Why don't you post some of your own ideas about ISIS, its effects on its region, what the near-term future holds and the strategies being pursued by the various players. That will probably require some actual thinking.
And none of this would have happened if the United States hadn't had the bright idea of going into Iraq and deposing Saddam. Iraq has been in a constant state of unrest and conflict for over a decade, against numerous enemies. I haven't seen any statistics, but I'm going to guess all the fighting and aerial strikes have caused a serious drop in living standards and sense of security. It's easy to criticise Iraqis for not wanting to fight from the comfort of your 1st world home, but you might change your mind if you'd been fighting in a war zone for years, with two new enemies popping up every time you've got the old one on the back foot. It's gotten to the point where *Iran* and *Hezbollah* are assisting Iraq against ISIS, and their help is being accepted! Yes, Iran, a theocratic nation which just decades ago was at war with Iraq over border disputes, thinks it is in its best interests to help Iraq, and nobody bats an eye. This whole fiasco in Iraq has to be one of the biggest f*ck ups in recent history, and a massive shit stain on the United States reputation. Any sympathy the U.S had garnered from the 9/11 attacks evaporated after their first year in Iraq, and after a decade of bullshit, I'm actually starting to see why the West isn't so popular in the Middle-East. In my mind, this is worse than the Vietnam conflict. At least after the U.S withdrew from Vietnam, things settled down. That hasn't happened in Iraq, and now the U.S is trapped in the 'You broke it, you bought it' conundrum.
As I stated over 10 years ago that if America went into Iraq to kill Saddam they should have done just that then left. I also said that once America left Iraq there would be more problems. Seeing as how Iraq was already at war with Iran and was creating problems in Kuwait he was on a path to try and control other countries if he could. His political party was in the minority but showed it could handle anything thrown at it except American firepower and military. It showed that only an iron fist could control his country but he took things to far and started a genocide against the Kurds and the Muslims in the South of Iraq. Once Saddam was killed that should have been it but America went on a nation building path and rebuilt the Iraq military to over 200,000 men which were supplied with billions of dollars of military hardware. That should have been more than enough to take on the 20,000 men in ISIS wherever they struck but alas we know now that without a good leader the military isn't much of anything more than a coward. Iraq is pleading for more American ground troops to be brought there but I do not think American citizens want to fight with cowards who at the sign of defeat throw down their weapons and give up or run away. True I'm sitting watching this unfold in the comfort of my home but I'll tell you what I'd rather stay in my home and fight to the death defending it rather than run away and let those who I'm fighting take it without a fight. Once the enemy has overrun an area they will soon be on the march to another city to take control of and eventually will overrun every city and find those men who ran away from the fighting before and kill them and their families. Is this what the Iraqi military want? Well that's what they will get unless they get a good leader and take over the war against ISIS to win not to run away. Winning any military war is done with leadership that can stay the course and never turn and run. Otherwise that military will continue to lose.
I'm assuming this Tele article is a spoof. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...te-change-threatens-US-national-security.html Although, it is probably not. It wouldn't be really surprising anyway. So I guess I'm not assuming that.
I predicted back in August 2006 that the Iraq war would be a disaster and what result would be. For example here: And here in that August too: And here in April of 2006: It may take a decade or two yet for all my mid east predictions to come true, but that is where things are now advancing to.
What do those nine year old posts have to do with ISIS? You seem to have been largely motivated by your own personal hostility towards "GWB". Unfortunately you don't tell us what lessons you believe should be drawn from the failure of his attempt to overthrow a tyrant and promote democracy in Iraq. I suggested up above that Middle Eastern tyrants aren't the worst fates those countries face. There are worse things, ISIS for one. But that lesson obviously was never learned in Western capitals, particularly in Washington DC. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton helped launch a very Bush-esque military air campaign to overthrow Moammar Qaddafi in Libya in hopes of promoting Arab-spring democracy there, and the results were even worse than those seen in Iraq, as Libya totally imploded into being a Somalia-style failed-state ruled by dozens of Islamist militias, including ISIS. They cheered the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak in Egypt in the name of Arab-spring democracy, watched the Muslim Brotherhood assume power, then saw the Egyptian military reestablish its dictatorship. They cheered the overthrow of the Saleh dictatorship in Yemen, and then watched that country become a another failed-state. And they are still at it in Syria, supplying money and arms to Islamist rebels in hopes of overthrowing the Bashir Assad dictatorship, with no thought at all to what will fill the vacuum once he's gone. It was the power vacuum that civil war created that gave ISIS its initial opportunity and base of operations in eastern Syria. Bush and Blair had the naive assurance that the people of Iraq longed for democracy, would welcome us as liberators, could organize free elections in a few months and that our military forces would be home in a year. They weren't expecting the Iraqis to loot everything in sight , divide up on sectarian grounds, then set about settling scores. But that unpleasant learning experience was totally forgotten by the ruling elites when the Arab Spring hit. It was back to the naive confidence that democracy would sweep everything before it and all we had to do was provide a few discreet pushes here and there, by airstrikes if not by Twitter. It isn't just the hated "GWB" and the Republicans. Obama, Hillary and the Democrats are up to their eyeballs in the same naivete and lazy thinking, and the whole region is descending into bloody anarchy as a result of all of their errors. Given that the only effective military force on ISIS' western flank is the Syrian army, we probably should be employing some real-politik by allying with Assad instead of continuing to try to subvert him. It's important that Damascus and the areas of Syria he controls be prevented from turning into a vacuum that ISIS will only be too happy to fill. If we want local proxy land-forces to fight ISIS for us, allowing us to keep our hands clean, who else is any position to do the necessary fighting in Syria?
