How the Arab World Came Apart • Hacker News Board

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#211

Post by nickik » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:30 PM UTC

k__ wrote: post #51

jomamaxx wrote: post #28

Ha ha ha ... ha ... The 'Arab World' was never together. Ever. All of the 'Anti-American Imperialism' kids here should remember that the bulk of the 'Arab World' is 'Arab By The Sword'. Arabic is spoken across North Africa, in particular because of Arab Colonialism of the 9th-12th centuries. Not since then has the 'Arab World' been anything resembling 'together'. The Turks kept them (and there was not much of them) u…

Does the west and especially the US have anything from stability? I think they also would do, what they did to the "arab world" to Russia or China if they could. The parts of the world that advance faster can dictate more rules, so everyone needs to get ahead. One way to ensure that this is the case is to slow other parts down.

Yes, stability would be good for them and everybody. War and fighting is not good for business in general.

The instability we see is definitely not a function of design. If you have studied any of it you will quickly realise that this is situation that has many actors that act based on their own interest and absolutely nobody has control over it. Those that attempt to control it usually end up creating a hole host of unintended consequences even if they sometimes manage to achieve their main goal.

Its however true, that in some limited cases, creating more chaos can potentially help you. Such cases definitely exist but they are not the majority of strategies used. Syria releasing of Jihadist to split the rebels is a interesting example of such a strategy. It usually is a strategy of the weak, not the strong. The strong prefer control, not chaos.

The idea that it would be best to throw everything in chaos is completely wrong and even the leaders of the super powers understand that. Only if you assume that their is some sinister conspiracy that has completely different values thats operating under our institutions, could such a policy be explained. I see 0 evidence for such a conspiracy.

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#212

Post by marcusgarvey » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:30 PM UTC

bogomipz wrote: post #178

SixSigma wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think the NYTimes has any responsibility for that. Except for never mentioning the fact or investigating what the consequences of the war they were propagandizing were likely to be.

Agreed on this point. The NY Times is the newspaper of record in the United States. And as such they hold responsibility both for their editorial policy that allowed Judith Miller's stories about WMDs. What's more remarkable is how unapologetic she is about her own involvement. This is worth a listen(the second half) http://www.wnyc.org/story/bobs-grill-1-judith-miller/

Iraq, the surprising arrival of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, Brexit shock, rise of Trump...the commentator classes of New York, DC, London and other "tastemaker" cities need to reckon with their failures and understand why they were so utterly wrong. Instead, in most cases, we see doubling down and demonization of the other side. It's quite extraordinary. The black swans are coming fast and thick.

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#213

Post by finid » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:32 PM UTC

falsestprophet wrote: post #204

finid wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The invasion of Iraq was stupid. It was likely illegal, I agree that the invasion was stupid, but it was not "likely illegal," it _was_ illegal.

legal: 1) of, based on, or concerned with the law; 2) appointed or required by the law. [1] Military force was authorized by Public Law 107-243 AUTHORIZATION FOR USE OF MILITARY FORCE AGAINST IRAQ RESOLUTION OF 2002 [2]. [1] http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/legal [2] https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PLAW-107publ243/html/PLAW-107p...

How beautiful! Congress voted to invade another country. That makes it legal.

Next you'll get together with your wife and make the decision to invade your next door neighbor. That should be legal, right?

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#214

Post by zeveb » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:33 PM UTC

sevenless wrote: post #176

ilostmykeys wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's sick to call war "beautiful" especially given that in those first few days innocent people were bombed out of existence along with bridges and infrastructure vital to the subsistence of millions of people. I didn't expect a sick comment to be rewarded on HN. But now I see the blatant and racist hypocrisy.

Terrorism all depends on the beholder, doesn't it? The forced restructuring of Iraq's economy along right-wing neoliberal lines by the occupying force was another war crime. Read "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" by Chandrasekaran.

> The forced restructuring of Iraq's economy along right-wing neoliberal lines

I don't think 'right-wing neoliberal' is the right term for what's basically a soft version of the Warsaw Pact's command-and-control economies.

> Read "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" by Chandrasekaran.

I did, and it's very good — excellent. The short, short version is that basically everyone is incompetent, time-serving, disinterested and/or corrupt.

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#215

Post by yardie » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:37 PM UTC

avisser wrote: post #165

yardie wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you met any Muslims that pray? Do you know anything about it all? 2 of those prayers occur before and after business hours. And even if they were working there's not a whole lot going on at 4:30am. 2 are short coffee break level prayers. A little meditation and a quick baslama and get on with it. And the longest, conveniently occurs around lunchtime anyway. I fail to see how prayer affects anyone's potential in…

Agreed. I work with a devout Muslim. I think I'd more effective if I took meditation breaks as regularly as he takes his short, prayer breaks.

My MIL is Muslim. When we are visiting and it's time to pray she finds a quiet corner, unrolls her rug, does her prayer, and is back before the tea has finished steeping.

I've spent more time getting to the break room at work than she has on afternoon prayer. So I fail to see the connection between the 2-3 scheduled daily prayer times and production. If that is the case, coffee, cigarettes, lunch, and bathroom breaks are equal contributors.

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#216

Post by jcranmer » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:37 PM UTC

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #2

So far this is good. There's a lot of depth. One nit: " Much as the United States Army and white settlers did with Indian tribes in the conquest of the American West, so the British and French and Italians proved adept at pitting these groups against one another, bestowing favors — weapons or food or sinecures — to one faction in return for fighting another. The great difference, of course, is that in the American We…

The problem with blaming Sykes-Picot for everything is that almost none of the modern borders are due to that agreement (well, the Jordan-Syria border does seem to match up, but that's it).

