I admit to surprise that Boy Assad came home empty-handed. It had seemed that Russia’s star was in the ascendant, and that recent events in Georgia, plus saber rattling over Poland and Moldova, meant that the bear was back in action.
However, the Georgian operation has had its consequences. Russia is now a capitalist nation, and deeply intertwined with the world economy. The last month has seen significant capital flight from the country as a result of events in the Caucasus, and Putin and Medvedev seem to have banked the fires of adventure for the time being.
The Soviet Union never faced the same difficulties, but today’s Russia is a different place. According to an op-ed in today’s YNet:
Assad slapped in the face- - - - - - - - -
Syrian leader thought Cold War is back, but Russia made it clear Assad was wrong
The Syrian army’s aging generals couldn’t believe their eyes: The Soviet Union is back. After seeing Russian tanks entering Georgia, they thought that time can be turned back two decades, to the era where the Soviet superpower backed President Hafez al-Assad; an era where Soviet advisors stayed in Syria, Soviet warships docked at the Tartus port, and Moscow transferred missiles and tanks to Damascus for free. Most importantly, it was an era where the Soviet Union provided Syria with protection against Israel.
Bashar Assad’s advisors therefore gave him the worst possible advice. The time has come to make Russia an offer it cannot refuse, they told him. And Assad, the perpetual rookie, of course took the advice. And so, the Syrian president headed to Moscow with a series of proposals, which the generals thought both sides will benefit from.
1. Syria agrees to Russian deployment of advanced ground-to-ground missiles in its territory as a counterweight to the American missile deployment in Poland. 2. Syria agrees that Russian Air Force jets will use Syrian territory and airspace. 3. The seaport at Tartus will be reopened. 4. Russia will be granted a friendly military outpost in the Middle East, at the gate to Europe, and go back to being a regional power.
In exchange, Assad intended to request advanced ground-to-ground missiles, as well as other weapons. His gut-feeling was excellent, and he mentioned his proposal in a briefing with Russian reporters ahead of his trip to Moscow.
The Syrian leader was stunned when the Russians slapped him in the face. Putin and Medvedev’s answer to his request was “not interested.” They have no interest in embarking on a new cold war. The slap was even worse because the Russians refused to sell advanced missiles to the Syrians, and added a few conditions: Firstly, they will be selling Syria defensive weapons only, rather than offensive ones. Secondly, they will not be selling Syria arms that would change the status quo of full Israeli supremacy over Syria. Thirdly, everything they sell will be paid for in cash, in advance.
The Russians know very well that Syria’s economy is unstable. They know that the Iranians help the Syrians with payments, but they also know that Iran itself is facing great difficulties. Assad swallowed the insult and returned to Damascus.
Why was there no chance for Assad’s “golden package” to begin with? Because Russia is not the Soviet Union. What Assad’s generals failed to grasp is that by invading Georgia Russia caused itself economic and political damage that would take years to repair. Russia is a capitalistic country that relies on its economy, and the economy responded with immense anxiety to the Georgia events.
The investors who lifted the Russian economy are simply running away now: $12 billion were taken out of Russia in the past two weeks. The Russian stock exchange’s RTS index declined by 32%, and the Russian Ruble was depreciated. Russia had no ability to continue this conflict.
So Bashar Assad has been humiliated.
More importantly, however, he was unable to acquire the hardware that would have put him in a stronger position in his negotiations with Olmert the Appeaser, and might have even helped him get the Golan Heights back.
Syria and Iran are currently preparing to ignite another proxy war with Israel through Hizbullah. If Assad was counting on Russian help to avoid the consequences, he’ll now have to find a different way to protect Damascus from any potential Israeli reprisals.
Hat tip: Abu Elvis.
29 comments:
Wow, all those who wanted war with Russia over Georgia should read this. Putin's Russia does not want a new Cold War, unlike some here in America do.
Very interesting, and very nice. No more Yojimbo then? Things are shaping up nicely. Russia is approaching its proper incarnation.
thanks for the update on assad's trip.
i translated an interview assad gave to kommersant last week, in which he brought up many of the gifts he expected to receive from russia. although it's yesterday's news, you can read it below.
http://notesfromrussia.wordpress.com/2008/08/21/interview-between-bashar-asad-and-kommersant/
i'm glad to hear they didn't receive the missile system.
