monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

@ehBeth,

Quote:

Trudeau is scared shitless of Islam.

That is the point I wanted to make. India is just an example of what a ill-equipped simpleton he truly is.

@ehBeth,

That sounds good in theory but in practice it's a near impossibility.

http://jewsdownunder.com/wp-content/uploads/Syria.jpg

Iraq is dealing with its own insurgencies, Lebanon is tiny and is still recovering from its own sectarian strife. If Israel got involved that would open up a whole new can of worms. That leaves Jordan and Turkey, Turkey is a NATO member and any wholescale involvement would be seen as Western involvement and Jordan isn't strong enough.

Quote:

The Jordanian military is dwarfed by the regional powers in the area including Egypt, Israel and Turkey as well as the encroaching forces of Iran.

Unlike some of its more powerful neighbors, Jordan does not seem to have the population with sufficient social cohesion to draw on nor the resources to train, equip and field a much larger military than it does already.

https://www.quora.com/How-does-the-Jordanian-military-compare-with-other-militaries-in-the-region-What-could-be-the-reasons-for-differences-if-they-exist

1 Reply

@izzythepush,

izzythepush wrote:

That sounds good in theory but in practice it's a near impossibility.

which still doesn't give the West any right to muck about in the ME

we have to step back. countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran need to step up as peacemakers/peacekeepers in the region without always to handing-off to countries who enjoy interfering

1 Reply

@ehBeth,

Like Izzythepush said, there is a Shia Sunni war (has been forever)going on for all the immediate neighbors. I doubt Saudi Arabia really cares about the people in Syria getting gassed. It is all about waging their war with Iran and other Shia countries. I think we should stay out of the Yemen thing and not support SA war there and concentrate with our allies of the west on getting rid of Assad because he has committed war crimes in his use of chemical weapons on his people. After that, work on containment and then get most of our troops out of the whole blame place in the ME.

2 Replies

@revelette1,

revelette1 wrote:

Like Izzythepush said, there is a Shia Sunni war (has been forever)going on for all the immediate neighbors.

yes I know and I continue to believe it is not the place of the West to interfere in the ME in any way. We have made a big mess - and we continue to make it worse every time we step in.

1 Reply

@coldjoint,

coldjoint wrote:

India is just an example of what a ill-equipped simpleton he truly is.

we're pretty happy with the deals and $ Trudeau came back with. Not a guy I've voted for. Not a guy I would vote for. but ...he's getting business done and getting Canada into good non-US trade alliances so I can't complain about his goofy outfit choices - in India or at Hallowe'en.

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@ehBeth,

Saying what needs to be done by other countries sounds an awful lot like handwringing. I think everyone can agree that something needs to be done. The West has been mucking around in the ME for a long time, unfortunately its still more concerned with its own interests than looking for a real solution.

Iran and Saudi Arabia need to sit down together and thrash all this out. That should be what our leaders should be doing, pressurising the Saudi Crown Prince to get off his arse and go to Tehran.

Instead you've got Trump allowing the Saudis to set America's foreign policy in the ME, which includes marginalising Iran and trying to weasel out of international treaties.

There's a multitude of reasons, oil, Israel, Suez and a **** ton of trade on Western stock markets, but really it all boils down to one thing. The wealthy banks and global corporations that fund our governments would rather things stay the way they are.

0 Replies

@ehBeth,

ehBeth wrote:

revelette1 wrote:
Who do you imagine will do it?

their immediate neighbours

You are echoing Trump's stated policy goals.

As Finn has noted it's one thing to note crimes by authoritarian dictatorships, but quite another to intervene to take them out. Lots of side effects and other considerations involved and hard to know how much net good will result.

1 Reply

@ehBeth,

ehBeth wrote:

revelette1 wrote:

Like Izzythepush said, there is a Shia Sunni war (has been forever)going on for all the immediate neighbors.

yes I know and I continue to believe it is not the place of the West to interfere in the ME in any way. We have made a big mess - and we continue to make it worse every time we step in.

Careful, you're getting dangerously close to commenting on the British intervention in the Ottoman Empire during WWI. Izzy is very sensitive about that.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

You sure were singing a different tune when Cheney was pushing the Iraq war because there was a possibility of a "mushroom cloud." So tell me, what is the difference between then and now other than Assad actually has them now and has been using them?

