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So four more NATO troops were killed by a 'green on blue' attacker (or whatever they call it) in Afghanistan today. How much longer until these types of attacks utterly crush our moral over there? They seem like they'd bring things to a breaking point much more quickly than mere insurgency.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 18:41 |
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# ? May 29, 2024 23:55 |
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az jan jananam posted:http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/7365/was-the-arab-spring-really-worth-it_the-fascinatin
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 18:50 |
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Augure posted:That's because you don't need to offer an alternative beyond "Don't do that thing." What should we do instead of blowing up civilians wantonly to "get" our "man"? Instead, we should not do that. Yes, but by doing nothing to "get" our "man", as you put it, our "man" targets civilians himself with impunity, knowing there is nothing we can or will do to stop him. Our "men" resort to violence in order to achieve their ends, ends which will likely mean Islamic dictatorship, and have no qualms about harming civilians, both in the West and in their own countries, in order to do it. Do I regret that civilians have to die in any conflict? Yes, of course. Yet I believe the consequences of not confronting fundamentalist militants are worse, for us, and for the people who live in the countries where they are trying to gain power.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 18:51 |
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They don't tie up women and children and literally wear them as shields 24/7. We could always just kill them when they're NOT surrounded by civilians even if it's not as easy. You're creating a false dichotomy between "Killing them when they're around innocents" and "Not killing them ever".
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 18:53 |
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A Fancy 400 lbs posted:They don't tie up women and children and literally wear them as shields 24/7. We could always just kill them when they're NOT surrounded by civilians even if it's not as easy. You're creating a false dichotomy between "Killing them when they're around innocents" and "Not killing them ever". To put it another way, there's no reason to strive for the marginally less evil outcome. Life is not a binary choice like that.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 18:57 |
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A Fancy 400 lbs posted:They don't tie up women and children and literally wear them as shields 24/7. We could always just kill them when they're NOT surrounded by civilians even if it's not as easy. You're creating a false dichotomy between "Killing them when they're around innocents" and "Not killing them ever". As long as they live and operate mixed in with civilians, instead of providing military targets such as bases, weapons facilities, and such, there is no way to target them when they aren't around innocents. Many times their own attacks are targeted in civilian areas, meaning that even when they are "on the job" as a combatant, they are in civilian areas. As long as they refuse to behave as a normal military entity, they put all those around them at risk.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 18:59 |
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A Fancy 400 lbs posted:They don't tie up women and children and literally wear them as shields 24/7. We could always just kill them when they're NOT surrounded by civilians even if it's not as easy. You're creating a false dichotomy between "Killing them when they're around innocents" and "Not killing them ever". I thought that was sort of his point. His post was in response to someone saying that no action against them should be proposed, which he was pointing out was problematic for its own reasons. The take-away I think is to find the best way of neutralizing these people who will go about and kill civilians no matter what with minimal loss of life.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:03 |
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Brown moses, who is this guy on twitter? He really thinks you are a guardian journo or some thing?
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:06 |
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PT6A posted:As long as they live and operate mixed in with civilians, instead of providing military targets such as bases, weapons facilities, and such, there is no way to target them when they aren't around innocents. Many times their own attacks are targeted in civilian areas, meaning that even when they are "on the job" as a combatant, they are in civilian areas. As long as they refuse to behave as a normal military entity, they put all those around them at risk. No way. None. Absolutely impossible. Good thing indiscriminately killing civilians doesn't help the enemy recruit or man, we'd be in quite a pickle!
