Soldato
Keeping a lid on the mess ie: commiting genocide and murdering anyone that opposed them.
I still think, despite the calamity afterwards, that it was right to remove saddam.
ISIL, ISIS, Daesh discussion thread.
- Thread starter RoboCod
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Keeping a lid on the mess ie: commiting genocide and murdering anyone that opposed them.
I still think, despite the calamity afterwards, that it was right to remove saddam.
Caporegime
It's not a question of knowing how, it's a question of being willing. Brutal people need brutal methods to keep them in line.
Caporegime
So how do you define people that regularly burn others alive, throw people to their deaths for potentially being homosexual, use rape as punishment?
Are they just misunderstood?
So how do you define people that regularly burn others alive, throw people to their deaths for potentially being homosexual, use rape as punishment?
Are they just misunderstood?
Ill-educated.
The sooner the modernisation of society in the ME the better. Once the people realise there is more beyond scripture on paper about make-believe fairy tales the sooner they will cease to believe it is acceptable to hack someones head off just because they hold a different viewpoint to themselves.
A violent oppressive dictator is not a solution to progression. To simply label them as savages who need a firm hand in unjust. We are all people and all people can change, develop and grow, as can their civilisations.
As the old saying goes, you're allowed your own opinions, but you're not allowed your own facts. So I'm afraid it isn't "end of", because you're simply wrong.
Let us not ignore the facts. The "big-bad-West" comment is short sighted and incredibly ignorant of events that occurred in the ME either much longer ago than modern history, or if more recently, then nothing to do with the West at all. I'll lay the facts out for you in case you missed any thing, because you seem so matter of fact about the whole situation I feel you might have missed quite a bit. Like anything that happened before you came of age, or read a bias left wing nut web page perhaps...
I can forgive people for thinking it's all the wests fault, after all, if they're not willing to dig out a book and instead rely solely on the rhetoric that is churned up on the web then what chance do they have of understanding the situation anyway?
First we must acknowledge that Islamism is as much (if not more) a response to the failure of Arab leaders to deliver meaningful outcomes to their people, than it is to any Western intervention (Lima, this happened before any Western intervention) Further, Arab people often lacked opportunities for political participation. Arab citizens therefore turn to mosques as public spaces for political discussion. As a result religion became the language of politics and of political change. Islam is intertwined in their political proceeds. It's like the Catholic church domineering all things political here (Again, much of this has occurred in many Muslim countries, well before any Western involvement anywhere)
Also, post-colonialism failed Arab middle classes, as the ruling elite continued to hold power and wealth, dictatorships and oppression rules supreme (the oppressive ruler scenario that you think is a good thing? It isn't). We had quick economic growth in emerging Gulf states which increased the influence of conservative Muslim governments. At the same time the expansion of the oil-based Gulf economy brought about uneven development, the response to which was growing support for Islamism as a tool of expression for internal grievances (politics - again, nothing really to do with the West).
We must also consider that the effects of cultural erosion and globalisation have resulted in what is pretty much a Muslim identity crisis (again, not a Western fault).
Add to all this civilisations that have experienced large power vacuums where tribal conflict and power struggle has crippled huge areas.. it all becomes somewhat disingenuous and naive to consider the entire situation as a simple as a "West Vs Islam" scenario. That is blinkered.
Soldato
However bad Saddam Hussein was, his Iraq was a better place than what it is now.
The US and the UK went in to Afghanistan and Iraq removed what was a stable governing system (compared to today) and the fall out has been creating ISIS which is a far bigger threat than the Taliban and even Al Qaeda.
The US and the UK went in to Afghanistan and Iraq removed what was a stable governing system (compared to today) and the fall out has been creating ISIS which is a far bigger threat than the Taliban and even Al Qaeda.
Again, highly subjective. I wonder what your viewpoint would be if you were Kurdish living under the fear of Saddam. Oh no that's right, the ME is a bigger issue today because us poor westerners are a target now too.
Soldato
True. Not so good for the Kurds, but at least it was stable.
Lets not forget anyone who opposed him.
He destroyed the town of Dujail and imprisoned all its women. The men disappeared (assumed massacred).
He invaded Kuwait over oil and debt and when pushed back his forces he set fire to their oil as they retreated, burning over a billion barrels. They also opened the pipelines releasing over 10 billion barrels. All of which caused environmental disaster.
Towards the end of the Gulf war in 1991 he massacred thousands of Shiite Muslims for supporting the Shiite rebellion in Southern Iraq. These Marsh Arabs had lived in that region for thousands of years but he bulldozed their villages and built a network of water control that diverted water away from the marshes thus decimating their way of life. The marsh area is now 10% of what it was.
