ISIS destroyed Jonah's tomb and other historical sites

[Channel72]

So again, why strategic relationships are established with Pakistan (a nation known to sponsor the most radical islamist organizations and one of the direct architects of Afghanistan's fall to islamism, also well-known for the massive 2+ million genocide in Bangladesh), Saudi Arabia (nation with death penalty for Sharia 'crimes' like sex with the wrong person, nation known to sponsor the most radical islamist organizations and one of the funders of ISIS, Taliban and Chechen extremists)?

Again, these policies are all based on immediate goals, and the fact that sponsoring these radical regimes has cost America so dearly in terms of counter-terrorism measures merely highlights the bumbling incompetence of American foreign policy.

Our relationship with Pakistan is likely to keep tabs on their nuclear weapons, and because their government is superficially friendly to us. We don't care about the radical Islamic organizations they sponsor for the same reason I put off doing the dishes this morning... laziness/incompetence/worrying about other things.

Our relationship with Saudi Arabia is fucking obvious Stas. It's because of energy policy. As for human rights abuse/Sharia law etc of the Saudis... again, don't care, deal with it later, too busy worrying about getting re-elected.

The fact that our funding of these radical governments has resulted in such serious blowback (like... 9/11, which sent our stock market crashing and cost us trillions) just shows how bumbling we are.

[K. A. Pital]

Okay. You are saying that say, Zbigniew, whose writing makes it very clear that they wanted (a) a disunited Middle East (b) a Middle East where influence of foreign powers, like Russia/China, is limited (c) a Middle East/CA with a more pronounced islamic identity, had no clue about what the CIA actually thought. Or that his strategy thinking was not influential (in fact it was, he pretty much takes credit for Afghanistan, and he does it rightfully).

You are also saying that the CIA cannot actually comprehend the consequences of their own strategy recommendations. And as opposed to being slightly wrong - by which I mean that the result produces too radical islamic regimes that conduct terrorist attacks or causes client states to experience great turmoil - they are in fact completely wrong, and their thinking is aimed towards making the world a better place!

My version is very realistic: they did want an overall slide to islamism because it makes the huge region hard to dominate for competing powers, but some results (Taliban, for instance) were unexpected. That much is clear from the fact they would prefer a less radical brand of islamists from the Afghan warlords. But islamists with Sharia law still. So they are incompetent, but not 180 degrees incompetent!

Failing when trying to broadly achieve some goals is also more realistic than succeeding at the exact opposite of what you wanted.

[cosmicalstorm]

Very interesting ideas Stas!

Here's a helpful chart:
Middle east friendship chart

[Block]

That chart isn't close to correct.

[K. A. Pital]

That chart signifies a lot of what's wrong with the public perception of ME conflicts.

[Channel72]

Okay. You are saying that say, Zbigniew, whose writing makes it very clear that they wanted (a) a disunited Middle East (b) a Middle East where influence of foreign powers, like Russia/China, is limited (c) a Middle East/CA with a more pronounced islamic identity, had no clue about what the CIA actually thought. Or that his strategy thinking was not influential (in fact it was, he pretty much takes credit for Afghanistan, and he does it rightfully).

Nobody even knows who Zbigniew is anymore, Stas. I'm sure whatever influence he had pretty much dissipated under Reagan. Do you think Zbigniew has even met Obama, let alone contributed to his policies? I think he appears on PBS every now and then... that's about the extent of his influence.

You are also saying that the CIA cannot actually comprehend the consequences of their own strategy recommendations. And as opposed to being slightly wrong - by which I mean that the result produces too radical islamic regimes that conduct terrorist attacks or causes client states to experience great turmoil - they are in fact completely wrong, and their thinking is aimed towards making the world a better place!

Uh... yeah; the CIA is known to make a lot of mistakes. They're not completely wrong - they've always anticipated some blowback for their policies - but the problem is (1) they're often wrong, and (2) even when they're right, sometimes the presiding Administration just doesn't listen to them. (They tried to warn about 9/11, but nobody cared.) Similar thing with ISIS today - Obama was warned, but nobody cared - and Obama's political goals (distancing himself from Iraq) are more important to him. Anyway, the CIA's ability to conduct long-term political engineering is severely hampered by the shifting political winds of whatever administration they answer to.

My version is very realistic: they did want an overall slide to islamism because it makes the huge region hard to dominate for competing powers, but some results (Taliban, for instance) were unexpected. That much is clear from the fact they would prefer a less radical brand of islamists from the Afghan warlords. But islamists with Sharia law still. So they are incompetent, but not 180 degrees incompetent!

Your version is insane. You think that Cold War-era policies put in place during the Carter administration are still somehow effective today. Obama's administration is mostly former-Clinton people, it doesn't even include Bush people, let alone Carter people.

