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A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

bbc.com

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Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#71

Post by RobertoG »

varjag wrote: post #63
RobertoG wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wanted to know what happened so I read the report. I have to say that the "details" are scarce in the report. The investigator not even went to place where the attack happened (because of the danger). The conclusions are also interesting, because they accuse ISIL, and not Assad. While sometimes ISIL and Assad have shared interests in the ongoing war, that doesn't mean they are the same. After all, we have seen some…

You didn't really finish the report, did you? Page 33: > On the basis of the foregoing, the Leadership Panel is confident that the Syrian Arab Republic is responsible for the release of sarin at Khan Shaykhun on 4 April 2017.

You are right, unwisely I commented before finishing it (it's a long document). I offer my excuses.

I found specially damaging for the Syrian version the point 24 and 26 in the annex II: "The Syrian Arab Republic informed the Mechanism that the pilot had later been shot down and was missing in action. "

"During a briefing given by the Syrian Arab Republic to the Mechanism in Damascus, a representative of the Syrian Arab Air Force stated that no aircraft of the Air Force had attacked Khan Shaykhun on 4 April 2017. This contradicted the public statement made by the Government [..]"

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#72

Post by Koshkin »

mcv wrote: post #62
sacado2 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, we call him Kadhafi in French (and this time I checked the spelling).

I notice Wikipedia now spells it as Gaddafi. I thought it used to be Khaddafi in English. Interestingly, Dutch Wikipedia now calls him al-Qadhafi.

It's such a mess. We might be better off just translating the damn names (like they did in the remote past)...

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#73

Post by robdachshund »

varjag wrote: post #27
adventured wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

France had no problem supporting the conflicts in Libya and Syria that sought to accomplish similar outcomes as in Iraq (remove & replace Gaddafi and al-Assad). In fact, France has routinely urged Trump and the US to remain engaged in the Syria conflict. "Emmanuel Macron to urge Donald Trump to keep US in Syria during White House talks" https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/04/23/emmanuel-macron-...

Both Libya and Syria conflicts were started by their respective dictators massacring people.

Nope, they were caused by those leaders refusing to deal oil with USD, just like Iraq.

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#74

Post by wu-ikkyu »

michaelt wrote: post #13

But because their masters in Moscow wanted to hear there was potential for a first-strike, to please their bosses, that’s what the spies delivered. “These people were close to the West, they lived in the West and knew there were no plans for a first strike but they reported what they were told to report,” Jones explains. [...] It was a dangerously vicious circle. “It’s a failure of the Soviet system,” says Jones, “So…

While that may be true in many cases the example of Iraq and WMDs is more nuanced than most realize. The CIA was not reaching the conclusions that the Bush administration wanted and so Bush and co. created the Office of Special plans in order to deliberately stovepipe (misinterpret) the intelligence.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Special_Plans

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#75

Post by dsfyu404ed »

mikeash wrote: post #66
lmm wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about the Budapest Memorandum?

It does not require other nations to defend Ukraine from a non-nuclear attack.

While not required in a legal sense they certainly might do so anyway. Ukraine is as entitled to it's sovereignty as any other nation. Just letting the Russians steamroll Ukraine is equally irresponsible. Germany, France, etc are going to (rightfully) have a very, very hard time tolerating (i.e. not coming to the aid of Ukraine) that kind of belligerent behavior in Europe.

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#76

Post by nova22033 »

adventured wrote: post #25
varjag wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, most of the Western governments don't do that. The reason "coalition of the willing" was so thin is that aside the US and the UK few bought that. France have threatened veto in the UN, so it was not put to the vote… that's also how the whole "freedom fries" idiocy took off. And the rest of continental Europe was immensely sceptical.

France had no problem supporting the conflicts in Libya and Syria that sought to accomplish similar outcomes as in Iraq (remove & replace Gaddafi and al-Assad). In fact, France has routinely urged Trump and the US to remain engaged in the Syria conflict. "Emmanuel Macron to urge Donald Trump to keep US in Syria during White House talks" https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/04/23/emmanuel-macron-...

Assad is genuinely using chemical weapons against a civilian population so I don't think this makes the point you're trying to make.

