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Read the rules in the OP before posting, please.In order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a re-read to refresh your memory! The vast majority of you are contributing in a healthy way, keep it up! NOTE: When providing a source, explain why you feel it is relevant and what purpose it adds to the discussion if it's not obvious. Also take note that unsubstantiated tweets/posts meant only to rekindle old arguments can result in a mod action. |
On June 15 2014 07:15 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 07:08 Adreme wrote:On June 15 2014 06:44 coverpunch wrote:On June 15 2014 03:55 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:39 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:29 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:17 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:10 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 02:40 DeepElemBlues wrote:We created 9/11 ourselves by our proxy wars through Israel and our terrorism of Iraqi civilians in the first gulf war. when men like ayman al-zawahiri and osama bin laden were young men getting radicalized israel's main ally was france, not the united states. the persian gulf war war happened in the 1960s when sayyid qutb wrote the book that is the modern ideological underpinning of sunni jihadism? when he was being tortured in an egyptian jail when egypt was an ally of the soviet union and hostile to the united states? the persian gulf war happened hundreds of years ago when the islamic doctrines of supremacism and cultural xenophobia that qutb relied on were developed? saudi arabia is iraq? osama was pissed saudi arabia asked the united states and not him to fight saddam. osama felt quite jilted. osama bin laden was in a legitimate position to speak for muslims and wage jihad for them because dirty infidels were trodding the holy sand of saudi arabia? was there an election? a muslim religious conference? US is responsible for 9/11 because non-american muslims are children with no ambitions or motivations of their own. they just sit around staring at the sky presumably until americans show up and mess with them, then all of a sudden they for some odd reason don't want to just defend "their" land from dirty infidels, they want to restore the islamic caliphate and dominate the planet as they have loopily said several times. seems kind of like an overreaction. almost as if they have motivations that spring from somewhere other than noam chomsky's latest screed. By our own blood-for-blood creed, we have single-handedly inspired every anti-west terrorist attack for the next 50 years. nonsense. anti-west terrorist attacks are inspired, have been inspired, and will be inspired by an imperialist ideology that demands its version of islam be the exclusive belief in islamic-majority countries (and you die if you don't follow), and that non-islamic cultures show deference to it in various ways (like muslims can proselytize in their countries but they can't do it in muslim countries, muslims are allowed to immigrate to their countries but they can't dirty sacred "muslim land" with their infidel beliefs, muslim cultural mores must be respected in their countries but anything "un-islamic" being introduced into their culture is unacceptable and a justification for violence, the list goes on and on really). and you can just go ahead and die if you sully their perfect culture with your dirty sexuality or your un-islamic democracy with separation of church and state. and heaven forbid you and your barely-human filthy non-muslim feet dare touch "muslim land." or you could believe the fantasy that they hate us because we were mean to them. as if marxist theories about political violence being the responsibility of the boogeyman oppressor can be transferred wholesale onto a non-western culture. talk about orientalism. Meh, you haven't really convinced my that my action-reaction approach is wrong by quoting the propaganda lines of muslim politicians and leaders. You really shouldn't take those things at face value. I think you have not understood his post. What he is saying is literally the opposite of what muslim politicians and leaders have been saying. (that these exact leaders are just using the anti-western sentiments as an excuse to spread an imperialistic version of Islam over the middle east, no matter if the West is intervening or not) I couldn't tell what was going on in the first half of the post because I couldn't really tell what was irony/sarcasm. The second part is what I'm disagreeing with. Unless I've lost my basic reading comprehension, he basically said they're haters hating because they're hateful and that's the end of discussion. The thing that makes me disagree with this is that many of the things he claimed about their 'imperialist ideology' have direct parallels with the elevated rhetoric/propaganda of the tea party, who are not haters hating because they're hateful, but smart politicians taking advantage of the lowest levels of argumentation and the basest of feelings to instill pride and a feeling of unity in their followers for the purposes of control and stability. There is no reason to deny that a certain portion of foreign terrorism (especially the acts of terrorism committed by people that grew up in the West and have gone nuts) is fueled by Western politics, but it's nonsense to claim that the majority of problems in the middle-east stems from Western 'occupation'. That's exactly what people like bin Laden have used as an excuse for their terrorist operations. The biggest problem the middle-east faces is that it's caught up in societies that are 200 years behind everybody else. Apostasy is still punishable by death in many countries, women have no rights, children have no education, dictators are ruling like kings and many people support Shariah law. That this is not going to end very well is pretty clear. And we can do absolutely nothing about it. Maybe it wouldn't look as chaotic as it does without the Iraq war, but the parties involved would have found another reason to bash each other's heads in for sure. I never claimed that the middle eastern problems stem from our politics. I agree that their main problem is they're years behind. I'm just saying our intervention in the middle east (Mainly the creation of Israel and its maintenance as an elite military power in the region, the two Iraq Wars, our own personal military bases, and our often exploitative business practices) are (in light of the obvious problems in the region) the metaphorical equivalent of covering your dick in honey and fucking an anthill. You're only harping on things that can't be changed. We can't undo history. The question is how do you want President Obama to play this out going forward? What do you think he will decide to do? And which decisions and outcomes would you be happy with and which decisions and outcomes would you say he's messing up and continuing the ugly legacy? I suppose the answer can be implied that you want a full withdrawal and the US to do nothing about these wars. I mean at the end of the day the only reason ISIS is making any gains at all is because Malaki has made zero effort to reach out to the Sunni's in Iraq. This basically is on Malaki to fix the rift between the sides since he is a major cause of it and if we just go in and take down the militants for him then all we are doing is allowing him to continue to widen the rift. Oo they have been massacring themselves in Iraq since the moment Saddam fell. You can't just 'reach out' when one side is determined to remove the other from existence.
There are extremist Sunni's in Iraq just as there are extremist Shiites and I am not saying he should reach out to them because those extremists are not groups you can win to your side but what he can do is try to include Sunni's in general into the government which by and large he has made no effort to do. This lack of effort is the only real reason a group like ISIS is even able to get a foothold in the first place and has been a major criticism of Maliki for years now.
