The US tried to support Somalia once the Soviets shifted to Ethiopia, but it was pretty much token support, as Barre had demonstrated he'd go out of his way to squander any aid on his retarded "greater somalia" venture.

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>>3173737
Somalia originally had Soviet backing, but Barre's autism led to the Soviets getting ejected from the country for asking him to not invade his neighbors unprovoked. He ended up squandering all the Soviet aid on weapons and sponsoring terrorists in Ethiopia and Kenya, as he was obsessed with the idea of "Greater Somalia" (pic related). The problem was, Greater Somalia has literally nothing of value - Ogaden (the Ethiopian portion of Greater Somalia) is a desolate wasteland.

Anyways, when he invaded Ogaden and the Soviets pulled support, America stepped in and offered support, but the support Somalia received from the Americans was much less than what they got from the Soviets (part in thanks to Carter's foreign policy). Every power wanted a puppet/ally in the region, as it allowed them to project power across Red Sea shipping, so after the US had dropped Ethiopia, we needed another ally in the region. However, with how Barre had acted with Soviet support, all the US was willing to do was prop him up and keep him going without really giving him anything he could use to keep pushing his Greater Somalia agenda.

>>3176947
Ogaden has oil reserves as does Northern Somalia.
Siad forgot that although Somalia was self-sufficient that it would not be able to recover from a defeat or a loss of most of its equipment.

>>3173328
DTIC is an awesome historical source.

>>3176947
>>3176889
African modern history is fucking interesting and criminally under-taught

Its like early 20th century europe but with meddling cold war superpowers

>>3179232
The Angolan Civil War (pretty much all of Angolan history from post-WW2 to about 2005) is another really interesting one.
>Portuguese and South Africans fighting two competing insurgent groups (UNITA and MPLA)
>Portuguese pull out
>South Africa joins forces with UNITA and Zaire and invades
>Cubans and Soviets come to aid of MPLA ("official" Angolan government)
>South Africans withdraw under international pressure
>Near regular cross-border raids by South Africans culminate in major battle between South Africa and Cuba at Cuito Cuanavale

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>>3180973

Remember when corrupt Indian casino lobbyist made a movie about that war?

I do

>>3173666
>tumblr
leave

>>3173663
Well they were an Italian colony after all
Like father, like son

>>3173670
that m16 tho, so sexy.

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>>3185727

M16A2 is best M16 Tbh

A4 is rail-covered cancer

>>3185772
Never fired any of the two but they both looks quite cool to me.

Favourite rifle by far which isnt bolt action. best bolt rifle : Mosin

>>3180973
Angola is batshit.

>>3173335
>play Call of Duty: Black Ops
>second level has you killing Cubans and Nicaraguans in Angola
>look it up
>that actually happened
blew my mind desu

>>3185775
>Mosin
>Please be bait

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>>3186729

>"The real enemy is Cuban colonialism," Savimbi told reporters, warning, "The Cubans have taken over the country, but sooner or later they will suffer their own Vietnam in Angola."

>>3173335
Well they were buying sugar at 20x market price, from across the ocean, effectively funding the Cuban government singlehandedly. Makes sense they'd want something in return.

>>3185108

I bet that Italy is more important than the country you are from.

>>3190682
shouldn't you be leeching eurobux, guido?

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>>3190660

Still, I can't imagine the average Cuban infantryman, who was raised in a country that had fought very hard to overthrow the dominance of the United States, was very happy with being sent to die in wars on the side of the globe on behalf of an even more seemingly alien power (the USSR).

Also fun fact: US and Cuban troops have fought each other in direct combat at least once during the Invasion of Grenada.

>>3173328

Reading this is fascinating

>>3186729
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vIsAto6toE

>>3173279
>>3173294
So much more aesthetic than modern US soldiers with all their tacticool crap.

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>>3199637

ikr

The US Military's horrid appearance (and general state) is one of the reasons I wound up not joining even though it was my childhood dream.

It's just adding insult to injury to have me fight a bunch of retarded wars for oil/central banks AND make me wear unaesthetic/ineffective camouflage uniforms that look like either a gravel quarry or a drunken frat boy puked all over them

>>3173185
islam

>>3199781
Yeah I especially hate all the dumb rails and optics all over the guns, along with those ballistic glasses that look they're for a science lab class. Russia's one of the few military's that still looks pretty good for the most part. But they've been buying into some of the memes recently too with rails being built onto the gun. So dumb they don't have any iron sights you have to attach them to the rail.

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>>3199797

Rails are pretty stupid Tbh. I could understand issuing scopes and lasers SF teams, designated marksmen, and even squad leaders, but giving them out like candy to literally everyone is both incredibly costly (in terms of equipping each infantryman) and is going to cause supply problems, especially if you're expanding the army very quickly (as is the case in almost all major wars).

Russia's keep-it-simple-stupid approach may put them behind technologically but also means they can bounce back from a massive attrition rate, which contributed to their survival in WW2.

>>3173335
Didn't the Cubans decide to intervene in Angola on their own, and the Soviets disapproved it?

>>3200054
>but giving them out like candy to literally everyone is both incredibly costly
That's really the whole point. Lots of today's military "innovations" are just marketing ploys by defense contractors to get as much money from the government as possible. It's happened to every big power in history. Wealth concentration just attracts the worst of people who in turn cause the whole thing to implode.

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>>3200068

Well I was more referring to the interventions in Somalia and South America but yeah.

The Soviets were surprised by Cuba's decision to openly intervene but I don't imagine Cuba would have gone ahead with it without at least the expectation of Moscow's blessing, especially since they would have needed Soviet planes for the airlift.

>>3200073

I'd say the US Military is in a quandary not that different from what Germany had in World War II. Every newly developed piece of equipment is over-engineered, produced at exorbitant cost, put into production for the sake of political expediency, and is enabled through cronyism and bribery on a massive scale. All of which, were contributing (although not the only) factors to the Third Reich's defeat.

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>>3173663
>>3185108

One of the primary strategic locations in Mogadishu is an old spaghetti factory the Italians built

http://www.raffaeleciriello.com/site/pw/39pasta.html

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>>3201863

>that pic

Truly the wonders of Globalism at work

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>>3173185

US Ambassador to Somalia Robert Oakley wrote two books on the subject of the Somali Civil War.

https://bookstore.usip.org/books/AuthorDetail.aspx?id=9670