ISIS...Islamic State Victims

We need to be careful though regarding placing too much trust in these rebel groups. They have a track record of factionalising and changing sides

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...ons-over-to-al-Qaedas-affiliate-in-Syria.html

Similarly,

https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...8b1351-8fb7-4f7e-a477-66ec0a0aaf34_story.html

You do wonder if it's stories like this which have caused the American's to warn Russia about their involvement making things worse? It's actually a back door acknowledgement of their own failure, but in truth, it isn't without legitimacy. The history of these types of interventions is that if you can't deliver a decisive early blow, the goodwill you might have enjoyed initially will turn against you and you end up becoming a recruiting agent for the people you're trying to oppose

Harakat Hazm were also part of the same covert CIA programme seemingly and have also handed their weapons over to Jabhat al Nusra. Is this the reason (probably allied to their experience in Afghnistan in the 1980's) which is preventing America from supplying anti aircraft missiles (rightly so). They simply can't guarantee whose hands they'll end up in, and where they'll be used, against what

In terms of the number of groups, splinters, and factions etc, Wikipedia has brought something together which gives you an insight of the complexity. Good luck if you can sort this lot out, but I note a few of the groups we've featured fail to appear on it, which makes you realise just how fluid this situation is with its various splits, factions, and amalgamations

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_armed_groups_in_the_Syrian_Civil_War

Ultimately I think a lot of this comes down to how you prioritise.
 
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I saw something on facebook yesterday, which said, 'they lied about Iraq 2003 and now they're doing the same with Syria'.

The situation now faced in Syria and ISIS couldn't be further from 2003 and Saddam, imo.
Anyone can see this is a genuine catastrophe. I was wholly against 2003 invasion, but where there is a genuine case for military intervention I do believe calculations and considerations should be made to determine if your doing more good than bad by intervening.

So I don't buy into far left anti-war viewpoints and frankly the far right has been wrong too often to take seriously, there must be some sort of middle way here. Assad's fate is still pending, and ISIS seem the greater threat to the world at present.

As the Americans and west are powerless to do anything maybe we should let Russia play a much more strategic role in the middle east, but if the West agree the Russians should do that, then at the same time the West should back off and literally let the Russians take over and do all the donkey work.

Because the idea that the British, Americans, Russians can all be doing their own thing and bombing that part of the world without any joint up effort could be more dangerous than Assad or ISIS, imo.

The biggest players should either work together, or let one power like Russia go for it.
The option seemingly being used now of all taking an 'active role' while actually viewing the other active party like Russia as a strategic enemy is what could end in tears, imo.

Ps, really this entire subject and the middle east is not one of strong subjects.
So I'm wary of trying to debate this too much, or I'll get caught out. ;)
 
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marble said:
As the Americans and west are powerless to do anything maybe we should let Russia play a much more strategic role in the middle east, but if the west think the Russians should do that, then at the same time the West should back off and literally let the Russians take over and do all the donkey work.
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If it's proven that a bomb was responsible for the air crash in Sinai, then it would seem likely this will catalyse Russia into a much more strategic role, taking over and doing all the donkey work

Which is the polite way of saying 'all guns blazing'

Bears sleep well but when woken by a sharp kick to the hindquarters tend to be ill-tempered and very dangerous

Where this is all going I don't know and fear to guess
 
marble said:
The biggest players should either work together, or let one power like Russia go for it.
The option seemingly being used now of all talking an 'active role' while actually viewing the other active party like Russia as a strategic enemy is what could end in tears, imo.
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Too damn right !
This is getting worse by the day; the world needs a strong leader to defeat the existential threat that is ISIS. The West (and the world) is badly in need of a decisive leader to confront the murderous neanderthals of militant Islam.
Sadly, Cameron isn't up to it; Cameron ain't no Churchill. Even more so, Obama isn't a Franklin Roosevelt. The West and Civilisation in general is being badly let down by weak, vacillating leadership.

Get off the pan, you've already made the entire middle-east FUBAR with your meddling; and let Putin go to work. Stop dropshipping tons of weaponry to "moderate" Islamicists (which would be a funny term if it weren't so tragic); share your intel with the Russians, and stop the "Assad Must Go" rhetoric.

