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Syria War and Shiite Government of Maliki to Blame

by Oui Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 02:38:53 PM EST

In addition to a new article yesterday, the reporter followed the developments as the sectarian violence increased due to a failed policy of PM Maliki who has estranged the Sunni minority in Anbar province. Don't obfuscate the issue by denying the direct link to the Syrian civil war started three years ago. [Links added are mine - Oui]

See my earlier diary - Michael Ledeen from Trotsky to Mussolini - Our Freedom Betrayed.

What We Left Behind

(The New Yorker) Apr. 28, 2014 - When the last American soldiers left Iraq, at the end of 2011, the bloody civil war between the country's Sunni and Shiite sects had been stifled but not resolved. Now the sectarian violence had returned, with terrifying intensity. For more than a year, thousands of Iraqis, nearly all of them members of the Sunni Arab minority, had been gathering to rail against Maliki's Shiite-dominated government. Although the protests were mostly peaceful, security forces responded harshly, detaining thousands of Sunni men without charges and, in one encampment, touching off a spasm of violence that left hundreds of civilians dead. Across the Sunni heartland, north and west of Baghdad, the town squares filled with angry crowds, and the rhetoric grew more extreme. In Ramadi, protesters raised black jihadi flags, representing the extremist Al Qaeda offshoot that had dominated the city during the American occupation. "We are a group called Al Qaeda!" a man shouted from a stage in the protesters' camp. "We will cut off heads and bring justice!" The crowd cheered.

Speaking into the television cameras on Christmas, Maliki ordered the protesters to disband. Largely ignoring his own men's excesses, he claimed that the protests were dominated by extremists. "This site has become a base for Al Qaeda," he said, filled with "killers and criminals." Maliki ended his speech with what for him was a flourish of emotion, lifting a hand from the lectern. "There will be no negotiations while the square is still standing." [Another dark Christmas for Iraq's Christians]

In the protests at Ramadi, a Sunni member of parliament named Ahmed al-Alwani had inflamed the crowds, accusing Maliki of being in league with the Iranian regime, the region's great Shiite power. "My message is for the snake Iran!" Alwani shouted into a microphone, jabbing his finger into the air. Referring to Maliki and those around him as "Safavids" and "Zoroastrians," terms that denote Iranian invaders, he said, "Let them listen up and know that those gathered here will return Iraq to its people!"

Obama, al-Maliki discuss fighting al Qaeda

Continued below the fold ...

Obama, al-Maliki discuss fighting al Qaeda

(CBS News) Nov. 1, 2013 - Mr. Obama said his administration has been "encouraged" by the work al-Maliki has done "to ensure that all people inside of Iraq -- Sunni, Shia and Kurd -- feel that they have a voice in their government... so people understand that when they have differences they can express them politically as opposed to through violence."

Mr. Obama said that he and al-Maliki also spent a "considerable amount of time talking about Syria, where the spillover effects of the chaos and Assad's horrific treatment of his own people has had spillover effects in Iraq as well." He said it's in the interest of both the United States and Iraq to "try to bring about a political settlement" in Syria.

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Syria War and Shiite Government of Maliki to Blame | 14 comments (14 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
Re: Syria War and Nouri al-Maliki to Blame (none / 0)
Does Obama have President Ford's playbook for evacuating an embassy under attack? A pity of Saddam's palaces and the fortified U.S. Embassy which will get some redecorating done when ISIS sweeps through.

To be clear, ISIS has been strengthened through weapon shipments into northern Syria via Turkey for US allied opposition fighters against Assad. The Kurds have battled the jihadists and kept them out of their territory. The region where ISIS roamed in Syria was scarcely populated in the cities along the Euphrates river, see Raqqa and the cleansing of Deir ez-Zour.

 « click for more info ISIS in Syria

Maliki wasted the good relationship U.S. forces maintained with tribal leaders in the Sunni triangle of Anbar province. The Sunni areas have been run over by ISIS with help of local tribal leaders. I understood ISIS had been succesful through awakening of 'sleeper cells' in these major cities. It has been a slow proces of months ... Maliki's parliamentary election represented  a hollow victory because the Sunni population refused to take part.

○ Reports: The dynamics of Iraqi forces and resistance in Anbar province
○ Perhaps You Have Noticed ... A turning Point In Syria  May 26. 2013

Amnesia and Gaza Genocide

by Oui on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 02:42:21 PM EST
Obama: No Boots on the Ground in Iraq (none / 0)
Obama: No ground troops in Iraq  (Video)

(CNBC) - Faced with a jihadist insurgency crisis in Iraq, President Barack Obama said Friday he would not be putting U.S. troops on the ground and that any other decisions will take days of planning.

