The difference between Aleppo and Mosul?

Dohnjoe

KingBrian2 wrote: »

President Hafez and his son Assad were much liked by the population of the country otherwise he would not enjoy the popularity he now holds.

Using this faulty logic, Kim Jong Un is much liked by the population - because he enjoys huge popularity

The facts of oppressive single-party states speak for themselves

Syria's poor human rights situation deteriorated further in 2009, as the authorities arrested political and human rights activists, censored websites, detained bloggers, and imposed travel bans. No political parties are licensed. Emergency rule, imposed in 1963, remains in effect and Syria's multiple security agencies continue to detain people without arrest warrants.

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2010/country-chapters/syria

The authorities have been accused of harassing and imprisoning human rights activists and other critics of the government.[3] Freedom of expression, association, and assembly are strictly controlled.[2][3] Women and ethnic minorities face discrimination.[2][3] According to Human Rights Watch, President Bashar al-Assad failed to improve Syria’s human rights record in the first 10 years of his rule,[4] and Syria's human rights situation remained among the worst in the world.[5]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Syria

"Freedom of expression and all forms of media remained strictly controlled by the state. Punitive laws were used against those who expressed dissent."

http://www.refworld.org/docid/4a1fadbcc.html

recedite

Dohnjoe wrote: »

Using this faulty logic, Kim Jong Un is much liked by the population - because he enjoys huge popularity

Move up a notch, to China, and you have a better example. People there have no real say in who governs them, but as long as everything is going well the majority don't really care. That country has advanced hugely in terms of the ordinary people's standard of living.
Syria, Iraq, and Libya all had a good standard of living comparable to Europeans until the US arrived on the scene. Good salaries, state of the art medical facilities etc. All gone now.
Bush threatened to bomb countries "back to the stone age" if they did not co-operate with his "war on terror". Now several countries are back in the stone age, and terrorism has spread everywhere in the region.
Pakistan reluctantly complied with US demands, and now it sits back and watches helplessly while a foreign power regularly assassinates its citizens with drone strikes, but at least it has survived intact as a state.

If you actually asked people in Syria, Iraq and Libya would they turn back the clock to a time before the US intervention, and have their dictators back providing peace and stability, I doubt you would find a single person who would say No.

BoJack Horseman

recedite wrote: »

If you actually asked people in Syria, Iraq and Libya would they turn back the clock to a time before the US intervention, and have their dictators back providing peace and stability, I doubt you would find a single person who would say No.

Of course.

Same goes that if you asked someone if they preferred to live in a democracy or a dictatorship people tend to prefer the former.

Ireland faced years of destruction and instability to attain self rule & democracy from Britain, as did many of our European friends endured similar.
I am glad we did.

Others may differ in that viewpoint.

Dohnjoe

recedite wrote: »

Syria, Iraq, and Libya all had a good standard of living comparable to Europeans until the US arrived on the scene. Good salaries, state of the art medical facilities etc. All gone now.

Ah these classic fallacies (not to mention outright myths) And "Germany was doing great in the 30's"

Syria, Iraq and Libya were corrupt ****holes with dictatorships.

Iraq was a bad situation made a lot worse by the horrendous US invasion

Syria and Libya were pressure cookers with domestic uprisings. Partisans who have the world view that the US/West/Israel/Russia/whoever is to blame for everything cannot reconcile their narratives with those facts (yes it's a retarded phase I went through myself)

alastair

recedite wrote: »

If you actually asked people in Syria, Iraq and Libya would they turn back the clock to a time before the US intervention, and have their dictators back providing peace and stability, I doubt you would find a single person who would say No.

The situation in Syria and Libya wasn't prompted by US intervention, but by domestic uprisings against autocratic regimes. That the US subsequently became involved to a greater or lesser degree didn't change that reality.

recedite

BoJack Horseman wrote: »

Ireland faced years of destruction and instability to attain self rule & democracy from Britain, as did many of our European friends endured similar.
I am glad we did.
Others may differ in that viewpoint.

Easy to say when you didn't have to live through it yourself
Scotland voted against "self-rule and democracy from Britain" recently. Nobody died. There are many paths to the same end goal. Violent insurrection is only one of those.

alastair wrote: »

The situation in Syria and Libya wasn't prompted by US intervention, but by domestic uprisings against autocratic regimes. That the US subsequently became involved to a greater or lesser degree didn't change that reality.

Come on now, we all know these regimes were undermined by the CIA with rebels being armed and funded. In Gadaffi's case, When that wasn't enough, Nato air strikes were brought to bear; just enough to tip the balance against him.

The Syrian war would be over now if the rebels weren't receiving outside support. The more support they receive, the longer the suffering goes on.

alastair

recedite wrote: »

Come on now, we all know these regimes were undermined by the CIA with rebels being armed and funded.

