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I was not aware until now that Sarkozy and Cameron were left-wingers.

 AlexHolker wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
You can't end this problem. You can kill people, but you can't kill ideas. If you destroy ISIL, a new organisation that is probably even worse is going to spring up real quickly.

What makes you think that Islamist dreams of empire are any more resilient than the German or Japanese dreams proved to be? If Hitler can be driven to such despair by defeat that he would order that Nazi Germany has forfeited its right to exist before killing himself, what makes you think that the Islamists would react any better to their abject failure to establish a new caliphate?

Well, I bet we could do that, if we would practice total scorched earth warfare like what happened in WW2. We won't though.

We didn't try to win the hearts and minds of the Germans and Japanese. We made them fear for their societies very survival.

 Alpharius wrote:

What do you suggest?

With Daesh the local political and military forces need to be considerably supported and strengthened, in terms of training and equipment but not militarily . The overt (or even covert) use of force by the West simply strengthens Daesh's 'crusader' narrative and airstrikes will do little of real substance anyway.

Once Daesh has been militarily defeated the entire region needs to be carefully, and tactfully, guided and supported to ensure that Governments are representative, accountable and actually support their populace. It will take a long time for the Middle East to develop Western style democracy, if ever, but its clear to see what the lack of stable governance leads to.

Lingering flashpoints, like the Kurds and Israel, also need to be diplomatically tackled along side the more unpalatable of our 'Allies'.

In short I would be as well asking Santa but I don't see how the region can be stabilised when we keep randomly bombing bits of it.

 Frazzled wrote:

The French planes did look pretty though.

While I'd proffer they should up their game, I can understand their position. Why have a massive military if you don't need one? If you don't view the projection of military power as needed you don't need it.

In a better world all the militaries would be minimalist affairs.

There is also a legacy issue. The military doctrine of most European countries is based on stopping a large conventional force invading from the East and fighting a war on home soil. Power projection overseas hasn't been a concern since the end of the colonial era. Even the UK struggled in the Falklands at the height of the cold war. Switching over to volunteer forces that operate abroad in mostly low intensity conflicts is going to take a long time.

Once Daesh has been militarily defeated the entire region needs to be carefully, and tactfully, guided and supported to ensure that Governments are representative, accountable and actually support their populace. It will take a long time for the Middle East to develop Western style democracy, if ever, but its clear to see what the lack of stable governance leads to.

History might disagree with you. ISIL is just another in a string of movements historically. The Ottomans learned to deal with them by pulling back from the region. Once the movement burned itself out they would move back in.

Terrorism has been an issue now because of media and ease of movement.

 Antario wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

The French planes did look pretty though.

While I'd proffer they should up their game, I can understand their position. Why have a massive military if you don't need one? If you don't view the projection of military power as needed you don't need it.

In a better world all the militaries would be minimalist affairs.

There is also a legacy issue. The military doctrine of most European countries is based on stopping a large conventional force invading from the East and fighting a war on home soil. Power projection overseas hasn't been a concern since the end of the colonial era. Even the UK struggled in the Falklands at the height of the cold war. Switching over to volunteer forces that operate abroad in mostly low intensity conflicts is going to take a long time.

Which is why it was USAF C-17's that were transporting the French military to Mali.

 djones520 wrote:

 AlexHolker wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
You can't end this problem. You can kill people, but you can't kill ideas. If you destroy ISIL, a new organisation that is probably even worse is going to spring up real quickly.

What makes you think that Islamist dreams of empire are any more resilient than the German or Japanese dreams proved to be? If Hitler can be driven to such despair by defeat that he would order that Nazi Germany has forfeited its right to exist before killing himself, what makes you think that the Islamists would react any better to their abject failure to establish a new caliphate?

Well, I bet we could do that, if we would practice total scorched earth warfare like what happened in WW2. We won't though.

We didn't try to win the hearts and minds of the Germans and Japanese. We made them fear for their societies very survival.

That can't be done with Islam, which is a worldwide religion with a billion adherents in dozens of countries, many of which are friendly to the west, or even allies (e.g. Turkey is a member of NATO.)