"Although events on the ground in Iraq have been happening very quickly, our ability to plan ... is going to take several days, so people should not anticipate that this is something that is going to happen overnight," Obama said in a nationally broadcast address at the White House.

Obama's overarching message was that he would prefer to rely on a political solution that involved Iraqi leaders making concerted efforts to overcome sectarian divides.

Obama reflected on the U.S.'s decade of involvement in Iraq, saying that oil-rich country had been provided an opportunity "to claim their own future" at the expense of American soldiers and taxpayers, but its leaders had been unable to overcome sectarian disagreements that have long plagued the region. Because of this, the president said, the current crisis in Iraq "is not solely or even primarily a military challenge," but a situation calling for "intensive diplomacy."

ISIS militants steal $450M, advance on Baghdad

Militants also marched into the towns of Saadiyah and Jalawla in the eastern province of Diyala after security forces abandoned their posts early on Friday, security sources told Reuters.

ISIS declared Shariah law was in effect in the areas they controlled, outlawed other forms of Islamic worship and ordered women to wear the hijab - a traditional Muslim head and body covering. They also declared that no other armed forces would be tolerated except ISIS.



Amnesia and Gaza Genocide
by Oui on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 02:44:17 PM EST
False Promises and Missed Opportunities In Iraq (none / 0)
Although he missed the early analysis in these developments, Juan Cole has written some excellent articles about the Sunni resurgence in Syria and Iraq. He blames not only George Bush, but indicts Nouri al-Malaki, Saddam Hussein and western leaders after World War I for their colonial greed of the oil riches of Mesopotamia.

The Fall of Mosul and the False Promises of Modern History

Mosul's changed circumstances are also an indictment of the irresponsible use to which Sunni fundamentalists in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Oil Gulf are putting their riches. The high petroleum prices, usually over $100 a barrel, of the past few years in a row, have injected trillions of dollars into the Gulf. Some of that money has sloshed into the hands of people who rather admired Usama Bin Laden and who are perfectly willing to fund his clones to take over major cities like Aleppo and Mosul. The vaunted US Treasury Department ability to stop money transfers by people whom Washington does not like, has faltered in this case. Is it because Washington is de facto allied with the billionaire Salafis of Kuwait City in Syria, where both want to see the Bashar al-Assad government overthrown and Iran weakened? The descent of the US into deep debt, and the emergence of Gulf states and sovereign wealth funds is a tremendous shift of geopolitical power to Riyadh, Kuwait City and Abu Dhabi, who can now simply buy Egyptian domestic and foreign policy away from Washington. They are also trying to buy a Salafi State of Syria and a Salafi state of northern and western Iraq.

...
It is also an indictment of the shameful European imperial scramble for the Middle East during and after WW I and the failed barracuda colonialism of the interwar period, as London and Paris sought oil and other resources, and strategic advantage, in areas they had promised the League of Nations they would prepare for independence.

As the war was winding down it was clear that the Ottoman Empire would collapse. The French saw Mosul, with its oil wealth, as part of Syria. The British in New Delhi and in Cairo, for all their wrangling, agreed that it should be part of Iraq, which British and British Indian troops were conquering.

When British Prime Minister Lloyd George met with French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau at Versailles, he was eager to push back French claims on Mosul. Since the British and their Arab allies had taken Damascus from the Ottomans, some wanted to renege on the Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916 altogether.

 « click for more info

○ NY Times Op-Ed: Unity Through Autonomy in Iraq (2006)

Biden-Gelb 5 point plan for Iraq - Senator Joe Biden and Leslie Gelb of the Council on Foreign Relations developed a plan for Bosnia-style "federalism"--that is, the soft partition of Iraq into Sunni, Shia and Kurdish areas.

Amnesia and Gaza Genocide

by Oui on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 02:46:44 PM EST
William Polk: A Warring People (none / 0)
Quite fitting, Obama sends aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush to the Persian Gulf ...

When will they ever Learn? America on Brink of another Military Engagement

(Informed Comment) - America appears once again to be on the brink of a war. This time the war is likely to be in Syria and/or in Iraq. If we jump into one or both of these wars, they will join, by my count since our independence, about 200 significant military operations (not all of which were legally "wars") as well as countless "proactive" interventions, regime-change undertakings, covert action schemes and search-and-destroy missions. In addition the United States has provided weapons, training and funding for a variety of non-American military and quasi-military forces throughout the world. Within recent months we have added five new African countries. History and contemporary events show that we Americans are a warring people.

So we should ask: what have we learned about ourselves, our adversaries and the process in which we have engaged? The short answer appears to be "very little."