God bless.
It was very clever longterm defensive strategy enmeshing Russia in capitalism (and good for them too). Putin's little foray into Georgia ended up costing his economy 12 Billion, a brisk spanking that required no NATO tanks and may have cured his Napoleon complex (he's short) or considering his background, the Stalinmania he encourages. There's no reason to keep mentioning his little puppet Medvedev, who doesn't speak a word without old Vlad the Impaler's hand up his a**.
let's recall the USA has spent two TRILLION on the afghan/iraq wars and apparently doesn't care at all how much it costs. 12 billion these days is chump change.
Purified anti-Russia hatred by Laine above. I cannot remember when I saw such intense naked hatred expressed in this forum last time. Very disappointing.
Conservative Swede, I too am disappointed. Your admiration for Russia may fit the "Swede" but not "Conservative" part of your moniker. From your geographic location there is no excuse for lack of knowledge regarding Russians' abysmal treatment of all other peoples unfortunate enough to feel their yoke. They have never admitted wrong-doing and continue to lower like a black cloud over Europe.
Do you defend unrepentant Germans as well?
@Laime
Your seething, hysterical hatred of Russia blinds you to the dispicable and ugly face of the deplorable actions of the USA and its vile NATO gangsters.
You state:
"Do you defend unrepentant Germans as well?"
Trawling the gutter. But what about the USA & NATO's delightful forrays into Bosnia? Ethnic cleansing, bombing of innocent civilians from high altitude using cluster bombs. Demonising a once proud ally with a stack of lies whilst working with Al Qaeda and the Saudis to create a muslim state in Europe all based on a pack of lies.
And then there is the "little folly" into Iraq. Have Dubya and his arse-licking neo-cons found the WMD's yet? Maybe they were too busy securing the oil and handing out fat lucrative contracts to Haliburton, Exxon and BP. After they'd once again bombed innocents with cluster bombs from high altitude and used radioactive ammunition - all without a UN mandate of course. But then again, the US and NATO have made it clear that such things as "international law" only apply to nations who don't do what the US demands.
Your nation has innocent blood on its hands. Clinton, Dubya, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Albright, Rice, Holbrook, Walker - all should be sat where Karadic is now, facing trial for war crimes. All should face execution for their guilt.
But justice isn't compatible with US global hegemony and muslim appeasement.
And you have the nerve to ask CS:
"Do you defend unrepentant Germans as well?"
Look up the word "hypocrite".
What you defend is equally as abhorrent.
The Russians are not the only ones to have shown restraint in the georgia-situation. Can you imagine how temptating it is for Israel to go for a serious military relationship with Georgia ? A fleet of refueling tankers operating out of southeast Georgia would enable the IAF to control most of iranian airspace for sevaral days...
And still, no advanced antitank weapons system (incl.trainig) were suplied to the georgians ; otherwise the russians would have lost hundreds of tanks.
An Israeli anti-tank infantry unit of 50 soldiers is capable of destroying 20 main-battle-tanks with what they carry on their backs.
If the russians were to suply syria with offensive weapons, they might run into such units next time they go for a drive-around on georgian territory.There are at least 200.000 people in Israel who came from Georgia.
So, the russians are ,as always, good chessplayers, so they won't endanger their queen to win a pawn.
For now.
Have we learned nothing from the past.
Just because the Russians told the Syrians to piss off in public does not mean they are not going t provide support.
Laine,
You are not denying your hatred. Instead you take pride in it. Even to the point where you claim that not sharing your hatred of Russia disqualifies a person from calling himself conservative. Given the intense and unfettered hatred you expose against Russia, it's highly remarkable. Unfortunately there are millions of North Americans with feelings like yours.
It's sad to see you in this way. When you wrote in a very sober way about Jews the other day, you appeared to be a person free of this sort of hatred. But you are just making up for it elsewhere, I see now.
Do you defend unrepentant Germans as well?
This comment exposes several things, characteristic for people of Laine's kind:
1) How it doesn't take long until Putin is connected to "unrepentant Germans", i.e. Nazism.
