Geneva Convention

[rowan]

Right so Digby goes straight to Russia again, where the ethnic Russian majority voted to make a peaceful transition back to Russia because a US-backed coup in Kiev had led to a civil war in which ethnic Russians were being mass-murdered by Ukranian Neo-Nazis, among others, and a corrupt, pro-Western oligarch had been installed.

& of course this justifies totally the fact that NATO has occupied Afghanistan for 16 years (it's longest ever war on foreign terrain), has made no impact on the Taliban, has failed to free the civilian population, let alone ensure their security or restore women's rights to any degree, and that well-documented plans to ship gas out of the Caspian region via Afghanistan were fully underway in the US before 9/11 even happened.

So, once again, thank you for this glimpse into the mindset of the imperialist. It is clear that NATO can bomb and occupy whoever it likes because . . . Russia

The Nazis should've thought of this. Ya, but look vot ze Rusyans are doing . . . !

[Stones of granite]

Right so Digby goes straight to Russia again, where the ethnic Russian majority voted to make a peaceful transition back to Russia because a US-backed coup in Kiev had led to a civil war in which ethnic Russians were being mass-murdered by Ukranian Neo-Nazis, among others, and a corrupt, pro-Western oligarch had been installed.

& of course this justifies totally the fact that NATO has occupied Afghanistan for 16 years (it's longest ever war on foreign terrain), has made no impact on the Taliban, has failed to free the civilian population, let alone ensure their security or restore women's rights to any degree, and that well-documented plans to ship gas out of the Caspian region via Afghanistan were fully underway in the US before 9/11 even happened.

So, once again, thank you for this glimpse into the mindset of the imperialist. It is clear that NATO can bomb and occupy whoever it likes because . . . Russia

The Nazis should've thought of this. Ya, but look vot ze Rusyans are doing . . . !

There was no coup in Kiev, no matter how many times you write it and stamp your little feet.
The "civil war" was actually a Russian invasion, leading to the shooting down of a Malaysian airliner, killing all on board, by a Russian SAM system, possibly operated by their local puppets, but which the Russians subsequently made disappear.
Incidentally, the Donetsk "rebels" were also largely Neo-Nazis. Right up until Russia disappeared most of their leaders as well.

[Digby]

no matter how many times you write it and stamp your little feet.

In a well known story about the clicking of feet it did of course feature a wicked with of the east, the west being entirely above board and indeed deserving of naught but praise

[rowan]

Once again, we need only go as far as Britain's own Guardian newspaper to destroy all the imperialist denialism being deposited on this forum. From multi-award winning Australian journalist John Pilger:

Every year the American historian William Blum publishes his "updated summary of the record of US foreign policy" which shows that, since 1945, the US has tried to overthrow more than 50 governments, many of them democratically elected; grossly interfered in elections in 30 countries; bombed the civilian populations of 30 countries; used chemical and biological weapons; and attempted to assassinate foreign leaders.

In many cases Britain has been a collaborator. The degree of human suffering, let alone criminality, is little acknowledged in the west, despite the presence of the world's most advanced communications and nominally most free journalism. That the most numerous victims of terrorism – "our" terrorism – are Muslims, is unsayable. That extreme jihadism, which led to 9/11, was nurtured as a weapon of Anglo-American policy (Operation Cyclone in Afghanistan) is suppressed. In April the US state department noted that, following Nato's campaign in 2011, "Libya has become a terrorist safe haven".

The name of "our" enemy has changed over the years, from communism to Islamism, but generally it is any society independent of western power and occupying strategically useful or resource-rich territory, or merely offering an alternative to US domination. The leaders of these obstructive nations are usually violently shoved aside, such as the democrats Muhammad Mossedeq in Iran, Arbenz in Guatemala and Salvador Allende in Chile, or they are murdered like Patrice Lumumba in the Democratic Republic of Congo. All are subjected to a western media campaign of vilification – think Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez, now Vladimir Putin.

