I don't agree with Baroud's "Political Impotence" posit, but take issue here with a commenter:
C#1:
aletheia · ~12:10, 26May'13
@Andy Perry: "the ideological framework that underpinned all actors in
the Middle East collapsed with the end of the Cold War." aletheia · ~12:10, 26May'13
Me: No. Assertions must be a) obvious enough that they brook no argument (not so here), OR b) substantiated (no such here).
To substantiate the *opposite* of "collapse:"
1. Jabotinsky(~1923): "No native population would stomach the intrusion ... Unremitting force ... to Arab objections to Zionist control of the territory."
2. Ben-Gurion(1936-39): "We must see the situation for what it is. ... But in the political field we are the attackers and the Arabs are those defending themselves. They are living in the country and own the land, ..."
3) frus1945v08: "Oil resources constitute a stupendous source of strategic power, and one of the greatest material prizes in world history"
4) Memo PPS23(George Kennan): "...we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts."
My assertion #1: That Jabotinsky's 'perpetual aggressive war' has not stopped, and the only way for it to *be* stopped is for a large enough majority in the rest of the world to *force* it to stop, possibly by 'sending Israel to Coventry' = a *total* boycott, *no* trade, *no* dialogue - no contact at all, only fence them in and ignore them - until they at least honour their promise to implement UNGA181(Palestine state)+194(return). That in turn means all stolen land/property to revest and/or full recompense/reparations, including 65+yrs lost rent.
My assertion #2: That the US is intent on total subjugation of any resistance, and will not stop unless stopped, and the only way that might happen is if both a) its subjugated satellites rebel and b) some effective muscle is put in the US' way, only perhaps possible by Russia and China combined (with India, if they ever got a pair).
As my substantiation, I simply say: Look and see. The aggressive Zionist invaders continually attack their neighbours, the US continually attacks the 'arc of instability' (includes all ME oil, then there's Africa and South America); actually fomenting = *creating* instability - also to attack Russia (Chechnya, say) and China (Uighurs, say) - About 2,820,000 results.
As "supreme international crimes" go, they are all "Go!" - for US/Zs.
-=*=-
Then, another interesting comment + 2 responses:
C#2:
Clovis · ~14:00 25May'13
While Barzoud's cataloguing of the world of sorrow and death the US's imperial adventures have left in their wake is a necessary though depressing exercise, I think he is working from a flawed premise and therefore missing the forest for the trees. That is, I do not think the sociopaths in power measure the "success" of these adventures in the present functionality of the societies they have ravaged, in the "increased influence" they may or may not have gained in these societies, or in the military "victory" (or not) over the peoples whose regimes they have destroyed. On the contrary, I think the short-term goal is the "process" itself: i.e., the destruction of the relatively self-sufficient societies of Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc., the decimation of their fighting populations and military capabilities, the continual creation of new theatres of combat, the invention of a new class of international mercenary soldier, and the fragmentation of the respective polities of these countries. This is the precisely "new Middle East" they wanted: crippled, politically and socially dysfunctional, disunified and fragmented into warring ethnic enclaves, effectively incapable of independent existence. They have achieved a goal at once short-term and long-term, with the Empire's and the West's (and Israel's) hegemony increasing by default, as these countries flounder in their newfound abjection, powerless to affect the geopolitics of the region.
R#1:
Fitzhenrymac · ~14:50 25May'13
Yes, Clovis. They are like the black death, a plague that left nothing but destruction in its wake. I agree that that was their partial aim - to so terrify other countries that none will stand up to them particularly India and China.
It's not just about profit anymore, its about power and control.
A side aim for some parties was to control oil, gas and the many other huge deposits of minerals their satellites and Russian geologists discovered in Afghanistan and Iraq.
R#2:
Ipse_Dixit · ~0:55 26May'13
Excellent comment which I think may apply equally to our own societies whose democracies and standards of living are also being negatively affected by these wars.
-=*=-
Me: It's not just "these wars" (which, being 'murder for spoil,' illustrate the psychopathic depravity of the tyrants that *undemocratically* rule over us), but the wholesale destruction of "the Enlightenment" plus society in general. Thatcher: "There is no such thing as society" as self-fulfilling prophecy; check full context here = unmistakeable rhetoric to cut social services, à la Rand + Hayek -> wretched serfdom for any needy and squalid struggle for most. From the justified-optimism of the 60s, we the people now have *no* hope - except for first ousting the tyrants (who keep trying for an overwhelming monopoly on guns, thus *proving* their fear of us), then reinstalling truth + justice = peace.
Says it all.