Politics thread (USA Elections 2016) - Page 167

On October 08 2019 07:50 Spitfiree wrote: I thought (and still do) that if not for any other reasons, at least for geopolitical the Kurds are a strong ally to have there, gives the USA another way to control the region. Hopefully, this piece of shit Erdogan will get overthrown soon, he s already losing his positions in Turkey, but I wouldn't be surprised if he enforces martial law at some point.

Obviously, thats why the US has backed them, they serve as a militaristic pawn in the region that serves the US geopolitical interests, so I welcome the withdrawal from Syria and all the other countries.

^

wow. how do you even begin having a discussion with someone who has given up all pretense of being in touch with the real world.

"I am a right-wing libertarian and I pretend to be non-interventionist, except when it comes to economic sanctions combined with funding violent opposition groups in other countries to install puppet governments that serve US interests, that's perfectly fine. But my noble principles tell me that everyone should physically stay home, always. Don't talk to me about the complexities of the real world please, I ain't listening. My simplistic theories of how the world works are never wrong and if world leaders followed them everyone would be better off. Ethnic cleansing? That's fine. Allowing Turkey and their ISIS collaborators to work together to free thousands of ISIS members and undo all of the successes and sacrifices of the past 10 years in eradicating the most violent terrorist organization on the face of the earth? Also fine. It's not like ISIS threatens the entire fucking world or anything. Non-intervention is a simple rule and it simply works folks! Making exceptions to rules? To hell with that, not simple enough. Gotta keep it simple."

What is happening is not "non-intervention". It appears to be non-intervention for a simpleton with a truncated frame of reference. Non-intervention means that you don't intervene, period. At any point. It doesn't mean that you intervene, for years, by creating chaotic circumstances, and just when you can actually do some good to try to make up for it, you get people to trust you and get them to destroy their fortifications because you have a weapons deal with another country and you allow them to invade your long-standing allies. That is intervention.

On October 08 2019 07:50 Spitfiree wrote: I thought (and still do) that if not for any other reasons, at least for geopolitical the Kurds are a strong ally to have there, gives the USA another way to control the region.

They didn't have any "control". It's not the right word to be using. They didn't get to choose how things are done there, they are autonomous regions. What they had is the assurance of relative stability for as long as they prevented Turkey from invading and as long as the international community provided enough resources to keep ISIS members captive. Now everything positive that they actually did for the region is going to be cancelled and possibly lead to a massive genocide with ISIS being able to re-consolidate power.

I dont support any funding to groups and puppet governments, I believe trading with an "evil" entity to be immoral, I don't believe in a government controlled trade, so I don't want the state dishing out sanctions but companies choosing not to trade with them, for example Blizzard fired and banned people caving in to the Chinese comunist party interests in regards of Hong Kong, this has been the #1 trending topic in Twitter, I would like a world where this outrage is materialized in economic loss for the company, as I've said it before that is our power not through ballots.

I dont want the Kurds destroyed obviously, but this is a perfect example of why interventionism is terrible, it creates unwinable conundrums and you are "stuck" there, it happened in Iraq, in Afghanistan, Syria and Yemen, the US should have never wen't into those places and as much mayhem it causes they need to leave and stop paying world police.

Also I never said there are no exceptions to non-intervention, an invasion to military ally, a global threat with nuclear or biological weapons or a WW2 scenario, but they have to be truly exeptions, century-old squabbles between theocracies in the middle east to control the prices of fossil fuels is not an exeption to me.

It's amazing how all the leftist are neo cons now. I thought US imperialism and foreign wars were bad.

I think the administration saw the small contigent there as sitting ducks, and wanted to avoid US soldiers getting killed there which would mean having to retialate and escalate.
I'm hoping Trumps economic sanction threats are stronger at restraining Erdogan than a 100 guys standing in the middle of nowhere.

PD: I don't think the US should leave Syria, I'm just pointing the hypocrisy.

On October 09 2019 22:56 Baalim wrote: I dont support any funding to groups and puppet governments, I believe trading with an "evil" entity to be immoral, I don't believe in a government controlled trade, so I don't want the state dishing out sanctions but companies choosing not to trade with them, for example Blizzard fired and banned people caving in to the Chinese comunist party interests in regards of Hong Kong, this has been the #1 trending topic in Twitter, I would like a world where this outrage is materialized in economic loss for the company, as I've said it before that is our power not through ballots. I dont want the Kurds destroyed obviously, but this is a perfect example of why interventionism is terrible, it creates unwinable conundrums and you are "stuck" there, it happened in Iraq, in Afghanistan, Syria and Yemen, the US should have never wen't into those places and as much mayhem it causes they need to leave and stop paying world police. Also I never said there are no exceptions to non-intervention, an invasion to military ally, a global threat with nuclear or biological weapons or a WW2 scenario, but they have to be truly exeptions, century-old squabbles between theocracies in the middle east to control the prices of fossil fuels is not an exeption to me.

