Warning: Political post/Middle East Crisis [Archive]

DaveM

08-05-2006, 02:30 AM

We were all brought up as children with the admonition: "violence never solves anything". I fear that the situation in the Middle East will be "solved" by violence, and that the solution will be one that no one, save for the military victor, will want.

Whatever one may say about the likes of Saddam Hussein, his iron fist put a halt to the sort of factional fighting which is steadily turning Iraq into one huge mass grave. My guess is that it will take someone more or less like him to put a stop to it again. A more benign dictator may arise, but I have little doubt that it will be a dictator nonetheless.

As to the situation involving Lebanon and Israel, it will never be resolved on more than a temporary basis until the United States and several other nations stop regarding the nation of Israel as above reproach. Hezbollah (which is by no means a sovereign nation or under the sovereignty of Lebanon) kills three Israelis--Israel responds by killing 900 Lebanese, most if not all of them civilians. At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, I do recall a certain nation which adopted such policies during WWII....

Above all else, it is not our war. We entered Iraq on a lie about "weapons of mass destruction" alleged to be under the control of Al-Qaeda there, then we were there to remove Saddam Hussein and "bring democracy" to Iraq. Never, to my knowledge, were our troops charged with the virtually impossible mission of attempting to keep several giants from clashing. It's not going to happen. Fighting has been more or less continuous between the same or similar factions for over 6000 years. Matters are not going to change simply because American troops have been thrown into the mix.

I say we bring everybody home, put the money currently being spent on the war into developing energy independence for this country, and let the Middle East go to hell--or wherever it wants to go. Should we be attacked by forces in the Middle East, we will defend ourselves, but I think it likely that anti-American sentiments over there will decline significantly if we stop stirring the hornet's nest and adopt the seemingly unthinkable notion that the nations of that area have the same right to sovereignty that we do.

Once upon a time I would have added that we should provide the Iraqi government (such as it is) with money to rebuild all of the infrastructure our military blew to hell. As citizens of that country continue to destroy things on their own at an increasing pace, they have forfeited the right to any compensation.

A popular saying of some years ago proclaimed: "NO BLOOD FOR OIL". Well, we've shed plenty of blood over there and, as anyone who drives a car knows all too well, oil prices have only gone up and continue to do so. Oil is now out of the equation. The question we should truly be asking is whether blood for sand is a fair exchange. Because that is the war we are fighting now. It is the only one that is left. And there is plenty of sand that those who live on it will always consider far more worthy of fighting for than any foreign soldier trying to stop those who are fighting to defend their sand.

Bring our people home and if everything collapses over there, let's do what we can to insure that it does not affect us significantly. It is not our fight, and if the various warring factions over there are able to produce only chaos, they will have brought it on themselves.

Dee

08-05-2006, 05:01 AM

I'm more concerned, disturbed actually, about my own government's position on this.

There can never be peace as long as neither side of a conflict wants it - which after 46 years on this planet it is clear to me they do not.

How many generations in the Middle East have now come (and gone) since Israel was established? Children raised to hate "the enemy" with a sickening intensity.

Cease-fires are meaningless in the face of that much hate.

No, I don't believe there will ever be peace in the Middle East.

My two coins.

david uk

08-05-2006, 06:25 AM

we cannot just pull out of the Middle East since we are supplying many of the weapons that are being used there... a bit hypocritical of the US and the UK to ask for the ceasefire to be delayed yet at the same time continue to sell arms to one side of he conflict whilst condemning syria and Iran for selling arms to the other.

For me the French solution is the most realistic... stop the killing now, sort out the peace afterwards.

Amy in Vermont

08-05-2006, 07:32 AM

I am strongly anti-war, no matter where or who.

I think we were wrong to go into Iraq and Afghanistan. I beleive that Iraq is clearly on the verge of civil war and we should get out as fast as we can.

I am very conflicted about the Israel situation. As an American Jew, I support Israel's right to exist and to defend itself. As a pacifist, I ahbor the violence regardless of the reason, and I think they may have over reacted this time.

Any time the deep hatred that Dee so succinctly described is at the root of the violence, there will be no victors and no end.