Washington's role in Ukraine is different only in its implications for the rest of us. For the first time since the Reagan years, the US is threatening to take the world to war. With eastern Europe and the Balkans now military outposts of Nato, the last "buffer state" bordering Russia – Ukraine – is being torn apart by fascist forces unleashed by the US and the EU. We in the west are now backing neo-Nazis in a country where Ukrainian Nazis backed Hitler.

Having masterminded the coup in February against the democratically elected government in Kiev, Washington's planned seizure of Russia's historic, legitimate warm-water naval base in Crimea failed. The Russians defended themselves, as they have done against every threat and invasion from the west for almost a century.

But Nato's military encirclement has accelerated, along with US-orchestrated attacks on ethnic Russians in Ukraine. If Putin can be provoked into coming to their aid, his pre-ordained "pariah" role will justify a Nato-run guerrilla war that is likely to spill into Russia itself.

Instead, Putin has confounded the war party by seeking an accommodation with Washington and the EU, by withdrawing Russian troops from the Ukrainian border and urging ethnic Russians in eastern Ukraine to abandon the weekend's provocative referendum. These Russian-speaking and bilingual people – a third of Ukraine's population – have long sought a democratic federation that reflects the country's ethnic diversity and is both autonomous of Kiev and independent of Moscow. Most are neither "separatists" nor "rebels", as the western media calls them, but citizens who want to live securely in their homeland.

Like the ruins of Iraq and Afghanistan, Ukraine has been turned into a CIA theme park – run personally by CIA director John Brennan in Kiev, with dozens of "special units" from the CIA and FBI setting up a "security structure" that oversees savage attacks on those who opposed the February coup. Watch the videos, read the eye-witness reports from the massacre in Odessa this month. Bussed fascist thugs burned the trade union headquarters, killing 41 people trapped inside. Watch the police standing by.

A doctor described trying to rescue people, "but I was stopped by pro-Ukrainian Nazi radicals. One of them pushed me away rudely, promising that soon me and other Jews of Odessa are going to meet the same fate. What occurred yesterday didn't even take place during the fascist occupation in my town in world war two. I wonder, why the whole world is keeping silent." [see footnote]

Russian-speaking Ukrainians are fighting for survival. When Putin announced the withdrawal of Russian troops from the border, the Kiev junta's defence secretary, Andriy Parubiy – a founding member of the fascist Svoboda party – boasted that attacks on "insurgents" would continue. In Orwellian style, propaganda in the west has inverted this to Moscow "trying to orchestrate conflict and provocation", according to William Hague. His cynicism is matched by Obama's grotesque congratulations to the coup junta on its "remarkable restraint" after the Odessa massacre. The junta, says Obama, is "duly elected". As Henry Kissinger once said: "It is not a matter of what is true that counts, but what is perceived to be true."

In the US media the Odessa atrocity has been played down as "murky" and a "tragedy" in which "nationalists" (neo-Nazis) attacked "separatists" (people collecting signatures for a referendum on a federal Ukraine). Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal damned the victims – "Deadly Ukraine Fire Likely Sparked by Rebels, Government Says". Propaganda in Germany has been pure cold war, with the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung warning its readers of Russia's "undeclared war". For the Germans, it is a poignant irony that Putin is the only leader to condemn the rise of fascism in 21st-century Europe.

A popular truism is that "the world changed" following 9/11. But what has changed? According to the great whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg, a silent coup has taken place in Washington and rampant militarism now rules. The Pentagon currently runs "special operations" – secret wars – in 124 countries. At home, rising poverty and a loss of liberty are the historic corollary of a perpetual war state. Add the risk of nuclear war, and the question is: why do we tolerate this?

http://www.johnpilger.com

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ohn-pilger

[OptimisticJock]

Right so Digby goes straight to Russia again, where the ethnic Russian majority voted to make a peaceful transition back to Russia because a US-backed coup in Kiev had led to a civil war in which ethnic Russians were being mass-murdered by Ukranian Neo-Nazis, among others, and a corrupt, pro-Western oligarch had been installed.

