David Ignatius at WaPo released some tidbits from Osama bin Laden’s personal papers, which were seized after the SEAL team waxed the terror kingpin. I don’t know what I was expecting — a good old-fashioned Batman villain, maybe. But Osama comes across like the Brand Manager of the Sanitary Napkin Category at a backwater Koch Industries health and beauty products division. He fretted about consumer perceptions and brand equity, dispensed fancy titles like “Deputy Emir” to underlings and pulled together annual reports. The banality of evil still surprises.
After President Obama reversed Bush Administration policy and stopped using the phrase “Global War on Terror” to describe the twin clusterfucks in Iraq and Afghanistan and assorted US meddling worldwide, al Qaeda seriously contemplated a corporate identity overhaul in response. They felt that the more narrow focus on their own organization diluted the pan-Muslim jihadi image they were trying to project. It was like everyone was unfriending them on Facebook or something. Score one for President Obama, I suppose.
The big revelation: bin Laden wanted to assassinate President Obama because, according to bin Laden, “he is the head of infidelity and killing him automatically will make [Vice President] Biden take over the presidency… Biden is totally unprepared for that post, which will lead the U.S. into a crisis.” Somewhat hilariously, the papers also reveal that al Qaeda believes Fox News lacks “objectivity.”
The Wingnutosphere isn’t sure what to make of the first revelation. Some are all, “O’dumbo is teh most unpreparered o’neegro evar at leest O’biden is wite thx for nothing o’sama u r a looser!” To a man, they are gleeful that al Qaeda dissed Fox News because obviously it follows that Fox News is the only network that embodies Judeo-Christian values. Or something like that.
One hopes further document dumps don’t reveal Osama’s fondness for “Walker, Texas Ranger” or “WrestleMania” reruns; the resulting plummet in nunchuck and novelty singlet sales might endanger the fragile economic recovery.
Here was my key takeaway from the Osama Papers: The Bearded Boogeyman who caused so much pain and suffering was, at heart, a middle-management marketing hack who happened to traffic in death and misery instead of cheap consumer goods. Had he possessed any true strategic acumen, bin Laden would have sent anonymous gift baskets to the Bush Administration and Fox News, who did more to check “Destroy America” off the al Qaeda to-do list than a thousand bumbling “Deputy Emirs.”
[X-posted at Rumproast]
Tone In DC
LULz. That’ll leave a mark.
DougJarvus Green-Ellis
I may change my name to DougJ, Head Of Infidelity.
scav
@DougJarvus Green-Ellis: As a mere comm enter, can I aspire to Sub-Deputy Emir?
DougJ, Head of Infidelity
@scav:
Why not?
Brachiator
This is pretty insipid. Sometimes you have to back off from the snark pipe.
kdaug
And guitars!
Damn, now I have to listen to The Clash again.
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
All global international terrorist kingpins watch “Walker, Texas Ranger” and sekritly want to be Chuck Norris and kick through a windshield because they can. They are charter members of the wingnut world, albeit some different local customs than a Dick Cheney polishing his teeth with his own bile. Testosterone fantasy, and a willingness to send others to fight to the death do them part. It’s all a movie, a bloody shoot em up. Seal Team 6 edited Osama out forever, and a day or two more. And we wait wait wait for the reaper to visit the one with no pulse.
Cassidy
There is a Cover sheet and TPS report joke in here somewhere, but damned if I can come up with one.
MikeJ
I would aspire to Deputy Emir if I weren’t already the The Most Exalted Potentate of Love.
Daaling
In your unsuccessful effort to make light of the Bin Laden mistique you seem to be forgetting how long he managed to hide by doing several very smart things. Picking a very unlikely town right next to the equivalent of Westpoint in Pakistan. No telco wires into the compound. Near the capital and far away from the tribal areas.
He also clearly saw Obama as his most dangerous enemy. The guy was clearly every bit as smart as most people though. And I don’t know what your definition of evil is but you fail to make any haha in that attempt either. Nobody every things they are evil. Even hitler was apparently quite normal to be around and did fairly normal thing when it came to domestic situations.
Frankly, your whole post reeks of someone who has no clue what they are talking about from behind their computer and white picket fence a billion miles (figuratively) from anything resembling the reality on the ground in Bin Ladens world.
samara morgan
well, that isnt strictly true. as a follower of Ibn Wahhab, who was a pan-Arab nationalist, OBL was very successful at turning the Global War on Terror into the Global War on Islam.
Obama spoiled that by dialing down the paranoia induction with his Cairo speech.
OBL was smart enough to first attack Wall Street AND then the Pentagon and White House. He got the rich target. He destroyed the economy with two jets.
pretty good return to value.
and behold! he is achieving his goal of an america free arabian penninsula one state at a time.