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On June 15 2014 06:44 coverpunch wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 03:55 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:39 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:29 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:17 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:10 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 02:40 DeepElemBlues wrote:We created 9/11 ourselves by our proxy wars through Israel and our terrorism of Iraqi civilians in the first gulf war. when men like ayman al-zawahiri and osama bin laden were young men getting radicalized israel's main ally was france, not the united states. the persian gulf war war happened in the 1960s when sayyid qutb wrote the book that is the modern ideological underpinning of sunni jihadism? when he was being tortured in an egyptian jail when egypt was an ally of the soviet union and hostile to the united states? the persian gulf war happened hundreds of years ago when the islamic doctrines of supremacism and cultural xenophobia that qutb relied on were developed? saudi arabia is iraq? osama was pissed saudi arabia asked the united states and not him to fight saddam. osama felt quite jilted. osama bin laden was in a legitimate position to speak for muslims and wage jihad for them because dirty infidels were trodding the holy sand of saudi arabia? was there an election? a muslim religious conference? US is responsible for 9/11 because non-american muslims are children with no ambitions or motivations of their own. they just sit around staring at the sky presumably until americans show up and mess with them, then all of a sudden they for some odd reason don't want to just defend "their" land from dirty infidels, they want to restore the islamic caliphate and dominate the planet as they have loopily said several times. seems kind of like an overreaction. almost as if they have motivations that spring from somewhere other than noam chomsky's latest screed. By our own blood-for-blood creed, we have single-handedly inspired every anti-west terrorist attack for the next 50 years. nonsense. anti-west terrorist attacks are inspired, have been inspired, and will be inspired by an imperialist ideology that demands its version of islam be the exclusive belief in islamic-majority countries (and you die if you don't follow), and that non-islamic cultures show deference to it in various ways (like muslims can proselytize in their countries but they can't do it in muslim countries, muslims are allowed to immigrate to their countries but they can't dirty sacred "muslim land" with their infidel beliefs, muslim cultural mores must be respected in their countries but anything "un-islamic" being introduced into their culture is unacceptable and a justification for violence, the list goes on and on really). and you can just go ahead and die if you sully their perfect culture with your dirty sexuality or your un-islamic democracy with separation of church and state. and heaven forbid you and your barely-human filthy non-muslim feet dare touch "muslim land." or you could believe the fantasy that they hate us because we were mean to them. as if marxist theories about political violence being the responsibility of the boogeyman oppressor can be transferred wholesale onto a non-western culture. talk about orientalism. Meh, you haven't really convinced my that my action-reaction approach is wrong by quoting the propaganda lines of muslim politicians and leaders. You really shouldn't take those things at face value. I think you have not understood his post. What he is saying is literally the opposite of what muslim politicians and leaders have been saying. (that these exact leaders are just using the anti-western sentiments as an excuse to spread an imperialistic version of Islam over the middle east, no matter if the West is intervening or not) I couldn't tell what was going on in the first half of the post because I couldn't really tell what was irony/sarcasm. The second part is what I'm disagreeing with. Unless I've lost my basic reading comprehension, he basically said they're haters hating because they're hateful and that's the end of discussion. The thing that makes me disagree with this is that many of the things he claimed about their 'imperialist ideology' have direct parallels with the elevated rhetoric/propaganda of the tea party, who are not haters hating because they're hateful, but smart politicians taking advantage of the lowest levels of argumentation and the basest of feelings to instill pride and a feeling of unity in their followers for the purposes of control and stability. There is no reason to deny that a certain portion of foreign terrorism (especially the acts of terrorism committed by people that grew up in the West and have gone nuts) is fueled by Western politics, but it's nonsense to claim that the majority of problems in the middle-east stems from Western 'occupation'. That's exactly what people like bin Laden have used as an excuse for their terrorist operations. The biggest problem the middle-east faces is that it's caught up in societies that are 200 years behind everybody else. Apostasy is still punishable by death in many countries, women have no rights, children have no education, dictators are ruling like kings and many people support Shariah law. That this is not going to end very well is pretty clear. And we can do absolutely nothing about it. Maybe it wouldn't look as chaotic as it does without the Iraq war, but the parties involved would have found another reason to bash each other's heads in for sure. I never claimed that the middle eastern problems stem from our politics. I agree that their main problem is they're years behind. I'm just saying our intervention in the middle east (Mainly the creation of Israel and its maintenance as an elite military power in the region, the two Iraq Wars, our own personal military bases, and our often exploitative business practices) are (in light of the obvious problems in the region) the metaphorical equivalent of covering your dick in honey and fucking an anthill. You're only harping on things that can't be changed. We can't undo history. The question is how do you want President Obama to play this out going forward? What do you think he will decide to do? And which decisions and outcomes would you be happy with and which decisions and outcomes would you say he's messing up and continuing the ugly legacy? I suppose the answer can be implied that you want a full withdrawal and the US to do nothing about these wars.
History is only part of it. The US still supports most middle-eastern dictators, has military bases or occupation forces in several countries and consistently sabotages a two-nation solution for Palestine. All of these things induce hate and could easily be changed.
