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Randarkman posted:
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Jul 25, 2014 13:47
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Volkerball posted:If you think American conservatives are making it difficult for the US and Iran to work out a deal, you haven't had much exposure to Iranian conservatives. They shot Neda, publicly execute drug offenders, still provide poo poo tons of aid to Hezbollah and Assad, and shunned Ahmadinejad and his clique from Iranian politics by sticking them with a bunch of allegations including sorcery. Iran has its work cut out for it to normalize relations with anyone who isn't a diabolical rear end in a top hat. None of those are an impediment to normal relations. The United States had normal relations with the USSR, and it has normal relations with Egypt and Saudi Arabia. In the wake of the fall of the Berlin Wall the United States sometimes feels like it has forgotten that being its geopolitical opponent does not in itself make a state evil, illegitimate and insane. Ahmadinejad was a problem because 1. he was, himself, an anti-American Holocaust-denying firebrand and 2. it would have suggested that brinksmanship and a hardline attitude are the only way to deal with the West. This was arguably true, but making nice with Rouhani is suggesting otherwise now, and it would be nice to go all the way.
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Jul 25, 2014 14:01
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Randarkman posted:That article mentioned how Kobane is excluded from the UN Aid coming into the country at this time. Also the Kurds are less united than is often thought to be the case, with rivalry between different regional governments, political parties, militias and even tribal groups. Each of these have and will primarily focus on defending and supplying their own immediate territory and interests rather than co-operating across regional, political and ideological lines. The UN has 4 corridors that it is allowed to use without the regime's permission. One of those is from Turkey, and it does not pass directly through Kobane, meaning the city won't receive that UN aid directly. Rudaw is a Kurdish source, so they're definitely milking it as much as they can to get support, but what this means is that the Kurds are in the exact same situation as they have been for the last couple years. They control a border crossing with Kurdish Turkey, and receive supplies and fighters from there. 300 just crossed the border to Kobane a week or two ago. The reason they aren't getting that UN aid is because there's a limited supply, there's very few corridors, and there are a lot of places in Syria that are in desperate trouble that have been excluded from supplies for so long that people are starving to death and disease is running rampant. Rojava is not even close to being one of those places. quote:What problems are we talking about here? I can see it being a problem for them that more people are beginning to see them as the primary threat, but mostly the groups that oppose them are too incompetent and/or disunited to present an effective united front it seems. As of now they seem to be at their strongest point having conquered economically important regions in both Iraq and Syria, as well as large quantities of weapons from the Iraqi Army. IS built it's legacy by being your typical insurgent fighting force. Staying hidden, being opportunistic with their attacks, and avoiding major conflict. Now they've captured territory and labeled themselves as the caliphate, and it's a loving lot for how thin their ranks are. They can't defend it all, so it's a balancing act of them retreating in some areas, and fighting in others. They can't exactly come under attack in Aleppo and expect to get reinforcements from Baghdad. They were pushed out of Aleppo, then pushed out of Damascus, made gains here, came back and fought there, etc. I expect that if the regime begins an offensive against them, which seems likely given how much they exerted to try and maintain a hold on the gas fields and how they are starting to bomb civilians in ISIS controlled territory, they'll split. But that won't be big news, so they already won the narrative. This is how they fight. Also, supposedly somewhere in the neighborhood of 700 fighters died during the gas field raids and the fighting for division 17. They were getting barrel-bombed (which kill 30-40 civilians a pop in Aleppo) and the regime had tunnels to retreat, so I'd imagine ISIS took some seriously heavy losses. That should become more clear in the next few days. quote:Not really that surprising with their recent focus on Iraq, and their limited manpower. Also what moderate factions are we talking of, where can I read about this? (just curious) It's in a state of flux right now with JaN reestablishing its identity to try and gain some of the jihadist support ISIS suddenly seems to have a monopoly on. Whole lot of changes incoming. The SRF and FSA are the two biggest umbrellas that I know of, so googling those would give you a decent chunk of the story, but there's hundreds upon hundreds of groups. Here's an article on ISIS losses in Damascus, although that seems to have been a JaN operation. http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2014/Jul-22/264694-syria-rebels-press-bid-to-expel-isis-from-damascus-area.ashx#axzz38TbGOkCf Peel posted:None of those are an impediment to normal relations. The United States had normal relations with the USSR, and it has normal relations with Egypt and Saudi Arabia. In the wake of the fall of the Berlin Wall the United States sometimes feels like it has forgotten that being its geopolitical opponent does not in itself make a state evil, illegitimate and insane. The Cold War doesn't strike me as "normal relations." Iran backing a declared terrorist group in Hezbollah, and supporting a declared helper of terrorists and brutal dictator in Assad are definitely impediments. And yes, relations with Rouhani are promising, but he is not the literal supreme leader of Iran. Khameini also has to appease the basiji sect, and the last thing they want is to soften their stance on the West.
