The Islamic state

[coley]

That would be a "no" then.

Because there really is no parallel, is there? You just said the first thing that came into your head didn´t you?

But hey, don´t let that stop you. I´m sure you can think of a few more atrocities to pin on the Turks while you´re at it.

I suspect you were forced to watch Midnight Express at an early age.

Midnight express! Nivvir heard of it, here's another wee gem for you to consider, just pinning imagined atrocities, mind you!
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_invasion_of_Cyprus

 

[phildwyer]

Midnight express! Nivvir heard of it, here's another wee gem for you to consider, just pinning imagined atrocities, mind you!
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_invasion_of_Cyprus

But more important, you´re beginning to come off as a racist now. It sounds as though you´re trying to portray the Turks as a violent and predatory people, given to genociding their neighbors with no provocation.

If that´s your opinión, please say so. I´d like to know what I´m dealing with here.

 

[coley]

First of all, just as many Turks were killed by Greeks as vice versa.

But more important, you´re beginning to come off as a racist now. It sounds as though you´re trying to portray the Turks as a violent and predatory people, given to genociding their neighbors with no provocation.

If that´s your opinión, please say so. I´d like to know what I´m dealing with here.

Whey aye, the old urban gambit, "your beginning to come off as a racist now"
I was trying to have a reasoned debate but that crack leaves me with no option to fall into line with most on here as regards you.
Sorry, but you really do bolster me belief in being an agnostic and the further belief,in that if there is a god, then that God is a total Shyte as are all his/her adherents.

 

[Diamond]

Coming to this a little a late in the day - what are the views of urbanites on the potential liabilities v benefits of arming the Kurds in light of their wider territorial claims?

 

[SpookyFrank]

Coming to this a little a late in the day - what are the views of urbanites on the potential liabilities v benefits of arming the Kurds in light of their wider territorial claims?

They should have the right to determine their own fate, as all people should. They shouldn't need to fight anyone for that.

In terms of their ongoing fight against ISIS, they've put the entire international community to shame with their courage and resolve and if nobody else is willing to send in troops to fight alongside them then giving them the weapons and resources they need to keep fighting has to be a better use of money than firing million dollar missiles to blow up one vehicle at a time. If only the Kurds had a corrupt dictator with expansionist fantasies we'd have armed them long ago.

 

[SpineyNorman]

The difference isn´t in the scale (although the scale was different), but in the circumstances. The massacres of Armenians took place during a civil war, in which Armenian armies also massacred Turkish civilians. The Jews of Europe had no army and had never harmed anybody.

See the difference?

So would you also deny that what happened in Rwanda in 1994 was genocide?

 

[kebabking]

if anyone is interested, Israeli media reckons that the 45 Fijian UN Peacekeepers from the Golan heights who were taken hostage in August by Al-Nusra Front - who recently suggested they would 'join' with IS - were freed after our friends the Qatari's paid an eye-watering ransom of $25million...

http://www.timesofisrael.com/report-qatar-paid-nusra-front-25m-ransom-to-free-un-golan-hostages/

a novel way of money landering perhaps?

 

[coley]

So would you also deny that what happened in Rwanda in 1994 was genocide?

He's managing to deny the Armenian genocide so Rwanda shouldn't be too much of a stretch.

 

[andysays]

He's managing to deny the Armenian genocide so Rwanda shouldn't be too much of a stretch.

No Turkish involvement in that one (Rwanda), so he's probably not bothered either way

 

[seventh bullet]

Is he denying the events took place at all, or is he disagreeing that they should be defined as genocide? Or is he just taking the piss?

 

[andysays]

I would say

1. denying that the generally accepted version of the events is accurate
2. disagreeing that they constitute genocide
3. come on, remember who we're talking about, do you really have to ask?

 

[seventh bullet]

Don't indulge him then.

 

[coley]

I would say

1. denying that the generally accepted version of the events is accurate
2. disagreeing that they constitute genocide
3. come on, remember who we're talking about, do you really have to ask?

Seems like he is defending the Turkish position in advance, should there be an IS massacre of Kurds.

 

[Diamond]

They should have the right to determine their own fate, as all people should. They shouldn't need to fight anyone for that.

In terms of their ongoing fight against ISIS, they've put the entire international community to shame with their courage and resolve and if nobody else is willing to send in troops to fight alongside them then giving them the weapons and resources they need to keep fighting has to be a better use of money than firing million dollar missiles to blow up one vehicle at a time. If only the Kurds had a corrupt dictator with expansionist fantasies we'd have armed them long ago.