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On June 15 2014 06:44 coverpunch wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 03:55 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:39 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:29 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:17 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:10 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 02:40 DeepElemBlues wrote:We created 9/11 ourselves by our proxy wars through Israel and our terrorism of Iraqi civilians in the first gulf war. when men like ayman al-zawahiri and osama bin laden were young men getting radicalized israel's main ally was france, not the united states. the persian gulf war war happened in the 1960s when sayyid qutb wrote the book that is the modern ideological underpinning of sunni jihadism? when he was being tortured in an egyptian jail when egypt was an ally of the soviet union and hostile to the united states? the persian gulf war happened hundreds of years ago when the islamic doctrines of supremacism and cultural xenophobia that qutb relied on were developed? saudi arabia is iraq? osama was pissed saudi arabia asked the united states and not him to fight saddam. osama felt quite jilted. osama bin laden was in a legitimate position to speak for muslims and wage jihad for them because dirty infidels were trodding the holy sand of saudi arabia? was there an election? a muslim religious conference? US is responsible for 9/11 because non-american muslims are children with no ambitions or motivations of their own. they just sit around staring at the sky presumably until americans show up and mess with them, then all of a sudden they for some odd reason don't want to just defend "their" land from dirty infidels, they want to restore the islamic caliphate and dominate the planet as they have loopily said several times. seems kind of like an overreaction. almost as if they have motivations that spring from somewhere other than noam chomsky's latest screed. By our own blood-for-blood creed, we have single-handedly inspired every anti-west terrorist attack for the next 50 years. nonsense. anti-west terrorist attacks are inspired, have been inspired, and will be inspired by an imperialist ideology that demands its version of islam be the exclusive belief in islamic-majority countries (and you die if you don't follow), and that non-islamic cultures show deference to it in various ways (like muslims can proselytize in their countries but they can't do it in muslim countries, muslims are allowed to immigrate to their countries but they can't dirty sacred "muslim land" with their infidel beliefs, muslim cultural mores must be respected in their countries but anything "un-islamic" being introduced into their culture is unacceptable and a justification for violence, the list goes on and on really). and you can just go ahead and die if you sully their perfect culture with your dirty sexuality or your un-islamic democracy with separation of church and state. and heaven forbid you and your barely-human filthy non-muslim feet dare touch "muslim land." or you could believe the fantasy that they hate us because we were mean to them. as if marxist theories about political violence being the responsibility of the boogeyman oppressor can be transferred wholesale onto a non-western culture. talk about orientalism. Meh, you haven't really convinced my that my action-reaction approach is wrong by quoting the propaganda lines of muslim politicians and leaders. You really shouldn't take those things at face value. I think you have not understood his post. What he is saying is literally the opposite of what muslim politicians and leaders have been saying. (that these exact leaders are just using the anti-western sentiments as an excuse to spread an imperialistic version of Islam over the middle east, no matter if the West is intervening or not) I couldn't tell what was going on in the first half of the post because I couldn't really tell what was irony/sarcasm. The second part is what I'm disagreeing with. Unless I've lost my basic reading comprehension, he basically said they're haters hating because they're hateful and that's the end of discussion. The thing that makes me disagree with this is that many of the things he claimed about their 'imperialist ideology' have direct parallels with the elevated rhetoric/propaganda of the tea party, who are not haters hating because they're hateful, but smart politicians taking advantage of the lowest levels of argumentation and the basest of feelings to instill pride and a feeling of unity in their followers for the purposes of control and stability. There is no reason to deny that a certain portion of foreign terrorism (especially the acts of terrorism committed by people that grew up in the West and have gone nuts) is fueled by Western politics, but it's nonsense to claim that the majority of problems in the middle-east stems from Western 'occupation'. That's exactly what people like bin Laden have used as an excuse for their terrorist operations. The biggest problem the middle-east faces is that it's caught up in societies that are 200 years behind everybody else. Apostasy is still punishable by death in many countries, women have no rights, children have no education, dictators are ruling like kings and many people support Shariah law. That this is not going to end very well is pretty clear. And we can do absolutely nothing about it. Maybe it wouldn't look as chaotic as it does without the Iraq war, but the parties involved would have found another reason to bash each other's heads in for sure. I never claimed that the middle eastern problems stem from our politics. I agree that their main problem is they're years behind. I'm just saying our intervention in the middle east (Mainly the creation of Israel and its maintenance as an elite military power in the region, the two Iraq Wars, our own personal military bases, and our often exploitative business practices) are (in light of the obvious problems in the region) the metaphorical equivalent of covering your dick in honey and fucking an anthill. You're only harping on things that can't be changed. We can't undo history. The question is how do you want President Obama to play this out going forward? What do you think he will decide to do? And which decisions and outcomes would you be happy with and which decisions and outcomes would you say he's messing up and continuing the ugly legacy? I suppose the answer can be implied that you want a full withdrawal and the US to do nothing about these wars.
I'm for the smart choices: Non-interventionism or total war. The in between options are largely ineffective. There is no 'quick fix' (less than 20 years) to the middle east (aside from the total war options of physical or cultural genocide).
I would say withdraw from Saudi Arabia, leave Iraq to the Iraqis, and protect our other allies there during times of invasion (not domestic terrorism). Continued military support of Israel (have to be biased somewhere), and complete cessation of drone strikes. Let the middle easternerners kill each other and stay out of countries where we don't have a dog in the fight.
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On June 15 2014 07:36 Adreme wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 07:15 Gorsameth wrote:On June 15 2014 07:08 Adreme wrote:On June 15 2014 06:44 coverpunch wrote:On June 15 2014 03:55 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:39 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:29 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:17 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:10 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 02:40 DeepElemBlues wrote:
[quote]
when men like ayman al-zawahiri and osama bin laden were young men getting radicalized israel's main ally was france, not the united states.
the persian gulf war war happened in the 1960s when sayyid qutb wrote the book that is the modern ideological underpinning of sunni jihadism? when he was being tortured in an egyptian jail when egypt was an ally of the soviet union and hostile to the united states?
the persian gulf war happened hundreds of years ago when the islamic doctrines of supremacism and cultural xenophobia that qutb relied on were developed?
saudi arabia is iraq? osama was pissed saudi arabia asked the united states and not him to fight saddam. osama felt quite jilted.
osama bin laden was in a legitimate position to speak for muslims and wage jihad for them because dirty infidels were trodding the holy sand of saudi arabia? was there an election? a muslim religious conference?
US is responsible for 9/11 because non-american muslims are children with no ambitions or motivations of their own. they just sit around staring at the sky presumably until americans show up and mess with them, then all of a sudden they for some odd reason don't want to just defend "their" land from dirty infidels, they want to restore the islamic caliphate and dominate the planet as they have loopily said several times. seems kind of like an overreaction. almost as if they have motivations that spring from somewhere other than noam chomsky's latest screed.
[quote]
nonsense. anti-west terrorist attacks are inspired, have been inspired, and will be inspired by an imperialist ideology that demands its version of islam be the exclusive belief in islamic-majority countries (and you die if you don't follow), and that non-islamic cultures show deference to it in various ways (like muslims can proselytize in their countries but they can't do it in muslim countries, muslims are allowed to immigrate to their countries but they can't dirty sacred "muslim land" with their infidel beliefs, muslim cultural mores must be respected in their countries but anything "un-islamic" being introduced into their culture is unacceptable and a justification for violence, the list goes on and on really). and you can just go ahead and die if you sully their perfect culture with your dirty sexuality or your un-islamic democracy with separation of church and state. and heaven forbid you and your barely-human filthy non-muslim feet dare touch "muslim land."
