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Double-posting because forum glitch.Ikasuhito posted:I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be a reference to when Ben Carson said that he believed they used to store grain in the pyramids. It's from a medieval attempt at shoehorning the pyramids into the bible. This article explains it well. Ben Carson being a person whose religious beliefs are right out of the middle ages, he embraced that legend as a fact.
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Nov 3, 2017 15:15
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Israel looking to become more involved in Syria. quote:The Israeli army issued a statement on Friday morning declaring that it will intervene militarily to prevent the occupation of a Druze town in the Syrian Golan heights which has come under attack by the Islamic militant group Nusra Front.
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Nov 3, 2017 15:30
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Count Roland posted:Israel looking to become more involved in Syria. Or less? Israel has been semi-openly supporting Nusra for a while, it kinda stopped in the last year or so when it looked like the game was won by Assad, now it seems, at least according to the reports, Israel has actively prevented Nusra from attacking Assad. So what gives? What's the strategy here? To cozy up to Assad and play good neighbors? This is weird.
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Nov 3, 2017 16:40
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Can we wait til the "it's been 0 days since Israel bombed the Syrian regime" counter ticks over to 1 before we start accusing the two of being in bed together?
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Nov 3, 2017 17:19
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Saudi Arabia hires head of bank famous for bankrupting itself to run its sovoreign wealth fund. https://www.ft.com/content/be8a8bd8-be78-11e7-9836-b25f8adaa111 Cant see what could possibly go wrong. also here's an incredible article from Jacobin about the gulfs insane city building policy:- https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/11/gulf-states-oil-capital-ecological-disaster Al-Saqr fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Nov 3, 2017 |
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Nov 3, 2017 18:39
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Holy poo poo that was fast: https://twitter.com/AlSuraEnglish/status/926395213496463362 quote:#BREAKING - #Iraqi forces fully liberate last #ISIS-held city in #Iraq, Al-Qaim https://twitter.com/AlSuraEnglish/status/926399568152993792 quote:Our full report on the day long city offensive liberating #Iraq from #ISIS in any cities can be found here.
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Nov 3, 2017 18:52
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Al-Saqr posted:Saudi Arabia hires head of bank famous for bankrupting itself to run its sovoreign wealth fund. I get the sense these guys watched the animatrix and were like whoa, what can we do to make this happen in real life?
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Nov 3, 2017 18:58
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SAA are now in Iraq. https://twitter.com/AllyOfTruth/status/926446987792257024 https://twitter.com/klkamashiq/status/926412736552226816 https://twitter.com/klkamashiq/status/926429431794724864
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Nov 3, 2017 19:51
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https://twitter.com/ReutersWorld/status/926516493143216128 All talk.
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Nov 3, 2017 20:51
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Al-Saqr posted:here's an incredible article from Jacobin about the gulfs insane city building policy:- A really interesting article. Do you have some more articles that shed light on how exactly the existing power structures and industry make it hard to make sensible investments for a post oil economy in the gulf?
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Nov 3, 2017 21:15
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Al-Saqr posted:also here's an incredible article from Jacobin about the gulfs insane city building policy:-
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Nov 3, 2017 21:29
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Saladin Rising posted:Holy poo poo that was fast: Hawija and Tal 'Afar were liberated so quickly because both were under siege for a long time and in Tal 'Afar, IS used all their resources and manpower to push out into the Ninawa desert and break the siege. Same goes for Hawija, throughout the entire Mosul campaign they launched daily attacks on the Mosul-Tikrit highway in order to disrupt or break the flow of equipment and manpower to Mosul. The result was that they were low on men and weapons when the offensives were launched. Whereas al-Qa'im wasn't under siege and they apparently still have a lot of manpower and weapons there. Weird how it fell so quickly. I would compare it to Mayadin but not Hawija or Tal 'Afar.
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Nov 3, 2017 21:47
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I wonder how much of ISIS's operational leadership is even still alive at this point. They have no capital and whatever is left of their central command is cowering somewhere along the Euphrates with three armies closing in on it amid sustained bombing and information warfare. It's no wonder their outlying cadres are collapsing. The chance of getting informed and timely strategic directives from ISIS central is next to nil, so they must be operating independently and are probably just trying to stay alive/keep fighting.