I edited my post, go read the second paragraph I added there, it addresses your second paragraph. Your logic doesn't follow at all. I don't even think that you are thinking about it. This is groupthink.

They were not playing "world police". They were not controlling anything or imposing their will, which is what policing means. It was basic peacekeeping which was not only useful to US interests, but morally owed to the 11,000+ dead (not just Kurds, not even predominately Kurds) and the 25,000+ injured who fought to make the world safer and defeated the Islamic State. This is as straight-forward an exception as there can ever be. Rojava isn't a theocracy, it is the complete opposite of one. Again, you are not thinking. You are being indolent.

And yes you did support installing a puppet government when you were outraged that some countries didn't support the implantation of one of them in Venezuela and you supported the economic warfare of the US which it was proven to you is not about this reductionist view of "not trading". There is no such thing as "evil entitites", do you believe in witches and ghosts also? All States are inherently violent and immoral, how you choose to discriminate between which ones are "evil entities" and those who are not is not inscribed in the fabric of the universe, and under all of them there is a population of people who can suffer, it isn't a computer simulation.

On October 09 2019 22:57 GoTuNk wrote: It's amazing how all the leftist are neo cons now. I thought US imperialism and foreign wars were bad. I think the administration saw the small contigent there as sitting ducks, and wanted to avoid US soldiers getting killed there which would mean having to retialate and escalate. I'm hoping Trumps economic sanction threats are stronger at restraining Erdogan than a 100 guys standing in the middle of nowhere. PD: I don't think the US should leave Syria, I'm just pointing the hypocrisy.

If you're going to "point out the hypocrisy", then do it for real. Don't just vaguely imply that there was US imperialism in Northern Syria. Show us the evidence. This was an alliance that benefited everyone except fascists and religious extremists, it wasn't imperialism. The imperialistic part is betraying your allies for financial gain after they trusted you and agreed to your security mechanism deal and proceeded to remove their defenses and destroy their fortifications along the border line. Anyone who makes the case that the US should not be involved there anymore has to provide some explanations as to why getting them to weaken themselves before a long-planned invasion is part of a non-interventionist agenda. Are you going to be one to offer those explanations?

On October 09 2019 23:30 Loco wrote: Show nested quote + On October 09 2019 22:57 GoTuNk wrote: It's amazing how all the leftist are neo cons now. I thought US imperialism and foreign wars were bad. I think the administration saw the small contigent there as sitting ducks, and wanted to avoid US soldiers getting killed there which would mean having to retialate and escalate. I'm hoping Trumps economic sanction threats are stronger at restraining Erdogan than a 100 guys standing in the middle of nowhere. PD: I don't think the US should leave Syria, I'm just pointing the hypocrisy. If you're going to "point out the hypocrisy", then do it for real. Don't just vaguely imply that there was US imperialism in Northern Syria. Show us the evidence. This was an alliance that benefited everyone except fascists and religious extremists, it wasn't imperialism. The imperialistic part is betraying your allies for financial gain after they trusted you and agreed to your security mechanism deal and proceeded to remove their defenses and destroy their fortifications along the border line. Anyone who makes the case that the US should not be involved there anymore has to provide some explanations as to why getting them to weaken themselves before a long-planned invasion is part of a non-interventionist agenda. Are you going to be one to offer those explanations?

So US troops stationed on certain places outside of the US are acceptable when it's with the goal of "peacekeeping"? Like in Syria. Or South Korea?
I'm pointing out I've never seen a leftist say anything good about US military participation abroad but THIS is the time it is ok and they are actually peace keeping.
Other question: How did you feel about Obama leaving Irak?

I'm not making the argument, I don't think the US should leave Syria. If anything they should send more troops and force parties to split the country. I'm a neo con, I think the US has to police the world because the alternatives are worse.

On October 09 2019 23:13 Loco wrote: What is happening is not "non-intervention". It appears to be non-intervention for a simpleton with a truncated frame of reference. Non-intervention means that you don't intervene, period. At any point. It doesn't mean that you intervene, for years, by creating chaotic circumstances, and just when you can actually do some good to try to make up for it, you get people to trust you and get them to destroy their fortifications because you have a weapons deal with another country and you allow them to invade your long-standing allies. That is intervention.