or you could believe the fantasy that they hate us because we were mean to them. as if marxist theories about political violence being the responsibility of the boogeyman oppressor can be transferred wholesale onto a non-western culture. talk about orientalism. Meh, you haven't really convinced my that my action-reaction approach is wrong by quoting the propaganda lines of muslim politicians and leaders. You really shouldn't take those things at face value. I think you have not understood his post. What he is saying is literally the opposite of what muslim politicians and leaders have been saying. (that these exact leaders are just using the anti-western sentiments as an excuse to spread an imperialistic version of Islam over the middle east, no matter if the West is intervening or not) I couldn't tell what was going on in the first half of the post because I couldn't really tell what was irony/sarcasm. The second part is what I'm disagreeing with. Unless I've lost my basic reading comprehension, he basically said they're haters hating because they're hateful and that's the end of discussion. The thing that makes me disagree with this is that many of the things he claimed about their 'imperialist ideology' have direct parallels with the elevated rhetoric/propaganda of the tea party, who are not haters hating because they're hateful, but smart politicians taking advantage of the lowest levels of argumentation and the basest of feelings to instill pride and a feeling of unity in their followers for the purposes of control and stability. There is no reason to deny that a certain portion of foreign terrorism (especially the acts of terrorism committed by people that grew up in the West and have gone nuts) is fueled by Western politics, but it's nonsense to claim that the majority of problems in the middle-east stems from Western 'occupation'. That's exactly what people like bin Laden have used as an excuse for their terrorist operations. The biggest problem the middle-east faces is that it's caught up in societies that are 200 years behind everybody else. Apostasy is still punishable by death in many countries, women have no rights, children have no education, dictators are ruling like kings and many people support Shariah law. That this is not going to end very well is pretty clear. And we can do absolutely nothing about it. Maybe it wouldn't look as chaotic as it does without the Iraq war, but the parties involved would have found another reason to bash each other's heads in for sure. I never claimed that the middle eastern problems stem from our politics. I agree that their main problem is they're years behind. I'm just saying our intervention in the middle east (Mainly the creation of Israel and its maintenance as an elite military power in the region, the two Iraq Wars, our own personal military bases, and our often exploitative business practices) are (in light of the obvious problems in the region) the metaphorical equivalent of covering your dick in honey and fucking an anthill. You're only harping on things that can't be changed. We can't undo history. The question is how do you want President Obama to play this out going forward? What do you think he will decide to do? And which decisions and outcomes would you be happy with and which decisions and outcomes would you say he's messing up and continuing the ugly legacy? I suppose the answer can be implied that you want a full withdrawal and the US to do nothing about these wars. I mean at the end of the day the only reason ISIS is making any gains at all is because Malaki has made zero effort to reach out to the Sunni's in Iraq. This basically is on Malaki to fix the rift between the sides since he is a major cause of it and if we just go in and take down the militants for him then all we are doing is allowing him to continue to widen the rift. Oo they have been massacring themselves in Iraq since the moment Saddam fell. You can't just 'reach out' when one side is determined to remove the other from existence. There are extremist Sunni's in Iraq just as there are extremist Shiites and I am not saying he should reach out to them because those extremists are not groups you can win to your side but what he can do is try to include Sunni's in general into the government which by and large he has made no effort to do. This lack of effort is the only real reason a group like ISIS is even able to get a foothold in the first place and has been a major criticism of Maliki for years now.
Iraq counts far more than a thousand Sunni suicide attacks by now, if I'm not mistaken. It's really hard to talk about "effort" when a few dozen people every week get blown up by terrorists. Also one of the more important reason that groups like ISIS are doing really well is because they're well funded (probably by the gulf states) and because they've cultivated their image as "Samaritans" among people that are suffering from the war.
Instead of supporting a side military humanitarian aid by the West would probably not only be cheaper, but also reduce the incentive for the people to run over to extremist organisations.
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President Barack Obama slammed pundits and members of Congress who refuse to confront climate change in drought-stricken California on Saturday, calling them a “fairly serious threat to everybody’s future."
Speaking to University of California, Irvine graduates in Anaheim, Obama said lawmakers were failing to uphold the responsibilities of their office by not taking bold action to curb the harmful effects of carbon emissions.
“Today’s Congress, though, is full of folks who stubbornly and automatically reject the scientific evidence about climate change,” he said. “They’ll tell you it’s a hoax, or a fad.”
He criticized those who ducked the issue by claiming they weren't qualified enough to speak on the matter, like House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R).
“Let me translate," he said. "What that means is, ‘I accept that manmade climate change is real, but if I admit it, I’ll be run out of town by a radical fringe that thinks climate science is a liberal plot.'"
"I'm not a scientist either, but we've got some good ones at NASA," he added.
Source
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On June 15 2014 07:46 Nyxisto wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 07:36 Adreme wrote:On June 15 2014 07:15 Gorsameth wrote:On June 15 2014 07:08 Adreme wrote:On June 15 2014 06:44 coverpunch wrote:On June 15 2014 03:55 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:39 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:29 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:17 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:10 Jormundr wrote:
[quote]
Meh, you haven't really convinced my that my action-reaction approach is wrong by quoting the propaganda lines of muslim politicians and leaders. You really shouldn't take those things at face value. I think you have not understood his post. What he is saying is literally the opposite of what muslim politicians and leaders have been saying. (that these exact leaders are just using the anti-western sentiments as an excuse to spread an imperialistic version of Islam over the middle east, no matter if the West is intervening or not) I couldn't tell what was going on in the first half of the post because I couldn't really tell what was irony/sarcasm. The second part is what I'm disagreeing with. Unless I've lost my basic reading comprehension, he basically said they're haters hating because they're hateful and that's the end of discussion. The thing that makes me disagree with this is that many of the things he claimed about their 'imperialist ideology' have direct parallels with the elevated rhetoric/propaganda of the tea party, who are not haters hating because they're hateful, but smart politicians taking advantage of the lowest levels of argumentation and the basest of feelings to instill pride and a feeling of unity in their followers for the purposes of control and stability. There is no reason to deny that a certain portion of foreign terrorism (especially the acts of terrorism committed by people that grew up in the West and have gone nuts) is fueled by Western politics, but it's nonsense to claim that the majority of problems in the middle-east stems from Western 'occupation'. That's exactly what people like bin Laden have used as an excuse for their terrorist operations. The biggest problem the middle-east faces is that it's caught up in societies that are 200 years behind everybody else. Apostasy is still punishable by death in many countries, women have no rights, children have no education, dictators are ruling like kings and many people support Shariah law. That this is not going to end very well is pretty clear. And we can do absolutely nothing about it. Maybe it wouldn't look as chaotic as it does without the Iraq war, but the parties involved would have found another reason to bash each other's heads in for sure. I never claimed that the middle eastern problems stem from our politics. I agree that their main problem is they're years behind. I'm just saying our intervention in the middle east (Mainly the creation of Israel and its maintenance as an elite military power in the region, the two Iraq Wars, our own personal military bases, and our often exploitative business practices) are (in light of the obvious problems in the region) the metaphorical equivalent of covering your dick in honey and fucking an anthill. You're only harping on things that can't be changed. We can't undo history. The question is how do you want President Obama to play this out going forward? What do you think he will decide to do? And which decisions and outcomes would you be happy with and which decisions and outcomes would you say he's messing up and continuing the ugly legacy? I suppose the answer can be implied that you want a full withdrawal and the US to do nothing about these wars. I mean at the end of the day the only reason ISIS is making any gains at all is because Malaki has made zero effort to reach out to the Sunni's in Iraq. This basically is on Malaki to fix the rift between the sides since he is a major cause of it and if we just go in and take down the militants for him then all we are doing is allowing him to continue to widen the rift. Oo they have been massacring themselves in Iraq since the moment Saddam fell. You can't just 'reach out' when one side is determined to remove the other from existence. There are extremist Sunni's in Iraq just as there are extremist Shiites and I am not saying he should reach out to them because those extremists are not groups you can win to your side but what he can do is try to include Sunni's in general into the government which by and large he has made no effort to do. This lack of effort is the only real reason a group like ISIS is even able to get a foothold in the first place and has been a major criticism of Maliki for years now. Iraq counts far more than a thousand Sunni suicide attacks by now, if I'm not mistaken. It's really hard to talk about "effort" when a few dozen people every week get blown up by terrorists. Also one of the more important reason that groups like ISIS are doing really well is because they're well funded (probably by the gulf states) and because they've cultivated their image as "Samaritans" among people that are suffering from the war. Instead of supporting a side military humanitarian aid by the West would probably not only be cheaper, but also reduce the incentive for the people to run over to extremist organisations.
