[QUOTE=R.D. Silverman;418000]And yes, getting rid of ISIS may (probably will) create other problems. But if they are
lesser problems it will be worth it.[/quote]
When since WW2 has U.S. regime-changing and warmongering 'led to lesser problems'? Korea? Nope - still divided, North a Stalinist nightmare state in no small part because hatred of and paranoia about the U.S. - whose Korean-War carpet bombings killed hundreds of thousands of North Koreans - serve as a unifying force exploitable by successive regimes. Vietnam? Nope - millions died, and the 'godless commies' ended up running the whole country. Interestingly, despite that they never did become a Soviet puppet regime, which was the main pretext for U.S. involvement there (that and a vain attempt to help the French keep its colonial boot on the neck of the nation). The fact that Vietnam is today far different from North Korea is a credit entirely to its people, not to anything the U.S. did. Rest of Indochina? Well, in Cambodia Nobel Peace laureate Kissinger''s illegal bombing campaigns killed hundreds of thousands directly and helped the Khmer Rouge to power - not exactly a 'lesser problem' outcome. South America, Africa, Middle East - pretty much variations on the same theme, that in the name of 'democracy and US values' we are serial committers of mass-scale atrocities and supporters of many of the most loathsome, undemocratic regimes on the planet.

As for 'lesser problems' resulting from making war on extremist movements like Al Qaeda and ISIS, see Noam Chomsky's reference to Andrew Cockburn's book [i]Kill Chain[/i] in my following post for the military history there. The executive (pun unintended) summary is "when you kill one leader without dealing with the roots and causes of the phenomenon, he is typically replaced very quickly by someone younger, more competent and more vicious."

[quote]As for "collateral damage", the death of Middle Easterners is quite rightly their concern.
Deaths of Americans and their allies is quite rightly our concern.[/QUOTE]
So even when the death of Middle Easterners is caused by the U.S., it's 'their concern', not ours?

[QUOTE=R.D. Silverman;418208]Actually, I did. Any number that I give would be arbitrary. Furthermore, the question itself is a leading
'have you stopped beating your wife question'. It is flame bait.

If I gave a small number as an answer it would open up an attack that my suggestion of a large number of troops
is total nonsense.[/quote]
I think it more likely that it would open up an attack that you are in denial about the foreign-lives cost of U.S. warmongering.

[quote]If I give a large number as an answer it opens an attack that I don't care about casualties when I am not personally
involved.[/quote]
Your comment about "it's their concern" and ha-ha-funny joke in post #189 about napalm already made that eminently clear.

[quote]Assumes facts without proof. I agree that we indulge in such behavior. I see no proof that it would
help solve the problem with extremists in the Middle East. It would merely mean that the ones in
charge are not put there by us, but instead selected by events that no one can control.[/quote]
Events no one can control - you mean, like the last set of democratic elections in Iran, in the 1950s? Whatever did happen to their non-extremist elected Mossadegh - did they vote him out after his term because he failed to deliver on his economic program, or what?

[quote]There is no evidence that our leaving the Middle East totally alone would get rid of extremism.[/quote]
I assert there are gobs and gobs of evidence which you are deliberately omitting - the above-alluded-to CIA ouster of Iran's Mossadegh and installation of an extreme tyrant in the form of the Shah led to a generation-long reign of terror, which led directly to the end-70s Islamic revolution there, i.e. to the same 'Iranian religious extremists' you loathe. Which is especially ironic because the chief source of religious extremism in the region there today is not the Iranian mullahs, but the Wahabbists in Saudi Arabia, another tyrannical regime only in power because of U.S. backing. The list goes on, but those 2 front-and-center examples demolish your 'is no evidence' claim. As does the fact that the emergence of non-state extremism in the form of outfits like Al Qaeda and ISIS can all be tied *directly* to U.S. involvement in the region.

