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Torrannor posted:As bad as things are in Ghouta, Yemen is still the biggest humanitarian crisis on this planet. It's nice and easy to write about evil Assad and evil Putin doing horrible things in Syria while not mentioning the US spported Saudi blockade of Yemen that's causing the biggest famine of the century. Starting last week, Ghouta is on pace to match the death toll of the entire Yemen war by like, July. It's the longest siege since Sarajevo. Volkerball fucked around with this message at 10:20 on Mar 1, 2018 |
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Mar 1, 2018 10:12
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LeoMarr posted:Afghan fatigue will last until the last man leaves. 7,000 is too many for the american public to stomach. Aswell as lack of real understanding of the issue at in general. No one givew a poo poo about afghanistan other than "we need to get out" ive heard this on both sides of the aisle. Coming back to the us esp transitioning jnto the civilian world whenever that word "afghanistan" comes up theres always a disdain for anyone sent to the country. Not a disdain for the individual person, more of the act of being sent to the place. I am looking at gallup polls here. Among the most important problems "war in the middle east" doesn't even make it to 1% and "fear of war" makes it to about 2%. That doesn't look like war fatigue to me. I am not saying that the americans would be willing to start a new war. I just don't think there is that much resistance to the current deployment levels in Afghanistan.
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Mar 1, 2018 11:02
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The Houthi are about to execute a bahai man for his religion
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Mar 1, 2018 14:21
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Squalid posted:The Houthi are about to execute a bahai man for his religion cool to see that even in times of wars, they keep their priorities straight
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Mar 1, 2018 14:39
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Lame.
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Mar 1, 2018 15:56
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LeoMarr posted:Afghan fatigue will last until the last man leaves. 7,000 is too many for the american public to stomach. Aswell as lack of real understanding of the issue at in general. No one givew a poo poo about afghanistan other than "we need to get out" ive heard this on both sides of the aisle. Coming back to the us esp transitioning jnto the civilian world whenever that word "afghanistan" comes up theres always a disdain for anyone sent to the country. Not a disdain for the individual person, more of the act of being sent to the place. There is no American war fatigue unless there are scores of dead bodies coming back home.
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Mar 1, 2018 16:03
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Squalid posted:The Houthi are about to execute a bahai man for his religion This is the other thing about that conflict - there are few players outside of the immediate region directly involved and both of the groups involved are pretty horrible. It's incompetent authoritarian Wahhabi government and local minions versus self declared fundamentalist islamists backed by the other lovely authoritarian regional power. Plus neither side comes remotely close to the absurd poo poo like the highly successful Assad government war on Syrians, the Russian hospital bombing campaign, or ISIS. Syria is so terrible it kinda overshadows Yemen. Warbadger fucked around with this message at 16:16 on Mar 1, 2018 |
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Mar 1, 2018 16:10
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You mean The Yemen war is directly supported by America so it gets ignored.
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Mar 1, 2018 16:18
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Syria overshadows Yemen because, A: Very few refugees nominally when compared to Syria B: No one wants to talk about how the US is supporting an American ally using famine as a strategy
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Mar 1, 2018 16:18
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Warbadger posted:Plus neither side comes remotely close to the absurd poo poo like the highly successful Assad government war on Syrians, the Russian hospital bombing campaign, or ISIS. Syria is so terrible it kinda overshadows Yemen. The Saudis absolutely bomb hospitals in Yemen, if not quite as brazenly or often as Assad and Putin in Syria.
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Mar 1, 2018 16:21
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Sinteres posted:The Saudis absolutely bomb hospitals in Yemen, if not quite as brazenly or often as Assad and Putin in Syria. They do, but they haven't made a systematic campaign out of it. Same deal with attempting to eradicate the undesireables - the blockade may be just that but it's dwarfed both in body count and appearance by the Assad/Russian approach of just murdering the gently caress out of as many civilians as possible with bombs, tanks, guns, and gas (while also blockading what they can). Warbadger fucked around with this message at 16:35 on Mar 1, 2018 |
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Mar 1, 2018 16:31
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Squalid posted:The Houthi are about to execute a bahai man for his religion The Baha'i are nearly unique in terms of religions with a nontrivial population in that if you're the sort of reactionary dickwad who cares about whether or not a religion is People of the Book, the Baha'i are still okay to pick on. it doesn't really come up too often, but Mormons absolutely would have the same problem, what with ongoing divine revelations like "oh actually God just now told us that black people aren't under an ancestral curse" also, Hindus getting declared PotB is one of my favorite examples of rulers making their theology nerds contort their logic to match social progression; "eh gently caress it, the Vedas are sort of a holy book, all those weird gurus aren't technically prophets, and actually we don't really have to distort the monotheism thing too much at all because Hinduism's whole syncretic gimmick is that all 'gods' are facets of the One True Incomprehensible God"
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Mar 1, 2018 16:48
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coathat posted:You mean The Yemen war is directly supported by America so it gets ignored.