You are equating Sunni and terrorist which isn't a good equivalence. We have enemies among both sects of Islam but we also have allies among them
Iraq is sort of in a unique position where when Europeans drew lines to create the countries in the middle east Iraq was the one where you basically had a fairly significant split of Sunni and Shiite whereas countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia are far more dominant of either Sunni or Shiite Iraq is stuck in a weird sort of split where the majority is Shiite but not an overwhelming majority and so when you try to diminish the importance of a massive part of your population it comes as no surprise when they aren't as eager to put down rebellions as you would like.
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Obviously not every Sunni in Iraq is a terrorist. But the country has very large problems with terrorism coming out of Sunni parts of the population, probably more than most other countries. It's not so easy to reach out and unite the population when both groups hate each others guts. And also talking about uniting the general population is kind of besides the point. We were talking about ISIS and they are so extreme that even Al Qaeda is distancing themselves from them. Talking to these people is not an option.
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On June 15 2014 00:22 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 00:18 Jormundr wrote:On June 14 2014 13:35 coverpunch wrote:On June 14 2014 13:14 GreenHorizons wrote:
What blows my mind is that the second Bush started a war to prevent Iraq/Saddam (who was funded by the first Bush) from getting/distributing more/better weapons than the first Bush gave them. So Bush Jr. invades Iraq, destabilizes the hell out of it and drops off brand new weapons, equipment and billions of dollars to the terrorists we were supposed to be fighting. All while lining the pockets of the VP's former company and ballooning his interests, making him millions of dollars personally off of the Iraq war. Also his former company is responsible for the deaths of dozens of soldiers due to shitty work and asshole deals.
But bring up Iraq and the real travesty is what Obama has/hasn't done... Like seriously get a grip on reality.... It's embarrassing...
He's screwed up plenty but the schizophrenic outrage is way past ridiculous... This is Obama's tar baby now. Bush doesn't get a say in how the US plays this out because he's not president any more. For the moment, blaming Bush is not helpful to the more important questions of whether the US can beat back ISIS and restabilize the Iraqi government, and the even more important question of whether it's even worth the trouble. I'd also point out that Syria is fighting the same group, despite the fact that the US did not invade them. The way that war has gone is hardly a preferable model. Quick question: Why do we care about muslims killing the muslims that we were killing 10 years ago? Neither of them are our friends now. The only friends we have in the area are Saudi Arabia and Israel, and if the extremists (gasp) take back over all that our allies will see is a regional return to the status quo. So the worst thing that is going to happen is that everything in the middle east returns to business as usual: A bunch of islamic extremists threatening to destroy Israel while covering their nuts with both hands so Israel doesn't kick them in the dick. Now, throw all that aside and pretend we actually have a reason to want to stop these extremists: How the hell are you going to propose we do that? We already tried direct confrontation in the first and second Iraq war and, as it turns out, killing extremists on their own soil (at this point they're known as freedom fighters) only tends to breed a new, stronger generation of extremists with more extensive military experience. Also that and spending the lives of their civilians, our soldiers, and our tax dollars for literally NO GAIN (unless you call further destabilizing the region gain). Without a permanent or longterm (20-50+ years) occupation, we're not going to do anything useful there because we have already shot ourselves in the foot and given so much ammunition to our enemies. For the so called goal of stability we have three options: -Occupy long enough to get rid of generational hatred -Kill them down to the last woman and child -Let the region stabilize itself But please, do feel free to share your knowledge on why fighting a bunch of freedom fighters on their own soil for absolutely no benefit to us is an intelligent and necessary undertaking for our country. The problem with doing nothing is your giving a terrorist organization who split from Al-Qaeda because they were to soft the power of a nation. Now to some of us that is a bad thing but if you wanne sit back and see what happens after im all for it. Just don't complain when a lot of Americans get killed again.
Iran will take care of that. Not something US will be happy about, but frankly I find Iran as much better natural ally for the west than the despotic shitholes we support because they have oil.