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Nov 3, 2017 23:43
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Laurenz posted:Hawija and Tal 'Afar were liberated so quickly because both were under siege for a long time and in Tal 'Afar, IS used all their resources and manpower to push out into the Ninawa desert and break the siege. Same goes for Hawija, throughout the entire Mosul campaign they launched daily attacks on the Mosul-Tikrit highway in order to disrupt or break the flow of equipment and manpower to Mosul. The result was that they were low on men and weapons when the offensives were launched. It seems likely that as much of their fighting force as possible was dispersed into the desert or fled. What the amounts to is anyone's guess.
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Nov 3, 2017 23:59
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Duckbox posted:I wonder how much of ISIS's operational leadership is even still alive at this point. They have no capital and whatever is left of their central command is cowering somewhere along the Euphrates with three armies closing in on it amid sustained bombing and information warfare. Its pretty amazing they didn't just surrender/defect a long time ago. That so many have kept fighting for so long shows there really were a lot of dedicated people involved.
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Nov 4, 2017 01:08
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Count Roland posted:Its pretty amazing they didn't just surrender/defect a long time ago. That so many have kept fighting for so long shows there really were a lot of dedicated people involved. Consider that ISIS members were almost required to commit horrendous crimes, and that many of the attacking armies are not inclined to be merciful.
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Nov 4, 2017 01:18
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TheDeadlyShoe posted:Consider that ISIS members were almost required to commit horrendous crimes, and that many of the attacking armies are not inclined to be merciful. That's why you defect instead. Easier said than done I know, but in this conflict we've seen many, many routs of soldiers in national armies against forces that were inferior on paper. That IS has so often fought to the end shows a real difference in these organizations.
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Nov 4, 2017 01:21
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Great New Yorker article that gives a general history of the SDF and follows events up through the retaking of Raqqa. Covers things like Kurdish / Arab tension, the complexities of granting amnesty to former ISIS fighters, and the weird limbo the SDF is likely to be left in now that ISIS is gone — https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/11/06/dark-victory-in-raqqa
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Nov 4, 2017 02:52
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Throatwarbler posted:SAA are now in Iraq. Well, it would now be rude of the Iraq army to not help Assad destroy his opposition.
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Nov 4, 2017 13:32
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http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-41870406quote:Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri has resigned, saying in a televised broadcast he feared for his life, while also fiercely criticising Iran. Maybe its  of me, but I read this and think of the story I posted yesterday about Israel threatening to move more forcefully into Syria. I guess its 'cause from a grand strategy point of view, the US, Saudi Arabia and others see conflicts in Syria and Iraq winding down, to Iran's favour. Israel in Syria keeps Assad on his toes-- another potential conflict could easily spring up. Destabilizing Lebanon (well, not like Lebanon is particularly stable now) puts pressure on Hezbollah, key Iranian proxy. Keeping the conflict open-ended keeps open a way to strike at Iran and its influence, even if I think this is a dumb strategy that hasn't been working.
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Nov 4, 2017 15:49
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Count Roland posted:http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-41870406 Israel was just talking about protecting a small Druze village because their own Druze community was upset about Nusra threatening them and they didn't want to have to take in Druze refugees from Syria. They made back channel threats/deals to deal with it in the past, and were just more open about it this time. Israel may do something at some point because of iranian influence on their border (or they may not--as Obama people constantly said, Netanyahu talks a lot bigger than he acts), but Hezbollah is a reminder that intervening in neighboring countries can create long-term problems for Israel.
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Nov 4, 2017 16:58
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Duckbox posted:I wonder how much of ISIS's operational leadership is even still alive at this point. They have no capital and whatever is left of their central command is cowering somewhere along the Euphrates with three armies closing in on it amid sustained bombing and information warfare. At this point IS is basically back to being an insurgency. They are still very active in Diyala and Salahuddin and pretty much conduct raids every single day on PMU and ISF positions before retreating back to wherever they're hiding. The IS fighters take their commands from their Wilayat's and not from the central leadership, at this point they all know their caliphate is over. It wouldn't surprise me if some high-up IS figures have managed to smuggle their way out of the Euphrates area, maybe even out of Syria and Iraq.