First Iraq, next Afghanistan.
Then Pakistan will kick us out.
Tim O
ROFL, sorry, I didn’t get passed “Betty Cracker”! (There’s been a lot of “Cracker” talk on Stephanie Miller lately.)
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Wow, those papers are really like something out of The Onion done in real life. I mean people died because of that clown. wow,..
Amir Khalid
@Brachiator:
Actually it was pretty much my take on Osama as well. Real-life bad guys aren’t the over-the top badasses you see in books and movies. Their obsessions aside, they can be pretty unexciting in person. Osama probably saw himself not as a jihadi Lord Voldemort, but basically just an ordinary guy but with a special mission to fight in God’s cause. Remember, if he hadn’t found this vocation, he would have wound up as a managing director at a Bin Laden group company. To him, appointing deputy emirs in charge of this or that would have been just taking care of bidness.
samara morgan
@Daaling: and you are cuckoo bananas if you think the Paks didnt know EXACTLY where OBL was. Pasha sold OBL’s geo-loc to Panetta in return for dialing back the droning long enough to get Zardari relected.
Seal Team 6 was a huge fake-out to obscure that fact, because the Pak citizens are violently against colluding with Americans after Raymond Davis.
David Koch
What’s more interesting is just how happy bin Laden was with having Bush in the White House, to the extent that bin Laden released the election eve video in 2004 to push Bush across the finishing line.
samara morgan
@Amir Khalid: haha.
he was Lord Voldemort.
he changed the world.
Corner Stone
I hope this puts paid to the myth of Osama, or how integral he was (not) in the operational side of AQ and others going forward.
It should also make some ask questions about his ability to plan a multi-month operation against the continental US, and move pieces into place for a fairly intricate attack.
samara morgan
@David Koch: very true. OBL SAID he wanted to turn the war on terror into a war on Islam. he succeeded beyond his wildest dreams, largely because of stupid WEC Bush.
Mino
…the Bush Administration and Fox News, who did more to check “Destroy America” off the al Qaeda to-do list than a thousand bumbling “Deputy Emirs.”
This.
Cassidy
@Daaling:
And what have you done?
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
It sounds like he was in charge of AQ operations, it was just that AQ was but shadow of its former self, and there wasn’t much left to operate, after years of getting picked apart by the US and others.
Ramiah Ariya
All that I can say about this post is that 9/11 is distant, and that is probably why now suddenly OBL is a clown. I don’t remember anyone saying this during the Bush years. In fact, I distinctly remember that one of the grouses of American liberals was that Bush “took his eye off the mark” with chasing OBL down.
I also want to point out that Obama could also be described as trafficking in death and misery – if you were unfortunate enough to be in one of the few countries in which drones operate. Just for some perspective.
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
From the Ignatius link
gregor
See, we told you so: liberals are just like Osama – both claim that Fox New is not ‘objective’.
samara morgan
@Ramiah Ariya: well….they would like to belittle him now. He was Lord Voldemort. He changed the world for Americans with 20 followers and 4 jets…forever.
these people here are like little children who think their lives can go back to what they were now that OBL is gone.
but its more like a horror movie where the two surviving teenagers think they are safe…..until AfPak Jason jumps out and cuts them in half.
Corner Stone
@Ramiah Ariya: There are a couple different ways to look at this.
Most, if not all, of the US wanted “revenge” against the boogeyman Osama after 9/11. That’s not unusual considering how the USG goes about creating the needed Next Hitler.
Secondly, Osama didn’t change our National Security structure, our shit scared politicians did. Mainly for electoral favor.
This whole mess is less about Osama, what he was capable of or actually accomplished, then it is our pandering as a nation.
Betty Cracker
@samara morgan:
I don’t think that. We’re all at the mercy of a relatively small band of plutocrats and religious fanatics as well as geopolitical forces over which we have no control.
Reagan was the idiot who originally weaponized al Qaeda. I don’t think bin Laden was an evil genius — he mostly got lucky because of our (Americans’) own stupidity, arrogance and overreaction. We happens next depends on how stupid we continue to be.
Corner Stone
By the time Osama got got he was a babbling loon. To allow some speculation, he was most likely out of his mind most hours of the day due to a severe medical ailment.
Fuck, the guy probably thought he could sneak a devoted follower into the Secret Service and cap Obama, ala a Tom Clancy novel plot.
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
America was a big soft ball target on 9-11. The Muppets could have conducted the same attack, and announced it on their show, and still got away with it. The changes wrought by 9-11, were internal and political in this country, and what we should be afraid (and the world as well) of on this ocean surrounded empire, is ourselves and the ongoing civil war of two people of differing world views, that has long existed before OBL was but a twinkle in his daddy’s eyes.