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:08 |
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What is claimed to be two camera angles of the same event. Both takes are shaky, but it seems like yet another case of an RPG hit turning a tank into an enormous firecracker: http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=da3_1347283248
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:10 |
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PT6A posted:Do I regret that civilians have to die in any conflict? Yes, of course. Yet I believe the consequences of not confronting fundamentalist militants are worse, for us, and for the people who live in the countries where they are trying to gain power. You do realize that fundamentalist militancy within a very tiny portion of the over all Muslim population is a direct result of American intervention in the affairs of the Muslim world, right? Maybe if our nation stopped serving the interests of multinational corporations and attempting to shape the world to our desire we'd have less people in the world that were so angry at America. I dunno, just a thought.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:20 |
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Crasscrab posted:You do realize that fundamentalist militancy within a very tiny portion of the over all Muslim population is a direct result of American intervention in the affairs of the Muslim world, right? Maybe if our nation stopped serving the interests of multinational corporations and attempting to shape the world to our desire we'd have less people in the world that were so angry at America. I dunno, just a thought. Are you suggesting that if the US just up and dropped everything in the middle east, everyone would just go home? It's certainly true that US intervention has caused problems but just up and going home won't fix them.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:23 |
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PT6A posted:As long as they live and operate mixed in with civilians, instead of providing military targets such as bases, weapons facilities, and such, there is no way to target them when they aren't around innocents. Many times their own attacks are targeted in civilian areas, meaning that even when they are "on the job" as a combatant, they are in civilian areas. As long as they refuse to behave as a normal military entity, they put all those around them at risk. You know that civilians live on lots of US bases, right? Would you consider them acceptable collateral damage under the laws of war as you view them, if they happened to live with an active-duty soldier, sailor, airman, or Marine? What if a hypothetical attacker couldn't easily access any other portion of the base?
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:24 |
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Space Gopher posted:You know that civilians live on lots of US bases, right? Would you consider them acceptable collateral damage under the laws of war as you view them, if they happened to live with an active-duty soldier, sailor, airman, or Marine? What if a hypothetical attacker couldn't easily access any other portion of the base? In essence, yes. A military base is a valid military target. If you specifically targeted a civilian housing portion thereof, it would be unacceptable, but if the attack targeted the base as a whole, and damage was done to civilian portions of the base, it would be legitimate. If the base specifically told all their soliders to go hide at their homes while continuing all of their duties, and started stockpiling their weapons and vehicles in those civilian areas, then it would turn that area into a valid target for an opposing force, yes.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:28 |
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PT6A posted:As long as they live and operate mixed in with civilians, instead of providing military targets such as bases, weapons facilities, and such, there is no way to target them when they aren't around innocents. Many times their own attacks are targeted in civilian areas, meaning that even when they are "on the job" as a combatant, they are in civilian areas. As long as they refuse to behave as a normal military entity, they put all those around them at risk. At the risk of your bullets and explosives. That you release on them. Knowing how many civilians are at risk. Captain Frigate posted:Are you suggesting that if the US just up and dropped everything in the middle east, everyone would just go home? It's certainly true that US intervention has caused problems but just up and going home won't fix them. Killing more of them wouldn't be much better.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:28 |
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Captain Frigate posted:Are you suggesting that if the US just up and dropped everything in the middle east, everyone would just go home? It's certainly true that US intervention has caused problems but just up and going home won't fix them. He wasn't suggesting that.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:29 |
Crasscrab posted:You do realize that fundamentalist militancy within a very tiny portion of the over all Muslim population is a direct result of American intervention in the affairs of the Muslim world, right? I realize that Americans like to make themselves the center of the world and all international social developments, but this isn't remotely true. The fundamantalist militancy you're talking about arose more directly as a polemic against what puritans saw as jahili deviance from the Shari'a as well as a reaction against perceived Sufi excesses, hundreds of years before the United States had been established.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:35 |