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Nov 4, 2017 17:04
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Saudi shoots down houthi ballistic missile over Riyadh http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-41872995 Oh poo poo it looks like the houthis launched the missiles at Riyadh Airport, reports of explosions https://twitter.com/ajenglish/status/926875124657160198 Reports of smoke from the airport:- http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/yemen-houthi-fire-missile-saudi-arabia-riyadh-171104180946302.html Al-Saqr fucked around with this message at 20:18 on Nov 4, 2017 |
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Nov 4, 2017 20:11
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Massive government firings happening, people as high up as Prince Miteb the head of the national guard being fired, will be back later tonight with details. here are links to tide you over:- https://english.alarabiya.net/en/Ne...tion-probe.html http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/11/saudi-ministers-national-guard-economy-dismissed-171104190619900.html
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Nov 4, 2017 22:27
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Is this indicative of some kind of strategy or shifting coalition among the princes? I hate this kind of black-box politics, at least in the American political-theatre the clowns have to mime out their intentions for the mob. Not much to make sense of in these Royal schemes.
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Nov 4, 2017 23:47
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Count Roland posted:http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-41870406 None of this is tinfoil hat, it is just reality.
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Nov 4, 2017 23:55
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I think at this point we can just call it a coup. Monarchies aren't really ruled by one person but by a court oligarchy. The king is still the king, but MBS has taken up the mantle of the heir apparent, which means he's effectively in power already. Now he's purging the government of rivals/threats, which probably means that anyone loyal to the previous crown prince is going to get booted in favor of his people. These purges are almost inevitable in oligarchic systems because, as we've seen, even a crown prince can be vulnerable if a rival gains too much power.
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Nov 5, 2017 00:05
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Al-Saqr posted:Saudi shoots down houthi ballistic missile over Riyadh https://twitter.com/StratSentinel/status/926881254804545536 Video of this.
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Nov 5, 2017 00:15
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I'm outside so I can't talk much, but holy poo poo, WALID BIN TALAL got arrested!!!!! This is huge!! https://twitter.com/joyce_karam/status/926914862722179073 Looks like his mile high tower is gonna be put on hold!
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Nov 5, 2017 00:22
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Al-Saqr posted:I'm outside so I can't talk much, but holy poo poo, WALID BIN TALAL got arrested!!!!! This is huge!! As one mans tower falls, the soap gets slippery.
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Nov 5, 2017 00:41
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Can someone walk me through whatever the gently caress is happening in Saudi Arabia in very small words? Like is there a genuine chance for political change here or is this just the usual succession process bullshit? Seriously all I understand of the current situation is there's a new heir apparent, Crown Prince Something-or-Other, who has been mouthing the usual words about moderation and tolerance that the Western media loves, and now Various Important People are getting arrested. Do the Yemeni missiles falling on Saudi airports have anything to do with Saudi domestic politics?
Vincent Van Goatse fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Nov 5, 2017 |
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Nov 5, 2017 01:14
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Can someone walk me through whatever the gently caress is happening in Saudi Arabia in very small words? Like is there a genuine chance for political change here or is this just the usual succession process bullshit? The latter, to a certain definition of "usual" considering the general idea of royal successions is to have as few of them as possible, and this appears to be a particularly comprehensive consolidation at a very delicate time in middle east politics. It is a genuine political change and interesting for that! But probably not in the way one would outright hope for.
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Nov 5, 2017 01:29
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This is definitely different than normal for Saudi Arabia. They were staring at a generational crisis for a long time since they had an unbelievably stupid succession system in which the slightly younger brother of an ancient monarch would take over after he died, so you'd end up with another near-dead king at least ostensibly running things (often they'd be infirm so the crown prince or other royals would step in to take on a lot of his duties). Eventually they realized that system wasn't working anymore, so they started choosing crown princes instead, and the current king fired the last one to replace him with his son. There was immediate pressure on the media and everyone else to talk about how great the new crown prince was, and now it seems the consolidation of power behind the crown prince is continuing with these arrests. Tl;dr version: Rule by tradition and consensus is being replaced by an ambitious prince who wants to consolidate power behind himself. Dr Kool-AIDS fucked around with this message at 01:43 on Nov 5, 2017 |
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Nov 5, 2017 01:40
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Can someone walk me through whatever the gently caress is happening in Saudi Arabia in very small words? Like is there a genuine chance for political change here or is this just the usual succession process bullshit? Seriously all I understand of the current situation is there's a new heir apparent, Crown Prince Something-or-Other, who has been mouthing the usual words about moderation and tolerance that the Western media loves, and now Various Important People are getting arrested. Do the Yemeni missiles falling on Saudi airports have anything to do with Saudi domestic politics? basically what we're seeing is the most dramatic and violent capture of power by a prince since King Faisal deposed king Saud in 1964, this isnt a political change but a really dramatic changing of the leadership of the royal family and the structure of power within the family. Like, it's probably not a good or progressive change since the country is fully headed into a police state corporate nightmare with some makeup such as women driving, but it is a rather dramatic changing of the centers of power of the people who run things, way beyond what I thought was going to happed that's for sure.
