Listen: Reporter calls us from search for Joseph Kony in Africa
Apr 30, 2012, 10:33 AM | Updated: Oct 11, 2024, 1:43 pm
 U.S. special forces are working with teams in Africa in a search for Joseph Kony. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis) |
U.S. special forces are working with African forces in
the search for Joseph Kony, who became known to many
people in the U.S. after a video called Kony 2012
went viral earlier this year.
New York Times reporter Jeffrey Gettleman is in Nairobi
and called into Th
e Ross and Burbank Show Monday to give us an update on
the search.
Gettleman, who went out with U.S. special forces units
Monday morning, says he thinks they’re making progress.
“It looks like they have a pretty good idea of this
rough area where he may be in, in Central African
Republic. The problem is that area is several thousand
square miles big and it’s this terrain that nobody can
really penetrate.”
The rugged terrain in Central Africa is filled with
hundred foot trees and large swamps of elephant grass,
says Gettleman.
“Everybody says the same thing which is the terrain is
the biggest enemy and it renders a lot of the U.S. high-
tech gear like satellite imagery, thermal imagery,
listening devices, it renders a lot of that pretty much
useless because the forest is so thick.”
In his New York Times piece, Gettleman explains
the U.S. forces are working in an advisory role, offering
support to African forces.
Gettleman calls it an “interesting match up”
considering the training of U.S. soldiers versus Kony’s
forces who work well in the territory.
“You have some of the most elite, well trained, well
equipped soldiers in the world, the U.S. special forces,
which means Army Green Berets, Navy Seals and some others
versus this very bizarre rebel group with a lot of child
soldiers, dirt poor, kind of desperate, yet they’re very
good in that environment.”
Gettleman said he wouldn’t be surprised if sometime
soon there are reports that Kony is dead, “but at the same
time, he’s been doing this for 25 years,” says Gettleman.
Listen to his full update from Africa:
By JAMIE GRISWOLD, MyNorthwest.com Editor