As Westerners, most of us have no concept of the depth of the religious ardor that underlies these conflicts. It is beyond our sphere of comprehension. We are dealing with:

People who will fly airplanes into buildings with no regard for their own life or the lives of others. The are doing it in the name of their god and are considered martyrs.

Men who are making sure they have ritually and physically cleansed themselves before they blow themselves up. This way, when the get to heaven, which they surely will because they are martyrs, they will be clean for their encounter with the 72 virgins that their religion says will greet them at the pearly gates.

A man who's son had been killed. He was an Arab, living in Israel. His young son had been killed by a Hesbollah rocket. He did not weep on camera. He proclaimed his son a martyr and declared his support for Hesbollah, on camera, for the world to hear.
There is another dimension to these conflicts that I think many people miss. It is the reason why diplomacy, particularly the efforts of the United Nations, are doomed to fail. We are dealing with non-governmental entities. They have no stake in playing by "the rules of engagement". Hesbollah, Al-Queda, Taliban... they are independent entities with nothing to lose and much to gain. We can make all the demands we want of other governments, but they do not control or even influence these groups. So Condy can fly back and forth across the ocean all she wants....the rest of the kids do not want to play fair in this sandbox!

I do not think its just about oil. Its also about ancient deep seated rage, cultural conflict, and hatred deeper than we can begin to fathom. There may never be a solution that everyone can live with.

Dee

08-05-2006, 07:42 AM

I do not think its just about oil. Its also about ancient deep seated rage, cultural conflict, and hatred deeper than we can begin to fathom. There may never be a solution that everyone can live with.

Tragically, that's how I see things too Amy.

Melba

08-05-2006, 07:42 AM

DaveM....I wholeheartedly agree. Especially after I saw those protests in support of Hezbollah in Baghdad yesterday. I truly believe Iraq is on the verge of a civil war. Lets drop it and run and work on our own messes. On the other hand, the President has already shown us that natural disasters on our own soil are not important enough of a cause.

Amy.....I am against war too, but there are plenty of those who are for it, and as long as there are, there will be wars.....unfortunately. And our lovely President is also among those who have no clue at the depth of hatred and religious ardor either...that is the scariest thing of all. I believe Condi knows her job and is good at it, but again we are dealing with those who don't answer to a government in the first place and she is fighting a losing battle.

Oak Kitten

08-05-2006, 09:13 AM

And our lovely President is also among those who have no clue at the depth of hatred and religious ardor either...that is the scariest thing of all.

Actually, GWB is just as blinded by his own warped religious ardor - remember - he truly believes that God is speaking directly to him and guiding him - that is why he is so @%#&ing inflexible and refuses to admit to making any mistakes. He is also counting on the political support of American fundamentalists of the Christian Right who are all in favor of this escalating this conflict, so it will bring about the Apocalypse and the the End Times so they can all go to Heaven.

I don't think I have ever been so pessimistic about the future as I am at present. The mess in the Middle East is truly intractable. The "best" possible outcome from this debacle as I can see it is that Americans finally learn a very hard lesson about the limits of military force. That lesson will come at the expense of our international reputation, which is already shot to hell. But there are also very real dangers out there that we are now in no position to address - such as the rise of a militant Islamist Iran led by a true madman and the proliferation of nuclear technology among states that will have no compunction about using it, namely Iran, North Korea, Pakistan.

Is there anything more absurd that watching the futility of the UN trying to negotiate a cease-fire which requires the permission of the belligerents, who are both bent on the total destruction of the other?

We cannot fight Islamist extremism in the same manner that we fought wars in the past against nation-states. It obviously does not and will not work. It will require a level of sophistication and international cooperation that is far beyond the capabilities of the current administration, utilizing the "weaponry" of "soft power," diplomacy, economics, education, etc. There are no quick fixes. But the problem is we are represented (I consciously did not use the term "led" because there are no leaders in our political establishment any more.) by politicians who are incapable of thinking of anything beyond the next election cycle and how they are going to keep themselves in office. They act on the advice of pollsters and political consultants, not on principle.

So there you have it, ladies and gentlemen, we have met the enemy, and it is us.

