So...American troops are much safer now that US-Syrian relations have
deteriorated, there is now a group of vengeful Syrians and America has yet again
show that it thinks that killing civilians if justified to achieve its aims?

Don't you think that there might be one or two...errr...'repercussions'?

Where I an angry, young Syrian who saw my country being attacked and my
government doing nothing about it, I may well be heading to the ammunition shop.

There were "repercussions" to allowing insurgents to shelter and arm in Syria unmolested. Which one do you think is the bigger danger to our troops?

One is wondering why an angry young Syrian is not angry about his government giving shelter to Al Quaeda leaders and according terrorists.

What worth are good relations with Syria - if they do like this? Answer: nothing. What worth are good relations with Syria, if they keep on undermining stability in Lebanon? Answer: nothing.

What is wrong with you? A key figure in the Al Quaeda hierarchy and an active logistics and traffick expert for smuggling terrorists in and out of Iraq has been taken out. Thats the kind of guys that kill dozens, sometimes a hundred people with one bomb. He's gone, one worthless bug less in the world, big deal. Get over it. This one will not assassin civilian anymore. and no civilians will get killed due to his participation in terror.

If you have a better method to take out and neutralise enemy terrorists and their leaders in their hierarchy, I am listening. If all you have is just good intentions, but no realistic procedures that survive the test of reality, step aside and let others hunt them down and kill them.

I know all that, and my attitude on the Iraq war and US foreign policy has not chnaged since 2003. However, this thread is about an incident in Syria, not Saudi Arabia, and relations with Syria not Saudi Arabia, so it is Syria'S policy in question here, not Saudi Arabia's.

either you have troops in Iraq fighting in a war, or you pull them out. As long as they have not pulled out, they fight a war, no matter the reasons why this war was laucnhed. If you fight a war, you go after the enemy and do not allow to get distracted from that mission, and you do not allow him save havens. You locate him, you go there, you kill him. If that goes at the cost of somebody supporting him, then that is part of the setting. Maybe it will make him think on wether to continue that support, or kick out those he supports.

Three things I said about Iraq, always, from the beginning in 2003 on, and I have not changed my views a bit.

First, the war was not about WMD and Al Quaeda links and 9/11, but was preplanned since the early nineties, and was about geostrategical goals and dominance over certain fields of Iraq's economy, namley the oil business, and the flow of oil in international trade patterns. "Control" is the message here.

Second, that in order to prevent this acting becoming a precedent for the future, it is needed that America fails in getting an economical advantage from this war, but indeed needs to pay for it more than it gets in return. I do not know how the profit caluclation for single companies like Mercenary corporations or Halliburton looks like, it seems they are making a fortune, but the American nation as a whole does not profit from this war, in fact it is paying more and more into this adventure at it'S own loss at home - and that is good, even if in the end last but not least we foreigners from other nations and China subsidise this war by keeping alive the patient the american financial system is, by investing money into it for different reasons than Iraq. From this experience it is unlikely that a future US government is easily tempted and as easy<-minded as bush has been to try something like Iraq again for vague calculations about national profit interests. the more painful and costly the lesson, the better it will be learned. "No economical profit" is the message here.

And third, I always said that one should get out there, and never should have gotten in. But as long as one is there, i also always said, this makes only sense in itself if one is waging war like war is meant to be waged, and that is not by saving the enemy, but by crushing him, and not acting weak, but strong, not being indiscriminating regarding target and civilian, but also not allowing the enemy being saved by hiding between civilians, or escaping due to the presence of civilians. After the enemy you go, and the less civilians are standing in the way, the better - but if there are some, bad karma. Cruel? Injust? Yes, it is cruel, it is inhumane, it is injust, I totally agree, I am completely aware of that, and I hate it. Welcome to war.

This I have said always, for five years now. Those who agree with bush'S war will not like points 1 and 2, and those who are against Bush and the war will not like point 3. So what - must I change my mind just to please them all, or because my position is under fire from all sides, Bush-fans and Bush haters alike? Either you fight a war, or you don't. either you have war, or not. either you kill the enemy, or he overcomes you. either you stay in Iraq and fight, or you don't want to fight - then you have to pull out. But two things you cannot have: being peaceful and civilised, and fighting a war at the same time.