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On June 15 2014 07:37 Hagen0 wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 06:44 coverpunch wrote:On June 15 2014 03:55 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:39 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:29 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 03:17 Nyxisto wrote:On June 15 2014 03:10 Jormundr wrote:On June 15 2014 02:40 DeepElemBlues wrote:We created 9/11 ourselves by our proxy wars through Israel and our terrorism of Iraqi civilians in the first gulf war. when men like ayman al-zawahiri and osama bin laden were young men getting radicalized israel's main ally was france, not the united states. the persian gulf war war happened in the 1960s when sayyid qutb wrote the book that is the modern ideological underpinning of sunni jihadism? when he was being tortured in an egyptian jail when egypt was an ally of the soviet union and hostile to the united states? the persian gulf war happened hundreds of years ago when the islamic doctrines of supremacism and cultural xenophobia that qutb relied on were developed? saudi arabia is iraq? osama was pissed saudi arabia asked the united states and not him to fight saddam. osama felt quite jilted. osama bin laden was in a legitimate position to speak for muslims and wage jihad for them because dirty infidels were trodding the holy sand of saudi arabia? was there an election? a muslim religious conference? US is responsible for 9/11 because non-american muslims are children with no ambitions or motivations of their own. they just sit around staring at the sky presumably until americans show up and mess with them, then all of a sudden they for some odd reason don't want to just defend "their" land from dirty infidels, they want to restore the islamic caliphate and dominate the planet as they have loopily said several times. seems kind of like an overreaction. almost as if they have motivations that spring from somewhere other than noam chomsky's latest screed. By our own blood-for-blood creed, we have single-handedly inspired every anti-west terrorist attack for the next 50 years. nonsense. anti-west terrorist attacks are inspired, have been inspired, and will be inspired by an imperialist ideology that demands its version of islam be the exclusive belief in islamic-majority countries (and you die if you don't follow), and that non-islamic cultures show deference to it in various ways (like muslims can proselytize in their countries but they can't do it in muslim countries, muslims are allowed to immigrate to their countries but they can't dirty sacred "muslim land" with their infidel beliefs, muslim cultural mores must be respected in their countries but anything "un-islamic" being introduced into their culture is unacceptable and a justification for violence, the list goes on and on really). and you can just go ahead and die if you sully their perfect culture with your dirty sexuality or your un-islamic democracy with separation of church and state. and heaven forbid you and your barely-human filthy non-muslim feet dare touch "muslim land." or you could believe the fantasy that they hate us because we were mean to them. as if marxist theories about political violence being the responsibility of the boogeyman oppressor can be transferred wholesale onto a non-western culture. talk about orientalism. Meh, you haven't really convinced my that my action-reaction approach is wrong by quoting the propaganda lines of muslim politicians and leaders. You really shouldn't take those things at face value. I think you have not understood his post. What he is saying is literally the opposite of what muslim politicians and leaders have been saying. (that these exact leaders are just using the anti-western sentiments as an excuse to spread an imperialistic version of Islam over the middle east, no matter if the West is intervening or not) I couldn't tell what was going on in the first half of the post because I couldn't really tell what was irony/sarcasm. The second part is what I'm disagreeing with. Unless I've lost my basic reading comprehension, he basically said they're haters hating because they're hateful and that's the end of discussion. The thing that makes me disagree with this is that many of the things he claimed about their 'imperialist ideology' have direct parallels with the elevated rhetoric/propaganda of the tea party, who are not haters hating because they're hateful, but smart politicians taking advantage of the lowest levels of argumentation and the basest of feelings to instill pride and a feeling of unity in their followers for the purposes of control and stability. There is no reason to deny that a certain portion of foreign terrorism (especially the acts of terrorism committed by people that grew up in the West and have gone nuts) is fueled by Western politics, but it's nonsense to claim that the majority of problems in the middle-east stems from Western 'occupation'. That's exactly what people like bin Laden have used as an excuse for their terrorist operations. The biggest problem the middle-east faces is that it's caught up in societies that are 200 years behind everybody else. Apostasy is still punishable by death in many countries, women have no rights, children have no education, dictators are ruling like kings and many people support Shariah law. That this is not going to end very well is pretty clear. And we can do absolutely nothing about it. Maybe it wouldn't look as chaotic as it does without the Iraq war, but the parties involved would have found another reason to bash each other's heads in for sure. I never claimed that the middle eastern problems stem from our politics. I agree that their main problem is they're years behind. I'm just saying our intervention in the middle east (Mainly the creation of Israel and its maintenance as an elite military power in the region, the two Iraq Wars, our own personal military bases, and our often exploitative business practices) are (in light of the obvious problems in the region) the metaphorical equivalent of covering your dick in honey and fucking an anthill. You're only harping on things that can't be changed. We can't undo history. The question is how do you want President Obama to play this out going forward? What do you think he will decide to do? And which decisions and outcomes would you be happy with and which decisions and outcomes would you say he's messing up and continuing the ugly legacy? I suppose the answer can be implied that you want a full withdrawal and the US to do nothing about these wars. History is only part of it. The US still supports most middle-eastern dictators, has military bases or occupation forces in several countries and consistently sabotages a two-nation solution for Palestine. All of these things induce hate and could easily be changed. Changed to what? This sounds an awful lot like Arab Spring 1.0 nothing but flowers and sunshine, or even the Bush "Democracy Project" approach to middle east interventionism. It's still unproven that all the US has ever had to do is to stop inducing hate. Even claiming we're the ones sabotaging a two-nation solution for Palestine is a hefty dose of revisionism (Palestinians have consistently wanted and elected leaders to pursue a one-state solution--that is, Israel gone and Palestine everywhere). You wouldn't be the first to argue America's foreign policy was to blame for the September 11th attacks, and murderous terrorists were just responding to it.
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On June 15 2014 09:00 mcc wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 00:22 Gorsameth wrote:On June 15 2014 00:18 Jormundr wrote:On June 14 2014 13:35 coverpunch wrote:On June 14 2014 13:14 GreenHorizons wrote:
What blows my mind is that the second Bush started a war to prevent Iraq/Saddam (who was funded by the first Bush) from getting/distributing more/better weapons than the first Bush gave them. So Bush Jr. invades Iraq, destabilizes the hell out of it and drops off brand new weapons, equipment and billions of dollars to the terrorists we were supposed to be fighting. All while lining the pockets of the VP's former company and ballooning his interests, making him millions of dollars personally off of the Iraq war. Also his former company is responsible for the deaths of dozens of soldiers due to shitty work and asshole deals.
But bring up Iraq and the real travesty is what Obama has/hasn't done... Like seriously get a grip on reality.... It's embarrassing...
