West Asia News and Discussions (YEMEN, gulf)

[ShauryaT]

Sahi toh bol raha hai. North Vietnam was more pure than South Vietnam. ISIS - sunnis are more pure than the Sunnis who have made peace with the Shias and are dominating them.

If Americans do not have in them to be colonizers, then why the hell do they f(ck around. If you break it, you own it. Friedman was making a case to not mess - AFTER the US has contributed to the mess. Watch the documentary, I linked, it will be clear.

[ShauryaT]

ISIS and Vietnam

ISIS and Vietnam

In May, I visited Vietnam and met with university students. After a week of being love-bombed by Vietnamese, who told me how much they admire America, want to work or study there and have friends and family living there, I couldn’t help but ask myself: “How did we get this country so wrong? How did we end up in a war with Vietnam that cost so many lives and drove them into the arms of their most hated enemy, China?”

It’s a long, complicated story, I know, but a big part of it was failing to understand that the core political drama of Vietnam was an indigenous nationalist struggle against colonial rule — not the embrace of global communism, the interpretation we imposed on it.

The North Vietnamese were both communists and nationalists — and still are. But the key reason we failed in Vietnam was that the communists managed to harness the Vietnamese nationalist narrative much more effectively than our South Vietnamese allies, who were too often seen as corrupt or illegitimate. The North Vietnamese managed to win (with the help of brutal coercion) more Vietnamese support not because most Vietnamese bought into Marx and Lenin, but because Ho Chi Minh and his communist comrades were perceived to be the more authentic nationalists.

I believe something loosely akin to this is afoot in Iraq. The Islamic State, or ISIS, with its small core of jihadists, was able to seize so much non-jihadist Sunni territory in Syria and Iraq almost overnight — not because most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis suddenly bought into the Islamist narrative of ISIS’s self-appointed caliph. Most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis don’t want to marry off their daughters to a bearded Chechen fanatic, and more than a few of them pray five times a day and like to wash it down with a good Scotch. They have embraced or resigned themselves to ISIS because they were systematically abused by the pro-Shiite, pro-Iranian regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria and Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki in Iraq — and because they see ISIS as a vehicle to revive Sunni nationalism and end Shiite oppression.

The challenge the U.S. faces in Iraq is trying to defeat ISIS in tacit alliance with Syria and Iran, whose local Shiite allies are doing a lot of the fighting in Iraq and Syria. Iran is seen by many Syrian and Iraqi Sunnis as the “colonial power” dominating Iraq to keep it weak.

Obsessed with communism, America intervened in Vietnam’s civil war and took the place of the French colonialists. Obsessed with jihadism and 9/11, are we now doing the bidding of Iran and Syria in Iraq? Is jihadism to Sunni nationalism what communism was to Vietnamese nationalism: a fearsome ideological movement that triggers emotional reactions in the West — deliberately reinforced with videotaped beheadings — but that masks a deeper underlying nationalist movement that is to some degree legitimate and popular in its context?

I wonder what would have happened had ISIS not engaged in barbarism and declared: “We are the Islamic State. We represent the interests of Syrian and Iraqi Sunnis who have been brutalized by Persian-directed regimes of Damascus and Baghdad. If you think we’re murderous, then just Google ‘Bashar al-Assad and barrel bombs’ or ‘Iraqi Shiite militias and the use of power drills to kill Sunnis.’ You’ll see what we faced after you Americans left. Our goal is to secure the interests of Sunnis in Iraq and Syria. We want an autonomous ‘Sunnistan’ in Iraq just like the Kurds have a Kurdistan — with our own cut of Iraq’s oil wealth.”

That probably would have garnered huge support from Sunnis everywhere. ISIS’s magazine, Dabiq, recently published an article, “Reflections on the Final Crusade,” (transcribed by the Middle East Media Research Institute), which argued that America’s war on ISIS only serves the interests of America’s enemies: Iran and Russia. It quotes U.S. strategists as warning that Iran has created a “Shia-belt from Tehran through Baghdad to Beirut,” a threat much greater than ISIS.

Then why did ISIS behead two American journalists? Because ISIS is a coalition of foreign jihadists, local Sunni tribes and former Iraqi Baath Party military officers. I suspect the jihadists in charge want to draw the U.S. into another “crusade” against Muslims — just like Osama bin Laden — to energize and attract Muslims from across the world and to overcome their main weakness, namely that most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis are attracted to ISIS simply as a vehicle of their sectarian resurgence, not because they want puritanical/jihadist Islam. There is no better way to get secular Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis to fuse with ISIS than have America bomb them all.

