In tears

[G1veMeStrength]

Fucking parliament. You utter bastards. You're going to kill people and it won't stop anything.

Someone on another thread quoted Goebels as having said all you needed to do to get the public on your side was to tell them they were in danger

How on earth is that relevant?

We are in danger from ISIS. or was Paris, Tunisa all a horrid dream, or the bomb plots already stopped,

and even then, the damage done to us whilst horrific is nothing to whats going on out there.

The problem is that we have no endgame. Bombing the fuckers back to the Stone Age is too short term a policy. What then?

Same problem as Iraq really - everyone wanted the shock and awe/fancy bombs/massive profits for the industries that feed on war... And no one wanted to think about the duller, far more important things like getting the road networks, the water and the civil structure back up and functioning.

I don't, in principle, oppose going after daesh with every weapon we have, but I would like to see some coherent strategy for what happens when the dust settles. Until then, we are just happily creating another huge power vacuum and setting the stage for yet more chaos.

Ultimately, until populations in the area see a viable local alternative, the situation won't change. That doesn't mean we sit back and do nothing it means we act with intelligence behind our force.

Sadly I think my brother is right too. He has spoken at length to officials in the US and UK who just don't understand that they need to change the way they think. This is not a war like the others we have fought in Europe where the cultures are actually very similar.

I also shake my head at Obama being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. The man has more blood on his hands than Bush for his failure to control the region after the Arab uprising that was overseen by Hillary Clinton. A lot of Americans recognize this and its just giving Trump more fuel. This is extremely dangerous. It was on the news last night here in NYC (CBS which normally a more liberal) that Trump was right to say people were celebrating after 9/11. There were confirmed reports that senior officials did talk about at the time. I was open mouthed that CBS would knife Hillary Clinton in this way.

I don't, in principle, oppose going after daesh with every weapon we have, but I would like to see some coherent strategy for what happens when the dust settles. Until then, we are just happily creating another huge power vacuum and setting the stage for yet more chaos.

The big difference is that Saddam Hussein was president of Iraq from 79 until 03 and had completely enmeshed all the institutions of the state and civil society with his Ba'ath party. This did, unfortunately, mean that his overthrow caused a vacuum.

In contrast, Daesh have only existed for a few short years, their aras of control do not correspond with the boundaries of recognised nation states and there is plenty of opposition, resistance and expertise ready to step in as well as the remnants of national infrastructures.

Hopefully that is cause for hope (and all the more reason to assist people in liberating themselves NOW).

Ken livingstone is talking about local parties deselecting their MPs.

Which JC has said won't happen. After all he would have been deselected over 500 times.

It was an unwhiped free vote.

Elenden my words were kindly meant, how you decide to take them is up to you. I wasn't talking about the SWP campaign but another and "gimmer" round here is someone who's been around a while/ is advanced in years compared with the young 'uns but not necessarily qualified for gransnet. Although gransnet members can also refer to themselves as gimmers. HTH.

Back to Syria:
I agree with everyone who says Middle East/ North Africa policy has for a long time been an unmitigated disaster. The only thing we can hope for with this campaign is that they stick to disrupting the further spread of Da'esh on the ground by hitting static funding/logistical targets away from civilian populations while the many interested parties get their collective acts together. At best, this is about buying time. We can only hope it's used wisely, but unlikely given today's sabre rattling from Assad's regime.

Troels, I have a 14 year old teenage son. So not a gimmer. I do have also older adult children, even though I started having birth at the average age of most females in this country.

Good grief. Is gimmer a female term only? How insulting a term is that? Didn't know you were the gate keeper of this term.

Kindly meant my arse! (Is that a gimmer term?)

Having babies. Not having birth.

And your view on Syria and the Middle East/North Africa is so paternalistic in its approach.

Err LurkingOne I don't live in Devon. I don't live anywhere near Devon, I've no idea where you've got that from.

