Word: commander
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...literary world, participating in critical literary discourse, along with producing creative works. His novels “John Henry Days” (2001), a Pulitzer Prize finalist, and “Apex Hides the Hurt” (2006) have been highly lauded for Whitehead’s comedic command of language and his ability to create interesting conceits that explore race in a post-racial world. Leader-Picone says, “I think the African-American literary tradition is incredibly rich and I think that he moves it forward while also drawing deeply from it.” Recently...
...Responsibility for changing that equation belongs to the new U.S. African Command (Africom), set up 18 months ago to help provide security to permit the rebuilding of shattered nations like Somalia. But don't look for quick action. "We do not have a military presence in Somalia," the command's chief, Army General William Ward, told Congress last month. In fact, the military is in no rush to head back to that lawless nation in the Horn of Africa. President Clinton's Pentagon was first bloodied there when 18 soldiers died in a 1993 firefight memorialized in Black Hawk Down...
...Even if the Pentagon had the stomach for this kind of fight, the confused command structure for the region would make it hard to succeed. You might think, after all, that Africom would be front and center in battling the piracy now rampant off Somalia's coast. But in fact Africom deals only with African territory, and not the seas surrounding it. Those are monitored by U.S. Central Command, also responsible for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. This disconnect - Centcom if by sea, Africom if by land - highlights the challenge facing the Pentagon as it tries to grapple with...
...role in battling pirates is helping Centcom hand over the captured ones - 130 so far this year - to East African nations for trial. Africom still has a lot of kinks to work out. At that House hearing on March 19, Ward acknowledged that he has only a "very small command" - headquartered in Stuttgart, Germany - to deal with Africa, and not a soul on Somali soil. But things are getting better. "Every day improvements are made," Ward said. "I count it a victory when I can pick up the phone or send an e-mail and it goes to the same...
Clearly, piracy off Somalia will not be stopped until order is brought to the country, a classic failed state which has been without a government for more than 15 years. Murphy, the Maersk Alabama's second-in-command, said the responsibility also lies with the U.S. government, whose ships have been patrolling the Gulf of Aden as part of a multinational task force. "We'd like to implore President Obama to use all his resources and increase the commitment to ending this Somali pirate scourge," said Murphy, the Maersk Alabama's second-in-command. "Wake up. This crew was lucky...