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Metallix does bring up a valid point, despite the fact that we really were playing into his hands. But it is awfully easy, and this guy shows inklings of it, to frame things in a context that makes them look favorable towards what Bin Laden wants. Nevertheless, I think the guy's overall point is dead on.
Good read!
I like how he tied into this the eastern philosophy of how opposites perpetuate each others existence.
Which brings me to my next point. The opposite of Bin Laden, Bush was not covered so well in this particular article.
See they both stand to gain from this. Bin Laden gets his recruits, and Bush gets absolute power over the United States. It is really amazing me, how the deeper I dig into this, the more and more similarities I find between Bush and fascists.
If Bin Laden is trying to bankrupt america, this may actually play into Bush's hands as well. Because when the Nazi Party took over Germany, the government was bankrupt and they merged the government with their own private industries. This is actually the definition of fascism, the merger of state and corporate power.
Also consider that Bush may be purposely keeping the economy weak in order to wipe out less resilient, smaller competitors.... after all, large corporations don't like competitors. And the only ones really making any money is a handful of oil companies and defense companies. All indeliably linked to one another.
Our government is so bankrupt right now that China is essentially buying the government by purchasing US bonds. What is the meaning of this? I don't know. And what affect will this have on China if our government is abolished and replaced by a corpo-state?
And if the US does go bankrupt (with the exception of some corporations) then we will all be very, very hard up. They could institute the draft and I think alot of people would run with it cause they would blame the terrorists and we ALL just want our lively hoods back. In fact, the bankruptcy of the US could feasibly collapse the entire worlds economies by losing our bountiful consumer base.... so if all the money and power is being consolidated into a handful of corporations, this could leave many countries weak to usurpation and complete takeover.... Essentially the only powers left in the world would be states and military powers.... This could get very damn ugly.
I do however think that communists countries would fare better during economic collapse, so this may actually put them in a better position.
Ugh.... wtf is wrong with people
"The TSOG stalketh the land and the serfs bow and worship it. It stealeth property, it burneth neighborhoods, it foully killeth all opposition. Ye think it only doth its violence to black people, or Hispanics, or kooks with odd religions, but its hand is at your own throat even now. TSOG fthagn! What--are ye stupid, or something?"
--Abdul Alhazred, The TSOGonomicon
i'm not convinced that bin laden wants to return to the caliphate.
while the idea of a central muslim leader is not a novel one, and may seem like a good idea to some devout muslims or some terrorists, i sort of think this guy's aims are more political in nature.
duh you say, the caliphate would be a political figurehead.
ok, but who would be the person to unite all the divisions in the muslim religion?
there are many factions. and i personally, don't see the sunnis and the shi'ites joining hands because of a caliphate.
i sort of think that the guy has a slightly more immediate goal of sparking a "clash of civilizations" because he thinks that the modern age ushered in by the united states is inherently amoral and destructive.
a full scale invasion like this one just alienates us more and more.
between this and the timely demise of yassir arafat, these are the makings of a world war.
not a surprise to me, that someone who pays attention to history would know how to provoke the united states into an attack (and that we'd just overdo it as usual until we made a fucking madman like hussein look like the innocent one)..it only took a year or so to squander all the sympathy 9.11 dredged up.
..we're the proverbial beyotch: just give us enough rope, and we'll hang ourselves.
It is interesting because he does seem to be more political. Even though this is entirely different from terrorism in the form of isolated cells that can operate alone without leadership.
One thing though is that WE have succeeded in uniting Sunni and Shiite muslims by presenting them a common enemy. This is the very same mentality that is pervading through the middle east.... everyone thinks we are some kind of godless heathens who are only out to get their resources and exploit them and disrespect them and their religion. The stronger this ideology becomes among the average muslim, the more unified they become. And Osama could serve as a sort of figurehead, or symbol of this movement, however disparate and unlikely it may seem.
Yes this is all extremely fucked.
"The TSOG stalketh the land and the serfs bow and worship it. It stealeth property, it burneth neighborhoods, it foully killeth all opposition. Ye think it only doth its violence to black people, or Hispanics, or kooks with odd religions, but its hand is at your own throat even now. TSOG fthagn! What--are ye stupid, or something?"
--Abdul Alhazred, The TSOGonomicon
I swear PMB and I read all the same websites. I read this article this morning while I was supposed to be typing some shit into Microsoft Excel for my stupid, mind numbing computer applications class.
There are a lot of parallels to be drawn between the United States at its current moment and the great empires of the past. We're spreading our military too thin fighting a new kind of foe that doesn't operate under the same rules of war that we do.
