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13 people were killed in Egypt today in clashes between the police and MB supportersquote:(Reuters) - Thirteen people were shot dead as supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood clashed with police across Egypt on Friday, defying an ever-widening state crackdown on the movement that ruled the country until six months ago.
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Jan 4, 2014 03:08
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Jesus Horse posted:Wasn't the main goal of AQ the overthrow of the house of saud? Was that a lie? The goal of AQ was to restore the Caliphate and to expel the infidels from the region. One of Bin Laden's first demands was for the US to remove troops from Saudi Arabia - and we did that. The Syrian, Iranian and Iraqi governments are run by Shi'ites, who are seen as just barely above "infidel" in the eyes of the Sunnis running Saudi Arabia. When the Bahrain civilians (mostly Shi'ites) tried to have their own Arab Spring, they were gunned down by the government troops and by Saudi troops that came in at the "invitation" of the Bahrain government. It looks to me that the Saudi government is also trying to restore the Caliphate. I've lived in that country and I think of the government of Saudi Arabia is the enemy of the people of the US. Jesus Horse posted:Do the SaudiS know that we will bail them out when their project bites them in the rear end?
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Jan 4, 2014 03:59
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Excuse my ignorance but why doesn't Saudi Arabia just declare itself the caliphate?
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Jan 4, 2014 04:27
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Zedsdeadbaby posted:Excuse my ignorance but why doesn't Saudi Arabia just declare itself the caliphate? Because that would mean they would actually have to do stuff, instead of get oil and beat their maids.
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Jan 4, 2014 04:29
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computer parts posted:Because that would mean they would actually have to do stuff, instead of get oil and beat their maids. How can you question the majestic projects which the Kingdom has undertaken, only for the glory of God? 
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Jan 4, 2014 04:36
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illrepute posted:Ehhh. I remember reading somewhere that Bush Jr. had his eyes on Iraq well before 9/11 anyway. I think by the time we were in Afghanistan the war on terror was pretty much on a set course, because nobody in a position to oppose it had the courage to. And it's not like a shift in popular opinion would've stalled it any, either. Remember all those anti-war protests? The ones that got ignored by everyone? I found Thomas Ricks' "Fiasco" to be fairly well-researched and detailed in its account of the run-up to and execution of the first years of the Iraq invasion/occupation (it was published in 2006). He's the Washington Post's Pentagon correspondent, and he has an interesting take on the top-level individuals involved. He actually de-emphasizes Bush, characterizing him more as a relatively uninformed push-around who believed and rubber-stamped whatever others encouraged him to. Instead, he places much of the blame in terms of instigation on Wolfowitz, who couldn't stop calling Saddam the next Hitler and made it his personal mission to convince everyone that not taking out Saddam was equivalent to not taking out Hitler. Rumsfeld was a frat-boy bully who sided with Wolfowitz and wasn't going to let anyone tell him no. Powell was sincerely duped by faulty and/or purposefully exaggerated evidence of WMDs, which many people in intelligence knew were almost definitely bogus, and Democrats in Congress were so scared of looking soft in the next round of elections that they authorized it. Once on the ground, Bremer (head of the occupation) was an insular, awkward misanthrope who did not coordinate with or even speak much to Sanchez (top commander), who was himself in over his head. Franks (head of Central Command who retired shortly after the initial invasion) just wanted to see himself as an American hero and still calls himself such in his autobiography. Add to that mix elements like Maj. Gen. Odierno's 4th Infantry Division, which was so notoriously trigger-happy, aggressive, and disrespectful to Iraqi citizens that the Marines filed a dissent referencing them, and Maj. Gen. Swannick's 82nd Airborne which infamously fired into a crowd in Fallujah, plus a severe continued lack of intel regarding the local populations or a real plan for consolidation of victories that did occur, and you have all the ingredients of a budding insurgency followed by chaos. If Ricks' account is accurate, and he seems to have plenty of interviews, documents, and photos to support his claims, there were a lot of people besides Bush who hosed that one up. The only two people he really praises are Mattis and Patraeus. TheMammoth fucked around with this message at 05:05 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 05:01
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Huttan posted:The goal of AQ was to restore the Caliphate and to expel the infidels from the region. One of Bin Laden's first demands was for the US to remove troops from Saudi Arabia - and we did that. I've never understood why there are such deep links between the Saudi and US governments. Saudi Arabia is the source of pretty much everything that we're fighting in the region. And from my knowledge, their share of the world's oil has never even been that high. I don't get it. Was it all Cold War era bullshit like everything else? If so, why hasn't the US dropped them after it ended? Sucrose fucked around with this message at 06:06 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 06:03
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Saudi Arabia hates Iran(and vice versa) and is a counterweight to them in the region, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, ect. Not to mention previous the Iranian revolution we in very painful terms found out what can happen if OPEC cuts off the oil, and Saudi Arabia is the head honcho of the OPEC members.(In regards to Saudi oil in general wiki lists the 2009 export volume of all nations. They are by a huge margin still the largest exporter although Russia has gained a lot of ground in the past decade)
Amused to Death fucked around with this message at 06:34 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 06:29
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The Saudis have close ties to the American oil industry in general, and the Bush family specifically, which kept them tight for a long time. They also prevent spikes in oil prices, which none of the other big producers have been willing to do.