ISIS needs to be contained before it destabilizes islands of decency like Jordan, Kurdistan and Lebanon. But destroying it? That will be hard, because it’s not just riding on some jihadist caliphate fantasy, but also on deep Sunni nationalist grievances. Separating the two is the best way to defeat ISIS, but the only way to separate mainstream Sunnis from jihadists is for mainstream Sunnis and Shiites to share power, to build a healthy interdependency from what is now an unhealthy one. Chances of that? Very low. I hope President Obama has thought this through.

[Aditya_V]

The rise of ISIS

An American view point from PBS.

But Tom Friedman has another half baked article today comparing ISIS to Vietnam! What do we do with these Americans

Look on the one hand the Americans know the truth is ISIS represents the Saudis and Qataris and is helped heavily by NATO member Turkey. NATO has also ensured by deploying patriot missiles etc that ISIS could not be attacked in traing camps in Turkey.

AT the same time they don't want a blowback of anther Terrorist attack or if anther Terrorist attack from the blue and be forced to attack there own allies. Hence all kinds of illogical logic will be found on CNN and US media.

[RSoami]

So why does Boka Haram exist in Nigeria. Because of American colonialism or because the Nigerian Christians have systematically abused the Muslims there.
Its a laughable piece of crap that Friedman is peddling there.

namely that most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis are attracted to ISIS simply as a vehicle of their sectarian resurgence, not because they want puritanical/jihadist Islam.

If most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis were impressed by sectarian resurgence, then they would have joined the much hyped `Free Syrian Army` to oppose Assad. That they are joining ISIS means they want puritanical/jihadist Islam.

What do we do with these Americans

[JE Menon]

Mr. Friedman must realise that though the world may be flat it is not thick.

[Philip]

Quarantine Americans as if they have Ebola! perhaps that may be the only good thing to come out of the disease.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 26846.html
Isis in Syria: A general reveals the lack of communication with the US - and his country's awkward relationship with their allies-by-default

A senior officer of Bashar al-Assad’s regime talks to Robert Fisk about his army’s brutal struggle with Isis, in a dirty war whose challenges include widespread atrocities

Robert Fisk
Damascus
Wednesday 29 October 2014

Phones were ringing through the army headquarters in central Damascus and a veteran of Syria's 1982 war with Israel in Lebanon was explaining how all wars involved victories and defeats - that Syria's forces also suffered setbacks in their war against “terrorism” - when the news arrived at his own desk. A flurry of calls established that Jabhat al-Nusra rebels had stormed into the centre of Idlib, the surrounded but still government-held city west of Aleppo; that they had captured the governor's office and were beheading senior Syrian officers. Our interview was not intended to have gone quite like this. It was a good day to see the general. Which means it was a bad day.

The leading Syrian army officer, who requested anonymity, takes a shrewd view of events - and history - and clearly had no objection to America's air strikes on Isis targets in his country, although he viewed them dispassionately. “Our army doesn't know where or when these strikes are going to happen,” he said. “We see aircraft on our radar - we can see everything - but if our checkpoints (on the front) see the strikes, it is only by chance. We and the Americans are not sharing information with each other. The Americans just do it. It's natural. They decide in the UN that they are going to do these strikes. Syria says 'yes'. We are fighting 'Daesh' (Isis) and the other terrorist groups. But America never asked us about their targets.”

Isis, Jabhat al-Nusra and other Islamist groups are one and the same - he dismisses the Free Syrian Army (FSA) so beloved of President Barack Obama and US Republicans as more of a fantasy army than a reality - and insists that the strategy of Isis and Jabhat al-Nusra is the same wherever the Syrian army fights them. “It's the same plan, the same orders, and we are using the same tactics in fighting them. There is a priority for the Syrian army - to know where they have to fight. I can't say that in all the military operations that the Syrian army is taking the upper hand. War is not just about victory. There are winners and losers. That is the nature of war.”

That's when the phones started ringing. Other officers arrived in the general's office. He walked into another room to take a call. His right-hand fingers tapped on his desk. Was the army to announce the events in Idlib? But he returned to our interview, remembering exactly where he had broken off. “Yes, there are places where the Syrian army loses and there are some setbacks, we can't deny that. We don't pretend that we always have victories. But our victories are bigger than our losses. Three days ago a town called Moraq - strategic between Idlib and Aleppo was recaptured by our army - the main road from Damascus to Aleppo is now completely safe.”

But not Idlib. The phones rang again. “Nusra tried to infiltrate into the city, but we foiled them,” he said triumphantly. True. But the general didn't mention - perhaps did not even then know - that his own comrades were being beheaded, even as the army was about to recapture the governor's office. By chance, I had been asking the general about Raqqa province, whose last military fortress and airbase was captured by Isis and Jabhat al-Nusra this year. Videos showed hundreds of Syrian soldiers being executed beside mass graves, one even showed two fighter jets being towed through the streets by rebels. And within days, reports from outside Syria spoke of Isis being trained on Mig-21s by former Iraqi pilots.

