Syria

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Bandit72
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Re: Syria

#21 Post by Bandit72 » Thu Aug 29, 2013 11:48 pm

We've said no, thankfully. I can't believe it was so close. Should have been a land slide NO.

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LJF
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Re: Syria

#22 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 10:10 am

So we are going to bomb Syria so Obama can save face in the world? Obama has to act because he said the red line was chemical weapons.

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Re: Syria

#23 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 10:23 am

Kerry just doubled down on the fact the president will do what he says. If they don't act in some manner, what would happen to the president, it would give every country the understanding this president doesn't back up what he says. They laid out a lot of countries that agree, but where are they with help. So we are going to drop some bombs so the president can say hey look I meant what I said. There is no need for us to get involved especially if it is us alone.

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Re: Syria

#24 Post by creep » Fri Aug 30, 2013 11:24 am

i doubt he will do anything. he just wants to make it look like he is making a tough decision. thanks to the uk for backing out of this mess.

if romney was president i wonder what the republicans would want to do?

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Re: Syria

#25 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 11:37 am

creep wrote:i doubt he will do anything. he just wants to make it look like he is making a tough decision. thanks to the uk for backing out of this mess.

if romney was president i wonder what the republicans would want to do?

did you watch Kerry's talk today? After what he said there is no way Obama can't do something. My prediction is we go it alone and that it is done by this time next week, before he leaves for G-20 meeting in Russia.

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Re: Syria

#26 Post by creep » Fri Aug 30, 2013 11:43 am

LJF wrote:
creep wrote:i doubt he will do anything. he just wants to make it look like he is making a tough decision. thanks to the uk for backing out of this mess.

if romney was president i wonder what the republicans would want to do?

did you watch Kerry's talk today? After what he said there is no way Obama can't do something. My prediction is we go it alone and that it is done by this time next week, before he leaves for G-20 meeting in Russia.
:lol: i'm so fucking out of touch i had no idea he is the secretary of state. i thought he was still a senator so i just blew off what he was saying. i still thought hillary was secretary of state. me dumb :dunce:

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Re: Syria

#27 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 11:56 am



It starts around the 10:35 mark, we are doing it to save face for Obama internationally and so Iran knows Obama means what he says. Look how can he not do something after he said the red line was chemical weapons. Just listen and if you still think we aren't bombing them please let me know. All of these countries, but there's no one to help us. Again not our place to police.

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Re: Syria

#28 Post by chaos » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:02 pm

Bandit72 wrote:We've said no, thankfully. I can't believe it was so close. Should have been a land slide NO.
Per Tracey Crouch, MP for Chatham and Aylesford:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/parliame ... icetwitter

What way will you be voting?
I’ll be voting against the government motion and the Labour motion because they both make reference to supporting military intervention in Syria.

What do you think should happen?
I think we should continue with diplomatic resolution and provide humanitarian support. I think we could also impose sanctions.

Isn’t it a bit late for all that?
No, I don’t think it is. We haven’t got the information for certain that it was the Assad regime that used chemical weapons. I think we have to be very careful when we don’t know who makes up the opposition. With the involvement of al-Qaeda, for example, we have to be very careful whose side we take on this.

Don’t you think chemical weapons are a red line?
Why is there mass outcry with the use of chemical weapons compared to when people are being blown up and shot? People are being massacred in Zimbabwe on a regular basis and we stand back and do nothing. Are we suggesting that if Mugabe used chemical weapons we should have an intervention in Zimbabwe? We shouldn’t have people committing genocide whether it’s with chemical weapons or not. The response to that, however, is always that we should be flexing our muscles and sending in military support, whereas I don’t think that’s the right way forward. You only have to look at Afghanistan and Iraq to know that sending armed forces doesn’t always lead to the right outcome.
Per David Davis, Conservative MP for Haltemprice and Howden:

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/parliame ... icetwitter

If it passes, when will the missiles be in the sky?
Who knows? It’s not actually that time-sensitive. The Americans have this saying – “load, fire, aim” – and that sums up their military policy sometimes. We don’t want to get into that – we want "load, aim fire".
If we are not going in to get rid of the regime, at this point I am not sure what it will accomplish other than more civilian deaths. I'm not saying we should do nothing, but I don't think the US should bomb or invade.