Then we all might just have a chance. It's possibly too late now -- I honestly think the war is already lost, and the era of the caliphate has begun -- but at least it's worth a shot.
 
Drone said:
Where this is all going I don't know and fear to guess
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There's so many countries with so many weapons, if anything ever does kick off there won't be much time for flights to Vienna for peace talks either at that point.

I can't help thinking, in my heart of hearts of hearts, that playing the cards we did in 2003 has left our foreign policy fucked until we all move base and live on Mars whenever that will be.

Thanks Tony and George.....:(
 
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Tiresome stuff colin

did either ever go into this wanting to kill anyone at all ? Bar sadam perhaps?

did either ever suggest genocide for those of another religious belief? I don't think so

look at the isis Al quera apologists on the left who are influential in corbyns team and think again

you can believe both sides were wrong but to directly equate the intentions of bush and blairs with thode of isis and bin laden (which the idiot far left do) is risible
 
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if that plane went down with an izal bomb on it..then i'd be guessing its only a matter of time before Russia start using izals caliphate..or barren waste land.... as a nuclear testing area
 
clivex said:
Tiresome stuff colin

did either ever go into this wanting to kill anyone at all ? Bar sadam perhaps?

did either ever suggest genocide for those of another religious belief? I don't think so

look at the isis Al quera apologists on the left who are influential in corbyns team and think again

you can believe both sides were wrong but to directly equate the intentions of bush and blairs with thode of isis and bin laden (which the idiot far left do) is risible
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ISIS is the bast*ard off-spring of the Iraq War and the Arab Spring. This is undeniable fact, and I will not even get into a discussion with you about it, because you can't make a blind man see.

Besides, pouring over Cause is pointless - dealing with Effect is much more purposeful - and I expect you're again going a little bit schizo, considering Putin is the one who is single-handedly taking the fight to ISIS.

Cue some boll*ocks from you about ISIS isn't Ukraine blah blah fu*cking blah.

This much I know myself, thank you very much. The point is that Governments do unpleasant things - even democratic ones. Western support for the totalitarian Wahhabist regime that is Saudi Arabia is an example. And for all their spouting-off about democracy, it sits easy with pretty-much every Western country, that a military dictatorship has been restored in Egypt, at the expense of a democratically-elected government.

Western countries promotion of democracy is self-evidently tempered by a realisation that it only works when it delivers the right kind of Government. Hopefully the recent misadventures will put an end to this idiotic mindset.
 
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Well I'd you can't see that the reason the muslim brotheehood was chucked out in Egypt was because they were clearly eroding imdependent institutions then continue to wallow in your ignorance. The Egyptians could see what was on the agenda

so it was "idiotic" to "promote" democracy in Latin america Asia africa and eastern europe then?

these countries would be better off with dictators would they?

Mind you quite q few here would probably think so.

The he probelm with many democracies is that they are not secular and they also do not have the institutions to make them work. The I dpendent rule of law and independent civil service. But which ever way you look at it preferring totalitarian states is plain ignorant and a bit sick. You will get the very occasional Singapore but ultimately without representation you are sitting in a pressure cooker

You blame the Arab spring ? How stupid of them to want a better state and freedoms and the right to vote? Stupid Arabs eh. Know no better

but of course a five year old would understand why the Arab spring happened in the first place wouldn't they?

and its moronic to state that le pen farages and every inadequate creeps hero is the "only one" taking the fight to isis. I have no problem with them doing so but its frankly weird to think that was the sole agenda and that has been the sole target.
 
