This is messed up.
As of 16 August 2014 Areas controlled by the Islamic State [shown in red]
It seems that when you fight and take out one enemy in the Mideast, another, bigger enemy springs up and takes the old enemy’s place.What the fuck are we supposed to do? Make an alliance with Iran?Reminds me of what Churchill said about the alliance with Stalin.MORE: And what the hell is up with the so-called “Caliph” being a released U.S. prisoner? (“Environmentally friendly” Camp Bucca my ass!)
Are we nuts? Or are we doing these things deliberately?
What worries me is that I don’t think the United States — as a country — is psychologically capable of fighting a war like this, even if we had a wartime mentality.
Which (with all respect to analysts like this guy), we do not.
Comments
18 responses to “Who’s winning?”
Rudy telling Saudi prince to shove it:
http://ww2.hdnux.com/photos/10/41/34/2234165/5/628×471.jpg
Barry bowing:
https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQ9E1L1dB1Scz87_026Irn0oZ3Q5MtV9oxUbMPxkY5CtxdcGbuX
A contrast that explains the rise of savagery in Iraq. They know they can get away with it.
This is an excerpt from a comment I came across made by another person elsewhere on the web. I think he is spot on:
This is an excerpt from a post by Sam Harris at his site:
Link: http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/why-dont-i-criticize-israel
The Muslim “holy” book, as a call to arms for their god, instills into Muslims a view of the world that is fundamentally different as compared to the “holy” books of other religions. Their god must reign supreme and there is always an enemy and you always attack unless circumstances force a strategic retreat. Then you abide your time until you can go on the offensive again. Not all Muslims are militant, but a significant number of them are and it’s due to the “call to arms” nature of their “holy” book.
This likely isn’t news to those paying attention, but Islam needs to go through a cultural/political reformation and embrace the “live and let live” pluralism of modern secular democracies. Until then, some Muslims will always be striving to establish a world caliphate and they won’t be using moral suasion to do so.
This is Europe’s and Russia’s and Saudi Arabia’s back yard, not ours. I’m all for giving weaponry to Israel but at some point the surrounding players – those closest to the threat – are either going to have offer up their blood and treasure or suffer the consequence of a powerful Islamic idiocracy.
This is Europe’s and Russia’s and Saudi Arabia’s back yard, not ours.
Is Chicago in their back yard?
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/alleged-isis-terrorists-threaten-u-s-twitter-article-1.1914363
Re “Barry bowing”: I’ll take that over George W. Bush holding hands with the Saudi king.
http://www.fourwinds10.net/resources/uploads/images/gay-Saudi-King.jpg
Is Chicago in their back yard?
Chicago is our front yard. If we need to take care of business in your front yard, we will. We can no longer afford the cost in blood or treasure to go gallivanting across the globe chasing these a$$holes down. They want to bring the fight to the US then we’ll exterminate them here. The EU and Russia and Saudi Arabia can put their young mens’ lives on the line for a change if they wish to exterminate them at the source. Not our job.
@Craig:
Both pictures are disgusting. The difference is that Bush waged a retaliatory war in the Middle East after 9/11, and he is no longer in charge.
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@CapitalistRoader:
The idea is to keep it out of our front yard. As to Saudi Arabia, along with Qatar they are responsible for ISIS. Saudi princes are directly funding it.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/iraq-crisis-how-saudi-arabia-helped-isis-take-over-the-north-of-the-country-9602312.html
Frank, yeah, the Saudis screwed up:
http://english.al-akhbar.com/node/21234
We can no longer afford to conquer and/or occupy every threat on the globe in order to keep those threats out of the US. The idea is to quit treating our allies like children; we can’t come running whenever there’s a dispute. The Poles, at least, are starting to get the message:
A Polish magazine said Sunday it has obtained recordings of a private conversation in which the foreign minister says Poland’s strong alliance with the U.S. was worthless and “even harmful because it creates a false sense of security.”
http://www.military.com/daily-news/2014/06/23/report-poland-minister-calls-us-ties-worthless.html
@CapitalistRoader
Your comments are spot on, IMO. WWII ended nearly 70 years ago and the Cold War ended 25 years ago. It’s time that the European nations stood back up on their own two feet and took control of their own security.
