US in deep trouble with it's ISIS/Turkey/Kurdish policies

Let's see if I have this right, Turkey attacks the Kurds who are fighting ISIS. Israel Attacks Hezbollah and Syrian Forces Fighting ISIS. The Saudi's and UAE fund ISIS and the US Government supports all these actions against those fighting ISIS while claiming publicly that the are fighting ISIS. Now if I were one of those tin foil hat guys I would say actions speak louder than words. I would say that by attacking those who are fighting ISIS you are actually helping ISIS.

@El Kabong
@Kirkland Laing
@Gandalf
@TitoFan

The Kurds are fighting for their very lives and the US allowing Turkey to do so serves only the interests of IS! And the US is supposed to be fighting IS while, allowing Turkey to annihilate the Kurds? The Kurds will fight back because they have no choice and Turkey will pay dearly in the end. Now, Turkey will have to deal with the Kurds and IS both coming after their military.

Now Turkey (a NATO ally) and the Kurds are at war. So here are most of the groups warring over there... the U.S., Turkey, the Kurds, the Islamic State, Al-Nusra Front, al-Jabab, plus the moderate rebels of Syria, Assad's forces, the Iraqi government forces, the Shia militias, al-Qaeda, Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Houthis in Yemen, Boko Haram, and a bunch of groups in Africa.

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Originally Posted by brocktonblockbust

Let's see if I have this right, Turkey attacks the Kurds who are fighting ISIS. Israel Attacks Hezbollah and Syrian Forces Fighting ISIS. The Saudi's and UAE fund ISIS and the US Government supports all these actions against those fighting ISIS while claiming publicly that the are fighting ISIS. Now if I were one of those tin foil hat guys I would say actions speak louder than words. I would say that by attacking those who are fighting ISIS you are actually helping ISIS.

@El Kabong
@Kirkland Laing
@Gandalf
@TitoFan

The Kurds are fighting for their very lives and the US allowing Turkey to do so serves only the interests of IS! And the US is supposed to be fighting IS while, allowing Turkey to annihilate the Kurds? The Kurds will fight back because they have no choice and Turkey will pay dearly in the end. Now, Turkey will have to deal with the Kurds and IS both coming after their military.

Now Turkey (a NATO ally) and the Kurds are at war. So here are most of the groups warring over there... the U.S., Turkey, the Kurds, the Islamic State, Al-Nusra Front, al-Jabab, plus the moderate rebels of Syria, Assad's forces, the Iraqi government forces, the Shia militias, al-Qaeda, Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Houthis in Yemen, Boko Haram, and a bunch of groups in Africa.

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Well I can't believe it what a mess, strange indeed they are bombing the Kurds for retaliation
for the death of 2 police men.

It really is a debacle. Apparently the Turks are in talks with the Kurds. Turkey has also opened itself to attacks by isil but many Arab states have been asking for us help with Isis. Problem is I don't think the issue can be resolved from the air. The American population is not in favor of boots on the ground in the mid east. I'm sure we have special forces around. Like @Gandalf always says the US needs to step up drone attacks. To quote miles, the more drones the better and invasion is the way to go. Damn that guy is a hawk. He must have US defense stocks in his portfolio.

Exactly Walrus. If there is one thing to learn from the 21st century, it is that arms are a sound investment.

@you lot.

Remember our current Syria strategy? We're training a bunch of moderate nutjobs to fight the Islamic nutjobs. Turns out the moderate nutjobs aren't doing so well.........

A Pentagon program to train moderate Syrian insurgents to fight the Islamic State has been vexed by problems of recruitment, screening, dismissals and desertions that have left only a tiny band of fighters ready to do battle.
Those fighters — 54 in all — suffered perhaps their most embarrassing setback yet on Thursday. One of their leaders, a Syrian Army defector who recruited them, was abducted in Syria near the Turkish border, along with his deputy who commands the trainees....Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter has acknowledged the shortfalls, citing strict screening standards, which have created a backlog of 7,000 recruits waiting to be vetted. Mr. Carter has insisted the numbers will increase.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/31/wo...-in-syria.html

A Syrian insurgent group at the heart of the Pentagon’s effort to fight the Islamic State came under intense attack on Friday....The American-led coalition responded with airstrikes to help the American-aligned unit, known as Division 30, in fighting off the assault....The attack on Friday was mounted by the Nusra Front, which is affiliated with Al Qaeda. It came a day after the Nusra Front captured two leaders and at least six fighters of Division 30, which supplied the first trainees to graduate from the Pentagon’s anti-Islamic State training program.
....“This wasn’t supposed to happen like this,” said one former senior American official, who was working closely on Syria issues until recently, and who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential intelligence assessments....Division 30 said in a statement that five of its fighters were killed in the firefight on Friday, 18 were wounded and 20 were captured by the Nusra Front. It was not clear whether the 20 captives included the six fighters and two commanders captured a day earlier....