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clivex said:
Well I'd you can't see that the reason the muslim brotheehood was chucked out in Egypt was because they were clearly eroding imdependent institutions then continue to wallow in your ignorance. The Egyptians could see what was on the agenda
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What the f*ck has that got to do with anything? If that was the case wouldn't waiting until the next election and then throwing them out be the 'democratic way'? Or can you throw democracy to one side when it doesn't suit you (see my earlier point).

so it was "idiotic" to "promote" democracy in Latin america Asia africa and eastern europe then?

these countries would be better off with dictators would they?
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How many of these countries had democracy imposed on them from outside? Actually, I don't dispute that these are good examples, but then again, they were clearly ready for it, and passive encouragement is entirely legit. But there is a world of a difference between these examples, and those of the Middle-Eastern Arab states, where people tend not to differentiate between Islam as a religion and a political movement; mainly because - in the eyes of a Muslim - there is no material difference. Islam is political dogma and religion together, and the two are indivisible. That's why you run the risk of authoritarian/hardline Islamists getting in power in these countries.

The point? Learn which countries are ready for democracy, and which are not - it doesn't work across the board.



and its moronic to state that le pen farages and every inadequate creeps hero is the "only one" taking the fight to isis. I have no problem with them doing so but its frankly weird to think that was the sole agenda and that has been the sole target.
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No idea what the fu*ck you're talking about here.
 
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They should have waited for an election. If there had been one.l. Hamas anyone?

the three biggest muslim countries are democracies. Turkey Indonesia and pakistan. End of

you stated that Putin is only one fighting isis. Rubbish
 
marble said:
The biggest players should either work together, or let one power like Russia go for it.
The option seemingly being used now of all taking an 'active role' while actually viewing the other active party like Russia as a strategic enemy is what could end in tears, imo.
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One of the big problems that ISIL were able to exploit by virtue of good fortune, was that all the players who might have challenged them were too busy identifying the wrong threat. Basically ISIL were everyone's second or third priority

The US were more concerned about achieving democratic accountability in Iraq (replacing Malaki and getting a more representative structure)
The Shia Iraqi government more concerned about the Sunnis
The Iranians, the Saudis (and vice versa)
The Turks, the Kurds
The British seemed to be irrationally obsessing on Assad (some of the observations made by David Richards regarding Cameron are hilarious)
The French were interested in creeping to the Americans and trying to fill some of the void that the UK had lost post Libya
Even Assad seemed more interested in dissident groups before he came to fully appreciate the danger posed by ISIL

This has allowed ISIL to grow beyond that which they should have been allowed to.

ISIL have a number of strengths now which means I'm far from convinced they will be easily defeated any longer. That time has passed. Their ability to command fierce loyalty and obsessive fighting spirit amongst their followers has to be respected. As does their ability to replenish their losses. This will become even more apparent in the next decade as the produce of the baby breeding Jihadi factories starts to reach martyrdom age

They also have a number of weaknesses though. They lack an industrial base and therefore the eapons they've got are largely pilfered or supplied by sympathtic donors in the Gulf. They're geographically surrounded without natural defences. They are seemingly following a prophetic play book that makes them reasonably predictable
 
I have no idea. Who's going to put troops on the ground. ? It will be by gradual erosion I believe and it's true about the economic base. That's got to come under enormous pressure if not already.
 
clivex said:
so it was "idiotic" to "promote" democracy in Latin america Asia africa and eastern europe then?

these countries would be better off with dictators would they?
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Grasshopper might let you get away with this, but I'm not going to be quite so charitable, as I think the picture is much more opaque. For every good example, there's a counter example.

Overall democracy was held back in South America in favour of military juntas for decades by the direct activity of the USA, most notably in Chile when the CIA ousted the democratically elected Salvador Allende and replaced him with Augustin Pinochet.

The CIA were also instrumental in Ecuador too, installing General Lara in 1972 to replace their democratically elected government (I use democratic loosely, but something did exist that would pass as a democracy)

Uruguay had been one of the more stable and vaguely democratic countries of South America until 1973 when a military junta banned socialism and in doing so made political opposition illegal

Colombia waited until 1974 before they outlawed democracy and the behest of their string pullers

Argentina you will know about, but might choose to recall how the USA spent 3 weeks sitting on the fence about who to back over the Falklands. The US delegation at the UN even attended the Argentine party to celebrate their capture. In Al Haig's memoirs he makes it clear that it was he, supported by Cap Weinberger, who persuaded Reagan to back Thatcher. Reagan was quite prepared to stay neutral and knife Britian in order to keep South America in the hands of right wing juntas