 AlexHolker wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
You can't end this problem. You can kill people, but you can't kill ideas. If you destroy ISIL, a new organisation that is probably even worse is going to spring up real quickly.

What makes you think that Islamist dreams of empire are any more resilient than the German or Japanese dreams proved to be? If Hitler can be driven to such despair by defeat that he would order that Nazi Germany has forfeited its right to exist before killing himself, what makes you think that the Islamists would react any better to their abject failure to establish a new caliphate?

Are you now comparing impirialism to religion? Seriously?

Ah well. The reason German imperialism vanished (though some anti-EU folks might claim otherwise ) is that the very reason for its existence was gone after WW2. Germans had long been searching for new opportunities, new "Lebensraum" in the east. Over the centuries many Germans settled in Eastern Europe. German imperialism came about as a result of the drive to unite all ethnic Germans in a single German state. After WW2, all Germans that lived outside of the new borders of the German state were either exterminated or expelled. With the Germans gone, so was the desire of Germany to control those areas.

Japanese imperialism was mostly a result of the humiliation Japan received at the hands of Western powers, and the desire to get on the same level as the Western powers that followed out of that. After WW2 Japan was occupied by the US, which made imperialism impossible. Japan subsequently got on the same level as the West due to economical success, which removed the need for imperialism as a tool to become equal to the West (also because the West itself moved away from imperialism).

Now with radical islamism (it is not imperialism, imperialism is something that only states can do.), the main causes of that is that Muslims (like the Japanese earlier) have an inferiority complex towards the West. The West is stronger than the Middle East and it is not really shy about it. Quite the contrary, the West is arrogant, self-righteous and very insistent about imposing its cultural values (that it regards as superior to everything else) on others. Like the Egyptian philosopher Hassan Hanafi has said: "(The Westerners) are perpetual teachers, we the perpetual students. Generation after generation, this asymmetry has generated an inferiority complex, forever exacerbated by the fact that their innovations progress at a faster pace than we can absorb them." I hope you can understand that this leads to frustration. Their culture is under threat from the West. Like most of the rest of the world (like in Asia and Africa) the initial response was nationalism. And altough Arab nationalism was initially succesful in fighting Ottoman and European rule, unlike in the rest of the world, it ultimately failed and lost its influence and power after the Yom Kippur War. The only alternative for muslims is to draw upon their shared religion instead for inspiration. To go back to the roots of their culture and religion, and look to a time when the situation was reversed (the Middle Ages), thus giving rise to Islamic fundamentalism. And since this conflict is not just cultural, but inevitably also political, fundamentalism gives rise to islamism. The frustration of islamism by other political forces (mostly the old guard of nationalists who remained in power) in turn leads to the emergence of islamic terrorism, which after being frustrated time and time again, becomes ever more extreme.
So basically, islamic fundamentalism is never going to go away unless living conditions in the Middle East are drastically improved, and dropping bombs is only going to make things worse.

 Frazzled wrote:

The Ottomans learned to deal with them by pulling back from the region.

The world has changed. The small localised wars that characterised the colonial period were fought against groups who were largely emeshed in local power structures (even if they had been supplanted) who had little to no communications with the wider world and had little impact on the wider world.

Daesh is the latest incarnation on an international movement that is openly active in 2 continents and has support, if not active interests, globally and has proven ability to strike directly at it's enemies home soil. There really isn't a comparison.

Absent advocating the extermination of 1Bn innocents (which is as illogical as it is horrifying a concept), I am not seeing how staying involved in the mess has helped the US or Western Europe. The only policy that seems to have worked over time is the installation of dictators.

 Frazzled wrote:
The only policy that seems to have worked over time is the installation of dictators.

Which will in all likelihood no longer work.

We need to stay involved but it needs to be all about soft power and caution, not force and arrogance which seems to have the plan for the last 15 years or so.

Why do you believe staying involved is helpful? How many times has Brazil been attacked?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_Brazil

 Frazzled wrote:
Why do you believe staying involved is helpful? How many times has Brazil been attacked?