There is no threat the Muslim world, or any other, that could match that great and dangerous rift in our own house. Attacks from abroad can aggravate that status quo into a higher state of conflict, but cannot do real damage by itself. Except of course, bring more American bombs to to foreign back yards. I want none of it, but the rules are what they are, and near unstoppable, once set in motion.
And unfortunately, and I really mean that, the folks in the ME and nearby are still in mortal danger, and will remain so as long as the combustion engine runs the world, and they have a lot of the fuel that makes it go.
Brachiator
@Amir Khalid:
I understand and agree with the banality of evil arguments. But I demur when I get a sense that people are trying to get snarky or to minimize the damage caused by people like bin Laden.
samara morgan
@Betty Cracker: well…he was lucky, but he was also a genius and a fanatic.
he brought down the global house of cards economy with one lucky junk punch to Americas Wall Street nads. OBL understood the correlation between fiscal and military might.
Sure he was aided by our own paranoia induction.
And you are belittling him and mocking him now…..but he changed the world forever.
ShadeTail
@Ramiah Ariya:
Speaking for myself, I always thought bin Laden was a clown. In fact, I thought all of AQ were clowns. 9/11 was done with fucking *box cutters* for crying out loud. That business was so whacked out and disorganized that it succeeded on 100% luck. And everything that came afterward, from the shoe bomber to the underwear bomber, only reinforced my opinion.
But then, I wasn’t one of the numerous *American* clowns who were caught off-guard by a major terrorist attack. I’d been expecting one for the better part of 10 years.
feebog
@ Samara Morgan
I would argue that Bush/Cheney/Rumsfield, et al had more to do with changing the world for Americans than did OBL. Bin Laden opened the door, but lil’ Smirky and his merry gang of assholes were the ones who walked through it.
Mino
@samara morgan: No. We did in our economy by own selves, thank you.
Amir Khalid
@samara morgan:
All I meant was, Osama most likely didn’t terrorize his followers the way Voldemort did his, because that wouldn’t have been the prophet’s way, and Osama saw himself as a good Muslim trying to emulate the Prophet. I tend to think Al-Qa’ida was somewhat overrated as a threat. Its success on September 11 was a stroke of luck; it has never managed to pull off anything on a similar scale since. Its leading lights were a civil engineer and a physician, smart people but not military men or political leaders who could strategize the kind of jihad they imagined they were fighting. And as evil and scary as Osama was made out to be, I suspect that in reality Osama was the mouse that the palace mousecatcher left unmolested — so that there would always be mice in the palace and he, the mousecatcher, could never be laid off.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker:
Really? Do you want to formally put yourself down in the Ron Paul non-interventionist camp?
The United States got sucked into an ugly proxy war against the Soviets in Afghanistan. But do you really want to say that the US should not have got involved in any way, and should not have supplied any weapons and support to anyone in the region? Do you really want to say that the world shuld have let the Soviets invade? This was one result: The 10-year Soviet war resulted in the deaths of over 1 million Afghans, mostly civilians and due to land-mines.
I know the fantasy is that the Afghans would have inevitably defeated the Soviets, but this ignores the official and unofficial arms trade, and the support funneled through the US ally Pakistan.
You speak of an over reaction. What should the reaction have been?
And by the way, US efforts to seriously fund the Mujahideen fighters began with Jimmy Carter, not Reagan.
And also by the way, the Soviets didn’t invade just for shits and giggles, they got suckered into invading to bolster the Afghan Communists, who had clumsily overreached in attempting to crush all opposition. Nastiness all around.
gocart mozart
Bin Laden got in a solid punch, but it was the Bankers and Bond Traders that did the real damage.
Daaling
@samara morgan: Oy vey, I don’t even have to try mock you. You are doing a fine job yourself!
@Cassidy: You mean besides being a rockstar billionaire genius astronaut scientist pro athlete who saves baby seals in his spare time?
Amir Khalid
@Betty Cracker:
A quibble: Ronald Reagan’s administration supplied arms not to al-Qa’ida, who if I recall correctly did not yet exist in the 1980s; but to the Taliban, when they were fighting the Russkies who had come into Afghanistan as Brachiator describes.
ShadeTail
@Brachiator:
Not ignoring bin Laden in favor of Iraq, just for one thing. And then there are the torture regime, undermining the Constitution in the name of ending terrorism, simultaneously paying for all the military action *and* massive tax cuts with the national credit card, and ignoring or even purposefully worsening all the signs of bad economic stress. The past ten-and-a-half years have been numerous mistakes and over-reactions, one after another after another.
samara morgan
@feebog: true. but OBL played those guys. how is that not genius?
@gocart mozart: @Mino: indeed, the bubble would have collapsed eventually. but OBL accelerated the collapse.
we should have had a correcting crash after 911. but Bush told americans to “go shopping” and Greenspan colluded to cut the Fed to (eventually) 1/2%.
that blew up the bubble into a ginormous unsustainable pre-Econopalypse.