"In case you missed it over the weekend, the Islamic State took over another Iraqi city." http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiep...-warming-as-national-security-threat-n2001497 http://dailycaller.com/2015/05/19/i...at-led-up-to-chris-stevens-death-in-benghazi/ http://washington.cbslocal.com/2015/05/21/donald-trump-this-country-is-a-hellhole/
Well, you're right in this instance. That was the Dems alone, fine. But forget ye not Bush I and II and the entire fiasco of Iraq itself. The worm will turn back to the alternate setting of stupid soon enough, because both parties are, in fairness, both fucked to hell and gone.
(leçon du jour) Stop the military adventurism. Our military is good at killing people and breaking things. They suck at nation building, and our department of state is staffed by people who are equally incompetent.
Well, they did a pretty good job at rebuilding the world after WWII. But, nation building requires money, and the nation has been unwilling to spend that kind of money rebuilding Iraq or Afghanistan. Additionally, nation building requires competent leadership, planning and execution...all attributes the Baby Bush administration lacked.
The "Dems alone" have done nothing, good or bad, since Reagan was elected. The Dems are not a "wing", either - a good fraction of them are rightwing, a minority are center and of those a couple are center left. The Clintons, for example, are center-right politicians - solidly in the Right "wing". The other "wing" in the US not only "saw it coming", they "saw it coming" when it was coming - say, back when Donald Rumsfeld was shaking hands with Saddam Hussein and welcoming him into the Big Boys Club (Locals and Natives branch). Then when the US was supplying Saddam Hussein with the makings of poison gas, and standing aside while he put down the latest Kurdish rebellion with it. Then when the US was blocking the efforts of a militarily conquered colonial collage like Iraq to organize itself democratically along its tribal lines and gain local control of its resources. The rightwing authoritarian military mudhole that the US has created in the ME - including the restriction of our options to military force, the removal of leftwing anti-Islamist political powers, and the destruction over time of every non-Islamist democratic option - is a consequence of the success of the rightwing authoritarian "wing" in the US, especially its increasing dominance of US foreign policy since WWII. The first and biggest lesson, for too many Americans, would be that history does not start during whatever five minute moment the Foxframing media finds best for their presentations. If you can't recall what happened, you don't know what's happening. Americans might easily forget what they did, but other people do not as easily forget what was done to them. The second lesson is that "promoting democracy" is not done by saying that's what one is doing. It's a set of actions, an organization of behaviors. Not all actions qualify. In particular, bringing in a foreign power's selection of new autocrat by military helicopter and setting him up in the capital city with dominating military support, banning local community organizations such as trade unions, preventing local attempts at holding elections and voting, forbidding local and representative governments to regulate or tax foreign corporations, funneling huge amounts of cash money into local economies untraceably through organized criminals and foreign-allied local big men, and so forth, do not qualify. ISIS is one recent manifestation, the most recent splinter manifestation, of the most common and widespread consequence of foreigners removing representative government and setting up oppressive, corrupt dictatorships in Muslim countries during the 20th Century. Vulnerability to the ISIS faction, whatever its local name, is not an alternative fate, but a consequence, of imposed ME tyranny. Imagine the cheek of "the world", assigning the US responsibility for the consequences of its violent behavior. Of course the US rightwing warhawks saw this unfair "sniping" coming from the beginning, right? It was Colin Powell, a rightwing military general with access to the American media, we heard pointing out that the Pottery Barn Rule was going to be in effect after Iraq: "You broke it, you bought it". And your presumption that no one in the current US administration has been thinking hard - and modifying their rebel support etc accordingly - about the aftermath of Assad's inevitable fall, is based on what, exactly? Been out of the country for the past few years? Not everyone is as corrupt, shortsighted, ignorant, arrogant, greedy, venal, childish, violent, amnesiac, and just comically damn dumb, as the US political faction that backed and launched the Iraq War. Maybe nobody else is. They're a unique group.
