Isis

[Stavros]

Watch the video below from VICE News which is an interview with a Canadian ISIS member, it explains my thought process on why eventually the US MUST bring the war to ISIS.

Vice News has produced some compelling material on IS, but it also exposes them to ridicule, one example being the Canadian fool in the video linked above. I am not down-grading the determination some of these lads have to kill people in the US, Canada, the UK, France and so on, and I fear that an incident will happen, but when a wannabe 'martyr' threatens to kill everyone, take over the White House or the whole world and so on, you have to admit that it is a measure of how far from reality these people are.

[broncofan]

Robert Fisk in the Independent has suggested that negotiations with IS ought not to be ruled out, on the basis that negotiations are often held between people who regard each other as evil incarnate. In the case of IS, which has based a lot of its appeal on being completely uncompromising, any move to negotiate -possibly by factions within IS if not the leadership itself- would probably lead its young radicals to accuse those willing to talk of selling out. There are in Iraq a fair number of ex-Ba'athists and alienated Sunni Arabs from Anbar province in the IS fold right now, but it isn't clear to me if they are in support of this mythical Caliphate that has been pronounced or if they are just using IS as a powerful wedge against the government in Baghdad. What exactly there is to negotiate about is also not clear. It there was a route back into government for the disaffected Sunni in some kind of federal division of the country, and this would run counter to the IS project in Iraq, while a ceasefire and some sort of proposal for a negotiated settlement in Syria would also undermine its support amongst all but those who think that the Caliphate has a realistic future. People are sick and tired of fighting, refugees want to go home. IS just offers them more of what they are exhausted from.

Didn't Robert Fisk get hit in the face with a stone and issue a public apology to the stone? I would love there to be a diplomatic solution. That was the reason I asked in the initial question what demands Isis would have? It's a fair question. You're suggesting that maybe there are a fair number of Sunnis and former Ba'athists who could be peeled away from the 30,000 strong in ISIS. A unity government would weaken ISIS, but I don't know why we should believe ISIS is bluffing. It does not make sense to me that an army would murder everyone they encounter (especially on sectarian grounds) if their intent is to share power. I've heard of starting a negotiation with a strong bluff...

I think many are acting as if those who want to intervene have an imperialistic purpose or ulterior motive. "Let them sort it out" to me means that whoever has the guns and is better mobilized wipes out as many villages as possible until they get what they want.

The most self-interested stance would be to say we do not want to be involved in more conflict there...if it's also best for all parties, that would be great. To me, non-intervention seems like the most expedient choice for the U.S and Britain, but not the best for people who are in the path of ISIS. I'm not being facetious at all when I say that. There is not a place on earth where I would look at a group executing entire villages and say there should not be a united and international response. It seems to me that when it is clear-cut and there is an opportunity to act without huge blowback, the world should. Obviously, that opportunity does not exist with North Korea or any other nuclear power...but if you have an armed band going through the countryside killing everyone in their sights, I think attempting to negotiate first is an honorable thing. If it proves futile, then it could be time to act.

[Stavros]

It could be that an analysis of the past shows that in the early phase of operations when a political group is establishing its reputation, and in this case (but not all others) territory, compromise is simply not on the agenda, so that diplomatic moves would be futile, and if anything suggest that the opponents of IS are weak. The deeply depressing murder of Alan Henning underlines this position and also serves to enable IS to depict those Muslims who called for his release as being soft, disloyal and unwilling to either join their 'Caliphate', or focus their anger on the treatment of Muslims in general or campaign for the release of specific prisoners in jails in various countries.
It would appear from a report in today's New York Times, that Henning was murdered on the 20th of September or thereabouts when residents of Raqqa saw him being taken out of town followed by a film crew.

-I don't know why we should believe ISIS is bluffing. It does not make sense to me that an army would murder everyone they encounter (especially on sectarian grounds) if their intent is to share power
-I think this is the main strategic weakness of IS because it is claiming that it is re-building the Caliphate knowing that both non-Muslims and Muslims of various beliefs existed in all the former attempts to create a pan-Islamic caliphate, even if they can claim that power-sharing between Muslims and non-Muslims did not happen and that non-Muslims paid a religious tax, and so on. At the moment it is demonstrating that it will not tolerate difference as it is defined by them. This suggests that if their credentials are as pure as they claim, they have staked everything on a victory or death scenario, which at this phase as I said above, makes diplomacy rather pointless. Whether or not divisions will emerge within IS which outsiders can exploit is not clear, it happened in bin Laden's group because of 9/11, it could happen in IS with regard to differences of opinion on the merits of the cause in Iraq as opposed to Syria -it is still too early to judge.