Sounds like the Revolutionary war to me (note: I am in no way conflating Bin Laden and George Washington, I'm just making a damn analogy). While Britain was busy fighting France, the Continental Army was hiding out behind trees and sniping the marching troops and killing officers on the battlefield (unheard of at the time). History repeats itself.
I don't think Bin Laden wants to create a unified muslim state accross the middle east and south asia. I do think that he wants the United States and Israel out of the region, and especially the holy lands (the USA has bases in Saudi Arabia, a big point of contention in the region). I also think that they (al Quaeda and their allies) will stop at almost nothing to reach that goal.
In this sense it's like Vietnam. We can win all the battles but still be bled by the insurgents until we're damn well ready to go home.
...thanks for the post...as a lot of people have said, this is not a new perspective for a lot of us, but it is good to hear someone else say it...
...the first mistake the us made in the 'war on terror' (...aside from declaring war on an idea, which is another discussion) was invading afghanistan...it was so obvious that that kind of reaction was exactly what was being prevoked...and not only that, it is an action that is completely futile...the taliban government was given an altimatem to either hand over osama bin laden or be invaded...this was an impossible task for them...while the taliban did have strong control of the capital and the immediate area, they had little to no control of the outer regions that were run by warlords, and absolutely no control of the mountainous region where al-queda resided...they couldn't have handed over osama if they wanted to...a fact we easily proved because after completely destroying the taliban forces in a little over two weeks, we weren't able to locate or capture osama either...
...part of me considers that possibly the real reason why afghanistan was taken over was becasue the taliban was finnally beginning to garnish enough power to control the war lords that controlled the opium trade...in fact, earlier that year, production from there trickled to a minnimum and the streets of london and the entire east coast of america had the largest heroin shortages in years...now tha the taliban is out, and the us backed government is in, production is at an alltime high...
...i have laways questioned the legitamicy of invading afghanistan...and i still see absolutely nothing that was gained from it except for one less muslim state in the world...
I too found it to be a very interesting read. No doubt, Bin Ladin is a pretty clever man, but he may just be too clever by half. I can see the two-opposites-working-together thing clearly, and to some extent I agree. I think, however, that we should carry the fight to Bin Ladin. Instead of artillery barrages and cruise missles, I think we should dry-gulch him at the first opportunity.
I think this entire episode will eventually take the cuffs off the CIA, and we are going to wind up with a much larger, much better funded CIA that is secretly permitted to go back into the black-bag "wet work" business, if they are not already so doing, as well as a much larger and more robust Special Operations Group.
We know about Abu Gharib, we know about Guantanamo Bay and Camp X-Ray. I think those are just for public consumption. You just gotta know that the CIA has secret prisons where the guards have got better sense than to take digital snapshots of their handiwork, and where interrogation has a rather more sinister bent than playing "stack the Iraqis" with naked guys.
I bet that Iraq is covered with field expedient cemetaries full of captured terrorists who were not readily forthcoming with some good information. It's pretty easy to dispose of bodies in a country where there is a war in progress. And unlike the clods that were arrested and tried for crimes at Abu Gharib, I think the CIA interrogators probably don't leave many traces.
It's just a matter of time until somebody reveals where Bin Laden can be found. When we locate him, he's history.
\"I\'d rather wake up in the middle of nowhere than any city on earth\" Steve McQueen
Originally posted by seeking@Nov 10 2004, 03:45 PM dude was not implying that bin laden had anything to do with the running of iraq, or that bin laden was some evil genius, just that as a whole, we were playing right into the hands of our enemy (who he chose to use bin laden as a figure head for). he gets a little liberal with his forays into detail, but at the base level, it's really not that far fetched at all. infact, since day one, there are several of us on here (steve austin, !@#$, browner, tesser, myself, etc) that have basically outlined the strategy that dude is flossing. certainly if a bunch of writers can forsee the makings of a world war, bin laden could too.
"The only way to stop them is to destroy their networks and leaders just like we did in Afghanistan."
we didn't really accomplish much of anything in afghanistan. the taliban still exists, as does bin laden. it's totally not over.
Seeking, i know the taliban still exists and one of the reasons why they still have a foundation is because we did a half-assed job. At first we did pretty well in executing our objectives but than blah shit went off course and not a word about Afghanistan. Bush's administration was more focused on personal issues rather than actually doing what they were suppose to be doing. Afghanistan could have been a success but we didn't do alot of things like actually rebuilding the country, securing its borders, containing suppressed militias and keeping pressure on Bin Laden.
what do you suggest we do to get out of the mess we're in??
you never killed a general you only touched a soldier...
