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Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

nytimes.com

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Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#171

Post by chad_strategic »

chad_strategic wrote: post #77
Animats wrote: post #12

The author has a point. Most of the 9/11 attackers were Saudis. Bin Laden was a Saudi. Saudi Arabia is a dysfunctional country propped up by oil money. It's even more insular than it used to be. Saudis used to send their kids to the US to go to college, with Government funding. Now Saudi Arabia has enough educational institutions that they don't do that. Years ago, I met a Saudi girl finishing Stanford who mentioned…

---> Saudi Arabia is a dysfunctional country propped up by oil money. I can't wait, the world can't wait any longer to end our dependence on fossil fuels. The world / middle east will be a better place if we reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. May the force be with Elon Musk / Telsa ;)

Somebody from the oil industry complex just down voted me.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#172

Post by 001sky »

jacquesm wrote: post #139
001sky wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no gift is ever free. that is the problem.

I fail to see the downside of a free education. The questions you might ask is what it is exactly that is being taught but in general a free education is a good thing.

"Since the act of accepting a gift can create a sense of unfulfilled obligation on the part of the receiver, gifts are sometimes refused, depending on the situation."

This notion from an etiquette guide to foreign culture I think is relevant.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#173

Post by jacquesm »

hackuser wrote: post #164
jacquesm wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this sarcasm? I'm asking because I don't see any markers indicating that it is and I get this wrong every 3rd comment or so. If it isn't sarcasm you are somewhat mis-informed. If it is sarcasm then please ignore this comment. As for the Shah, he was very much there with the support of the oil industry, but that doesn't make him all bad. He wanted to make Persia a modern state and in doing so upset the Mullahs whic…

> As for the Shah, he was very much there with the support of the oil industry, but that doesn't make him all bad. He wanted to make Persia a modern state and in doing so upset the Mullahs IIRC, he oppressed, imprisoned, tortured and killed people in large numbers, for decades.

Yes, he did that too. (Especially to his opponents.) The keyword is 'SAVAK'. (See comment elsewhere in this thread). The Shah was a dictator in every sense of the word, but surprisingly, he had some good sides too.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#174

Post by jacquesm »

hackuser wrote: post #159
jacquesm wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the US/Iran resentment goes back a bit further, roughly to the time that Iran took a whole pile of US hostages that were held for more than a year. That's not the sort of thing that is easily forgotten and it is one of the cornerstones of West/Islam conflict. After that it was mostly a downward spiral, with some recent relaxation on both sides of the line.

> I think the US/Iran resentment goes back a bit further, roughly to the time that Iran took a whole pile of US hostages that were held for more than a year. But that didn't happen in a vacuum either. The U.S. engineered or facilitated the overthrow of a mostly democratic Iranian leader in 1953, and put in his place a mini-dynasty of dictators who brutally oppresssed Iranians, with U.S. support, until that day in 197…

I said 'US/Iran' resentment. The 'Iran/US' resentment dates back even further, and if you trace it all to its roots you end somewhere in the 1700's or so, but then it was still (mostly) the UK and not the US.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#175

Post by jacquesm »

acveilleux wrote: post #166
jacquesm wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the US/Iran resentment goes back a bit further, roughly to the time that Iran took a whole pile of US hostages that were held for more than a year. That's not the sort of thing that is easily forgotten and it is one of the cornerstones of West/Islam conflict. After that it was mostly a downward spiral, with some recent relaxation on both sides of the line.

The US was also big time friend of the previous guy...

They all but installed him.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#176

Post by intopieces »

zeveb wrote: post #105
xlm1717 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main difference is that the government in power currently in Iran deposed the government that the US set up and wanted to have as an ally. If the Shah had remained in power in Iran, the US would likely be as close with Iran as they are with Saudi Arabia.

> the government in power currently in Iran deposed the government that the US set up The U.S. did not 'set up' the Shah; he was the legitimate ruler of Persia. Nor did the U.S. overthrow a 'democratically-elected leader'; the Shah's legitimate government successfully defeated a coup attempt by his prime minister Mossadegh, who died peacefully under house arrest years later.

I would grateful if you could cite a source for this information, as it runs counter to all the sources I'm familiar with. A few examples are:

An Introduction to the Modern Middle East: History, Religion, Political Economy by David S. Sorenson (Page 202) http://bit.ly/1S9HrTA

The Cold War Museum http://www.coldwar.org/articles/50s/OperationAjax.asp

If the U.S. didn't overthrow Mossadegh, why did the CIA admit to doing so years later in declassified documents?

http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB435/

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#177

Post by lobster_johnson »

hackuser wrote: post #159
jacquesm wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the US/Iran resentment goes back a bit further, roughly to the time that Iran took a whole pile of US hostages that were held for more than a year. That's not the sort of thing that is easily forgotten and it is one of the cornerstones of West/Islam conflict. After that it was mostly a downward spiral, with some recent relaxation on both sides of the line.

> I think the US/Iran resentment goes back a bit further, roughly to the time that Iran took a whole pile of US hostages that were held for more than a year. But that didn't happen in a vacuum either. The U.S. engineered or facilitated the overthrow of a mostly democratic Iranian leader in 1953, and put in his place a mini-dynasty of dictators who brutally oppresssed Iranians, with U.S. support, until that day in 197…

Also, the overthrow of Mossadegh was fundamentally about communism. Eisenhower featured that Mossadegh's policies would lead Iran towards communism. (The British were the ones who got that ball rolling; they wanted to depose Mossadegh for other reasons, mostly related to oil, but were not in a position to do anything with him.)

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#178

Post by criley2 »

vox_mollis wrote: post #74
criley2 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We also have Christians murdering abortion doctors, setting bombs and fires at clinics, Christian Sovereign Citizens murdering police on a near monthly basis, advocating for a theocracy in America (God above Country or Establishment of a national religion), advocation of Christian Law above secular law, etc, and we manage to keep our society from becoming a theocracy. Frankly, if a few evangelical Muslims are capable…

Well the obvious answer here is that all Abrahamic religions are suspect for breeding violence. But you can't say that in polite company for fear of the ADL, et. al.

Any ideology can breed violence. The Bolshevik Revolution by Marxists, or Mao's Cultural Revolution, are examples of non-religious ideologies that led to violence.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#179

Post by guelo »

nickff wrote: post #116
0xFFC wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As Iranian (I am commenting from Tehran) I completely approve your point of view.I even explained in long comment in this post(you can find it in bottom).Iranian regime nightmare is liberal people( because they are the most effective opposition to current regime, all of other opposition's dismantled by regime very easily they don't even exist in society). you know why? Because they are only threat to nature of this u…

From the perspective of a Western government, Iran's international relations are the problem.[1] The fact that Iran's society is relatively advanced does little to console the families of the 1100 American soldiers killed by Iranian proxies in Iraq; nor does it console the families of the hundreds (if not thousands) of Israeli civilians killed by (Iranian government supported) Hamas. State support for the Assad regim…

There's also the Israel tail wagging the dog issue. Israel hates Iran so we hate Iran. Israel loves Sunni dictatorships in Egypt and Saudi Arabia so we love Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Re: Saudi Arabia, an ISIS That Has Made It

#180

Post by rchaud »

gwbas1c wrote: post #138

From: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html "Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic." Is this article really appropriate for Hacker News?

Agreed. I come to HN to read about technology, not geopolitics. Some related issues like electronic surveillance, encryption etc. seem relevant, but a discussion about geopolitical roles of two Middle East regimes seems pretty off-topic. The controversial nature of these topics also unfortunately attracts people who aren't HN's target demographic, and dilutes the excellent content of the site.
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