2) How this naked hatred of Russia typically goes hand in hand with naked hatred of the German people.
3) And I think we could expect that anytime a German leader would act with real self-confidence, that Laine would turn into a virulent Ralph Peters.
This sort of deep rooted anti-European hatred (mainly from Americans, but also other Anglos, etc.) is at the core of what is suffocating our civilization into death.
Also. The idea that $12 billions of money transfers would have any impact on why Russia acts as they do, I think we can safely ascribe to Western fantasies. Fantasies of the typical Westerner who is devoid of understanding of the traditional concept of acting honourably and morally.
Remember how the Americans started giving away the oil fields to the Arabs for tax reasons! (which were of course stupid tax laws made by themselves!). Such people imagine that others act out of similar morally deranged reasons, out of Homo Economicus reductionism. But Russia's actions vis-a-vis Georgia, Syria, United States, etc., simply follow good sense and honour. That's the simple explanation. But the simple explanation does not match the theme of hatred, and is probably not even understood by the people bent on Homo Economicus reductionism.
Ignore Laine, he's thick.
Russia exhibits par-excellence the very things we charge the EU with being: bureaucratic, corrupt, and authoritarian, in that order.
"3) And I think we could expect that anytime a German leader would act with real self-confidence, that Laine would turn into a virulent Ralph Peters."
This is so true. Not only with regards to "Laine", but also in Ralph Peters. I feel a real pang of sadness for Ralph Peters; his twists and turns reflect the madness and confusion in America's soul.
@HH
Indeed.
But even Russia struggles to plumb the depths of beaurocracy, corruption and authoritarianism displayed by the utterly morally bankrupt United States and its fawning EU allies - or should I say ally?
What a dispicable nation the United States has become. It languishes in the trash alongside GB, France and the many other corrupt EU self-hating nations. Festering, rotting, decaying remnants of once proud western civilisations.
And we womder why Islam is in the ascendancy. Perhaps, given the sickening state of our nations, we are getting our just desserts.
Because I'll be honest: What the west (and I mean mainly the US and GB) now represents sickens me to my stomach. Decadent, self-loathing, morally bankrupt and corrupt nations, devoid of true leadership and statesmen and whose cowardice in the face of adversity shames their people. Rather than fight those who hate their every fibre and who strive to eliminate their very existence, the so-called leaders of the west, these profiteering parasites, turn traitor to appease the crocodile who cannot wait to devour them by selling out their own people along with the values millions fought and died for just 65 years ago.
For what?
We are livimg in sick societies, ruled by a corrupt elite who drive us almost to insanity with unbridled unresponsible consumerism, permitting all and sundry to demand the state bear the consequences of poor lifestyle choices.
Stupidity rules and just like the Romans, we as a civilisation are now ripe for the picking. And the muslims know it.
Still, so long as we can all rant amd rave hysterically about the big bad bear, things can't be that bad eh?
Defiant Lion --
We get the idea: you loathe the USA. You’ve made yourself clear.
Now cut it out for a while.
This blog is hosted by two Americans who are quite tolerant of opposing points of view. However, I’m getting tired of your gratuitous slurs against Americans. You won’t find us doing similar thing to the British, or the Russians, or the French, or the Chinese, or any other nation, no matter how much we dislike the policies of their governments and their international behavior.
Your repeated insults are offensive and rude. Not only that, they are inaccurate.
I’m among the first to criticize American foreign policy and NATO actions in the Balkans and the Caucasus. But our government is inept and incompetent, not evil.
I have plenty of experience with Washington DC, and even know some of the people in the think tanks, the government, and the Pentagon. My point of view is more informed than yours, and I beg to disagree with you. There are many people who agree with me who are trying to implement changes in the right direction. Neither the country nor its government is a monolith.
I love my country, even with all its warts, and I will no longer sit here and take this kind of nastiness from you without comment.
Take your obnoxious hate-filled invective elsewhere. There are plenty of sites that will welcome that kind of talk, but this is not one.
I admire the Baron for keeping his cool under the onslaught of anti-Americanism that some people mistakenly think constitutes a defense of Russia.
