by Jack
It’s been a long tradition in the Arab world that, the enemy of your enemy is your friend …that is, until you no longer have that enemy. Then the game changes. Reports are now filtering in from ISIS held regions of Iraq, in particular Mosul, that ISIS forces are just a means to an end of an even greater threat…Maliki in Baghdad. Certainly not all Sunnis want ISIS running things or even want them hanging around after they have helped re-established their Sunni control.
People in Mosul speaking on condition of anonymity were recently quoted in the media as saying ISIS fighters are mostly scum. But, they are using them even though they don’t like them. Maliki is seen as the real enemy. He’s made many moves against Sunnis since we left Iraq to exclude them from power sharing. Okay, and some were for good reasons (like ties to Saddam’s Baathists) but many were not. It was just a sectarian payback kind of move and this payback junk has been going on for 700 years.
ISIS has left captured regions pretty much intact. They’re not pillaging, they’re not blowing up things and they’re not worse than al Qaeda. But, they are murdering Shiites and yes it’s bad, but this seems to be the Arab-worlds way of doing things. Some Sunnis were in favor of this too, but not all. And more likely it’s not even a majority favored this kind of brutality, but this was ISIS doing not theirs.
We’ve been allied with Sunni’s in Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Egypt, Libya, UAE and in many other countries. Sunnis represent about 85-90% of the world’s Muslims. Do you think they are going to be real happy with America when we start bombing their fellow Sunnis in order to get at radical Sunni ISIS forces?
We’re told ISIS is on the verge of setting up this Caliphate State(1) that will control parts of Syria and Iraq and will be threatening Jordan and Iran. Not true say the civilian Sunnis in ISIS captured cities, this is really just a consolidation and affirming of religious/ethnic partitions that have always existed.
They say this Caliphate story is just that, a story. It’s almost entirely hype by ISIS to scare people and directed at the media they’re trying to influence. Sure, maybe some in ISIS and in the Sunni controlled regions want this stupid throwback stuff, but the majority of Sunnis say they don’t! They only want self-control and stability. And so far they see no attempts by anyone to radicalize the captured regions of Iraq and turn it into some sort of religious state like Iran’s. In order to have stability they would like to see Maliki out of power because he has been a sectarian adversary from day one. They don’t trust him, they think he is both corrupt and incompetent. And they feel he is dangerous when it comes to his bigotry against Sunni and his connections to Iran. Over a million people died in the last war between Iraq and Iran, tensions there are naturally high.
Gary Brechter wrote a pretty darn good piece that coincides with what I know about this situation and I suggest you take a look at it. it’s a real eye opener apart from the hyped stories we’re getting in the media. Here’s a snippet: “”This is one of those dramatic military reverses that mean a lot less than meets the eye. The “Iraqi Army” routed by ISIS wasn’t really a national army, and ISIS isn’t really a dominant military force. It was able to occupy those cities because they were vacuums, abandoned by a weak, sectarian force. Moving into vacuums like this is what ISIS is good at. And that’s the only thing ISIS is good at.
ISIS is a sectarian Sunni militia—that’s all. A big one, as militias go, with something like 10,000 fighters. Most of them are Iraqi, a few are Syrian, and a few hundred are those famous “European jihadis” who draw press attention out of all relation to their negligible combat value. The real strength of ISIS comes from its Chechen fighters, up to a thousand of them. A thousand Chechens is a serious force, and a terrifying one if they’re bearing down on your neighborhood. Chechens are the scariest fighters, pound-for-pound, in the world.” For more follow this link.
1. Caliphate – is an Islamic state led by a supreme religious and political leader known as a caliph – i.e. “successor” – to Muhammad. The succession of Muslim empires that have existed in the Muslim world are usually described as “caliphates”. Conceptually, a caliphate represents a sovereign polity (state) of the entire Muslim faithful (the Ummah, i.e. a sovereign nation state) ruled by a single caliph under the Constitution of Medina and Islamic law (sharia).
Mercy on us, Jack. Do you EVER investigate your sources?
Libby, what part of this story do you believe is wrong? Please let me know and I will check it out.
I know you rarely spell them correct.
As it turns out Libby the source is a writer in a conglomerate of writers at NSFWCORP. Most of its writers have written for such publications and outlets as NPR, MSNBC, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Daily Beast, The Nation, The Guardian, The Independent Film Channel, The Huffington Post, Salon.com, Al Jazeera English, The Villiage Voice, The Onion, Wired, Playboy,and Penthouse to name quite a few.
What’s the prob?
Also, “…spell them correctly?”
The Telegraph:
And once again this is how Obama manages to be taken by complete surprise. Maybe if he would get his face out of the mirror and listen to his senior advisers once in awhile we could avert going into crisis mode once a week. Obama doesn’t have the right stuff…never did…never will.
It’s Gary Brecher.
He is an admitted “war hobbiest” and writes a column called “The War Nerd”.