No we don't.

recedite wrote: »

In Gadaffi's case, When that wasn't enough, Nato air strikes were brought to bear; just enough to tip the balance against him.

Sure - but that's a far cry from claiming that the cause of the civil war in Libya was US intervention.

recedite wrote: »

The Syrian war would be over now if the rebels weren't receiving outside support. The more support they receive, the longer the suffering goes on.

You could say precisely the same for the Russian or Iranian support of Assad. But again - it's a far cry from the claim that the civil war was instigated by US (or for that matter Russian or Iranian) intervention.

Dohnjoe

recedite wrote: »

Easy to say when you didn't have to live through it yourself
Scotland voted against "self-rule and democracy from Britain" recently. Nobody died. There are many paths to the same end goal. Violent insurrection is only one of those.

Care to explain options did the Syrian/Libyan people had besides mass protest

Come on now, we all know these regimes were undermined by the CIA with rebels being armed and funded.

Directly before the protests, Gadaffi and Assad were on relatively good terms with Western powers. The uprisings were domestic.

recedite

Dohnjoe wrote: »

Directly before the protests, Gadaffi and Assad were on relatively good terms with Western powers. The uprisings were domestic.

Unfortunately these guys weren't playing ball they way they were supposed to.

When the Syrian war is over, the west coast will be used to pipe oil and gas into the Med and towards Europe. The only question is, will it be a Russian pipeline or a Saudi/US/Iraqi one? Assad was, and still is, considered too close to the Russians. So close in fact, they are sending another fleet at this very moment to make sure US/Iraqi forces don't move seamlessly from Mosul across the Syrian border and try to take control of Raqqa.

Gadaffi had this mad idea to set up an alternative currency for the international trading of oil. Which would have tended to make the US dollar into a worthless piece of paper, "backed up" only by almost $20 trillion of debt. That was unacceptable.

BoJack Horseman

recedite wrote: »

Easy to say when you didn't have to live through it yourself.

Forgive my lack of time machine.

Dohnjoe

recedite wrote: »

Unfortunately these guys weren't playing ball they way they were supposed to.

And here comes the conspiracies

When the Syrian war is over, the west coast will be used to pipe oil and gas into the Med and towards Europe. The only question is, will it be a Russian pipeline or a Saudi/US/Iraqi one?

The pipeline conspiracies

Assad was, and still is, considered too close to the Russians. So close in fact, they are sending another fleet at this very moment to make sure US/Iraqi forces don't move seamlessly from Mosul across the Syrian border and try to take control of Raqqa.

The Russians are sending warships to

Gadaffi had this mad idea to set up an alternative currency for the international trading of oil. Which would have tended to make the US dollar into a worthless piece of paper, "backed up" only by almost $20 trillion of debt. That was unacceptable.

More conspiracy whataboutery debunked many times over. Gadaffi had many whacky ideas, one of which was to bring in a gold dinar, an idea he floated for many years and likewise it was ignored for years. The AU finally dumped the notion in 2010. Libya had what, 6bn in gold reserves, yes definitely a large threat to the global currencies, of which trillions are moved daily

Again, more hallmarks of the partisan view

recedite

Dohnjoe wrote: »

Libya had what, 6bn in gold reserves, yes definitely a large threat to the global currencies, of which trillions are moved daily

Maybe you don't understand how fiat currencies work. The US dollar can shift in the trillions because it is the currency used to trade oil. Not because of any other reason.
Libya only needed enough gold to back its own currency, or possibly extend that to cover a regional North African currency. Then it could sell its oil in Dinars instead of Dollars.

Heres an analogy. Lets say I start writing IOU's and taking them down to the shops to pay for stuff. At first, the local shops might take them, but only if they knew and trusted me. But after I have written 20 trillion of them, nobody would take them. So I put armed men in the petrol stations, and tell the attendants there that they can only accept my IOUs to buy petrol, no other form of payment. Now everybody else sees that my IOU's are needed to buy fuel, so they have a value again. I can go down to power city and buy a huge flat screen TV, just writing another IOU to pay for it. Happy days. Even my armed men are paid the same way, so I can afford to have more than anyone else.

glued

Cheerful Spring wrote: »

Hilary said shes will support a no fly zone over Syria when she spoke last night. So War is highly likely with the Russians if she fails to negotiate with them and agree.

Hilary is more likely to start World War 3 the way she is talking. A no fly zone gives an obvious advantage to ISIS and The Rebels. Assad, Russia and their chums are likely to get very angry about that. It would be completely unenforceable and the Israelis would be against it as they have and will continue to attack Hezbollah whenever they get a chance in Syria.