Oak

david uk

08-05-2006, 10:04 AM

So there you have it, ladies and gentlemen, we have met the enemy, and it is us.

Oak

well said

we really need to look at how our own behaviour has created and is creating much of what is happening now.
The US poured money into al Quaeda and Bin Laden for years calling him a "freedom fighter" until he turned against them, and then they suddenly called him a "terrorist".

The US (along with the British) supported the dictatorship of the Shah of Iran until he was deposed by a revolution and then we all then started clamouring for "democracy".

The US, UK and France continue to support brital regimes in Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states whilst going going about the need for democracy in other countries.

We created the state of Israel - probably the right thing to do at the time- but Israel has occupied land and turned people out of their homes and we now call those people "terrorists" for fighting back.

The US also installed and maintained brutal dictatorships in Latin America for decades, and now dare crtiticise Castro for doing the exact same thing they perpetuated in other countries for years.

One of my favourite folk singers... the Chilean Victor Jara had his hands cut off and was subsequently excecuted on 9/11,,,, not in 2001 but on the same date in 1973 by the US backed Pinochet regime. Imagine if that hapened to our Janis, simply for singing what she felt...

I am not taking any sides here and hope I have not offended anyone, but I think a lot of what is now happening is of our own making, so we need to stick in there and help sort it out.

I cry for all victims on every side of this conflict, not only for our own soldiers

peace.

ps I hope the new French-US initiative works out

david uk

08-05-2006, 11:23 AM

"Bring our people home and if everything collapses over there, let's do what we can to insure that it does not affect us significantly. It is not our fight, and if the various warring factions over there are able to produce only chaos, they will have brought it on themselves." Dave M

But Dave, the country of Iraq itself is an artificial creation, created by the western powers decades ago against the will of the local people.... we can just leave them to it, but again I do feel we largely created the situation.

DaveM

08-05-2006, 02:23 PM

I quite agree, David--we did the same thing with the Shah of Iran, who became a celebrity while maintaining policies that made Saddam Hussein look like an amateur. When he was deposed by people who couldn't stand him any more....his successor immediately became "the bad guys". Much of that, of course, was about the oil.

I, too, can remember when the Taliban were "Freedom Fighters" because they were opposed to the Big Bad Russians. We sent them money, arms, and pretty much anything else they asked for. What a wonderful foreign policy coup that turned out to be!

The factional fighting currently growing in the Middle East is not about oil. Were it not for the oil, however, the United States would not be meddling with matters over there. As things stand, out various interventions virtually insure that authorities will eventually come to power which will be intensely (and justifiably) anti-American and we just might lose access to the oil anyway. So....let's leave matters alone and if need be, eventually set up diplomatic relations with the last man standing. Meanwhile, we really don't need to go any further into debt with the Chinese, which is how the war is currently being financed.

I believe it important to separate Judaism from the State of Israel. Judaism is a religion and a set of traditions dating back thousands of years. "Jews" are both those who practice Judaism and in large part an ethnic group. Israel is a nominally secular nation founded in 1948, the majority of whose citizens are Jewish. Judaism flourished long before the establishment of the state of Israel. It will flourish long after the current State of Israel is forgotten (and probably radioactive) dust. No other nation, to my knowledge, claims immunity from criticism on the grounds that criticizing its policies is racist. The United States has no problem criticizing nations which have Moslem governments and citizens, Christian governments and citizens, and any other variation to be found worldwide. Yet when Israel talks like a fascist government and walks like a fascist government....

Every religion has fanatics who adopt portions of its tenets to the point of delusion. A growing number of "Christians" in this country see nothing wrong with bombing abortion clinics, shooting doctors, blocking scientific research that could save countless lives, and attempting to control the types of medicine your doctor can prescribe. A significant faction believe that current events in the Middle East are the beginnings of Armageddon (far from the first time they've done so) and are busy waiting to be "raptured" (a concept drawn from a 1909 Scofield Reference Bible annotation and not even Biblical in origin).

Personally, I wish they'd just get it over with. The world would undoubtedly be a happier place.

david uk

08-05-2006, 03:52 PM

Dave, I think we are basically in agreement.