He knew about the jets. “This is cheap propaganda - these were old, unflyable jets that stood near the airbase gates. If they could have been flown, we would have taken them away. They were very old Mig-17s, junk jets without radar or control. We couldn't rebuild them - and nor can they. Even the Russians can't rebuild them. We know everything that is flying over Syria - even the American planes - but these old Migs can never leave the ground.”

Syrians inspect the site of a car bomb blast in the central Zahra district of Homs, Syria, on Wednesday, which killed one and injured 25 Syrians inspect the site of a car bomb blast in the central Zahra district of Homs, Syria, on Wednesday, which killed one and injured 25 (EPA)
As for Raqqa and its citizens and the fate of his soldiers, he was visibly angry. “Isis is reactionary, trying to represent the past - the medieval era. There are executions, torture, they are telling people they are practising sharia. And they are teaching children how to behead people....” The general would not speculate on how many of Syria's soldiers had been murdered in Raqqa. “I can't give you exact numbers - some are still missing, videos can be doctored. We don't take Isis's word for anything. There are soldiers who have been captured. We don't know how many.” Unknown to the general, up to 70 soldiers had just been beheaded in Idlib.

I was surprised, I said, that Syria does not call these executions war crimes - as Syria's enemies always accuse Syria of war crimes. But it was clear from his reply that this is a war without any prisoners. “The Syrian Arab Army has been in open war with terrorists for four years. Of course we are feeling angry. We have setbacks and they are targeted by us every day. We are killing hundreds of them. I am not going to give Syria to these stupid people. We are fighting to the death. But we are for a political resolution. We are concerned that in the end there must only be a political resolution for Syria. Eliminate the terrorists - all the people in the world are against them - and anyone who carries weapons against Syrian soldiers or the Syrian government or civilian people is involved in terrorism. We will deal with them. America did this because a journalist was murdered - it was a pretext for America to come to Syria. But we are going to eliminate all the terrorists on Syrian soil. In my opinion, we are cooperating with the Coalition because we said 'yes' when they attacked Isis. The UN resolution was a sign of cooperation.”

An explosion following an air-strike is seen in the Syrian town of Kobani , on Wednesday An explosion following an air-strike is seen in the Syrian town of Kobani , on Wednesday (Reuters)
As for the battle of Ain al-Arab, or Kobani, on the Turkish border - famous on television screens around the world - the general had some cynicism. “We must separate the military and the political. Ain al-Arab is a Syrian town, the majority of its people are Kurds and Isis attacked them, just to control it. And to base themselves there, because it's a border town. Politically, however, there is something of a theatre about this. The Turks want to have a buffer zone and to pressure the US to give them this buffer zone. And the Americans are trying to push Turkey into the war situation. This is the 'headline'! But they are trying to use each other, the Turks and the Americans, and Ain al-Arab's civilians are paying the cost of this.”

As for the FSA into which the US put so much faith, he laughs. “There may be some in Idlib and near Deraa.”There were soldiers and some officers who defected from the Syrian army,” he said. “Some asked to come back and are in our army again. Others returned and we sent them home.” More Dad's Army, it would seem to the general, than the Free Syrian Army.

[Philip]

The US honchos have never heard of Dale Carnegie? "How to lose friends and not influence people" appears to be the US establishment's ,mantra.Just look at how they abused Bibi N.

http://rt.com/news/200427-netanyahu-chi ... interview/
Netanyahu ‘chickenshit’ & ‘coward’: US officials go tough on Israeli PM
Published time: October 29, 2014

US-Israeli relations have sunk to new lows after Obama administration officials were cited calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “chickenshit” and “coward” engaging in political posturing, instead of efforts at Middle-Eastern de-escalation.

The comments were delivered in a conversation with The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg on condition of anonymity. To many they symbolize the next step in a “full-blown crisis” of relations between the two, primarily over Netanyahu’s relentless settlement-building in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, and the Iranian nuclear issue.

“The thing about Bibi is, he’s a chickenshit,” said one official, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname. “The good thing about Netanyahu is that he’s scared to launch wars. The bad thing about him is that he won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states,” he continued.

Goldberg keeps a running list of all the things US officials have ever called Netanyahu in interviews, and it’s not small. “Aspergery” popped up, among other things. But it is the first time high-ranking officials have expressed their views of the Israeli leader in such a “gloves-off manner.”

A partial view taken on October 29, 2014 shows cranes used to construct new buildings in the Israeli settlement of Har Homa, which was originally built in the 1990s, in the annexed Arab east Jerusalem area of Jabal Abu Ghneim. (AFP Photo/Ahmad Gharabli)

Netanyahu has repeatedly said he will not halt construction of 1,000 new housing units, which are considered illegal under international law, when built beyond the established 1967 ‘green line.’