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Jan 4, 2014 06:29
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Also, Cold War alliances die hard, especially when there is money involved.
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Jan 4, 2014 06:31
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Would it be fair to blame FDR for America's close relationship with the Saudi's or am I looking in the wrong direction?
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Jan 4, 2014 06:34
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Al-Saqr posted:please spare us this fake crocodile tear horseshit.You had no problem with the occupation and destruction of Iraq both as an entity and as a society that you played a small part in (but none the less did play a role), did you start 'getting sad' at any point during the destruction of fallujah? the Willy Pete Showered on kids over there? the systematic torture, summary killings, and overall hosed up behavior committed by the occupation authorities? so you have no right to start lamenting on a situation that was created and abetted by the U.S. Occupation of Iraq. Zedsdeadbaby posted:I have to raise my eyebrows at this. You loving invaded the place, you silly twat. Western militaries aren't going anywhere, guys. In order to overcome the dudebro war crime culture of the military that was protected in Iraq, it's going to take soldiers who try to understand regions they're in, and empathize with people outside of their humvee going against the grain. I know it's a touchy issue in this forum, even more so in this thread, but don't write the guy off like he was pulling the trigger in Haditha just because he said he deployed. You don't know what his story is. Cut him some slack. He didn't say anything worth burning him at the stake. Volkerball fucked around with this message at 07:48 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 07:23
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If the US occupation never happened, we wouldn't be seeing such a clusterfuck in Iraq right now.
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Al-Saqr posted:please spare us this fake crocodile tear horseshit.You had no problem with the occupation and destruction of Iraq both as an entity and as a society that you played a small part in (but none the less did play a role), did you start 'getting sad' at any point during the destruction of fallujah? the Willy Pete Showered on kids over there? the systematic torture, summary killings, and overall hosed up behavior committed by the occupation authorities? so you have no right to start lamenting on a situation that was created and abetted by the U.S. Occupation of Iraq. go carry out your jihad in person, don't hide behind a computer screen (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jan 4, 2014 07:40
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Baloogan posted:go carry out your jihad in person, don't hide behind a computer screen I'm sorry, what? Is calling someone out on their bullshit the same thing as an act of violence all of a sudden?
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Jan 4, 2014 07:50
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Al-Saqr posted:I'm sorry, what? Is calling someone out on their bullshit the same thing as an act of violence all of a sudden? You are assigning alot of blame on one guy. I'm calling you a terrorist because you did it to the guy you quoted in your original post edit: It sucks to face the blame for other's actions.
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Jan 4, 2014 07:53
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Hey man everyone knows that the only people with agency in the middle easy are Americans. I'm sure the decades of dictatorship would have never bubbled over and everything would have been hunky dory.
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Jan 4, 2014 07:58
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Al-Saqr posted:I'm sorry, what? Is calling someone out on their bullshit the same thing as an act of violence all of a sudden? What about Bait and Swatch posted:Having deployed to Iraq twice, it is saddens me to see the country sliding back towards the abyss. I really hoped that I could visit as a tourist in the near future. set off your bullshit alarm? The part where he expresses basic human empathy, or the part where he expresses hope for Iraq? Not every soldier is a prejudiced murderer. At least not in the US. There was just terrible leadership that covered up terrible things and a big chunk of soldiers who took that as a green light. It's not like there wasn't one single US soldier who ever did one slightly good thing during the entirety of the occupation.
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Jan 4, 2014 08:12
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AllanGordon posted:Hey man everyone knows that the only people with agency in the middle easy are Americans. I'm sure the decades of dictatorship would have never bubbled over and everything would have been hunky dory. America shares a fair share of blame for the establishment and longevity for more than a few of those Middle-East autocracies, and even ignoring that the War on Terror hasn't done anyone any favors.
