Should the US send troops in as peacekeepers to corrct the situation? If not, why not?

Yes or no to sending US troops?

The short answer to beardedbruce's question is no they should not. Now should the United Nations do something about the situation in the Sudan, apart from electing Sudan onto the UN Human Rights Commission for a three year term, then yes it should. Unfortunately, the UN would have to undergo some major changes before that would be possible.

CarolC, who I note completely choses to ignore some very interesting insights provided in greg stephens post (thanks for those Greg), is of the opinion that should the UN put troops into Sudan they should not be under the command of either the US or the British - great pity that for a number of very sound reasons.

From reading what a lot of people state about the UN, and what that organisation should, or shouldn't do. It is rather obvious that very few of you know what the UN can and cannot do, rather briefly it's as follows:

Point 1:
And this is a major one. The UN is forbidden by it's Charter from interfering with the internal affairs, politics or conflict situations within any recognised member state.

Point 2:
The UN will only ever deploy peace-keeping troops, by invitation, once the various warring factions have agreed to resolve their differences by negotiation, and a ceasefire exists. The task of the UN peace-keeping troops is to establish and monitor the ceasefire lines, nothing else. Should those negotiations fail and the ceasefire collapses, the UN peace-keeping troops are withdrawn.

Point 3:
It is not the task of the UN peace-keeping forces to "set things right". They are generally barely equipped to protect themselves let alone impose a settlement in any given situation, having neither heavy support weapons or tactical air support.

Point 4:
Another very important one. The UN has no troops, it relies on contributions from member states. If you exclude the support and command and control capabilities of the US military, this normally results in a hotch-potch of penny-packets from a variety of nations whose armed forces are not used to working together, their equipment is incompatible and their command and control structure is shakey to put it mildly. There exists only one cohesive, multi-national military capability on this earth today, and that is the NATO military alliance. I make the distinction between NATO and the NATO military alliance, because France is a member of one but not the latter. Any multi-national force mustered and put under French Operational Command would result in a complete and utter shambles, purely by dint of the fact that the French, although NATO members, withdrew from the military alliance in 1960, and have remained isolated ever since. They do conduct exercises bi-laterally with other NATO members but those exercises are always "tailored" to make them appear to work, in practice it would be very different.

CarolC in one of her posts above, gave a start date of 1983, which pdq corrected to 1956. CarolC also seems to support the contention that:

"Maybe the US wants all of that oil for itself. Pardon me for being cynical, but this pattern looks familiar to me."

That seems rather at odds from what has happened:

"Exploration activity began at the end of the 1950s in the coastal waters of the Red Sea and Sudanese continental shelf. Internal political unrest caused many companies to withdraw from Sudan and the deterioration in security conditions on the oil fields caused the oil companies to suspend all operations in 1984. Since the early 1990's however, foreign oil companies began to return. In December 1996 the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company (GNPOC) was formed comprising the China National Petroleum Corporation, Petronas, Sudapet and Araxis which provided a much needed injection of capital, especially into developing the Unity and Heglig fields. In November 1997 the United States imposed sanctions against Sudan on the basis that profits from oil were being used to fuel the civil war. The pressure of sanctions has kept American firms out of Sudan, although Canadian company Talisman Energy is still operating in the Sudan. Talisman Energy has also purchased Araxis' share in GNPOC. Current players in Sudan include GNPOC, Lundin Oil (IPC Sudan Ltd), Petronas, Sudapet, Gulf Petroleum Corporation (GPC), China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), National Iranian Gas Company, OMV, Royal Dutch / Shell, and Talisman Energy. TotalFinaElf are reportedly looking to return to their concession in the Bor Basin and are listed as being the most likely partners to Petronas in their permit for Block 5B."

Source: Mbendi Site - Sudan Oil

Where are all those American Oil Companies Carol? I see the Sudanese themselves; Malaysia; China; Iran; Canada; The Dutch and the French looking to get back into the action.

The oil companies stopped operations in 1984, only returning in the early 1990's, as stated in the article - what part were the oil companies playing in the mayhem between 1984 and 1990 Carol?