[quote]Yep. Sanctions worked very well with IRAN. You can't fight ideology and religious fanaticism with 'sanctions'
And with extremist states such as Saudi Arabia such sanctions would (based on historical evidence) result in
terrorist attacks by the Saudis. 9/11 was perpetrated by Saudis.[/quote]
Uh, actually the Iranians came to the negotiation table re. the recent nuclear deal precisely because long-running U.S. sanctions had taken a heavy toll. And again, it wasn't the Iranians who birthed and aided the 9/11 attackers, it was our 'allies' the Saudis. So let me see if I get your logic here: Because U.S. support for the Saudis and their extremist ideology and religious fanaticism led to the 9/11 attacks, whereas with Iran it led to a long standoff and eventual return to the negotiation table, we better not try to sanction the Saudis because 'they might attack us because of it.'

[quote]Furthermore, as long as the Muslims have such total hatred of Israel, and as long as we support Israel I suspect
that there will still be extremist attacks on us, no matter what else we do.[/quote]
So perhaps we should consider our uncritical look-the-other-way-no-matter-how-badly-they-repay-us-for-it support for the Israelis? After all, they have more than enough nukes to ensure that no ME nation will move against them in anything but a low-level-nuisance way.

[quote]The current question is not, "What can we do to bring (or force) peace in the Middle East'.
I don't believe that is possible today. Once upon a time England/Western Europe was much like the Middle East
in the way those in power treated people. (burning for heresy, torture, etc. forced conformity to religion etc.) They grew out of it
but it took many hundreds of years. [Yes we can debate English history if you like]

The only question before us in this thread is how to get rid of a group that is indulging in total savagery.[/quote]
You mean the U.S.? Because based on body count we are runaway winners in the global deaths-by-terrorism sweepstakes.

[quote]This is simply selecting which SOB's in the Middle East are 'our SOB's' and which are not.[/quote]
I know it's a nutty idea, but perhaps we should consider allowing the people of the ME to select their SOB's for themselves? Or would not be in accord with 'American values?'

[quote]The only question under consideration is how to get rid of ISIS. The fact that it will leave a power vacuum which will
lead to other problems is not part of the decision. There are several possible consequences to a power vacuum and
trying to guess which of them will occur requires a crystal ball. I do acknowledge that other problems will follow.
We can only deal with them one at a time.[/quote]
Actually, no need for a crystal ball - again quoting Cockburn, "when you kill one leader without dealing with the roots and causes of the phenomenon, he is typically replaced very quickly by someone younger, more competent and more vicious." Your boots-on-the-ground-call is all about a reactionary way of trying to deal with the symptoms. Nothing about root causes - you allude to such on several occasions, e,g. noting Saudi support for terrorism, but apparently attempting to deal with such root causes is impossible, because 'they might attack us.'

[quote]Personally, I blame the [b]entire[/b] Middle Eastern 'good old boy, tribal, misogynist religious nut-case culture' for the problems.
It is claimed that the extremists are a minority. I don't see the majority doing anything about it except
to pay lip service to 'bad behavior' after it happens.[/quote]
Extremist misogynist religious nut-cases are certainly in charge in all the ME nations where the U.S. has intervened and 'picked SOBs' (or attempted to) - Saudi Arabia & most of Arabian peninsula, Iran, Libya, Iraq, Kuwait, etc.

[quote]We've got our share of extremists too. --> so called 'conservative evangelical Christians, skinheads, KKK, etc'.
But of course the Republicans who are so strongly ranting against Muslim extremists do not call out Christian
extremists when they attack Planned Parenthood. Indeed, they claim that such acts are NOT terrorism.[/QUOTE]
Interesting that you (rightly) excoriate the GOP loonies but omit mention of the thoroughly bipartisan support for U.S. imperial thuggery and warmongering, the D.C. "there is only on war party" dynamic. That dynamic may not be overtly religious but it is certainly extremist - but clearly a couple people getting killed by a domestic nutcase riles you far more than the many millions of the slaughtered resulting from U.S. imperial terrorism. Perhaps it is that kind of willful blindness that "they hate us for", far more than our supposed (and rapidly-vanishing) "freedoms".