READ MORE: Netanyahu says settlement criticism 'against American values', scores US scorn

Similarly, the Israeli leader is opposed to making any deals with Iran, and has recently warned in another conversation with The Atlantic that he intends to speak directly to Congress and to the American people, because President Barack Obama is unwilling to recognize his stance.

One of the officials interviewed by Goldberg voiced a “red-hot anger” at the Israeli leader for what he sees as severely undermining the peace initiative that Secretary of State John Kerry was so meticulously trying to build.

The other continued: “The only thing he’s interested in is protecting himself from political defeat. He’s not [Yitzhak] Rabin, he’s not [Ariel] Sharon, he’s certainly no [Menachem] Begin. He’s got no guts.”

Goldberg did not elaborate when exactly he recorded the interviews, only that they were done “the other day”.

“Netanyahu’s government has in recent days gone out of its way to a) let the world know that it will quicken the pace of apartment-building in disputed areas of East Jerusalem; and b) let everyone know of its contempt for the Obama administration and its understanding of the Middle East,” Goldberg says, explaining his own view on things.

Netanyahu reacts: 'I get attacked because I defend the State of Israel'

The Israeli PM addressed the remarks directly, though usually Israeli leaders do not respond to comments made anonymously.

"Our supreme interests, chiefly the security and unity of Jerusalem, are not the main concern of those anonymous officials who attack us and me personally, as the assault on me comes only because I defend the State of Israel," Netanyahu said in opening a memorial ceremony in parliament for an Israeli cabinet minister assassinated by a Palestinian in 2001.

"Despite all of the attacks I suffer, I will continue to defend our country. I will continue to defend the citizens of Israel," he added.

Meanwhile, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the anonymous officials' remarks do not reflect the US position or Barack Obama's views.

Earlier promises by Netanyahu to strike Iran if it doesn’t stop enriching uranium have had everyone in fear of a new world war, but, as one official in the interview said, “it’s too late for him to do anything… two, three years ago, this was a possibility. But ultimately he couldn’t bring himself to pull the trigger. It was a combination of our pressure and his own unwillingness to do anything dramatic. Now it’s too late.”

This mood is shared by other US officials, who, according to the interviewees, feel much easier about negotiating with Iran now that they think Netanyahu won’t carry out his strike threat.

These latest comments are part of the tit-for-tat opinion-trading that has been resounding over contentious issues, and have already aroused the criticism of the Israelis – most notably, the pro-settler Jewish Home party leader, Economy Minister Naftali Bennett, who insisted that “serious curses such as these towards the prime minister of Israel are harmful to millions of Israeli citizens and Jews around the world.”

"If what was written is true, the current government is planning to throw Israel under the wheels of the bus. I call for the US government to renounce these provocative insults and reject them out of hand," he said, as cited by The Guardian.

[anmol]

The Three Words the Former Head of Blackwater Told Glenn Beck About What Was Really Going on in Benghazi on 9/11
by Erica Ritz, theblaze.com
October 29th 2014 2:14 PM

Erik Prince, founder of the private security firm Blackwater, Inc. and author of “Civilian Warriors: The Inside Story of Blackwater and the Unsung Heroes of the War on Terror,” said something about the 2012 terror attack in Benghazi on Wednesday that could change the way the horrific conflict is viewed.

Prince was speaking on Glenn Beck’s radio program when Beck remarked: “The people in Benghazi that were killed, private contractors, we just left them behind, just discarded them. I think we were running guns over to Syria.”

“No. Actually missiles,” Prince said.

“Okay,” Beck paused. “Do you have anything on Benghazi you want to share?”

“No. Look, the reason that annex was there, they were buying back missiles from the Libyans and shipping them to Syria,” Prince said.

“Which was a theory of mine about three days into it, and I was just hammered to death for it,” Beck responded. “And nobody seems to care. … We were doing really nasty things. We left people behind. And we don’t care about them at all for some reason or another.”

Prince is not the first to say the United States was smuggling weapons into Syria. But he is yet another voice, and one with extensive knowledge of the region, to make the claim.

In addition to Beck’s assertions shortly after the attack, in May of 2013 Geraldo Rivera said his sources were saying the same thing.

“I believe, and my sources tell me, they were there to round up those shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles. They were going to hand those missiles over to the Turks, and the Turks were going to give them to the rebels in Syria,” Rivera said.

And in October of 2013, CNN reported: “Speculation on Capitol Hill has included the possibility the U.S. agencies operating in Benghazi were secretly helping to move surface-to-air missiles out of Libya, through Turkey, and into the hands of Syrian rebels.”

But the American people still don’t have any concrete answers on what exactly happened in Benghazi on September 11, 2012, or why the attack was initially blamed on a YouTube video.

The two also discussed the Islamic State’s growing power in the Middle East.