Part of the process of non-intervention is withdrawing troops, you can't leave troops all around the world and be non-interventionist, so withdraw and don't intervene again.

They were not playing "world police". They were not controlling anything or imposing their will, which is what policing means. It was basic peacekeeping which was not only useful to US interests, but morally owed to the 11,000+ dead (not just Kurds, not even predominately Kurds) and the 25,000+ injured who fought to make the world safer and defeated the Islamic State. This is as straight-forward an exception as there can ever be. Rojava isn't a theocracy, it is the complete opposite of one. Again, you are not thinking. You are being indolent.

ISIS is the result in great part of previous interventions, american troops in the middle east doesn't make the world safer, quite the contrary they have made it a more dangerous place.

I didn't mean Rojava specifically I mean that the US shouldnt get in the middle of hate filled conflicts older than the US itself, it only adds to the strife.

And yes you did support installing a puppet government when you were outraged that some countries didn't support the implantation of one of them in Venezuela and you supported the economic warfare of the US which it was proven to you is not about this reductionist view of "not trading". There is no such thing as "evil entitites", do you believe in witches and ghosts also? All States are inherently violent and immoral, how you choose to discriminate between which ones are "evil entities" and those who are not is not inscribed in the fabric of the universe, and under all of them there is a population of people who can suffer, it isn't a computer simulation.

I condemn governments that support terrible opressive dictators.

I specifically used quotation marks in "evil" for a reason -_-. because of the subjectivity, I think if you consider an entity as evil you should stop tarding with it, I consider ISIS evil, so I wouldn't buy or sell them anything that would aid them, would you?

If you consider ISIS evil then you should not be supporting the decision to not only allow but have facilitated the fascistic Turkish state to come and help free them so they can resume their terror activities en masse. It makes sense to support the withdrawal of troops in this particular region only if the gains that have been made against ISIS can be secured without those US meat shields in the way.

You think the people there want the US to be there? They obviously don't. If the SDF had been allowed to have anti-tank and anti-air weapons and there was an international no-fly zone, no one would want them to stay there, since they could hold their own. But it is precisely because of imperialistic forces that they were not provided those--that there was a de facto embargo against them. It's because the real threat--the ideological threat-- to imperialists are the ecofeminists in Rojava, they are not the Jihadists (who are openly working with the Turkish state). NATO prefers funding and maintaining an extremely expensive high-tech army that employs ex-ISIS and ex- al-Qaida Jihadists than preventing the genocide of those who cannot physically threaten them, and who have actually built a society around the values that they pretend to care about. This is the world we live in.

If you're like wondering why the EU supports this fascist doing this, it's essentially because he has a "deal" with Europe where he will resettle the Syrian refugees (mostly families from hardcore Jihadists) in those invaded territories as he ethnically cleanses the region so that Europe won't have to deal with receiving them. This is what he has already done with Operation Olive Branch in Afrin. That region used to consist of a 95%+ indigenous Kurdish majority and now most of them have been driven out or killed.

On October 09 2019 22:57 GoTuNk wrote: It's amazing how all the leftist are neo cons now. I thought US imperialism and foreign wars were bad. I think the administration saw the small contigent there as sitting ducks, and wanted to avoid US soldiers getting killed there which would mean having to retialate and escalate. I'm hoping Trumps economic sanction threats are stronger at restraining Erdogan than a 100 guys standing in the middle of nowhere. PD: I don't think the US should leave Syria, I'm just pointing the hypocrisy.

Oh yes, cause flexibility makes you hypocritical. It's one thing to have beliefs and support them, quite another to be completely delusional and not adapt to the real world.

Funnily enough, I had a friend of mine pointing the same thing about the contingent, yet I don't understand the argument at all.

Turkey is indeed pressured by the Kurds and they're a threat to their actual physical borders, that why they'll bomb them. That being said USA Has been funding the Kurds for a super long time and just decide to 'leave' them once their use of them is gone, thus enabling Erdogan to genocide them. Does Trump have the right to do so? Sure. Is it the right thing do to? Obvioulsy far from it.