In all the fulmination, with the incompetent psychoanalysis of me and erecting of strawmen (I have no problems with contemporary Germany or Germans. I have lived there. I said they expressed remorse for their nation's crimes. I have never expressed approval for events in Kosovo etc.)I did not see a single rebuttal to the inconvenient fact that Russia has committed genocide and oppression on a massive scale equalled only by Mao's China and has never owned up to its crimes against humanity. In fact, the majority of Russians would like their bloodily acquired empire back as their soaring approval of Putin and his sabre rattling attests.
The regime which most closely resembled the Russian Soviet regime, two rotten peas in a pod who signed the Molotov Ribbentrop pact of friendship is the German Nazi regime but it had a death rate one tenth of Russia's, did not enslave millions for decades, and has made apologies and reparations. Therefore it is completely valid to ask why people who rightfully condemn the German nazi regime persist in whitewashing the even worse Russian regime? Answer that instead of making things up about what I think about Germans, Kosovo etc. Historian and communist ideologue Eric Hogsbawm answered that he thought a few tens of millions killed to achieve a world communist utopia was worth the sacrifice.
Equating the United States to Russia in wrongdoing is so ridiculous on so many levels that I have lost all interest in "speaking" to people who are such moral midgets. They make disgusting ad hominem attacks on someone for pointing out the historically documented genocide of millions by Russians while inflating what amounts to jaywalking in relative impact by the United States.
No matter how you try to hide the truth, people the world over have voted with their feet. They have always flowed into the United States. No one has ever broken down the doors of Russia to get in. For most of its history, it was the other way around. Russia had to build a barbed wire fence to keep people from escaping its tender ministrations.
What a brawl here...
From the post:
They have no interest in embarking on a new cold war.
Good. Capitalism is Good, it prevents wars.
Baron:
How disingenous for you to describe what I have written as "anti americanism". I do not loathe the USA, I actually love the USA but I hate what is being done NOW by its leaders.
I have also slated the EU, my own country GB, along with the rest of NATO for what they have done in the name of our people and nations.
You then say your government is incompetent and not evil. If you are more informed than I then don't stoop to this ad hominem "I know better than you" and throwing brickbats such as "anti americanism" and "rude and offensive and nastiness" - these are the same tactics used by our enemies who scream "Islamophobe" and "racist" at those who disagree.
Instead, why not debate and tell me where I am wrong?
I am charging your nation - AND MINE - with genocide and ethnic cleansing along with waging illegal wars. I am saying that our nations are being lead by war criminals who should face justice for their evil crimes. And yes, what they have done is evil and just as the nazis were evil so too are other people who knowingly committed genicide against innocents.
The facts Baron are that the leaders of our nations - from Bush snr, to Blair, Clinton and Dubya - hold you, me and our peoples in such contempt they deliberately lied and misled us at every turn. That isn't incompetence Baron no matter how your patriotism dresses it up. They can be both incompetent and evil and their is strong evidence to support both.
Also I have not resorted to personal attack towards any poster here in the way you have with me, my wrath is directed at those who are entrusted to serve and protect us but who are betraying us.
And you can call me all the names under the sun but it doesn't change what they have done nor does it make you patriotic. Nor will it ever stop me from speaking out about what has happened in Iraq and especially Kosovo, the ramifications that are still being felt today (Situation in Georgia along with Iran) and that have seriously undermined the west and has now created another cold war.
You might stop me here but the blog world doesn't end here. But it seems smearing critics and then banning them is another tactic we often accuse our enemies of but are willing to adopt when it suits.
You aren't the only one who is trying to make a difference because they love their country. I for one don't believe that supporting and defending people who have committed ethnic cleansing and who violate international law at will and in so doing, sell-out the traditions and values of our nations, is love of country rather blind faith.
So Baron, prove me wrong in fair debate or kick me out. I have used no foul language nor resorted to personal abuse. I stand by everything I have written about the USA and GB and I believe I am right. I'm willing to debate you. But it's your blog and your call.
Laine,
I didn't claim to know for sure your attitude vs. Germany. It has not been expressed overtly as your intense hatred for Russia, which is because it has had no reason to be triggered.