“If the Assad regime were to fall right now, then ISIS would be running Syria as well,” Prince said. “We can do the whole post-analysis of what was done wrong that led to ISIS being in charge, but now, the people we should be supporting vigorously are the Kurds.”

Prince said that at some point, however, “some force is going to have to crush ISIS and prevent them from spreading.”

“Because they will spread,” he said. “They are now trying to get going in Egypt. You have radical Islamists in Libya that have professed allegiance to ISIS as well, to the caliphate. …. This cancer will spread. You are going to have to deal with some of the primary tumors to suppress them, or they are going to continue to metastasize.”

Prince has said a private contractor could be the best force to deal with the Islamic State, and gave Beck more details about what would be needed.

Though some are saying it would require a ground force with tens of thousands of troops to defeat the Islamic State, Prince said a private contractor with “a good organic air package” could get the job done with 5,000 men.

“ISIS flows from being an Al Qaeda-like pure terrorism force — IEDs, ambushes…” Prince said. “A unit that could move on them with a battalion-size operation — with armor, with artillery, with some air — and that’s well-supplied and will pursue them relentlessly, they are not used to standing and fighting against that level of organized force.”

“Why would that be a bad thing? Why would we not do that?” Beck’s co-host Pat Gray asked.

“It’s ultimately a political question,” Prince responded. “From the private sector, yes, it is very possible to do this. I know people very well who know how to organize this, and it should be an option. That’s why I talk about it in the book. This is an option that’s been in the tool box of the American decision-makers for a long time.”

[IndraD]

It appears that the 'Kurd heroine' is not dead and she may not be the legendary 'tigress' sniper either
Glad she's alive but hope she dispatches a few scumbags to their 72

If US has any dum in bum they should make sure this girl escapes into safety she can be handy to win psychological war against IS
If Masala can be used as trophy every now and then why can't this girl be?

[Singha]

the blackwater man has a point. it could be done the way he says. makes it easier to put aside geneva convention too for any ISIS in the net.
finally someone pointed out a use case where these pvt contractors can benefit the whole world.

[RSoami]

US and west can talk all Geneva convention shit as they want but eventually ISIS and Taliban and their likes will be put down through the means they are using today. Genocide and Massacres and unlimited violence.
And eventually US and the west will support those who actually do this dirty work. Be it Assad or Iran or Shias in Iraq, the Kurds or the Pakhanistani Army.
All of US airpower has not defeated ISIS in Kobane. All of US firepower could not defeat the insurgents in Iraq. Nor could it defeat the Taliban. Despite all of chest thumping by TSJones and other bheri phunny Americans they will eventually throw Geneva convention to the bins and support the culling of the jihadis.

[RSoami]

Iraq is in terrible mess but all around ISIS there is only Malsi and nothing else. There is nowhere for them to go. Today or tomorrow the chickens are coming home to roost.
And Israel is no Bharat.

[nachiket]

the blackwater man has a point. it could be done the way he says. makes it easier to put aside geneva convention too for any ISIS in the net.
finally someone pointed out a use case where these pvt contractors can benefit the whole world.

Well this game has been played before. Just that in those days, they used to be called mercenaries, rather than "private contractors".

[kmkraoind]

For Turkey and U.S., at odds over Syria, a 60-year alliance shows signs of crumbling

Rumblings may happen, but nothing happens to Turkey, unless USA decided to re-invent history and decides to gift Bosporus strait to Bulgaria.

[kmkraoind]

Kurdish Peshmerga Cross Into Kobani to Battle Islamic State



The rousing welcome by people indicates that people are scared of ISIS and 100% Sharia rule. Only rich KSA is implementing 100% Sharia, even these rich brats use Dubai, Jordan, EU and KSA as a safety valve.

[vishvak]

The Peshmarga help is more of a show than a lot of substance. There are hardly about 150 Peshmarga, who were to reach Kobane. The Turkish Army first confiscated weapons and heavy armors and tanks, then made them wait in Turkey without any facilities (food, bedsheets, toilets), then sent a lot of FSA first to Kobane as trojan horses. The Turks don't want Kobane to be its Stalingrad that is why all the show while the real game is played away from Camera. The Peshmarga are already accompanied by, and surrounded by, Turkish Army while they reach Kobane.

[Jarita]

^^ Also they dont want YPG to become bigger than they have become. YPG is fighting for independence from Turkey

[Singha]

even a small troop of well handled ICV would make life very untenable for the ISIS in kobane by raiding their supply lines and rear areas. the 20-30mm cannon on a ICV will neatly shred those HMG armed toyota 'techicals' the ISIS like to flaunt.

[RSoami]

US Turkey alliance was built on anti Russian platform. It will work as long as US (stupidly)sees Russia as a bigger threat than radical Islam.
Too many Americans being beheaded everywhere or some terrorist attack in some American city could change the equation.

