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Please guys, stay on topic.
This thread is about the situation in Iraq and Syria. |
On August 31 2013 20:09 Klive5ive wrote:Show nested quote +On August 31 2013 19:58 hzflank wrote:On August 31 2013 10:11 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 10:10 Zarahtra wrote:On August 31 2013 10:02 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 09:55 dUTtrOACh wrote:On August 31 2013 09:50 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 09:41 iPlaY.NettleS wrote:On August 31 2013 07:52 BioNova wrote:
It's awesome, so now we invade Saudi Arabia right? Since the red line was crossed, I'll just defer to the usual cheerleaders. How does one invade a country already owned? Pretty sure Iran is next on the agenda after Syria, they've been wanting to invade Iran for years. Sometimes in cases like these I wish the UN would just revoke the supremacy of Syria, occupy the country and force real democracy down the throat of these cave-men before they murder more innocent people, both Assad and the despicable opposition should rot in jail. So remind me how many innocent people the USA murdered in Iraq war? What about the 400,000 killed or maimed by chemical weapon Agent Orange in Vietnam war? And what about the many indigenous Australian massacres that have taken place since your country's founding? We can play the equivalency game all day. Only... the numbers don't equal out. The point is that every nation on this earth has done unspeakable things, and to simply point at the past atrocities committed by the US government as evidence that the Syrian government is somehow absolved of their culpability or that it suggests a path of inaction is the way to go is not very sensible. They are not absolved of anything, however it's generally advicable to learn from history. It's pretty much agreed that ignoring the lies that led to Iraq, it's still generally accepted on both wings in the US that the Iraq war was a failure. You seem quite willing to not learn a thing and just say fuck it. I think most sensible people are searching for other solutions, though sadly Obama screwed himself by drawing a certain line which forces him to do an insanely stupid thing or loose credibility. What is not accepted, however, is the equation of this scenario with the one in Iraq. Furthermore, considering that the British Parliament vote was as close as it was in concert with the support of nations like Turkey for armed intervention, "insanely stupid thing" is not agreed upon either. Also, the UK was not actually voting to help people in Syria, we were voting for military action such as missile strikes. It's quite annoying to see the British people on TL bending that vote to their own local political agenda and using the Syruan people as an excuse. These people (on TL) don't give a shit about Syrian people. . But it's ok for you to bend it right?! It was not a vote for strikes, that would have required another vote. Let people read what it implied for themselves http://www.itv.com/news/2013-08-28/the-full-text-of-the-governments-motion-on-syria/
I have no reason to bend anything, as I do not support either of the parties (while you are obviously a conservative supporter who is bending it to make that party look good).
I watched the majority of the commons debate and caught up on some of the lords debate. The majority of the debate was about launching missile strikes against command infrastructure in Syria. This is exactly what the government said it wanted to do (initially). What good would that do the Syrian people? They claimed that they wanted to do it to send a message to Assad.
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On August 31 2013 20:09 Catch]22 wrote:
My sides almost split when someone suggested the US "Shouldn't start a war in Syria".
Along with saying that it was horrible that the US was even contemplating launching missiles at syrian command posts, whereas the use of chemical weapons that killed 1500 people didnt seem too bad to these people.
A government killing hundreds of it's own people is bad, no matter what the method used. I do not care whether it was gas or bullets. How does launching missiles at Syrian government command posts make it any better?
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This thread was started in March 2011.
In August 2013 the UK has a vote about actually taking action, and it fails.
We didn't feel a need to do anything for the last 2+ years, is the potential use of chemical weapons suddenly making the whole thing so much worse than the last 2 years of violence?
You can't sit by for 2 years and act like it's fine until someone uses a particular type of weapon, and suddenly it's a really big and bad situation.
The US and France are being massive hypocrites, the Brits are doing what they have done for the last 2 years, which is sit back and do nothing.
None of the three can claim they have any right to say anything, because all of them spent 2 years doing nothing.
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On August 31 2013 20:09 Catch]22 wrote:
My sides almost split when someone suggested the US "Shouldn't start a war in Syria".
Along with saying that it was horrible that the US was even contemplating launching missiles at syrian command posts, whereas the use of chemical weapons that killed 1500 people didnt seem too bad to these people.
Don't try and turn this into a "people who support military action" vs "people who don't care about chemical weapons being used on innocent people" debate.
There is a huge spectrum of people who don't want to take military action right now. Some people completely against getting involved at all, and others would be in favour of military action if the official report shows Assad did use chemical weapons, and then there are people with views somewhere between those 2.
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On August 31 2013 20:33 Lonyo wrote:
This thread was started in March 2011.
In August 2013 the UK has a vote about actually taking action, and it fails.