Failing when trying to broadly achieve some goals is also more realistic than succeeding at the exact opposite of what you wanted.

America has totally failed to stabilize Iraq, even after spending trillions of dollars. Yes, we really are that fucking bad at doing this. If our goal was to simply fuck-up the Mid East, we could have done that a hell of a lot cheaper.

Your examples (Pakistan/Saudi Arabia) of American consistency are few and far between, and reflect really pressing matters like energy policy/nuclear proliferation.

[Channel72]

Also, we funded radicals in Afghanistan because we thought it would keep the Soviets in check. I guess it seemed like a good idea at the time. We had no fucking clue it would lead to a worldwide terror network that would radicalize many elements in the Mid East, costing us trillions.

[Broomstick]

Not to mention that at the time the US was funding radicals in Afghanistan to screw with the Soviets there was no way to foresee that down the line one of those groups would level several acres in Manhattan and knock a hole in the Pentagon.

There is NO overall, decades-long master plan on the part of the US to mastermind anything.

[K. A. Pital]

Um... Did I ever say you actually predicted 9/11? I thought I said the exact opposite: it was an unexpected consequence. But an unexpected consequence of a policy that I cannot find serving a good goal no matter how hard I try.

America has totally failed to stabilize Iraq, even after spending trillions of dollars

Sometimes you fail to stabilized puppet regimes. But, point about the ability to screw the Middle East a lot cheaper than this is taken. I think that it is a valid counterpoint.

Nobody even knows who Zbigniew is anymore, Stas.

And the CIA and national security think-tanks aren't very much like a gerontocracy full of old people chewing the very same ideas over and over?

All in all, frankly, I started this discussion because people started arguing for Western (meaning: US) intervention. Which, to this day, has not produced good results.

[Broomstick]

I'm trying to think of the last time "US military intervention" resulted in a positive outcome and can't think of anything more recent than WWII.

[Channel72]

It's been argued that US intervention in Columbia was pretty successful, but I don't know enough about this to really gauge if it was worth whatever negative consequences are also associated with the incident:

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/P ... asp?page=1

[K. A. Pital]

I was specifically referring to interventions in the Middle East.

[Simon_Jester]

To summarize my reply to Stas:

I honestly think the US is not acting as it does in an attempt to keep the Middle East disunited. I think that US actions in each case are decided by idiosyncratic factors relevant only to that case, with very little overall coherence or unified policy.

Simon, I do see your point, but I cannot help but see at least some sort of consistency in the policy (and yes: the pre-Bush and post-Bush regimes are more aimed towards doing the same thing cheaply, Bush was the only one who directly assaulted the Middle East and Central Asia with military force).

Carter sent commandos to Tehran to rescue hostages. Reagan sent the Marines into Lebanon, the carrier battlegroups to Libya, and American ships to patrol the Persian Gulf. Bush the Elder sent the entire US military against Iraq in the first Gulf War. Clinton bombed Iraq and launched missiles into Sudan and Afghanistan. Obama launched airstrikes against Libya and has a persistent drone-war going on in Yemen, Pakistan, and probably some other places I don't remember at the moment.

Bush the Younger is only unique in that he sent large invasion forces to occupy Middle Eastern nations. And that he was the first US leader to use military force to attempt regime change, rather than using airstrikes to 'punish' nations who had specifically acted against the US, or to use troops to respond to specific outbreaks of violent 'anarchy' where fighting between two or more sides had broken out.

But prior to Bush the Younger, there was no policy of supporting religious fundamentalists and beggaring the Middle East. There was a policy of supporting whoever did more or less what the US wanted, regardless of what kind of government they had. And many of the US client states in the region were among the richest in terms of per capita GDP and command of high oil prices.

And during Bush the Younger, there was no policy of supporting religious fundamentalists, there was a policy of fighting them because Bush the Younger thought they were anti-American terrorists. Granted that fighting them only makes them stronger in some ways, but by that logic the Soviets can be blamed for the Taliban, which is idiotic. And many of the US client states in the region were still among the richest in terms of per capita GDP and command of high oil prices.

And after Bush the Younger, there was no coherent policy of supporting religious fundamentalists, only a de facto one created by Obama basically deciding to not even have a real Middle East policy and just hoping all problems with the region would somehow go away on their own.

Gaddafi was not bombed because that would make Libyan fundamentalists happy, he was bombed because frankly the US hates Gaddafi even if they didn't act on that hatred for nearly thirty years. The Syrian rebels were likewise supported (a little) because the US hates Assad. There are novels from right-wing hacks in America which quite explicitly fantasize about wrapping Assad into the whole "Axis of Evil" crap... And you'll note that the whole idea of an "Axis of Evil" totally overlooked the brute fact that there was no ideological commonality among the three states- an Arab-nationalist dictatorship, a Shia fundamentalist theocracy, and a pseudo-Stalinist autarky ruled by a dynasty of deified monarchs were all treated as somehow 'together.'