I'm still trying to figure out who the enemy is....
"The TSOG stalketh the land and the serfs bow and worship it. It stealeth property, it burneth neighborhoods, it foully killeth all opposition. Ye think it only doth its violence to black people, or Hispanics, or kooks with odd religions, but its hand is at your own throat even now. TSOG fthagn! What--are ye stupid, or something?"
--Abdul Alhazred, The TSOGonomicon
porque,
opium production did not slow because the taliban cracked down on it, it slowed because we gave the taliban (i believe) 43 million dollars to 'suppliment' the income of the poppy farmers. that was in may of 01. a couple months later....kaboom.
right or wrong, we 'needed' to invade someplace, and all things considered, afghanistan was the obvious choice. for one, we knew bin laden was there, so it was an easy sell, and for two, the taliban is an easy target because virtually no one, even muslims, could really defend their rule. we 'save face' by killing some people and look like we're being tough not only on terrorists, but on foreign governments that harbor them. of course we chose the absolute weakest govt (and country) to flex in, so in reality it proved nothing.
what do i think we should do? who cares what i think? i cant decide if it bothers me that once you speak out on something, people expect you to have a viable answer, or if i think it's good to hold people accountable. personally, i think outrage is more important than answers (atleast from the masses). we don't need to know how to fix it, we just need to support those that do. of course we're dumb as shit and we support whoever hates fags the most, but still. even if i did have 'the' answer, the true 'right' answer, i'm still a graffiti writer and no one will care.
having said that, the 'answer' is easy. we do the only thing that is going to actually fix things. we form a 'collition' with countries who are trusted by the muslim world and we allow them to have a viable voice in the procedings. we stop acting in the interest of american companies, and we start acting in the interest of achieving peace and stability. there are definitely some extremist wackos over there who are caught up in some religious bullshit, and will fight us regardless, but they are the minority. most people over there just want to be happy (like everyone else). so start working to achieve that. we appoint new people, we start working on humanitarian campains, we focus on fixing the infastructure of iraq, the water, the electricity, etc. we do a bunch of shit that proves that we want to help iraq be a soverign country. just by doing that, we'll be taking the fire out from underneath the asses of discontent. look how easily we're passified over here? give us fucking wrestling and we're chilling. all we need to give them is clean water. if we stop playing the agressor, they can not get angry at our aggression, they'll relax, we'll build up iraq, we'll step out and let them handle their internal power struggle anyway they like. they'll still have their problems, but they will be there problems, and as ghandi said (in a much more apu like tone) a man would always rather work out his own problems than be forced into a decision.
ok, it wasnt really like that at all, but basically.
i need to go get breakfast. hopefully everything will be fixed by the time i get back.
look, we'll cross the "hesh accidentally shot himself in the ass" bridge when we come to it. no homo
*BLACK OUT POSSE*
I kinda sidestepped the question for the time being, but that is really what needs to happen. I'll second that seeks.
"The TSOG stalketh the land and the serfs bow and worship it. It stealeth property, it burneth neighborhoods, it foully killeth all opposition. Ye think it only doth its violence to black people, or Hispanics, or kooks with odd religions, but its hand is at your own throat even now. TSOG fthagn! What--are ye stupid, or something?"
--Abdul Alhazred, The TSOGonomicon
Are you saying that humanitarian causes are NOT going on Iraq? There's a shitload of good stuff being done over there. Unfortunately the US is not giving it the same priority as battling the insurgents. Plus, it's obviously not gonna show up in most mainstream media cause it doesn't excite anyone (ie: no advertising money), and it doesn't show up in most indy media cause it doesn't help the indy agenda. But it's not like we're there ONLY killing Iraqis and letting schools rot.
i know it is going on, but not nearly as quickly or as cost effectively as it could be. what's the one big example? the cement factory that an american company was given a $15,000,000 contract for, then dragged its feet for ever, so an iraqi company came in and did it for like $84,000?! if we were serious about rebuilding that country we could, easily. we just need to stop sending empty trucks back and forth across the dessert at the tax payers expense. shit is taking so long because it's good for haliburton's pocket. it's good for brown & whats his name. the longer it takes and the more dangerous it is, the more they make.
