Biafra — Hunger, Politics, Inhumanity

By the end of this summer, whether or not the relief missions are successful, the breakaway nation of Biafra and fully a third of its 15 million citizens may both be dead. The political tragedy of this prolonged and agonizing death is overshadowed only by the human.

Biafra, the former eastern region of an obviously unworkable and disintegrating Federation of Nigeria, proclaimed its independence a little over a year ago, on May 30, 1967. Since then it has been in an increasingly vicious...