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Jul 25, 2014 14:14
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I have been passionately reading the USPol, Ukraine, and I/P threads and I feel I have a good foundation of knowledge for all, coming in here I know ISIS has been taking serious gains but I don't necessarily know how we got here. Could anyone point me to some timelines/rundowns of situations/relevant history(maybe the past 50 yrs because of how it seemed important in analyzing perspectives in the I/P debate) of Syria/Iraq/ISIS/the arab spring/whatever you guys think I should know to know what I'm talking about? Just trying to get myself to where I can make sound analysis of the situation and explain it to others. Blowdryer fucked around with this message at 06:22 on Jul 27, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 14:25
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Blowdryer posted:I have been passionately reading the USPol, Ukraine, and I/P threads and I feel I have a good foundation of knowledge for all, coming in here I know ISIS has been taking serious gains but I don't necessarily know how we got here. Could anyone point me to some timelines/rundowns of situations/relevant history(maybe the past 50 yrs because of how it seemed important in analyzing perspectives in the I/P debate) of Syria/Iraq/ISIS/the arab spring/whatever you guys think I should know to know whay I'm talking about? Lol. Is that all? This is a good starting point on the main dynamic at play in Syria at least. It's insanely more complicated than I/P, so be warned. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1NgB6GZV8k
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Jul 25, 2014 14:35
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Volkerball posted:The Cold War doesn't strike me as "normal relations." By 'normal relations' I don't mean friendliness. I mean embassies or consulates, upholding treaty obligations, not embargoing them, being willing to cooperate on issues of mutual interest, and so on. Rather than the attitude of intractable belligerence and duplicity the United States has taken to Iran until recently, as if they were some kind of inherently illegitimate criminal gang rather than a peer state with which America has substantial disagreements. quote:Iran backing a declared terrorist group in Hezbollah, and supporting a declared helper of terrorists and brutal dictator in Assad are definitely impediments. There is a problem for the US with Iranian support for Hezbollah, but that's Hezbollah's being an opponent of Israel, not their moral failings. And that falls under 'Israel' in my list of reasons. quote:And yes, relations with Rouhani are promising, but he is not the literal supreme leader of Iran. Khameini also has to appease the basiji sect, and the last thing they want is to soften their stance on the West. I think the agonising failure of Iraq has taken a lot of wind out of the hawk lobby, leading to things like the halting of the push to intervene in Syria, and the detente with Iran. So now is a very good opportunity to deal with the above problem and make progress. Peel fucked around with this message at 15:04 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 15:02
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Keep in mind that we have supported groups later recognized as terrorists internationally because they hate Iran.
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Jul 25, 2014 15:08
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Congrats to Vice on getting the first embed with the Islamic State. As a journalist, I think this type of reporting will actually increase -- slightly -- in coming months. Reporting in this environment still requires various editorial handicaps and a nerve of steel, but it's an interesting development. MothraAttack fucked around with this message at 15:51 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 15:49
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In a fight between ISIS and Assad I'm still not sure which guy I loathe more.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:07
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MothraAttack posted:Congrats to Vice on getting the first embed with the Islamic State. Vice has been embedded with ISIS before in Syria, if I recall correctly. They were interviewing mostly non-Arabs.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:12
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On the other hand, dudes are pulling some sick donuts in that APC...