I suppose the counter-argument, which I do not necessarily support but which needs to be aired, is that it's a fuel to the fire situation.

The Kurds are undoubtedly putting up a brave fight but their principal war aim is an independent Kurdistan, which currently includes large swathes of several sovereign countries.

To provide them with heavy weapons and then expect them to swat IS away and retreat to Erbil evermore seems a bit naive at best.

 

[coley]

if anyone is interested, Israeli media reckons that the 45 Fijian UN Peacekeepers from the Golan heights who were taken hostage in August by Al-Nusra Front - who recently suggested they would 'join' with IS - were freed after our friends the Qatari's paid an eye-watering ransom of $25million...

http://www.timesofisrael.com/report-qatar-paid-nusra-front-25m-ransom-to-free-un-golan-hostages/

a novel way of money landering perhaps?

Another nice deposit in the terrorists current account.

 

[coley]

Coming to this a little a late in the day - what are the views of urbanites on the potential liabilities v benefits of arming the Kurds in light of their wider territorial claims?

The problem is making sure any such weaponry goes to the Kurds.

 

[kebabking]

The problem is making sure any such weaponry goes to the Kurds.

no, the problem is what happens to the weapons once IS have been defeated.

the kind of stuff they need, everything from ATGW to Artillery, UAV's for ISTAR, and with lots of armoured mobilty thrown in for good measure, is exactly the kind of stuff you can fight a decent war with - and this stuff has a 30/40 year lifespan. Kurdistan has territorial designs on bits of 4 countries - thinking that you can shovel the kind of heavy gear the Kurds need to fight IS and it will be used once, then ditched and won't appear again, is a bit like thinking you could arm Argentina with long range strike aircraft for a fight against Chilé and never worrying that it will, at some stage, turn up unannounced over Stanley.

personally i'm fully of the view that a Kurdistan of some type - or a number of Kurdistans within the four current states - is well overdue, but i'm not convinced that giving them an army that could achieve it militarily is the way to stabilise the area, however imperfect that stability might be.

 

[coley]

no, the problem is what happens to the weapons once IS have been defeated.

the kind of stuff they need, everything from ATGW to Artillery, UAV's for ISTAR, and with lots of armoured mobilty thrown in for good measure, is exactly the kind of stuff you can fight a decent war with - and this stuff has a 30/40 year lifespan. Kurdistan has territorial designs on bits of 4 countries - thinking that you can shovel the kind of heavy gear the Kurds need to fight IS and it will be used once, then ditched and won't appear again, is a bit like thinking you could arm Argentina with long range strike aircraft for a fight against Chilé and never worrying that it will, at some stage, turn up unannounced over Stanley.

personally i'm fully of the view that a Kurdistan of some type - or a number of Kurdistans within the four current states - is well overdue, but i'm not convinced that giving them an army that could achieve it militarily is the way to stabilise the area, however imperfect that stability might be.

See your point but the alternative? Would you prefer IS instability or that caused by the Kurds trying to establish a secure homeland?

 

[kebabking]

See your point but the alternative? Would you prefer IS instability or that caused by the Kurds trying to establish a secure homeland?

theres a question! if the Kurds have the heavy combat power to secure big wedges of territory then they'll quickly find themselves at war with Turkey and Iran, and what passes for the central state in Iraq and Syria. that, i would suggest, is unlikely to go well for them...

its not a solution to the problem, but if western/regional power can defeat IS it kicks the Kurdistan issue a bit further down the road, meaning someone else hads to deal with it.

 

[coley]

theres a question! if the Kurds have the heavy combat power to secure big wedges of territory then they'll quickly find themselves at war with Turkey and Iran, and what passes for the central state in Iraq and Syria. that, i would suggest, is unlikely to go well for them...

its not a solution to the problem, but if western/regional power can defeat IS it kicks the Kurdistan issue a bit further down the road, meaning someone else hads to deal with it.

TBH, I think what we are seeing is the beginning of a major move back towards historical borders as opposed to those drawn in the sand post WW1, the trick is making sure IS doesn't carve itself a chunk of other people's countries.
I think instability is a given in the area for the foreseeable future and the West needs to think much more carefully about who it supports, as the eventual main powers in the region will tend to have long memories.