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#77

Post by dsfyu404ed »

pluma wrote: post #26
trhway wrote: post #7

We still have the chance - minor Ukraine/Russia navy conflict yesterday so far resulted in nation wide martial law in Ukraine triggered on today. I'd not put it past Putin to not let the crisis go waste and for example "solve" the Ukraine/Russia Azov sea issues by making the Azov sea outright into an internal Russian sea which would naturally raise the tensions with the NATO/Europe/US and others. (Also, given the ext…

I don't see how an incursion on Ukraine would result in a war with NATO. Ukraine's problem is precisely that it's a formerly neutral party and not part of NATO. In fact, from a Russian POV the reason for the annexation of the Crimean peninsula were fears fueled by Ukraine moving closer to NATO and the EU, violating its neutrality and jeopardising Russian military operations within Ukraine. I'm not justifying the anne…

While a war might not be triggered in a WW1-esque "if X then Y" sense it may very well happen anyway. Ukraine is as entitled to it's sovereignty as any other nation. Just letting the Russians steamroll Ukraine is not exactly a good solution either. Germany, France, England, etc. are going to (rightfully) have a very, very hard time tolerating (i.e. not coming to the aid of Ukraine) that kind of belligerent behavior in Europe. If there were Russian tanks in Kiev the NATO states east of Germany would all but demand a military reaction because of the dangerous to them precedent that allowing an invasion (even if the invaded nation is not a NATO member) to go unopposed would set.

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#78

Post by graeme »

js8 wrote: post #28

My takeaway from this is that governments do not always act rationally, and therefore MAD doctrine, which assumes that the actors are rational, is a dangerous nonsense.

What's the alternative to MAD? We still have it. People have calmed down, but it remains.

I always took it to be a description of the state of play once nukes exist.

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#79

Post by mockingbirdy »

ben_w wrote: post #59
mockingbirdy wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's about the refugees. Many EU countries lack basic decency and risk to destroy EU because of Syrian refugees. Solving the crisis there is indirectly one of the interests of the EU. The current situation also strengthens the position of Russia in the Middle East which is not in European interest. Disclaimer: I'm from Germany. We have a shift to the right in most EU countries. One of the reasons the Britains left th…

The countries most upset by refugees, are those who have the least. This has also been the case in the UK (communities who hate immigrants and want less don’t have any) and from what I’ve seen of German voting patterns in recent elections. The fear of them has been amplified, but I don’t believe the actual refugees are the problem. And, in case you’re wondering about me mixing up refugees and migrants, part of the pr…

> I don’t believe the actual refugees are the problem.

I don't think so, too. The underlying problem is growing inequality of wealth and opportunities. The very far right-wing people fear that the refugees will worsen their situation (and many are simply xenophobic, too).

I think it's a shame that there is no differentiation between these problems of inequality and helping people who get attacked by their own government. It seems that many people here in Europe don't understand that it's our duty to help people who get killed in their home countries (by our own moral standards).

- - -

France (and other European nations) care about the Syrian conflict because of the fear that more refugees will seek shelter in the EU (most European countries could handle this, but they won't do it because they aren't humanitarian which is pretty sad to see). Bringing peace to Syria is therefore a critical part of EU's solution to this (another wave of refugees would seriously risk the EU because the people here seem to have lost their connection to humanism - we could easily handle it if we want to). I have a hunch that I got downvotes because people interpreted my opinion as being contra refugees, but I'm actually telling the opposite. The problem is that many European countries (i.e. people) have decided that it's not their problem when people are in life-threatening situations and die while trying to get into those countries.

Re: A military exercise staged 35 years ago almost triggered World War Three

#80

Post by macspoofing »

duxup wrote: post #70

Mutually assured destruction makes sense if humans and information is perfect .... but it's not so it seems more like it is just a matter of time until it happens. It is interesting to see how this plays out as the start of an exercise. I remember growing up in North Dakota and when the air force bases would run drills the sky would be filled with planes flying in formation .... no way you could tell if it was real o…

>Mutually assured destruction makes sense if humans and information is perfect .... but it's not so it seems more like it is just a matter of time until it happens.

Or not. If it is chance that prevents our self-destruction then you would expect it to already have happened. Seems like there is 'something' (for lack of a better word) to prevent it. Whatever it is, it seems to work and we're still here.

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