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Jippa posted:Brown moses, who is this guy on twitter? He really thinks you are a guardian journo or some thing? Pretty sure it's one of the loonies of the Guardian live blog comments, he'll probably bitch about me e-bullying him on Monday morning. It did result in this Tweet from Neil Wallis, former Executive Editor of the News of the World quote:Frankly, lots of @Brown_Moses tweets or retweets I disagree with, but he is consistant...and consistantly interesting.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:44 |
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az jan jananam posted:I realize that Americans like to make themselves the center of the world and all international social developments, but this isn't remotely true. The fundamantalist militancy you're talking about arose more directly as a polemic against what puritans saw as jahili deviance from the Shari'a as well as a reaction against perceived Sufi excesses, hundreds of years before the United States had been established. Yeah, sorry about that. I admit I'm not as familiar with the base issues within Islam, but what I'm trying to say is that maybe if we didn't insert ourselves into the problems of other peoples we wouldn't be dealing with the hostilities in the world that we are today.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:44 |
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Captain Frigate posted:Are you suggesting that if the US just up and dropped everything in the middle east, everyone would just go home? It's certainly true that US intervention has caused problems but just up and going home won't fix them. He, and I, and many others, are advocating for a far less aggressive, collateral-damage laden strategy. So the enemy doesn't keep getting more wayward people who've have nothing left to lose after their homes are demolished and their family killed. PT6A posted:In essence, yes. A military base is a valid military target. If you specifically targeted a civilian housing portion thereof, it would be unacceptable, but if the attack targeted the base as a whole, and damage was done to civilian portions of the base, it would be legitimate. If the base specifically told all their soliders to go hide at their homes while continuing all of their duties, and started stockpiling their weapons and vehicles in those civilian areas, then it would turn that area into a valid target for an opposing force, yes. You keep talking about this like they are an enemy force, under a commander or state control. This is not a traditional war, you cannot conceive of it in traditional means. There are no 'targets' with these people that weaken them in any meaningful way. It isn't a professional army, it doesn't have the type of command structure that would be affected by conventional tactics. Responding to new conventions of combat with standard, indiscriminate application of traditional tactics is counter-productive and only strengthens the opposition forces, by pushing more and more people to their side. This war will be won by working with the people of the region, not by ignoring them and 'accidentally' killing them when double checking your target becomes inconvenient. The simple fact of the matter is there is no solution that will end hostilities in the near future. The animosity that exists right now in the middle east for U.S. actions will not dissipate anytime in the next decade, at least. For the foreseeable future? There will be militants attempting to attack any presence, civilian or otherwise, that they deem associated with the U.S. But the only way for those attacks to ever end is for the U.S. forces to not sink to the same level, and fight without causing collateral damage. That is what will turn the people against the militants. It's going to be a slow, painful process for everyone involved, and I'm sorry to say I have no doubt more people on both sides are going to die in the process, but this is the situation the world is in right now. That's the situation the last 50+ years of foreign policy has put us in. e: Plavski posted:I've been following this little twitter debate all day. It's been highly enjoyable, Mr. Assad! Ron Paul Atreides fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Sep 16, 2012 |
# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:45 |
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Brown Moses posted:Pretty sure it's one of the loonies of the Guardian live blog comments, he'll probably bitch about me e-bullying him on Monday morning. It did result in this Tweet from Neil Wallis, former Executive Editor of the News of the World
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:47 |
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New Division posted:He wasn't suggesting that. Ok so let's get a list together here. I think its easier to discuss potential solutions when non-solutions are laid out in detail. Not to do: Drone strikes nothing total evacuation it seems plausible to me at least to break potential solutions down into two general categories of diplomatic and military. Both are problematic in different regards. Military for the obvious reasons that it can cause collateral damage and diplomatic in that it is generally difficult to find people to negotiate with, and having no real guarantees that any accords that are reached will be followed, and that is it fairly indirect. Also negotiating with terrorists is generally not done and would at the very least cause a public backlash. From a pragmatic point of view, it seems that if what you really want is one Bad Dude Down then the way to minimize civilian death would be to do something like the Osama assassination. I don't really have any real knowledge when it comes to things like that though, but it seems like that kind of thing would be really difficult to organize. Another tack could be the long term strategy of trying to directly address the social needs of the people in the middle east via programs involving infrastructure development and public works. I think this is the "best" solution but one that will not happen. First and foremost it would be implausible to expect public support for building infrastructure overseas when a lot of US infrastructure is so shoddy and