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Jul 25, 2014 16:13
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Rukeli posted:Vice was embedded before with ISIS in Syria, if I recall correctly. They were interviewing mostly non-Arabs. Yeah, it was either in Raqqa or Deiz ez-zor. I'd assume it's probably the same guy, and I hope with those two stories out of the way, he has enough to live lavishly and retire in Hawaii.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:14
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illrepute posted:In a fight between ISIS and Assad I'm still not sure which guy I loathe more. ISIS can take out Assad, then everybody can gang up on ISIS without reservations.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:21
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Charlz Guybon posted:They control territory that holds millions now. Surely their manpower is increasing sharply. They wouldn't be willing to engage in firefights that kill hundreds if it wasn't. Yeah, but you can't just take dudes off the street, hand them an AK and expect them to fight with competence. ISIS has relatively small core of experienced fighters, and it's those dudes who are pulling off the successful operations. Also holding that territory ties up dudes as well since all of it is more or less contested. Demiurge4 posted:At this point Syria is a humanitarian disaster that deserves a full UN peace keeping mission but Turkey is a stable democracy on the border and a NATO member. They are also Muslims so they won't get the same amount of local resistance a European mission would get. With enough material support and a good local media campaign in Turkey I think it could work. And the question is whether Turkey is willing to wade into the clusterfuck that is Syria and potentially get stuck in that quagmire for god knows how long. I'd hazard a guess and say that they aren't.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:27
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Deteriorata posted:ISIS can take out Assad, then everybody can gang up on ISIS without reservations. I would expect a even more violent/heinous group to emerge from those ashes especially since Assad has his own base of support.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:27
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Ardennes posted:I would expect a even more violent/heinous group to emerge from those ashes especially since Assad has his own base of support. It seems like at some point, you can't get a more violent or heinous group. Are the current groups not at peak violence and heinousness? What could be some further steps they could take to achieve this pinnacle?
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Jul 25, 2014 16:30
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Yea, as far as I'm aware ISIS has literally been executing like thousands of surrendered enemy soldiers and anyone who disagrees with them or is suspected of disagreeing with them in general, right? Kinda the only way to be more violent than them would be to just execute everyone everywhere, and that probably wouldn't last all that long.
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Jul 25, 2014 16:36
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Charlz Guybon posted:They control territory that holds millions now. Surely their manpower is increasing sharply. They wouldn't be willing to engage in firefights that kill hundreds if it wasn't. The Europa Universalis analogies are mostly jokes, you realize?
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Jul 25, 2014 17:16
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Volkerball posted:If you think American conservatives are making it difficult for the US and Iran to work out a deal, you haven't had much exposure to Iranian conservatives. They shot Neda, publicly execute drug offenders, still provide poo poo tons of aid to Hezbollah and Assad, and shunned Ahmadinejad and his clique from Iranian politics by sticking them with a bunch of allegations including sorcery. Iran has its work cut out for it to normalize relations with anyone who isn't a diabolical rear end in a top hat. You could say a lot of those same things about our conservatives and/or police state. Our police murder protesters or put them in hospitals on a pretty regular basis, we have 3x their per-capita incarceration rate and execute people for all kinds of things and our people literally break into spontaneous applause about it, we're supplying weapons and aid to an apartheid state and all kinds of murderous juntas and tinpot dictators, they can't stop talking about how women love rape, and they can't shake their belief that the President is actually secretly born in Kenya in a massive global conspiracy. "Republicans have their work cut out for them to