General News Thread

[2Bad]

Well I mean if we're talking about strictly what can we do as a political reality then welcome to "sit around with our thumbs in our butts" because that's what we're going to do. Maybe we will throw some money or materials at the problem except even that approach has been so tainted by abysmal failures that it's hard to find support for it.

E: that said I would really like for the irreplaceable inheritance of all humanity to stop getting blown up by an Islamic death cult

And we should probably just recognize the Kurds at this point because come on

[I3uster]

Maybe we will throw some money or materials at the problem except even that approach has been so tainted by abysmal failures that it's hard to find support for it.

do you really care about a few dead turks, not like the PKK has any interest in targeting the US when they are done

it will make the EU conversation a bit awkward for a while in turkey though

[SeiKeo]

And we should probably just recognize the Kurds at this point because come on

There's a very low chance that this isn't going to happen fairly soon and tbh it seems to me that the current proposal is that we're going to basically switch Iraq out for them in the constellation of "Middle Eastern associates."

Maybe we will throw some money or materials at the problem except even that approach has been so tainted by abysmal failures that it's hard to find support for it.

See, Buster, when I hear "let's fund local reliable rebel groups" this is what I think. "This is a thing that has never gone wrong for us."

[2Bad]

do you really care about a few dead turks, not like the PKK has any interest in targeting the US when they are done

it will make the EU conversation a bit awkward for a while in turkey though

Turkey's been a more reliable ally than a lot of Europe from the US government's perspective. I wasn't really talking about funding the Kurds though, I'd rather see actual ME countries (that is, states we recognize, obviously Kurdistan is basically a de facto nation at this point) do something. Militarily Israel would be ideal but that's obviously not an option for an impossibly long list of reasons. Jordan is practically foaming at the mouth to get involved at this point though.

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There's a very low chance that this isn't going to happen fairly soon and tbh it seems to me that the current proposal is that we're going to basically switch Iraq out for them in the constellation of "Middle Eastern associates."

I wonder how open to that association the Kurds actually are though. I mean, for the Kurds the West consists of people who twice promised them a nation and twice told them to fuck off.

e: I mean logically yes it makes sense to take any offer of friendship from the big kids on campus but logic and policy often have little to do with one another especially when you're talking about a bunch of people who are probably super high on nationalist fervor at the moment.

[I3uster]

Again the PKK has no interest in fucking with the west unless you count Turkey, so unless you see a bit of skirmishing as a reason to go full scale NATO counteroffensive and drop some more democracy it most likely won't escalate.

That said for the affected countries recognizing a Kurdistan basically means you just propped up a 2nd Israel at their doorstep especially when you promote them to #2 strategic ally.

[2Bad]

I dunno, Kurdistan seems like an actual useful ally as opposed to the North Korea which Israel is to our China.

[SeiKeo]

I wonder how open to that association the Kurds actually are though. I mean, for the Kurds the West consists of people who twice promised them a nation and twice told them to fuck off.

Things are a little different in Iraqi Kurdistan, the northernmost autonomous region where the "invasion" is still referred to -- insistently -- as a "liberation." It's a strange, parallel universe in which American ideals like freedom from tyranny and economic promise are more intact than they are in America, as is the belief that those ideals can be spread and won through war. Some say that admiration for Americans runs so high that among the younger generation are Kurds named "Bush." I've never met such a child (nor have I ever met anyone who has) but it's plenty surreal that, as the amigos gleefully tweeted, Iraqi Kurds like Americans...

"Obama is a good family man," a local reporter told me. "But I love Bush more. Bush killed Saddam." He shook his fist and said, "I love America!"

Anecdotal but there's a lot of anecdotes.

[2Bad]

Well then fuck me I guess.

[SeiKeo]

Well then fuck me I guess.

Like, at this point, we basically did give them the nation, we just haven't done the paperwork for it.

[2Bad]

Well encouraging separatism has its own problems but its not like we didn't already cross that line and even if we hadn't it's not like there's anyone that can actually STOP them at this point.

[I3uster]

I dunno, Kurdistan seems like an actual useful ally as opposed to the North Korea which Israel is to our China.

I was talking more about the reaction by the populace. Which isn't positive when you are a de-facto US puppet state that can get as landgrabby as you want without facing repercussions. Not that they necessarily will be of course, but as an agitator you really only need to have them have the option.

It's probably still the best option to support them at the moment since the PKK has big secular ideas even if they got watered down, and if you don't want to invest and educate the only other option to get rid of radical thought is an ideological purge.

man isnt it great that the us props up the commies to fight the islamists they propped up to fight the commies

[2Bad]

It helps that communism has proven to be more hilarious than harmful.

e: I should also clarify because someone is going to bring it up I'm sure: no I am not saying Israel is as bad as NK, Israel is a functional state more or less for one. However it causes us no end to trouble, does us very little good, and is run by a tremendously arrogant blowhard despite heavily relying on us for its existence so...

[SeiKeo]

Eeeeh I like the comparison in that 'ally' is generally a misinterpretation but the US/Israel relationship is a lot more complicated.

[2Bad]

Well yeah NK would completely collapse if China cut the cord, Israel wouldn't necessarily do so. As I said, it's a functional state. It is, however, a nuclear rogue state which does little more than make everyone nearby pissed at its great power patron.

[Marmadillo]

It helps that communism has proven to be more hilarious than harmful.

I beg to differ. It's just that at this point communism is simply too dead to matter. All we have to deal with in that front is horror stories whenever somebody manages to defect from NK.

EDIT:
Also somewhat related to the latest topic.
http://www.welt.de/print/wams/articl...-EU-Armee.html

[Seika]

I beg to differ. It's just that at this point communism is simply too dead to matter. All we have to deal with in that front is horror stories whenever somebody manages to defect from NK.

Whether one can conceivably call North Korea communist is a bit of a difficult proposition at this point. Autarkic Juche, whose relation to any kind of socialism is rather dubious, has taken over lots of the language of its political discourse, and what NK applies is a third thing entirely.

(And there's the whole debate over whether you can actually say communism has ever been put into proper practice by a state, and whether it's inherently dangerous or states failing to apply it properly are a cause of harm, and whether it's so impossible to realistically apply that any attempt will inevitably fail and likely become dangerous).

[Marmadillo]

It's debatable of course, same as with any other formally communist states left in the world. I use communism here as an umbrella term for the wider movement and slogans used by various groups of, at least initially, socialist bent, "Islamism" as used in this thread is quite similar.

[2Bad]

Well we're mostly talking about Sunni states if you want to be specific. Iran isn't specifically related to this beyond the loss of Iraq as a power being a destabilizing element.

I honestly don't know if there is an Ibadi nation today.

[mAc Chaos]

(And there's the whole debate over whether you can actually say communism has ever been put into proper practice by a state, and whether it's inherently dangerous or states failing to apply it properly are a cause of harm, and whether it's so impossible to realistically apply that any attempt will inevitably fail and likely become dangerous).

Yeah, I always found the "it wasn't /really/ communism" argument to be pretty weak. You could say the same thing about capitalism or Christianity, but that never stops people from attributing those ideologies to the real world version of them. You can't compare the ideal version of one system against the real world version of others.

[Five_X]

I honestly don't know if there is an Ibadi nation today.

Oh, man.