We fought in WW2 for nothing. They just want to do it again and again. It's exactly the same players at work and they are in cahoots as they were then. People get befuddled by the propaganda of 'left', 'right', 'Christian', 'Jew' , ' Muslim' when the reality is the elites from each (right wing Xtians in arms industry- rightwing Jews in banking/media) are friends and never do badly out of it. Don't think for one moment this isn't about getting the 'rest of us' in line just as it was then. They're panicking because they know their working population base has given up in response to constant war and their other policies (mass immigration). This is about taking it out on newcomers (it won't just be Muslims) or making them prove their loyalty and decimating the uppity poor again who have rejected their wars and fled their cities.

Good grief. Is gimmer a female term only? How insulting a term is that? Didn't know you were the gate keeper of this term.

Gimmer is unisex, AFAIK, a bit comic, wry, self-depreciating, usually used about one-self (or selves). I don't think she was being nasty

That is, I think she was trying to say 'we are both old enough to know a few things' without sounding superior.

Agree, Want2Be.
I also think Obama getting the Peace Prize was a bit . I think Hillary Clinton has been a disaster as Sec of State, and I am one who would rather bite off my right arm than vote Republican.

Salene Thu 03-Dec-15 08:28:53
Russia's bombing campaign in Syria will lead to further radicalisation and increased terrorism said David Cameron on the 4th October 2015........ Hmmmmm fucking hypocrite

This is very strong evidence that America has been completely wrong footed by Russia on Syria, and that the State Dept has no clue about how to deal with the middle east. We should be far more worried about US bungling and incompetence than we are. We should be far more worried that America seems to have Britain wrapped around her little finger than we seem to be. Britain should be looking dispassionately at foreign affairs and should not be so quick to jump on the anti Russian bandwagon.

Dodgy Dave does not give a hoot about the people of Syria. He has been issued his orders by Washington and is providing the required military support to allow the US to be a player when ISIS is finished off in Syria. Obama still clings to the notion that America can depose governments and leaders elsewhere in the world, and still seeks to push Assad out. Russia is fighting with Assad against ISIS, based on the principle that it is always a good thing when a brutal dictator owes you a massive favour. A utilitarian principle to be sure, but a sound one imo, and a far better one in real life than the fairy tale promoted by the US of popular democracy magically arising by means of demonstrations in city squares, all with names based on the colours of the participants' flags or harking back to the Cold War -- 'Arab Spring' for instance.

This labeling alone should tell us how completely out of touch with reality the US is, how ideologically based its ambitions are, and how dangerous it is to blindly follow the American lead. Britain is not now allied with Russia. The US is using Britain to further its own aims in Syria, which are opposed to the aims of Russia there and pushed by Cold War warriors who dominate the corridors of the State Department.

What has been learned from history here is not to put boots on the ground. The west has learned a lot from previous ground conflict in the region and in SE Asia. Hence aerial bombing.

Once more, I am puzzled by the Daesh/ISIS debate. Islam is not a centralised, organised religion the way the RC church or the CofE are. Any group with a heritage of following the Prophet can claim in all good conscience that they are excellent Muslims. They can and do issue fatwas against authors whose books they find idolatrous. They can and do call people who do not agree with them 'Infidels'.

So the Daesh/ISIS thing is an attempt to present the unwieldy and poorly defined entity known as Islam as a single well-defined thing, with no ambiguity about its core beliefs, and easy ways to decide who is and who isn't Muslim and it is not those things. The definition of Islam is now and always has been up for grabs, and that is the root of much of this conflict. This, and not merely bombing or political interference by western powers, is what drives conflict and creates terrorists ready to take up arms they are just as ready to slaughter fellow Muslims as people in the west.

('The nazis didnt have large chunks of people operating on their behalf, beating them was achievable' -- yes they did, actually. There were lots of homegrown Nazis everywhere they went, perhaps with the exception of Poland and Serbia. There was even a captured Russian Nazi army that was used against the Red Army in the final days of the war. Everywhere else, lots of people aided and abetted the Nazis, particularly when it came to carrying out the Holocaust and attacking the USSR, from Ukraine to the Baltics, Slovakia, Croatia, Hungary, Romania. Many of the descendants of these fascists are playing a role in eastern European politics today. German defeat didn't necessarily mean the defeat of Nazism.)

Why are people calling them Daesh now?

I thought Daesh was just an Arab acronym for Isis.