normalize relations with anyone who isn't a diabolical rear end in a top hat". It's dumb to focus on the hard-line conservatives in societies. Of course they make things difficult for the moderates, that's no reason not to try and normalize relations. Once things de-escalate it's a lot easier for moderates to sell those positions instead of having to defend against conservatives trying to one-up the other guy. In the grand scheme of things we've kissed and made up with some real loving scumbags. We're even getting close to kissing and making up with Cuba, which once upon a time had similarly virulent anti-American sentiment as the Iranian revolution does. Don't make the mistake of thinking that countries who disagree with us are controlled by robots who are programmed to hate America, honest and balanced negotiations can solve pretty deep chasms. If the US is willing to give on Iran's right to nuclear power I definitely think a deal can be reached. They already agreed to an ore-swap deal circa 2010 before we blew up the deal and passed more sanctions. De-escalating the sanctions would probably be a good step to undermine the hard-liners too, it's real hard to claim you're negotiating fairly when you've got your hands around the other guy's throat. Of course, our conservatives won't let that happen, but that's not their fault. Paul MaudDib fucked around with this message at 19:56 on Jul 25, 2014 |
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Jul 25, 2014 17:24
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Deteriorata posted:ISIS can take out Assad, then everybody can gang up on ISIS without reservations. My fear is that this ends up like the Taliban, where everyone goes, "Not my problem.  " until they, I don't know, harbor an international criminal when a major western power wants revenge or something.I want to believe everyone will realize ISIS is a threat to all of them and smear them on the ground when/if Assad falls, but I somehow have my doubts. 
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Jul 25, 2014 17:55
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Demiurge4 posted:At this point Syria is a humanitarian disaster that deserves a full UN peace keeping mission but Turkey is a stable democracy on the border and a NATO member. They are also Muslims so they won't get the same amount of local resistance a European mission would get. With enough material support and a good local media campaign in Turkey I think it could work. I was under the impression that Arab nations have a massive pickle with turks because of centuries of Ottoman domination? I'm not actually too well versed in mid-east political imaginary, but i think most Arab states would throw a fit over turkish intervention, and i guess the local population wouldn't be very supportive either.
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Jul 25, 2014 19:01
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The political process in Iraq continues to grind on slowly, they've now managed to elect a President! Say hello to Iraq's new President Fuad Masum of the PUK. His nomination by the PUK was a bit of an eleventh hour surprise, up until his name was floated the two major candidates were Barham Salih (backed by the KDP and the majority of the PUK) and the Kirkuk governor Najmiddin Karim (backed by current Iraqi President and Party head Jalal Talabani). Karim hosed up big time and announced his candidacy before securing the PUK's support, going against the will of the party is probably the biggest mistake any Kurdish politician could make and pretty much killed his bid. Talabani returned to Iraq on Saturday (he's been in Germany for the last 18 months after suffering a massive stroke) and hastily arranged for Masum to be nominated by the PUK alongside Salih. Masum is a party grandee; he helped found the PUK, has lead the Parliamentary Party for the last couple of years and was the first prime minister of the unofficial 1991 government - he's hardly on the political ascent but he's a well respected pair of hands who will follow the party line. Importantly, he is well respected by Shia and Sunni law-makers, something which helped him easily defeat Salih in the vote to secure the Presidency. Now all he's got to do is ask the SLC to form a government and there finally might be a new Iraqi government. Also, Iran is probably pretty happy with Masum winning.  Masum on the right, Soleimani on the left
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Jul 25, 2014 19:44
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Meanwhile, Russia is clandestinly trying to broker some cooperation between Assad and the (Syrian) Kurds against IS. Recent events propably increase the chances of success by a considerable margin. It also isnt likely that Turkey would shoot down the Syrian goverment envoys this time.