If the US doesn't want to confront Iran and the Shia militias it backs, then it has no business taking potshots at ISIS either. Not like ISIS has a nuclear program last I checked, and their propaganda is spread in the West by local players who we should be targeting on local soil. America should pack its bags and tell the Iraqis "Sorry boys, you're on your own now. When you're interested in fighting for a secular pro-western democracy, feel free to give us a call." Maybe the Kurds deserve US protection, but that's about it. Everyone else has blood on their hands, we don't need to be their air force.
The "Dems alone" have done nothing, good or bad, since Reagan was elected. The Dems are not a "wing", either - a good fraction of them are rightwing, a minority are center and of those a couple are center left. The Clintons, for example, are center-right politicians - solidly in the Right "wing". The other "wing" in the US not only "saw it coming", they "saw it coming" when it was coming - say, back when Donald Rumsfeld was shaking hands with Saddam Hussein and welcoming him into the Big Boys Club (Locals and Natives branch). Then when the US was supplying Saddam Hussein with the makings of poison gas, and standing aside while he put down the latest Kurdish rebellion with it. Then when the US was blocking the efforts of a militarily conquered colonial collage like Iraq to organize itself democratically along its tribal lines and gain local control of its resources. The rightwing authoritarian military mudhole that the US has created in the ME - including the restriction of our options to military force, the removal of leftwing anti-Islamist political powers, and the destruction over time of every non-Islamist democratic option - is a consequence of the success of the rightwing authoritarian "wing" in the US, especially its increasing dominance of US foreign policy since WWII. The first and biggest lesson, for too many Americans, would be that history does not start during whatever five minute moment the Foxframing media finds best for their presentations. If you can't recall what happened, you don't know what's happening. Americans might easily forget what they did, but other people do not as easily forget what was done to them. ISIS is one recent manifestation, the most recent splinter manifestation, of the most common and widespread consequence of foreigners removing representative government and setting up oppressive, corrupt dictatorships in Muslim countries during the 20th Century. Vulnerability to the ISIS faction, whatever its local name, is not an alternative fate, but a consequence, of imposed ME tyranny. Imagine the cheek of "the world", assigning the US responsibility for the consequences of its violent behavior. Of course the US rightwing warhawks saw this unfair "sniping" coming from the beginning, right? It was Colin Powell, a rightwing military general with access to the American media, we heard pointing out that the Pottery Barn Rule was going to be in effect in Iraq: "You broke it, you bought it".
I believe this is the fulcrum or pivotal issue regarding ISIL. Fear is their only real weapon and it is the fear that needs to be understood and mastered if ISIL is to be neutralized. ( they can never be defeated except by neutralization IMO ) If you consider for a moment that they currently have control over a massive population and still only appear to have 20,000 plus fighters you might realize that their caliphate cause is actually not at all popular, for if it were their fighter numbers would have swelled to millions and not a mere 20k+. The obvious lack of local support requires ISIL to recruit from over seas to maintain their numbers. Deal with the fear and the problem would be solved. I do not believe the "cowardice" displayed is actually real cowardice but something that ISIL have learned to master when it comes to inspiring it in others. (Almost all soldiers will "break" if pushed hard enough and IN THE RIGHT WAY.) Which, to me, is more telling of ISIL's skill at fear indoctrination than the actual level of courage with in the Iraqi troops. Our own Governments ISIL fear induced reaction to the threat of ISIL ( Australia ) is bordering on the absurd. The latest paranoid initiative is to promote systemically educating school children in "How to pick a Jihad-ist" "STUDENTS could be given school lessons on how to spot a jihadi under radical new plans before the Federal Government." (Australia) http://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/pa...-spot-terrorists/story-fngqim8m-1227367152342 This move has enormous fear creating potential in itself, not only instilling it in our children ( fear of going to school and each other ) but those that may be innocently "witch hunted" and wrongly accused and persecuted. Our Government would be handing our kids to ISIL ( FEAR ) on a platter with such a crazy proposal. IMO *edited to reflect Sculptors concerns..ISIL it is Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Here's one of my sculptures: (that's OSIRIS and HORUS in her hair) So. I'd prefer that we refer to those murderous religious fanatic thugs as ISIL Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Fanaticism gives licence to extreme violence----"cry havoc ..." This military adventurism ain't democrats nor republicans, this is another poor example of the elites ensnared by the siren's song of the military industrial complex and all of it's war profiteering blood money. The elites don't fight, they just stroke their egos and rake in the money. And, we dumb schmucks blame one fake political party or the other, thinking that somehow that might make a difference. All is shadow, smoke and mirrors. Remember the "VietNamization of another of our "wars"? That army folded faster than a house of cards in a strong wind. "Oh, but this time is different" Not hardly! If'n you can't win: Ain't no sense in fighting. We never should have started this fiasco, and prolonging our idiocy won't make it go away.
Just thinking... I tend to believe the main fear that drove the Iraqi troops to flee is basically because ISIL does not take prisoners. it only takes hostages. It is the enormous fear of being captured alive by ISIL and what ISIL may do to them whilst in captivity, I think is the main driving fear that is making the troops abandon their posts and weapons.
