Article

2016-08-14 Terror Networks

The brittle world the Arabs built, then destroyed

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Posted by Fred 2016-08-14 00:00|| || Front Page|| [2 views ] Top

#1 In his attempt to answer what went wrong, Anderson avoids providing "a single answer."

How about 'Islam'

Posted by lord garth 2016-08-14 07:54|| 2016-08-14 07:54|| Front Page Top

#2 I'd go with 'Arab'. But that's just my opinion.

Posted by Pappy 2016-08-14 08:51|| 2016-08-14 08:51|| Front Page Top

#3 How about "there are multiple issues which, when combined, form the toxic sludge that is "the Arab World"?

Islam is the leading factor, but not the only one. I always SMH at people that have to reduce any situation to a single blame point.

Posted by AlanC 2016-08-14 09:02|| 2016-08-14 09:02|| Front Page Top

#4 The beginning of the unraveling? 1927 and the founding of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.

Posted by Spemp Thusoth6068 2016-08-14 09:15|| 2016-08-14 09:15|| Front Page Top

#5 Some give them credit for inventing algebra and the number 0 but all I give them credit for is Olympic gold level blowing yourself up in crowded spaces.

Posted by jpal 2016-08-14 09:55|| 2016-08-14 09:55|| Front Page Top

#6 Um, the numeral 0 was invented by an Indian according to Hogben.

Posted by AlanC 2016-08-14 11:50|| 2016-08-14 11:50|| Front Page Top

#7 Unraveling???

Those people have been killing each other and fighting over the succession to Mohammed for over 1200 years. They still piss and moan about the Crusades...a 1000 years ago and whine and snivel all the while.

They have done more harm to themselves over the years than any single event or series of events the "imperialists" could bring to them.

Remember Tamerlain and the 1.5 million massacred in Baghdad and that was a leader who is called a "defender of the faith" by Moslems...burned the University of Baghdad and threw ever book and scroll in the libraries into the Euphrates River...turning it black for miles.

The only time the Moslems functioned is when they hired Jews and Christians to take care of the administration while they indulged in court intrigue and assassinations. Even their fierce Janissaries were Christians and Jews.

We are locked into a battle of good versus evil. Islam which promotes paradise through a culture of death and destruction against Christianity and Judaism which believe in love, peace, and paradise through brotherly love and forgiveness.

The problem, for all of the excuses the academics want to heap on the situation, is Islam and there is no other way to cut the salami.

If Erdogan isn't stopped the next failed state/hell hole will be Turkey.

When I was in Libya, I had hope that cooler heads would prevail but the leadership was too chicken shit to deal with the militias and the Islamists in a meaningful way.

In Iraq, much of the same early energy and hopefulness is gone. Same story, but I will dump Iraq right in George's lap for all of the wrongheaded and stupid things that Paul Bremer did in Iraq that drove vast numbers of them straight into the arms of Al Qaeda.

Posted by Sock Puppet of Doom 2016-08-14 11:59|| 2016-08-14 11:59|| Front Page Top

#8 In my professional travels over the decades, I had found no other region to rival the Arab world in its utter stagnation.

The "stagnation" had been taking place for over a century, and accelerated after WWII. The Arab world had been "unraveling" for 50 years before the US invaded Iraq.

In fact, the invasion was an attempt to transform the Middle East by creating a functioning democracy. The Bush administration tried to do it on the cheap and underestimated the backlash from Iraq's neighbors.

Posted by Frozen Al 2016-08-14 12:30|| 2016-08-14 12:30|| Front Page Top

#9 When we had intimidating force bracketing Iran geopolitically, in Iraq, Afghanistan and a credible NATO ally in Turkey, we had the power to induce change there through a mix of internal revolution and confrontation from the US and a coalition of the willing countries at risk for Iranian domination. No one had the balls to take that on and endure the costs, and all the decrement of our influence and sway in the region has been the fruits of this gutlessness. now, thanks to our feckless and frankly incompetent POS POTUS, the task will be more than we can do. God help Israel.

Posted by NoMoreBS 2016-08-14 13:35|| 2016-08-14 13:35|| Front Page Top

#10 And here in the US we no longer have good, accountable government, and we are doing well in developing our own culture of grievance.

Posted by KBK 2016-08-14 14:49|| 2016-08-14 14:49|| Front Page Top

#11 I always SMH at people that have to reduce any situation to a single blame point.

"Arab" really isn't a blame point; it's a... label for a condition. In my case, it's an opinion forged over years of wandering around that area.

Posted by Pappy 2016-08-14 16:40|| 2016-08-14 16:40|| Front Page Top

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