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Jan 4, 2014 08:14
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Zedsdeadbaby posted:Excuse my ignorance but why doesn't Saudi Arabia just declare itself the caliphate? They don't need to, they already have ideological influence that vastly exceeds any comparable "Islamic" state. Abdullah announcing "Btw ummah im the caliph lol" would be a) redundant b) piss off a huge number of Muslims c) scare the poo poo out of a huge number of non-Muslims d) set up additional competition for his position that he almost certainly doesn't need.
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Jan 4, 2014 08:15
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Paper Mac posted:They don't need to, they already have ideological influence that vastly exceeds any comparable "Islamic" state. Abdullah announcing "Btw ummah im the caliph lol" would be a) redundant b) piss off a huge number of Muslims c) scare the poo poo out of a huge number of non-Muslims d) set up additional competition for his position that he almost certainly doesn't need. What sort of sway does Saudi Arabia/the Saudi royal family have on the ummah?
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Jan 4, 2014 08:24
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Baloogan posted:You are assigning alot of blame on one guy. I'm calling you a terrorist because you did it to the guy you quoted in your original post that makes no sense though, I never joined a fighting force and invaded a country and did two tours there, and then come out and say 'I'm really sad for Iraqi's', just because I wasn't in any particular branch that did war crimes or whatever. quote:The part where he expresses basic human empathy, or the part where he expresses hope for Iraq? I am not placing blame on this guy, he wasn't any kind of decision maker, I'm saying that he has no moral right to pretend that he has any kind of sympathy or sadness for the people of Iraq since he was part of an apparatus that oversaw it's destruction and a mass murder of it's population. I'd LOVE to have seen whether his 'sadness' and 'empathy' prevented him from saying anything when it was the military occupation doing most of the killing and destroying before the regime THEY INSTALLED picked up the slack. It's strange how there's this narrative going on that the U.S. military is some kind of doe-eyed thumb twiddler who walked into a situation they didn't understand when if you look back and see how systematically brutal the occupation was that's clearly not the case. If he went to serve the geopolitical and economic interests of his country, then fine, that's his job and he needs the tuition money. He's not the one who has to bury the dead, heal the torture wounds, and watch society collapse and have a foreign occupation be the master of your country and Mercenaries be the rule of law, etc. but PLEASE don't try to sell me that you give a poo poo about Iraqi's when you were part of the shoelace that formed the boot on their necks. Al-Saqr fucked around with this message at 08:33 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 08:26
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Formerly deployed soldiers are probably the largest demographic that even give one loving poo poo about Iraq right now. Or maybe refugees or something I don't know.
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Jan 4, 2014 08:35
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Al-Saqr posted:If he went to serve the geopolitical and economic interests of his country, then fine, that's his job and he needs the tuition money. He's not the one who has to bury the dead, heal the torture wounds, and watch society collapse and have a foreign occupation be the master of your country and Mercenaries be the rule of law, etc. but PLEASE don't try to sell me that you give a poo poo about Iraqi's when you were part of the shoelace that formed the boot on their necks. You're basically saying Oskar Schindler didn't really give a poo poo about Jews because he was a member of the Nazi Party (  ). I get that you're pissed about the occupation, but Christ, not every single American soldier out there was an evil giggling orcish monster salivating over the thought of kicking Iraq back to the Dark Ages or whatever.
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Jan 4, 2014 08:37
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Miltank posted:What sort of sway does Saudi Arabia/the Saudi royal family have on the ummah? They're the money behind the wahhabis.
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Jan 4, 2014 08:53
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Al-Saqr posted:that makes no sense though, I never joined a fighting force and invaded a country and did two tours there, and then come out and say 'I'm really sad for Iraqi's', just because I wasn't in any particular branch that did war crimes or whatever. Ironically enough, soldiers who were support and never really got exposed to the war were among the most spiteful to the Iraqi's and Afghani's in my experience. The Taliban and jihadists in Iraq were terrible, oppressive forces, and people in areas they controlled suffered greatly. On the ground, there was a lot that anyone could do to improve life for people impacted by the fighting. It depended on when you were there, and where exactly you were, I'm sure, but I don't think it's fair to assume that no soldier can be proud of what they did in those wars, there were medics giving locals treatment, construction projects, any number of things. Even infantryman could find ways to be a positive influence if they tried. That doesn't change the fact that there were soldiers who killed indiscriminately in the name of protecting themselves and their friends, or that there were some savage, brutal assholes who's existence in the military in itself is a failure, anywhere from private to general. I just think it's fair to hear them out, because there's a lot of soldiers with a lot of stories. Full transparency, I never deployed, but I was in an infantry unit from the week they got back from Iraq until the day they left for Afghanistan a year and a half later. Volkerball fucked around with this message at 09:36 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 09:25
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Remember this from a couple of days ago?quote:The Lebanese military authorities have detained the Saudi leader of a Sunni militant group linked to Al Qaeda that claimed responsibility for a double suicide bomb attack on the Iranian Embassy in Beirut in November, according to Lebanese news media. Well it's just been reported he's died "from a deterioration of a health condition." I guess that handily avoids him answering some awkward questions.
