Current Affairs Syria...

[dholliday]

Well, to be honest, the Iraq/Kurdish conflict has been going on since WW1. So unless you count that as a western intervention, the Middle East has been a turbulent place throughout modern history and the west has merely exacerbated what was pre-existent.

Point taken though, but I think it's beyond idealistic to say if we left them alone then they'd all be happy. The problem is they'd drag the west in to regional disputes when they became genocides anyway, because of the way the modern world is.

Yes it has, and we're adding to the turbulence, so we're agreed there.

They wouldn't be happy if we left them alone, I didn't even imply that. There's also mass murder happening in Yemen & in Palestine but because the murderers are Western allies we're not fussed. We pick & choose who we want to save based on how much money there is to be made and which cushy VIP jobs can be kept or made, then we paint it in the media as "good vs evil".

Sadly, as you also say yourself, that's the way of the modern world.

Horrible stuff. We've been morally bankrupt since the 2003 Iraq invasion, tho' if you look at history maybe we've always been so...Iraq was still getting air-strikes in the 90's under Bill Clinton long after the first Iraq War ended, just as one example.

I wonder how the younger generation think about all this. Is there the usual anti-war idealism other generations had or are they too distracted to think about it too much?

 

[zzr45]

As if they hadn’t gone far enough with reboots. This Vietnam one isn’t very good.

Let’s hope we do the same again and keep it the f away from us.

 

[Tubey]

Yes it has, and we're adding to the turbulence, so we're agreed there.

They wouldn't be happy if we left them alone, I didn't even imply that. There's also mass murder happening in Yemen & in Palestine but because the murderers are Western allies we're not fussed. We pick & choose who we want to save based on how much money there is to be made and which cushy VIP jobs can be kept or made, then we paint it in the media as "good vs evil".

Sadly, as you also say yourself, that's the way of the modern world.

Horrible stuff. We've been morally bankrupt since the 2003 Iraq invasion, tho' if you look at history maybe we've always been so...Iraq was still getting air-strikes in the 90's under Bill Clinton long after the first Iraq War ended, just as one example.

I wonder how the younger generation think about all this. Is there the usual anti-war idealism other generations had or are they too distracted to think about it too much?

Erm... Twitter mate?

Seriously, if hippies had Twitter in the 60s/70s, it'd be no different to what it is now haha

The problem is that it is idealism. "Give peace a chance" they say... but what peace? What chance has it got if left alone anyway? Inaction in this case simply means hundreds of thousands are slaughtered - is that a price worth paying for a "peace" eventually in the hands of an enabled dictator?

As for your wider point, yes, there is a truth to what you're saying, but again I simply don't buy into the logic that just because something was automatically means that something will be.

 

[dholliday]

Inaction in this case simply means hundreds of thousands are slaughtered - is that a price worth paying for a "peace" eventually in the hands of an enabled dictator?

There is absolutely no indication that if the West were to leave Syria alone there'd be "hundreds of thousands slaughtered". There is instead the opposite indication, thanks to Russia. The war would be long finished, Syria would be back in the control of a democratically-elected Head of State (note: not a dictator) who has proven in the past he has relatively liberal values. Maybe that was the problem with him...

 

[JimmyJeffers]

Do you know what the words "is better than" means?

You read it as a zero sum game - where if you don't want bombs dropped means you definitely don't care.

No. I said action "is better than" inaction in this case. That doesn't mean those advocating inaction "don't care about babies being gassed."

Complete lack of tact and the ability to understand context and you should have apologised immediately. Simple as that.

Blimey! you’re having an absolute mare here. If anyone with half a brain could be bothered to reread through your condescending and uneducated posts they’d come to the same conclusion as me. Anyways. Let’s just leave it there.

 

[tsubaki]

That's BS. The onus isn't on the "interventionist crowd" to come up with the plan - what they're saying is that there should be a plan.

Whereas those of you who bang on about Iraq - a mistake - do so without understanding that you can learn from mistakes. You can't use one example of something going wrong to completely refuse to do anything ever again - that's why you have Assad backed by Putin doing whatever the hell they want because they know useful idiots will shield them from retaliation in the west.

How is this evidence of learning of the mistakes of Iraq?

We are proposing doing something in response to a situation on the ground where Assad has probably won already (given that one would think the Kurds would throw in their lot with the Syrian Government now that the US is talking about abandoning them again). No-one knows what that something is, apart from the usual nonsense about it being no doubt effective at stopping whatever it was ever happening again, or what we will do if it doesn't work.

To deal with this properly will require tens of thousand, probably more like a couple of hundred thousand, Western troops and all the accompanying naval and air forces for an extended period - years rather than months - of time. It will also require dealing with (in whatever way) Russian and Iranian personnel on the ground, as well as all the heavily armed jihadi elements roaming around the country, as well as the interested parties in the region (especially Turkey) who have been merrily interfereing in Syria for years, as well as the refugees and the vast amount of reconstruction required across the entire country.