[Singha]

islamists are trying very hard to organize random street level beheadings in western countries. already such plots have been caught in australia (700 islamists picked up in multi city raids) and UK ofcourse.

[IndraD]

India has a very interesting musical connection with Kurdistan

Legendary composer Madan Mohan was born at Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan, where his father Rai Bahadur Chunilal was working as an Accountant General with the Kurdistan Peshmerga forces, Madan Mohan spent the first five years of his life in the Middle East

[RSoami]

http://www.dw.de/un-15000-foreigners-fi ... a-18033420
15000 foreign jihadis fighting with ISIS.
And moron shiromani Friedman thinks that its only Sunni resurgence.

[Singha]

500 Ugandan Islamists are based in Congo and fighting every side. Locals hate them for massacres.
Yesterday one was pulled from a bus by a mob burned to death and his flesh eaten.

[RajeshA]

500 Ugandan Islamists are based in Congo and fighting every side. Locals hate them for massacres.
Yesterday one was pulled from a bus by a mob burned to death and his flesh eaten.

Uganda should be Jagatguru!

[Singha]

Here http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/10/3 ... SL20141031

[UlanBatori]

Mr. Friedman must realise that though the world may be flat it is not thick.

JEM, Friedman is parroting the Nut&Yahoo narrative, isn't he? That narrative holds that the Shiite minority (Iran and Syria and the majority in Iraq that was suppressed by Saddam) must be destroyed.

Tel Aviv sees the Sunni majority (KSA+Egypt+Turkey+Pakis), despite all their weapons and wealth and numbers, as being fundamentally corrupted and therefore not a threat.

So Friedman's logic can be seen to be nailed to the ground through the one fixed prejudice: SHIA= BADDEST. That comes from Tel Aviv, not Washington DC.

[ramana]

ISIS, Boko Haram and the Ugandan Islamshits are all sado-masochist goon squads. They have to be treated the same way to make them cower.

[Shanmukh]

500 Ugandan Islamists are based in Congo and fighting every side. Locals hate them for massacres.
Yesterday one was pulled from a bus by a mob burned to death and his flesh eaten.

Uganda should be Jagatguru!

Ehh-no, saar. The Dutch were doing it 400 years ago. They ripped out the flesh of Cornelius de Witt and Johann de Witt, and cooked and ate it. They exhibited the hearts of the two traitors for a long time in the market place. They even sold the flesh of the two `traitors' for 10 sous a piece.

So were the English. See the lovely campaign of Kirke's Dragoons (in an acrid irony, they were called Kirke's Lambs) in the aftermath of the Monmouth Rebellion. He kept the executioners busy with the choppers, gibbets and the cauldrons of pitch. I will spare you the nauseating details.

No one can beat the Europeans in cruelty. They are inventively cruel, and sadistic. Not even the Islamists can compare with them.

[Singha]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozrrrUiDL7M

this fight scene from a new film Black Gold encapsulates nicely the whole islam vs white devils thing.
two warring clans are at each others throats already , when great satan comes from nowhere to bombard them all.
heavy losses in the islamic corner initially
but they quickly band together to attack the common enemy, inflict losses and send the white devils packing in the end to rousing AOA AOA shouts!

[Singha]

sounds like the murderous british colonel william tavington in The Patriot film was modelled after kirke's dragoons.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1p3mCPHVbU

[RajeshA]

nageshks ji,

being brutal is certainly not a new invention. However being brutal to the brutal has a certain educational quality to it.

[K Mehta]

The Egyptian plan to form a buffer zone in gaza is similar to the Israeli plan. Only difference being the Egyptian using their own territory. The part about water trenches reflects greater understanding of Gaza tactics. This would lead to decrease in attacks on Egyptian army but in long term will give rise to a humanitarian crisis as it will lead to stoppage of major trade in Gaza. This will cause shortage of food and other critical needs. With the Egyptian government following Israeli lead, almost all ways to transport into Gaza become tightly regulated.
This is another example of majority of Muslims suffering due to their non-opposition/ cooperation to radical islamists.

Egypt-Gaza Strip: Egypt plans to create a 500m buffer zone along the 13km border with the Gaza Strip to block weapons smuggling.

Authorities told residents living along the border to evacuate their homes so that they can be demolished. Water-filled trenches or a canal will be dug to prevent tunnel construction.
Comment: This is a direct and immediate response to last week's attacks that killed 31 Egyptian soldiers. The government judges that the Hamas government in Gaza aided the Islamic militants in Sinai in making the attack and is determined to prevent a recurrence.
The measures President al-Sisi has ordered are by far more effective and serious than any previous efforts to control smuggling. The army casualties last week appear to have pushed Egyptian tolerance to the limit. On its surface, the bulldozing operation resembles Israeli tactics.

The new initiative will have both security and economic impacts. It will disrupt gunrunning and put many Palestinian tunnel diggers, the supply chain, the supporting companies and arms smugglers out of business, assuming Egypt is serious about implementation. The effects on employment might be greater than the impact on security.