And many of the US client states in the region are STILL among the richest in terms of per capita GDP and command of high oil prices.

Thanas, Channel and others seem to think that the change of presidents somehow means the US and other nations change foreign policy radically every four years. In fact, the changes are often marginal and the impact of long-standing doctrines is very long-lasting.

I look forward to seeing your examples.

I have a theory as to why this is so: one, the Senate is a gerontocracy full of incumbents that act like a Politbureau echo chamber.

If by 'echo chamber' you mean a bunch of useless noise, that's fairly accurate of the modern era. Otherwise... debateable. It's true that they're basically gerontocratic, and that this probably does explain why American foreign policy has remained firmly anti-Russian, just to give one example. On the other hand, the Senate's actual power over foreign policy has been rotting away steadily since the Second World War. It has basically reached zero in the modern era because as a de facto reality, they're too deadlocked to actually change anything significant.

The US pursues a 'consistent' policy on some issues not because of an ongoing plan by a cabal of cynics, but because there is no person or group within the system capable of saying "okay, this is our strategy, all relevant elements of our behavior will be modified to fit the strategy." The closest we've had to that in the past 20-30 years was Bush the Younger and his neoconservatives, who at least had an ideology that was telling them what to do.

Two, the National Security establlishment (CIA) is an even more of a closed gerontocracy ruled by the very same people with the very same attitudes.

Except that the president actually does get to tell them what to do. The same people* keep cycling back into office because they're part of the intelligentsia of the two American political parties; this is especially true on the Republican side of the aisle.

*(most of them NOT part of the CIA, don't forget the NSA, the National Security Advisor, and the Department of Defense...)

Examples: Jackson-Vanik amendment remaining in force even for successor states of the USSR for a very long time (despite being removed for the PRC as this interferes with WTO rules). The sponsoring of islamists, often of the most dangerous kind, way after the USSR collapsed (so this isn't just a fluke or inconsistent policy, in my view).

The sponsoring of Islamists has been sporadic and accompanied by active fighting of Islamists in other places.

The attitude of America toward Islamists is, at the most favorable, like that of a European colonial power towards an African tribe in the 1800s: to ally with them when it is convenient, and shoot at them when they do anything disliked. And by default the US's attitude is somewhere between 'neutral' and 'dislike.'

Jackson-Vanik is a good example of gerontocratic inertia in action, I agree... but you will note that in many of the countries that it affects, the nation was repeatedly granted 'waivers.' This is a good example of a basic problem with American governance: we've gotten used to using various workarounds and legal fig-leaves to avoid actually changing fundamental laws that would otherwise present a problem. This is why the US has a debt ceiling: because we're not willing to admit that the ceiling was a bad idea all along OR to actually balance the budget, so the ceiling remains in force and has to be raised by another congressional vote every six to twelve months.

For that matter, the US congress has not passed a budget since, what, 2009? Does this really sound to you like an organization capable of pursuing a relevant, intelligently organized foreign policy strategy?

Now, viewing the security establishments and spy organizations as dangerous, self-serving tools that are controlled and steered either by the same people for decades, or by people brought up in the same vein using the very same theories, and considering the fact that these organizations direct the state policy in matters of 'national security' (though it would be much better to honestly call these things a Ministry of War), one can imagine a consistent, even if slightly misguided, policy to ensure non-dominance of the Middle East on the basis of fracturing it through 'islamic identity' (as opposed to national or even pan-Arab identity).

Except that, I would argue, these organizations are NOT controlled and steered by the same people for decades, they are controlled and steered by two or three different cliques with different ideas about which way to steer (and why, and even how the steering wheel works). All of which are fighting over the steering wheel.

The most likely outcome of this is that the organization thus 'steered' either goes nowhere and continues in a straight line (because the fighting is so fierce no one can even reach the wheel)... Or that the vehicle will veer wildly from crisis to crisis, sometimes heading straight for a dangerous cliff or other obstacle because no one actually has enough control to divert it.

Which ALSO describes the real situation pretty well, if you ask me.

---

So again, why strategic relationships are established with Pakistan (a nation known to sponsor the most radical islamist organizations and one of the direct architects of Afghanistan's fall to islamism, also well-known for the massive 2+ million genocide in Bangladesh), Saudi Arabia (nation with death penalty for Sharia 'crimes' like sex with the wrong person, nation known to sponsor the most radical islamist organizations and one of the funders of ISIS, Taliban and Chechen extremists)?