Oak Kitten

08-05-2006, 03:56 PM

marjan

08-05-2006, 04:02 PM

I think the country of Israel started years ago with some doubtable points.
They begun and still are trying to establish this, that Israel is only for jews.
That would make them the only country in the world that is trying to get a state were only jews are living in. It remembers me to South Africa who tried to do the same thing, and they failed. It seems to me that the only thing and maybe the most important thing to do, is to realize there will be living people in their country that has other believes, etc. then they have. And that Israel is a multi cultural country as there is everywhere else in this world.

Lily

08-05-2006, 11:14 PM

Marjan, you have a huge mistake on your hands! Israel is a Jewish state, but it NEVER claimed to be ONLY for Jews!
In fact the majority of Arab population that carries Israeli citizenship and have ALL of the rights as any Israeli Jew does but not the obligation of serving in the army ( the hardest of our citizenship duties) WAS "force fed" the citizenship at the time... Well ,that is a whole different story all together.

Lily

P.S. to your knowledge at least 20% of Israeli population ( yes, those who carry the citizenship) are not Jewish and never had anything to do with the Jews - from various Slavic nationalities to Chechen and everything in between. Proud and equal citizens of the Jewish State. I have Druz, Ukrainian, Romanian, Chechen friends - NEVER did they raise any issues with discrimination or any such thing. My Druz friend was a captain in Border Police Unit, serving side by side with us, my Ukrainian friend is chemist engineer at the most prestigious Israeli pharmaceutical firm Teva, the Romanian- the leading clarinet in Jerusalem Symphonic Orchestra, etc.... Those people ACCEPT the fact that they are the citizen of the Jewish State and don't strive to the distraction of it.
The most important thing is that they have their own countries but are content to live in Israel. That is not the case with Palestinians, do you know?! It is has been made for us since day 1 of our Independence a War of Survival - either them or us. I am willing , as time consuming, as it might be, to provide all historical support facts to my statements.
We have NEVER BEEN presented with any other choice unfortunately but we are still hopeful, and as ware as Israel is of it's wars and dangerous existence it is not desperate to the point of a SUICIDE.

Lily

08-05-2006, 11:18 PM

Where does that come from?! As a Jew that lost part of the family to concentration camps, and as a proud civilized Israeli, statements like that make me think that the person either doesn't know the meaning of the Fascism or being intentionally anti-semitic

DaveM

08-06-2006, 02:18 AM

And here we have the inevitable race card being drawn.

If you will consult a good dictionary, you will find that fascism is defined as: "A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism". The term was invented by the Italians, who drew on the word "fasces", referring to bundles of sticks used ceremonially (there are two on the back of the U.S. dime) and obliquely, to the tendency of Fascist thugs to club the heck out of everyone they disagreed with.

Yes, Nazi Germany was a Fascist government. However, there were Fascist governments long before the Nazis and have been many since. Spain under Franco would be a good example, so would Nicaragua under Somoza and Argentina under Juan Peron. At present, the United States is adopting some ominously fascist policies.

I did not mean to, and never would, attempt to belittle the Holocaust or the tragedies of those who lost families in the Nazi concentration camps. Neither do I excuse the "refugee camps" currently crammed with Palestinian Arabs, who live in subhuman conditions simply because they do not belong to the "master race" (yes, I'm deliberately being harsh).

George Santayana, in a line which has unfortunately become cliche, wrote of the Holocaust that "those who will not remember history are condemned to repeat it". A number of present-day nations, including our own, are in serious need of some remembrance just now. Because that unutterably horrible bit of history to which Santayana referred has been repeated time and time again--in the Soviet Union, in South Africa (where the British invented concentration camps during the Boer war c. 1901), in Bosnia-Herzegovnia, in Bangladesh, in Sri Lanka, in Rwanda, in Sudan, in China. During WWII the United States "interned" hundreds of thousands of Japanese-Americans, though admittedly, they were most certainly not sent to extermination camps.

Everybody's favorite government contractor, Halliburton, is currently constructing "detention centers" throughout the United States. The first phase of the project will provide space to "detain" 450,000 people. Apologists for this state that the camps will be "only" for illegal immigrants, presumably Hispanics (wanna bet?). Once again a not yet self-proclaimed Master Race prepares to reduce another to the status of Untermenschen.