Brazil is politically stable.

If we disengage the moderate forces in the region will not only have a harder time ousting Daesh, there is also a danger of heading towards dicatorship/genocide/bad places (which in fairness may happen anyway). Daesh will still regard the West as a target irrespective of what we do.

Isolationism has never been a wise course of action.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_Brazil

Objection your honor. My opponents use of facts and logic are detrimental to my case!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Silent Puffin? wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Why do you believe staying involved is helpful? How many times has Brazil been attacked?

Brazil is politically stable.

If we disengage the moderate forces in the region will not only have a harder time ousting Daesh, there is also a danger of heading towards dicatorship/genocide/bad places (which in fairness may happen anyway). Daesh will still regard the West as a target irrespective of what we do.

Isolationism has never been a wise course of action.

Which supports two arguments: both of which are distateful.
*nuke the site from orbit.
*for the protection of whatever country you are in, keep "those people" out.

There has to be a third way, and it needs to be found, or else the Trump factions will win across the US and Europe.

I think the Third Way may be to soldier on. Don't panic! Minimum interference. Try our best to keep our nations safe. Support friendly, stable governments. Make it clear that Muslims are welcome as long as they obey the law of the land.

We're not going to suddenly convert everyone in the Middle East to liberal pluralistic democracy, but most of the youth is coming over to our side, as in Iran, and gradually things will turn around. as the old guard die off.

The blunt fact is that life under ISIL is complete gak unless you're a gun-toting youth or an extreme religious fanatic. Most people aren't. They want to run corner shops, or make films, or set up fashion businesses, get on with their neighbours and not live in fear all the time.

I think everyone's responsible for the mess in the Middle East. Complete dog's breakfast...

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I think the Third Way may be to soldier on. Don't panic! Minimum interference. Try our best to keep our nations safe. Support friendly, stable governments. Make it clear that Muslims are welcome as long as they obey the law of the land.

We're not going to suddenly convert everyone in the Middle East to liberal pluralistic democracy, but most of the youth is coming over to our side, as in Iran, and gradually things will turn around. as the old guard die off.

The blunt fact is that life under ISIL is complete gak unless you're a gun-toting youth or an extreme religious fanatic. Most people aren't. They want to run corner shops, or make films, or set up fashion businesses, get on with their neighbours and not live in fear all the time.

Indeed.

Pull out everything, military and economic. Not in a malicious way but rather leave them alone. The US has been pretty busy colonizing MENA economically for a long time. See nation in debt, offer aide, increase their debt due to aide, impose laws to relieve debt, open markets, privatize industry and sell it to western investors, exploit people and land, now profit. Rinse and repeat.

Islam is the last thing many of the down trodden have. The last bastion the west can't break. So naturally it radicalizes in the face of its percieved opposition. People in MENA can't fight on the wests terms so they have chosen a method that is ugly, horrible but effective. It says go away we don't want you here.

So I say leave and maybe save ourselves from our own greed at others expense while we are at it. Let them build, govern and live as they choose, it is their right to have. In a generation they will probably leave their grievances behind and both sides can wash their hands of the ugliness.

At least that would be the ideal way to do it. I suspect we will try the bomb until they accept their subordinate purpose to the west again method. Not like the people will mind their lives getting even worse. You either live to get beheaded by ISIS or collateral'd by America lol.

Maybe we should treat them as a nation state. ? Sideways thinking.

That has rules. If you attack the west its a act of war. We will pound every single flying your flag to rubble with swift efficiency treating it as a declaration of open warfare. No softly kid gloves, bring the steel armoured fist.

If you can behave less like seeming war adicts who have managed to anger a long list of nations. They might live and they may learn.
They want to be a "state" ... Can they manage to obey the rules man kind holds them too.

They can choose to act like civilised men, or face the concqunces of there violent acts.
They'd have a choice, they make that one, so be it which way they go, and if it is a hellfire missile turning there leaders to a thin stain, well that's that.
We gave them a choice, they chose rather badly.