These are not some short-term relationships. They continue for a long time. Explain that to me.

The US has a strategic relationship with Saudi Arabia because:

1) They have lots and lots of oil. Note that this client relationship is not enough to ensure that the US will have cheap oil, it just ensures that there is A supply of oil that the US can count on actually getting extracted, shipped, and refined in an orderly fashion. Whereas Saddam's Iraq or the Iranian theocrats might well decide to stop shipping oil to prove some political point, or might get into a war that disrupts shipping (as the Arab-Israeli Wars involving Egypt disrupted shipping along the Suez Canal)

2) There is a wide perception among the US foreign policy establishment that if the Saudis weren't getting aid funneled in from the West, they'd collapse and be replaced by a regime that is more blatantly fundamentalist in character, i.e. the Taliban or ISIL. Under this argument, the Saudis are essentially a group of mercenaries the US pays to keep some kind of fragile, feeble, leaky lid on the situation. This isn't a very smart strategy, because the House of Saud has been collaborating with fundamentalists for 300 years and is quite capable of playing "good cop, bad cop." But I have heard it advocated.

3) Because the US has no actual 'hard power' domination of the Middle East, there is a sense of... well, the expression that comes to mind is "better to have them inside the tent pissing out than outside the tent pissing in." As an American client state, we can at least keep Saudi Arabia from specifically backing groups we really want to make sure aren't being backed. In principle. Whereas if they go their own way, well, they still have the oil revenues but we now have no influence over what they do and don't do.

Similar arguments seem to motivate US actions with regards to Pakistan.

And pay attention: I am not saying that all US actions are favoring islamists. They did want islamism to be stronger (that goal arose somewhere in the 1970s, it was nicely tied with both anti-Sovietism (and combatting Russian/Chinese influence), but also good as an independent goal, because it keeps the region disunited. But when the islamists directly attack them (Taliban), it is too much and there's no option but to attack.

I honestly think that the US is not acting out of fear of the region becoming united, but rather out of a hodge-podge of individual local concerns that don't really connect to each other.

[K. A. Pital]

I am kind of confused now, because you say Bush the Younger was fighting islamists. Sure, he was fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, who, as it was seen, supported a direct attack on the USA. At the same time keeping the flow of cash to the house of Saud uninterrupted; and now there are files that prove the house of Saud was behind the financing of some of the most notorious islamsit organizations whose names you hear today.

And many of the US client states in the region were still among the richest in terms of per capita GDP and command of high oil prices.

How is that a counterpoint, if these client states are known to be direct sponsors of islamism across the entire Middle East, and even way into Central Asia and South-Eastern Europe?

And you'll note that the whole idea of an "Axis of Evil" totally overlooked the brute fact that there was no ideological commonality among the three states- an Arab-nationalist dictatorship, a Shia fundamentalist theocracy, and a pseudo-Stalinist autarky ruled by a dynasty of deified monarchs were all treated as somehow 'together.'

But that's fantasy books (I heard the 'axis' also included North Korea). What I see is that Arab nationalist regimes are toppled in practice, while the Shia theocracy they did not dare to touch.

On the other hand, the Senate's actual power over foreign policy has been rotting away steadily since the Second World War. It has basically reached zero in the modern era because as a de facto reality, they're too deadlocked to actually change anything significant.

Hmm. I am actually kind of wondering now. I recall that the weapon supplies to Pakistan during the TORCHLIGHT genocide and the weapon sales to Indonesia during the 1965 slaughter were done via third parties and without Congressional authorization, in essence an operation executed covertly by the executive branch. But this does not apply to more recent political decisions, as the Senate rubberstamps pretty much everything.

This isn't a very smart strategy, because the House of Saud has been collaborating with fundamentalists for 300 years and is quite capable of playing "good cop, bad cop." But I have heard it advocated.

Yeah, that also got me wondering, since after decades of experience one can um... learn the lesson. I mean, there were documents that were leaked, about the consistent funding of various 'Islamic state'-oriented forces by the house of Saud. They are well-known to the public now, but it is clear that intelligence agencies were aware of that well before; maybe ~10-15 years prior to now.

As an American client state, we can at least keep Saudi Arabia from specifically backing groups we really want to make sure aren't being backed.

I shouldn't say that, but really? I mean, giving aid to people who are anti-NATO (as was the case with the USSR) is at least a consistent policy. Giving money to people known to fund the very people that directly attack you later... is kind of strange. Especially given that without the money from Saudi Arabia and Qatar a lot of these groups would face difficulties with recruitment, getting advanced weaponry and paying to maintain a decent command structure.

I must say I kind of liked the idea that the US tried, at least somehow, to create a moderately islamist, but fractured, Middle East. It looked like a sensible strategy, with blowback, but also with notable benefits (like keeping foreign powers out).

