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[palsch]

The White House confirms Syria has crossed the 'red line' of using chemical weapons.

This may help force some sort of intervention, but far from clear yet. There is no way they are getting a Libya style UN resolution with Russia openly supporting Assad. Trying to legally justify unilateral intervention in a mess civil war is hard.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Unless somebody starts a Marshal Plan: Syrian Edition, the country will be an economic ruin no matter who wins. Truefact: High explosives being detonated in urban centers is a very inefficient way to create jobs.

[misko27]

Unless somebody starts a Marshal Plan: Syrian Edition, the country will be an economic ruin no matter who wins. Truefact: High explosives being detonated in urban centers is a very inefficient way to create jobs.

Lies. This is the most effective method ever. Ask Pre-Tsarist Russian Anarchists. So many jobs for the Okhrana were had.


Anyway, here's what I expect. Or hell, hope.

[Bauglir]

High explosives being detonated in urban centers is a very inefficient way to create jobs.

Wait, what? Shit.
In case of watch lists, this post is intended to be humorous in nature and does not in any way reflect actual deeds or intentions of myself or anybody I know.

[10ebbor10]

On a side note, I found my quote

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half the time.

[Sheb]

The stuff is, the administration is only sending small arms and ammo apparently. They need anti-air weapons and ATGs. You don't bring a bomber down with an assault rifle...

[RedKing]

Problem being, you don't want to rush to give heavy armament to people who may potentially hate you almost as much as the people they're fighting against. (cf. Afghan mujhadeen).

"Hey, let's give Stinger missiles to Sunni militants with connections to al-Qaeda. There is absolutely NO way this could go badly."

Not to mention Israel is liable to lose its shit at the thought of the US funnelling heavy weapons into an unfriendly next door neighbor that they semi-regularly bomb. It's not as if the Syrian rebels are going to be pro-Israeli when this is all over.

[Owlbread]

I think NATO and the wider EU might just have to take a bite of this awful shit sandwich and intervene with a no-fly-zone over Syria. This won't be like Libya; there will be casualties, we will lose planes and pilots, there will be hostility with Russia and Iran (we will probably kill Iranian soldiers that are on the ground in Syria right now); we just can't allow this to spread into Lebanon or Israel or Iraq or the wider area. This war shows no sign of easing up and Assad has already damned himself to an untenable position as leader of Syria.

Of all the times we should have been intervening in the Middle East, I think now may be the time we're needed most.

[misko27]

Well, Israel has yet to do anything to the rebels, so far all of their attacks have been directed at Hezbollah. AND, they were one of the countries making the argument that Syria used chemical weapons.


Frankly, I'd think Israel prefers a country that hates it but is bound by not wanting to risk self-destruction,(even Hezbollah doesn't like getting destroyed.) to a country full of random angry people with guns, tanks, planes, Chemical weapons, more guns, and more militants then you can shake a stick at. Nations have to deal with the fact that you can bomb them, and kill their citizens, and destroy their industry, etc. while amorphous terrorist groups don't have that problem


In addition, there is a non Al Nusra front related organization, which is where the US is funneling it's weapons.

[Owlbread]

Winds of change sweep over Iran:

Hassan Rouhani, a fairly moderate, reformist-backed Presidential candidate is leading in early popular vote counts to succeed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the Presidency of Iran.

[10ebbor10]

Told ya. Leave the extremists* alone, and they'll come to their senses eventually. The fact that we're slowly murdering their economy with sanctions also has something to do with it, I suppose.

Though well, the religious leadership is attempting to maintain control. Intimidation, shutting down media, blocking out most other reformist candidates,... Probably also committed fraud in the last elections (Protestors that got arrested then are still under house arrests, so no protests are expected). We'll see what happens. Besides, it's only a moderate reformist candidate, so don't expect to much too happen.


*Not that they were that extreme to begin with, but..

[Owlbread]

I sincerely recommend that the title of this thread be changed to "Middle Eastern Politics Megathread". Perhaps we should even have a "Politics" subforum.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Told ya. Leave the extremists* alone, and they'll come to their senses eventually. The fact that we're slowly murdering their economy with sanctions also has something to do with it, I suppose.

Though well, the religious leadership is attempting to maintain control. Intimidation, shutting down media, blocking out most other reformist candidates,... Probably also committed fraud in the last elections (Protestors that got arrested then are still under house arrests, so no protests are expected). We'll see what happens. Besides, it's only a moderate reformist candidate, so don't expect to much too happen.


*Not that they were that extreme to begin with, but..

Tell that to all the people they had slaughtered for harmless or completely fictional slights against their god.

Anyway, the Iranian elections are an illusory sham to keep the public happy. The Guardian Council approves all candidates and can veto any bills they pass anyway, so even if by some miracle a true reformer won the presidency and the Islamic Consultative Assembly had a majority of reformers, it wouldn't mean anything. Iran is not a democracy. It is a theocracy with democratic trappings.

[Owlbread]

Tell that to all the people they had slaughtered for harmless or completely fictional slights against their god.

Anyway, the Iranian elections are an illusory sham to keep the public happy. The Guardian Council approves all candidates and can veto any bills they pass anyway, so even if by some miracle a true reformer won the presidency and the Islamic Consultative Assembly had a majority of reformers, it wouldn't mean anything. Iran is not a democracy. It is a theocracy with democratic trappings.

Somehow I am reminded of your proposals for "managed democracy" on the last few pages.

[10ebbor10]

Tell that to all the people they had slaughtered for harmless or completely fictional slights against their god.

Anyway, the Iranian elections are an illusory sham to keep the public happy. The Guardian Council approves all candidates and can veto any bills they pass anyway, so even if by some miracle a true reformer won the presidency and the Islamic Consultative Assembly had a majority of reformers, it wouldn't mean anything. Iran is not a democracy. It is a theocracy with democratic trappings.

Little more than 1000 since the Iranian Revolution, if my sources are correct(Primarly the wiki). While this doesn't justify anything, it's not as bad as Afghanistan, or many other countries. Certainly doesn't compare to the 1.2 million deaths of the First Gulf war, which was at least partly financed by the US and US allies(And much of the West of course. Made a killing selling weapons to both sides.).

And well, the council has to compromise. Sanctions are killing the Iranian economy, and while the protests have been suppressed, they haven't died down completely. Most likely the "reformist" candidate will win, and we'll end up seeing some token compromises. Don't expect sweeping changes, however.

The US just never got over the fact that their embassy was taken hostage, hence why Iran is always the absolute evil nation of evil doomness.