Yukawa, aged around 42 and who dreamed of becoming a military contractor, was captured in August outside the Syrian city of Aleppo. Goto, 47, a war correspondent with experience in Middle East hot spots, went to Syria in late October to try to help Yukawa.
Astronuc said:How long can Saudi Arabia stand on the sidelines?
Ultimately, there needs to be a force on the ground.Warmly greeting a group of Sunni leaders led by Sheikh Ahmed Abu Risha, the president of the Iraqi Awakening Council, Allen reminisced last week about the critical help the leaders had provided the U.S. military eight years ago in ridding Anbar province of al-Qaida insurgents.
. . .
But hours later, Abu Risha and Allen got a rude jolt. IS fighters, they learned, had just stormed the compound of Abu Risha and his family, overrunning security forces, blowing up homes and the mosque.
“This was a message to the United States — that you cannot protect anyone. … We are able to reach anywhere,” Abu Risha told Yahoo News.
Whose force?Astronuc said:...
Ultimately, there needs to be a force on the ground.
My cousin tells me we will soon have a vast army of invincible AI robots, perhaps just in time for the ultimate battle on the ground.Astronuc said:In battle against Islamic State, Iraqi tribal chiefs plead for more U.S. aid
At meeting with Obama envoy, Sunni leaders paint bleak picture of U.S.-backed campaign
http://news.yahoo.com/in-battle-aga...chiefs-plead-for-more-u-s--aid-155913315.html
Ultimately, there needs to be a force on the ground.
mheslep said:Whose force?
Then, if Iraqi forces area unable to destroy ISIS, you favor a unilateral US ground force invasion of ISIS held Iraq?Astronuc said:So maybe a US force would be the best solution.
I favor a European army conscripted from all those countries which invaded and intervened since Sykes/Picot.mheslep said:Then, if Iraqi forces area unable to destroy ISIS, you favor a unilateral US ground force invasion of ISIS held Iraq?
Multinational force from the region would be better.mheslep said:Then, if Iraqi forces area unable to destroy ISIS, you favor a unilateral US ground force invasion of ISIS held Iraq?
http://news.yahoo.com/japan-says-efforts-free-islamic-state-hostage-deadlocked-075801477.htmlTOKYO (AP) — Japan and other nations condemned with outrage and horror on Sunday the beheading purportedly by the Islamic State group of Kenji Goto, a journalist who sought through his coverage of Syria to convey the plight of refugees, children and other victims of war.
Analysis: The world's problems enter Japan's psyche, againTOKYO (AP) — The Japanese, who inhabit one of the safest countries in the world, have been brutally reminded that the world is a dangerous place.
In a shock to a country that can feel insulated from distant geopolitical problems, two of its own have reportedly been killed by Islamic radicals in Syria, the latest apparently beheaded in a video posted online this weekend by militant websites.
Dotini said:http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-31121160#
BBC suggests the Jordanian pilot has been burned alive
Greg Bernhardt said:Can Jordan have any meaningful response to this?
There is one flaw in such strategy. For being feared they need firepower a bigger by a few magnitudes. Now I mainly see fury - on a main left wing leaning Polish newspaper in comments complain that we have to many qualms and with great applause people are suggesting rather nasty ways of dealing with ISIS (advices include napalm / white phosphorus / sarin).Vanadium 50 said:Yes. They don't want to be loved. They're happy being feared.
IMO this is exactly what ISIS wants - European armies crusading in the middle east. IMO, they also want every country in the region, including Jordan, inflamed in war.Czcibor said:Now I mainly see fury - on a main left wing leaning Polish newspaper in comments complain that we have to many qualms and with great applause people are suggesting rather nasty ways of dealing with ISIS (advices include napalm / white phosphorus / sarin).
Damn, now if Americans asked us for some troops I guess, that there would be no problem with convincing public opinion that we're fighting with evil incarnated and request would be accepted by masses.
Dotini said:IMO this is exactly what ISIS wants - European armies crusading in the middle east. IMO, they also want every country in the region, including Jordan, inflamed in war.
Somewhere in Game of Thrones you can read, "Chaos is a ladder."
Czcibor said:Now I mainly see fury - on a main left wing leaning Polish newspaper in comments complain that we have to many qualms and with great applause people are suggesting rather nasty ways of dealing with ISIS
When a fly becomes annoying enough somebody will swat it.Sherman's tactics were brutal. But they worked.
Why did he consider it necessary to inflict hardship on civilians as well as enemy soldiers?
Early in the war, Union commanders, including Sherman, had required Union soldiers to respect the property, lives and even the freedom of Southern civilians in areas occupied by the Union forces. But this worked out badly for the Union army. Armed Southern "civilians" frequently murdered Union soldiers who traveled in small groups or who became separated from their units. Confederate guerrillas sabotaged Union communications behind Union lines.
Commenting on this situation, Sherman wrote,
"We are not only fighting hostile armies, but a hostile people, and we must make old and young, rich and poor, feel the hard hand of war."