There is a whole grubby history of democratic movements being quashed in central America by the US for fear that they might develop socialist symapthies, from El Salvador, to Guatamala

It was only when the Soviet Union ceased to be a threat that democracy suddenly took off on the continent. Ever wondered why that was? It seems too much to ask that people suddenly had a spontaneous conscious awakening doesn't it? It was because it was the first time it was encouraged and allowed. In that respect the evidence of South America supports Grasshopper's assertion that it isn't the structure that is promoted, but rather the result, and if that result doesn't go the way that people want it to, then the movement is disrupted and dictators imposed. You saw the same thing happen in Angola incidentally with the so called Unita Freedom Fighters refusing to accept a result and going back to war. Indeed, we only saw an official admission earlier this year that the CIA had scuppered democracy in Iran 1959 and installed the Shah for fear that a democratically elected government might gravitate towards Moscow. This would be another example of how the laws of unintended consequences plays out, as the Shah begat Khomeni, begat the Islamic Revolution and Iran Iraq war, begat Iraq's invasion of Kuwait

It's rarely black and white, there's a whole load of grey where democracy and expediency come into conflict
 
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30 viewers reading chit chat, are the clever people (you know who) reading in???

Alun, would you care to hazard a guess as to what this new signals intelligence is?

If I recall my information correctly the Americans justified a lot of the big spying stuff on Facebook exposed by Snowden, on the basis they were working on a new signals intelligence.

There's always new ways of doing things that come to light of, its just the specifics of this particular term which are of interest.
 
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clivex said:
I have no idea. Who's going to put troops on the ground. ? It will be by gradual erosion I believe and it's true about the economic base. That's got to come under enormous pressure if not already.
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Well that's an admission of sorts I suppose.

The bottom line is, anyone can produce a list of countries or players who they don't want involved. That's easy. But sadly the luxury of choice isn't one we necessarily have. You need to identify the willing, and, the capable. When you start drawing up that list your options start to narrow quite alarmingly. Try doing it, and hopefully you'll start to realise that its a sub-optimal solution

Broadly speaking we have the following engaged

Syrian army = credible opponents if supported
Kurds = motivated and credible, but only interested in their own homeland. Won't fight beyond that border
Hezbollah & Quds = motivated and credible, but run a severe risk of expanding the conflict
Shia militia = motivated and credible but even more risky than Hezbollah as witnessed in Tikrit
Free Syrian Army = disjointed amalgam of splinter groups and factions, unreliable, difficult to see how they can win the shooting war
Iraqi army = not a credible fighting option
al Nusra = AQ affiliate, might not like ISIL, but clearly no option

Your gradualist approach is most unlikely to work. Inertia plays into ISIL's hands. They're likely to be the ones who gain territory under this strategy, as indeed has been the pattern to date. Think yourself lucky that we still have people on the ground willing and capable of fighting ISIL though. It saves us from doing so.

I don't see how organising an election anytime soon helps anything either? Indeed, you could probably argue its just about the last thing the country needs right now. There is no way that ISIL will be the slightest bit detered by it anyway. Similarly, I don't see that widespread economic collapse is imminent unless the people are able to rise up to affect it. My own feeling is that they'll simply be slaughtered, and in any event, I wouldn't under estimate the resiliance of the ISIL fighters to endure hardship

We want the caliphate defeating, and ideally at the hands of someone who doesn't risk expanding the theatre of conflict. That rules a lot of players out. We know that if the US got involved on the ground it will be used to rally and recruit. I suspect the same will apply to Russia in time. If Iran gets involved it risks escalation if Saudia Arabia and Qatar increase their own supply to rebel groups with all the attendant risks of a wider regional sunni/ shia conflict. The least risk option to my eyes at least would be if Syria and Iraq were able to regain control of their own territory. This probably means America strong arming the Gulf states to crack down on their sponsorship of various opposition groups in other people's countries. It's difficult for these Gulf states to argue they're working in support of democracy when their own records are so appalling. Indeed, Saudi Arabia has been prepared to support Sunni rebels in Syria, yet wasted no time cracking down in shia protests in Bahrain. They're clearly pedalling sectarian divisions and are as big a part of the problem than they are any solution. It also then requires the US and Russia to provide the top cover and some of the hardware to allow the Syrian state to re-establish itself and defeat the caliphate. When this is achieved, we can then set about resolving the peace. Assad will by then be little more than grateful puppet. I would think the field is a lot less encumbered for moving towards a different resolution provided the key stakeholders co-operate
 
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marble said:
Alun, would you care to hazard a guess as to what this new signals intelligence is?
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From a tecnical point of view? No. Basically the people who wage surviellance warfare operate at a level well in advance of anything I understand.