Egypt: Local media reported yesterday that Egypt already has begun ordering forced evacuations and demolishing homes in the buffer zone Egypt is creating along the border of the Gaza Strip.

Comment: The initial reports tend to confirm that Egypt finally is serious about controlling smuggling and tunneling from Sinai into the Gaza Strip.

[vishvak]

Genocide: 10 Reasons Why Ezidis Refuse to Return to Shingal

Peshmarga storming ISIS in few villages
link

Yezidis running out of supplies on Sinjar during rains

YPG men and women killing ISIS
link

[UlanBatori]

Now: ISIS killing Sunnis.
So there is hope still for ISIS to control all the lampposts on the Avenuex des Hanging Jarnails in Pindi and LaHore?

[Singha]

neither isis nor ypg can win or control kobani without
(a) lots of manpower to swarm all over the rubble, with carl gustav, shipons, flamethrowers and explosive charges/LMG teams.
OR
(b) armoured pincer to close the trap behind the town, followed by starving out the isis over a couple of months, sniping at them when foraging at night...

this kind of shooting from rooms and holes happened in lebanon for decades and essentially nothing changed. the front moves by a few blocks in each to and fro push and thats it.

[KLNMurthy]

ISIS and Vietnam

ISIS and Vietnam

In May, I visited Vietnam and met with university students. After a week of being love-bombed by Vietnamese, who told me how much they admire America, want to work or study there and have friends and family living there, I couldn’t help but ask myself: “How did we get this country so wrong? How did we end up in a war with Vietnam that cost so many lives and drove them into the arms of their most hated enemy, China?”

It’s a long, complicated story, I know, but a big part of it was failing to understand that the core political drama of Vietnam was an indigenous nationalist struggle against colonial rule — not the embrace of global communism, the interpretation we imposed on it.

The North Vietnamese were both communists and nationalists — and still are. But the key reason we failed in Vietnam was that the communists managed to harness the Vietnamese nationalist narrative much more effectively than our South Vietnamese allies, who were too often seen as corrupt or illegitimate. The North Vietnamese managed to win (with the help of brutal coercion) more Vietnamese support not because most Vietnamese bought into Marx and Lenin, but because Ho Chi Minh and his communist comrades were perceived to be the more authentic nationalists.

I believe something loosely akin to this is afoot in Iraq. The Islamic State, or ISIS, with its small core of jihadists, was able to seize so much non-jihadist Sunni territory in Syria and Iraq almost overnight — not because most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis suddenly bought into the Islamist narrative of ISIS’s self-appointed caliph. Most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis don’t want to marry off their daughters to a bearded Chechen fanatic, and more than a few of them pray five times a day and like to wash it down with a good Scotch. They have embraced or resigned themselves to ISIS because they were systematically abused by the pro-Shiite, pro-Iranian regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria and Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki in Iraq — and because they see ISIS as a vehicle to revive Sunni nationalism and end Shiite oppression.

The challenge the U.S. faces in Iraq is trying to defeat ISIS in tacit alliance with Syria and Iran, whose local Shiite allies are doing a lot of the fighting in Iraq and Syria. Iran is seen by many Syrian and Iraqi Sunnis as the “colonial power” dominating Iraq to keep it weak.

Obsessed with communism, America intervened in Vietnam’s civil war and took the place of the French colonialists. Obsessed with jihadism and 9/11, are we now doing the bidding of Iran and Syria in Iraq? Is jihadism to Sunni nationalism what communism was to Vietnamese nationalism: a fearsome ideological movement that triggers emotional reactions in the West — deliberately reinforced with videotaped beheadings — but that masks a deeper underlying nationalist movement that is to some degree legitimate and popular in its context?

I wonder what would have happened had ISIS not engaged in barbarism and declared: “We are the Islamic State. We represent the interests of Syrian and Iraqi Sunnis who have been brutalized by Persian-directed regimes of Damascus and Baghdad. If you think we’re murderous, then just Google ‘Bashar al-Assad and barrel bombs’ or ‘Iraqi Shiite militias and the use of power drills to kill Sunnis.’ You’ll see what we faced after you Americans left. Our goal is to secure the interests of Sunnis in Iraq and Syria. We want an autonomous ‘Sunnistan’ in Iraq just like the Kurds have a Kurdistan — with our own cut of Iraq’s oil wealth.”

That probably would have garnered huge support from Sunnis everywhere. ISIS’s magazine, Dabiq, recently published an article, “Reflections on the Final Crusade,” (transcribed by the Middle East Media Research Institute), which argued that America’s war on ISIS only serves the interests of America’s enemies: Iran and Russia. It quotes U.S. strategists as warning that Iran has created a “Shia-belt from Tehran through Baghdad to Beirut,” a threat much greater than ISIS.