However one day there will come a leader in Germany that starts acting forcefully in the real self-interest of Germany. Which will trigger all the neocons and usual suspects to jump up and down, fulminating about how Nazism is back. It's not until such a situation that my hypothesis about you and Germans is tested, and of course it's quite possible that you deviate from the pattern and stay completely cool when it comes to Germans.
laine: "the onslaught of anti-Americanism that some people mistakenly think constitutes a defense of Russia."
I think your anti-Russianism is not the best way to defend America.
The USA has been criticized, especially in the media, for being the most western, white, confident nation. That is what we used to call anti-Americanism.
For some reason, the Russians, who are white too, were reduced to a lesser status of good savages. But this is no longer true. The anti-western media has turned anti-Russian since Russia no longer is a communist dictatorship.
Now the USA is also criticized by internet dissidents for its suicide by immigration and its betraying of itself and the white world. It is a completely different kind of anti-Americanism! It is more like anti-anti-Americanism.
Defiant Lion --
What I object to most is your tone, which can be proved neither wrong nor right. The tone is something that I, and presumably most of the other Americans who read these threads, find repellent. I don’t have to prove that it exists or that it’s offensive. It exists; that’s obvious. And I am offended by it.
It is a tone of bitter anger, nastiness, and general disrespect towards my country, and I’m tired of it. The fact that you display the same tone towards your own country does nothing to mitigate what you say. Even Conservative Swede doesn’t speak of his own country in the same terms with which you revile yours and mine.
Many of the facts that you cite are true, and some of your opinions I agree with. But I object to your tone.
As for the content of what you say — on some issues I am in disagreement with you, and you are also factually wrong about some.
Factual errors:
I am charging your nation - AND MINE - with genocide and ethnic cleansing…
My country does not engage in genocide, not in the commonly accepted definition of the word. Genocide is defined as “The systematic and planned extermination of an entire national, racial, political, or ethnic group”.
Like “Hitler”, “Nazi”, and “holocaust”, the word “genocide” has been abused into virtual meaninglessness. Its revised definition would be something like “any national policy which might inadvertently result in the deaths of many people”, or, for some politicians in the Democratic Party, “any policy of which we disapprove”.
I agree that my country’s policies are often misguided and wrong, and have caused needless suffering and death, but they are not genocide. To describe them as such trivializes actual genocides.
…along with waging illegal wars.
All wars are illegal outside the borders of the country that wages them. UN approval doesn’t make a war legal, and lack of it doesn’t make it illegal. Legality can only exist within the law-based structures of a nation-state. To talk of illegality outside of that context is meaningless.
Once again, people in the Democratic Party refer to “Bush’s illegal war” because they don’t approve of it, but they were fine with the war over Kosovo in 1999, even though it was equally “illegal”.
The facts Baron are that the leaders of our nations - from Bush snr, to Blair, Clinton and Dubya - hold you, me and our peoples in such contempt they deliberately lied and misled us at every turn.
I can’t speak for Blair — I haven’t followed his career so closely — but Bush did not lie, even when he imparted information that turned out to be untrue. The evidence is overwhelming that he and much of his administration believed the intelligence about Iraq, and that even when they were misled by their subordinates they were either not being deliberately misled, or were misled for ordinary venal reasons. There have already been enough angry kiss-and-tell memoirs coming out of the Bush administration to support this contention. In order to believe otherwise, one has to multiply entities and posit vast secret cabals and conspiracies.
This is where incompetence comes in. Our government is massively, institutionally, structurally, and systemically incompetent.
To this Bush has added his personal flaws, one of the main ones being an inability to acknowledge previous errors.
The spread of Saudi money throughout the system complicates the picture, because that has created a huge amount of corruption which actively impedes the country’s interests. People are betraying their country, but it is for money. I hope that someday they get the just desserts reserved for traitors.
An opinion I disagree with:
And yes, what they have done is evil and just as the nazis were evil so too are other people who knowingly committed genicide against innocents.
What we have done is not just as evil as the Nazis. I don’t buy the reductio ad Hitlerum argument. Distinctions can be made, and intentions do matter.
