Paul Johnson was beheaded today by a group claiming to be a part of Al-Queda. Their demands were not met, so they beheaded him. I'm not shocked, but I am disappointed that they think they can kill innocents to get their way.
The death of Mr. Johnson is a sad event, but not one that was not to be expected. What his death indicates to all westerners in SA is that they are not welcome and that they should leave for their own good, at least that’s the message they want sent out. SA is a country on the verge it really is, and really the Saud’s only have themselves to blame, they financed the madrassas which radicalizes many of the poor in the Islamic world. Saudi Arabia is in serious trouble imo, it may take a while but that regime can only last so long. Fear is not a way to maintain power, and me thinks the Saudi’s are finding that out.
"really the Saud’s only have themselves to blame, they financed the madrassas which radicalizes many of the poor in the Islamic world" I think you are right. The country is in serious trouble. I would not wanna be there and I feel sorry for any moderate, reasonable person that has to live there. Of course, this is all bad news to all of us that rely on the oil...maybe I should go buy a hybrid car.
What his death indicates to all westerners in SA is that they are not welcome and that they should leave for their own good, at least that’s the message they want sent out you're making the mistake of saying that al-Qaeda represents the popular view of the Saudi street "they" is not the Saudi people's view. "they" is al-Qaeda
I didn’t say the Saudi’s I was implying Al Q anyways; I know that many within Saudi don’t like this, I talk to some. But Al Q is popular in poorer regions of the country, and poorer segments of society. There is no doubt that Al Q has a large base of support in SA, a silent portion of the population. Also in my sentence in which you quoted “they” were the westerners…
Paul Johnson's beheading... it really is sad during the past few days the media has been parading his wife, son, grandson and the community on TV so i sort of got to know him his killing has become more personal than that of other hostage killings in that sense if there is any positive coming out of it (we should look for the positive in any situation) is that the terrorists did not get what they wanted the Israeli gov't has a policy of bargaining with kidnappers, even for dead bodies it is because of that fact Hizballah has a special "kidnapping unit" that tries very hard to kidnap soldiers and civilians Israel has historically traded for hostages, usually "paying" much larger price. for example, the last hostage exchange with Hizballah, for 3 dead bodies and one live man, Israel has released dozens of dead bodies and hundreds of live ones if America or the Saudis were to budge it would have increased the incentive to continue and increase kidnappings and ransom seeking i guess it won't stop kidnapping altogether - that would be naive to assume, but it would decrease them - or at least decrease terrorists' expectations when bargaining this ugly crime should increase the efforts of the Saudis and Americans to get rid of al-Qaeda.
if there is any positive coming out of it (we should look for the positive in any situation) is that the terrorists did not get what they wanted That is way too early to say, frankly the US govt is pushing people to get of SA, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there was an exodus of westerners from the region. So don’t cry victory just yet. If I were living in Saudi I would leave, what’s the point of staying? The situation in SA is just starting, one can only imagine where this one goes.
Well we seem to have a bunch of Al-Queada shit heads down in Cuba, lets start cutting of their heads. We are already down 0-2 so lets decapitate four of the bastards.
I believe that the terrorists did not and will not get what they wanted but instead this will backfire on them. For one example, read the post by crazy151drinker. For another example, I have not before but am now starting to feel the same way that he does.
Then what? Start an endless cycle of beheadings? Do you honestly think that Americans are going to be safer if you start cutting of their heads in GITMO? Fat chance, terrorism is not a easy thing to deal with, and I think you are starting to learn how much of a bind it really puts you in.
I said I started to feel like it but not that I would do it even if I had my way! My point was that people will tend to be more determined to eliminate these terrorists.
It’s true the terrorists did not get what they requested but do you really think that they expected to get the Saudis and/or U.S. to release Alquada prisoners?!! I think they did achieve their primary goal which is to “terrorize” the foreigners working in SA – And perhaps even more significant, “terrorize” the west, primarily US public. These terrorists are effective. They will influence and shape public opinion on foreign policy. We’ve been hearing news on a daily basis: two, three, four “Americans killed in a bomb blast”. That does not have the impact (on the public) as a single American kidnapped and beheaded because “demands” were not met.