It is not the sort of thing that can be planned for over a week.

 

[Jib in lad]

 

[JimmyJeffers]

How is this evidence of learning of the mistakes of Iraq?

We are proposing doing something in response to a situation on the ground where Assad has probably won already (given that one would think the Kurds would throw in their lot with the Syrian Government now that the US is talking about abandoning them again). No-one knows what that something is, apart from the usual nonsense about it being no doubt effective at stopping whatever it was ever happening again, or what we will do if it doesn't work.

To deal with this properly will require tens of thousand, probably more like a couple of hundred thousand, Western troops and all the accompanying naval and air forces for an extended period - years rather than months - of time. It will also require dealing with (in whatever way) Russian and Iranian personnel on the ground, as well as all the heavily armed jihadi elements roaming around the country, as well as the interested parties in the region (especially Turkey) who have been merrily interfereing in Syria for years, as well as the refugees and the vast amount of reconstruction required across the entire country.

It is not the sort of thing that can be planned for over a week.

You would imagine that this would have been planned as an eventuality by military personnel for years to be honest. Although it never seems that way when it comes to it.

 

[peteblue]

i wish there wasnt always a war of some sort going on

The defence industry disagrees......

 

[peteblue]

Considering that Obama told the world to stand by and await the USA and it's allies response after the last episode, and not one bomb was dropped in anger if I'm correct, Trump will definitely ensure that there is some visible response.
Then think back to Trump's attack on the Syria airbase after another atrocity when he almost phoned Assad and Putin, told them what was coming and when.
All showcasing with a potentially catastrophic outcome.

Well it is showcasing, but it’s also an absolute certainty. Obama painted a red line, they crossed it, he did nothing. This gave confidence to the whole worlds bad guys. Trump reacted when they crossed it, and one year on he’s going to do it again, and he’s told them. At least the bad guys know that he means business......whether you believe that’s good or bad....

 

[peteblue]

"We should do something about this" is basically as far as the interventionist crowd goes, there isn't usually a plan as to what happens after that and there certainly isn't any kind of global standard as to what is and what is not acceptable (take Syria for example - Assad using 500lb bombs to level Gouta is fine, but using chemical weapons is beyond the pale).

Global standard.....global standard.....well Argentina used to throw nuns out of aeroplanes, Hitler used to gas Jews, Britain used to shoot people with spears, America dropped nuclear bombs on populated areas. Like you, I don’t believe we have global standards, but we do have a revulsion factor, and when we find that the murder method upsets us enough we react....

 

[dholliday]

Well it is showcasing, but it’s also an absolute certainty. Obama painted a red line, they crossed it, he did nothing. This gave confidence to the whole worlds bad guys. Trump reacted when they crossed it, and one year on he’s going to do it again, and he’s told them. At least the bad guys know that he means business......whether you believe that’s good or bad....

C'mon Pete, you're more switched on than that.

What did Trump do to the bad guys? He agreed with Russia a pre-planned time & place for a series of strikes. 60 rockets resulted in minimal damage and a reported 9 deaths, which is a very low 'return' (for want of a better word), and as such hardly a deterrent, if deterrent was the intention (which it wasn't).

And who specifically are the bad guys in your scenario here?

 

[magicjuan]

Ha... the reason I mention Iraq at all is because that is honestly the only rallying cry you ever hear, probably because people don't know anything about history before the turn of the century.

How about the Spanish Civil War used as a proxy war by the Nazis to test weaponry. Similar to Russian involvement in Syria now.

Or how about the annexation of the Sudetenland and the claim on the Free City of Danzig etc. - testing the boundaries of the international community through measured aggression.

Or how about identifying the modern day parallels from the revanchism and irrendentism that blossomed prior to both World Wars with Crimea?

History is there to be learned from. All of it, not just selected pieces.

Then from all of that you should have realised that war is futile.
If it wasn't for the potential profits war would become completely oblivious.

 

[tommytowne]

C'mon Pete, you're more switched on than that.

What did Trump do to the bad guys? He agreed with Russia a pre-planned time & place for a series of strikes. 60 rockets resulted in minimal damage and a reported 9 deaths, which is a very low 'return' (for want of a better word), and as such hardly a deterrent, if deterrent was the intention (which it wasn't).

And who specifically are the bad guys in your scenario here?

This war by proxy is so unreal.
Making an appointment to bomb facilities and the targeted regime almost saying, after you, sir!
I truly despair.

 

[magicjuan]

Well, to be honest, the Iraq/Kurdish conflict has been going on since WW1. So unless you count that as a western intervention, the Middle East has been a turbulent place throughout modern history and the west has merely exacerbated what was pre-existent.

Point taken though, but I think it's beyond idealistic to say if we left them alone then they'd all be happy. The problem is they'd drag the west in to regional disputes when they became genocides anyway, because of the way the modern world is.

Didn't Churchill gas the Kurds in that period? Ironic really.