Perfectly fair. Give them a chance, one chance, maybe they may see sense.

 jhe90 wrote:
If you attack the west its a act of war. We will pound every single flying your flag to rubble with swift efficiency treating it as a declaration of open warfare. No softly kid gloves, bring the steel armoured fist.

Tried it. It not only did it not work it cost vast quantities of blood and treasure, destabalised much of the middle east, radicalised even further some elements of Islam and essentially created Daesh. Mission accomplished?

I don't think 'soft power' is going to cut it either at this point.

 Alpharius wrote:
I don't think 'soft power' is going to cut it either at this point.

This is a problem that needs diplomatic power and influence from the wider world to support and equip local powers to defeating Daesh militarily and socially. It really needs a sustained and carefully crafted approach.

 djones520 wrote:

I think the point he is making is that it was only a less then one day campaign because European air powers couldn't sustain anymore of it.

To be clear, I am talking about the 1986 bombing. The 2011 campaign extended well beyond a day.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Are you now comparing impirialism to religion? Seriously?

I'm comparing imperialism to imperialism. ISIL is not Islam, ISIL is their would-be caliphate. ISIL is explicitly trying to unite the Muslim world under a single dictator, their leader, and purify their territory of all who are not "true" Muslims. That they justify this under the guise of Muslim unity rather than German unity does not change what they are.

 dogma wrote:

 djones520 wrote:

I think the point he is making is that it was only a less then one day campaign because European air powers couldn't sustain anymore of it.

To be clear, I am talking about the 1986 bombing. The 2011 campaign extended well beyond a day.

If we stopped obsessing over smart weapons, and used old iron munitions, would cost alot less and easier to make. But you have to be willing to lose accuracy.

 jhe90 wrote:
Maybe we should treat them as a nation state. ? Sideways thinking.

That has rules. If you attack the west its a act of war. We will pound every single flying your flag to rubble with swift efficiency treating it as a declaration of open warfare.

And what about the people that have been subjugated and forced to fly the flag? India flew the British flag for a significant period of time; can India be held responsible for British imperialism?

No softly kid gloves, bring the steel armoured fist.

If you can behave less like seeming war adicts who have managed to anger a long list of nations.

This statement is in direct contradiction to the fairly bloodthirsty nature of the rest of your post.

What resources are available in the Daesh-controlled areas? If the supply of goods and services was cut off into there, could they build the weapons they fight with. Apart from the oil refineries we hear they control, what do they have to trade with, to get weapons?
Can Daesh sustain their 'state' without outside support?

Basically, lay siege to the area.

 jhe90 wrote:

 dogma wrote:

 djones520 wrote:

I think the point he is making is that it was only a less then one day campaign because European air powers couldn't sustain anymore of it.

To be clear, I am talking about the 1986 bombing. The 2011 campaign extended well beyond a day.

If we stopped obsessing over smart weapons, and used old iron munitions, would cost alot less and easier to make. But you have to be willing to lose accuracy.

And create even more extremists when people lose their family's to bombs dropped by planes flying our flag. Killing innocents with bombs is a recruitment drive for ISIS/ISIL/Daesh

 djones520 wrote:

 Antario wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

The French planes did look pretty though.

While I'd proffer they should up their game, I can understand their position. Why have a massive military if you don't need one? If you don't view the projection of military power as needed you don't need it.

In a better world all the militaries would be minimalist affairs.

There is also a legacy issue. The military doctrine of most European countries is based on stopping a large conventional force invading from the East and fighting a war on home soil. Power projection overseas hasn't been a concern since the end of the colonial era. Even the UK struggled in the Falklands at the height of the cold war. Switching over to volunteer forces that operate abroad in mostly low intensity conflicts is going to take a long time.

Which is why it was USAF C-17's that were transporting the French military to Mali.

True, but it isn't just the strategic airlift. The cold war left the US with a far more useful military infrastructure than Europe for modern conflicts. In that sense Obama's comments are a bit odd. Why blame France and the UK for a lack of capability that hasn't been available to these countries for decades. If the Wolfowitz doctrine is any indication, the US isn't particularly fond of the idea that other western nations develop significant ability to project power outside of their region.