 

[DrRingDing]

So, any reliable updates from Kobane?

 

[butchersapron]

Yes, better military news than yesterday. Beardie advance stopped, some ground won back. Female commander of all defences saying things improving.

 

[teqniq]

@mrgoldfink: Turkey opens a hospital in Gaziantep called 'Jihad' for treatment of ISIS fighters wounded fighting in Syria & Iraq

 

[coley]

Fro AJ
Complex demographics

Today, we are witnessing the explosion of the complex demographics of Arab society. In colonial times, local administrations had managed tensions between its myriad traditional social configurations, religious, sectarian, tribal, and ethnic, via a policy of containment, dilution, or repression. This role was subsequently taken up by the post-colonial state within a process of superimposed pseudo-modernisation, and under the banner of a collective national identity that remained feeble and skin-deep.

Amidst the collapse of fragile post-colonial political structures in countries like Libya, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen, traditional bonds and identities have reasserted themselves again, but in a more raucous bloody manner. Sunnis, Shia, Kurds, Arabs, Muslims, and Christians, all turned against each other in a chilling spectacle of senseless self-mutilation.

This atmosphere of paranoid animosity, social disarray and political crisis was a potent incubator for Islamic radicalism, with its ideological fervour, excommunicatory tendencies, and puritanical dreams. Political grievances mingled with ethnic and sectarian grudges to produce the hatred ridden grandiose discourse of al-Qaeda, ISIL and their Jihadist likes.

 

[SpookyFrank]

I suppose the counter-argument, which I do not necessarily support but which needs to be aired, is that it's a fuel to the fire situation.

The Kurds are undoubtedly putting up a brave fight but their principal war aim is an independent Kurdistan, which currently includes large swathes of several sovereign countries.

To provide them with heavy weapons and then expect them to swat IS away and retreat to Erbil evermore seems a bit naive at best.

Those sovereign countries are all heavily armed. With the exception of Iraq, but before all this ISIS stuff happened the Kurds in Iraq were actually doing relatively well for themselves in terms of democracy and self-determination. They probably had no interest in fighting the Iraqi army, though they might have done if they'd known how easy it was. As for Iran and Turkey, the Kurds couldn't win a war against either of them and we can safely assume they'd know what the likely consequences of such a war would be for their people.

Especially when you look at the situation in Kobane, it seems to be a choice between letting people definitely get slaughtered now or maybe putting them in a position to cause trouble later on. A handful of proper anti-tank weapons could have made a huge difference to the fight for Kobane, but it would not be enough to let the Kurds march on Ankara afterwards. If nothing else, they're probably looking forward to a hard-earned break from getting shot at.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Female commander of all defences saying things improving.

I bet ISIS are just hopping mad about that

 

[SpookyFrank]

TBH, I think what we are seeing is the beginning of a major move back towards historical borders as opposed to those drawn in the sand post WW1, the trick is making sure IS doesn't carve itself a chunk of other people's countries.
I think instability is a given in the area for the foreseeable future and the West needs to think much more carefully about who it supports, as the eventual main powers in the region will tend to have long memories.

Was there ever much in the way of stable borders pre-WW1? I thought the idea of discrete states in the middle east was a largely Ottoman/European invention tbh.

 

[DrRingDing]

I bet ISIS are just hopping mad about that

Let's hope so. Here she is keeping an eye out for the weasels....

 

[DrRingDing]

One weasel looks like he may have been served some justice. This is doing the rounds....

Spoiler: NSFW: More nasty shit

 

[Diamond]

Those sovereign countries are all heavily armed. With the exception of Iraq, but before all this ISIS stuff happened the Kurds in Iraq were actually doing relatively well for themselves in terms of democracy and self-determination. They probably had no interest in fighting the Iraqi army, though they might have done if they'd known how easy it was. As for Iran and Turkey, the Kurds couldn't win a war against either of them and we can safely assume they'd know what the likely consequences of such a war would be for their people.

Especially when you look at the situation in Kobane, it seems to be a choice between letting people definitely get slaughtered now or maybe putting them in a position to cause trouble later on. A handful of proper anti-tank weapons could have made a huge difference to the fight for Kobane, but it would not be enough to let the Kurds march on Ankara afterwards. If nothing else, they're probably looking forward to a hard-earned break from getting shot at.

But the Kurds don't want to march on Ankara, do they?

All that is demanded is a Kurdish region to rule over and defend.