Re. the SoCal terrorist couple: Yes, a horrible, hateful act. So how would you characterize the fact that US cops have summarily executed over a 1000 people so far this year? (But note, that is not 'stone age justice' because they used cutting-edge weaponry.) Would you put American 'boots on the ground' to go after the terroristic krazed killer kops who are slaughtering Americans in far greater numbers than any foreign terror group is?

[url=www.truth-out.org/news/item/33888-horror-beyond-description-noam-chomsky-on-the-latest-phase-of-the-war-on-terror]Horror Beyond Description: Noam Chomsky on the Latest Phase of the War on Terror[/url] | TruthOut.org
[quote]Following the Paris massacre of November 2015, Obama stated in a joint news conference with French President Hollande that "ISIS must be destroyed." Do you think this is possible? If yes, how? If not, why not?

The West does of course have the capacity to slaughter everyone in the ISIS-controlled areas, but even that wouldn't destroy ISIS - or, very likely, some more vicious movement that would develop in its place by the dynamic I mentioned earlier. One goal of ISIS is to draw the "crusaders" into a war with all Muslims. We can contribute to that catastrophe, or we can try to address the roots of the problem and help establish conditions under which the ISIS monstrosity will be overcome by forces within the region.

Foreign intervention has been a curse for a long time, and is likely to continue to be. There are sensible proposals as to how to proceed on this course, for example, the proposal by William Polk, a fine Middle East scholar with rich experience not only in the region but also at the highest levels of US government planning. It receives substantial support from most careful investigations of the appeal of ISIS, notably those of Scott Atran. Unfortunately, the chances that the advice will be heeded are slight.[/quote]
My one quibble with the piece is that IMO Chomsky is far too generous to Democrat congresscritters:
[quote]As respected political analysts of the conservative American Enterprise Institute have observed, the former [Republican] Party is now a "radical insurgency" that has pretty much abandoned parliamentary politics, for interesting reasons that we can't go into here. The Democrats have also moved to the right, and their core elements are not unlike moderate Republicans of years past - though some of Eisenhower's policies would place him about where [Bernie] Sanders is on the political spectrum. Sanders, therefore, would be unlikely to have much congressional support, and little at the state level.[/quote]
When it comes to 'core elements' like US foreign policy, the domestic economy, so-called 'free trade' agreements, crooked-bankster-cartel bailouts and de facto legal immunity of same, and massive 24/7 government flouting of the rule of law in this country, I see no significant differences between the 2 parties. Ooh, look, the Dems talk a more progressive game on dog-whistle 'hot button' social issues ... color me unimpressed. Support for marriage equality is great and all, but does not come close in my mind to making up for thoroughly bipartisan support for US imperial aggression which has cost the lives of literally millions of human beings in all parts of the globe. What about those folks' rights to not be blown to smithereens as 'collateral damage' or have their economies turned into elite-benefiting looting operations? What about the rights of U.S. citizens to see elite white-collar criminals who loot and wreck the economy held to the same laws which apply to hoi polloi?

What Hillary Knew about Libya -Robert Parry
 

Please note- this is not Fux Noise. Other parts of the political spectrum can also question the realities of Clinton's career.

In Official Washington’s propaganda world, the U.S. government and its “allies” are always standing for what’s right and good and the “enemies” are the epitome of evil doing the vilest things. [URL="https://consortiumnews.com/2016/01/12/what-hillary-knew-about-libya/"]But some emails to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton[/URL] depicted a far different reality, writes Robert Parry.

[QUOTE]To justify U.S. “regime changes,” the U.S. government has routinely spread rumors and made other dubious claims which – even when later doubted or debunked – are left in place indefinitely as corrosive propaganda, eating away at the image of various “enemies” and deforming public opinion.

Even though this discredited propaganda can have a long half-life – continuing to contaminate the public’s ability to perceive reality for years – President Barack Obama and his administration have shown no inclination to undertake a kind of HAZMAT clean-up of the polluted information environment that American citizens have been forced to live in.

[/QUOTE]

EDIT: Remember the "cocaine" found in Manuel Noriega's habitation which turned out to be [URL="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mas"]masa[/URL]? And of course, they always find porn in "bad guy's" houses.