He is also the unveiled internet personae of a poetry writing English professor.
And the fact that he writes opinion pieces that coincide with Jack’s, and the two others stated above, do not make him in any way authoritative.
Now, as opinions go, it’s nothing nonsensical … I just object, as always, to you presenting things as journalism or analysis … when they’re not. Gary has no more facts about what’s going on than we do … and that ain’t much, really.
What I want is for someone to explain to me is the state of the Iraqi Security Forces. The idea that a militia force, even a ferocious one, could invade a sovereign nation and occupy a large city and sit there, while the sovereign nation’s army fails to budge them … for six months … blows my mind, really.
I’m mean, notwithstanding the umpteen billions we put into the ISF (it’s only money), … this thing reeks of Vietnam. If these people really cannot muster the whathaveyou to defend themselves, then they can just be overrun.
We’re not doing this again.
Libby: “I just object, as always, to you presenting things as journalism or analysis…”
Libby the assumption is your alone. We have repeatedly informed those who follow Post Scripts that this is a discussion blog written from a conservative prospective. We have in no way tried to give the impression that what we post is the final authoritative word.
We gather and discuss information in the news, including information and opinion expressed by others…including YOU!
The thing that makes “this” “reek of Vietnam” is the way the US has turned its back on the mission…defending the United States by eliminating an enemy aggressor. We had accomplished a lot in pursuit of that goal as Obummer took the reins. Unfortunately he failed to embrace the mission and looked instead to advancing the leftist agenda which has resulted in advancing the efforts and strength of the enemy.
The only other difference is that liberals aren’t spitting on our soldiers as they come home…yet.
I don’t know whether we will be forced to “do this again” or not. One thing’s for sure if we do it will be due to the absolute failure of this administration’s foreign policy agenda.
Consider:
You better pray we are not forced to “do this again!”
“Yet in spite of Iran’s history of violence and terrorism, Obama is essentially throwing in the towel on Iraq, handing the situation off to our most dangerous rival in much the same way he gave Syria to the Russians and Iranians.”
You force me to be offensive … this is drivel … simple-minded drivel, fed to simpletons of a hawkish bent. It is war-mongering. I would have thought you’d learned your lesson the last time, but apparently not.
Try to use your imagination here. You do know some things. You know that Iranians are Persians and Shites. You know that ISIS is Sunni. And you certainly must be aware by now, that they don’t get along. Does Iran want to lose it’s influence in, and the security of, a neighboring state of the same religious persuasion on its border?
Unlikely. So how would it harm us to let them see what they can do?
And no blathering, rambling, ranting, changing the subject … none of that. I want a specific and explicit answer to this particular hypothetical. (But I ain’t gonna get it.)
And you’re going to have to explain this:
“… defending the United States by eliminating an enemy aggressor.”
Or I get to write it off as blather. Are you talking about Saddam Hussein? He was a threat to us? Oh, yeah … blather.
The only people who ever believed that … have a lingering taste for war-mongering propaganda.
Re #9 Libby: “You force me to be offensive”
HAH! That comes naturally to you! It is your raison d’être. But go ahead, blame Tina you mentally defective harpy lunatic.
By abandoning Iraq and not leaving in place a significant military presence that could have assisted in training and logistics for the Iraqi army and could have helped to develop new, well trained, effective leaders of that army, it was allowed to fall back into corruption and decay.
Add to that the diplomatic disengagement and turning of a blind eye to the exclusion of Sunni by Nouri al-Maliki, Obama helped to set the stage for a terrorist invasion and insurrection.
Your man Obama did this. He owns it. It IS the Obama doctrine.
Yet you morons fear Peggy! Peggy did not create this situation, Obama did. It is hard for me to comprehend that there are people in this world as outright and willfully stupid as Chris and Libby.
But it does help to explain how Obama was elected in the first place and won re-election, even though a large part of the blame for that can be placed at the feet of the GOP.
“By abandoning Iraq and not leaving in place a significant military presence that could have assisted in training and logistics ….”
Pie, we invaded in 2003 and left in 2011. That’s eight years! Twice as long as WWII! Were we efficacious? Seemingly not. (I could rant for six paragraphs right here, but I’ll spare you.)
Were we suppose to stay 20 years? You may be willing to lend your offspring to such an enterprise, but you’ve got very little company.
“Add to that the diplomatic disengagement and turning of a blind eye to the exclusion of Sunni by Nouri al-Maliki, ….”
This simply isn’t true. Maliki has been under diplomatic pressure, lots of it, and not just from us, ever since Fallujha to change the way he does business … but he is one intransigent and dim-witted fella.
You can’t really blame Obama for our cessation of military involvement in Iraq. You’d have to blame me for that. He was, indeed, doing what I elected him to.
And you really can’t blame him for Maliki … that goes to the previous administration.
And, I think you’re looking for a simple solution to the Middle East … there isn’t one.