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Jul 25, 2014 20:04
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kustomkarkommando posted:The political process in Iraq continues to grind on slowly, they've now managed to elect a President! Say hello to Iraq's new President Fuad Masum of the PUK. I would add that Soleimani is a pretty "interesting" figure. Rumors: During the "interesting" phase of the revolution in Iran, the Mullahs competed with the communist Tudeh party for dominance. The Mullah faction than stormed the US embassy (thus suddenly being more anti american than the communists). They used documents they seized from the embassy to both blackmail the "moderates" or smear them with very real poo poo. Now, there was a situation in which the Mullahs just completely pissed of the United States. Of course, this meant that the pro Soviet communist Iranians were like "Muahahaha, totally awesome, the US will propably take them out or hurt them and then we can seize power". They were like that until the Mullahs loving, and very literally, beheaded them all when they absolutly werent expecting a Mullah attack on them. Suleimanis role in this? Well, some "Anti Soviet hawks" like Ahmedinajad were much in favor of stroming the Soviet embassy and not the US one. Suleimani was a part of the faction that prefered to go after the US instead and managed to get that through. The question Russian circles are asking itself here is: Was he, at that point, in on the entire cunning sekrit and very successfully Mullah plan?
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Jul 25, 2014 20:15
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Whats the IS hardliner view on muslims of different races mixing? Seems like with all the foreign fighters joining them in the ME, there's got to be some conflict of 'best practices' with regard to race mixing.
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Jul 26, 2014 00:37
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ChairMaster posted:Yea, as far as I'm aware ISIS has literally been executing like thousands of surrendered enemy soldiers and anyone who disagrees with them or is suspected of disagreeing with them in general, right? Kinda the only way to be more violent than them would be to just execute everyone everywhere, and that probably wouldn't last all that long. There is always further depths in which to human will delve itself into, taking out Assad and then ISIS would not only mean they wouldn't be much left to Syria but that there would be a giant vacuum which almost certainly a nice liberal regime wouldn't last long. In fact, I can just picture how much of the country would want revenge on any government that was installed after two country spanning invasions.
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Jul 26, 2014 00:43
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bagual posted:I was under the impression that Arab nations have a massive pickle with turks because of centuries of Ottoman domination? I'm not actually too well versed in mid-east political imaginary, but i think most Arab states would throw a fit over turkish intervention, and i guess the local population wouldn't be very supportive either. Yeah, there's still lingering anti-Ottoman sentiment, not sure how serious it would be. It's especially notable in Armenians for justifiable reasons, to the point where Lebanese Armenians said they were siding with Hezballah because they're Shia, unlike the Future party which is Sunni (therefore like the Turks).
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Jul 26, 2014 01:28
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Shaocaholica posted:Whats the IS hardliner view on muslims of different races mixing? Seems like with all the foreign fighters joining them in the ME, there's got to be some conflict of 'best practices' with regard to race mixing. There's a line in the Quran about everyone being equal as long as they're Muslim but I'm sure there's plenty of people that ignore that.
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Jul 26, 2014 01:28
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Shaocaholica posted:Whats the IS hardliner view on muslims of different races mixing? Seems like with all the foreign fighters joining them in the ME, there's got to be some conflict of 'best practices' with regard to race mixing. The only suspicious race right now are Iranians, otherwise these groups tend to have quite a diverse range of people. Vegetables can gently caress right off though, queer rear end carrots can't be next to tomatoes or something.
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Jul 26, 2014 01:38
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wrong thread, sorry
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Jul 26, 2014 01:47
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computer parts posted:There's a line in the Quran about everyone being equal as long as they're Muslim but I'm sure there's plenty of people that ignore that. Yeah true. Nothing in the bible about black dudes with white chicks but christians tend to get uppity about that. I would think it gets a bit complex if the dude in question is also a frontline jihadist. What then?
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Jul 26, 2014 01:47
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Shaocaholica posted:Yeah true. Nothing in the bible about black dudes with white chicks but christians tend to get uppity about that. I would think it gets a bit complex if the dude in question is also a frontline jihadist. What then? Just because they are shitheads doesn't mean they endorse every odious ideology on Earth. Islamism was never big on racial segregation as their ultimate objective includes the political unity of all Islamic world. And jihadists come from many ethnic backgrounds all over the world and it's even somewhat of a point of pride for them.