Roger Moore
@Amir Khalid:
Not exactly. We were providing support to a looser coalition of Mujaheddin, who we largely gave up supporting after the Soviets were driven out of the country. The Taliban started after we had pretty much given up on the country and were mostly supported by Pakistan, who saw them as a useful proxy in Afghanistan.
samara morgan
@Amir Khalid: the arms went to the Northern Alliance, one of which was Karzai, and the mujahideen, one of which was OBL.
Amir Khalid
@Roger Moore:
@samara morgan:
I sit corrected.
Lojasmo
@ShadeTail:
Yup. I had also been waiting for the shoe to drop. I clearly remember, after the second plane hit, turning to my wife and saying “it’s about time” (inappropriate phrasing, etc.)
samara morgan
@Amir Khalid: but it became an american jihad against al-Islam.
an unwinnable fight.
Lawnguylander
samara morgan
@Lawnguylander: you will be laffin out of the other side of your mouth when Pak kicks us out for droning civilians.
;)
KDUN
RE: Random & unnecessary slams at pro wrestling
Don’t be a douche. There are, actually in fact, those of us here outside the boundaries of “Real Ammurrica” who like wrestling.
Lawnguylander
@pretend Muslim #2
Won’t affect me none and nobody will be able to hear me laugh over all the laughing India will continue to be doing.
I’ve heard people say that Bush must be pissed that Obama got bin Laden. I don’t think so because I think he was probably worried bin Laden would outlive him. Instead he’s enjoying a very comfortable and drunken retirement while bin Laden’s at the bottom of the ocean. He can live with that deal, I’ll bet. Plus he got to kill all those tens of thousands of Muslims. I bet he keeps a scorecard and knows he got many more of them than bin Laden got Americans. And bin Laden made all that possible. What a sucker.
samara morgan
@Lawnguylander:
how compassionate. but it was hundreds of thousands, and we are still paying the bill for that. less see….a million muslim dead for four trillion dollars–what does that work out to?
not very cost effective.
we BUILT bin Laden you dumb jackass cracker. we built him with Mubarak and the Shah and Operation Ajax. We built him with our craven cowtowing to the Saud despots. We taught him to fight in the Graveyard of Empires as our mercenary mujahideen against the sovs.
And he learned Americas achilles heel…..economic might is military might. that is why he hit the twin towers first.
Corner Stone
To describe Osama as any kind of “genius” one needs to suspend all evidence of the aftermath of 9/11 on predominantly Muslim nations.
For lack of a more clarified term
edited.
samara morgan
@Lawnguylander:
India wont be laffin either.
the prospect of ~100 nukes in terik-e-taliban hands has to be pretty sobering.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: orly?
OBLs main goal was to transform the war on terror into the war on Islam.
He succeeded. He wanted a war on Islam that America could never win.
and so we lost.
Jim Pharo
Or perhaps, Betty, he was never the evil-master mind we were led to believe he was.
Just sayin’…
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: sillie Cornerstone. he bankrupted us like we bankrupted the sovs in the arms race.
it cost America 4000 taxpayer dollahs for every dead muslim.
adds up.
;)
dogwood
@samara morgan:
You are definitely superhuman Samara. You are haranguing people in two threads simultaneously.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
And? The fucking Bush Tax Cuts have cost this nation at least as much in lost revenue as the supposed costs of the GWOT.
As usual, your conclusions are shit. Next time we “lose” to Islam how bout you let us all know.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Moron. We have the undisputed reserve currency of the world.
Any talk of bankruptcy is as stupid as every other conclusion you repeat in 70eleven threads with zero hint of irony. And just as wrong.
Lawnguylander
@pretend Muslim #2
Emma
@samara morgan: No, he wasn’t. He wasn’t even Sauron. He was Saruman, the guy who started with good intentions and got devoured by the evil because of his own arrogance.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: cost of war
some economists put the associated costs to the economy as high as 14 trillion over the last ten years.
the sovs didnt actually go bankrupt either. they just couldnt afford anything else.
like the US.
economic might is military might, dont you agree?
and we lost. we got nuthin from Iraq except a big muslim boot in Americas ass.
we are gettin nuthin from afghanistan either.
do you disagree with my conclusion?
samara morgan
@Lawnguylander: im a muslimah.
Pak wants Kashmir, not nuclear war. the more pure muslim the ME gets, the more sure they are to get the vale of Kashmir.
by 2020 one out of four humans will be muslim.
;)
America kept the lid on that conflict, but its a pressure cooker ready to blow.
And when Imran Khan gives America the boot in 2013 that will be three more islamic states that hate America.
tipping the balance of power.