The Union forces needed
"to humble their pride, to follow them to their inmost recesses, and make them fear and dread us...
"We cannot change the hearts and minds of those people of the South, but we can make war so terrible ... [and] make them so sick of war that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it."
McPherson and other historians believe that Sherman 's tough tactics, however distasteful they may have been, saved hundreds of thousands of lives by bringing the war to an end more quickly than would otherwise have been the case.
What lessons can America learn from Sherman 's March?
Does the Polish military have the air capability to deliver such weapons?Czcibor said:Polish newspaper in comments complain that we have to many qualms and with great applause people are suggesting rather nasty ways of dealing with ISIS (advices include napalm / white phosphorus / sarin).
Czcibor said:EDIT: I think that they reached a threshold of believing in their own propaganda.
HossamCFD said:I know that words like barbaric and monstrous have been used too much in discussing Daesh and started to lose their meaning, but burning someone alive is to me a new level of savagery. I cannot think of a worse fate.It seems there's a huge sentiment calling for revenge in Jordan. People are demanding the immediate execution of Sajida al-Rishawi, the convicted suicide bomber on death row that Jordan was trying to swap with the late pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh.
Captive treatment vs. opening fire to a legitimate target? (in the same way as we would not be specially outraged if this pilot burned to death in case of being hit with heat-seeking missile)Dotini said:Please allow me to play devil's advocate for just a moment. Of course it is monstrous to burn anyone alive. But the Jordanian pilot could also have burned people alive during his sorties with coalition forces. ISIS is said to have lost 6000 people to recent coalition actions. So ISIS took revenge by burning him in turn. Now the cycle of revenge is continued by calls to execute prisoners. Please explain why burning people alive is okay for the coalition, but not for the enemy? How is the cycle of revenge to be broken? Thank you for indulging a potentially naive question.
I've heard an idea that Jordanians should learn from Europe. Instead of such barbaric death penalty, they should express their deep concern, while implement a minor asset freeze and visa ban.naima said:I agree with dotini. Jordania replies with death sentence to terrorists. What does it mean? that killing the adversary is autorized! There is only one coherent answer: life sentence in jail!
It didn't take long - Jordan hangs two Iraqi militants in response to pilot's death.HossamCFD said:It seems there's a huge sentiment calling for revenge in Jordan. People are demanding the immediate execution of Sajida al-Rishawi, the convicted suicide bomber on death row that Jordan was trying to swap with the late pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh.
Dotini said:Please allow me to play devil's advocate for just a moment. Of course it is monstrous to burn anyone alive. But the Jordanian pilot could also have burned people alive during his sorties with coalition forces. ISIS is said to have lost 6000 people to recent coalition actions. So ISIS took revenge by burning him in turn. Now the cycle of revenge is continued by calls to execute prisoners. Please explain why burning people alive is okay for the coalition, but not for the enemy? How is the cycle of revenge to be broken? Thank you for indulging a potentially naive question.
I don't know. It would be quite hard to point where is the border between revenge and the general deterrent function of punishment.HossamCFD said:I don't agree with the death sentence, especially revenge motivated ones like this (Are they all revenge motivated?). I would lock up the terrorists for life but not execute them.
winning hearts and mindsnaima said:What does "fight hearts and minds" mean? is there a typo?
Czcibor said:Hossam, what would you advice for the West to do in the long run? I mean how to fight hearts and minds of people in Muslim civilization?
HossamCFD said:One of the reasons is the lack of good education that makes the public very prone to conspiracy theories that reflect their own biases.
HossamCFD said:Apart from that I do not think the west can do much to spread values of democracy, liberalism, and empowering reason over superstition. These have to be home grown and cannot be imposed.
= http://muhammadanism.com/Margoliouth/relation_arab_israel/relation_arab_israel.pdfIt was not apparently Mohammed's design to expel the Jews from the Arabian
peninsula, and indeed there are documents ascribed to him having the appearance of
genuineness, wherein he expressly stipulates that so long as they perform their
engagements there must be no interference with them. His second successor ruled that
within the peninsula no religion save Islam should be tolerated,
[PLAIN said:http://www.30-days.net/islam/history/caliphs/][/PLAIN]
Muhammad’s Successors – The Four Caliphs
http://www.30-days.net/reveal/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/califs-30-days-net.jpg
| AFTER MUHAMMAD :: The era of the four Medina-based Caliphs or “Rightly Guided Caliphs”. Three of the four were assassinated.
The first Caliph, Abu Bakr
By the time of Muhammad’s death in 632, Islam had become a dominant power in the Arabian peninsula. Muhammad’s successors (the four caliphs) were appointed by the Muslim community to carry out the leadership and rule of Islam throughout the Arabian peninsula and other parts of the world.
The four caliphs were more political figures than spiritual leaders. By military force the first caliph, Abu Bakr, brought all the tribes in the Arabian peninsula under the rule of Islam. These tribes had been divided after Muhammad’s death.