[QUOTE=kladner;422356]Please note- this is not Fux Noise. Other parts of the political spectrum can also question the realities of Clinton's career.

In Official Washington’s propaganda world, the U.S. government and its “allies” are always standing for what’s right and good and the “enemies” are the epitome of evil doing the vilest things. [URL="https://consortiumnews.com/2016/01/12/what-hillary-knew-about-libya/"]But some emails to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton[/URL] depicted a far different reality, writes Robert Parry.[/QUOTE]

But wait, there's more! Latest on the Blumenthal/Adelson shadow foreign policy directorate:

[url=theantimedia.org/emails-prove-hillary-knew-libyan-rebels-were-conducting-ethnic-cleansing-supported-them-anyway/]Emails Prove Hillary Knew Libyan Rebels Were Conducting Ethnic Cleansing, Supported Them Anyway[/url] | Zero Hedge

Thankfully, all that nastiness is now over and Libya stands as a regime-change-and-US-values-inculcation success story. Oh, wait...

[Of course - lest any of this be construed as partisan criticism - as long as we are treated to silly Kabuki theater by the GOP 'opposition' such as a much-ballyhooed set of 'Benghazi hearings' in which said opposition studiously omitted even the merest mention of the CIA-coordinated weapons smuggling program from Gaddafi's erstwhile arsenal to those famous 'moderate' Syrian regime-changin' rebels by way of the US consulate in Benghazi, all of Hillary's manifold evils must be viewed through the lens of 'there is only one War Party in Washington.']

[QUOTE][URL="http://theantimedia.org/emails-prove-hillary-knew-libyan-rebels-were-conducting-ethnic-cleansing-supported-them-anyway/"]Emails Prove Hillary Knew Libyan Rebels Were Conducting Ethnic Cleansing, Supported Them Anyway[/URL] | [B]Zero Hedge[/B][/QUOTE]That is a new source for me: theantimedia.org. Hair (and blood pressure) raising stuff. :furious:

[QUOTE=kladner;422529]That is a new source for me: theantimedia.org.[/QUOTE]

My bad - first saw story on ZH, followed to the source, forgot to change the '| source' extension following the URL/title.

[QUOTE=ewmayer;422532]My bad - first saw story on ZH, followed to the source, forgot to change the '| source' extension following the URL/title.[/QUOTE]
Minor quibble. I LIKE new sources. :smile:

[url]http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/us-general-calls-carpet-bombing-isis-american-values/story?id=36643104[/url]

[QUOTE]Lt. General Sean MacFarland told Pentagon reporters today in a video-conference from Baghdad that the U.S. is bound by the laws of armed conflict and “at the end of the day, you know, it doesn’t only matter whether or not you win, it matters how you win."[/QUOTE]

o [url=http://www.moonofalabama.org/2016/02/a-whitewash-of-clinton-and-her-war-on-libya.html]On The NYT’s Sorry Whitewash Of Clinton And Her War On Libya[/url] | Moon of Alabama blog

o Came across this 2015 story while reading the above, still germane:
[url=www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/06/libya-gadhafi-french-spies-rebels-support.html]Emails to Hillary contradict French tale on Libya war[/url] | Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the Middle East
[quote]The oft-repeated media tale in France holds that then-President Nicolas Sarkozy was outraged by Gadhafi’s crackdown on protesters in February 2011 but had no clear idea who to support. Enter a swash-buckling “intellectual,” Bernard-Henri Levy, who met with Transitional National Council leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil on March 4, immediately called Sarkozy, and had the French president invite Jalil to the Elysee Palace — and recognize the council as the country’s official government by March 10.

The emails to Clinton tell a distinctly less heroic story.

According to one entry from March 22, 2011, “officers” with the General Directorate for External Security — the French intelligence service — “began a series of secret meetings” with Jalil and Gen. Abdul Fatah Younis in Benghazi in late February and gave them “money and guidance” to set up the council, whose formation was announced Feb. 27. The officers, “speaking under orders from [Sarkozy] promised that as soon as the [council] was organized France would recognize [it] as the new government of Libya.”