;)
THE
It’s ridiculous Samara.
You are so clueless because you only look at the effects on the one side.
samara morgan
@Emma: i dont know that OBL’s intentions were ever good. non-violent protest would have been “good”. but his methods worked. America is crippled as a global hegemon, and will never be a superpower in the ME again.
OBL showed America was not invulnerable. He hit us on our own soil. And he destroyed the myth of American exceptionalism and “goodness”.
samara morgan
@THE: /shrug
the effects on the other side are more islamic democracies that hate and distrust America. Is that what we were going for?
Emma
@samara morgan: He hit us in our own soil and proceeded to bring more misery and despair to the Middle East than all the previous invasions had. I wonder if you ask the people there if they are all as enamoured of his actions as you seem to be.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Of course I disagree with your conclusion.
Economic might is not military might. And the Soviets had a number of issues plaguing them, well beyond your simplistic and asinine conclusion.
We can fund a trillion dollar DoD for the foreseeable future. Who’s going to stop us? Islam?
Beyond my own personal beliefs – the basic truth is we can continue to bomb, invade, drone and dictate terms to every nation we’re killing people in now, as we choose, for the foreseeable future.
Mino
@samara morgan: And he destroyed the myth of American exceptionalism and “goodness”.
No. We managed that ourselves, too. The rest of the world has generously allowed us our 8 year insanity bout and awaits our full recovery.
THE
@samara morgan:
Samara. There were two theaters in this war primarily. In both the balance of forces, post US intervention, are profoundly altered as a result of the decade or so of US intervention.
In Iraq the balance between Sunni and Shia.
In AfPak, the balance between Pakistan and India/China.
The path of history has been changed. In some ways the effect will propagate for decades, if not centuries.
You can’t just look at the wars in isolation. You need to see the bigger picture. What has been happening in the regions while the wars have been going on. What is the world like now as opposed to what it might have been if the US had never intervened.
The US intervention was a massive wrenching dislocation in both regions. It has permanently changed many things.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
Shit. I recently spent several weeks in the ME and GCC. And guess the fuck what? It’s USA fighter jets patrolling those skies baby.
You walk into a board room as an American and you have instant credibility.
You’re out of your mind if you think the US doesn’t project power to all the financial centers in the ME/GCC.
Lawnguylander
Poor, sad America. An economy nearly 3 times the size of the runner up, the world’s most powerful military by even greater margins, ludicrous margins really, cultural influence unparalleled in world history, the list of weaknesses go on and on and the rich and powerful scumbags that have always gotten richer and more powerful off the sorts of actions that drove bin Laden nuts really hit the jackpot as a result of 9/11. And all they had to do to ensure the dollars kept on flowing to them was to give enough Americans the Muslims they wanted. And bin Laden made it so easy for them. And now he’s dead, got his son killed. Bush is still alive and rich, Cheney, Rumsfeld, etc, too. #winning! pretend Muslim # 2, you are a chump.
THE
And if the US is so weakened, how come US continues to recover from the gfc while Eurozone spirals into stagnation and disintegration?
The EZ GDP has just printed negative according to Eurostats.
They are plunging into a double-dip.
US meanwhile recovers.
THE
I predict: India will no more cede Kashmir, than China will cede Xinjiang or Tibet. Both China and India will be great powers, and they will decide the future boundaries in Eurasia. Not just in Pakistan, but from Lisbon to Vladivostok.
Betty Cracker
@Lawnguylander:
Yep. It always does.
samara morgan
@Lawnguylander: and you are an organic conservative.
you only see tactics.
no airbases in Iraq, no airbases in A-stan, pretty soon no air-bases in Pakistan. more islamic democracies, more muslims every day.
Games theory 101. strategy beats tactics in the iterated game.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: you too.
ZERO airbases in Iraq, only ONE airbase we can still use in A-stan (and soon none) and in 2013 ZERO airbases in Pak.
the US pulls back to Saud and Jordan as afilliates.
we cant have airbases in Saud or the royals get shitcanned.
King Abdullah is having his own Ikhwan (the Brotherhood) problems.
no, OBL changed the world. and not in a good way for americans.
samara morgan
@THE: possibly. economic might==miltary might.
but i bet they will be smart enough to not attempt regime change.
That was Americas tragic flaw.
olbos, koros, hubris, ate.
After the Islamic Spring, the American Fall.
Chengiss never even tried regime change. Shamanism allowed the absorption of all other religions and cultures.
He was such a genius.
;)
THE
Where to start?
1. US is withdrawing from ME but US does not need ME so much any more. US oil consumption is falling rapidly as the price keeps spiraling. Same for OECD generally. US withdraws from ME because US soldiers don’t need to die so Chinese can have cheap gas for their cars.