None of this surmounts to what I would call stability! How quickly people forget.
Associate
On a slightly related note, if anyone wants some interesting reading regarding the power vacuum that was left after the removal of Saddam Hussein, there's a great book by Patrick Cockburn about Muqtada Al-Sadr and his influence in Iraq during the last decade. Highly recommended to anyone who has more than a passing interests to events in the Middle East.
Man of Honour
Saddam was an utter scumbag, hell he even looked a bit Stalin, an even bigger sack of nastiness.
Mistakes were made, the invasion was never justified for the reasons given. The Iraqi army was for all intents dismantled, all the personnel with grudges and no jobs melted into the tribal and resistance militias.
IS came from the ashes, with a lot of highly trained ex military leading the way with weapons pilfered from a dismantled army. Iraq has a new army but it's lost a lot of it's seasoned veterans (don't forget Iran/Iraq war gave a lot of experience to some of these soldiers).
Mistakes were made, the invasion was never justified for the reasons given. The Iraqi army was for all intents dismantled, all the personnel with grudges and no jobs melted into the tribal and resistance militias.
IS came from the ashes, with a lot of highly trained ex military leading the way with weapons pilfered from a dismantled army. Iraq has a new army but it's lost a lot of it's seasoned veterans (don't forget Iran/Iraq war gave a lot of experience to some of these soldiers).
For a start you must think posting in the arrogant insulting way you do gives big E-bro points? I can't think of any other reason why you would post in the way you do.
Second; you pretty much imply that I have a stupid view point that I've obtained from left wing nonsense tabloids. If you must know, I'm far far more right wing than left. Go figure.....but thanks for your assumption.
Thirdly; thanks for the long winded back story about why the Middle East is in the state it's in. I'm fully aware that the Middle East is in a huge mess largely due to a their own doing. If you opened your eyes and read my posts, you would see I have not for one minute said 'the west is the reason the Middle East is ****ed.' What I have said over and over is that the wests meddling is the catalyst that had caused the rise of Isis at this moment in time. I don't care if there is a debate about if sadam is just as bad, that's not the point and you seem to keep missing that in your egotistical replies.
Since you're such a clever clogs (that can't read my posts properly yet is an avid historian of the Middle East), answer me this - if the west didn't topple sadam, and perhaps to a lesser extent gadaffi and back the toppling of Assad, would Isis exist in its current form?
Try and answer with a yes or no without giving an unwanted history lesson filled with snide comments to anyone that disagrees with you.
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Alright princess, put your handbag away.
Demands someone opens their eyes, yet insists oppressive dictators are a good thing. Fantastic.
I'm afraid it was I doing the disagreeing with your statement, and it is in fact you getting quite precious about that.
You need the history if you want to even begin to understand anything that has come to fruition there.
Demands someone opens their eyes, yet insists oppressive dictators are a good thing. Fantastic.
I'm afraid it was I doing the disagreeing with your statement, and it is in fact you getting quite precious about that.
You need the history if you want to even begin to understand anything that has come to fruition there.
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I never 'insisted' dictators are a good thing....please try again
Not sure what your third paragraph is about... I know you are the one disagreeing (although not actually sure what you are disagreeing with exactly).
So you couldn't give a simple yes or no to my question?....cool.
Caporegime
John Kerry just been speaking on CNN, he said a ground force is needed.
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Caporegime
Boots on the ground, or Alan Titchmarsh, Tommy Walsh, and Charlie Dimmocks jugs 
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So what I can gather from all that you have said is that you're happy that these areas are ruled by a genocidal maniac who kills thousands of his own people if it means no ISIL in your News headlines?
"Keep a lid on the whole mess". Hmm, I think you have a skewed view of what that entailed for many of the people. It's easy to fall ignorant sat way back in relative safety.
I think steps forward often come from taking steps back. Removing such people is right. I wish we did it in other countries where perhaps we had lesser concern for our own interests. Alas, the real world doesn't work that way and never mind that, the capacity of our forces couldn't stretch that thin.
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I tend to agree to an extent. At the time the second Iraq war started, I was very much of the opinion it was a good thing. I didn't care if the WMD thing was a lie as I thought it would be good to get rid of brutal leaders. Thing is, years later and some hindsight has made me change my opinion on the subject. I would still support the war if we concluded it properly but as it stands we pulled troops out too early and it's become a huge mess. I think we should finish what we started.
Tefal your 2 quotes don't highlight contradiction. What I've been trying to get at is that whilst I don't fundamentally agree with how these dictators go about their business, I'd much rather they were still in place than have what is basically a huge cult running a muck across several countries.