A spokesman for the American military, Col. Patrick S. Ryder, wrote in an email statement that “we are confident that this attack will not deter Syrians from joining the program to fight for Syria,” and added that the program “is making progress.”
....[A senior] defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence reports, described what he called “silver linings” to the attack on Friday: that the trainees had fought effectively in the battle, and that coalition warplanes responded quickly with airstrikes to support them.




http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/01/wo...roup.html?_r=0




So depending on how you count it there are either three or eleven moderate nutjobs left alive. Out of a whopping total of 54 trained nutjobs since we stated this policy a couple of years ago. Impressive.

Erdogan in Turkey has his own agenda for this. I think he wants to bomb Kurds so he can get enough support to alter the countries constitution to get more power. I'm sure the US is throwing him a few billion as well. Erdogan is a strange guy, we might be seeing Brock in a Burkah if Erdogan gets his hands on the Turkish constitution.

Look what happen to Egypt, Libya, Iraq, and now Syria. A weaken middle east make Israel that much stronger. Which makes a attack on Iran much more likely.

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

@you lot.

Remember our current Syria strategy? We're training a bunch of moderate nutjobs to fight the Islamic nutjobs. Turns out the moderate nutjobs aren't doing so well.........

A Pentagon program to train moderate Syrian insurgents to fight the Islamic State has been vexed by problems of recruitment, screening, dismissals and desertions that have left only a tiny band of fighters ready to do battle.
Those fighters — 54 in all — suffered perhaps their most embarrassing setback yet on Thursday. One of their leaders, a Syrian Army defector who recruited them, was abducted in Syria near the Turkish border, along with his deputy who commands the trainees....Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter has acknowledged the shortfalls, citing strict screening standards, which have created a backlog of 7,000 recruits waiting to be vetted. Mr. Carter has insisted the numbers will increase.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/31/wo...-in-syria.html

A Syrian insurgent group at the heart of the Pentagon’s effort to fight the Islamic State came under intense attack on Friday....The American-led coalition responded with airstrikes to help the American-aligned unit, known as Division 30, in fighting off the assault....The attack on Friday was mounted by the Nusra Front, which is affiliated with Al Qaeda. It came a day after the Nusra Front captured two leaders and at least six fighters of Division 30, which supplied the first trainees to graduate from the Pentagon’s anti-Islamic State training program.
....“This wasn’t supposed to happen like this,” said one former senior American official, who was working closely on Syria issues until recently, and who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential intelligence assessments....Division 30 said in a statement that five of its fighters were killed in the firefight on Friday, 18 were wounded and 20 were captured by the Nusra Front. It was not clear whether the 20 captives included the six fighters and two commanders captured a day earlier....

A spokesman for the American military, Col. Patrick S. Ryder, wrote in an email statement that “we are confident that this attack will not deter Syrians from joining the program to fight for Syria,” and added that the program “is making progress.”
....[A senior] defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence reports, described what he called “silver linings” to the attack on Friday: that the trainees had fought effectively in the battle, and that coalition warplanes responded quickly with airstrikes to support them.




http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/01/wo...roup.html?_r=0




So depending on how you count it there are either three or eleven moderate nutjobs left alive. Out of a whopping total of 54 trained nutjobs since we stated this policy a couple of years ago. Impressive.

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I don't know Kirk, with Iran, China and Russia backing Bashir Syria unfortunately becomes a chess game and the people living their are the ones that suffer while read about it and discuss it in the paper. I remember shortly before the doody hitting the fan there was a nyt magazine special about Bashir and his wife. His wife lived a very opulent lifestyle. I think it was one of the things that pissed the Syrian people off. It's a shame, Syria has a beautiful history with some of the oldest Christian communities in the world. Bashir actually took time to protect those Christians who are now being butchered by the caliphate. With the middle eastern history I know many of us in the US would love to visit it but who wants to visit a war torn country, I can go to Chicago for that. It's a shame the whole Damn thing, I hope the best for the people of Syria, I'm sure they are just walking around like WTF. People just want a decent life. We take so much for granted and then read and pontificate about it like we know what the he'll is going on.