aged already. And then there's the matter of when we did that in Iraq via Haliburton the infrastructure was complete poo poo. Secondly, there's the matter of local support. I would be surprised if any large foreign-funded infrastructure projects didn't immediately become targets for sabotage by nationalism groups. This goes back to the need to try and fix short-term problems. In my mind, a large part of the problem is sort of endemic in the western administrative culture. Long term projects are difficult to do without stable (or otherwise "suitable") short-term environments, and this breeds a sort of mindset that views long term projects as futile which leads to a microscopic focus on whatever immediate concerns exist with the fantasy that once all the short term issues are cleared up long term projects will be able to be considered. I would probably even chalk up the legacy of the US Cold War operations on the world today as a result of this kind of thinking. EDIT: Myrdhale posted:He, and I, and many others, are advocating for a far less aggressive, collateral-damage laden strategy. So the enemy doesn't keep getting more wayward people who've have nothing left to lose after their homes are demolished and their family killed. I'm all for fewer people dying and fewer insurgents but I don't think that counts as proposing alternatives. I realize that in all likelihood no one here has real experience in this area but I think it would still be interesting to talk about actual concrete alternatives. Captain Frigate fucked around with this message at 19:59 on Sep 16, 2012 |
# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:56 |
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Crasscrab posted:You do realize that fundamentalist militancy within a very tiny portion of the over all Muslim population is a direct result of American intervention in the affairs of the Muslim world, right? Maybe if our nation stopped serving the interests of multinational corporations and attempting to shape the world to our desire we'd have less people in the world that were so angry at America. I dunno, just a thought. I am sure you were joking. There is absolutely no way anyone can be THAT naive unless they are being malicious.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 19:58 |
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PT6A posted:In essence, yes. A military base is a valid military target. If you specifically targeted a civilian housing portion thereof, it would be unacceptable, but if the attack targeted the base as a whole, and damage was done to civilian portions of the base, it would be legitimate. If the base specifically told all their soliders to go hide at their homes while continuing all of their duties, and started stockpiling their weapons and vehicles in those civilian areas, then it would turn that area into a valid target for an opposing force, yes. What if the attacker really, really wanted to kill a specific high-ranking leader? Say the general (or whatever) had excellent security on the job, and was more or less impossible to target with the weapons available to the attacker, but they were well aware of security weaknesses when the leader went home. In other words, say that in this hypothetical assassination there is "no way to target them when they aren't around innocents." Would you consider this appropriate under your views of the laws of war?
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:00 |
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Mans posted:Killing more of them wouldn't be much better. If you think that if the US immediately pulling out of the middle east would result in anything other than endless civil war, ethnic cleansing, and sectarian violence, I have a bridge to sell you.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:02 |
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Crasscrab posted:You do realize that fundamentalist militancy within a very tiny portion of the over all Muslim population is a direct result of American intervention in the affairs of the Muslim world, right? Maybe if our nation stopped serving the interests of multinational corporations and attempting to shape the world to our desire we'd have less people in the world that were so angry at America. I dunno, just a thought. Oh please. Sayiid Qutb was raging against American culture and values when America was barely involved in the Middle East.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:06 |
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Myrdhale posted:What's all this now? Sounds rather interesting. Some idiot from the Guardian live blog comments decided to start tweeting me about my lack of profile information, with this opening gambit quote:@Brown_Moses - Guardian promotes you but I can't find much on you. Are you some sort of secret agent? Who are you Well done to whoever tweeted this quote:Simon I've realised 'Brown Moses' is an anagram of 'Webs Morons'. You must be onto something
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:11 |
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3 Tablets Daily posted:If you think that if the US immediately pulling out of the middle east would result in anything other than endless civil war, ethnic cleansing, and sectarian violence, I have a bridge to sell you. It's the burden of the white man to maintain peace and stability in such barbaric and uncivilized areas. Or maybe the world isn't a black and white place where you only have two choices. Fundamentalism isn't because of the U.S. but a lot of them receive a shitload of money and recruits because of U.S. actions. Likewise, a progressive attempt to leave the Arab states to their own socio-economical interests would be the best in the long-term, even if it means ending the support of the Saudis and other regressive states which we seem to ignore. And i'm not sure why the U.S. leaving the area will result in ethnic cleansing and sectarian violence. Israel and Turkey already do it quite happily while the Arabic peninsula has no problems with using live rounds against protesters and guess who supports all of them? Just leave them to their resources without doing it cold turkey. Make sure that you don't leave puppets or authoritarian figures on your way out nor you cause enough political or economic blunders to make the countries hate you. But to say that the U.S. should maintain soldiers on the other side of the continent for what is basically their own personal interest is not the way to progress.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:15 |