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Re: Syria

#29 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:10 pm

chaos wrote:
Bandit72 wrote:We've said no, thankfully. I can't believe it was so close. Should have been a land slide NO.
Per Tracey Crouch, MP for Chatham and Aylesford:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/parliame ... icetwitter

What way will you be voting?
I’ll be voting against the government motion and the Labour motion because they both make reference to supporting military intervention in Syria.

What do you think should happen?
I think we should continue with diplomatic resolution and provide humanitarian support. I think we could also impose sanctions.

Isn’t it a bit late for all that?
No, I don’t think it is. We haven’t got the information for certain that it was the Assad regime that used chemical weapons. I think we have to be very careful when we don’t know who makes up the opposition. With the involvement of al-Qaeda, for example, we have to be very careful whose side we take on this.

Don’t you think chemical weapons are a red line?
Why is there mass outcry with the use of chemical weapons compared to when people are being blown up and shot? People are being massacred in Zimbabwe on a regular basis and we stand back and do nothing. Are we suggesting that if Mugabe used chemical weapons we should have an intervention in Zimbabwe? We shouldn’t have people committing genocide whether it’s with chemical weapons or not. The response to that, however, is always that we should be flexing our muscles and sending in military support, whereas I don’t think that’s the right way forward. You only have to look at Afghanistan and Iraq to know that sending armed forces doesn’t always lead to the right outcome.
Per David Davis, Conservative MP for Haltemprice and Howden:

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/parliame ... icetwitter

If it passes, when will the missiles be in the sky?
Who knows? It’s not actually that time-sensitive. The Americans have this saying – “load, fire, aim” – and that sums up their military policy sometimes. We don’t want to get into that – we want "load, aim fire".
If we are not going in to get rid of the regime, at this point I am not sure what it will accomplish other than more civilian deaths. I'm not saying we should do nothing, but I don't think the US should bomb or invade.



exactly, but what does Obama do if he stated the chemical weapons were the red line? What does he do to show that he means what he says? They have already stated several times regime change isn't the objective. The current regime has used chemical weapons and is killing it's own people, how do you change that without removing them? We're in it because of what he said.

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Re: Syria

#30 Post by creep » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:18 pm

just bring it to congress. as fucked up as our political system is one man should have to power to bomb a country.

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Re: Syria

#31 Post by chaos » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:21 pm

LJF wrote: exactly, but what does Obama do if he stated the chemical weapons were the red line? What does he do to show that he means what he says? They have already stated several times regime change isn't the objective. The current regime has used chemical weapons and is killing it's own people, how do you change that without removing them? We're in it because of what he said.
I hear what you are saying but I hope he doesn't go through with it. If the administration really wanted to get out of it, they could just say that based on the evidence thus far, they cannot be sure who is responsible for the chemical weapon attack. They could/should come up with something to save face.

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Re: Syria

#32 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:31 pm

chaos wrote:
LJF wrote: exactly, but what does Obama do if he stated the chemical weapons were the red line? What does he do to show that he means what he says? They have already stated several times regime change isn't the objective. The current regime has used chemical weapons and is killing it's own people, how do you change that without removing them? We're in it because of what he said.
I hear what you are saying but I hope he doesn't go through with it. If the administration really wanted to get out of it, they could just say that based on the evidence thus far, they cannot be sure who is responsible for the chemical weapon attack. They could/should come up with something to save face.
no they can't just watch the Kerry talk. He laid it out that it is clear the current regime did it. There is no backing out of this. Please watch what he said and tell me if you think there is anyway out, I don't see it. There is no reason for us to bomb them and play police.

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Re: Syria

#33 Post by chaos » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:46 pm

I don't know. Maybe something along the lines of it has come to our attention that rogue parties within the Assad regime blah blah blah . . . As I said if the administration really wanted to get out of it they would.