As both a historian and a former policy planner for the American government, I will very briefly here (as I have mentioned in a previous essay, I am in the final stages of a book to be called A Warring People, on these issues), illustrate what I mean by "very little."

I begin with us, the American people. There is overwhelming historical evidence that war is popular with us. Politicians from our earliest days as a republic, indeed even before when we were British colonies, could nearly always count on gaining popularity by demonstrating our valor. Few successful politicians were pacifists.

Even supposed pacifists found reasons to engage in the use of force. Take the man most often cited as a peacemaker or at least a peaceseeker, Woodrow Wilson. He promised to "keep us out of war," by which he meant keeping us out of big, expensive European war. Before becoming president, however, he approved the American conquest of Cuba and the Philippines and described himself as an imperialist; then, as president, he occupied Haiti, sent the Marines into the Dominican Republic and ordered the Cavalry into Mexico.



Amnesia and Gaza Genocide
by Oui on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 02:48:43 PM EST
Ah, the Observant Eye (none / 0)
During the presidency of George Bush and Dick Cheney, crown prince and later King Abdullah of SA became furieus with the Americans for the decision to invade Iraq. Abdullah joined Mubarak in warning of the coming catastrophy and the power vacuum to be filled by the Iran backed Shiites. Saudi Arabia supplied funds and arms to Iraq's Sunni faction to withstand the militants of Sadr's forces. This increased the ethnic strife in Anbar province and Baghdad and a continuous flow of Sunni militants placing bombs in Shia neighborhoods and mosques/holy places. The Wahhabist extremism also purged the Christians, forced the nijab on women and closed down theaters and shops selling alcoholic beverages.

The turmoil of the Sunni-Shia religious war spread across all of the greater Middle-East. The stupidity of the western powers and the Obama administration was to fuel division by the overthrow of Gaddafi in Libya and the attempted coup in Assad's Syria. Where chaos could be created, the US administration got support from allies Turkey and Israel. Both of these two states are able and willing to unleash their great military power when they feel threatened.

○ Obama Sidelined on Syria, Hollande and King Abdullah Deliver Arms to Syrian Rebels
○ US Will Be Ousted by Saudi King Abdullah in Middle-East  by Oui on Feb. 27, 2013
○ The Saudi-Israeli Alliance and Piggy-back Coup of 2005

Amnesia and Gaza Genocide

by Oui on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 02:51:09 PM EST
Re: Ah, the Observant Eye (4.00 / 2)
Any evidence that the Libyan revolt against Gaddafi was engineered by the West™?

A society committed to the notion that government is always bad will have bad government. And it doesn't have to be that way. — Paul Krugman
by Carrie (migeru at eurotrib dot com) on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 03:03:22 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Ah, the Observant Eye (4.00 / 2)
I don't know about the start of it, but by the time the revolt in Benghazi had occured, the West certainly backed the rebels with all but ground troops.

And were there not special forces involved in Tripoli?

Sweden's finest (and perhaps only) collaborative, leftist e-newspaper Synapze.se

by A swedish kind of death on Tue Jun 17th, 2014 at 02:41:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Ah, the Observant Eye (none / 0)
There are sufficient reports available, see my diaries about Libyan General Haftar (also spelled Hifter) and engineering color revolutions.

Quotes of lies and propaganda

"Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception."

-- Mark Twain, The Mysterious Stranger, 1916, Ch.9



Amnesia and Gaza Genocide
by Oui on Tue Jun 17th, 2014 at 03:36:38 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Ah, the Observant Eye (none / 0)
And while we are at it, care to explain this?

Oui:

Indeed it's legitimate to see the US allied to Al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan

I could have sworn AQ and the US have been at war for the past 20 years, particularly in Afghanistan.

by Bernard (bernard) on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 04:41:55 PM EST
[ Parent ]
US, CIA and Changing Allegiances (none / 0)
Robert Dreyfuss, a Nation contributing editor, is an investigative journalist specializing in politics and national security. He is the author of Devil's Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam and is a frequent contributor to Rolling Stone, The American Prospect and Mother Jones.

Carter, Bzrezinski and the Soviet-Afghan War of the '80s

In 1979 the largest covert operation in the history of the CIA was launched in Afghanistan:

    "With the active encouragement of the CIA and Pakistan's ISI, who wanted to turn the Afghan Jihad into a global war waged by all Muslim states against the Soviet Union, some 35,000 Muslim radicals from 40 Islamic countries joined Afghanistan's fight between 1982 and 1992. Tens of thousands more came to study in Pakistani madrasahs. Eventually, more than 100,000 foreign Muslim radicals were directly influenced by the Afghan jihad." (Ahmed Rashid, "The Taliban: Exporting Extremism", Foreign Affairs, November-December 1999).