The longer nations deny that such things go on, the longer we will be condemned to repeat them. Mind, when a Hispanic man, woman, or family shows up at my door with the Department of Homeland Security on their tail, they will find refuge at my house. Because I remember.

marjan

08-06-2006, 07:39 AM

Sorry Lily, but I was referring to an article that I just read yesterday written by Anders Strindberg who works for Jane's Intelligence Review.
And what he said in it made sence to me. Here is the link to the article
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article14323.htm

hoops

08-06-2006, 10:06 AM

religion is so much deeper than politics, but polictics is lead by religion or a lack there of. separation of church and state is an impossible thing to ask. we have all heard at one point or anothor in our lives that it's " an eye for an eye" and whether or not we truly believed that is what has shaped us has human beings, as individuals, but not as religious people. it is our religious , and i hate to use this phrase, but i can't think of another right now, scape goat. it is what let's us forget that we are going against everything we say we believe because somewhere in our teaching we have learned that it has been said that we can in the books we call holy. Sad to say these books have always been called holy and infailible thought they have proven over and over their utter failibility. tho it may be true that the word came from whatever you would like to call God, it is human beings who have interpreted the word and written it down for us to see. while God's word may be perfect, the intereptation has been imperfect and has been slightly differecnt form culture to culture in order to fit their needs. Yet we still need to feel the perfection of the word so that we may justify our actions.
what does all this have to do with the middle east situation? what does it have to do with the american part of the war? What so it have to do with the attainment of peace? aboslolutly everything. should we americans get out now? i wish we could, but we have made a giant mess that needs cleaning up. thing is, in order to start cleaning up we need to put down our weapons. but no one wants to do that. to me it is that endless spiral, that catch 22. the one hope we do have is the next generation, we can teach them better ways, we can teach them not only tolerance but acceptance, forgiveness and love. thought we have never known peace, we can teach them the ways to peace because we have experienced the ways in which peace cannot be reached. we can teach them to understand that we have made mistakes, terrible mistakes and how to avoid them in the future and how to atone for them now.
peace
hoops

Dee

08-06-2006, 12:54 PM

I'm more inclined to go with Gandhi who said, "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind."

DaveM

08-06-2006, 02:17 PM

Very well, and most succinctly, put, Dee.

hoops

08-06-2006, 04:45 PM

i agree with the both of you. i am a pacifist and i like this one too, slightly paraphrased: it is in the moment that one chooses to fight that one has lost

peace
hoops

DaveM

08-06-2006, 05:57 PM

Hoops--you allow me to recount a story that was related to me by a friend who spent some time in China. While wandering somewhere with his guide, he came upon two cab drivers screaming at each other over something or other. Whatever it was, both were purple in the face over it and hurling every manner of invective at each other.

My friend expected a fight to break out at any moment and suggested that they move on rather than get caught up in something. His guide only smiled, and said. "The one to strike the first blow will be the one whose ideas have run out".

janisian

08-06-2006, 09:10 PM

Dee, great quote from Gandhi!
DaveM, ditto great quote.
You know what amazes me? None of these people seem to realize that if they'd been born into different families, they'd be Jews/Arabs/whatever, and feel just as strongly.
I've rarely met anyone who said "Oh yeah, if I'd been born into a Jewish or Muslim family I'd definitely have become a fundamentalist Christian." Or "Oh yeah, if I'd been born into a fundamentalist Christian family I'd definitely have become a Muslim."
It amazes me that people can fight for generations over things that are, after all, just cultural pre-conditioning, and have so little to do with who we really are - or should strive to be...
That being said, I had a really good time a few months ago reading Leon Uris' "Exodus" AND "The Haj". Though his bias is evident through both, I sure learned a lot about both cultures. Highly recommend for anyone trying to understand this, because at the end of the day, you can blame the US, or Russia, or Syria -- but the Arab problem seems to also come down to the sheiks, the incredible, immense amounts of wealth they've accumulated and never distributed, and the fact that it's much, much easier to control an illiterate population through fear than it is through education.