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Jan 4, 2014 11:09
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Here's a very good piece about the way in which social media is being investigated to examine the conflict in Syria, which even includes Seymour Hersh's response to my FP piece.
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Jan 4, 2014 12:40
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Al-Saqr posted:that makes no sense though, I never joined a fighting force and invaded a country and did two tours there, and then come out and say 'I'm really sad for Iraqi's', just because I wasn't in any particular branch that did war crimes or whatever. You sound an awful lot like one of those neocon douches that think people who committ a crime and get sent to jail are forever irredeemable subhumans with no worth in their opinion ever. From previous posts I know you are not but you sure sound like one now. Shitloads of young people that serve in the military starts doing so because they are naive and/or since it is a way to get an education you can't otherwise afford. And if you are part of that whole machinery/culture you are always reminded of the greater good in your actions, which makes actually rejecting all that crap even harder. Its basically the same feedback as being in a gang, you usually join because of a mix of social glorification and necessity. You might know what you are doing ain't right, but most of your friends, who are also in the gang, pats you on the back and says its ok anyway. But you wouldn't say that an ex gang member were crying crocodile tears if he laments the new gang war that broke out in his old hood.
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Jan 4, 2014 12:43
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Zudgemud posted:You sound an awful lot like one of those neocon douches that think people who committ a crime and get sent to jail are forever irredeemable subhumans with no worth in their opinion ever. It's perfectly fine to blame a gang banger for, you know, being a gang banger. If they have change of heart afterwards, great, but that doesn't excuse the poo poo they did in the first place. I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that the poster in question is genuinely concerned over the plight of the Iraqis, but they still deployed as part of a force that literally carried out war crimes against the population. Even if Bait and Swatch wasn't part of any of the excesses, he/she was still part of the human infrastructure that enabled the siege of Fallujah etc. Being roughly reminded of that once in a while isn't really unreasonable.
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Jan 4, 2014 12:58
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Yeah it's safe to say that if someone really cared about the Iraqi people they wouldn't have willfully joined an invasion force attacking and occupying their country.
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Jan 4, 2014 13:03
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Calling all American soldiers war criminals or just as guilty as war criminals because they're a member of the same institution is just as dishonest as calling all Muslims jihadists or just as guilty as one since they're a member of the same religion. Stop with the association fallacies.
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Jan 4, 2014 13:14
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SoggyBobcat posted:Calling all American soldiers war criminals or just as guilty as war criminals because they're a member of the same institution is just as dishonest as calling all Muslims jihadists or just as guilty as one since they're a member of the same religion. That was the point I was trying to make a few hours earlier but I didn't know the right fancy words and such. Baloogan posted:You are assigning alot of blame on one guy. I'm calling you a terrorist because you did it to the guy you quoted in your original post
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Jan 4, 2014 13:18
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Sucrose posted:Yeah it's safe to say that if someone really cared about the Iraqi people they wouldn't have willfully joined an invasion force attacking and occupying their country. Plenty of people had the wool pulled over their eyes: "We will be greeted as liberators!" and so on. The Iraq war was a terrible war built on a foundation of lies, but those lies did fool many people until evidence came out as the war went on. Some of the justifications were even true; Saddam was a vicious dictator and the crimes of the US against the Iraqi people does not change that, nor does Saddam being a vicious dictator justify those wrongs committed against the Iraqis.
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Jan 4, 2014 13:32
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Every German alive during WW2 bears responsibility for the Holocaust and they should be smugly reminded of this fact if they ever lament those years.