This project of the US intelligence apparatus was conducted with the active support of Pakistan's Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), which was entrusted in channelling covert military aid to the Islamic brigades and financing, in liason with the CIA, the madrassahs and Mujahideen training camps.

U.S. government support to the Mujahideen was presented to world public opinion as a "necessary response" to the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in support of the pro-Communist government of Babrak Kamal.

Same U.S. policy in Bosnia, Iraq, Libya and Syria: using militants and war lords for regime change, ending in chaos.

Amnesia and Gaza Genocide

by Oui on Sun Jun 15th, 2014 at 08:51:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: US, CIA and Changing Allegiances (none / 0)
OK, that was in the 1980s and is well known and acknowledged: The US financed and supported Bin Laden to fight the Soviets. My question was about the last 20 years: Since 1990, Bin Laden and AQ are fighting the USA (and the "West" generally speaking.

Oui:

using militants and war lords for regime change

Iraq: on the TV, it looked pretty much like the US Army overthrowing Saddam Hussein...

Bosnia: what kind of regime change has been achieved?

by Bernard (bernard) on Sun Jun 15th, 2014 at 09:41:42 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Terror Blowback from 50 Years of U.S. Policy (none / 0)
From Foreign Affairs issue Nov/Dec 1999: "The Taliban: Exporting Extremism" by Ahmed Rashid

During the war against the Soviets, the few Deobandi Afghan groups that then existed were ignored. Across the border, however, the JUI used the war to set up hundreds of madrasahs in Pakistan's Pushtun belt, offering Afghan refugees and young Pakistanis free education, food, shelter, and military training. These Deobandi madrasahs, however, were run by barely literate mullahs untutored in the original reformist Deobandi agenda. Saudi funds and scholarships brought them closer to ultraconservative Wahhabism.

Still, the JUI remained politically isolated until Pakistan's 1993 elections, when it allied itself with the victorious Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, becoming a part of her ruling coalition. For the first time the JUI gained access to the corridors of power, establishing close links with the army, the Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) and the Interior Ministry. In 1996 the Taliban handed control of training camps in Afghanistan over to JUI factions, thus enhancing their image among the new generation of Pakistani and Arab militants who studied there.

BLOWBACK

With the active encouragement of the CIA and Pakistan's ISI, who wanted to turn the Afghan jihad into a global war waged by all Muslim states against the Soviet Union, some 35,000 Muslim radicals from 40 Islamic countries joined Afghanistan's fight between 1982 and 1992. Tens of thousands more came to study in Pakistani madrasahs. Eventually more than 100,000 foreign Muslim radicals were directly influenced by the Afghan jihad.

The camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan where they trained became virtual universities for promoting pan-Islamic radicalism in Algeria, Egypt, Yemen, Sudan, Jordan, the Philippines, and Bangladesh. Americans woke up to the danger only in 1993, when Afghan-trained Arab militants blew up the World Trade Center in New York, killing six people and injuring 1,000. The bombers believed that, just as Afghanistan had defeated one superpower -- the Soviet Union -- they would defeat a second.

One of the main recruiters of Arab militants for the Afghan jihad was bin Ladin. As the richest and highest-ranking Saudi to participate in the struggle, he was heavily patronized by the ISI and Saudi intelligence. Bin Ladin left Afghanistan in 1990 but returned in May 1996. Soon he turned on his former patrons and issued his first "Declaration of Jihad" against the Saudi royal family and the Americans, whom he accused of occupying his homeland.

Striking up a friendship with Umar, the Taliban chief, bin Ladin moved to Umar's base in Kandahar in early 1997. Bin Ladin reunited and rearmed the Arab militants still remaining in Afghanistan after the war against the Soviets, creating the "055" brigade. The Taliban had no contact with Arab Afghans or pan-Islamic ideology until then. But Umar was quickly influenced by his new friend and became increasingly vociferous in his attacks on Americans, the United Nations, and the Saudis and other pro-Western Muslim regimes. Recent Taliban statements reflect a bin Ladin-style outrage, defiance, and pan-Islamism that the Taliban had never used before his arrival.

After the August 1998 bombings of U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, the United States accused bin Ladin of financing terrorist camps in Somalia, Egypt, Sudan, Yemen, and Afghanistan. A few days later, America fired cruise missiles at bin Ladin's camps in eastern Afghanistan, killing nearly 20 militants but leaving his network unharmed. Washington demanded bin Ladin's extradition; the Taliban refused to comply.

