Good luck with squishing ISIL. If we decide it has to be done we will have to do it ourselves. The Turks are only one "ally" of many, each of whom has a particular agenda often in direct conflict with other "allies". The Turks just happen to be near the front at present so their veniality and duplicity are currently visible. How about them Saudis? They are bombing ISIL with one hand while the other sends shiploads of money to ISIL and Al Queda. Qatar is a wonderful helpmate who can't send enough cash to the extremists. We know how great the Iraqis are at protecting their country not to mention shanking every Sunni in view. The natural, normal impulse on the part of liberal and conservative foreign policy "experts" is to DO SOMETHING about all this. With this crisis I think Obama is right. We are doing a reasonable amount to help these scumbags help themselves but if they won't do anything should we? We can take some actions to prevent genocide as we have done for the last several decades but if we decide we are going to do more we will have to do a LOT more. That means the flower of our youth coming back with grievous injuries or dead in serious numbers. Should we do this for dicknoses who won't do anything for themselves? Probably not, but it is an election year and there is potent momentum to the "threats" and we won't be able to help ourselves. So Obama will try to avoid being a pussy and he will gradually escalate to prevent a Carter like disaster for the Mideast and the Democrats. Whoever wins Democrat or Republican will prove he or she is no pussy and will go in with vigor. The only certainty being more failure more wasted lives and more damage to what is left of US prestige in the world. Sadly this is how the great empires crumble.
October 10, 2014 at 7:09 PM
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The group known as the Islamic State have a three pronged position on the outskirts of Kobani, a Kurdish town on the Syrian border. Largely undeterred by Western air strikes, the soldiers for the new caliphate are pressing and without massive help on the ground, the inhabitants of the town are facing total annihilation.
The blame for the current debacle in the Mideast can be placed on so many people. Certainly the Turks, whom will not allow the Kurdish brethren in Turkey to come to the defense of their proper.
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1897 map of Turkey, Kurdistan and the Caucasus
It seems interesting that the Turks, who have been fighting the guilt and specter of the Armenian genocide for the last hundred years, would wish to be so closely connected with a new genocide. Perhaps it's in their nature? In any case, Erdogan tried a clumsy triangulation/extortion strategy or pinion against Syria as a deal point before he would consider committing his own ground troops. World leaders are justifiably enraged.
Where is Europe? Where is Russia? Where is China? Do not all supposedly civilized countries, many facing their own brand of islamic terrorism at home, have skin in this game? Where, come to think of it, is Ben Affleck? Why is it always the United States responsibility to wipe the world's ass? Who will finally come forward to bell the ISIS cat? The Germans have long had relations with the Turks, they are awfully quiet.
And finally to our own President, Obama. This guy may have a wicked baseline jumper from the left side, but I don't think that he is a natural military leader or tactician. When Jimmy Carter is calling you a pussy, you must really be a pussy. Where are the contingency plans?
Leon Panetta, a longtime centrist democrat, who has held every job imaginable, certainly not an apologist or a man with an axe to grind, was this President's Secretary of Defense, recently wrote a new book pillorying Obama's role in the mideast. I think he was dead on. When Obama drew a red line on chemical weapons and then let Assad gingerly step over it he showed that he could be punked on the world's battlefield. That never would have flown in the neighborhood I grew up in in New York. Maybe things are different in Chicago but it would have been quite maricon in the boroughs as the Puerto Ricans might say.
When people are about to get exterminated, you either say fuck it, it's none of my business or you step up to the plate and do whatever is necessary. Because nobody is going to be interested in hearing your or anybody else's excuses later. We can not be half assed. The world needs to vanquish the virus that is ISIS.
"Weighing the Kurds"
1 Comment -
Good luck with squishing ISIL. If we decide it has to be done we will have to do it ourselves. The Turks are only one "ally" of many, each of whom has a particular agenda often in direct conflict with other "allies". The Turks just happen to be near the front at present so their veniality and duplicity are currently visible. How about them Saudis? They are bombing ISIL with one hand while the other sends shiploads of money to ISIL and Al Queda. Qatar is a wonderful helpmate who can't send enough cash to the extremists. We know how great the Iraqis are at protecting their country not to mention shanking every Sunni in view. The natural, normal impulse on the part of liberal and conservative foreign policy "experts" is to DO SOMETHING about all this. With this crisis I think Obama is right. We are doing a reasonable amount to help these scumbags help themselves but if they won't do anything should we? We can take some actions to prevent genocide as we have done for the last several decades but if we decide we are going to do more we will have to do a LOT more. That means the flower of our youth coming back with grievous injuries or dead in serious numbers. Should we do this for dicknoses who won't do anything for themselves? Probably not, but it is an election year and there is potent momentum to the "threats" and we won't be able to help ourselves. So Obama will try to avoid being a pussy and he will gradually escalate to prevent a Carter like disaster for the Mideast and the Democrats. Whoever wins Democrat or Republican will prove he or she is no pussy and will go in with vigor. The only certainty being more failure more wasted lives and more damage to what is left of US prestige in the world. Sadly this is how the great empires crumble.
October 10, 2014 at 7:09 PM