DaveM

08-06-2006, 11:40 PM

I entirely agree. Belief, one might say, is a culture-bound syndrome.

It is sad that the fastest and easiest way to manipulate a nation's people is through fear. But it is the standard tool of the dictator and one need only look at the "national terror alert level" reports that accompany many newscasts to see how well George Bush & Co. have used it.

Lost in the short term planning of such authoritarians is that fact that no people will remain slaves forever, regardless of individual beliefs. Ideology lasts only so long when one's stomach is empty or one's relatives are disappearing. Just as a whipped dog will eventually turn and bite, so a people under the thumb of an oppressive regime will eventually either rebel or simply cease to function (Soviet Russia became a masterwork of industrial non-production, likely because workers decided there was little point in giving their best to a system which would never reward them for it). Consequently, dictators tend to fall and rise rather quickly. Unfortunately, all too often they are merely replaced by new dictators with a new set of slogans

Dee

08-07-2006, 02:00 AM

david uk

08-07-2006, 07:00 AM

I second that Dee, or should I say Janis:p

Melba

08-07-2006, 07:39 AM

It amazes me that people can fight for generations over things that are, after all, just cultural pre-conditioning, and have so little to do with who we really are - or should strive to be...

I watch this stuff on the news and think "where is this going?" I dont' stress out too much because there isn't anything I can do about it, but I wonder about the impact on all of us. I especially feel sad for those displaced citizens who felt they had to flee their own homes. They certainly are not being allowed to stive to anything. Not to mention the innocent civilians already killed. Its certainly gotten a lot of people I know talking about Revelations. Of course none of us knows for sure when the end will be........

Robert the Bard

08-07-2006, 07:43 AM

Hmmm, I seem to find myself in the minority, to some extent, however, I'm never one to duck and cover...:eek:

Do I agree with the policies of the current administration? Not entirely, no. However, in the wake of 9/11, I wholeheartedly supported what was being done. The business in Iraq is wearing way thin with me, but I'm not totally convinced that we shouldn't have gone there anyway. Yes, we created Osama, to a large extent, and it should fall to us to destroy him. The thing that really amazed me was the vehemence with which we approached the response to 9/11. These kinds of attacks have been going on around the world since I can remember, and at 43, I can usually remember quite a bit. Yet the US didn't think to get involved on this scale, or call for the world to get involved either. It was all good while it was somebody else's problem. The thing is, it's not just somebody else's problem any more. It's our problem too.

RedjackRyan

08-07-2006, 08:10 AM

Its a small club, Robert, but welcome to it. Like you, i don't agree with all of this administrations policies, but i do believe that the removal of Saddam Hussein and the destruction of Al-Queda are two things that needed to happen ten years ago.

People expect instant results, unfortunately this is a war the likes of which no one has fought before. There is no CLEARLY defined enemy, the enemy isn't wearing a uniform, doesn't march in a straight line, and could be anyone anywhere at anytime. The enemy doesn't want money, land, food, or power.. the enemy simply wants anyone who does not believe the religious doctrine he does, Dead.

As Americans, we're not used to that ideology.. we think that if only we can sit down with these people and talk, it will all be alright. Israel understands however.

david uk

08-07-2006, 09:00 AM

yes Ben I agree, but why did the US (and the UK and France) fund these people in the first place?

RedjackRyan

08-07-2006, 09:34 AM

I think it was a lesser of the evils kind of thing, David. At least in my opinion, at the time the US, France, UK and others were backing Hussein it was for the purposes of stabilizing the region. I'd like to think that had anyone really known what type of person Hussein was, they wouldn't have chosen to back him, but thats speculative. For a time, the region was relatively stable..it wasn't until Hussein began trying to extend his power that those who had backed him had second thoughts. I imagine its much the same with Bin Laden and others, for whatever reasons they were the lesser evil at one time and by backing them, it temporarily kept things from spinning out of control as it is doing now.

I sympathize with those that say 'pull our troops out now' as despite my armchair general wishes, I'm a peaceful person by nature, However, i can't back that sentiment. Pulling the troops out en-masse will send the wrong message to those who wish to do us harm. It will tell them that if they draw things out long enough and can inflict enough hurt on our troops that we'll lose our nerve and back off. Thats something that we absolutely cannot allow. That said, I'm all for whatever means ends this conflict as quickly as possible and renders the terrorist elements either completely destroyed, or extremely reluctant to tangle with us again.