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Mar 1, 2018 18:18
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If you guys have any quality info to share on Yemen, by all means plz post.
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Mar 1, 2018 18:50
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Hadi’s government is still accusing the UAE of trying to partition Yemen, but have maintained a tense peace with the separatists since their battles in January. Saudi and UAE need to figure out what the gently caress they are trying to achieve if they want an outcome better than total defeat. Also the Saudi bombing campaign quite obviously intentionally targeted health infrastructure on a mass scale, probably they were directly inspired by Syrian tactics though that’s just speculation on my part.
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Mar 1, 2018 19:40
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Call me naive, but I don't get what intentionally bombing hospitals is supposed to accomplish outside of a full on genocide campaign. Is that what they're going for?
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Mar 1, 2018 19:46
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Goon Danton posted:Call me naive, but I don't get what intentionally bombing hospitals is supposed to accomplish outside of a full on genocide campaign. Is that what they're going for? Its called terror bombing. You bomb a hospital and the wounded now have to slowly die with their families. While the whole time screaming and dying. Just like bombing any other infrastructure in some way it disenfranchises the populace.
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Mar 1, 2018 19:49
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Goon Danton posted:Call me naive, but I don't get what intentionally bombing hospitals is supposed to accomplish outside of a full on genocide campaign. Is that what they're going for? Make the area unlivable, so the people leave, the militias leave with their families, and your troops can just roll in. In theory.
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Mar 1, 2018 19:51
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Goon Danton posted:Call me naive, but I don't get what intentionally bombing hospitals is supposed to accomplish outside of a full on genocide campaign. Is that what they're going for? Insurgents, like anyone else, cannot live off just fresh air and idealism: they need food, shelter, fuel, equipment, and a lot of other stuff which they find directly or indirectly in the civilian population. If you remove the civilians from an area, then you remove the insurgents' support structure. Then the insurgents become easy picking. To remove the civilians, you target everything that makes life livable, so that even the most stubborn of them will be forced to flee -- and hospitals are very high up on that list, especially in wartime where their services are needed so much. But schools, marketplaces, and bakeries get targeted too. Of course, this kind of things is generally considered to be war crimes, but so long as you have a UNSC P5 to veto-protect you from any repercussion, you'd be crazy to let such considerations restrain your hand. After all, you're a bloodthirsty genocidal dictator, not a soy boy.
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Mar 1, 2018 20:48
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That makes a gross kind of sense, and really just sounds like a localized genocide.
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Mar 1, 2018 20:52
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Goon Danton posted:localized genocide.  "Dehousing"
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Mar 1, 2018 20:59
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There's also the simple logic of "yeah a bunch of the fighters we just injured yesterday went to that hospital, so let's bomb the hospital". That's why some of the Southern Front rebels are okay with having injured fighters and civilians go to Israeli hospitals across the border, because Assad bombing an Israeli hospital would be one of the dumbest possible things he could do (other than everything he's already done, of course).
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Mar 1, 2018 21:09
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Goon Danton posted:That makes a gross kind of sense, and really just sounds like a localized genocide. Welcome to the cold logic of war, enjoy your stay.
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Mar 1, 2018 21:29
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Orange Devil posted:Welcome to the cold logic of war, enjoy your stay. 
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Mar 1, 2018 21:41
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Orange Devil posted:Welcome to the cold logic of war, enjoy your stay. Mandatory reading on how guattari and deleuze, etc were used by IDF: http://dev.autonomedia.org/node/5450 Not exactly the same but if you're just coming in from the cold, it's "fun" reading
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Mar 2, 2018 00:47
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https://twitter.com/MSF_USA/status/968506646958886912?ref_src=twcamp%5Ecopy%7Ctwsrc%5Eandroid%7Ctwgr%5Ecopy%7Ctwcon%5E7090%7Ctwterm%5E3 The world loving sucks.
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Mar 2, 2018 01:26
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Goon Danton posted:That makes a gross kind of sense, and really just sounds like a localized genocide. You have to remember though, it's ridiculous to accuse Assad of genocide.
