Last King of Scotland

"Well-disposed to Britain: perhaps to an extent damaging to him in the African context." Concluding that Amin was in need of their help, the Foreign Office recommended the sale of arms to him. He was one of ours, not likely to kick up about Rhodesia or South Africa, and keen to stem the communist drift of neighbouring states.

I got that quote from Giles Foden's article in The Guardian. I made it to The Last King of Scotland and wow a lot is going on in my mind that I had to write about it. So I googled to find out more about the infamous Idi Amin. His madness and brutality I will never and hope to never understand. What is interesting is as he rose up in the ranks there were huge documented red flags about this man. And while he isn't credited with much intelligence he managed to charm and brutalise a country and live out the rest of his days in pretty much peaceful exile. The man killed almost half a million people. And that is why I lifted this particular quote about him. Amin was a conveniance, it was believed he could be controlled, eliminated easily enough when necessary (there were 7 assassination attempts), a good tool for the powers that be (same ones who pretty much turned a blind eye on apartheid and the other crap they were creating in Africa)...hmpfh I wonder who really was the tool. What makes me sick is here is a man who wiped out whole families and got to live out the rest of his days, still driving his fancy cars, getting massages on the condition that he please just lay low and keep his mouth shut. I have to say I really don't know what to make of this and it's stuff like this that makes me wonder about the world we live in. We've got people dying because of some rocks we decided are beautiful and valuable, black liquid that has us addicted harder than the worst crack addict. People I believe we are better than this we have to change or else, well I don't even want to go there.

Peace and Love