I agree with General Allen’s assertion that: The Islamic State is an entity beyond the pale of humanity and it must be eradicated. If we delay now, we will pay later.
drop the neo-con artists who inhabit fox news on mosul and let them fight it out with isis start with the cheneys and bush then the rest of the neo-con artists!
I blame this situation on George W. Bush. After the U.S. invaded Iraq, the first thing that Bush did was abolish the Iraqi army and the police. Bush now admits that was a mistake. It is not surprising that a country, any country, would fall into anarchy and gang warfare in a country with no army or policemen.
Chocolatier August 25th, 2014 (#):
So you are informing us that Iraq had NO ARMY AND NO POLICEMEN from 2003 on? The idea was to have a police force and army with minimal ties to the Saddam regime.
Competently or not,post-Saddam police force and army were created. How much continuity there should have been with the Saddam police force and army is certainly up for debate, but this is an entirely different matter from claiming that post-Saddam Iraq had “no army or policemen”
Anyone who claims that post-Saddam Iraq had “no army or policemen” is either woefully ignorant is is an inveterate liar. Knave or fool, as they say.
Eric:
What the fuck are we supposed to do? Make an alliance with Iran?
Examine Obama’s foreign policy in the middle east and tell me we don’t already have at the least a de facto alliance:
1. During the Iranian Green Revolution of 2009/10 Obama was quiet. With pictures of blood soaked young women in the street, he should have spoken out, unless of course he was sympathetic to or cowed by the mullahs. Ditto gays hanging from scaffolds.
2. He has played along with Iran’s game of uranium enrichment in effect allowing them to become a nuclear power.
3. He has sabotaged, invaded, and bombed Iran’s Sunni enemies from North Africa to Pakistan.
4. He waited until it was too late to intervene before faking a red line crossed by Assad in Syria, Iran’s Shia ally. What is interesting about this is the recent confirmation from Hillary Clinton.
5. He pulled us out of Iraq leaving a Shia dominated government in power. Now that Sunni controlled ISIS is threatening that government, he is bombing and probably putting special forces on the ground, like the UK is.
There are other indications of Obama’s duplicity like his looking the other way while Venezuela’s Chavez brought in Revolutionay Guards from Iran. There is evidence of a missile base. And more…
Having pointed this all out, I still believe that ISIS should be destroyed – even if it benefits Iran. Allowing it to become a regional power allied with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states would be catastrophic.
The threats to Chicago and other cities coming from al-Baghdadi and ISIS are in fact coming from Riyadh. Draw you own conclusions as to where I think a dozen or so GBU-43/B’s should be dropped.
Most Americans would like to see ISIS destroyed, including me, but how do we do that, given that polls show that the American public is strongly opposed to sending the U.S. army back to Iraq? I know of no bill in Congress that would authorize sending troops back to Iraq.
Chocolatier, here is another possibility:
http://www.dailypundit.com/?p=90792
I share your view that the people who run Saudi Arabia are not our friends. Any alliance we have with the Saudi princes is just a matter of mutual convenience, like out alliance with Stalin during World War 2 or our alliance with Czar Nickolas during World War 1. We had nothing in common with their values, but we found it convenient to pretend that we did – until the war was over.
For al-Baghdadi and ISIS as they slaughter and behead their way to Heaven:
“Lord our Father,Allah, Christ, Muhammad, Yahweh, etc. ad nauseum our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth into battle — be Thou near them! With them — in spirit — we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended in the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames in summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it —
For our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimmage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!
We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen. Allahu Akbar etc…
Thanks to Mark Twain