The American public still support Uncle Sam but the rest of the world is starting to wake up to the massive negative impact American foreign policy is having on the world and the Middle East in particular. The hypocritical nature of supporting the Saudis and the Yemeni despots while arguing for the removal of Assad is wearing very thin on most people. Hilary is a continuation of that policy and they are on a collision course with a man who will take them on.

Nobody agrees with bombarding Aleppo but Syria cannot be overrun with these apparent 'moderate' rebels and ISIS which is essentially what the US allowed to happen, thanks to the DoD releases on WikiLeaks.

blackpearl

glued wrote: »

Hilary is more likely to start World War 3 the way she is talking. A no fly zone gives an obvious advantage to ISIS and The Rebels. Assad, Russia and their chums are likely to get very angry about that. It would be completely unenforceable and the Israelis would be against it as they have and will continue to attack Hezbollah whenever they get a chance in Syria.

The American public still support Uncle Sam but the rest of the world is starting to wake up to the massive negative impact American foreign policy is having on the world and the Middle East in particular. The hypocritical nature of supporting the Saudis and the Yemeni despots while arguing for the removal of Assad is wearing very thin on most people. Hilary is a continuation of that policy and they are on a collision course with a man who will take them on.

Nobody agrees with bombarding Aleppo but Syria cannot be overrun with these apparent 'moderate' rebels and ISIS which is essentially what the US allowed to happen, thanks to the DoD releases on WikiLeaks.

Have to agree well put, It took Russia to grab the bull by the horns and take on isis.Changed times Russia could not care about America this is all going on because Russia have a naval base in Syria and the yanks can stand having them in the med.

Jimmy Garlic

blackpearl wrote: »

Have to agree well put, It took Russia to grab the bull by the horns and take on isis.Changed times Russia could not care about America this is all going on because Russia have a naval base in Syria and the yanks can stand having them in the med.

That and Syria was supposed to be a stepping stone towards conquering Iran as part off the PNAC plan. A lot of people think PNAC ended with Bush jr, it didn't , Obama is on board with it http://freebeacon.com/national-security/obama-joins-pnac/

Hillary Clinton is a major supporter of it...
https://theintercept.com/2016/07/25/robert-kagan-and-other-neocons-back-hillary-clinton/

alastair

Jimmy Garlic wrote: »

That and Syria was supposed to be a stepping stone towards conquering Iran as part off the PNAC plan. A lot of people think PNAC ended with Bush jr, it didn't , Obama is on board with it http://freebeacon.com/national-security/obama-joins-pnac/

No he isn't. Bill Kristol hasn't trademarked the words 'American Century', and anyone else is free to use them for their own purposes. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. Has it escaped your notice that Obama worked hard to negotiate an agreed settlement with Iran, and has been the friendliest president towards Iran since the revolution?

Jimmy Garlic wrote: »

Hillary Clinton is a major supporter of it...
https://theintercept.com/2016/07/25/robert-kagan-and-other-neocons-back-hillary-clinton/

No she's not. That some neocons support Hillary over Trump tells nothing more than they prefer Hillary to Trump. Not a sniff of a suggestion that Hillary supports PNAC.

KingBrian2

Everyone needs to calm down on this. Everyone is missing a very important point. A lot of the reasons for hating Assad and starting unrest in Syria a secular state was sectarianism on the part of Jihadists who despise Shia Islam. This was not some opposition to despotism that some would claim. A very big part of it was sectarianism. Across Sunni Muslim states and I will highlight a few. Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Iraq the Shia and other communities like the Coptic Christians in Egypt were horrible attacked by mobs. Mosques and churches burnt. Syria nor Iraq does not need any of these guys to be anywhere near power.

alastair

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Everyone needs to calm down on this. Everyone is missing a very important point. A lot of the reasons for hating Assad and starting unrest in Syria a secular state was sectarianism on the part of Jihadists who despise Shia Islam.

The protests and subsequent rising against Assad were not sectarian in nature. It was a typical Arab Spring dynamic - protesting against a corrupt and autocratic government. I think it's you who has missed the point. The civil war has subsequently become far more sectarian in nature, but it wasn't the impetus for the initial uprising.

KingBrian2

alastair wrote: »

The protests and subsequent rising against Assad were not sectarian in nature. It was a typical Arab Spring dynamic - protesting against a corrupt and autocratic government. I think it's you who has missed the point. The civil war has subsequently become far more sectarian in nature, but it wasn't the impetus for the initial uprising.

Their was also an Occupy Wall Street protest and protests all across the Mediterranean if my memory serves me. Tea Party Americans also protested against the corrupt despotic Obama for raising taxes.

http://caveviews.blogs.com/.a/6a00d8341bffd953ef0120a5c18141970c-800wi

Their is plenty more of those photos if you go to Google Images.