We didn't feel a need to do anything for the last 2+ years, is the potential use of chemical weapons suddenly making the whole thing so much worse than the last 2 years of violence?
You can't sit by for 2 years and act like it's fine until someone uses a particular type of weapon, and suddenly it's a really big and bad situation.
The US and France are being massive hypocrites, the Brits are doing what they have done for the last 2 years, which is sit back and do nothing.
None of the three can claim they have any right to say anything, because all of them spent 2 years doing nothing.
The sad part is, this outrage is pretty much only so loud due to Obama trying to not be embarrased due to his red line comment. I'm byfar more outraged by the fact more than 100k people have died in this conflict rather than that 1.4k just joined them.
If I thought some kind of intervention would actually help the situation I'd be all for it, but I can't see how it will. I've said it before in this thread that I think the money people are willing to put into a military operation should rather go to do more humanitarian work, help civilians flee the country or get away from places where the biggest conflicts lie.
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On August 31 2013 20:16 hzflank wrote:Show nested quote +On August 31 2013 20:09 Klive5ive wrote:On August 31 2013 19:58 hzflank wrote:On August 31 2013 10:11 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 10:10 Zarahtra wrote:On August 31 2013 10:02 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 09:55 dUTtrOACh wrote:On August 31 2013 09:50 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 09:41 iPlaY.NettleS wrote:On August 31 2013 07:52 BioNova wrote:
It's awesome, so now we invade Saudi Arabia right? Since the red line was crossed, I'll just defer to the usual cheerleaders. How does one invade a country already owned? Pretty sure Iran is next on the agenda after Syria, they've been wanting to invade Iran for years. Sometimes in cases like these I wish the UN would just revoke the supremacy of Syria, occupy the country and force real democracy down the throat of these cave-men before they murder more innocent people, both Assad and the despicable opposition should rot in jail. So remind me how many innocent people the USA murdered in Iraq war? What about the 400,000 killed or maimed by chemical weapon Agent Orange in Vietnam war? And what about the many indigenous Australian massacres that have taken place since your country's founding? We can play the equivalency game all day. Only... the numbers don't equal out. The point is that every nation on this earth has done unspeakable things, and to simply point at the past atrocities committed by the US government as evidence that the Syrian government is somehow absolved of their culpability or that it suggests a path of inaction is the way to go is not very sensible. They are not absolved of anything, however it's generally advicable to learn from history. It's pretty much agreed that ignoring the lies that led to Iraq, it's still generally accepted on both wings in the US that the Iraq war was a failure. You seem quite willing to not learn a thing and just say fuck it. I think most sensible people are searching for other solutions, though sadly Obama screwed himself by drawing a certain line which forces him to do an insanely stupid thing or loose credibility. What is not accepted, however, is the equation of this scenario with the one in Iraq. Furthermore, considering that the British Parliament vote was as close as it was in concert with the support of nations like Turkey for armed intervention, "insanely stupid thing" is not agreed upon either. Also, the UK was not actually voting to help people in Syria, we were voting for military action such as missile strikes. It's quite annoying to see the British people on TL bending that vote to their own local political agenda and using the Syruan people as an excuse. These people (on TL) don't give a shit about Syrian people. . But it's ok for you to bend it right?! It was not a vote for strikes, that would have required another vote. Let people read what it implied for themselves http://www.itv.com/news/2013-08-28/the-full-text-of-the-governments-motion-on-syria/ I have no reason to bend anything, as I do not support either of the parties (while you are obviously a conservative supporter who is bending it to make that party look good). I watched the majority of the commons debate and caught up on some of the lords debate. The majority of the debate was about launching missile strikes against command infrastructure in Syria. This is exactly what the government said it wanted to do (initially). What good would that do the Syrian people? They claimed that they wanted to do it to send a message to Assad.
Obviously.. except I'm not haha
"The majority of the debate" unlike me, you obviously didn't watch it.
Just read the motion, it's plain and simple.
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On August 31 2013 20:33 Lonyo wrote:
This thread was started in March 2011.
In August 2013 the UK has a vote about actually taking action, and it fails.
We didn't feel a need to do anything for the last 2+ years, is the potential use of chemical weapons suddenly making the whole thing so much worse than the last 2 years of violence?
You can't sit by for 2 years and act like it's fine until someone uses a particular type of weapon, and suddenly it's a really big and bad situation.
The US and France are being massive hypocrites, the Brits are doing what they have done for the last 2 years, which is sit back and do nothing.
None of the three can claim they have any right to say anything, because all of them spent 2 years doing nothing.
This isn't about the chemical attack. Chemical weapons have been used on several occasions during this conflict, from what I've read, nobody gave a damn about that until recently. This has to be about something else.