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Jan 4, 2014 13:34
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SoggyBobcat posted:Calling all American soldiers war criminals or just as guilty as war criminals because they're a member of the same institution is just as dishonest as calling all Muslims jihadists or just as guilty as one since they're a member of the same religion. I didn't say all American soldiers were just as guilty as those that actually committed the war crimes. I pointed out that no force can committ those war crimes unless they have a supply chain, a command structure, bases, etc. In a just war, every last fry cook in the base's kitchen gets to say "I did my little part, I helped", and I don't think that's unreasonable. But it goes both ways as well. Even if you only carried stuff around or worked in the munitions factories, you did your small part, you helped. This doesn't automatically make you a terrible person, but it isn't meaningless either. Edit: and in this case we're talking about a deployed soldier. brakeless posted:Every German alive during WW2 bears responsibility for the Holocaust and they should be smugly reminded of this fact if they ever lament those years. Speaking as a German, if during the Nazi era you in some way supported the regime, you were part of the problem, yes. You probably had good reasons, you most likely did something fairly inconsequential, and I'm not calling for your hanging, imprisonment or punishment in any way (depending on what you did, obviously), but yes, you were part of the whole thing. That's moral culpability, not legal guilt.
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Jan 4, 2014 13:48
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brakeless posted:Every German alive during WW2 bears responsibility for the Holocaust and they should be smugly reminded of this fact if they ever lament those years. Being alive isn't the same as personally signing up for it. And I'm not saying anything at all about him being some sort of war criminal, just that he obviously wasn't on the Iraqi's side, you know. AVeryLargeRadish posted:Plenty of people had the wool pulled over their eyes: "We will be greeted as liberators!" and so on. The Iraq war was a terrible war built on a foundation of lies, but those lies did fool many people until evidence came out as the war went on. Some of the justifications were even true; Saddam was a vicious dictator and the crimes of the US against the Iraqi people does not change that, nor does Saddam being a vicious dictator justify those wrongs committed against the Iraqis. I have sympathy for the average person having the wool pulled over their eyes as far as the government blatantly lying about threats from Iraq goes, especially a year after 9/11 (A despicable tactic I still can't believe Bush isn't more widely reviled for in this country, along with everything else). I have significantly less sympathy for anyone who actually believed in invading and occupying a country for their own good. Sucrose fucked around with this message at 13:55 on Jan 4, 2014 |
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Jan 4, 2014 13:53
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Sucrose posted:I have sympathy for the average person having the wool pulled over their eyes as far as the government blatantly lying about threats from Iraq goes, especially a year after 9/11 (A despicable tactic I still can't believe Bush isn't more widely reviled for in this country, along with everything else). I have significantly less sympathy for anyone who actually believed in invading and occupying a country for their own good. Why? If some 20 year old brought up by right wing parents has been told for his whole life that the USA has a responsibility to play world police and take down evil dictators I'd expect them to believe it. Ignorance and naiveté are not the fault of those who suffer from them, but of the rest of society for not educating them.
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Jan 4, 2014 14:17
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botany posted:I didn't say all American soldiers were just as guilty as those that actually committed the war crimes. I pointed out that no force can committ those war crimes unless they have a supply chain, a command structure, bases, etc. Just how far back does this guilt by association go? Is it just the local units involved, or the entire U.S. Army? How about the other military organizations like the Navy and Air Force? The U.S. government that controls those military organizations? How about the U.S. citizens the government represents (lets not get sidetracked on this point; the government represents you whether it is ideologically similar to your views or not)? If a squad of Marines executes a small group of unarmed civilians, how culpable is that Army fry cook who wasn't even in the same theatre of operations?
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Jan 4, 2014 14:32
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botany posted:I didn't say all American soldiers were just as guilty as those that actually committed the war crimes. I pointed out that no force can committ those war crimes unless they have a supply chain, a command structure, bases, etc. Well if we go by your logic here then "supporting the regime" could have taken the form of emptying trashbins in Berlin during the war. If there's nobody doing that job, then it's one less body for the genocide machine right? Everyone who didn't outright flee from Germany is morally culpable if they enabled even the tiniest function of the state. The connection between someone commiting a war crime and someone who happens to be elsewhere in the army at the same time is about as nebulous. If you can't see how dumb assigning blame on that basis is, especially in the context of telling someone that they aren't allowed to care what happens in Iraq because they were part of the US army at the time, I'll have a pretty good laugh.
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Jan 4, 2014 14:46
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Because, you see, soldiers choose what military operations they will take part in, and can totally opt out if an operation is ordered that they are morally opposed to without any sort of penalty. Oh wait. You sign a four year contract in summer of 2001. You work in the motor pool. The United States is not currently at war with anyone. Four years later it's summer of 2005, and the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan have no end in sight. The army extends the term of your contract because the military hasn't been meeting it's recruitment quotas. According to Al-Saqr, you are just as guilty of war crimes as the Black Water guys who gunned down civilians for fun.
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Jan 4, 2014 15:07
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