& of course this justifies totally the fact that NATO has occupied Afghanistan for 16 years (it's longest ever war on foreign terrain), has made no impact on the Taliban, has failed to free the civilian population, let alone ensure their security or restore women's rights to any degree, and that well-documented plans to ship gas out of the Caspian region via Afghanistan were fully underway in the US before 9/11 even happened.

So, once again, thank you for this glimpse into the mindset of the imperialist. It is clear that NATO can bomb and occupy whoever it likes because . . . Russia

The Nazis should've thought of this. Ya, but look vot ze Rusyans are doing . . . !

There was no coup in Kiev, no matter how many times you write it and stamp your little feet.
The "civil war" was actually a Russian invasion, leading to the shooting down of a Malaysian airliner, killing all on board, by a Russian SAM system, possibly operated by their local puppets, but which the Russians subsequently made disappear.
Incidentally, the Donetsk "rebels" were also largely Neo-Nazis. Right up until Russia disappeared most of their leaders as well.

Seriously mate, why the fuck are you bothering?

For obvious reasons this is a subject I was looking to discuss in a serious manner but this thread, unlike the original, was fucked through 2 or 3 posters being fannies instantly. Not that this is a surprise but I really don't get why people feed into it.

[rowan]

"Seriously mate, why the fuck are you bothering? "

Good question. I figured out after the horrific civilian carnage America inflicted upon both Iraq and Syria was greeted with deathly silence on this forum, notwithstanding a little finger-pointing at the Russians, that the denialism, prejudice and outright hypocrisy involved here are so deeply entrenched nothing is going to change them. That destroys objectivity entirely and reduces discussion on international crises to a must-win contest of the ego - which really is a waste of time.

[Stones of granite]

Right so Digby goes straight to Russia again, where the ethnic Russian majority voted to make a peaceful transition back to Russia because a US-backed coup in Kiev had led to a civil war in which ethnic Russians were being mass-murdered by Ukranian Neo-Nazis, among others, and a corrupt, pro-Western oligarch had been installed.

& of course this justifies totally the fact that NATO has occupied Afghanistan for 16 years (it's longest ever war on foreign terrain), has made no impact on the Taliban, has failed to free the civilian population, let alone ensure their security or restore women's rights to any degree, and that well-documented plans to ship gas out of the Caspian region via Afghanistan were fully underway in the US before 9/11 even happened.

So, once again, thank you for this glimpse into the mindset of the imperialist. It is clear that NATO can bomb and occupy whoever it likes because . . . Russia

The Nazis should've thought of this. Ya, but look vot ze Rusyans are doing . . . !

There was no coup in Kiev, no matter how many times you write it and stamp your little feet.
The "civil war" was actually a Russian invasion, leading to the shooting down of a Malaysian airliner, killing all on board, by a Russian SAM system, possibly operated by their local puppets, but which the Russians subsequently made disappear.
Incidentally, the Donetsk "rebels" were also largely Neo-Nazis. Right up until Russia disappeared most of their leaders as well.

Seriously mate, why the fuck are you bothering?

For obvious reasons this is a subject I was looking to discuss in a serious manner but this thread, unlike the original, was fucked through 2 or 3 posters being fannies instantly. Not that this is a surprise but I really don't get why people feed into it.

You're right. I should know better. His pressel button is jammed on

[canta_brian]

Care to debate the issue rather than just making infantile blubbering noises, Donny? Of course, it must be hard for a 12-year-old to have any understanding of historical context...

So the world's major super power disguised as NATO has been at war with the Taliban for 16 years but the Taliban seems to be winning? Oookay.

So their reason for invading and occupying Afghanistan was to hunt down bin Laden (who they claim to have murdered in Pakistan 5 years ago anyway) and those who are harboring him? Ooookay.

So this has nothing to do with transporting vast gas reserves out of the Capsian region to the Indian Ocean when no other route was available - despite a well-known pre-9/11 agenda to do so? Oooookay

But even the Guardian appears to concede otherwise:

In 1998, Dick Cheney, now US vice-president but then chief executive of a major oil services company, remarked: "I cannot think of a time when we have had a region emerge as suddenly to become as strategically significant as the Caspian." But the oil and gas there is worthless until it is moved. The only route which makes both political and economic sense is through Afghanistan.