2. The biggest impact short term is the falling price of Nat gas rel to oil. I believe soon trucking industry & commercial transport will switch from diesel to CNG. T.Boone obviously believes the same. Also switch to more fuel efficient fleet, Biofuels etc is well under way.
The market is adapting in many surprising ways to the rising prices.
3. China is different. I try to understand what they will do, but apart from their aggressive attitude in S China Sea, it is not yet clear to me. They are content so far with an economic empire, but they want to supply the labor mostly, which locals often don’t like. I study to learn the answer to this.
4. Chinese military spending is rising at a very rapid rate.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone:
sure, just like we did in Vietnam amirite? right up to Operation Frequent Wind Redux.
@Emma: OBL is a hero to many muslims.
im not “enamoured.” i said nonviolent protest would have been better.
i admire OBL for what he accomplished. like one admires a shark.
and you are a fool indeed if you discount the centuries of misery the western powers have visited on MENA.
Do you think the ummah will blame OBL for any of this?
America just created an infinite supply of spareparts for the jihaadi factory
samara morgan
@THE: sure, all of the above.
but i think you are WRONG…you forgot the 800 lb gorilla in the room.
because Our Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Israel is gunna kick off WWIII if we try to cut and run.
;)
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Please explain why we need airbases in the ME.
The US can and will project power across MENA until we choose not to.
There is no comparison to Vietnam wrt military goals and capabilities.
THE
@samara morgan: No right now I am very skeptical about Israel attack. There is a lot of psywar here. The pressure on the Shia crescent is overwhelmingly through Syria atm. Also the sanctions on Iran are having a severe economic impact and will continue to do so for some time.
Israel will not attack I think. Iranian position is weakening very fast for now.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: because of Our Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Israel, dumbo.
we are already on the slippery slope to the fall of Kabul, and Pak is gunna kick us out in 2013 when Imran Khan gets Zardaris job.
Afghans are burning crosses already.
samara morgan
@THE: yup. but the US has to project power in the ME to protect Israel.
if the US bails or gets forced out, how long before the Israelis are driven into the sea? 10 seconds?
they havent been very good neighbors, indeed, they have been the neighborhood bully with the US backing them up.
poof! no more US, no more Israel.
and i doubt the Israelis are gunna lauch nukes in their own back yard.. the fallout would kill them too, and oil prices will zoom.
that is why the US could nuke Japan. far away.
the US cant nuke Iran for example without creating fallout for other ME countries.
;)
;)
THE
@samara morgan:
no you are totally wrong. Israel has best military in the region and hundreds of nukes. Her population has bomb shelters & fallout shelters protected against CNB warfare.
Also the strongest frontline states Egypt and Syria are both facing relentless economic decline. I do not believe Democracy can stop this; it is deeply endemic.
By contrast Israel economy is facing huge gains from vast discoveries of oil and gas in the Med and onshore shale.
Her scientific output is second to none on Earth for her size. She will be early gainer from solar sunbelt boom that is also happening in Australia and California, etc. as solar prices fall rapidly below grid parity for daylight/summer peak power.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: As usual, your conclusions are shit.
The US does not need an airbase in Afghanistan to project power.
And who will attack Israel in conventional warfare? Egypt and Syria have their own serious internal issues, Jordan certainly is not going to, nor Saudi Arabia. Iraq is out of the picture. So that leaves Iran. And you’re crazier than I thought if you really believe Iran will attack Israel.
As for nukes, they’re not even worth discussing.
THE
Umm. Nevada? Alamogordo New Mexico?
samara morgan
@THE: @Corner Stone: dudes, do you read history books? when are the jewish folk most in danger? when their neighbors are facing hard times.
nope, long after the last drop of oil is sucked out of the desert sands, we will still have to be protecting Our Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.
And of course Iran isnt going to attack Israel with conventional weapons….nor will any other islamic state.
the one state solution is going to fall to demographics after its bled white with kassems, suicide commandos and blockade embargos.
Demographics is destiny.
no, we cant project power without bases. perception is reality.
;)
samara morgan
@THE: tests. not city killers.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Then how about this reality?
As usual, you seek to confuse what you’re talking about because you have no valid argument.
What do airbases in MENA have to do with the one state solution?
If no one is going to attack Israel then how will demographics shove Israel into the sea in under 10 seconds?
You can’t follow a cogent line of argument because your conclusions are shit.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: wallah, i just think my conclusions are so obvi that a fifth grader could get them.
i guess im giving you too much credit.
if america’s patronage and protection is removed from Israel, THEN she wont last 10 seconds.
but we all know that isnt going happen like that.
;)
we cant ever be released from the obligation of protecting Our Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Israel as long as Israel cant get along in the neighborhood.
if there is not a two state solution, then Israelis are outbred by arabs in something like 10 years. South Africa redux.