Everything else is an egg-dance only.

You know, the US of A is the exception that confirms the rule.
All countries must abide by international law, except of course the USA.
"Do as I say not as I do" would be the motto of the americans.

Nevertheless sometimes they are right. That's why I decide on an issue-by-issue basis wether I am suppoorting them or not. Neither do I always oppose them for principal reasons, nor do I make it a principal thing to always be with them, no matter what. I think that is the only intelligent solution to how to deal with american policies. Everything else is ideological trench warfare in defense or in attack against America.

Sometimes yes, as when they went to war with afghanistan.
Clear casus belli and clear goals.
With iraq not so. It was a farce from beginning to end.

You can't believe a rule to be right and simultaneously believe your self right to
break it. Not only because it is extreme hypocrisy, but because it makes rules
utterly worthless. No one ever breaks a rule because they think they are wrong to
break it.

Of course, but such are the privileges granted to the last imperial superpower.

In various political and economical fields, all nations break rules all the time, for selfish motives. In case of america the public looks especially sharp, for ideological reasons (in case of the poltiical left, for example) and the simple fact that due to it's extraordinary powerposition in the world even usually minor aspects of internal politcs of this country, that usually go by unnoticed or uncommented, in case of America stretch beyond the scale of being US-internal and in fact affect much of the rest of the world, thus making that close monitoring of and interest in America a totally legal and justified thing of nation'S legitimate self-interest (although America often gives the impresson of not knowing what "rest of the world" means :lol: ) Seen that way the amnerican perception that people shout easier about America than about the misdeeds of others, is an absolutely correct observation that describes the facts. But this circumstance has a reason, and america has to live with it as long as it clings to the top of the global world order. the more powerful China becomes, or the EU, the tighter they will be kept under public observation and commenting as well.

Yes, and every empire there ever was, was like that. However, these privileges can be used for good or bad. Fifteen years ago, the prospect of a Pax Americana, if it would have been balanaced and just towards everybody, looked tempting, even if being enforced by hegemonial power, like the ruling of Rome in many regions brought more positives than negatives for the local population as well, and added to the basis of the later western development we enjoy the benefits from. If you do not believe that a pax americana also could have had benefits, just look at the mjaor war unfolding again in Congo, or the decades of war and bloodshed in the middle East. But in the last eight years we have seen these imperial privileges being abused unbalanced and injust, for completely selfish, even criminal motives and ignoring the legitimate interests of others completely. Different to Rome, the Bush years just claimed to be about bringing civilisation and justice, but in fact were about economical dominance and maximum exploitation. This corruption of american idealism, even at American'S own costs, just for the interest of a small plutocratic elite at the top, is what has discredited the historic reputation of Bush's government, forever. And almost all people associated with him, are burned and have no powerful political future anymore, will not recover frokm having been asscoiated with Bush, with maybe the only exceptions of colin Powell who left the shipwreck just in time, and Condy Rice.

If the strategy is flawed a tactical "succes" is meaningless.
... but the "colateral damage" real.

Indeed. That's why the troops should get out there better sooner than later.

Radical Islam has been on the rise again long before Bush ever took office. It is the same Islam that was put to hold in front of the gates of Vienna in the past. It has risen again, attacking our life lines in the Middle East and elsewhere, and those societies in the area that would rather do without them, and it was the Bush administration that was the first one in recent times that ATTACKED BACK and took the fight BACK to them. What has discredited the Bush administration is closet commies like you. If there would be more sane persons around and the media were less one sided and not run by closet commies who still didn't get over the Vietnam war and the fact that the Soviet Union failed miserably, then the Bush policy of hitting BACK against the Islamists after countless attacks conducted by THEM, culminating in 9/11, would be rightously praised.
If there had been as many pu**ies and confused people around when the Islamists stood in front of Vienna as there are today, then all the women in Europe would be wearing headscarfs today.

woah, skybird a closet commie??

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:rotfl:

Not quite.

I agree with some of what you said, not with other bits.