0 Replies

@georgeob1,

georgeob1 wrote:

... commenting on the British intervention in the Ottoman Empire during WWI ...

Actually, this was instigated by the Germans (> pursuit of SMS Goeben and SMS Breslau).

1 Reply

@blatham,

blatham wrote:

Shop at Dicks!

No. I prefer to patronize stores that do not strive to violate my rights.

0 Replies

@revelette1,

revelette1 wrote:

Chemical attacks can never be irrelevant, but I understand what you are saying and I agree, the situation is horrible. If we killed more innocents last weekend in an effort to kill IS, that is inexcusable too. Surely they didn't just fire off indiscriminately in civilian areas regardless if IS is there?

I'm not sure what event you are referring to, but collateral damage is allowed in war.

revelette1 wrote:

I don't understand why more effort is not spent in going after the Assad regime and less on IS as the Assad situation seems the more urgent (long urgent if that makes sense) right now.

Assad is repugnant to us, but he is not trying to attack us or destroy us.

Islamic State was committed to attacking and destroying us.

0 Replies

@Finn dAbuzz,

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

Look what happened when your heroes Obama and Clinton went into Libya and took out Ghadaffi because Hillary wanted to notch her belt with a dictator.

I really don't know why everyone thinks that our war in Libya wasn't the embodiment of perfection.

Finn dAbuzz wrote:

Unless we are prepared to own the backward countries we liberate, the most we should do is spank the dictators when they cross our red lines.

Kadaffy being anally raped with a bowie knife and then shot in the head seems an appropriate punishment for the Lockerbie bombing.

1 Reply

@revelette1,

revelette1 wrote:

I think we should stay out of the Yemen thing and not support SA war there and concentrate with our allies of the west on getting rid of Assad because he has committed war crimes in his use of chemical weapons on his people.

Some of the factions in Yemen (the ones we are warring against) are actually trying to attack and destroy us and our allies.

0 Replies

@Walter Hinteler,

Walter Hinteler wrote:

georgeob1 wrote:
... commenting on the British intervention in the Ottoman Empire during WWI ...
Actually, this was instigated by the Germans (> pursuit of SMS Goeben and SMS Breslau).

The rivalry with Germany started well before that with the Wilhelm's Planned Berlin to Bagdad railway.

British reactions to the Ottomans depended inversely on their relations with Russia.

Their ambitions in the Mid East took a new turn first with their expropriation of the Suez Canal in 1882 and later with the exploration for oil by William D'Arcy in 1901 and later (1908) codified in an exclusive agreement with Persia and other ongoing agreements with Local authorities in Bahrain and what is now Kuwait.

1 Reply

@georgeob1,

Might be so. But nevertheless, Turkey only became involved under German pressure. And when the SMS Goeben and SMS Breslau got the new names Yavuz Sultan Selim and Midilli in the Turkish navy (with German crew) ...

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Just as was to be the case in the Second World War, the Dardanelles represented a potential avenue of supply for the Russians. In the Great War, the Young Turks thought to burnish their reputation and legitimize their regime by allying themselves to the Central Powers. As Churchill points out in his history of the Second World War, the Brits attempted to get the Turks to ally themselves with the western powers in 1940, but Mustafa Kemal was dead, and the timidity of the succeeding leadership precluded that. So it was that Herbert Norman Schwarzkopf, St. was sent to Persia in 1941, and the Brits and the Americans set up and propped up Shah Pahlavi, to provide the conduit to Russia. (Of course, Schwartzkopf took his son with him to Teheran, which is why Norman Schwartzkopt, Jr. was in charge of the Central Command at the time of the 1990-91 Gulf War.)

This is all strategic considerations 101.

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Justice IG sends criminal referral of Andrew McCabe to US attorney (CNN)

Manafort Suspected as ‘Back Channel’ to Russia, U.S. Says (Bloomberg)

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@oralloy,

Quote:

I really don't know why everyone thinks that our war in Libya wasn't the embodiment of perfection.

Maybe because it removed a strongman who after Reagan almost blew his ass off was content with oppressing just his people. Now we have another failed state where terrorists can thrive.

I hardly mourn Moammar (although no one should die as he did), but since Obama and Clinton weren't prepared to replace him with a democratic reformer, the intervention was all for show and led to the terrible tragedy of Benghazi.

1 Reply

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