An apartheid state cannot survive in the 21st century.
the carriers dont project power like land airbases.
one outboard launch or Hamas/Hizb’ seal team of suicide commandos that connects with a carrier and its all over.
the particular vulnerabilty of aircraft carriers is that they can sink.
;)
THE
@samara morgan: What’s the difference? Hiroshima and Nagasaki were both around 10 or 20 kT. Trinity was the same.
There are very few if any Megaton warheads in modern weapons. They are not necessary because modern weapons are so accurate against point targets. Also multiple warheads allow you take advantage of 2/3 power scaling rule to destroy the area targets with a smaller total yield.
Or better still, you use a staged attack with a few low yield ground bursts to create shock waves that break open buildings. And then a high altitude high yield burst creates a heat pulse that ignites a firestorm. The firestorm actually destroys the city.
These strategies are designed to minimise fallout.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: why are you arguing over this? its obvi that American power is declining in the region and thats a good thing.
After Nov 2012 Our Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Israel has to fish or cut bait.
right now Bibi is just dicking around hoping that Obama loses.
But he is going to win.
Then Bibi gets the two-state or no-state talk.
i cant wait.
;)
samara morgan
@THE: but they arent designed to minimize oil prices.
;)
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: you see CS….i know its relly, relly hard for you to grasp….but America is a powerless hyperpower now.
we spent 10 years, trillions of dollars, thousands of american soljah lives in Iraq……..and we got NUTHIN for all that blood and treasure.
And the whole world saw that.
welcome to the 21st century, babee.
samara morgan
@THE: thats the two hostages.
Israel and oil.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Your conclusions are shit.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Nobody puts Bibi in a corner.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: I’m not arguing about anything. You haven’t made an appreciably cogent line of argument to discuss. You jump from one shit conclusion to another as people pin down how brutally naive and ridiculous you are.
As usual, your conclusions are shit.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
You are clearly lacking any basic information about carrier power projection or a carrier battle group.
As usual, your conclusions are shit.
THE
Nope they are very hard to sink. In WW2 it took many hits to sink an aircraft carrier. They have multiple internal compartments and all the doors seal automatically. But you have never heard or radar? Infrared imaging? Constant air patrols. Mostly 100km plus standoff range? You can’t always do that so you need air support to safely penetrate narrow straits. Aircraft carriers do not sail alone. They have a large support fleet to cover other specialized functions of defense or offense.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
Hell, you sound more and more like your revered hero Osama. Maybe you could activate the secret infiltrator you had stashed onboard the Lincoln 10 years ago, and he could open the hatches!
An aircraft carrier and its support group isn’t like the USS Cole tied up in a suspicious port.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: dude, i got paid for wargaming when i was at work. its called vulnerabilty exploitation.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
I hope they didn’t pay you very much as your suggestion an outboard could bring down a carrier is shit.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: did i SAY that?
can you make a future scenario where the US doesnt have to support Israel?
i cant.
that is why we are chained to the ME.
forevah, as i see it.
and i guess you never saw the end of Syriana, CS.
;)
wrb
@Corner Stone:
Actually there was a pretty famous war game in which the guy playing Iran ( Marine Lt. Gen. Paul Van Riper) went unconventional and swarmed the fleet with little boats and sank much of the fleet. The game referees changed the rules.
This is an account from a flakey looking site but it matches my memory of what I read on reputable sites at the time:
wrb
@wrb:
here is the nyt:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/12/washington/12navy.html
THE
I can easy.
20 Years from now, the ever-falling price of solar will drive the last fossil fuel from the market. And OPEC, and the MENA region that derives so much of its economic power from petrodollars, will collapse economically.
They will never recover.
By 2100 the human race, pursuing ever-cheaper energy, will have spread its solar collectors in a vast Dyson cloud around the Sun, and we will be a Type II Kardashiev civilization.
Human beings will no longer live on the Earth, which will become a planetary wildlife reserve, preserved for science until the Sun dies, as the only planet in the known universe, known to have evolved life.
THE
@wrb: The obvious response of the USA is to make it clear that every nuclear carrier is armed with nuclear weapons.
Make it the rule that if a nuclear carrier is about to sink, the captain must, under pain of death, order the launch of his nuclear weapons against the perpetrating party and his nation of origin, if known.
Use them or lose them.
So yes, the destruction of an aircraft carrier would IMHO be an act of war, justifying an all-out nuclear strike.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
Yeah, you fucking simple, you did.
(my emphasis)
Right the fuck here at comment #93.
And maybe you should re-watch Syriana again.
Corner Stone
@THE: The even more obvious response is to say that if the USN hasn’t learned a damned thing in 4 years then they deserve to lose a carrier.