* * * * * *
You won’t get banned for this. I can’t ban people on Blogger, and I probably wouldn’t anyway. I am simply asking you to desist from your invective.
It’s quite possible to make the points you make, but in a non-offensive manner. I know it can be done, because other commenters do it all the time.
about use of the word 'genocide' :
The USA did not engage in genocide in Iraq or Kosovo, or any other place, but it is slowly genociding itself at home.
The word genocide usually refers to what happened to the Jews in Germany. What is implied by the mass media is that killing millions of people is wrong, destroying an ethnic group or a nation (for example Tibet) is wrong too, but what happened to the Jews is uniquely evil because it associated the two things: killing people and destroying an ethnic group.
In fact, it isn't clear if the definition of genocide necessarily includes physical killing, or if destroying a nation is enough in itself. We hear so often about genocide in the mass media that the word comes naturally to our mind, and it is frutrating to be told that we can not use it ourselves. Saying that mass immigration from non-white countries to the West amounts to genocide is a fast and easy way to make oneself understood, and to convey one's indignation. When we refrain from using the word genocide because we are afraid it is an exaggeration, we trivialize what mass immigration does to us.
As for the term 'genocide', I believe it was invented to describe what happens to the Armenians during the crumbling days of the Ottoman Empire. The term was used before it was realized that the Nazis were doing the same towards the Jews.
I believe in principle it could be done without mmass killing, it is about killing a nation, not a given number of individuals. That is akin to what China is doing in Tibet.
@Baron
"But I object to your tone."
Your blog, I will respect your wish.I am very very angry about what is going on and I shall try to moderate my feeling in my comments.
Your position on genocide is different to mine. I believe the US planned "operation Storm", the Croat offensive to drive the
Serbs from the Krajina, and the driving out of the Serbs from Kosovo is genocide. I don't know if you're aware Baron that
retired US generals along with PR agency Ruuder Finn were involved in these events? The demonisation of the Serbs was a
planned and deliberate lie to appease the muslims.
How many Serbs (and indeed, Kosovo Albanians who refused to tow the KLA line) have to die for the word genocide to apply
to them? Yet the Albanians accused the Serbs - falsely - of genocide and we (the US and UK) accepted it.
We sold out an ally to appease our enemy - we (NATO)- even worked with Al Qaeda and the Saudis to create Kosova. Not only
do I believe that what was done constitutes evil, I believe the consequences will be bad for the west as events are now proving.
"To talk of illegality outside of that context is meaningless."
I disgaree very strongly. If this is true, there is no point to the UN or international law. But this is the issue here:
The US is demnading Russia respect international law by respecting internationally recognised borders. Do you see what I
mean about the consequences of Kosovo?
"...but they were fine with the war over Kosovo in 1999, even though it was equally “illegal”.
Good news Baron - we share common ground! I reckon this is due to the effectiveness of multiculturalism and the media campaign
to demonise the Serbs as evil monsters. A tactic a certain Little Coropral used to great effect. It's easy for a nation to
support war against those who have been dehumanised.
"The evidence is overwhelming that he and much of his administration believed the intelligence about Iraq..."
I will post some resources at the end of this post that contradict this for you to review Baron.
"The spread of Saudi money throughout the system complicates the picture, because that has created a huge amount of
corruption which actively impedes the country’s interests."
Agreed 100%. The Saudis are a major problem for us and yet we court our own destrutcion by pandering to the Saudis. I find it
odd that the hatred shown to the Russians is far moer intense than to the Saudis, a far greater and deadlier threat to us.
Witness 9/11 as an example,an act of war on the US funded and carried out largely by Suadis. A war by proxy I believe conducted
by Saudi Arabia.
"I don’t buy the reductio ad Hitlerum argument. Distinctions can be made, and intentions do matter."
I believe that the evidence shows that the intention of the US and NATO was to smash Serba and the Serbain people, make them
international pariahs, drive them from their homelands to appease the Islamic world at whatever cost to the Serbs it
entailed.
I know I am not the most eloquent writer so I'll let people far more eloquent than I explain why my stance against our
nations is so very strong (and angry!)