Btw, I disagree with Kerry that it is a matter of our (the US's) national security that we act. I think that we put our national security more at risk in this particular instance.

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Re: Syria

#34 Post by creep » Fri Aug 30, 2013 12:50 pm

this may be the only political issue that we all agree on.

does anyone think we should bomb the shit out of them?

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Re: Syria

#35 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 1:00 pm

To me what is really sad is that it seems more and more that the only reason is so Obama saves face.

I think AS thinks we should bomb them or at least that is how I read what he said earlier.

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Re: Syria

#36 Post by chaos » Fri Aug 30, 2013 1:23 pm

Aleppo, Syria's largest city, no longer has internet connectivity.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the ... -internet/

...
Given the intense fighting in the Aleppo area, it’s possible that the outages are related to local infrastructure damage. However, Internet outages in Syria have a curious history of happening at times convenient for the Assad regime. In November 2012, some 92 percent of national Syrian Internet traffic went offline as the regime was rumored to be mixing chemical weapon components, while 78 percent of traffic went offline in January when Assad gave a rare public address. Some past localized Internet outages have also coincided with government offensives in those areas.
...

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Re: Syria

#37 Post by Hype » Fri Aug 30, 2013 1:49 pm

I think I have a nuanced view. I generally try to determine, in particular cases, whether there's some truth to Realpolitik (as hated as Kissinger is/was, he's not obviously wrong in every case. This article may help make sense of what is a large influence on my political thinking: http://universitypublishingonline.org/c ... 000482A011 ), and when it's feasible or not, vs. the same thing wrt isolationist intuitions. I have both. I'm of the general opinion that the world would benefit from a stronger, more military-oriented United Nations (actually, I'd call it a Hobbesian sovereign), but I'm well aware of the extreme difficulties in implementing and maintaining this sort of thing in practice. So it's understandable that the UN issues declarations with no teeth, and has a security council that has members who are basically the world's largest human rights abusers currently (in various ways).

I'm also not simply an America-basher, as much as Jasper seems to think I am (I'm probably more of a Jasper-basher than an America-basher, but then maybe Jasper thinks he's America...). In this particular case, I was surprised that the United States didn't try to intervene much sooner, given that the media has reported massive death-tolls for quite a long time. This leads me to suspect (but it's just a really bad guess) that the US has been engaging in covert stuff there (as they surely have been in Egypt as well)... and trying to manage their relationships with Russia and China in the mean-time. I'm okay with the US intervening if it can be shown to put a stop to the sheer volume of civilian death Assad has been orchestrating, but I don't know whether that is what would happen. I also agree that there is totally a potential for this being a 'false flag' sort of thing (e.g., the CIA could have worked with the rebels to orchestrate what would appear to be a chemical weapons attack), but I also think it's too conspiracy-theorist-esque to speculate about that sort of thing just because it might be possible.

I find the simple isolationist style arguments against doing anything a bit weak, given there's a massive precedent for interventions actually helping. Bill Clinton did say that he wished he had done more, sooner, in at least one of his military-strikes in the mid-90s (I can't remember if it was Rwanda or Kosovo...), and I think he may have a point... it's just very messy and I don't think it's worth simply sticking to ideology one way or the other here. Public opinion also matters too, so there's that... :noclue: I think there might just be no right answer here. States and organizations probably should, though, try to do what they can to try to mitigate massive human rights abuses whenever they can and it's in their and/or their allies' interests. I don't know what that would amount to in Syria though.

From the article I reference above:
Henry Kissinger, The New Republic, 16 December 1972, page 21 wrote:There is really very little of Machiavelli's one can accept or use in the contemporary world. . . . If you want to know who has influenced me most, I'll answer with two philosophers' names: Spinoza and Kant. Which makes it all the more peculiar that you choose to associate me with Machiavelli.