Conventional warfare between states has often been used to force one side to retreat/surrender before negotiations can begin to resolve the original political dispute or to gain an advantage, or to end a situation without further negotiation -the First World War led directly to the sequence of negotiations that began in Versailles in 1919, whereas the end of the Second World War produced a different outcome and a different set of negotiations which dragged on for years. By contrast, the defeat of Argentina in 1982 did not lead either the UK or Argentina to seek a new understanding on the status of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas), nor was any form of diplomacy produced after the Iran-Iraq war or Iraq's invasion of Kuwait to deal with whatever it was that provoked those disputes.
It would therefore not be in the interests of the forces opposing IS to open a diplomatic channel right now as this would be seen as 'appeasement' (unless it is tried merely to confirm that it is a useless prospect, as happened with the British government and both the Provisional IRA and Loyalist groups in Northern Ireland); it would not suit IS which stakes its reputation (as did Iran in the early phase of the Islamic Revolution) on a complete rejection of international relations and indeed any political reality that it does not control. It would not be radical, revolutionary group if it opened negotiations with the kuffar, but then for the core leadership what is there to negotiate if not our 'surrender'?

There was an attempt a few years ago to negotiate with a more 'moderate' wing of the Taliban in Afghanistan, when it was felt they were in a weak position precisely because of a division with the group over its long term aims. There must be a belief in Iraq that just as the Awakening movement was created to defeat al-Qaida in Iraq, that there must be ways of bringing back Sunni opponents into the Iraqi political system in order to weaken the base of IS in Iraq, though it is too early to say how the new government will approach this, and another element of the success of the Awakening movement was that it was run in tandem with the 'surge' which meant more US boots on the ground, which appears to have been ruled out here.
Unfortunately we are still in an early phase of the IS phenomenon, and they clearly believe they are setting the agenda, and that spells doom for a lot of people.

[buttslinger]

As much money as the Arabs are making off oil, the American businessmen must be making just as much. I wonder what Obama promised all those countries to "fight" ISIS?
ISIS is nothing more than a bunch of street thugs. There are no police there because there's nobody to pay the police.
Let's set the oil fields on fire and triple the price of gasoline. Maybe then we'll get an electric car that kicks ass.
When is the last time you've heard good news from the middle east?

[Stavros]

As much money as the Arabs are making off oil, the American businessmen must be making just as much. I wonder what Obama promised all those countries to "fight" ISIS?
ISIS is nothing more than a bunch of street thugs. There are no police there because there's nobody to pay the police.
Let's set the oil fields on fire and triple the price of gasoline. Maybe then we'll get an electric car that kicks ass.
When is the last time you've heard good news from the middle east?

If you have been watching the news recently you will know that the price of oil is currently falling, and that this has exposed divisions in OPEC on the issue of production -Iran wants to restrict it in order to maintain the price of oil at $100 a barrel, OPEC member states have budgeted for spending on the basis of a minimum $100 a barrel. A lower oil price hits Russia, as it did in the 1980s, but would also undermine the viability of shale oil and gas production in the USA which would in turn return the US to a dependency on exports from which in recent years it has been relieved owing to the success of this industry (in terms of output if not always in environmental terms).
There is a long but interesting discussion of oil prices from yesterday's Telegraph:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/n...ver-price.html

Setting oil fields on fire is both a waste of resources and environmentally damaging, I don't know why anyone thinks it is anything other than a spiteful gesture, one that Saddam Hussein made in 1991.

[buttslinger]

.....Setting oil fields on fire is both a waste of resources and environmentally damaging, I don't know why anyone thinks it is anything other than a spiteful gesture, one that Saddam Hussein made in 1991.

Most foreign policies are just gambles based on the odds, that doesn't really work when ISIS is beheading western journalists. ISIS is dictating policy. If or when Iran gets the bomb, fluctuating oil prices may be the least of the world's problems, because they're known to fly off the handle when God vs. Allah ....or whatever ...comes up.

George W. was more of a J R Ewing Oil Tycoon than a president, Obama is right to disdain the Middle East, but doing so might put the election of Hillary in jeopardy. When it comes to money and power, all World Leaders have a bit of tunnel vision.

Mr Spock and Mr Stavros are both welded to Logic, the problem with the Middle East is, there is no logical answer to the dilemma there. Because of the OIL. The United States policy on the Middle East before 2001 was hope it didn't come over here. Technically, the USA can't use it's resources to build a perfect car, we are limited as a government to build the perfect weapon. But in this case, the perfect car is the perfect weapon. Beat the Devil. Here and Abroad. (never happen. I predict eternal bloodshed)

[Stavros]

Last weekend The Observer newspaper in the UK published a survey and supporting articles on changing attitudes to drugs in the UK, and, in addition posted a fascinating article by Ed Vulliamy on the transition in Mexico from the old-style mafia-type drug cartel to the more recent version, more para-military and even more ruthless than what came before. I was struck by this claim made without a supporting reference, which I will try and find:

"While the old-guard narcos might do business over lunch or in smart hotels, the new guard control the internet. The Zetas post their atrocities on YouTube, by way of recruitment posters; it is a matter of conjecture whether they got the idea from al-Qaida – recently inherited by Islamic State (Isis) – or the other way around. Patrick Cockburn, author of a recent book on Isis, reports that a recent video claiming to show a beheading by the jihadist group was in fact not their handiwork at all: it was shot in Mexico, an execution by the Zetas.
While the mafia old guard might hide a body in the concrete of a flyover, the new organisations make their brutality as public as possible. As the chief forensic examiner for the police in Tijuana, Hiram Muñoz, puts it so eloquently, as he searches for meanings and messages in the mode of mutilations: “The difference is this: in what I would call normal times, I kill you and make you disappear. Now, they are shouting it, turning it into a grotesque carousel around their territory. In normal conditions, the torture and killing is private, now it is a public execution using extreme violence, and this is significant.”


An obvious difference is that the USA does not send in the bombers to lay waste to Mexican villages, distribution depots, or the villas of the drug barons in Mexico City or wherever they live.



This is the link to the article
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2...-guzman-war-us

[Odelay]

I subscribe to two theories on why we're seeing and reading about so much violence.

1. The internet. duh!
2. The world is approaching 7 billion people, which means more degenerates and it's these people who make the news. (see #1, above)

There were a little more than 2 billion people at the time of Hitler and Stalin and look at what they did. A world population, 3 times that size, is going to produce some truly monstrous people.

Just finished a long read on female victims of domestic violence, who are themselves subject to long terms of imprisonment when their partners violently kill their children. Sentences as long as 10, 20, 45 yrs, even life are handed to abused mothers whose children are deemed murdered because the mothers didn't do enough to protect their children.

The laws are written as gender neutral - in other words, a man could be prosecuted as an enabler of abuse, standing idly by while his wife murders his child. But as you might expect, men almost never get charged with this crime even when their wives do commit the murder.

As for the men who kill these children in hideous fashion, they're simply the scum of the earth.

[broncofan]

I am pretty sure the world is not more violent than before, but it is surprising that there is still so much violence. The things people did to each other in the Middle Ages and antiquity were cruel...impaling one another on pikes, crucifixions, torture etc. It's just amazing that all of our collective outrage, all that's been written about war and it's still as popular as ever.

I was looking up the U.S. military budget yesterday and at 600 billion dollars, we still can't solve these problems. I'm not saying that because we put so much of our resources into our military that we are responsible for whatever happens around the world...but why is our military such a priority for us? Having a Democrat in the white house hasn't changed the fact that the international community is divided in every conflict based on vested interests.

Whenever there's a crisis, Russia and China ask whether our inability to help solve it is good for them or bad for American hegemony. We ask what's good for Assad, what's good for our allies. There is no international consensus, only nations armed to the teeth taking sides or sitting on the sidelines while blood is shed.

[Stavros]

With reference to the the posts above by Odelay and Broncofan, I would counsel against despair, not least because Steven Pinker has argued that the volume of political violence at the level of total war has decreased in the last 100 years.
On the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916 more than 20,000 troops were killed and thousands more injured; at its peak in 1969 the USA had 549,500 boots on the ground in Vietnam. One of the reasons why the US military opted for the use of the nuclear bomb on Japan in 1945 was the calculation that to defeat Japan on its home turf would require an invasion force of at least one million men.

A major difference that is now evident is the use of air power, including drones, seen as a cheaper and possibly more efficient strike capability. What one loses with boots on the ground is a clearer view of the situation in small places, from towns and villages to, for example, a building in which hostages are being held, or Osama bin Laden is hiding -would that operation have been possible without eyes on the ground?
It has also been argued that US intelligence has suffered because the CIA no longer embeds agents inside countries where it has interests. Whether or not this would have given the US fore-knowledge of the emergence of IS I cannot say.

Before, and certainly after the Cold War ended, strategists were looking at 'low intensity warfare' and insurgencies as a more common form of conflict, but the problem is that it is an asymmetric form of warfare, in which the vast military might of the USA has serious problems dealing with an enemy that often cannot be seen, whose location changes regularly, and whose publicity is ubiquitous. If IS is different from previous guerilla bands, it is because it is attempting to create a state rather than positing a future state as an outcome of the campaign. That makes it a bigger challenge, but must also make IS a bigger target.
Notwithstanding what I said about the decline of political violence at the level of total war, I wonder if, rather than put boots on the ground, the US would consider the use of a tactical nuclear weapon that would, for example, obliterate Raqqa. I once discussed different sorts of nuclear weapon with a military officer who confidently, if chillingly, assured me that a tactical nuclear weapon could 'take out' a target with minimal nuclear fall-out. It was, he insisted, an efficient way of dealing with an enemy.
The use of nuclear weapons has been banned in international law -but then so has war...if ground forces from Turkey in the North, and Saudi Arabia in the South cannot deal with IS, I wonder...