How is the US army as sitting ducks there exactly? Who will do shit to do, demolished Syrian government? Turkey? Or the detroyed ISIS?
Erdogan is in the worst position even since he's been in power in the country. His currency got destroyed, he lost regional elections in the most important part of the country .... twice and pressure is building up. On top of that massacring kurds will enable ISIS to somewhat rebuild, as I'm pretty sure that Turkey will also push out immigration camps, which would be a perfect recruiting place for ISIS after

And yeah, @Loco, agree control is not nearly a suitable word there, more like 'influence' i guess

On October 10 2019 05:44 Loco wrote: It's because the real threat--the ideological threat-- to imperialists are the ecofeminists in Rojava

On October 10 2019 07:26 Spitfiree wrote: Turkey is indeed pressured by the Kurds and they're a threat to their actual physical borders, that why they'll bomb them. That being said USA Has been funding the Kurds for a super long time and just decide to 'leave' them once their use of them is gone, thus enabling Erdogan to genocide them. Does Trump have the right to do so? Sure. Is it the right thing do to? Obvioulsy far from it.

They didn't just leave them. They first made promises that they would keep the peace with Turkey if they accepted to remove their defences and fortifications along the border. Then right after they did that they didn't follow up on their commitment and betrayed them at their weakest. I say "they" but I mean, it was Trump.

The YPG/YPJ/SDF were not a physical threat to Erdogan. That is the justification that he uses as propaganda to justify his unjustifiable war, using language like "establishing a safe zone" to replace their "terror corridor". The fact is, they have never once launched an attack of incursion into Turkey in their entire history. What threatens Erdogan is the Kurds who are already living in Turkey and who would (ideally) become part of a democratic confederation of Kurdish communities with others in Rojava, Iraq, Iran and Syria. Their ideals of a free, pluralistic, egalitarian, rational and ecological society are too incompatible with his own fascistic ideals.

about one of the only voices of support

cmon Baal
100 US soldiers is damn significant - attacking with them there without their cooperation would be a huge PR etc. blow to erdogan

Nato should come together really to put pressure on him

On October 10 2019 08:26 Loco wrote: The YPG/YPJ/SDF were not a physical threat to Erdogan.

Unfortunately, you're looking this through a rational point of view where everyone "behaves" well, while Erdogan just sees a group of people that are slowly grouping upon his southern border with history of the same people living in South Turkey for many years. Politicians, but mostly military personnel are trained to see and prevent potential threat even if there's slight chances of said events ever happening.

I wish I could blame Trump, but honestly, this is just American politics repeating itself throughout history, nothing new. They've done this shit countless times in South America, Africa and the Middle East. They didn't do that in Europe cause the last time they had the chance was during WW2 prior to them joining, and it would've been a -EV move to do so back then. (don't get me wrong they've been supporting/funding Eastern European countries for quite a while but not nearly the same situation as the previous examples)

On a complete different note:
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/10/trump...e=sharebar%7Ctwitter&par=sharebar

every time i think that this shit cant get better it does...

On October 10 2019 21:01 LemOn[5thF] wrote: cmon Baal 100 US soldiers is damn significant - attacking with them there without their cooperation would be a huge PR etc. blow to erdogan Nato should come together really to put pressure on him

Of course I get it, they are meat shields Turkey obv can't kill american troops.

What Loco and you are not getting is that the fact that I support the retreat of troops doesn't mean that I approve the tactics of this specific one.

For example, I am for the legalization of all drugs, if tomorrow Heroine in particular were legalized across the US I would be like... "well, its a shitty drug to start with but ok, lets keep going".

btw, what is the upside for the US about this?, Europe doesn't intervene to stop the migrant bomb Turkey is holding but whats in it for the US? please no "to erradicate the threat of ecofeminists" answers lol

Trump gets to keep his name on "his" (he doesn't own them) two towers in Istanbul. Worth it.

On October 11 2019 00:17 Baalim wrote: btw, what is the upside for the US about this?, Europe doesn't intervene to stop the migrant bomb Turkey is holding but whats in it for the US? please no "to erradicate the threat of ecofeminists" answers lol

I mean if you are a completely amoral cynic who sees the world as a struggle between nations where relative gains matter more than absolute gains (rather than favoring cooperation to get gains across the board), then an american position of destabilizing the middle east because it predictably leads to an influx of immigrants into Europe which leads to the further political fragmentation of the EU can make some 'sense'. If you also see how Putin and Erdogan both favor this (they have much more adversarial relationships with the EU than what has normally been the case for the US), and how Trump essentially, outspokenly, favors the highest bidder, it's not hard to see how it happens. He's also an anti-institutionalist who wants to negotiate from a position of power - if the EU is united, the US doesn't have that, if negotiating with individual european countries, it does.

On a short timeline, I can see the realpolitik justification for this. Doesn't make it any less abhorrent though.