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Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

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Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#11

Post by seszett »

Someone1234 wrote: post #5

The author was right: I did not. I do not want to read another article by someone who thinks the Iraq war was about terrorism, and who seems to have potato levels of knowledge about international politics. > and now in Syria, before in Libya, and only created more failed states and ungoverned spaces that provide havens for terrorists and spilled terror like dropped paint across borders. Yeah, no, that isn't at all wh…

Yeah, I also didn't really agree with this:

> Whack-a-mole is a game, not a plan. Leave the Middle East alone. Stop creating more failed states.

For some reason, I have difficulty thinking that just "leaving the Middle East alone" will somehow lead ISIS to disappear on its own and the Syrian government/Syrian rebels/Kurds/various fundamentalist islamist groups to magically arrive to some peaceful balance. Especially with ISIS having the stated goal of world domination (yeah, just leaving alone those who want to dominate the world rarely works, we tried that for a while before 1939).

The truth is, human society and civilization isn't a fundamentally stable system that's being thrown off by US or European interventions. Intervention is sometimes useful, sometimes bad, and it seems difficult for everyone to estimate whether interventions will be good or not.

Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#13

Post by dudul »

What other response than "we will find them and kill them one by one" can be given by democracies? Democracies cannot back down because of terrorists. I honestly think that, by design, terrorism cannot win against western democracies.

I wonder if terrorists understand that. People will be afraid, people may be scared, but at the end, governments will not yield. And to be clear, I'm not saying politicians are brave or whatever, it's just because of how democracies work.

Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#14

Post by crpatino »

zxcvcxz wrote: post #6

Well I'm watching MSNBC right now and pretty much every commentator is talking about how the terrorists were communicating using encryption and suggesting the fact that criminals have the ability to communicate secretly is something new that needs to be curtailed. Haven't seen anyone suggest we should read everyones mail yet (maybe they do this in France?). It's pretty crazy the way the media is acting. Am I to reall…

From what my French friends have told me, the public attitude there does take for granted that Government will know everything about you. They see the US debate over Internet privacy as silly (never had enjoyed those liberties themselves during the land-line phone era).

I have never been in France myself, so take this comment with a grain of salt.

Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#15

Post by soylentcola »

zxcvcxz wrote: post #6

Well I'm watching MSNBC right now and pretty much every commentator is talking about how the terrorists were communicating using encryption and suggesting the fact that criminals have the ability to communicate secretly is something new that needs to be curtailed. Haven't seen anyone suggest we should read everyones mail yet (maybe they do this in France?). It's pretty crazy the way the media is acting. Am I to reall…

I noticed the same thing on the CNN feed they run in the lobby at work. All sorts of talk about encryption being the reason that massive international intelligence apparatus was unable to prevent or predict the recent attacks in Paris.

I'm not sure how much is talking points or how much is just commercial news media looking for an angle they can pitch as new insight. Either way, it was really weird to run across. There are so many factors at work here and so many conflicting motivations and policies and bits of info...yet the top story is about how long-existing, commonly available methods may have been used to thwart the combined intelligence agencies of the western world.

Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#16

Post by ls66 »

This ignores the fact that whack-a-mole has almost certainly indeed thwarted other attacks that would have otherwise sailed through. The problem is complex, no doubt, but I think for a civilized society pursuing this individually is almost the only option.

Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#18

Post by samstave »

Someone1234 wrote: post #5

The author was right: I did not. I do not want to read another article by someone who thinks the Iraq war was about terrorism, and who seems to have potato levels of knowledge about international politics. > and now in Syria, before in Libya, and only created more failed states and ungoverned spaces that provide havens for terrorists and spilled terror like dropped paint across borders. Yeah, no, that isn't at all wh…

I'd just like to point out that the civil wars in both Syria and Libya were far from 100% organic.

The U.S. Was pushing to fuck around with Syria and were embarrassed by Russia about two years ago, just prior to that we were funding and supplying rebels, who we now call terrorists.

The U.S. Is very very good about fomenting "organic civil wars" among many other things...

Syria is the new hotness in proxy war.

And one of the things that sucks is that now the Paris issue tied with fake Syrian refugees is resulting in all sorts of craziness all over the world, including U.S. States' governments refusing any "refugees"

My pessimistic side feels that some portion of the governments of the world are looking for the next arch duke Ferdinand to whack as a tinderbox.

Re: Paris: You Don’t Want to Read This

#19

Post by Wonderdonkey »

danso wrote: post #9

A little coincidental but not completely off-topic...I just read this March 2015 piece from The Atlantic that's been passed around as the article about ISIS and its motives: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isi... It's a great, lengthy read...it's been posted a few times on HN but without much discussion. But relevant to the OP's opinion: the Atlantic writer asserts that the success of ISIS is…

Came here to recommend this article as well. It's by far the most informative piece I've ever read on ISIS. This should be required reading for every policymaker and military strategist.
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