Bin Ladin's notoriety has created major problems for Pakistan and Saudi Arabia -- two key American allies in the region who have recognized the Taliban government. Pakistan is reluctant to help the United States capture bin Ladin; the Saudi terrorist gives valuable help to the Kashmiris and the Jamiat-ul-Ulama-i-Islam (JUI) would protest if Islamabad was seen to do Washington's bidding. Already in July the JUI issued death threats to all Americans in Pakistan, to be carried out if bin Ladin is extradited to the United States.

Developments Arab Spring Egypt's Revolt Explained

(Booman Tribune) - CIA boosted Muslim Brotherhood (MB) in Egypt during the cold war years to break the influence of the Soviet Union. The MB was suppressed under Nasser (video) and left Egypt for Qatar, UAE and Saudi Arabia. Only in Qatar is the MB still welcome, the MB is outlawed in UAE and similarly in Saudi Arabia. The MB turned out to be a subversive militant organisation. Saudi Arabia, the guardian of the two sanctuaries of Islamic faith, is based on the pure Islamic belief of Wahhabism. Apparently Safalism is tolerated and funded/supported to spread the Islamic faith through mosques across the globe. The foreign preachers in Saudi funded Western mosques are homophobic, anti-Israel and against western culture. It's the source for Muslim youth traveling to Chechnya, Yemen and Pakistan for jihad.



Amnesia and Gaza Genocide
by Oui on Sun Jun 15th, 2014 at 01:40:09 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: US, CIA and Changing Allegiances (none / 0)
Bush Army in Brzezinski's Afghan Trap

(Truthout) June 20, 2008 - A decade later, we can look back upon the tactic Zbigniew Brzezinski was boasting about, also as a trap Washington was laying for itself. The US was working to give its own Afghan war to itself. It is a weird sort of war, in which it killed allied troops over a week ago and is struggling to cope with the aftermath.

The former national security adviser, who assisted President Jimmy Carter during 1977 to 1981, was alluding to the plan to aid and arm insurgents in Afghanistan months before the Soviet intervention, with Carter authorizing covert Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operations in the region in July 1978. Codenamed Operation Cyclone, the CIA program for 1979 to 1989 was funded to the tune of $20 million to $30 million per year from 1980 to 1986, and $630 million per year thereafter.

Never Ending War in Afghanistan Full Documentary

CIA Anderson about the Soviet-Afghan War: "Fought with our goal and their blood."



Amnesia and Gaza Genocide
by Oui on Mon Jun 16th, 2014 at 02:51:39 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Syria War and Nouri al-Maliki to Blame (none / 0)
In the eighties, the Reagan administration joined with Pakistan, ISI and Saudi Arabia to support jihadists from Arab nations to fight the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Osama Bin Laden became involved organizing these foreign fighters in the AfPak region of Waziristan (Northern Territories). OBL founded al-Qaeda and Dr. Zawahiri of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood joined forces forming a formidable terror organization in the nineties.

Indeed, the CIA and ISI gave support, funds and arms to these foreign fighters opening training camps and creating a legion of 40,000 jihadists. Among these fighters were citizens from Tunesia, Libya, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Yemen and Saudi Arabia. After the Soviets were defeated giving rise to the Taliban in Afghanistan, many fighters returned to their homeland or joined OBL in Sudan. The blow-back has been experienced ever since. OBL lost his Saudi citizenship, was purged from Sudan and moved to Afghanistan with his group.

The uprising in Libya against Gaddafi was supported by al-Qaeda veterans and CIA linked Libyans living in the US. See info about present developments in my diary - Reagan's CIA Man In Libya Now Employed by Obama.

After the overthrow in Libya, thousands of jihadists moved to northern Syria to join the holy war against Assad and took over what started as a protest and uprising in Homs. The US with its GCC allies moved tons of munitions and weapons from Libya to Syria through territory of NATO ally Turkey and Jordan. Indeed the arms send to the Free Syrian Army were transferred to terror group al-Nusra front who fought for some months in a joint effort with forces from ISIS or ISIL.

Indeed it's legitimate to see the US allied to Al-Qaeda forces in Afghanistan and the AQ affiliates fighting for "democracy" in Libya and now in Syria. Obama abruptly changed policy towards Syria last September - Obama Nixes Close Foreign Policy Advisors.

○ Jerusalem Post: Salafist Groups Forging Al-Qaida Base in Syria
○ Revisited: Engineering 'People's Revolutions' - A Color?

Amnesia and Gaza Genocide

by Oui on Sat Jun 14th, 2014 at 04:28:28 PM EST
Syria War and Shiite Government of Maliki to Blame | 14 comments (14 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)


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