the problem is that we keep getting fed this shit about how unstable the region is and all the waring factions and we need to create stability before we can give it over. blah blah. as long as we're there as an occupying military presence, it will never be stable, period. so the sunnis and the shi'tes dont get along? what the fucks that got to do with me? let muslims argue with muslims about whatever the hell they want. we're ignoring genocide all over the world, yet somehow we can't bear to witness two equal sides fighting eachother? give me a break. every action we undertake just insures futher resistance. it's like the dr suess story of the east going zak and the west going zak. we need to recognizing that by going forward as we are, we will never reach our destination, but if we take a step to the side, we will have very little resistance. muslims are not going to pour in from syria to try and stop us from fixing the roads or stocking hospitals. so motherfuckers wanna have control of fallujah. ok, have it. place is a shit hole anyway. boom, no more dead soldiers, no more pissed off iraqi's. is it a 'unified' iraq? no, but you can't force unity, only the vague illusion of it. if we quit trying to forcibly control people, and instead raised their standard of living back to what it was when saddam was in power (with the added bonus of lack of fear of torture), what can they be mad about? that the west is invading their land and corrupting their values? ok, so lets stop. if they want to be controlling, let them be controlling. we dont allow gay people to 'officially' love eachother, who the fuck are we to tell anyone else about equality?!
if one group starts slaughtering another group, fine, we step in BEHIND a group of impartial countries and try to help them solve their differences.
basically, what it comes down to is that as long as we are there, they will fight us. they will not give up, ever. they have absolutely nothing to lose. we get all fucking queezy when we see a picture of a dead stranger. they carry dead and dismembered relatives around in their arms. they have an emotional investment in fighting us, we have nothing. we have 3000 dead americans, over 3 years ago. we have a leader who is a fucking retard, that 'we' just reelected, sending the absolute worst possible message to the world. look how we feel about sharon...the rest fo the world feels the same way about us.
i coudl go on forever i guess, but theres no point. i know we are doign humanitarian things, but i question how much of it is for the good of the iraqi people, and how much of it is for the good of swiss bank accounts.
look, we'll cross the "hesh accidentally shot himself in the ass" bridge when we come to it. no homo
*BLACK OUT POSSE*
im not saying pack up and leave, i'm saying we stop presenting ourselves as exactly what they already believe we are. we stop looking for 'terrorists' in a country that had virtually none before we invaded it, and we focus on building a socio-economic platform for them to handle their own business on.
at this point, no one wants to hear shit that america has to say. no one trusts us. hell, according to kabars figures, there are a million americans who are willing to fight america. how can we be surprised that they're not feeling us? we have to change that by action, not by media hype or empty promises. we have to bring in people they will trust, which means people that have been very critical of us. we have to prove we're serious about helping and not about controlling. it's the only way it will possibly work. you cant 'make' someone love you.
we also can't save every country from itself. there will always be civil wars, unrest and injustice. either we revamp the UN and give it actual power and authority, or we just walk away from it all. as it stands now though, our aid is dictated by our interest, not by the interest of humanity.
look, we'll cross the "hesh accidentally shot himself in the ass" bridge when we come to it. no homo
*BLACK OUT POSSE*
Good point seeks. 400 pages of documents have been released from the pentagon about how reconstruction funding has been misused and skimmed.
With a 70% unemployment rate, and people who have given up their farms because of the chaos, we have serious problems. I've heard plenty of stories about soldiers who give candy to kids and then they go tell their friends and all of a sudden mobs of them are all over you... and sometimes insurgents sneak up in the crowd, and BOW, they are dead. It is now illegal, at least in some units I know of, to give handouts. You will actually be punished for helping people.
You cannot ever gain stability OR popular support if people are simply struggling for survival, let alone independence, self esteem, vengeance or whatever.
I know we are doing alot of good over there. But it is too little too late. Handouts and schools are not going to keep the people pacified. Its like putting a bandaid on a missing limb. Give a man a fish, and he will eat for a day, teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime. Virtually the only jobs being created in Iraq are security jobs... and obviously that is very contraversial.
There are also alot of soldiers who are engineers and whatnot who are upset about not being able to do their jobs so much because of all the private contractors. Not to mention the money they recieve for doing the same thing we could do, or Iraqis could do to help the economy. So we do all this grunt work while the contractors get all the cush jobs. They are actually reclassing alot of people to MPs, Infantry, Truck drivers, etc.... They are even eliminating most of the support MOS' eventually. Rumsfeld wants EVERYONE to be a motherfucking grunt, because there is a cap on the population of the volunteer army. The Air Force and Navy are also letting people go, or directly putting them into the army.
There's a ton of shit going on but I guess you get the idea.
"The TSOG stalketh the land and the serfs bow and worship it. It stealeth property, it burneth neighborhoods, it foully killeth all opposition. Ye think it only doth its violence to black people, or Hispanics, or kooks with odd religions, but its hand is at your own throat even now. TSOG fthagn! What--are ye stupid, or something?"