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Mar 2, 2018 01:28
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Cat Mattress posted:Insurgents, like anyone else, cannot live off just fresh air and idealism: they need food, shelter, fuel, equipment, and a lot of other stuff which they find directly or indirectly in the civilian population. I don't think I agree with this reading of Saudi tactics. First of all the Houthi aren't fighting an insurgency. Though their army does include irregular formations its largely a professional force. It's not like Iraq or Syria circa 2006 where everywhere is a potential combat zone and the enemy can blend into the civilian population. Secondly I don't think the coalition is attempting to displace civilians. Saudi bombers have targeted the entire north, though they have especially punished the capital of Sana'a and the Houthi's home region of Saa'da, neither of which are exactly on the front line. In any case, where exactly would displaced Yemenis go? Most Yemeni's probably couldn't flee even if they wanted to, as famine is by far the greater threat to their lives. The coalition didn't commit nearly enough forces to smash the coalition in a rapid offensive thrust like Ethiopia did the ICU or America Iraq in 2003, and while Muhommed Bin Salman was probably stupidly optimistic when he started this mess I don't think he was so stupid as to believe he could just occupy the entire country and crush the Houthi with pure military force. Rather instead I think the plan was to use just enough force to check the Houthi advance, strangle them economically, and wait for the Houthi to implode. Yemeni politics have long been characterized by fragile coalitions. Apply enough pressure and the coalition that brought the Houthi to pwer could have fractured. We almost saw this with Saleh's attempted defection. We did see some defections after his death, however the battles between Hadi and the separatists have prevented the coalition from capitalizing on those opportunities. In order for the Saudis to win they need political support for the Houthi to fall apart, and for elements to defect to their side. The cruel and indiscriminate bombing however seems totally counter productive to this goal however, as it will simultaneously engender hatred towards the coalition and bolster the Houthi claim to defend the people. I don't think there's any higher objective in the campaign than to make Yemenis suffer. It's just spite or at least indifference. edit: lollontee posted:You have to remember though, it's ridiculous to accuse Assad of genocide. Been hitting the bottle again, eh lollontee?
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Mar 2, 2018 01:49
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OctaMurk posted:Make the area unlivable, so the people leave, the militias leave with their families, and your troops can just roll in. In theory. Exactly. Hitting the food, water, power, commerce centers, hospitals, etc. depopulates the area. The civilians either leave or they die - and it's how you end up with half the Syrian population fleeing the country despite "only" killing a half million of them. KSA isn't nearly as brazen as Assad, but probably has had some similar ideas in mind.
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Mar 2, 2018 03:52
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Warbadger posted:Exactly. Hitting the food, water, power, commerce centers, hospitals, etc. depopulates the area. The civilians either leave or they die - and it's how you end up with half the Syrian population fleeing the country despite "only" killing a half million of them. What places in Yemeni exactly do you think the Saudi coalition is trying to depopulation? Sana'a? Taiz? Hodedah? Somewhere else? This narrative makes no sense 
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Mar 2, 2018 04:18
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Squalid posted:What places in Yemeni exactly do you think the Saudi coalition is trying to depopulation? Uh, every single place that either has enemies, or could harbor them? Why is it hard to believe that this is the reasoning behind the Saudi bombing campaign when the Syrians have been doing this for years? Or do you believe the Saudis are so incompetent that they are accidentally bombing all this poo poo?
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Mar 2, 2018 04:29
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OctaMurk posted:Uh, every single place that either has enemies, or could harbor them? Why is it hard to believe that this is the reasoning behind the Saudi bombing campaign when the Syrians have been doing this for years? Or do you believe the Saudis are so incompetent that they are accidentally bombing all this poo poo? I mean I could believe that
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Mar 2, 2018 05:21
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OctaMurk posted:Uh, every single place that either has enemies, or could harbor them? Why is it hard to believe that this is the reasoning behind the Saudi bombing campaign when the Syrians have been doing this for years? Or do you believe the Saudis are so incompetent that they are accidentally bombing all this poo poo? Uh "every single place" that has enemies is all of north Yemen and much of the eastern desert, so I'm pretty sure they aren't trying to evict everybody from those areas, if only because there's no place they could conceivably go. Lord knows Saudi Arabia doesn't want those refugees winding up in their country. According to a June 2017 report by The Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, displacement actually peaked at the end of 2015 at 2.2 million and has since declined by 50% as people have gradually returned to their homes. This displacement occurred primarily during the initial phases of the conflict as the Houthi fought large scale conventional battles with their rivals for control of the country. More recent displacement has been concentrated in places afflicted again by large conventional battles between ground forces for example in Taiz or Najran, Saudi Arabia. It's not airplanes displacing people, its artillery and infantry. If depopulation is an explicit tactic of the Saudis, they have failed utterly. While the Saudis have targeted essential civilian infrastructure the scale of their campaigns differs dramatically from what we have seen from the Syrian government in places like Eastern Ghouta. According to the BBC, 93% of all structures in Eastern Ghouta had been damaged or destroyed as of December. This one neighborhood may have suffered more airstrikes than all of Sana'a, a city as large as Damascus. Unlike the dumb bombs dropped indiscriminately by the Syrian state, most Saudi airstrikes as far as I know have been smartbombs aimed at specific strategic targets like hospitals, bridges, schools, fishing boats, etc. The point I am making is that what we know of Saudi tactics is not consistent with an intention to displace civilians (excepting their own citizens who have been intentionally removed from parts of the border). Nor is it clear what they have to gain from such a policy, and nor why they would continue it given that if there were trying it, it has failed completely. Rather we should look for an explanation of Saudi actions that is more parsimonious with the evidence at hand.