My point was that people will tend to be more determined to eliminate these terrorists. The inherent danger with this war is that the more you prosecute, the more trouble you get yourself in. You know clay, whenever you press it really hard it slips through your fingers and distorted, imagine the Middle East as a clay ball, you have a black spot on it. What the US did was squeeze the ball to get rid of the black spot, but chances are that the black dot was only further entrenched in the lump of clay. If you simply pick it off it would be much better.
The US did not squeeze the clay ball because it will be the same as beheading all the terrorists and nuke the Middle East regions where terrorists are confirmed to be there. The US is trying its best to pick the black spot of clay ball off with the full intention of keeping the clay ball the least damaged possible by hunting down only the terrorists while avoid civilian casualty as much as possible.
If SA is in trouble, US is in trouble. I’ve read somewhere that SA has about 1 trillion dollars in US banks and another trillion in US economy. –Obviously, this is US money returning home from oil “purchases”.
Do you honestly believe that invading a nation in the heart of the Middle East, picking? That's ridiculous. The Middle East has been corrupted by American power very much so over the last 60 years. I was thinking to myself what would have happened if democracy was allowed to flourish in the Middle East until it was crushed by the joint Anglo-American overthrow of the democratically elected leader of Iran? The Middle East was on a very different path back in the 30’s-50’s. You must remember the Saudi’s are in power today because of American patronage, especially after the 1935 oil agreement. The US has squeezed the Middle East, and Iraq is just another example of that. Three things in the Middle East cause much of the terrorism: i) Israel ii) The Saudi’s iii) Secularism/Westernization All of which has direct American support, do you wonder why they hate you? The Middle East wasn’t allowed to develop naturally, and unnatural things are quite ugly aren’t they? One can argue that modern terrorism is really a natural backlash against imposition of western culture on their culture. Democracy, consumerism, capitalism, socialism, communism, et al are not values that the region is used to or necessarily wants. You cannot impose democracy on anyone, its antithetical to the reason d’etre of democracy, self-determination. I think the best thing would be to let the region develop naturally, and let the moderates in Arabic society deal with the extremists, the more you attack them the less and less support you get from the majority of the Muslim world. The death of anyone American, Arab, Israeli, etc is a crime against humanity, until Americans-Arabs realize that the cycle will not end and only grow to unimaginable proportions. I must say the terrorists have got the US in a real bad bind, the US is falling apart economically, militarily is overstretched, and the US is starting to look more and more like the USSR. Xenophobic ideologicalism.
Undecided, I think you "decided" a very long time ago. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Why wont anyone have the balls to say, "You know what, the U.S. has been stickin' it to the whole world for some time now, why should we care if a muther****** gets his head cut off. Noone told him to go over there. He could have stayed in the U.S. and drew a welfare check. That's what I did."
Undecided, I think you "decided" a very long time ago. What I have decided is that the Middle East has not developed naturally, not only by the United States much of the problem in the region stems more from the Europeans and their imperial cutting up of the region, and worst of all the Balfour Declaration that threw the whole region into political chaos. Europe was allowed to develop naturally from Roman greatness, to the depths of the middle ages, back up to the renaissance, that was a natural development. In the Middle East that simply doesn’t exist, the region was brought from backward tribalism to urbanized, rich, western like consumers within two generations. Any culture, any people would be in a state of shock and many would resent that. "You know what, the U.S. has been stickin' it to the whole world for some time now, why should we care if a muther****** gets his head cut off. Noone told him to go over there. He could have stayed in the U.S. and drew a welfare check. That's what I did." I personally don’t feel like that, I think that Americans are overall nice people. But the actions of their government has been VERY questionable over the last 60 years in that region. My question to Americans is, what did you expect?
You are very informed and gracious Undecided, but I have to disagree with you on the American's being overall nice people. "Their government," are the key words in your sentence. Without the U.S. government cracking heads all around the globe, we overall nice Amerikkkans would not be able to drive luxury tanks, eat ourselves to death, or be racist toward others.
Taliban, Al Queda and the Saddam regime are examples of the naturally developed Middle East. I guess you would like to wait and see more of these instead of doing something. The US is not falling apart economically according to the latest economic news. So the US military might look overstretched to you because there are casualties (there are always casualties in wars so the US military will never look to you since you are looking for a perfect military that will never take in casualties to not be called overstretched by you) but to me, they are doing great (as a matter of fact, they are doing much better than the previous World/Korean/Vietnam wars). To me, the US is looking better and better and nothing like the USSR.
