How come, at all the (usually) 3rd world country trouble spots, like Somalia, Ivory Coast etc etc, all the rebels/freedom fighters/terrorists/pirates are driving around in new pickups? Where do they get them from, and what do they pay with? Who services them, and what sort of warranty period is there?
I can't see any of them going to the local Mitsubishi or Toyota dealer in downtown Mogadishu and taking out a lease plan on a new truck, haggling over some mats, and getting stiffed for fancy polish, fabric treatment, or maybe even gap insurance.
Do they take them back for a service or warranty claim, I wonder. If so, does the garage have to refer warranty claims back to head office (wherever that is) if it's been shot at or overloaded with freedom fighters?
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All available on the black market, you pay for the container, open it up, and see what colour pickup has been nicked for you.
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If ever there was a city i'd love to have a wander through via Streetview, it's got to be Mogadishu.
The idea of a glass palace car dealership though...
Although stranger things have happened... -> www.wired.com/magazine/2011/01/ff_hackerville_romania/all/1
scroll down to the Mercedes glass palace in the field :-)
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>> All available on the black market, you pay for the container, open it up, and
>> see what colour pickup has been nicked for you.
What's with the thumbs down message? That is the way the 4x4s arrive! There are export embargoes to most of those countries, they dont come from Toyota!
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Don't worry Z. I guess Dave answered his own question.
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In Somalia they mostly came from the aid organisations
Know locally as "Technicals'', the term for these heavily armed Toyota trucks originated from how the aid organizations in Somalia acquired these vehicles.
As the situation in Somalia deteriorated, the were forced to hire local gangs equipped with these vehicles to 'protect' their aid convoys. Payment for these gangs and the vehicles was listed on expense reports as "Technical Assistance".
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In Chad the armies - there were several of various sizes - used Toyota Land Cruisers in pickup or open configuration. Often they had twin 50 calibre machine guns mounted on a swivel in the rear, quite a heavy assembly. The other standard heavy weapon was a recoilless rifle (as they call it), a relatively lightweight and short-range piece of heavy artillery, light enough to be carried in a pickup. The ammo is big and heavy though.
The Polisario Front in Western Sahara, at the other end of the Sahara really, used quiet open-topped long-wheelbase petrol Land Rovers painted matt sand colour with all brightwork covered or painted over. Surprisingly invisible from a little way off. Mounted the same weapons as in Chad though. And of course men with Kalashes or equivalent in both cases.
You wouldn't want one of those, fully manned, coming at you in anger believe me.
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www.biyokulule.com/view_content.php?articleid=3048
Interesting endorsements of the reliability of the Hilux truck
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In reply to the thread title, I imagine the Chadians got their Toyotas or the money to buy them from their various backers, France, the US and Libya being then (early 80s) the main foreign big players, although neighbouring countries would have perhaps played facilitating roles - actually importing the various hardwares. The Polisario got its Land Rovers I think through Algeria, its main backer for many years. Military-spec Land Rovers used to be sold in a slightly spooky government-to-government way. BL didn't sell them to just any movement anywhere, or so it said.
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A lot of them will come through Tunisia and Egypt where they are easy to get hold of. They would either by driven straight across the boarder or put on trucks and driven across. Spare parts and the such will come the same way. Garages will be the same one's that were there before in places like Benghazi. From what I remember, in Iraq nearly everything came through Kuwait and it seemed to work well for the locals few cars conked out by the side of the road.
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Insurgency Breakdown Cover
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Ha, Zero, I guess you offended someone. I've never noticed the thumbs thing before. You'll have to stop using words like black market.
Maybe some of the overseas aid finds it way back to the dealerships somewhere. I guess they don't have to worry about a green card when they cross the border, or maybe all the dodgy countries have an agreement like the EU where you're covered for 3rd party wherever you are.
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>> Ha, Zero, I guess you offended someone. I've never noticed the thumbs thing before.
>>
? I can see a green thumbs up next to Zero, not down. That means several people like his post, doesn't it?
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>> >> Ha, Zero, I guess you offended someone. I've never noticed the thumbs thing before.
>>
>> ? I can see a green thumbs up next to Zero, not down. That means
>> several people like his post, doesn't it?
The red face to the right of the thumbs up indicates someone clicked on the 'offensive' button, the nearest to a thumbs down.
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>> >> ? I can see a green thumbs up next to Zero, not down. That
>> means
>> >> several people like his post, doesn't it?
>>
for 7 thumbs up, see
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=5843&m=130188&v=e
for red faces, see
red
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=5843&m=129814&v=e
redder
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=5843&m=130012&v=e
note - above status true at time of posting. Liable to change if other c4p memebrs click to rate those posts.
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John,
You are being too modest, only posting links which relate to me.
You received lots of thumbs-ups here:
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?v=e&t=5074&m=111241
Last edited by: Iffy on Tue 5 Apr 11 at 11:42
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>> ? I can see a green thumbs up next to Zero, not down. That means several people like his post, doesn't it?
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=767
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I see on the news that now that we have destroyed most of Gadaffi's armoured kit his outfit is using "Technicals". It will be difficult to tell who is who from several thousand feet up.
There must be a ready supply of pickup trucks.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Tue 5 Apr 11 at 12:06
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How does one get to become a qualified user then in order to use the thumbs and face icons?