More likely a better explanation lies in the importation of the Western idea of a nation-state (that a country should be coterminus with cultural boundaries), which tends to strongly reject the idea that countries can have multiple countries, combined with the failure of the Ottoman Empire to synthesize a durable Ottoman culture. The latter failure is arguably due in large part to, you guessed it, European meddling: the Ottoman state had largely functioned, and kept peace among fractious religious sects, by keeping its Islamic nature as a core of its identity (basically being a dual Turkish-Arab state). One aspect of this was the basis that most obligations of civic duty (particularly military duty) was borne solely by Muslims, with the non-Muslims (predominantly Christians) paying an extra tax, an arrangement generally accepted by both groups. European powers considered this intolerant [1], and forced a series of capitulations on the Ottomans in part to guarantee the security of Christians (which basically leads to the Armenian Genocide).

With the idea of a state centered on Islamic identity increasingly a failure, the Young Turks instead focused on a narrow, Turkish-based state, which alienated pretty much all minorities (including the Arabs) save the Kurds (their bid for nationalism started mostly post-WWI). After the Armenian Genocide, many Arabs suspected that similar treatment awaited them, but they largely kept to showing support for the regime during the exigencies of WWI. The Iraqis in occupied Mesopotamia didn't cooperate with the British (not that it saved them from retribution), for example. The Bedouin did offer support to both sides, but they were not reliable allies to either side. Only the Hashemites (who controlled Mecca and Medina) revolted, successful only due to the aid of the British, who gave them Jordan and Iraq as victory spoils (their original Kingdom of the Hejaz was conquered by the Saudis, another British ally, in the interwar period).

[1] Side note: the Ottomans generally forbade the Muslims from proselytizing to the Christian groups, whereas the capitulations generally forced the Ottomans to accept Christian missionaries attempting to convert Muslims.

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#217

Post by acqq » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:39 PM UTC

chishaku wrote: post #206

rm999 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source? I just searched and see no such pledge. All I'm finding are vague statements from her allies and advisors that they think she'll prioritize Syria.

State Department policy on Syria is regime change going back to at least 2011. The method/means is still fluid. See the article and State Department testimony below, emphasis mine. NYT, from 2013: "Last summer, as the fighting in Syria raged and questions about the United States’ inaction grew, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton conferred privately with David H. Petraeus, the director of the C.I.A. The two off…

> back to at least 2011.

At least to 2006, ten years ago, thanks to the US Embassy cable published by Wikileaks:

https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/06DAMASCUS5399_a.html

Some coverage:

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2015/10/wikileaks-cabl...

"The cables also show that U.S. support for efforts to overthrow the Syrian government beginning in 2011 were not a response to the Assad government’s repression of protests but rather a continuation of a years-long strategy by more directly violent means."

Without that cable, this would be impossible to prove. Helps understanding why Manning who leaked that was 9 months in solitary confinement, stripped naked:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/mar/11/stripped-naked...

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#218

Post by 7Z7 » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:40 PM UTC

lukasm wrote: post #108

hacker42 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems they are missing an important factor, namely 4) the personal, cultural and economical impairment due to the religion of Islam. Nobody has time to thrive when they have to pray five times a day, when almost every thought and action is dictated by an old book and when half of their human potential is hidden in cloth bags.

praying is not a problem. The biggest problem is lack of debt. Wanna open a new business? You can't take credit. Problems with cashflow? You can go to a debt prison. Forget about mortgage for a house etc.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you. But mortgages exist in lots of Muslim majority countries. Are you really suggesting that Muslims don't take on debt?

You can take out a mortgage in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Bangladesh, Morocco.. They were the first four I checked.

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#219

Post by Kurtz79 » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:41 PM UTC

NikolaNovak wrote: post #138

jcbeard wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The invasion of Iraq was stupid. It was likely illegal, based on false pretenses, and well....shouldn't have happened. The invasions initial execution was beautiful (first few days). The US Military performed splendidly. The follow through (driven by political leaders) was idiotic. Stupid decisions like not listening to his generals (Bush), disbanding the Iraqi security forces (Paul Bremer), and the odd focus on turn…

>> in every country where natural resource mining is dominant, we see a rise of more despotism. I think we're still doing reasonably OK in Canada... :->

Also, Norway:

"The country maintains a combination of market economy and a Nordic welfare model with universal health care and a comprehensive social security system. Norway has extensive reserves of petroleum, natural gas, minerals, lumber, seafood, fresh water, and hydropower. The petroleum industry accounts for around a quarter of the country's gross domestic product (GDP) On a per-capita basis, Norway is the world's largest producer of oil and natural gas outside the Middle East." (Wikipedia)

Re: How the Arab World Came Apart

#220

Post by zeveb » Thu, Aug 11, 2016, 2:42 PM UTC

mustaflex wrote: post #90

mms1973 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When Europe dominated the Middle East (and Africa), it was a pretty safe place. Certainly there was hope. Now the entire region is going down the sink. Maybe the problem instead is that Europe _LEFT_ ?

the White man's burden syndrom? France was the colonial power in control over there, they used basic divide and conquer tactics. While the sunnis arabs are in majority in Syria they took another minority faction, the nusayriis, and trained them in military schools, etc... to put them in power. It's like having a protestant pope in Vatican. Contrary to Europe where different ethnic groups are well separated in differe…

> France was the colonial power in control over there, they used basic divide and conquer tactics.

And while France ran Algeria and Lebanon, they were thriving, pleasant, peaceful, beautiful places. Beirut was once one of the loveliest cities in the world.

There are worst things than colonialism; to a first approximation, every single post-colonial country is worse off than it was when it was a colony (I wouldn't count the U.S. as post-colonial because in a very real sense it's a successful colony).