The notion that the protest in Syria was none other than US backed proxies is completely misleading. The Saudi's were untouched and Syria and Iran were particularly targeted by US aggression.

Jimmy Garlic

alastair wrote: »

No she's not. That some neocons support Hillary over Trump tells nothing more than they prefer Hillary to Trump. Not a sniff of a suggestion that Hillary supports PNAC.

Neocons like Robert Kagan and Paul Wolfowitz wouldn't be supporting Clinton if there wasn't something in it for them

Elmer Blooker

alastair wrote: »

The protests and subsequent rising against Assad were not sectarian in nature. It was a typical Arab Spring dynamic - protesting against a corrupt and autocratic government. I think it's you who has missed the point. The civil war has subsequently become far more sectarian in nature, but it wasn't the impetus for the initial uprising.

How the term "Arab Spring" makes me squirm. Who invented it? The NY Times? The Washington Post? Newsweek? You can be sure no Arab has ever said the words.
The protests in Syria were sectarian from day one. I posted a video a few weeks ago of a protest in Daraa in 2011 and the chants from the crowds were for blood and martyrdom and NOT democracy and free elections.

alastair

Jimmy Garlic wrote: »

Neocons like Robert Kagan and Paul Wolfowitz wouldn't be supporting Clinton if there wasn't something in it for them

There is. They don't get a Trump as president.

alastair

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

The protests in Syria were sectarian from day one. I posted a video a few weeks ago of a protest in Daraa in 2011 and the chants from the crowds were for blood and martyrdom and NOT democracy and free elections.

You're simply wrong in that regard. The protests didn't begin from any sectarianism.

https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/eastern-mediterranean/syria/syria-s-tipping-point

Jimmy Garlic

alastair wrote: »

There is. They don't get a Trump as president.

If Trump backed the doctrine of ''regime change'' and perpetual war you can bet that they back him all the way. He doesn't though, so they don't support him. Hillary Clinton is a thinly disguised neocon. She sings their tune. She will give them the wars that they want + left cover.

alastair

Jimmy Garlic wrote: »

If Trump backed the doctrine of ''regime change'' and perpetual war you can bet that they back him all the way. He doesn't though, so they don't support him. Hillary Clinton is a thinly disguised neocon. She sings their tune. She will give them the wars that they want + left cover.

Trump certainly backed regime change in Libya and Iraq. Neither Trump nor Hillary support 'perpetual war', so that's simply a straw man argument.

Elmer Blooker

alastair wrote: »

You're simply wrong in that regard. The protests didn't begin from any sectarianism.

https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/eastern-mediterranean/syria/syria-s-tipping-point

I think I'll give your source a miss.

The International Crisis Group was founded after a chance meeting in January 1993 between former US diplomat and then-President of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Morton I. Abramowitz and then future World Bank Vice-President Mark Malloch Brown on a flight to Sarajevo.

" ...... a chance meeting!"

alastair

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

I think I'll give your source a miss.

" ...... a chance meeting!"

Your choice of course, but it's a legitimate and impartial group: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/International_Crisis_Group

Any NGO that gets support from George Soros, Chuck Feeney, Bill Gates, the Ford Foundation, and a swath of national governments (including our own) has demonstrated it's grounded in reality.

Elmer Blooker

I think its worth having a look at the latest Russian atrocity, this is a school with its roof intact and with desks not a centimeter out of place! There even seems to be a school book on one of the desks that withstood the shock waves- amazing!
If anyone wants the see the REAL effects of an airstrike find photos of the airstrike by our Saudi allies on a funeral in Yemen. I'm not going to post them as the are too graphic. This atrocity barely made the news in our free and fair media for some reason?

http://www.rte.ie/news/2016/1028/827472-syria-school-attack/

Dohnjoe

KingBrian2 wrote: »

Everyone needs to calm down on this. Everyone is missing a very important point. A lot of the reasons for hating Assad and starting unrest in Syria a secular state was sectarianism on the part of Jihadists who despise Shia Islam.

No, the jihadists arrived later in the conflict.

Assad was butchering his own people long before that

alastair

Elmer Blooker wrote: »

I think its worth having a look at the latest Russian atrocity, this is a school with its roof intact and with desks not a centimeter out of place! There even seems to be a school book on one of the desks that withstood the shock waves- amazing!
If anyone wants the see the REAL effects of an airstrike find photos of the airstrike by our Saudi allies on a funeral in Yemen. I'm not going to post them as the are too graphic. This atrocity barely made the news in our free and fair media for some reason?

http://www.rte.ie/news/2016/1028/827472-syria-school-attack/

Wow. That Russian air strike had no REAL impact at all. Asides from all the dead kids etc. Would you be happier if the photo showed more gore?