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Originally Posted by walrus

I don't know Kirk, with Iran, China and Russia backing Bashir Syria unfortunately becomes a chess game and the people living their are the ones that suffer while read about it and discuss it in the paper. I remember shortly before the doody hitting the fan there was a nyt magazine special about Bashir and his wife. His wife lived a very opulent lifestyle. I think it was one of the things that pissed the Syrian people off. It's a shame, Syria has a beautiful history with some of the oldest Christian communities in the world. Bashir actually took time to protect those Christians who are now being butchered by the caliphate. With the middle eastern history I know many of us in the US would love to visit it but who wants to visit a war torn country, I can go to Chicago for that. It's a shame the whole Damn thing, I hope the best for the people of Syria, I'm sure they are just walking around like WTF. People just want a decent life. We take so much for granted and then read and pontificate about it like we know what the he'll is going on.

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Syria has always been a country where big powers have fought their proxy wars. Just not as an actual war, that's a new thing. Every single Middle Eastern dictator lives an opulent lifestyle including all the ones we've kept in power for decades.

What we're doing there is the samr ridiculous thing we've done in countries like Ukraine and Libya. Some guy is in power who isn't allied to us so we've done everything we can to overthrow him and just expecting peace to break out the minute the regime is overthrown and a stable pro-American government to take its place. Because that's what happened in Iraq! It's hard to believe how idiotic our policies are. Iraq, Syria and Libya are ongoing nightmares with Yemen and other regional countries on the way to the same kind of faile d states. In a few years if we we somehow able to produce a bunch of guys like Saddam, Gaddafi and Assad and put them in charge and for them to produce peace and stability we'd be popping champagne corks. We'd immediately back them and fund them and prop up their regimes just like we once did to Saddam, Gadaffi, Assad* and so on.

*To be fair it was Hafez Assad, Bashir's dad who we propped up for a long time.

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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Originally Posted by walrus

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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Agreed.

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Originally Posted by walrus

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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They've been fighting the same war over there since the seventh century. Nothing is going to be resolved in our lifetimes. The last thing we should be doing though is destabilising a bunch of countries that were stable for decades.

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

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Originally Posted by walrus

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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They've been fighting the same war over there since the seventh century. Nothing is going to be resolved in our lifetimes. The last thing we should be doing though is destabilising a bunch of countries that were stable for decades.

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tyranny is not stability. Carp, I sound like Louis Farrakhan

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Originally Posted by walrus

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

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Originally Posted by walrus

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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They've been fighting the same war over there since the seventh century. Nothing is going to be resolved in our lifetimes. The last thing we should be doing though is destabilising a bunch of countries that were stable for decades.

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tyranny is not stability. Carp, I sound like Louis Farrakhan

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How many decades did the Assad family rule Syria with an orderly if dictatorial society? Or the Ba' aath party rule Iraq (Saddam plus others)? Or the Al Saud family rule Saudi Arabia? Or the Shah run Iran? Or the current mob run Iran? Or the Gulf princes rules their emirates? Gaddafi in Libya, various military dictators heading the same regime in Egypt? They're not pretty but they produce decade after decade of stable societies, QED. Encourage their downfall or actively overthrow them and look what you get.

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

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Originally Posted by walrus

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

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Originally Posted by walrus

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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They've been fighting the same war over there since the seventh century. Nothing is going to be resolved in our lifetimes. The last thing we should be doing though is destabilising a bunch of countries that were stable for decades.

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tyranny is not stability. Carp, I sound like Louis Farrakhan

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How many decades did the Assad family rule Syria with an orderly if dictatorial society? Or the Ba' aath party rule Iraq (Saddam plus others)? Or the Al Saud family rule Saudi Arabia? Or the Shah run Iran? Or the current mob run Iran? Or the Gulf princes rules their emirates? Gaddafi in Libya, various military dictators heading the same regime in Egypt? They're not pretty but they produce decade after decade of stable societies, QED. Encourage their downfall or actively overthrow them and look what you get.