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Re: Syria

#38 Post by Bandit72 » Fri Aug 30, 2013 2:03 pm

chaos wrote:
Bandit72 wrote:We've said no, thankfully. I can't believe it was so close. Should have been a land slide NO.
Per Tracey Crouch, MP for Chatham and Aylesford:
http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/parliame ... icetwitter

What way will you be voting?
I’ll be voting against the government motion and the Labour motion because they both make reference to supporting military intervention in Syria.

What do you think should happen?
I think we should continue with diplomatic resolution and provide humanitarian support. I think we could also impose sanctions.

Isn’t it a bit late for all that?
No, I don’t think it is. We haven’t got the information for certain that it was the Assad regime that used chemical weapons. I think we have to be very careful when we don’t know who makes up the opposition. With the involvement of al-Qaeda, for example, we have to be very careful whose side we take on this.

Don’t you think chemical weapons are a red line?
Why is there mass outcry with the use of chemical weapons compared to when people are being blown up and shot? People are being massacred in Zimbabwe on a regular basis and we stand back and do nothing. Are we suggesting that if Mugabe used chemical weapons we should have an intervention in Zimbabwe? We shouldn’t have people committing genocide whether it’s with chemical weapons or not. The response to that, however, is always that we should be flexing our muscles and sending in military support, whereas I don’t think that’s the right way forward. You only have to look at Afghanistan and Iraq to know that sending armed forces doesn’t always lead to the right outcome.
Per David Davis, Conservative MP for Haltemprice and Howden:

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/parliame ... icetwitter

If it passes, when will the missiles be in the sky?
Who knows? It’s not actually that time-sensitive. The Americans have this saying – “load, fire, aim” – and that sums up their military policy sometimes. We don’t want to get into that – we want "load, aim fire".
If we are not going in to get rid of the regime, at this point I am not sure what it will accomplish other than more civilian deaths. I'm not saying we should do nothing, but I don't think the US should bomb or invade.
EXACTLY what I said, re: Zimbabwe. And that regime has been going on for as long as I can remember. We've even had royals mixing with Mugabe ffs. It's the whole one rule for one, one rule for another nonsense which riles me. And besides, I refuse to bring my children up with idiot warmongering western 'leaders'.

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Re: Syria

#39 Post by LJF » Fri Aug 30, 2013 3:49 pm

1. This isn't our problem
2. If we do anything, which I'd bet we do before Obama leaving for G20 meeting, it's so he saves face and to make Iran think he stands behind his words. Which is a sick reason to bomb.
3. People complain about the US thinking it's the world police, but when there is a problem they look to the US to deal with it and want us to lead the way and pay the tab.
4. Obama's red line has put the US in a situation that no matter what he does he has put the whole country at higher security risk. Do nothing and Iran and others realize he is a joke and won't back up what he says. Do something and destabilize the region even more and give more fire power to those who believe in the theory the US is the evil empire.

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Re: Syria

#40 Post by chaos » Fri Aug 30, 2013 4:33 pm

Interesting piece on the West's part in the Assad family's rise to power:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/2 ... water.html

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Re: Syria

#41 Post by Jasper » Fri Aug 30, 2013 4:38 pm

I support Canada taking military action, insofar as I will not do anything to stop them. End of story.

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Re: Syria

#42 Post by chaos » Fri Aug 30, 2013 4:51 pm

For those of you who use twitter:
The 23 Twitter accounts you must follow to understand Syria
By Max Fisher, Published: August 30 at 1:11 pm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wor ... and-syria/

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Re: Syria

#43 Post by chaos » Sat Aug 31, 2013 4:59 am

"What doesn't kill a tyrant makes him stronger." Powerful piece against syria intervention.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2 ... r-war.html

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Re: Syria

#44 Post by chaos » Sat Aug 31, 2013 10:57 am

Obama is addressing the public now; he found his out. He is going to let Congress vote on whether to intervene militarily in Syria.

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Re: Syria

#45 Post by creep » Sat Aug 31, 2013 11:20 am

chaos wrote:Obama is addressing the public now; he found his out. He is going to let Congress vote on whether to intervene militarily in Syria.
he must read this board because that is what i suggested.

i thought he would find a way out.

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