1. This is a superb article from Julia Gorin who has been sounding thne alarm about our insane intervention in Kosovo
for years:
Albanian Love Gets More Expensive
2. I've posted this before but it really is the best docu about what went on in Yugoslavia. It's from senior people who were
there, it is their insider account:
Yugoslavia: Avoidable War 1
Yugoslavia:
Avoidable War 2
3. What we weren't told about Srebrenica. The pictures are the horrific evidence our media hid from us:
The Real Srebrenica
4.Remember what the media said about the Serbian death camps?
How ITN Fooled The World
5.Milosevic's sham trial:
Corruption of International Justice
Which begs the question: If all wars are illegal and legality only exists within a nation state then why are people being
tried for war crimes by foreign states? The same foreign states who fabricated evidence against them and who sided against them
in a civil war?
6. Iraq lies and the government and Dubya and Blair knew:
Words of Mass Deception
Lies That Led to War
There's a lot there Baron but I think it is well worth the time to go through them. I believe you will then understand why I am so
very angry at what has been done.
DL, that's a lot of documentation, worthy of an essay by itself. It's a bit excessive to post in a comment thread, I'd say.
As for anger? I think it's useless, except as a drive to set things right. Sorry 'bout it, but I don't buy into this NewAge stuff that anger is good in itself.
Defiant Lion --
I think we can find common ground on a number of things. I agree with most of what you say.
But the important thing, from my point of view, is that what you and I both object to is not a product of a systematic, concerted, well thought-out policy at the top levels of the American government.
We’re not that good! None of the people at the top is smart enough nor cynical enough to plan all this crap. The bad things get done for the usual reasons — misplaced ideology, cynical ambition, stupidity, short-sightedness, acting on bad advice, corrupt personal gain, etc., etc.
But it’s a hodge-podge, not the all-powerful demonic plan that your comments seem to imply.
That’s where I have the advantage — I’m a lot closer to where all these things happen, and I know how stupid and incompetent many of the people involved are. We just aren’t capable of what you imagine.
Maybe the Labour government in London is, but neither party in our country can do it. We don’t have the know-how. Putin has more tactical experise in his little finger than the entire White House, State Department, and National Security Council combined.
Which is, of course, one of the advantages of a truly despotic government.
As for “international law” and the UN — I don’t agree. Abolish the UN and the EU. There’s no such thing as international law; it has never once worked as designed. Nations still act based on their interests.
Law can only function within nation-states or smaller bodies. I don’t see that changing anytime soon.
And if the UN is ever successful, it will spread worldwide lawlessness and corruption, not legality.
International law worked quite well after the peace of Westphalia. But there's one really weird aspect to it: It's voluntary!
Except of course if one uses international agencies such as UN to enforce it. This is where things get ugly.
International law, interpreted by each state independently, is quite usable. It's UN and the coerced 'unison agreements' that is the fascist abuse of the system.
I believe Bush and Blair did commit genocide---against their own people.
"Genocide is defined as “The systematic and planned extermination of an entire national, racial, political, or ethnic group”.
That's us! And don't think it isn't systematic or planned. Here is Bill Clinton in his 1998 speech PRAISING our genocide:
"But now we are being tested again — by a new wave of immigration larger than any in a century, far more diverse than any in our history. Each year, nearly a million people come legally to America. Today, nearly one in ten people in America was born in another country; one in five schoolchildren are from immigrant families.
Today, largely because of immigration, there is no majority race in Hawaii or Houston or New York City. Within five years there will be no majority race in our largest state, California. In a little more than 50 years there will be no majority race in the United States. (Applause.) No other nation in history has gone through demographic change of this magnitude in so short a time."
Baron:
"I think we can find common ground on a number of things. I agree with most of what you say."
Good to know we're largely on the same side!
I would really like to continue this debate with you but things have turned really nasty in the UK so I'm going to be concentrating on that for a while.
Hope what I've posted has been informative and I'll be back posting in a few weeks I'm sure.
Thanks for debating me Baron and keep up the good work - I'll still be popping over here to keep up with what's going on.
@Diamed
Your comment has particular relevance this week. Marxism threatens us (the EU and the UK, I'm not sure about the US at this time) just as much as Islam.
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