Terrorists, funsters and all the other nice people

[firejuggler]

As you may know, on friday the 13th , Paris (France, not the one in Texas) has endured multiple terrorist attack.
Here is a link to have a summary of the events.
http://www.lemonde.fr/attaques-a-par...4_4809495.html

Those kind of people send me in fit of rage. this is why I won"t comment further than this.

[ewmayer]

Nasty bit of business, no doubt. But one cannot look at these atrocities in a vacuum - virtually unmentioned in the western MSM the past few years is France's 'interventionist foreign' policy role in the ME, especially in helping the US turn Libya into a civil-war-wracked failed state. A hell of a lot more than 150 innocents died as a result of that 'spreading of our values' effort. Is shooting noncombatants full of holes and blowing them to pink mist only 'terrorism' if they are citizens of wealthy nations and/or white? How many countries have the US and its allies terrorized over the past 25 years? And let us not forget that nasty outfits like IS were a direct result of the US blowing the shit out of Iraq over multiple wars, favoring one religious faction there and letting them freely terrorize the other, and actively abetting and arming various supposedly 'moderate' Sunni militant groups of the Al Qaeda stripe because they were deemed 'useful' in the ongoing efforts to create more failed states in the ME. Reap the whirlwind.

"Terrorism of the rich is called 'war', and war of the poor is called 'terrorism'." -- Peter Ustinov

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Edit: Econo-blooger Mike Shedlock (whose economic views have diverged from mine over the years but whose foreign-policy takes I still tend to agree with) has a decent set of links as well as his take:

Placing the Blame

1. US meddling in the Mideast, especially the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, directly led to the creation of ISIS.

2. US Drone policy by Bush, then greatly expanded by President Obama made more terrorists than it has killed. Thousands of innocent victims were killed or injured for every terrorist takeout.

3. The US backed so-called Al Qaeda "moderates" attempting to overthrow Syrian president Bashar al-Assad. In the civil war, millions of Syrians fled to Turkey.

4. Chancellor Merkel welcomed those Syrians with arms, giving them free money at first, then vouchers for free food and shelter. Millions of refugees passed from Turkey through Greece and the Balkan states for those handouts.

5. ISIS claimed in advance they would use Syrian passports to infiltrate Europe, yet nothing was done by Merkel. One of the attackers did have a Syrian passport. The threat was not idle, but was "recklessly ignored" as I warned just one day before the attack.

6. In October, I noted former UK prime minister Tony Blair (who joined president Bush on the inane takeout of Saddam Hussein), Apologizes for Creation of ISIS.

So yes, there is plenty of blame to go around, starting with inept foreign policy by the US and UK, then Germany and Sweden.

Repercussions

Financial Times writer Gideon Rachman missed the boat on the major consequences.

Expect a major loss of freedom in the US with more wiretapping and spying on citizens.

Yet, note how useless all that spying has been. The NSA and similar organizations in Europe did not have a hint of this attack, the Charlie Hebdo attack, or countless other minor shooting globally.

And of course the US warmongers will use this as reason to halt the treaty with Iran even though ISIS is a Sunni extremist group backed by Saudi Arabia.

The really radical US nutcases will seek a war with Iran.

[fivemack]

I do find this kind of distorted argument as to why some particular horrible event supports some loud-mouthed journalist's personal bugbears decidedly annoying.

Conflating all Syrian opposition to Assad with al-Qaeda seems the sort of political mistake that would only be made by someone incapable of getting over the naive belief that a war has two sides.

[kladner]

Chalmers Johnson

The Blowback Series

"Blowback" is sometimes described as "The Law of Unintended Consequences." I have the horrible feeling that perhaps some of these consequences are intended by the evil people like the Dulles brothers, Kermit Roosevelt, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the whole Neocon Cabal who set a great deal of this horror in motion. This would fit with the Repercussions section of Shedlock's list.

[kladner]

Just to be clear, I am horrified and appalled by ALL acts of violence by whatever actors. One still must ask how these things come to be.

[only_human]

Originally Posted by kladner

Chalmers Johnson

The Blowback Series

"Blowback" is sometimes described as "The Law of Unintended Consequences." I have the horrible feeling that perhaps some of these consequences are intended by the evil people like the Dulles brothers, Kermit Roosevelt, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the whole Neocon Cabal who set a great deal of this horror in motion. This would fit with the Repercussions section of Shedlock's list.

This idea that horrible policies get rammed through after disasters has been influential to my thinking: Naomi Klein: #The Shock Doctrine

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[tha]

Originally Posted by ewmayer

Nasty bit of business, no doubt. But one cannot look at these atrocities in a vacuum...:

Uhm, yes. But I would follow a very different path in doing the blame game. The troubles in Iraq did not start when G.W. Bush invaded Iraq lead by a peace loving Saddam Hussein and split up the country in a Shi'ite and a Sunni part. Troubles started when Iran invaded Iraq and were able to prevent a build up of anything resembling a country with internal freedom. About 50.000 Iranian forces followed the US forces by about 48 hours and imposed their will upon the local population.

Islamic State came into existence long after Barack Obama had taken office and had implemented his policies which failed dramatically in about each and every country, e.g. Turkey, Egypt, Saudi-Arabia, Israel, Syria, Libya. When the Sunni people and leaders of Iraq figured out they would be governed by the ayatollahs in Teheran and the US and Europe were happy to leave it that way and would be happy to grant Teheran with pretty much total control over the entire Middle-East, they formed IS and decided to confront this Teheran-Washington DC axis.

Take a look back at WW2. The popular view is that we allies won against Nazi Germany. A better view in my opinion would be that Stalin won the three party war, Hitler lost, and the West had to put up with a Cold War that lasted 40 years and resulted in dozens of local hot wars in which millions of people died.

We can only get the Middle East to a functional region if we confront both the ayatollahs in Teheran AND Islamic State.

[chalsall]

Originally Posted by tha

We can only get the Middle East to a functional region if we confront both the ayatollahs in Teheran AND Islamic State.

With the deepest of respect, "confront" is quite different than "engage".

If I May, many of my very best friends are Muslim. Several other very good friends are Christians, Atheists and Agnostics et al.

I would trust my life to any of them without a millisecond's thought.

The sad part is that religion is being used to divide.

IMO, for profit....

[kladner]

Originally Posted by only_human

This idea that horrible policies get rammed through after disasters has been influential to my thinking: Naomi Klein: #The Shock Doctrine

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I never made it through Shock Doctrine. It made too much awful sense.

[LaurV]

Originally Posted by chalsall

If I May, many of my very best friends are Muslim. Several other very good friends are Christians, Atheists and Agnostics et al.
I would trust my life to any of them without a millisecond's thought.
The sad part is that religion is being used to divide.
IMO, for profit....

Totally agree here.
Some of my best friends are Christians, some Buddhist, many Atheist/Agnostics.
I have Muslim and Hindu colleagues at work. There is nothing bad with them or with their beliefs.
Some are better persons than myself.

[kladner]

Paris (France, not the one in Texas)

[SNARK]In Paris, TX, half of the casualties would have been from the locals wildly firing their own assault weapons, and hitting who knows who.[/SNARK]