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I assume you are well traveled and have dealt with a vast array of culture. Have you had much opportunity to speak with People who leave these, as you say, stable countries and see what the people say about living in them. It's really quite chilling. It tears my heart out to hear the people tell me their stories of living in these regimes. I'm not saying the west has all the answers for these countries. They come from a different point of view. But Damon they went through some horrible things and fear speaking out as People still disappear in the night in these stable regimes. Are the people so beyond repair this is how they need to be governed to maintain stability as you say. Power vacuums are a frightful thing in those countries and People running on moderation seem to be locked up or disappear. A number of Chinese just got arrested as they dared protest the government is during an edict to take down crosses in houses of worship. I just am baffled by stuff like this, though not surprised. China wants its yen to become competitive to the dollar on the international stage, I don't think it is Chinese economics that may hinge this in its twenty year goal to do so, but I do think it's going to be Chinese politics that may hinder this but it's politics. Xi is in the midst of a power grab saying he wants to pull back Dengs collective administration. Sorry, I went off topic with the Chinese thing, feel free to post a graph proving me wrong. Did you know Indonesians constitution outlaws atheism, strange.





This

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Originally Posted by walrus

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

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Originally Posted by walrus

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Originally Posted by Kirkland Laing

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Originally Posted by walrus

Yes Kirk, we all know the Arabs and most leaders live . Opulent lives but I think Mrs Bashir showed off too much of her taste for western goods Gucci and what not. Basically the entire middle east has been a pawn for Britain, the US and Islam itself for years. I don't think that can be blamed for all of its current problems. Africa was a playground for the US and Russia during the cold war. Once again, can that be blamed for its current problems today.

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They've been fighting the same war over there since the seventh century. Nothing is going to be resolved in our lifetimes. The last thing we should be doing though is destabilising a bunch of countries that were stable for decades.

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tyranny is not stability. Carp, I sound like Louis Farrakhan

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How many decades did the Assad family rule Syria with an orderly if dictatorial society? Or the Ba' aath party rule Iraq (Saddam plus others)? Or the Al Saud family rule Saudi Arabia? Or the Shah run Iran? Or the current mob run Iran? Or the Gulf princes rules their emirates? Gaddafi in Libya, various military dictators heading the same regime in Egypt? They're not pretty but they produce decade after decade of stable societies, QED. Encourage their downfall or actively overthrow them and look what you get.

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I assume you are well traveled and have dealt with a vast array of culture. Have you had much opportunity to speak with People who leave these, as you say, stable countries and see what the people say about living in them. It's really quite chilling. It tears my heart out to hear the people tell me their stories of living in these regimes. I'm not saying the west has all the answers for these countries. They come from a different point of view. But Damon they went through some horrible things and fear speaking out as People still disappear in the night in these stable regimes. Are the people so beyond repair this is how they need to be governed to maintain stability as you say. Power vacuums are a frightful thing in those countries and People running on moderation seem to be locked up or disappear. A number of Chinese just got arrested as they dared protest the government is during an edict to take down crosses in houses of worship. I just am baffled by stuff like this, though not surprised. China wants its yen to become competitive to the dollar on the international stage, I don't think it is Chinese economics that may hinge this in its twenty year goal to do so, but I do think it's going to be Chinese politics that may hinder this but it's politics. Xi is in the midst of a power grab saying he wants to pull back Dengs collective administration. Sorry, I went off topic with the Chinese thing, feel free to post a graph proving me wrong. Did you know Indonesians constitution outlaws atheism, strange.





This

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I know quite a few people from this region. A lot of my clients come from the oily part of the world. What they've said for years is that yeah, such and such is a horrible repressive dictator but (they're all supporters of whatever regime they're living under) what's the alternative to us? If you take us away the crazies take power. I had half a dozen Saudi/Iraqi/Iranian guys tell me exactly what would happen in Iraq before Bush invaded. Oh, and one Jordanian. They all said Iran would take over the oily southern part of Iraq and the Kurds would split off and they'd both leave the non-oily Sunni (Saddam) part which used to hold the power to rot, and that the jihadis would take over the Sunni part. One of the Iraqi guys I talked to moved to Syria just before Bush invaded but in about 2005 he told me Syria was going to end up like Sunni Iraq, at war with itself and he fucked off to Dubai. Now he's making plans to go to Switzerland. The other one moved to London in 2002. Could tell you a lot more here about how accurate they were, let's just say they were spot on.

So it's the choice between bad and worse. Someone like Saddam or Gaddafi, who at least keep order and the electricity on, or ISIS or similar nutjobs.