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Did Saudi Arabia Just Clear The Way For An Invasion Of Syria And Iraq?
Did Saudi Arabia Just Clear The Way For An Invasion Of Syria And Iraq?
And now, a further turn for the absurd…
While it’s still far from common knowledge among the Western public that Washington’s closest allies in the Mid-East are funding, arming, and otherwise enabling the Sunni extremists (including ISIS) battling for control of Syria and working to destabilize Iraq, the massacre that unfolded earlier this month in San Bernardino has managed to focus some much needed attention on the role Saudi Arabia plays in promoting extremism.
As we noted in the immediate aftermath of the California mass shooting, the fact that Tashfeen Malik spent 25 years in Saudi Arabia living with a father who, according to family members who spoke to Reuters, adopted an increasingly hardline ideology as time went on, underscores the fact that the puritanical, ultra orthodox belief system promoted by the Saudis is poisonous. That’s not a critique of Islam. It’s a critique of Wahhabism and the effect it has on the minds of those who are inculcated by Saudi culture.
For years since 9/11, U.S. and Western officials have mostly looked the other way at all this ideological support for extremism: Saudi oil was just too important to the global economy, even though many of these Saudi petro-dollars were underwriting repression at home and the growth of Salafist fundamentalism abroad.This support for radicalism abroad should come as little surprise given that Islamic State is an ideological cousin of Saudi Arabia’s own state-sponsored extremist Wahhabi sect—which the country has spent more than $10 billion to promote worldwide through charitable organizations like the World Assembly of Muslim Youth. The country will continue to export extremism as long as it practices the same policies at home.
More, from “Saudi Arabia: An ISIS That Has Made It,” by Kamel Daoud:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Stage Is Set For The Syrian Invasion
The Stage Is Set For The Syrian Invasion
One week ago, when reporting on the latest bizarre plan presented by the Pentagon, namely providing Syrian rebels (but only the moderate ones, not the jihadists like al Nusra, or, well, ISIS) with B-1B Bomber air support in their attacks on ISIS, when we wrote that this “means in the coming weeks and months look forward to a surge in false flag “attacks” blamed on the Assad regime, aiming to give Obama validation to expand the “War against ISIS” to include Syria’s regime as well.”
We didn’t have long to wait: in an entirely unsourced Time article written today by Aryn Baker, the Middle East Bureau Chief, the stage for the second attempt at invading Assad regime is finally set.
The article, titled “Why Bashar Assad Won’t Fight ISIS” is essentially an essay that, as the title suggests “proves” that the Syrian leader is, in fact, quite close with ISIS and derives strategis benefits from his relationship, which is why he won’t attack them, and thus by implication is just as bad as ISIS and worthy of America’s wrath.
How does Baker build up her propaganda? First, she cits a “Sunni businessman who is close to the regime but wants to remain anonymous for fear of repercussions from both ISIS supporters and the regime” and who “trades goods all over the country so his drivers have regular interactions with ISIS supporters and members in Raqqa, the ISIS stronghold in Syria, and in ISIS-controlled areas like Dier-ezzor.” According to this Syrian version of Amazon:
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
Crude Conspiracies? Data Suggest Nations Do Go to War Over Oil
Crude Conspiracies? Data Suggest Nations Do Go to War Over Oil
The “thirst for oil” is often put forward as a near self-evident explanation behind military interventions in Libya, for instance, or Sudan. Oil, or the lack of oil, is also said to be behind the absence of intervention in Syria now and in Rwanda in 1994.
This of course clashes with the rhetoric around intervention, or its stated goal. No world leader stands before the UN and says they’re sending in the tanks because their country needs more oil. Such interventions are usually portrayed as serving directly non-economic goals such as preserving security
, supporting democratic values, or more generally promoting human rights.
But this is often met with scepticism and media claims that economicincentives played a key role. Was Iraq really “all about oil”? It’s worth asking whether this viewpoint has some mileage, or if it is instead purely conspiracy theory.
It’s a question we’ve addressed in our research on the importance of oil production in attracting third party military interventions. In a new paper co-authored with Kristian Gleditsch in the Journal of Conflict Resolution we model the decision-making process of third-party countries in interfering in civil wars and examine their economic motives.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
The Latest US Invasion Of Iraq Begins: US Military Search And Rescue Teams Arrive In Northern Iraq
The Latest US Invasion Of Iraq Begins: US Military Search And Rescue Teams Arrive In Northern Iraq
Despite numerous explanations that no boots-on-the-ground will be on-the-ground in Iraq in the war against Islamic State, it appears, as CNN reports, that the US military has moved Search-and-Rescue (S&R) assets to Northern Iraq as part of a “constant rebalancing” depending on the evolving airstrike-only mission.
Of course, as the ‘unnamed source’ was so quick to explain, this was in no way a response to threats from The UAE to pull out of the coalition unless S&R assets were placed in Iraq since, cynically speaking, the UAE demands are only the result of US demands that it demand it anyway.
However, as Bloomberg notes – on the heels of selling 170 M-1 Abrams tanks to Iraq indirectly ‘stimulating’ the US economy (“middle-class economics” don’t forget) – US allies are now withholding military power in an effort to get Obama to do more in Syria (which once again cynically-speaking – gives the President further excuse to provide billions in fresh military contracts to General Dynamics & Northrop Grummond) all in the name of peace, prosperity and the American way of life.
U.S. allies in the fight against Islamic State extremists are withholding military capabilities as leverage on President Barack Obama to do more in Syria, according to Bloomberg.
At issue are calls from the U.A.E. for U.S. pilot-rescue teams to be positioned closer to the Syrian battleground, where they’d be primed for quicker action, and from Turkey to impose a protected safe zone in Syria. Their demands create problems for Obama, who officials have said is wary of drawing the U.S. more deeply into Syria’s turmoil.
Underlying that issue is disagreement over Obama’s decision to make fighting Islamic State the priority over efforts to remove the regime of President Bashar al-Assad.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