The way you guys describe it is just depressing.

[Channel72]

Your opinion of American intelligence is quite flattering, but unfortunately way too high.

I am kind of confused now, because you say Bush the Younger was fighting islamists. Sure, he was fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, who, as it was seen, supported a direct attack on the USA. At the same time keeping the flow of cash to the house of Saud uninterrupted; and now there are files that prove the house of Saud was behind the financing of some of the most notorious islamsit organizations whose names you hear today.

Again, the US finances KSA because of the oil; it's not that complicated really.

We're not financing KSA because KSA supports Islamists (to argue so is a classic faulty causation fallacy), we're financing KSA in spite of that. Basically the US knows that KSA channels a lot of money to Jihadist groups, but considers it still worth it to fund KSA for energy-policy reasons, and also because the US figures it's better that the Arabian penisula is controlled by the Saudis than some flagrantly anti-American jihadist group.

I must say I kind of liked the idea that the US tried, at least somehow, to create a moderately islamist, but fractured, Middle East. It looked like a sensible strategy, with blowback, but also with notable benefits (like keeping foreign powers out).

This would require too much inter-administration continuity in terms of foreign policy, which does not exist in practice.

But that's fantasy books (I heard the 'axis' also included North Korea). What I see is that Arab nationalist regimes are toppled in practice, while the Shia theocracy they did not dare to touch.

WTF? We didn't want the Iranian theocracy to exist. We were backing the secular Shah (who we installed in the first place).

Again, you continue to cherry-pick like mad here. We toppled Saddam Hussein, but supported many other secular Arab-nationalist regimes in the past.

[Channel72]

Your opinion of American intelligence is quite flattering, but unfortunately way too high.

I am kind of confused now, because you say Bush the Younger was fighting islamists. Sure, he was fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, who, as it was seen, supported a direct attack on the USA. At the same time keeping the flow of cash to the house of Saud uninterrupted; and now there are files that prove the house of Saud was behind the financing of some of the most notorious islamsit organizations whose names you hear today.

It's not that confusing. Again, the US finances KSA because of the oil; it's really not that complicated.

We're not financing KSA because KSA supports Islamists (to argue so is a classic faulty causation fallacy), we're financing KSA in spite of that. Basically the US knows that KSA channels a lot of money to Jihadist groups, but considers it still worth it to fund KSA for energy-policy reasons, and also because the US figures it's better that the Arabian penisula is controlled by the Saudis than some flagrantly anti-American jihadist group.

I mean for fuck's sake... if we had our way, Israel would control the entire Middle East. Or did you miss the billions we funnel to Israel for anti-Islamist defense?

I must say I kind of liked the idea that the US tried, at least somehow, to create a moderately islamist, but fractured, Middle East. It looked like a sensible strategy, with blowback, but also with notable benefits (like keeping foreign powers out).

This would require too much inter-administration continuity in terms of foreign policy, which does not exist in practice.

But that's fantasy books (I heard the 'axis' also included North Korea). What I see is that Arab nationalist regimes are toppled in practice, while the Shia theocracy they did not dare to touch.

WTF? We didn't want the Iranian theocracy to exist. We were backing the secular Shah (who we installed in the first place).

Again, you continue to cherry-pick like mad here. We toppled Saddam Hussein, but supported many other secular Arab-nationalist regimes in the past.

EDIT: hmm.. somehow I fucked that up with a double post. Score more points for American stupidity!

[Simon_Jester]

I am kind of confused now, because you say Bush the Younger was fighting islamists. Sure, he was fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, who, as it was seen, supported a direct attack on the USA. At the same time keeping the flow of cash to the house of Saud uninterrupted; and now there are files that prove the house of Saud was behind the financing of some of the most notorious islamsit organizations whose names you hear today.

To be more clear, my point is that Bush the Younger had no clear policy of always fighting Islamic fundamentalists or always aiding them. He seems to have been dealing with each Middle Eastern country more or less separately, even to the point of turning a blind eye to ideological enemies of the US in 'friendly' countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, in order to concentrate on other enemies like Saddam Hussein and the Taliban.

I don't think Bush had a clear overall strategic picture of who in the Middle East he wanted to aid/support, and who he wanted to weaken/attack. I don't think Obama does either. Instead, a game of whack-a-mole is played, where crises are systematically ignored until they become too big to neglect (ISIL going on the rampage, 9/11)... at which point the administration in power at the time suddenly intervenes dramatically, often by picking on a previously designated "we hate this guy" character such as Saddam Hussein.

And many of the US client states in the region were still among the richest in terms of per capita GDP and command of high oil prices.

How is that a counterpoint, if these client states are known to be direct sponsors of islamism across the entire Middle East, and even way into Central Asia and South-Eastern Europe?