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Nov 5, 2017 01:42
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In short: The plaques and portraits are changing. Nothing else is.
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Nov 5, 2017 02:47
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I've probably repeated this in this thread before, but I've got a gut feeling that MBS is biting off way more than he can chew. He has to be pissing off some princes that still retain considerable power, what with the purges of the previous crown prince (who headed the Interior ministry, basically their FBI), and all these other princes and businessmen today. He's already proven himself to be a hothead with poor judgement and strategic thinking, what with the Yemen debacle and the failed Qatar embargo. And he'd be a young head of state anywhere, but this is a country where kings ascend at about the same age as popes do. Whether it's now or after he becomes king, someone has to be plotting behind the scenes to wipe that poo poo-eating grin off the crown prince's face.
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Nov 5, 2017 02:52
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Ramrod Hotshot posted:I've probably repeated this in this thread before, but I've got a gut feeling that MBS is biting off way more than he can chew. He has to be pissing off some princes that still retain considerable power, what with the purges of the previous crown prince (who headed the Interior ministry, basically their FBI), and all these other princes and businessmen today. He's already proven himself to be a hothead with poor judgement and strategic thinking, what with the Yemen debacle and the failed Qatar embargo. And he'd be a young head of state anywhere, but this is a country where kings ascend at about the same age as popes do. Whether it's now or after he becomes king, someone has to be plotting behind the scenes to wipe that poo poo-eating grin off the crown prince's face. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FJg9ZrvaGc
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Nov 5, 2017 02:54
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Sinteres posted:This is definitely different than normal for Saudi Arabia. They were staring at a generational crisis for a long time since they had an unbelievably stupid succession system in which the slightly younger brother of an ancient monarch would take over after he died, so you'd end up with another near-dead king at least ostensibly running things (often they'd be infirm so the crown prince or other royals would step in to take on a lot of his duties). Eventually they realized that system wasn't working anymore, so they started choosing crown princes instead, and the current king fired the last one to replace him with his son. There was immediate pressure on the media and everyone else to talk about how great the new crown prince was, and now it seems the consolidation of power behind the crown prince is continuing with these arrests. Al-Saqr posted:basically what we're seeing is the most dramatic and violent capture of power by a prince since King Faisal deposed king Saud in 1964, this isnt a political change but a really dramatic changing of the leadership of the royal family and the structure of power within the family. Thank you. This explains everything, and I'm not being sarcastic when I say that.
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Nov 5, 2017 03:08
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Ramrod Hotshot posted:I've probably repeated this in this thread before, but I've got a gut feeling that MBS is biting off way more than he can chew. He has to be pissing off some princes that still retain considerable power, what with the purges of the previous crown prince (who headed the Interior ministry, basically their FBI), and all these other princes and businessmen today. He's already proven himself to be a hothead with poor judgement and strategic thinking, what with the Yemen debacle and the failed Qatar embargo. And he'd be a young head of state anywhere, but this is a country where kings ascend at about the same age as popes do. Whether it's now or after he becomes king, someone has to be plotting behind the scenes to wipe that poo poo-eating grin off the crown prince's face. And assuming the Hariri "resignation" is part of MBS's plan, he just made himself some new enemies in a country they can't afford to piss off too much
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Nov 5, 2017 03:26
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https://twitter.com/BaFana3/status/926974746184515584 http://saudigazette.com.sa/article/521049/SAUDI-ARABIA/New-anti-terror-laws-include-death-penalty
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Nov 5, 2017 04:19
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