The second Caliph Omar
Under the second caliph Omar or Hadrat Umar Farooq (634 – 644) a phenomenal expansion began, which continued for about a hundred years. The Muslim armies defeated the armies of the Sassanian (Persian) and Byzantine empires. The Muslims then swept through the area that is present-day Iraq and Iran to Central Asia (Bukhara and Samarkand) and the Punjab. They conquered all the Asiatic territories of the Roman Empire except Anatolia (modern Turkey). Northward they occupied Syria, and Damascus was the capital of the Umayyad Dynasty (661 – 750). They conquered Egypt and moved across North Africa and into Europe, ruling most of Spain. Their move into the West was stopped in 732 by Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in France.Remarkable Growth
Within a hundred years after Muhammad’s death, Islam became an empire in which Allah and the laws of Islam were established in Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Only Europe would remain virtually untouched.
(edit: no strangers to colonialism , those guys?)
The third Caliph Othman and division
After the assassination of Othman or Hadrat Uthman, the third caliph, in 656, increasing tension arose within the Muslim community. This ended in a civil war and division which still exists up to this present day throughout the Muslim world.
The forth Caliph Ali and the Shiites
The Shiites, the followers of Ali, the fourth caliph and first convert to Islam, became strong opposers of the Umayyads (the tribe from which the third caliph came). The power struggle between these two Muslim groups continued after Ali’s assassination in 661 by his former followers called Kharijites.
The killing, hatred and division went on as Yazid, the son of Mu’awiyah of the Umayyad Dynasty, massacred Hussein, the son of Ali, with his family in 680. This event is celebrated every year during the Islamic month of Moharram by Shiites.
One of the things that I always think about is the history that led to these values in the west and why did the middle east not develop a similar tradition.jim hardy said:perhaps we take them for granted ?
It's very hard to know for sure what Mohammed did or didn't. Most of what we know about him and his companions come from the 'Hadith' collections, the earliest of which was compiled in the late 8th century, almost 150 years after he died. This puts us firmly in the Ummayad dynasty when the muslims had already established an empire that's by now centred around Damascus not Mecca or Medina. The earliest islamic document is of course the Quran but you can't really use it to learn about Mohammed as he is only mentioned there a few times. Given all of that I would say that the only thing I can be reasonably certain about is that Mohammed is most likely a historical figure, not a work of pure fiction, and that he might have authored at least parts of the Quran. Anything else is IMO open to serious doubts.It was not apparently Mohammed's design to expel the Jews from the Arabian
peninsula, and indeed there are documents ascribed to him having the appearance of
genuineness, wherein he expressly stipulates that so long as they perform their
engagements there must be no interference with them. His second successor ruled that
within the peninsula no religion save Islam should be tolerated,
= http://muhammadanism.com/Margoliouth/relation_arab_israel/relation_arab_israel.pdf
Blame your predecessor when things get unpleasant, eh ?HossamCFD said:However, in this account Umar claimed that it was Mohammed who told him to do so before he died, and that he is not acting on his own wishes.
I'd rather point out an earlier period, where in short while big part of our knowledge was set into doubt:jim hardy said:I'm told Western civilization took off in Europe only after Francis Bacon proposed scientific inquiry.
Out of four main civilizations (West, Islam, India, China) the last 500 years (except maybe Asian tigers and China from Deng Xiaoping) were clearly successful for the West. The other civs were developing in the usual pace, I think that it was rather some anomaly in the West.One of the things that I always think about is the history that led to these values in the west and why did the middle east not develop a similar tradition.
Astronuc said:http://news.yahoo.com/photo-king-jordan-looking-badass-132100812.html
Jordan's King Abdullah II can pull it off. He's no Michael Dukakis.
You'll be surprised how many normal people, ones that are not even particularly religious, believe Daesh is an American invention.Astronuc said:Unfortunately, a few blame the west. Daesh is homegrown.
Time to wake up and check that bad smell in the backyard.I guess extreme extremists are too much for the extremists.
Dotini said:Some say, figuratively, ISIS was invented at Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, and Bagram.
You analyse it too much from Western perspective. The problem is that for some Muslims already provoking enough thing is what they perceive as occupation of Andalusia (which you may incorrectly just consider as Spain).Dotini said:Some say, figuratively, ISIS was invented at Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, and Bagram.
I suppose I wouldn't be too surprised. There are similar trends for conspiracy theories in the west. I would imagine that many Muslims cannot believe the depravity of Daesh. It's so outside the norm.HossamCFD said:You'll be surprised how many normal people, ones that are not even particularly religious, believe Daesh is an American invention.
I think some members of Daesh have indicated that the collection of so many in the prisons in Iraq gave opportunity for contact and organization. Al Baghdadi used his time in Camp Bucca to develop his network.Dotini said:Some say, figuratively, ISIS was invented at Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, and Bagram.
AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — The United Arab Emirates said Saturday it ordered a squadron of F-16 fighters to Jordan, which an official said would participate in airstrikes on the Islamic State group after the UAE earlier suspended its involvement.