Because if one of the goals of this is to ensure cheap, tractable oil suppliers who will not become wealthy threats, then it makes no sense for the US to sit by and watch its clients grow rich and fat on oil money and yet continue to be threats.

It makes more sense that the US tolerates this sort of thing because of a lack of a unified policy that might dictate that it be ended.

But that's fantasy books (I heard the 'axis' also included North Korea). What I see is that Arab nationalist regimes are toppled in practice, while the Shia theocracy they did not dare to touch.

There have been considerable numbers of Republicans who have advocated attacks on Iran for many years; the main thing that has prevented this is the strategic realities that such a war would be costly and unpopular with the American people, especially while memories of the bloody and pointless war in Iraq are still fresh.

My point is that the 'axis of evil' is an authentic part of the ideology of the Bush administration... and one that was largely incoherent, but which certainly did not hesitate to condemn nations like Syria and Libya. It was based more on a nebulous perception that these were the states that were somehow behind international terrorism. Since they were already international pariah states, even if this perception was inaccurate, it had few negative consequences for the Bush administration, so they went on with it.

On the other hand, the Senate's actual power over foreign policy has been rotting away steadily since the Second World War. It has basically reached zero in the modern era because as a de facto reality, they're too deadlocked to actually change anything significant.

Hmm. I am actually kind of wondering now. I recall that the weapon supplies to Pakistan during the TORCHLIGHT genocide and the weapon sales to Indonesia during the 1965 slaughter were done via third parties and without Congressional authorization, in essence an operation executed covertly by the executive branch. But this does not apply to more recent political decisions, as the Senate rubberstamps pretty much everything.

The Senate rubberstamps executive decisions made by executives of the same party... but that doesn't make them a gerontocracy. They're "geronto" enough for anyone, but they're very short on "ocracy-" on actual power and the ability to govern what takes place.

Real power seems to reside mostly with the White House and the... I know this is awkward but the only thing I can think of to call it is the military-industrial-security-espionage complex. IF there is a conspiracy it's located within that complex, but I don't think there is. I think it's an incoherent muddle.

As to other examples of covert presidential action taken without full congressional knowledge, look at the CIA behavior that led into the Church Committee and also the Iran-Contra scandal.

Yeah, that also got me wondering, since after decades of experience one can um... learn the lesson. I mean, there were documents that were leaked, about the consistent funding of various 'Islamic state'-oriented forces by the house of Saud. They are well-known to the public now, but it is clear that intelligence agencies were aware of that well before; maybe ~10-15 years prior to now.

The catch is that for most of that time, the senior leadership of the US government was worried about a combination of domestic opinion polls and (recently) the seemingly impossible task of even convincing the opposition party to consent to passing a budget or other basic tasks to keep the government running at all.

Think about it. If Obama has domestic political issues as serious as "cannot pass a freaking budget" on his hands, do you really think he's spending a lot of time re-assessing our relationship with Saudi Arabia?

As an American client state, we can at least keep Saudi Arabia from specifically backing groups we really want to make sure aren't being backed.

I shouldn't say that, but really? I mean, giving aid to people who are anti-NATO (as was the case with the USSR) is at least a consistent policy. Giving money to people known to fund the very people that directly attack you later... is kind of strange. Especially given that without the money from Saudi Arabia and Qatar a lot of these groups would face difficulties with recruitment, getting advanced weaponry and paying to maintain a decent command structure.

It's stupid, but it's the sort of thing that seems to get a lot of credence among the US's policy establishment.

Probably because this sort of thing actually worked in the Cold War... but back then there were only two sides to the conflict and you could usually at least depend on your pet dictator to hate communism, so money given to him would be spent to fight communists.

The modern Middle East has far more than two sides, so trying to bribe people into NOT helping your true enemy and INTO helping you doesn't work as well.

I must say I kind of liked the idea that the US tried, at least somehow, to create a moderately islamist, but fractured, Middle East. It looked like a sensible strategy, with blowback, but also with notable benefits (like keeping foreign powers out).

The way you guys describe it is just depressing.

Well, I think it's more that this is the direction the Middle East was more or less doomed to evolve towards given the way the Cold War played out, and nobody is having much success exerting control over the process. Catastrophic mishandling of local political forces by outside parties seems to be the rule, rather than the exception.

And yeah, it's depressing, but one thing you have to understand about the nature of the capitalist West is that it is NOT organized in the same sense that the Soviet Union was organized. It did not win the Cold War because of a triumph of one type of cunning organization over another; it won because of a massive starting economic advantage. Plus (in my opinion) the fact that in economic policy controlled chaos won out over chaotic controls.