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Jul 26, 2014 02:08
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gently caress, I knew it, they're democrats.
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Jul 26, 2014 02:12
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Peel posted:None of those are an impediment to normal relations. The United States had normal relations with the USSR, and it has normal relations with Egypt and Saudi Arabia. In the wake of the fall of the Berlin Wall the United States sometimes feels like it has forgotten that being its geopolitical opponent does not in itself make a state evil, illegitimate and insane. Ahmadinejad was a reaction to the US after Bush putting Iran in the evil list. Both the previous 2 presidents were more progressive. Iranians blamed Ahmadinejad for the radical foreign policy and fail economic but he was picked by the clerics. Iran really is the most progressive country in the Middle East with a working political system and a progressive society. I don't see much different between Iran's political system and the China's. Thanks to Bush getting rip of two of Iran's main foes Saddan and Taliban the US can't keep Iran down that much longer.
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Jul 26, 2014 02:16
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Also, does anyone have more pics/video/text on the atrocities ISIS is committing? I have this weird morbid feeling tonight to understand what ISIS is about and what makes them even worse than al-Qaeda. 
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Jul 26, 2014 02:39
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whatever7 posted:Iran really is the most progressive country in the Middle East with a working political system and a progressive society. I don't see much different between Iran's political system and the China's. Thanks to Bush getting rip of two of Iran's main foes Saddan and Taliban the US can't keep Iran down that much longer. Also, at least on the legislative level and partly at the executive, Iran is multi-party even if a un-elected authority has effectively a veto. If anything Ahmadinejad was a boon to the neo-conservatives simply because he made Iran seem far more extreme than it really was and is. Pretty much everything changed as far as narratives when he left. Ultimately, I think Turkey is still more democratic....but as the Erdogan/AKP becomes more autocratic, it is getting a bit blurry.
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Jul 26, 2014 02:40
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TheRamblingSoul posted:Also, does anyone have more pics/video/text on the atrocities ISIS is committing? I have this weird morbid feeling tonight to understand what ISIS is about and what makes them even worse than al-Qaeda. This propaganda video was posted a while back in thread, its an hour of them randomly executing civilians and giving speeches:  http://tune.pk/video/4157108/isis-documentary-isis-only-targets-soldiers-not-civiliansIt got taken down from youtube, that's the only mirror I could find
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Jul 26, 2014 02:51
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Baloogan posted:gently caress, I knew it, they're democrats. They're anti-moderns, so they don't really fit neatly into American left/right categories. That said, one American political party is more anti-modern than the other.
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Jul 26, 2014 03:28
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kustomkarkommando posted:This propaganda video was posted a while back in thread, its an hour of them randomly executing civilians and giving speeches: Holy poo poo, I jumped at random to the crazy guy stabbing his passports (not a typo) and what followed was insane;  random driveby shootings blasting an AK full auto not even 2 yards from one car into another, apparently at-loving-random, followed by closeups of the corpses (yes they stopped and went back out to investigate their handiwork each time) reinforcing that these were just random-looking unarmed people, driving around and minding their own business, then being shot the gently caress up, and then having post-production work on the video for slowmo-replays of the killings. The gently caress, I didn't even get into what I was expecting as far as gruesome poo poo. It really puts that image of ISIS fighters standing in the shop into an even more "you guys are batshit loving crazy" light.
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Jul 26, 2014 03:41
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S.T.C.A. posted:Holy poo poo, I jumped at random to the crazy guy stabbing his passports (not a typo) and what followed was insane; I keep seeing this drive-by being called random. When I first saw it, it was part of a BBC report. They said that the video showed ISIS (as they were still called at that time) setting up checkpoints and ambushing Iraqi soldiers on their way to reporting for duty. This was when they were first seizing Mosul. BBC said they had a list of names, and appeared to be following it. I've seen the clips taken out of this context many times to support the idea that these attacks are just random violence. Unless someone can correct me, it seems very targeted, and not random at all.
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Jul 26, 2014 03:58
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