From a nuance point of view, so far as I can see the concern is probably restricted to Egyptian airport security and Sharm al Shiekh in particular. I'm sure the fear would be that ISIL got hold of Stinger missiles or similar, but I don't think the behaviour of the authorities suggests they believe they have (yet). I note for instance that America has been at pains to stress that they haven't supplied any anti aircraft kit to the Free Syrian Army, and that the initial denial that a shoot down was possible was qualified by the phrase "believed to possess anything capable". They're clearly leaving open the possibility that they could.

There's always been speculation about elaborate ways of bringing aircraft down of course, I have no idea if we've moved any nearer to this kind of thing, but I doubt it. One would hope that if we had then our government's might be a little bit more transparent. The logical percentage call is to suggest that a bomb is repsonsible, and perhaps some bombmaker might have found a new way for concealing one
 
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Warbler said:
Grasshopper might let you get away with this, but I'm not going to be quite so charitable, as I think the picture is much more opaque. For every good example, there's a counter example.

Overall democracy was held back in South America in favour of military juntas for decades by the direct activity of the USA, most notably in Chile when the CIA ousted the democratically elected Salvador Allende and replaced him with Augustin Pinochet.

The CIA were also instrumental in Ecuador too, installing General Lara in 1972 to replace their democratically elected government (I use democratic loosely, but something did exist that would pass as a democracy)

Uruguay had been one of the more stable and vaguely democratic countries of South America until 1973 when a military junta banned socialism and in doing so made political opposition illegal

Colombia waited until 1974 before they outlawed democracy and the behest of their string pullers

Argentina you will know about, but might choose to recall how the USA spent 3 weeks sitting on the fence about who to back over the Falklands. The US delegation at the UN even attended the Argentine party to celebrate their capture. In Al Haig's memoirs he makes it clear that it was he, supported by Cap Weinberger, who persuaded Reagan to back Thatcher. Reagan was quite prepared to stay neutral and knife Britian in order to keep South America in the hands of right wing juntas

There is a whole grubby history of democratic movements being quashed in central America by the US for fear that they might develop socialist symapthies, from El Salvador, to Guatamala

It was only when the Soviet Union ceased to be a threat that democracy suddenly took off on the continent. Ever wondered why that was? It seems too much to ask that people suddenly had a spontaneous conscious awakening doesn't it? It was because it was the first time it was encouraged and allowed. In that respect the evidence of South America supports Grasshopper's assertion that it isn't the structure that is promoted, but rather the result, and if that result doesn't go the way that people want it to, then the movement is disrupted and dictators imposed. You saw the same thing happen in Angola incidentally with the so called Unita Freedom Fighters refusing to accept a result and going back to war. Indeed, we only saw an official admission earlier this year that the CIA had scuppered democracy in Iran 1959 and installed the Shah for fear that a democratically elected government might gravitate towards Moscow. This would be another example of how the laws of unintended consequences plays out, as the Shah begat Khomeni, begat the Islamic Revolution and Iran Iraq war, begat Iraq's invasion of Kuwait

It's rarely black and white, there's a whole load of grey where democracy and expediency come into conflict
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you are talking about 50 plus years ago. You continually live in the past. No ones impressed by 5000 words on this . Aside from it being irrelevant, no one here needs to know what the usa did back then . They know anywya

i don't recall King Arthur promoting democracy either. So what

pointless

the current and recent western governments promote and support democracy.Obama has no interest in overturning democratic governments in any state in South america. Even Venezuela ...which is a socialisiT disaster.
 
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