He's screwed up plenty but the schizophrenic outrage is way past ridiculous... This is Obama's tar baby now. Bush doesn't get a say in how the US plays this out because he's not president any more. For the moment, blaming Bush is not helpful to the more important questions of whether the US can beat back ISIS and restabilize the Iraqi government, and the even more important question of whether it's even worth the trouble. I'd also point out that Syria is fighting the same group, despite the fact that the US did not invade them. The way that war has gone is hardly a preferable model. Quick question: Why do we care about muslims killing the muslims that we were killing 10 years ago? Neither of them are our friends now. The only friends we have in the area are Saudi Arabia and Israel, and if the extremists (gasp) take back over all that our allies will see is a regional return to the status quo. So the worst thing that is going to happen is that everything in the middle east returns to business as usual: A bunch of islamic extremists threatening to destroy Israel while covering their nuts with both hands so Israel doesn't kick them in the dick. Now, throw all that aside and pretend we actually have a reason to want to stop these extremists: How the hell are you going to propose we do that? We already tried direct confrontation in the first and second Iraq war and, as it turns out, killing extremists on their own soil (at this point they're known as freedom fighters) only tends to breed a new, stronger generation of extremists with more extensive military experience. Also that and spending the lives of their civilians, our soldiers, and our tax dollars for literally NO GAIN (unless you call further destabilizing the region gain). Without a permanent or longterm (20-50+ years) occupation, we're not going to do anything useful there because we have already shot ourselves in the foot and given so much ammunition to our enemies. For the so called goal of stability we have three options: -Occupy long enough to get rid of generational hatred -Kill them down to the last woman and child -Let the region stabilize itself But please, do feel free to share your knowledge on why fighting a bunch of freedom fighters on their own soil for absolutely no benefit to us is an intelligent and necessary undertaking for our country. The problem with doing nothing is your giving a terrorist organization who split from Al-Qaeda because they were to soft the power of a nation. Now to some of us that is a bad thing but if you wanne sit back and see what happens after im all for it. Just don't complain when a lot of Americans get killed again. Iran will take care of that. Not something US will be happy about, but frankly I find Iran as much better natural ally for the west than the despotic shitholes we support because they have oil.
Yeah the really ironic part is that amongst the countries in the region, Iran is basically one of the more democratic ones, despite having a strong religious oligarchy. They're way more democratic than Saudi Arabia, Qatar, etc....
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Former UK prime minister Tony Blair talks Iraq:
The civil war in Syria with its attendant disintegration is having its predictable and malign effect. Iraq is now in mortal danger. The whole of the Middle East is under threat.
We will have to re-think our strategy towards Syria; support the Iraqi Government in beating back the insurgency; whilst making it clear that Iraq’s politics will have to change for any resolution of the current crisis to be sustained. Then we need a comprehensive plan for the Middle East that correctly learns the lessons of the past decade. In doing so, we should listen to and work closely with our allies across the region, whose understanding of these issues is crucial and who are prepared to work with us in fighting the root causes of this extremism which goes far beyond the crisis in Iraq or Syria.
It is inevitable that events in Mosul have led to a re-run of the arguments over the decision to remove Saddam Hussein in 2003. The key question obviously is what to do now. But because some of the commentary has gone immediately to claim that but for that decision, Iraq would not be facing this challenge; or even more extraordinary, implying that but for the decision, the Middle East would be at peace right now; it is necessary that certain points are made forcefully before putting forward a solution to what is happening now.
So it is a bizarre reading of the cauldron that is the Middle East today, to claim that but for the removal of Saddam, we would not have a crisis.
And it is here that if we want the right policy for the future, we have to learn properly the lessons not just of Iraq in 2003 but of the Arab uprisings from 2011 onwards.
The reality is that the whole of the Middle East and beyond is going through a huge, agonising and protracted transition. We have to liberate ourselves from the notion that ‘we’ have caused this. We haven't. We can argue as to whether our policies at points have helped or not; and whether action or inaction is the best policy and there is a lot to be said on both sides. But the fundamental cause of the crisis lies within the region not outside it.
Indeed we now have three examples of Western policy towards regime change in the region. In Iraq, we called for the regime to change, removed it and put in troops to try to rebuild the country. But intervention proved very tough and today the country is at risk again. In Libya, we called for the regime to change, we removed it by airpower, but refused to put in troops and now Libya is racked by instability, violence and has exported vast amounts of trouble and weapons across North Africa and down into sub- Saharan Africa. In Syria we called for the regime to change, took no action and it is in the worst state of all.
The starting point is to identify the nature of the battle. It is against Islamist extremism. That is the fight. People shy away from the starkness of that statement. But it is because we are constantly looking for ways of avoiding facing up to this issue, that we can't make progress in the battle.
We were naïve about the Arab uprisings which began in 2011. Evolution is preferable to revolution. I said this at the time, precisely because of what we learnt from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Sometimes evolution is not possible. But where we can, we should be helping countries make steady progress towards change. We should be actively trying to encourage and help the reform process and using the full weight of the international community to do so.
It's interesting to see Blair coming back as a traditional liberal championing the spread of democracy and free markets to struggling nations, when most liberals in the UK and US seem to be going the other way and calling for a more passive foreign policy.
Unlike almost every other editorial on the issue, I appreciate that Blair is explicit about what he wants and why he thinks it is justified. Most other editorials sort of dance around it, preferring to fall back on the pessimism that President Obama will make the wrong choice. Hilariously, CNN is anti-intervention but thinks Obama will "forced" to do airstrikes, while the WSJ wants intervention but thinks we'll soon see helicopters evacuating US personnel from the Baghdad embassy as mobs close in.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
nice "transition." where are they transiting to?
just a tragic atavism of human society.
the biggest criminals though are the local actors. look at how palestinian refugees are doing half a century later, that's a microcosm of iraq.
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On June 13 2014 00:45 Nyxisto wrote:
I wouldn't actually consider myself a patriot, don't know how you would deduce that from my post :o
Well, as an American, I define patriotism chiefly as a loyalty to the set of political ideals that define's one's country; your posts are very frequently some assertion of Germany (of "Europe") as a positive example over the US, often focusing on things like Creationism, which are insane, mind you, but a really small part of the political picture in the U.S. Healthcare is big, taxes are big, foreign intervention/isolationism is big, "regulation" is big, immigration is getting big. Creationism is basically just a local issue for some extreme school districts (Education is handled locally in the US).
And I make these points because this is a discussion one has with Europeans and Euro-philes on a regular basis: there are different goals you can set up your government under. US obsesses over freedom, national prosperity and self-defense. Europe obsesses over social welfare and safety nets. I don't think its a problem for the world to have all types. Yes, I wish my country had socialized healthcare, but I also wish the rest of the free world would contribute properly to our mutual self-defense. And while I can advocate for this or that position, I do so from the understanding that the difference of opinion stems from different goals of states, both of which have contributed to what is good in the modern world.