Transporting all the Caspian basin's fossil fuel through Russia or Azerbaijan would greatly enhance Russia's political and economic control over the central Asian republics, which is precisely what the west has spent 10 years trying to prevent. Piping it through Iran would enrich a regime which the US has been seeking to isolate. Sending it the long way round through China, quite aside from the strategic considerations, would be prohibitively expensive.

But pipelines through Afghanistan would allow the US both to pursue its aim of "diversifying energy supply" and to penetrate the world's most lucrative markets. Growth in European oil consumption is slow and competition is intense. In south Asia, by contrast, demand is booming and competitors are scarce. Pumping oil south and selling it in Pakistan and India, in other words, is far more profitable than pumping it west and selling it in Europe.

As the author Ahmed Rashid has documented, in 1995 the US oil company Unocal started negotiating to build oil and gas pipelines from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan and into Pakistani ports on the Arabian sea. The company's scheme required a single administration in Afghanistan, which would guarantee safe passage for its goods. Soon after the Taliban took Kabul in September 1996, the Telegraph reported that "oil industry insiders say the dream of securing a pipeline across Afghanistan is the main reason why Pakistan, a close political ally of America's, has been so supportive of the Taliban, and why America has quietly acquiesced in its conquest of Afghanistan". Unocal invited some of the leaders of the Taliban to Houston, where they were royally entertained. The company suggested paying these barbarians 15 cents for every thousand cubic feet of gas it pumped through the land they had conquered.

For the first year of Taliban rule, US policy towards the regime appears to have been determined principally by Unocal's interests. In 1997 a US diplomat told Rashid "the Taliban will probably develop like the Saudis did. There will be Aramco [the former US oil consortium in Saudi Arabia] pipelines, an emir, no parliament and lots of Sharia law. We can live with that." US policy began to change only when feminists and greens started campaigning against both Unocal's plans and the government's covert backing for Kabul.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/ ... errorism11

http://www.ccace.ed.ac.uk/about-us/what ... ive-ageing

Maybe being 12 isn't such a bad thing.

[Sandydragon]

"Seriously mate, why the fuck are you bothering? "

Good question. I figured out after the horrific civilian carnage America inflicted upon both Iraq and Syria was greeted with deathly silence on this forum, notwithstanding a little finger-pointing at the Russians, that the denialism, prejudice and outright hypocrisy involved here are so deeply entrenched nothing is going to change them. That destroys objectivity entirely and reduces discussion on international crises to a must-win contest of the ego - which really is a waste of time.

I've asked you to compare NATO ROE and targeting methodologies with those used historically, or indeed across other military forces. Any thoughts yet on their relevance to LOAC vs your insistence that NATO personnel operate in the same manner as German troops in WWII?

[OptimisticJock]

"Seriously mate, why the fuck are you bothering? "

Good question. I figured out after the horrific civilian carnage America inflicted upon both Iraq and Syria was greeted with deathly silence on this forum, notwithstanding a little finger-pointing at the Russians, that the denialism, prejudice and outright hypocrisy involved here are so deeply entrenched nothing is going to change them. That destroys objectivity entirely and reduces discussion on international crises to a must-win contest of the ego - which really is a waste of time.

I've asked you to compare NATO ROE and targeting methodologies with those used historically, or indeed across other military forces. Any thoughts yet on their relevance to LOAC vs your insistence that NATO personnel operate in the same manner as German troops in WWII?

I would ask you the same but you're beyond redemption

[Sandydragon]

"Seriously mate, why the fuck are you bothering? "

Good question. I figured out after the horrific civilian carnage America inflicted upon both Iraq and Syria was greeted with deathly silence on this forum, notwithstanding a little finger-pointing at the Russians, that the denialism, prejudice and outright hypocrisy involved here are so deeply entrenched nothing is going to change them. That destroys objectivity entirely and reduces discussion on international crises to a must-win contest of the ego - which really is a waste of time.

