Is it possible for the West to do anything right in the Middle East?

[Burney]

Full-scale, boots-on-the-ground intervention and we get Iraq
Just intervene with air power and we get Libya.
Don't (or barely) intervene and we get Syria.

Seems to me that these people are intent on slaughtering one another and nothing we do is going to make a damn bit of difference.

[Pat Vegas]

Full-scale, boots-on-the-ground intervention and we get Iraq
Just intervene with air power and we get Libya.
Don't (or barely) intervene and we get Syria.

Seems to me that these people are intent on slaughtering one another and nothing we do is going to make a damn bit of difference.

I misread this as West Ham in the middle east.

[Luis Anaconda]

Full-scale, boots-on-the-ground intervention and we get Iraq
Just intervene with air power and we get Libya.
Don't (or barely) intervene and we get Syria.

Seems to me that these people are intent on slaughtering one another and nothing we do is going to make a damn bit of difference.

Easy one this,b. No, we can't. Though in memory of Jorge can I point out it is all fault anyway. Somehow

[Burney]

Easy one this,b. No, we can't. Though in memory of Jorge can I point out it is all fault anyway. Somehow

Interesting parallel I saw someone draw the other day. He suggested the ME may currently be going through its equivalent of The Thirty Years War. I think he meant it as an optimistic point of view, suggesting that a more secular enlightenment-type deal may result eventually.

[Luis Anaconda]

Interesting parallel I saw someone draw the other day. He suggested the ME may currently be going through its equivalent of The Thirty Years War. I think he meant it as an optimistic point of view, suggesting that a more secular enlightenment-type deal may result eventually.

Bizarrely, I was just thinking the same thing. They are just a few centuries behind really. Sadly I don't think history is that neat

[Burney]

Bizarrely, I was just thinking the same thing. They are just a few centuries behind really. Sadly I don't think history is that neat

I don't think anyone would describe the Thirty Years War as 'neat', la.

No, of course it's not, but it's interesting how many of the same forces are in play and in similar ways. It would be nice to think that, after a few decades of devastation and many millions dead, they might reach the conclusion that maybe all this religion business is overrated, tbh.

[Luis Anaconda]

I don't think anyone would describe the Thirty Years War as 'neat', la.

It least it was a nice round number

[Monty92]

I don't think anyone would describe the Thirty Years War as 'neat', la.

No, of course it's not, but it's interesting how many of the same forces are in play and in similar ways. It would be nice to think that, after a few decades of devastation and many millions dead, they might reach the conclusion that maybe all this religion business is overrated, tbh.

We could help nudge things along by stopping pretending that moderate, non-violent, western assimilated muslims are not a huge part of the problem, too?

[Burney]

We could help nudge things along by stopping pretending that moderate, non-violent, western assimilated muslims are not a huge part of the problem, too?

I think recognising that this is very much a pan-islamic family feud would be a good thing, m. Us trying to play 'good muslim/bad muslim' is unhelpful in the extreme. They're going to have to sort this shït out among themselves.

[Ash]

Full-scale, boots-on-the-ground intervention and we get Iraq
Just intervene with air power and we get Libya.
Don't (or barely) intervene and we get Syria.

Seems to me that these people are intent on slaughtering one another and nothing we do is going to make a damn bit of difference.

The usual one-sided reporting of unverified claims, which even if true, only ever seem to be about offenses committed by forces aligned to one side (the Syrian government) in the battle for East Aleppo, with the aim of raising the clamour for somethingmustbedonery in support of the 'rebels' (new name for Al-Queda).

We don't know what is happening in Al-Queda-held areas because these people, y'know, tend to chop journalists heads off, so we rely on 'tweets' and 'doctors' which are assumed to be geniune. I suspect they are from the same PR sources funded by Washington and Westminster which have been providing the same drip-drip of propaganda for the last five years.

http://www.alternet.org/grayzone-pro...-month-produce

Like the story of protest singer Ibrahim Qashoush, reported by BBC, CNN, Guardian, Telegraph, to have been brutally murdered by the 'regime', with his vocal chords cut out, who turns up alive and well in Spain. #fakenews

http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/syria-civil-war

The West *is* intervening in the conflict in Syria, and the conflict exists because the West started the civil war in the first place (or massively helped it along) with the familiar aim of regime change. And with the familiar outcome which as usual is being blamed on other sides and dutifully reported as such in the usual places.