Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: vyper on February 22, 2006, 11:13:52 am
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4740010.stm
Tens of thousands of people have staged protests across Iraq after a bomb attack heavily damaged one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam.
Dozens of Sunni mosques are reported to have been targeted and six Sunnis killed after a gang blew up the dome of the al-Askari shrine in Samarra.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/06/middle_east_enl_1140622457/img/1.jpg)
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Very sad. You've got to wonder how many Sunnis think that attacking a mosque is a valid target.
You know what is the real irony is here. If the sunni terrorists do succeed in their goal of causing a civil war they'd get slaughtered. The enemies they're so desperately trying to make have larger numbers, have probably consolidated a fair bit of military power under the new government, have Iran on their border who would no doubt aid them, have the Kurds to the north who would aid them in return for a share of the land taken and have probably no country bordering them who they haven't pissed off at one time or another.
Worse still if the west pulled out completely and just left them to it (which appears to be their goal) every islamic martyr going would head to Iraq and join up with one side or the other instead of flying to America or Europe to cause trouble.
Evidentally someone really hasn't been thinking about the endgame here. :rolleyes:
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Well... noone ever accused them of being smart, just of being violent.
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's quite a bit of damage.....
Meh. If they cannot even get along with eachother, how are they expected to get along with the rest of the world?
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"First t'was the Sunnis and then t'was the Shiites. Or maybe t'were the other way around."
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's quite a bit of damage.....
Meh. If they cannot even get along with eachother, how are they expected to get along with the rest of the world?
Reminds me a bit of the Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland during the 70s and 80s.
Very sad. You've got to wonder how many Sunnis think that attacking a mosque is a valid target.
You know what is the real irony is here. If the sunni terrorists do succeed in their goal of causing a civil war they'd get slaughtered. The enemies they're so desperately trying to make have larger numbers, have probably consolidated a fair bit of military power under the new government, have Iran on their border who would no doubt aid them, have the Kurds to the north who would aid them in return for a share of the land taken and have probably no country bordering them who they haven't pissed off at one time or another.
Worse still if the west pulled out completely and just left them to it (which appears to be their goal) every islamic martyr going would head to Iraq and join up with one side or the other instead of flying to America or Europe to cause trouble.
Evidentally someone really hasn't been thinking about the endgame here. :rolleyes:
I think the endgame is to have a source of conflict that either serves as a fertile training ground or to create an environment whereby the winner of a civil war, whatever creed, emerges as a fundamentalist and xenophobic dictatorship; either of which provides a basis for spreading fundamentalism*. I think there are 2 groups of people driving this; one is the foreign terrorists wishing to humiliate the US and its allies by destroying their aims of establishing a democracy in Iraq, and the second is the Saddam loyalists trying to re-exert the years of oppression they exercised over the Shia (and possibly partly doing so due to the Shia governmens reputed ties with Iran).
And ultimately, once more, it's the innocent people who pay the highest price.
*it's important to remember that the likes of Al-Queda are not interesting in destroying the west, but are primarily attacking (when they do) foreign targets in order to 'inspire' militancy; to create a sort of perverted pride in the ability of purported true believers to hurt the 'Great Satan' (or Crusaders, or whatever loaded term is used). and thus use this to inspire fundamentalist revolutions within their home countries - i.e. the Middle East and possibly the Muslim areas of Africa - as the 'internal' fundamentalist movement (whilst briefly bouyed by the Iranian Revolution) failed to create the theocracies or even the desire for them. Whilst a Muslim civil war in Iraq may not fulfill that task (although it would be portrayed as the failure/fault of the West), it would nonetheless be a training area for practicing such guerilla fighting; and portrayed as a result of the Christian worlds aggression. Additionally, the resulting theocracy (inevitable in a religious civil war IMO) would likely be more amenable to support such groups on its territory.
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I like how your footnotes are so much longer than your actual point.
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I think it's more a case of 'If you prime people with a feeling of belligerence and their own superiority, it won't always explode in the direction you plan.'
By deliberately working up people to believe their own religious views are the only acceptable ones, they will frequently lead to a schism in the religion itself. Henry VIII created the CoE with him represented as the direct link between God and the Church, it served his purpose at the time. It also added massively to the Protestant/Catholic Schism in Europe. And it also eventually circled around and hit the Monarchy in the back of it's head, costing the Monarchy it's power.
People who incite religious hatred should bear this in mind ;)
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I like how your footnotes are so much longer than your actual point.
Forgot the size code.......
:nervous:
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Iraq is spiralling into a civil war. What do you expect when you create a huge power vacuum with no plans to plug it? :rolleyes:
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Hmmm, it seems that sparks have already begun to fly...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4742188.stm
The body count is rising...
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That there's a holy explosion.
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The whole Iraq situation, starting with the invasion, has only managed to make the entire region less stable than it already was (which is saying a lot). A Civil War will make it even worse.
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The whole Iraq situation, starting with the invasion, has only managed to make the entire region less stable than it already was (which is saying a lot). A Civil War will make it even worse.
Which, In all honesty I believe was the point.
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The whole Iraq situation, starting with the invasion, has only managed to make the entire region less stable than it already was (which is saying a lot). A Civil War will make it even worse.
Which, In all honesty I believe was the point.
I'm wondering if the situation will end up being another Rwanda (replace Tutsi with Sunni, Hutu with Shi'ite, and it's a fairly similar situation already AFAIK).
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11491483/
Body count is already up to more than 100 confirmed so far.
Following the sectarian attacks, Shiite and Sunni leaders blamed each other for the violence, with each side portraying itself as the victim
So much for getting any real "leadership" out of these guys.
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Iraqi's make me lol.
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Iraqi's make me lol.
Be careful not to leave your mouth open too long though. They'll stick a bomb in it.
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Adsense really doesn't work well for recent events.
(http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b311/WMCoolmon/adsense.gif)
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The whole Iraq situation, starting with the invasion, has only managed to make the entire region less stable than it already was (which is saying a lot). A Civil War will make it even worse.
Which, In all honesty I believe was the point.
I'm wondering if the situation will end up being another Rwanda (replace Tutsi with Sunni, Hutu with Shi'ite, and it's a fairly similar situation already AFAIK).
Except that we don't have gorillas who will start coming back thanks to the poachers killing each other. ;)