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Mar 2, 2018 05:23
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Spiegel.de article about the alleged attack by russian pmcs on the us camp/base: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/american-fury-the-truth-about-the-russian-deaths-in-syria-a-1196074.html (It is behind an Adblocker-blocker, the Adblocker-blocker-blocker can be found here: https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3439500&pagenumber=609#post481752180 )
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Mar 2, 2018 14:04
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https://twitter.com/alexbrucesmith/status/969335408310984705
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Mar 2, 2018 14:50
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She's got Donnie's hands... Actually, it's Donnie under the desk... holding the phone...possibly his breath as well Cable Guy fucked around with this message at 15:05 on Mar 2, 2018 |
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Mar 2, 2018 15:02
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Cable Guy posted:She's got Donnie's hands... Too big to be Donnie's
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Mar 2, 2018 15:44
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Squalid posted:Uh "every single place" that has enemies is all of north Yemen and much of the eastern desert, so I'm pretty sure they aren't trying to evict everybody from those areas, if only because there's no place they could conceivably go. Lord knows Saudi Arabia doesn't want those refugees winding up in their country. I'd agree with you that they are not seeking the same goal of mass displacement and depopulation as Assad. They aren't nearly as blatant (or reckless) about these strikes and aren't even in the same ballpark with the frequency of attacks. The lack of damage to civilian areas on the scale of Syria is more because KSA isn't running terror bombing/shelling campaigns (which is another part of how they push out the civilians). However, that doesn't mean that they haven't attempted civilian displacement on a small scale by hitting those sorts of targets. Warbadger fucked around with this message at 16:34 on Mar 2, 2018 |
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Mar 2, 2018 16:31
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In addition to all the things people have mentioned here for why Yemen isn't in the news as much, but there's also that it's a lot further away and it's a LOT poorer than Syria which means the people themselves have less ability to communicate directly with the outside world. I mean I'm sure there are plenty of techbros in Sanaa, but I don't think the countryside is going to be remotely as wired as Syria is, where it seems like every other kid has a quadcopter and an iPad. (Though obviously the videos I'm watching are going to massively overrepresent that proportion of the population). The only Western reporting I've seen from northern Yemen at all is Vice, and for southern Yemen I haven't seen much more except a few trips to Aden and a couple trips to Marib. I don't think I've seen ANY native Yemeni reporting of the war, except for official bullshit put out by Hadi and the Houthis. I would also guess that there are a lot more people, at least in Europe, who personally know Syrians and who have been there, and at least thus have some sort of vicarious link to the country. Whereas I don't know any Yemenis, I've never met a Yemeni, and I doubt I know anyone who knows any Yemenis, and I sure don't know anyone who's ever been there. I mean, on a similar note no one ever heard anything about the Congo wars which displaced tens of millions and directly killed millions and went on for years. It got an article in the Economist every few months, and maybe it made NYTimes's page 8 of international section like once or twice a year. It's true that was before the Internet was really a big deal worldwide, so it's not a great comparison, but still. E: I don't know why people sometimes act like people should care about all tragedies equally, or care about all tragedies in a triaged manner according to their specific number of Tragedy Units. Like, a Texan would (and should) give a billion times more shits about a low-level civil war in Tamaulipas than they should about a massive genocide in Bangladesh. Because one of those things affects them personally — and possibly they can do something about — while for the other all they can do is 'raise awareness' on Facebook or whatever counts for activism these days. Honestly except for Brown Moses and the SA poster who got murdered in Benghazi (Sean Smith, if anyone hasn't been reading this thread that long and/or didn't remember), has anyone from this thread ever done anything remotely relevant or actually useful? Saladman fucked around with this message at 17:31 on Mar 2, 2018 |
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Mar 2, 2018 17:24
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I think it's fair to say you shouldn't tempt goons to try and do concretely 'useful' things in regards to this topic or we'll likely be saying hello to more Caros in the near future. 
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