--Abdul Alhazred, The TSOGonomicon
Question: Do you guys honestly think that focusing on the humanitarian issues and lessening the military activity will directly reduce insurgent activity? Do you have any shred of doubt that once we take things down a notch, the insurgency won't continue in search of a large (if not the whole) piece of the political pie in Iraq, and that things could end up worse (with the blame put on the US)?
*I hope you guys understand what I'm trying to do here... just wanna keep the discussion going out of the "complaint" realm, and into "answers" territory.
excuse my ignorance of american history, but wasnt it roosevelt who had the 'new deal' that brought us out of the depression by creating all the jobs programs?
iraq was not some island filled with grass huts. last i remember, baghdad was a 1st world city. they had doctors, lawyers, engineers, skilled labor, etc. they have all the manpower they need to rebuild their country, all they're lacking are the resources. instead of paying american construction workers 2grand a week, why dont we pay iraqi's 300? from my experiences, labor in places like that is equal to the quality in america, without the need for 80 billion safety laws governing it. why? because they're not lazy pieces of shit. there is no reason for ANY unemployment in iraq right now. there is so much work to be done, and so much money, everyone could be benefiting. ok, everyone but american corporations, which, call me heartless, can fuck off.
look, we'll cross the "hesh accidentally shot himself in the ass" bridge when we come to it. no homo
*BLACK OUT POSSE*
Well as stated earlier a stabilized economy would take alot of fire out of the ass of the insurgency. Not only that but with a stablized economy people will have greater incentive to preserve that stability and be less sympathetic to insurgents.
All of this is battle tested facts provided by the field manual "Insurgency and Counter-Insurgency". But Bush doesn't read so he wouldn't know.
"The TSOG stalketh the land and the serfs bow and worship it. It stealeth property, it burneth neighborhoods, it foully killeth all opposition. Ye think it only doth its violence to black people, or Hispanics, or kooks with odd religions, but its hand is at your own throat even now. TSOG fthagn! What--are ye stupid, or something?"
--Abdul Alhazred, The TSOGonomicon
Yes, but I am referring to the time it takes to reach that stabilized economy, which is a long way off. It's still very vulnerable for factions to rise up during that time.
mams,
dont sweat it, i know what you're doing, which is why ive bothered to give excessively long answers. sometimes it pisses me off that you dont just blindly agree, but by the time i get done writing my speech, i remember once again why you do it.
yes of course if we back off, for a short time, attacks against us will probably go up slightly, however, it stands to reason that the casualties we'd suffer as a result of stepping back would be no worse than those we'd incur as a result of pressing forward, and ultimately, would be far more 'productive' 'losses' if you will.
instead of just talking about 'insurgents' in some abstract way, think of them as what they are: a group of loose knit soldiers fighting their own personal war. now lets come up with a more tangible example: crips & bloods. (dont laugh).
9/10th's of gang members could give a shit less about 'territory', they were just born into the lifestyle. they care about revenge for their homeboys and surviving in a hostile environment. if they were given a viable alternative that they could understand and believe in, almost all of them would take it. this leaves 1% who actually believe in some insane notion of 'cripdom' or some shit, and will always be mad. iraqi insurgents are absolutely no different. most of them dont care about a 'pie', they just have nothing else to live for, so they get caught up in the need to feel empowered and important. in a country that fucked up, it makes total sense why dying for your brothers and countrymen is so appealing.
seeks/i've got all day
look, we'll cross the "hesh accidentally shot himself in the ass" bridge when we come to it. no homo
*BLACK OUT POSSE*
Originally posted by El Mamerro@Nov 11 2004, 11:24 AM Yes, but I am referring to the time it takes to reach that stabilized economy, which is a long way off. It's still very vulnerable for factions to rise up during that time.
thus far, all we've offered in the way of jobs is security, which seems to be getting them all killed and cant eb a very popular choice, yet still many of them are risking ostrization and death to feed their families. how about we start paying iraqi's to build roads? how about we pay them to clear debris from the cities, to renovate buildings, to fix sewer systems. it will take a while to create a stable economy, but the first step is creating ANY economy. an iraqi with no job and no way to support his family is a lot more likely to be angry than one who has a pay check and a respectable job that is serving his fellow iraqi's.
look, we'll cross the "hesh accidentally shot himself in the ass" bridge when we come to it. no homo
*BLACK OUT POSSE*
11-10-2004, 09:40 PM
11-10-2004, 10:14 PM