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On June 15 2014 23:26 Yoav wrote:Show nested quote +On June 13 2014 00:45 Nyxisto wrote:
I wouldn't actually consider myself a patriot, don't know how you would deduce that from my post :o Well, as an American, I define patriotism chiefly as a loyalty to the set of political ideals that define's one's country; your posts are very frequently some assertion of Germany (of "Europe") as a positive example over the US, often focusing on things like Creationism, which are insane, mind you, but a really small part of the political picture in the U.S. Healthcare is big, taxes are big, foreign intervention/isolationism is big, "regulation" is big, immigration is getting big. Creationism is basically just a local issue for some extreme school districts (Education is handled locally in the US). And I make these points because this is a discussion one has with Europeans and Euro-philes on a regular basis: there are different goals you can set up your government under. US obsesses over freedom, national prosperity and self-defense. Europe obsesses over social welfare and safety nets. I don't think its a problem for the world to have all types. Yes, I wish my country had socialized healthcare, but I also wish the rest of the free world would contribute properly to our mutual self-defense. And while I can advocate for this or that position, I do so from the understanding that the difference of opinion stems from different goals of states, both of which have contributed to what is good in the modern world.
We are coming up on the hundred year anniversary of the start of World War I where there was a horrific war caused by the escalation of a relatively minor dispute (of course, where the Balkans ended up in the 90s was not minor), which is a reminder that Europe fucking did that shit twice and that's why the US holds itself as primarily responsible for the collective defense.
Sure, we have dumb Americans who believe in creationism and a flat Earth and believe in aliens and angels roaming the Earth. But those people don't march out generations of young men to get mowed down by machine guns and chlorine gas.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
the u.s. had nukes, vietnam etc but i guess the lesson was lost on some of americans since they didn't get bombed back to the stone ages. europe at least learned from its history somewhat.
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On June 15 2014 23:26 Yoav wrote:
Yes, I wish my country had socialized healthcare, but I also wish the rest of the free world would contribute properly to our mutual self-defense. And while I can advocate for this or that position, I do so from the understanding that the difference of opinion stems from different goals of states, both of which have contributed to what is good in the modern world.
I just don't see that as mutually exclusive. I wish Europe would become a little more American in some aspects, for example regarding immigration, and I also think it would be a good idea for the US to copy a little bit from Europe's social system. I don't see where you'd have to chose one or the other except for ideological reasons. I don't think the US loses it's identity when all people have health-insurance and I don't think Europe will go into cultural decline just because we'd accept immigrants with open arms and would stop being closet racists.
(also I bring Germany up from time to time, because well I live here and I guess so the content is at least somewhat informative for people who don't, I'm not trying to start some kind of Euro/German-circle-jerk)
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On June 15 2014 23:52 coverpunch wrote:Show nested quote +On June 15 2014 23:26 Yoav wrote:On June 13 2014 00:45 Nyxisto wrote:
I wouldn't actually consider myself a patriot, don't know how you would deduce that from my post :o Well, as an American, I define patriotism chiefly as a loyalty to the set of political ideals that define's one's country; your posts are very frequently some assertion of Germany (of "Europe") as a positive example over the US, often focusing on things like Creationism, which are insane, mind you, but a really small part of the political picture in the U.S. Healthcare is big, taxes are big, foreign intervention/isolationism is big, "regulation" is big, immigration is getting big. Creationism is basically just a local issue for some extreme school districts (Education is handled locally in the US). And I make these points because this is a discussion one has with Europeans and Euro-philes on a regular basis: there are different goals you can set up your government under. US obsesses over freedom, national prosperity and self-defense. Europe obsesses over social welfare and safety nets. I don't think its a problem for the world to have all types. Yes, I wish my country had socialized healthcare, but I also wish the rest of the free world would contribute properly to our mutual self-defense. And while I can advocate for this or that position, I do so from the understanding that the difference of opinion stems from different goals of states, both of which have contributed to what is good in the modern world. We are coming up on the hundred year anniversary of the start of World War I where there was a horrific war caused by the escalation of a relatively minor dispute (of course, where the Balkans ended up in the 90s was not minor), which is a reminder that Europe fucking did that shit twice and that's why the US holds itself as primarily responsible for the collective defense. Sure, we have dumb Americans who believe in creationism and a flat Earth and believe in aliens and angels roaming the Earth. But those people don't march out generations of young men to get mowed down by machine guns and chlorine gas.
Which has nothing to do with any internal attribute that US has, but with the fact that Europe did not have a hegemon like US is in America. Your civil war shows nicely what happens when two even slightly similarly powerful blocks emerge and compete. You also marched men to get mowed down. You kill yourself much more eagerly than any other first world country, which in this day and age is much bigger problem.
US holds itself responsible for the defense, because they want the power that comes with it. It has nothing to do with any good will or anything like that. I would hope Europe creates common army and after that lowers it's collective military spending even more and when Americans ask for more just show them the finger. If they want to spend themselves more into debt, so be it.
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Civil War casualties were an order of magnitude smaller than World War I. And that's before we even get to the fact that World War II brought the horrors of the trenches to the home fronts, to civilian centers, and that while 90% of the casualties in World War I were military personnel, 90% of the casualties in World War II were civilians.
You might want to know that Czechoslovakia suffered about the same casualties in World War II as the Union in the Civil War, despite having only 25% of the population of America in 1860. That's how horrible the war was.
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On June 16 2014 00:36 coverpunch wrote:
Civil War casualties were an order of magnitude smaller than World War I. And that's before we even get to the fact that World War II brought the horrors of the trenches to the home fronts, to civilian centers, and that while 90% of the casualties in World War I were military personnel, 90% of the casualties in World War II were civilians.
You might want to know that Czechoslovakia suffered about the same casualties in World War II as the Union in the Civil War, despite having only 25% of the population of America in 1860. That's how horrible the war was.
you seriously wanne have this discussion as the only nation in the world that has used nuclear weapons against another?
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On June 16 2014 00:36 coverpunch wrote:
Civil War casualties were an order of magnitude smaller than World War I. And that's before we even get to the fact that World War II brought the horrors of the trenches to the home fronts, to civilian centers, and that while 90% of the casualties in World War I were military personnel, 90% of the casualties in World War II were civilians.
You might want to know that Czechoslovakia suffered about the same casualties in World War II as the Union in the Civil War, despite having only 25% of the population of America in 1860. That's how horrible the war was.
And yet you still push for warfare for the sake of warfare. Interesting.
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EPT