I've asked you to compare NATO ROE and targeting methodologies with those used historically, or indeed across other military forces. Any thoughts yet on their relevance to LOAC vs your insistence that NATO personnel operate in the same manner as German troops in WWII?

I would ask you the same but you're beyond redemption

I know, I know. I'm an eternal optimist. One day perhaps a debate will break out.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[SerjeantWildgoose]

I broke out in a debate once, but a couple of applications of Savlon, a week of penicillin and cutting out the chocolate Hobnobs soon had it cleared up

[SerjeantWildgoose]

These guys aren't 'heroes.' They're no different to the troops who occupied Vietnam, India, Kenya and Egypt; no different, in fact, to the German troops which occupied Poland and France.

And OI! Rowan!!

Call me a Nazi again ye tedious cunt and I'll round yer fecking village up and shoot the fecking lot of yez.

[Sandydragon]

These guys aren't 'heroes.' They're no different to the troops who occupied Vietnam, India, Kenya and Egypt; no different, in fact, to the German troops which occupied Poland and France.

And OI! Rowan!!

Call me a Nazi again ye tedious cunt and I'll round yer fecking village up and shoot the fecking lot of yez.

Seconded.

[Donny osmond]

Care to debate the issue rather than just making infantile blubbering noises, Donny? Of course, it must be hard for a 12-year-old to have any understanding of historical context...

So the world's major super power disguised as NATO has been at war with the Taliban for 16 years but the Taliban seems to be winning? Oookay.

So their reason for invading and occupying Afghanistan was to hunt down bin Laden (who they claim to have murdered in Pakistan 5 years ago anyway) and those who are harboring him? Ooookay.

So this has nothing to do with transporting vast gas reserves out of the Capsian region to the Indian Ocean when no other route was available - despite a well-known pre-9/11 agenda to do so? Oooookay

But even the Guardian appears to concede otherwise:

In 1998, Dick Cheney, now US vice-president but then chief executive of a major oil services company, remarked: "I cannot think of a time when we have had a region emerge as suddenly to become as strategically significant as the Caspian." But the oil and gas there is worthless until it is moved. The only route which makes both political and economic sense is through Afghanistan.

Transporting all the Caspian basin's fossil fuel through Russia or Azerbaijan would greatly enhance Russia's political and economic control over the central Asian republics, which is precisely what the west has spent 10 years trying to prevent. Piping it through Iran would enrich a regime which the US has been seeking to isolate. Sending it the long way round through China, quite aside from the strategic considerations, would be prohibitively expensive.

But pipelines through Afghanistan would allow the US both to pursue its aim of "diversifying energy supply" and to penetrate the world's most lucrative markets. Growth in European oil consumption is slow and competition is intense. In south Asia, by contrast, demand is booming and competitors are scarce. Pumping oil south and selling it in Pakistan and India, in other words, is far more profitable than pumping it west and selling it in Europe.

As the author Ahmed Rashid has documented, in 1995 the US oil company Unocal started negotiating to build oil and gas pipelines from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan and into Pakistani ports on the Arabian sea. The company's scheme required a single administration in Afghanistan, which would guarantee safe passage for its goods. Soon after the Taliban took Kabul in September 1996, the Telegraph reported that "oil industry insiders say the dream of securing a pipeline across Afghanistan is the main reason why Pakistan, a close political ally of America's, has been so supportive of the Taliban, and why America has quietly acquiesced in its conquest of Afghanistan". Unocal invited some of the leaders of the Taliban to Houston, where they were royally entertained. The company suggested paying these barbarians 15 cents for every thousand cubic feet of gas it pumped through the land they had conquered.

For the first year of Taliban rule, US policy towards the regime appears to have been determined principally by Unocal's interests. In 1997 a US diplomat told Rashid "the Taliban will probably develop like the Saudis did. There will be Aramco [the former US oil consortium in Saudi Arabia] pipelines, an emir, no parliament and lots of Sharia law. We can live with that." US policy began to change only when feminists and greens started campaigning against both Unocal's plans and the government's covert backing for Kabul.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/ ... errorism11

If I thought you wanted to debate anything I might try, but you dont so I wont bother.