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On August 31 2013 22:31 maybenexttime wrote:Show nested quote +On August 31 2013 20:33 Lonyo wrote:
This thread was started in March 2011.
In August 2013 the UK has a vote about actually taking action, and it fails.
We didn't feel a need to do anything for the last 2+ years, is the potential use of chemical weapons suddenly making the whole thing so much worse than the last 2 years of violence?
You can't sit by for 2 years and act like it's fine until someone uses a particular type of weapon, and suddenly it's a really big and bad situation.
The US and France are being massive hypocrites, the Brits are doing what they have done for the last 2 years, which is sit back and do nothing.
None of the three can claim they have any right to say anything, because all of them spent 2 years doing nothing. This isn't about the chemical attack. Chemical weapons have been used on several occasions during this conflict, from what I've read, nobody gave a damn about that until recently. This has to be about something else.
No. No they do not have to be about anything else. This time they CW attack was on a larger scale and with more evidence regarding the type of chemicals and the culprits. They literally shot the CW shells a few miles from where the UN team to assess PREVIOUS CW attacks was housed. Had the UN team found evidence of prior CW use, the same problem (for the IC) would have arisen (it was just very unlikely). Also Obama's red line on CW use is currently very salient.
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On August 31 2013 20:33 Lonyo wrote:
This thread was started in March 2011.
In August 2013 the UK has a vote about actually taking action, and it fails.
We didn't feel a need to do anything for the last 2+ years, is the potential use of chemical weapons suddenly making the whole thing so much worse than the last 2 years of violence?
You can't sit by for 2 years and act like it's fine until someone uses a particular type of weapon, and suddenly it's a really big and bad situation.
The US and France are being massive hypocrites, the Brits are doing what they have done for the last 2 years, which is sit back and do nothing.
None of the three can claim they have any right to say anything, because all of them spent 2 years doing nothing.
We're completely handicapped by the international systems we've created... You either break the law or you do nothing, either way you're in the wrong.
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So what do people want the British to do? Tell me your solution.
To help the Syrian people we need help from people who we continually give reasons not to help us with anything. If you think that peacekeeping in Afghanistan was difficult, imagine it in Syria which borders Lebanon and is a stone's throw from Iran. Do you want the entire region to end up involved in a war?
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On August 31 2013 23:43 hzflank wrote:
So what do people want the British to do? Tell me your solution.
To help the Syrian people we need help from people who we continually give reasons not to help us with anything. If you think that peacekeeping in Afghanistan was difficult, imagine it in Syria which borders Lebanon and is a stone's throw from Iran. Do you want the entire region to end up involved in a war?
What I want is incredibly simple. Complete and utter transparency regarding any intervention in Syria and all intervention to be aimed at preventing the targeting of civilians, and not to be biased towards either 'side'.
Russia simply cannot agree to intervention on the terms the US is proposing. Everyone is digging their own graves because they're calling their aims 'humanitarian' when their interpretation of the word is to make one side beat the other. We probably have a preferred side, but we cannot guarantee what will happen even if they win.
What everyone SHOULD be able to agree on is that the UN has a responsibility to protect civilians and only on these grounds should we be involved. The only way to implement this properly is through transparency (given that we are only talking about attacking weapon caches that are being used against civilians, Russia and China will find it more difficult to protest) and cooperation (targets being agreed by all UN security council nations).
It's a big ask but the worst case scenario is this: Russia and China continue to object and we end up not taking any military action. In other words, we exhaust any possibility of UN sanctioned action before ruling out action completely and in the process we clearly represent our own HUMANITARIAN goals and demonstrate that, despite the transparency, Russia and China will not even intervene on these grounds.
In other words, the worst case scenario is that we are in a better position than we are now.
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Well, the British voting 'no' just reinforces my view that there is no real reason for the West to intervene in Syria. 'Humanitarian' reasons are meaningless, ask any number of African nations about that one.
That, or suddenly democracy started working in Britain and PMs are suddenly not controlled by the powers that be, whoever those are at the time. Right.
The Iraq war justifications were all proven to be a bunch of lies but Britain intervened there anyway, lest anyone forgets.
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On September 01 2013 00:08 Taguchi wrote:
Well, the British voting 'no' just reinforces my view that there is no real reason for the West to intervene in Syria. 'Humanitarian' reasons are meaningless, ask any number of African nations about that one.
That, or suddenly democracy started working in Britain and PMs are suddenly not controlled by the powers that be, whoever those are at the time. Right.
The Iraq war justifications were all proven to be a bunch of lies but Britain intervened there anyway, lest anyone forgets.
It's sad that our vote is interpreted in this way.
The intelligence on Iraq was solid, but Blair straight up lied to the house. All we've done is throw the baby out with the bathwater. This is not Iraq.