I can confirm from other conversations/boards that Stratters doesn't live in Devon.

I do think however that the lack of support for airstrikes is very similar to the lack of Conservative voters. There was such outcry and handwringing about the airstrikes that those in support tended to keep quiet. A bit like being a conservative voter. You largely keep your mouth shut for fear of being vilified but stick to your views and vote accordingly.

Not to mention a lot of Nazis were whisked out of Europe to western countries. We knew who they were when they started infilitrating our churches with this 'church militant' jesus wants you to be wealthy stuff. And their utter disdain for anyone not blonde/blue eyed. It's all crap. Our forefathers hoped they were getting away from all this crap by coming to Australia.

Wow Elendon. I was genuinely being conciliatory to you and wondering if we were of a similar age. I was also agreeing with sentiments expressed here and elsewhere that Russian and Western policy in the ME and NA has generally been ill-thought through and jam-pack full of unintended consequences - usually bad for the people who actually live there.

In return I get dubbed a disappointment to the sisterhood for using a term that has been used by many on here for years and "paternalistic" in terms of my views on the ME/NA. I must have missed all those breakthroughs that led to wholescale peace, political stability, economic success, religious tolerance, tolerance of LGBT and gender equality.

Now I remember why I don't normally come onto AIBU under this or any other NN.

Thanks Strawberry for reading me correctly

The consequences are entirely intended - for them and for us.

Daesh don't like being called 'Daesh'. Seems a valid enough reason to me, why should we call them the Islamic State, they're emphatically not.

Ubik1

Deash is Arab for Isis, it's slightly derogatory but mainly an attempt to stop the idiots on both the left and right with trying to infer that all Islam is to be blamed etc and to try and nudge discussion away from the not true Muslim route and further along without explicitly adding caveats.

Fwiw, I don't think America has leaned on us at all, we are helping one of our oldest enemies and allies, I'm not sure if anyone can remember the man unison comic sketch where we happily take the piss out of our friends/neighbours until someone else further outside the circle decides to take the piss we class she ranks with a punch line that we will not achieve world piece until we are visited by aliens is one of the reasons why.

Plus the fact we have been flying over Syria daily to bomb Iraq (with the same airforce number) for over a year and a half targeting the exact same 'enemy' as we are now is somehow missed by those wanting to open some kind of dialogue with a hydra that doesn't want any negotiations is seemingly ignored.

It is a proxy war, but to lay the blame solely on the west is some kind of guilt complex, it has been ravaged in war for over 1400 years, long before the supremacy of the west, Russia, China and Pakistan have and are playing a part, Saudi have the petro dollars but unless you want to create another vacum or everyone gives up cars/foreign imports etc tomorrow we are going to have to hope the opec rebalances the situation.

You cannot pin point this on any one nation, nor can you pin point it on the west.

Thanks atticus. That did make me giggle, someone's powers of deduction are slightly wonk.

Damn autocorrect, hope you get the drift.

Mancunian

We close ranks,

Etc

The consequences are entirely intended - for them and for us.

Not totally true, they are wanting a guerrilla war, if you think it's an end game by the west we would have gone into Syria during the uprising, its trying to keep a lid on an ideology

Why is it that people are "devastated" and "crying" over all the innocent people who MAY be killed in allied air strikes, but these same people appear to be totally unconcerned about the hundreds of thousands of innocent civilians who ARE and HAVE been killed (and not by accident but by deliberate targeting of civilian populations) by ISIS and their predecessors?

Is it OK for ISIS to keep raping and murdering members of their civilian populations? As long as it doesn't involve us, then it's OK?

I really don't understand this argument. Airstrikes in Iraq have pushed ISIS back, now the aim is to do the same in Syria. Surely that it a good thing. It will ultimately mean peoples lives are safer.

In fact it is the same people who were concerned about the Syrian people long before they became media headlines, who raised the plight of the Kurds while the west looked the other way, who highlighted the civilian casualties in Iraq when only western military losses were being counted.

And no, it's not ok as long as it's not us, quite the opposite in fact.

We cannot bring peace by dropping bombs. These strategies have failed in the past.

We are not looking to turn away, just for war not to be the answer.