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>> How does one get to become a qualified user then in order to use the
>> thumbs and face icons?
You just have to be logged in.
EDIT: which you must have been to post - have I missed another joke? :)
Last edited by: Focus on Tue 5 Apr 11 at 13:48
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Aha, its working now!
Tried earlier and it wouldnt let me use them.
Made my day that has.
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Did you try before you logged in?
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>> Aha, its working now!
>> Tried earlier and it wouldnt let me use them.
You weren't logged in, but you had to log in to post, so now you can :)
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>> How does one get to become a qualified user then in order to use the thumbs and face icons?
www.car4play.com/forum/post/index.htm?t=767
"•You can only join in the rating system if you are a "qualified user". You have to have been registered on this site for a while and have made a certain amount of posts to be qualified."
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Thanks VX. This exlains it.
I was logged in when I tried before and was simply curious.
OOI, how many posts does one have to do before they are qualified?
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>> You wouldn't want one of those, fully manned, coming at you in anger believe me.
From what I have seen on the television - coverage of such conflicts is invariably very partial and skimpy though - the Libyan dissident militias are just children by Polisario and Chadian warlord standards. They rush forward until fired on, then turn tail and flee up to 50 or 100 miles without seriously engaging the enemy. It isn't that they lack courage necessarily, they just don't know what they're doing and have little structure, discipline or training. Many are probably quite enjoying rushing about and firing weapons though. Most young men would.
I have a lot of photos of the centre of Ndjamena, the Chad capital, taken in 1982 shortly after an 18-month struggle between two competing armies. The buildings all look as if they have been gnawed by enormous rodents, the entire Catholic cathedral is cut off six feet from the ground, the presidential palace's spaceframe roof is cocked over one eye like Frank Sinatra's rug after a night out, and 50 calibre holes are legion, right through tubular steel lamp posts, petrol pumps and the like. I didn't witness this, but someone who had told me that Toyotas with twin fifties on them used to have duels across the main square at a range of about 100 yards, nipping out from cover, firing a burst and nipping back, hoping to catch each other in the open. Fairly serious stuff.
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Why do arab leaders live in "compounds"? No one else does - Hitler and Churchill had bunkers, others live in Presidential Palaces.
Is it only those with wacky headwear, like Gadaffi or Yasser Arafat ?
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>> Why do arab leaders live in "compounds"?
Like that famous Boston Arab family, the Kennedys, with their summer compound at Kennebunkport, Maine, you mean CP? Perhaps they could have saved themselves trouble and avoided confusion by renaming the place Kennebunkerport.
:o}
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>> Like that famous Boston Arab family, the Kennedys, with their summer compound at Kennebunkport, Maine,
>>
Kennebunkport is the Bush family. George senior has a rather large gaff there out on the edge of the sea, rather nice spot.
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>> Kennebunkport is the Bush family.
Oh dear, so it is. I am covered in shame Wp. Perhaps everything I say is similarly doddering and wrong.
The Kennedys did have a 'compound' though, somewhere else on the New England coast perhaps. They sailed a bit I think. And compounds aren't just found in the Arab world but in other places where the gap between rich and poor is enormous (er, almost everywhere actually). They are a modern version of a mediaeval castle, which was a village or town in itself. The great man's house, with space for a lot of retainers, henchmen etc.
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>> The Kennedys did have a 'compound' though, somewhere else on the New England coast perhaps.
Cape Cod...although I will admit to using Wikipedia for that titbit.
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>> Why do arab leaders live in "compounds"? No one else does - Hitler and Churchill
>> had bunkers, others live in Presidential Palaces.
>>
These societies traditionally live in courtyards or cloisters, and in the case of Gaddaffi it may be from the Bedouin tradition to live in a camp of tents.
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Some of he compounds I have seen in tropical parts of the world consist of a walled garden with an open walled house within. A bit like a UK house and garden except the security perimeter is the garden wall not the house walls. The whole area inside the perimeter wall is considered to be living space.
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And as ON says, there are parts of the world where all the houses are in compounds. But those are different form the compounds of the rich, let alone the great and bad.
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I've just heard that the chap in the Ivory Coast with a name like Bilbo Baggins has a presidential palace, a compound and a bunker, but not for long perhaps.
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>> chap in the Ivory Coast with a name like Bilbo Baggins has a presidential palace, a compound and a bunker, but not for long perhaps.
Laurent Gbagbo is another real badass. He was a dull, corrupt, venal and stupid president. Having lost the election he refused to go and quickly resorted to street violence by tribally based militias, launching a civil war in which hundreds have died and hundreds of thousands been displaced.
I have been surprised by BBC objectivity in his case, setting him and his opponent back to back as if they were both equally responsible for the civil war. Alessane Ouattara (if I have his name right from memory) did all right as a technocratic prime minister. He can't be an angel exactly, but in my memory wars of this sort are always primarily the responsibility of the incumbent power.
Now Gbagbo, cornered in his bunker in his palace in his compound, has appealed to the UN to save him. It is tempting to think they should try a bit of tough love, and let Ouattara's troops do for him. But he probably has a row of wives and children in there with him, and these knock-down-drag-out tribally-inflected conflicts can get very ugly. So they probably will save the thieving carphound.
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Pickup trucks - where do they come from? - Zero