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Brown Moses posted:Some idiot from the Guardian live blog comments decided to start tweeting me about my lack of profile information, with this opening gambit What's the average amount of accusations of being a spy you get per week
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:21 |
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muike posted:What's the average amount of accusations of being a spy you get per week Probably once a week, either that or I'm part of some giant media conspiracy and I'm secretly working for the Guardian. Most of them aren't dumb enough to bring it to Twitter though, with nearly 2k followers there's usually a few people who take umbrage to those accusation. I'm like the Ricky Gervais of Syria blogging.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:27 |
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Mans posted:It's the burden of the white man to maintain peace and stability in such barbaric and uncivilized areas. Just out of curiosity, what do you think would be the outcome of a sudden power vacuum in every middle eastern country backed by the west?
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:28 |
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3 Tablets Daily posted:If you think that if the US immediately pulling out of the middle east would result in anything other than endless civil war, ethnic cleansing, and sectarian violence, I have a bridge to sell you. If you are implying things would change little, sure. IF you are saying things would get worse, you are wrong.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:29 |
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Because every other country in Central Asia in the midst of turmoil isn't enough, the CSTO has decided to flex their muscles and stage some training exercises in Armenia this week. Are you watching, Azerbaijan? http://news.tj/en/news/csto-joint-military-exercise-launched-armenia news.tj posted:
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:29 |
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Captain Frigate posted:In my mind, a large part of the problem is sort of endemic in the western administrative culture. Long term projects are difficult to do without stable (or otherwise "suitable") short-term environments, and this breeds a sort of mindset that views long term projects as futile which leads to a microscopic focus on whatever immediate concerns exist with the fantasy that once all the short term issues are cleared up long term projects will be able to be considered. I would probably even chalk up the legacy of the US Cold War operations on the world today as a result of this kind of thinking. I think this is a really good summary of the situation that frustrates a lot of people like me. Honestly I don't know what could work. I advocate for building the infrastructure anyway, even if it would be targeted. Building it up is the only way for the situation to stabilize. But that requires resources and public will that, as you pointed out, just won't materialize in the current climate. I'm 100% on board with the assassination thing though. If you need to get someone, strike with surgical precision, and only do it when you can do it without causing collateral harm. It might mean waiting for the opportunity to present itself but I think that's preferable to feeding the cause of the opposition through collateral harm to civilians. Ron Paul Atreides fucked around with this message at 20:38 on Sep 16, 2012 |
# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:36 |
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3 Tablets Daily posted:
I don't know. Israel would be hosed but their actions, supported by the U.S., caused the backlash against them. Iraq is already semi-independent, if they had the ability to nationalize their oil and industry they'd probably be better off than right now. The Saudis would be in trouble too just like Bahrain but if a government is only in power because of a foreign economic interest, specially when that government is quite repressive, i don't see how toppling it would be disastrous. And you're still in your robotic mode where you can't read properly. I said "progressively leave the Middle East to their own devices". That's usually not something that creates a power vacuum. I'd now like to ask YOU what you think the U.S. does in the Middle East. Are their actions justified? Is it the only thing between stability (lol) and total chaos? Should the U.S. keep on stationing troops and using naval bases until the end of times? They already kill each other, they just tend to kill the people we don't care about. \/\/\/\/\/\/\/ If they leave the region explodes so i guess they are according to some people. Mans fucked around with this message at 20:48 on Sep 16, 2012 |
# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:42 |
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Mans posted:I don't know. Israel would be hosed but their actions, supported by the U.S., caused the backlash against them. Iraq is already semi-independent, if they had the ability to nationalize their oil and industry they'd probably be better off than right now. The Saudis would be in trouble too just like Bahrain but if a government is only in power because of a foreign economic interest, specially when that government is quite repressive, i don't see how toppling it would be disastrous. I still don't get how the U.S. is creating any sort of stability in Middle East right now?