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On August 31 2013 21:29 Klive5ive wrote:Show nested quote +On August 31 2013 20:16 hzflank wrote:On August 31 2013 20:09 Klive5ive wrote:On August 31 2013 19:58 hzflank wrote:On August 31 2013 10:11 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 10:10 Zarahtra wrote:On August 31 2013 10:02 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 09:55 dUTtrOACh wrote:On August 31 2013 09:50 farvacola wrote:On August 31 2013 09:41 iPlaY.NettleS wrote:
[quote]
Pretty sure Iran is next on the agenda after Syria, they've been wanting to invade Iran for years.
[quote]
So remind me how many innocent people the USA murdered in Iraq war? What about the 400,000 killed or maimed by chemical weapon Agent Orange in Vietnam war? And what about the many indigenous Australian massacres that have taken place since your country's founding? We can play the equivalency game all day. Only... the numbers don't equal out. The point is that every nation on this earth has done unspeakable things, and to simply point at the past atrocities committed by the US government as evidence that the Syrian government is somehow absolved of their culpability or that it suggests a path of inaction is the way to go is not very sensible. They are not absolved of anything, however it's generally advicable to learn from history. It's pretty much agreed that ignoring the lies that led to Iraq, it's still generally accepted on both wings in the US that the Iraq war was a failure. You seem quite willing to not learn a thing and just say fuck it. I think most sensible people are searching for other solutions, though sadly Obama screwed himself by drawing a certain line which forces him to do an insanely stupid thing or loose credibility. What is not accepted, however, is the equation of this scenario with the one in Iraq. Furthermore, considering that the British Parliament vote was as close as it was in concert with the support of nations like Turkey for armed intervention, "insanely stupid thing" is not agreed upon either. Also, the UK was not actually voting to help people in Syria, we were voting for military action such as missile strikes. It's quite annoying to see the British people on TL bending that vote to their own local political agenda and using the Syruan people as an excuse. These people (on TL) don't give a shit about Syrian people. . But it's ok for you to bend it right?! It was not a vote for strikes, that would have required another vote. Let people read what it implied for themselves http://www.itv.com/news/2013-08-28/the-full-text-of-the-governments-motion-on-syria/ I have no reason to bend anything, as I do not support either of the parties (while you are obviously a conservative supporter who is bending it to make that party look good). I watched the majority of the commons debate and caught up on some of the lords debate. The majority of the debate was about launching missile strikes against command infrastructure in Syria. This is exactly what the government said it wanted to do (initially). What good would that do the Syrian people? They claimed that they wanted to do it to send a message to Assad. Obviously.. except I'm not haha "The majority of the debate" unlike me, you obviously didn't watch it. Just read the motion, it's plain and simple.
I agree with you. And I hate the Tories.
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If anything, we should give material aid to whichever side is losing, and then switch sides when that side begins to win. Lets draw this puppy out for decades if we can, radical muslims vs authoritarians? Hell yeah.
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Il put it simple, what america have done to the indians they continue to do on the rest of the world.
They are playing god, judging everyone, killing everyone who dont want to play their game, because war = killing. Did i need to remind you how many countries america destroyed, have you seen them before and after america "peace" forces came in those countries? The are manipulating you false with false news, supporting terrorist to destabilise, destroy and rob countries. You think this rebel forces are civilian? Wrong information. These are terrorists from all over the world paid by puppet masters to destroy Syria. Sadly(for them) they didnt do the job and now America have to make it by themselves.
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On September 01 2013 00:10 Klive5ive wrote:Show nested quote +On September 01 2013 00:08 Taguchi wrote:
Well, the British voting 'no' just reinforces my view that there is no real reason for the West to intervene in Syria. 'Humanitarian' reasons are meaningless, ask any number of African nations about that one.
That, or suddenly democracy started working in Britain and PMs are suddenly not controlled by the powers that be, whoever those are at the time. Right.
The Iraq war justifications were all proven to be a bunch of lies but Britain intervened there anyway, lest anyone forgets. It's sad that our vote is interpreted in this way. The intelligence on Iraq was solid, but Blair straight up lied to the house. All we've done is throw the baby out with the bathwater. This is not Iraq.
Don't get me wrong here, I interpret the rest of the world's democracies' voting procedures in a similar fashion. If it's important to the elite, it's gonna happen anyway. If no one really cares, suddenly democracy functions properly. Cynical yes, but it is what it is.
And I don't want to derail into Iraq, but 'solid'? There were no WMDs, what on earth could have been 'solid' about it? Do not tell me the house were tricked when the rest of the world, who happened to not give a rat's ass about Iraq, were strongly opposed to any intervention without actual evidence of wrongdoing, and said so at the time.
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EPT![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/D1N8TUX.png)