But now that the Cold War is over, any need to impose any kind of real discipline or control on the chaos has faded, and the political factions of the West squabble among themselves almost to the exclusion of following any coherent policy whatsoever.

[cosmicalstorm]

Another day, another massacre of hundreds of non-muslims. I wonder why Palestinians are worth so much more in terms of global attention?

Beirut (AFP) - Jihadists have killed over 700 tribal members in eastern Syria, monitors said Saturday, and are battling to seize a northern rebel bastion, sparking an appeal for an Iraq-style Western intervention...

http://news.yahoo.com/syria-clashes-jih ... 36315.html

Islamic State (IS) militants have been accused of massacring hundreds of people in areas under their control in northern Iraq and eastern Syria.

At least 80 members of the Yazidi religious minority are believed to have been killed with women and children abducted in a village in Iraq.

IS is also accused of killing 700 tribesmen opposing them in Syria's Deir Ezzor province, over a two-week period.

The violence has displaced an estimated 1.2 million people in Iraq alone.

US aircraft are providing air support for Kurdish forces in northern Iraq to drive back the militants and retake the strategic Mosul dam.

US Central Command said it carried out nine air strikes on Saturday, hitting targets near Irbil and the dam.

The strikes "destroyed or damaged four armoured personnel carriers, seven armed vehicles, two Humvees and an armoured vehicle," a statement said.

"All aircraft exited the strike areas safely."

The UK, Germany and other countries are delivering humanitarian aid for refugees in the north.

IS first emerged in Syria, fighting President Bashar al-Assad during the ongoing civil war there, but it has since overrun parts of northern Iraq, making its capital in the city of Mosul.

Pursuing an extreme form of Sunni Islam, it has persecuted non-Muslims and Shia Muslims, whom it regards as heretics.
'Men and boys'

Kurdish and Yazidi sources say the attack on the Yazidis took place in the village of Kawju (also spelt Kocho), near the town of Sinjar, on Friday afternoon.

Reports say the men were killed after refusing to convert to Islam. A US drone strike later destroyed two vehicles belonging to the militants.

Men were separated from women and children under 12 years old and the men and male teenagers were led away in groups of a few dozen each and shot on the edge of the village, a wounded man who escaped by feigning death told AP news agency.

The fighters then walked among the bodies, using pistols to finish off anyone who appeared to still be alive, the 42-year-old man said by phone from an area where he was hiding, on condition of anonymity.

"They thought we were dead, and when they went away, we ran away," he said. "We hid in a valley until sundown, and then we fled to the mountains."

A Yazidi refugee from a different village, Moujamma Jazira, told AFP news agency that people there had also been massacred, after trying in vain to fight back.

Dakhil Atto Solo said that 300 men had been executed in his village, and the women and children abducted. The report could not be verified independently.

Meanwhile, UK-based Syrian opposition activists reported that IS had executed 700 members of the al-Sheitaat tribe in the oil-rich province of Deir Ezzor.

"Reliable sources" reported that many of the tribesmen had been beheaded, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

"Those who were executed are all al-Sheitaat," Observatory director Rami Abdelrahman told Reuters news agency by telephone. "Some were arrested, judged and killed."

The news comes after reports on social media in recent days of al-Sheitaat tribesmen being decapitated by militants, their severed heads left in public view in streets.

Tribesmen in the area had tried to drive out IS at the beginning of the month, in a rare display of local resistance. IS responded by rushing in reinforcements.
Rallies in Europe

Kurdish forces supported by US air strikes battled on Saturday to retake Mosul dam, the country's largest, from IS.

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters shelled militants' positions and there was an unconfirmed report of a ground attack.

In north-eastern Syria, Kurdish forces have been giving military training to Iraqi Yazidis to help them fight IS, Reuters news agency reports.

In Western cities, demonstrators marched in support of Iraq's minorities, Yazidis, Christians and others, on Saturday.

In Paris, Kurdish protesters rallied against the "genocide of Yazidi Kurds" while in Hannover, Germany, a protester at a march told AP news agency: "Politicians must act now against the genocide... where not only Yazidis but also Christians, Arameans, Assyrians, heretics and anyone who doesn't agree with the inhuman world view of the terrorists of the IS is massacred, even decapitated. Now is the time for politicians to act."

Two Airbus flights carrying UK aid supplies landed in the Kurdish city of Irbil on Saturday and German military transport planes have also begun delivering aid.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said on a visit to Baghdad that he hoped the new Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi, would be able to represent all the different regions and religions in the country, as this was the only way to prevent disenchanted Iraqis from backing IS.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28824212

[Broomstick]

Kurdish and Yazidi sources say the attack on the Yazidis took place in the village of Kawju (also spelt Kocho), near the town of Sinjar, on Friday afternoon.