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:46 |
Mans posted:Or maybe the world isn't a black and white place where you only have two choices. Fundamentalism isn't because of the U.S. but a lot of them receive a shitload of money and recruits because of U.S. actions. Muslim fundamentalism is not, at it's core, anti-American. The cases of Libya, Syria, and Afghanistan are ones in which Muslim fundamentalists are willing to make implicit or explicit military alliances with the United States and other jahili states like Turkey. The central target of Muslim fundamentalists is not America, it is Muslims who practice under doctrinal differences, liberals, leftists, and all the others who embrace modernity, women who refuse the hijab, girls who want to get educated and seek an equal status with their male peers, religious minorities, and so on. Here's what the real destruction of fundamentalist militias looked like in the last year, historic Sufi shrines in Tripoli and Timbuktu torn down because they were deemed "deviant" to proper Islamic practice: The United States, as a target, is very low down on the list, even in situations like the Iraqi civil war where they were the obvious people to go after. Muslim fundamentalists kill and repress other Muslims far more indiscriminately and brutally than the United States; you can't point at American drone attacks on the Taliban in some distant corner of Pakistan that hardly any Arab really hears or thinks about and saying "this is it". This didn't get hardly any press in the Western media, but several months ago Tunisian Salafis raided and destroyed an art exhibit in Tunisia in which "Subhan'Allah" was spelled out with ants: Tunisian Salafis raided the art exhibit, just like they burned down the home of a TV executive that broadcast Persepolis, and staged riots to try and end the sale of alcohol in Tunisia. None of this has anything to do with America, it is fundamentally a project to reject modernity, which they consider to be a form of slavery, and to recreate the divinely inspired moral character of 7th century Arabia. az jan jananam fucked around with this message at 20:52 on Sep 16, 2012 |
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:48 |
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Mans posted:I don't know. Israel would be hosed but their actions, supported by the U.S., caused the backlash against them. Iraq is already semi-independent, if they had the ability to nationalize their oil and industry they'd probably be better off than right now. The Saudis would be in trouble too just like Bahrain but if a government is only in power because of a foreign economic interest, specially when that government is quite repressive, i don't see how toppling it would be disastrous. What makes you think the Israeli and Saudi regimes would collapse if the US would stop supporting them ? Saudi Arabia is insanely wealthy and can easily get anything the US sold them somewhere else with a lot less strings attached. Israel would lose a few percent of its economy but it's not like they were defenseless in 1967 when the US was supplying their enemies with weapons. Also note how the US backed Mubarak and the Shah were overthrown relatively easily while the non-US backed Gadaffi and Assad plunged their nations into total civil war.
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:50 |
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CeeJee posted:What makes you think the Israeli and Saudi regimes would collapse if the US would stop supporting them ? Saudi Arabia is insanely wealthy and can easily get anything the US sold them somewhere else with a lot less strings attached. Israel would lose a few percent of its economy but it's not like they were defenseless in 1967 when the US was supplying their enemies with weapons. I don't think they would collapse. I just think not funding them would be good-
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 20:56 |
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# ? May 29, 2024 23:55 |
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Mans posted:"progressively leave the Middle East to their own devices" This is meaningless. You might as well be saying "Leave in a way such that those bad things you said would happen, don't happen."
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# ? Sep 16, 2012 21:03 |