“In return for their assistance,” the memo states, “the DGSE officers indicated that they expected the new government of Libya to favor French firms and national interests, particularly regarding the oil industry in Libya.”[/quote]

o [url=libertyblitzkrieg.com/2016/02/26/confirmed-the-u-s-military-asks-tech-companies-to-tweak-their-algorithms-to-promote-certain-content/]The U.S. Military Asks Tech Companies to Tweak Their Algorithms to Promote Certain Content[/url] | Liberty Blitzkrieg

o [url=www.buzzfeed.com/mikegiglio/america-is-now-fighting-a-proxy-war-with-itself-in-syria#.thvyQPX9B2]America Is Now Fighting A Proxy War With Itself In Syria[/url] | Buzzfeed

As one NC reader summarizes, "a CIA backed militia is fighting a Pentagon backed militia." Another quotes from Joseph Heller's classic war satire [i]Catch-22[/i]:
[quote]This time Milo had gone too far. Bombing his own men and planes was more than even the most phlegmatic observer could stomach, and it looked like the end for him ... Milo was all washed up until he opened his books to the public and disclosed the tremendous profit he had made.
...
Yossarian: You killed Nately! He’s dead!
Milo: Nately was very lucky, he owned sixty shares of the syndicate, he died a wealthy man.
Y: What good will that do him? He’s dead!
M: Then it will go to his family.
Y: He was too young to have a family!
M: Then it will go to his parents.
Y: His parents don’t need it, they’re already wealthy!
M: Then they’ll understand.[/quote]

[QUOTE]America Is Now Fighting A Proxy War With Itself In Syria | Buzzfeed[/QUOTE]

In the fine tradition of the French selling arms to both sides of the Iran Iraq war. What the hey? If it sells more weapons, someone makes a profit. Capitalism wins! Besides, I think inciting and sustaining conflict in the region is one of the main aims of US involvement.

[CENTER][B][URL="https://theintercept.com/2016/03/08/nobody-knows-the-identity-of-the-150-people-killed-by-u-s-in-somalia-but-most-are-certain-they-deserved-it/"][SIZE=3]Nobody Knows the Identities of the 150 People Killed by U.S. in Somalia, but Most Are Certain They Deserved It[/SIZE][/URL][/B]

Glenn Greenwald
[/CENTER]
When I saw the headline, I assumed that it was the preface to a Borowitz column.

[QUOTE]The U.S. used drones and manned aircraft yesterday to drop bombs and missiles on Somalia, [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-35748986"]ending the lives of at least 150 people[/URL]. As it virtually always does, the Obama administration [URL="http://www.defense.gov/News-Article-View/Article/687353/us-conducts-airstrike-against-terrorist-camp-in-somalia"]instantly claimed[/URL] that the people killed were “terrorists” and militants — members of [URL="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-15336689"]the Somali group al Shabaab[/URL] — but provided no evidence to support that assertion.

Nonetheless, most U.S. media reports contained nothing more than quotes from U.S. officials about what happened, conveyed uncritically and with no skepticism of their accuracy: The dead “fighters … were assembled for what American officials believe was a graduation ceremony and prelude to an imminent attack against American troops,” [URL="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/08/world/africa/us-airstrikes-somalia.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news"]pronounced the[I] New York Times[/I][/URL]. So, the official story goes, The Terrorists were that very moment “graduating” — receiving their Terrorist degrees — and about to attack U.S. troops when the U.S. killed them.

With that boilerplate set of claims in place, huge numbers of people today who have absolutely no idea who was killed are certain that they all deserved it. As my colleague Murtaza Hussain [URL="https://twitter.com/MazMHussain/status/707235755786149888"]said[/URL] of the 150 dead people: “We don’t know who they are, but luckily they were all bad.” For mindless authoritarians, the words “terrorist” and “militant” have no meaning other than: [I]anyone who dies when my government drops bombs[/I], or, at best, [I]a “terrorist” is anyone[/I] [I]my government tells me is a terrorist. [/I]Watch how many people today are defending this strike by claiming “terrorists” and “militants” were killed using those definitions even though they have literally no idea who was killed.
[/QUOTE]