Reports say the men were killed after refusing to convert to Islam. A US drone strike later destroyed two vehicles belonging to the militants.

Men were separated from women and children under 12 years old and the men and male teenagers were led away in groups of a few dozen each and shot on the edge of the village, a wounded man who escaped by feigning death told AP news agency.

The fighters then walked among the bodies, using pistols to finish off anyone who appeared to still be alive, the 42-year-old man said by phone from an area where he was hiding, on condition of anonymity.

"They thought we were dead, and when they went away, we ran away," he said. "We hid in a valley until sundown, and then we fled to the mountains."

Did these fuckers read about Nazis doing shit like that and then say "Hey, that's what we want to aspire to be."? Because, really, this is starting to sound like accounts of genocide from the 1940's. Well, sure, details are different but the systematic slaughter is familiar.

[Channel72]

The Nazis are not even on ISIS' radar. They're probably thinking more in terms of 634 AD.

At least we can try and find some humor among this horrific situation: I find it somewhat funny that the US is basically launching an air campaign to blow up their own equipment.

Tying this back to the previous conversation, shit like this is the result of decades of bumbling, ad hoc foreign policy.

[Welf]

Did these fuckers read about Nazis doing shit like that and then say "Hey, that's what we want to aspire to be."? Because, really, this is starting to sound like accounts of genocide from the 1940's. Well, sure, details are different but the systematic slaughter is familiar.

I think this is taken straight from the Quoran (who likely copied the Bible).

I am kind of confused now, because you say Bush the Younger was fighting islamists. Sure, he was fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, who, as it was seen, supported a direct attack on the USA. At the same time keeping the flow of cash to the house of Saud uninterrupted; and now there are files that prove the house of Saud was behind the financing of some of the most notorious islamsit organizations whose names you hear today.

Fun fact: The House of Saud currently has about 15.000 members. Of those 14.999 are not the king. And with the current power structure only a handful of princes from the ruling faction has a chance of ever becoming king. I always viewed the US support for Saudi an attempt the strengthen the ruling faction which has massive interest in continuing the status quo. They may support a very reactionary islam to confirm their own position and will support militant groups if it serves their interests, but won't send money to really revolutionary groups which in the end will attack them (at least not on purpose, but stupidity isn't an unique American trait). Or has anybody seen the Muslim Brotherhood or Al-Quaida showing pictures of king Abdullah bin Abdulaziz? In fact, in 2013 the Saudis were very quick to ally with the new military rulers around Sisi and helped them crush the Muslim Brotherhood and they massacred Al-Quida at home with a massive campaign in 2003-06. What other factions within Saudi Arabia who might profit from change do with their money is another issue. Id the US tells us anything then that there always conservative billionaire hypocrites who support fundamentalists, and there are always factions who hijack fundamentalist groups to give them credibility for a power grab.
So yeah, US policy is often stupid, but there might be actual reasons for doing the stuff they do. And sometimes they only can choose between a terrible outcome and a less terrible one.

[xerex]

So again, why strategic relationships are established with Pakistan (a nation known to sponsor the most radical islamist organizations and one of the direct architects of Afghanistan's fall to islamism, also well-known for the massive 2+ million genocide in Bangladesh), Saudi Arabia (nation with death penalty for Sharia 'crimes' like sex with the wrong person, nation known to sponsor the most radical islamist organizations and one of the funders of ISIS, Taliban and Chechen extremists)?

These are not some short-term relationships. They continue for a long time. Explain that to me.

.

I'm coming late to this conversation, but i think the factor youre missing is that Pakistan and Saudi Arabia have thier own goals and motivations and the USA only has influence not control over them.

As for why the long term relationships. A large part is sheer inertia. The Pakistan relation ship dates all the way back to SEATO. It wasnt until Bush II that the US started to tilt towards India and away from Pakistan. But India also has a mind of its own and being Hindu isnt a useful entry point into the Muslim world.

As for Saudi Arabia. Well lots of oil but also becuase Saudi Arabia is a house of cards. If the USA were to turn against the Saudis . there is a fear that some version of Bin Laden would end up ruling Arabia.

Also as stated by other posters . The House of saud has 15,000 members who do not all think the same.

[K. A. Pital]

A journalist was recently executed by the IS.

[Vympel]

I saw the video on Liveleak. It was disturbingly well produced. The fucker who killed him was clearly from the UK. I turned it off before the beheading (with a small knife). I saw the Daniel Pearl beheading after all - I have no wish to see such a thing in my life, ever again.

EDIT: I've since learned that the video only shows the first second or so of the "beheading" but they cut away to a picture of the guy's head placed on top of his prone body. No doubt he is dead.

[wautd]

From what I know about the guy it's a great loss for objective journalism