Then why did ISIS behead two American journalists? Because ISIS is a coalition of foreign jihadists, local Sunni tribes and former Iraqi Baath Party military officers. I suspect the jihadists in charge want to draw the U.S. into another “crusade” against Muslims — just like Osama bin Laden — to energize and attract Muslims from across the world and to overcome their main weakness, namely that most Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis are attracted to ISIS simply as a vehicle of their sectarian resurgence, not because they want puritanical/jihadist Islam. There is no better way to get secular Iraqi and Syrian Sunnis to fuse with ISIS than have America bomb them all.

ISIS needs to be contained before it destabilizes islands of decency like Jordan, Kurdistan and Lebanon. But destroying it? That will be hard, because it’s not just riding on some jihadist caliphate fantasy, but also on deep Sunni nationalist grievances. Separating the two is the best way to defeat ISIS, but the only way to separate mainstream Sunnis from jihadists is for mainstream Sunnis and Shiites to share power, to build a healthy interdependency from what is now an unhealthy one. Chances of that? Very low. I hope President Obama has thought this through.

Bugger is manufacturing consent for Obama's retreat from the ISIS fight. It's the NY Times after all.

[pankajs]

The Independent ‏@Independent 42m42 minutes ago

The West is silent as Libya falls into the abyss http://ind.pn/10cShlT

Remember the time when Libya was being held up by the American, British, French and Qatari governments as a striking example of benign and successful foreign intervention? It is worth looking again at film of David Cameron grandstanding as liberator in Benghazi in September 2011 as he applauds the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi and tells the crowd that "your city was an example to the world as you threw off a dictator and chose freedom".

...
Foreign governments and media alike have good reason to forget what they said and did in Libya in 2011, because the aftermath of the overthrow of Gaddafi has been so appalling. The extent of the calamity is made clear by two reports on the present state of the country, one by Amnesty International called "Libya: Rule of the gun – abductions, torture and other militia abuses in western Libya" and a second by Human Rights Watch, focusing on the east of the country, called "Libya: Assassinations May Be Crimes Against Humanity".

...
In all three cases cited above, the West intervened in somebody else's civil war and tried to dictate who won. There was a pretence that the Taliban, Saddam, Gaddafi or Assad were demonically evil and without any true supporters. This foreign support may give victory to one party in a civil war, as in Libya, which they could not win by relying on their own strength. In Iraq, the beleaguered Sunni could not fight a US-backed Shia government so it needed to bring in al-Qaeda. Thus the conditions were created that eventually produced Isis.

[RSoami]

Look at the world map. From Nigeria to Mali. Libya to Egypt. Iraq. Afghanistan and Pakistan.Yemen. Radical Islamism is on the rise. Over the course of next 5 - 50 years, it will take over most of West Asia and North Africa.
Investment in social institutions and education is zero. Breeding is high. There can be no other result.
Iran needs to be strengthened.
And people need to pray to American and European strategic geniuses to keep them from using their swollen brains to hasten this process like they have done in Libya and Iraq.

[vijaykarthik]

http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-29853513#

More like it. Part of the problem with the internet and dumb morons, nowadays.

[wig]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 34472.html

From the evidence it appears that the weapons isis is using against the Syrians are of US make and build

excerpts

How did Islamists receive American weapons? See the evidence from guided missile that exploded near Syrian front line
But when a corporal dragged a sack load of missile parts into a room in this Syrian hill-top fortress, it contained some fascinating evidence of the rebel armoury. Most missiles fragment into thousands of pieces on detonation but just over a month ago - on 26 September - a guided missile exploded deep beneath sand and earth and the fragments clearly show the name of its American arms manufacturer, circuit boards and the coding of the weapon.

Part of the missile identifies the “Eagle-Picher IND (Indiana) INC.” company as the manufacturer and says, in English, that it is “helium charged”, adding - rather ironically as it turns out -- the words: “CAUTION -- CONTAINS 6400 PSIG He (high explosive), FEDERAL LAW FORBIDS TRANSPORATION IF REFILLED -- PENALTY UP TO $25,000 AND FIVE YEARS IMPRISONMENT (49 USC 1809). The Syrians do not know how this weapon - which appears to have been manufactured as long ago as 1989 - made its way from the US to the hands of their country’s Islamist rebels - but it would not be difficult for the Americans to find out. Its full computer coding reads: DOT-E7694 NRC6400/11109/M1033 79294 ASSY 39317 MFR 54080.

A battery tube from another missile fired on the fourth of last month carries an inscription indented in the metal: “132964 Battery thermal MFG DATE 12/90 LOT No (indecipherable numeral then 912 S/N 005959.”

These codes should make it easy for the Americans to identify the purchaser - or receiver - of the weapon, if they choose to do so.