Hopefully future administrations will learn a thing or two by looking back over the decisions that brought us to this point, and i mean go back 20 years at least to see what led up to the Iraq, Afghanistan,and Israeli/palestinian conflicts... and take that knowledge to heart...and vow to not repeat the same mistakes.

Oak Kitten

08-07-2006, 04:05 PM

at the end of the day, you can blame the US, or Russia, or Syria -- but the Arab problem seems to also come down to the sheiks, the incredible, immense amounts of wealth they've accumulated and never distributed, and the fact that it's much, much easier to control an illiterate population through fear than it is through education.

BINGO. We (the Western powers) are reaping the "benefits" of several decades of Realpolitik which emphasized pursuing our own political (anti-Communist) or economic interests at the expense of the people in those countries whose corrupt authoritarian regimes we propped up, while paying lip service to the ideals of democracy and liberty. That long history of hypocrisy has played a major role in creating the armies of Islamist militants around the globe - and at home as well, who are hell-bent on our annihilation.

Of course, the leaders of those countries are equally if not more to blame for the corrupt kleptocracies they've perpetuated, with our help.

As John Adams said, "To expect self-denial from men, when they have the majority in their favor and consequently the power to gratify themselves, is to disbeleive history and . . . the Word of God, which informs us that the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked."

I never thought I'd find myself spouting Calvinist theology, but it sure fits in this case. My own pagan corrollary to the above is that since God is also a creation of the human heart, he/she/it is also deceitful and desperately wicked, especially when invoked by anyone to justify the atrocities we are seeing on a daily basis on all sides.

While all the leaders of the various states take turns blaming each other, we are on the brink of a Third World War, that I think it is inevitable. There are some big bad-ass chickens coming home to roost, and all of us are going to pay the price eventually, and we won't be able to switch it off or tune it out.

(Sorry for the excess of mixed metaphors at the end.)

Oak

Amy in Vermont

08-07-2006, 08:40 PM

In the end, the hopelessness of the whole mess makes me deeply sad. I am someone who tries to see the good in each person I encounter. I know there are innocent people on all sides being killed and scarred for life. It touches me deep down in side and nudges my inner comfort level aside for a moment. Then it awakens a feeling of powerlessness that I am sure pales by comparison to that of the victims of the war.

Bat

08-07-2006, 10:24 PM

Some of those victims of war are the little boys who are being taught lies that they are told are true, distorted views of Islam, and being raised to be cannon fodder and human bombs...sometimes I think it's a mercy for all concerned that they are taken young and fast.

DaveM

08-08-2006, 01:39 AM

I'm not sure how wealthy the various sheiks were before oil was discovered--prior to that, I believe the major export from the Middle East was dried dates. Not exactly a generator of wealth. They do keep one regular, however.

I don't know who first discovered oil in the Middle East, but the concern first responsible for large-scale exploration and exploitation of the resource was ARAMCO (the Arab-American Company), a joint American/British/Saudi venture. That eventually made the sheiks rich, while significant numbers of Middle Eastern countries were still living a nomadic existence via camel train. For that matter, some still are, just as some Americans still live in the present-day equivalent to "hobo jungles".

A local rummage sale recently yielded a quite spooky book (yet another reminder that some strange folks have lived around here): "Polish Atrocities Against The German Minority In Poland", a 1940 English translation of a book by the same title which was published simultaneously in Germany. Distributed while the U.S. was still neutral as far as World War II was concerned, this presents, in beautifully-crafted detail, the Reichspropaganda Ministry's contention that Poland started World War II and that Germany only sent troops into Poland as part of a "rescue mission", Liberally illustrated with photographs and "personal accounts", it would be very easy to believe, and I cannot help but wonder how many people did (or still do).

I could only handle reading a few pages, but believe that material of this sort ought to be required reading for anyone with enough knowledge of its origin and context to "consider the source" and recognize it for what it is. Those who have been in the habit of believing everything they read just might start learning better.