Here you go...



Sent from my HUAWEI VNS-L31 using Tapatalk

[kk67]

Find a conflict then look for a pipeline to blame it on. Even one that's not even been built yet. You know it makes sense.

I'm afraid your sarcastic tone does nothing to hide the fundamental truth of what you've written. It is frighteningly accurate to characterise the middle east conflict as Gazprom v Halliburton. That is what the overwhelming proportion of wars are all about.
Out of interest,.....why do you think the west is involved/started wars based in the oil/gas rich region...?. Hmmm?.

Considering that the world is cross-crossed with pipelines to an extent that most people have no clue about, the correlation between a conflict and a pipeline or planned pipeline isn't exactly surprising.

That's not exactly an answer, Fella. The whole place is a fecking desert. Why are we starting wars there..?.

[Stones of granite]

I'm afraid your sarcastic tone does nothing to hide the fundamental truth of what you've written. It is frighteningly accurate to characterise the middle east conflict as Gazprom v Halliburton. That is what the overwhelming proportion of wars are all about.
Out of interest,.....why do you think the west is involved/started wars based in the oil/gas rich region...?. Hmmm?.

Considering that the world is cross-crossed with pipelines to an extent that most people have no clue about, the correlation between a conflict and a pipeline or planned pipeline isn't exactly surprising.

That's not exactly an answer, Fella. The whole place is a fecking desert. Why are we starting wars there..?.

It may not be the answer you are looking for, but it remains the the truth.

[kk67]

Considering that the world is cross-crossed with pipelines to an extent that most people have no clue about, the correlation between a conflict and a pipeline or planned pipeline isn't exactly surprising.

That's not exactly an answer, Fella. The whole place is a fecking desert. Why are we starting wars there..?.

It may not be the answer you are looking for, but it remains the the truth.

It's massive income. That's why we are starting wars and creating huge diasporas. Massive, massive income.
Huge numbers of people are dying so that a small number of people can make a huge amount of money.
That's all it is.
That's why we are fighting over some deserts.

[kk67]

...and heroin fields. The economics of war are so simple. It's the Establishments greatest trick to connive with their financiers and convince us all that war is a necessity of life when actually they're just making a profit.
Doomed to repeat history..?....

[Sandydragon]

...and heroin fields. The economics of war are so simple. It's the Establishments greatest trick to connive with their financiers and convince us all that war is a necessity of life when actually they're just making a profit.
Doomed to repeat history..?....

Nato were doing their best to eradicate the drug trade in Afghanistan. The Taliban were keen to preserve it as they made significant money from the sale of drugs. I agree that money and warfare are intrinsically linked, although I suspect you weren't linking drugs and the Taliban.

[OptimisticJock]

That's not exactly an answer, Fella. The whole place is a fecking desert. Why are we starting wars there..?.

It may not be the answer you are looking for, but it remains the the truth.

It's massive income. That's why we are starting wars and creating huge diasporas. Massive, massive income.
Huge numbers of people are dying so that a small number of people can make a huge amount of money.
That's all it is.
That's why we are fighting over some deserts.

Maybe that's why you were there.

[kk67]

Maybe that's why you were there.

Sorry, Fella. Point taken.
I'm not a pacifist but the whole profiteering war industry (industrial complex ??), the propaganda that desperately attempts to hide it, the cheerful complicity of those that will never have to experience the horror and the subsequent damage to all those who have had direct contact.....it really boils my piss.

[Mellsblue]

Have you ever boiled piss? A team mate of mine once did on the coach on the way back from a match. Utterly awful. I can only assume that is what hell smells like.

[kk67]

If you boiled my piss after I'd eaten asparagus tips......that would be a fate worse than a fate worse than death.
I sometimes eat them just for the hell of smelling it.

[morepork]

Have you ever boiled piss? A team mate of mine once did on the coach on the way back from a match. Utterly awful. I can only assume that is what hell smells like.

"A team mate of mine".


RAH