But, here we get back to the functional definition of goals v capabilities.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: i didnt say SUNK the carrier.
i said “all over”. 60% of americans already want to gtfo A-stan.
if our carriers start getting attacked with any success at all, the electorate is gunna want them out of the Gulf.
everyone remembers the Cole.
again, even after all the oil is gone, Israel is our ball and chain to the region.
and you havent seen Syriana. it was an oil tanker, not a carrier.
@THE: yeah, lol. And Secret Israel can board no-ships to go a hidden planet where they can live happily evah after….at least until the Honored Matres sniff them out.
@wrb: yeah i saw a FOUO video on that exercise. i thot it was pretty sweet. with drone tech so accessible and cheap now, the new asymetrical game is drone swarms instead of small boat swarms.
big carrier, big target.
;)
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Don’t try and parse your way out like a little bitch version of burnspbesq.
Your conclusions are shit.
Corner Stone
If any nation state successfully strikes a US aircraft carrier they’re gonna wish they never woke up for breakfast.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: By the way, your conclusions are shit.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan:
No you dumb joke. People got fucking dead from space in Syriana, with no warning and no recourse.
Your conclusions are shit.
THE
@samara morgan:
I’ll tell you once and I know you won’t understand it.
The power of drones is not the drones. It is the computation.
US will lead drone-tech as long as it leads in information technology.
Now small drones can’t do much because they can’t carry much payload against a carrier.
Big Metal Ship + Small Drones = Fleabites.
And larger drones are targets for your automatic defenses, or your electronic countermeasures.
So it comes down to computation again.
e.g. Intelligent swarms of drones can defend a carrier too.
THE
1. Your problem is you don’t model it. You don’t do the math. You react by emotion. And you are wrong and silly and you don’t even know why.
2. I pretty much assume that religion won’t be a major factor in any developed nation by 2100. The trends are pretty strong and persistent. So space habitation will be very secular, and will self-select for the more progressive, educated people, at least at the start.
THE
BTW assuming you are really interested in this question, and not merely trying to score points.
For a good declassified report on the thinking that has gone into designing the remarkable capabilities of the X-47B, and its potential to revolutionize carrier operations, I recommend: Range, Persistence, Stealth and Networking.
There’s a brief outline of the most important points here.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: chu mad CS?
i didnt say sunk, i said connected.
and the end scene in Syriana is an outboard vs oiltanker.
you didnt see it. your argument seems to be that the US has enough power to crush countries into submission.
that didnt work in Iraq and its not working in A-stan.
obvi.
@THE: you keep changing the subject. OF COURSE there is a detection/payload sweet spot. im just saying even after the oil is all gone, we will still be chained to the ME because of Israel.
unless there is justice, which means a two-state solution and Israel has to learn to get along in the neighborhood.
THE
In all honesty Samara. I stopped believing there would ever be an independent Palestinian state some time ago. After the fanaticism and suicide bombings of the last Intifada. When Israel ended up building the wall to stop it. Something changed forever then. Israel stopped believing in peace. Or that’s how it seems to me.
Now, I think the Haredi will continue to grow as a movement until Israel feels secure. With their ultrahigh birthrate, they will eventually outbreed everyone. This is plan B.
Justice is nonsense Samara. Where is the Justice for the North American Indian, the Australian Aborigine or the people of Tibet? Where is the justice for the Kurds or the people of Armenia? (Yet Turkey dares to criticise Israel!) They lost and that was the end of it.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: My argument is that your conclusions are shit.
And it’s an obvi winning one as you keep proving it to be true.
;)
;)
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: my conclusion is that the US is chained to the ME because of Israel.
not just because of oil.
why do you think that is a shit conclusion?
it seems gobsmackingly obvious to me.
THE
When the age of oil ends, I believe in 20 years or so, Iran will be the world’s largest supplier of Pistachio nuts.
Cower in fear all you nut-munchers.
THE
The USA will be fortunate to have such a powerful nation as a regional ally.
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: Mainly because your conclusions are shit.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: look nasty old creeper guy.
all im saying is that the US currently has TWO hostages to fortune in the ME. Oil AND Our Crazy Ex-Girlfriend Israel.
if the US is unable to project power going into the future, and Israel doesnt make a stab at gettin along with the neighbors, either Israel is toast or theres WWIII, Defense of Israel.
my demographic isnt too jazzed about supporting WWIII.
NO BLOOD FOR JEWS!
hahahahaha
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: hahahaha. whassa matter spoiled rich white catholic girl? choooo mad?
;)
;)
demos is destiny. and your destiny is to be ignorant. obvi.
THE
This cartoon strip speaks for me too. Also.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: nope.
and ima revert. i think i was actually excommunicated last year from my parents parish.
;)
and in only eight more years one out of every four humans on the planet will be muslim.
that is why its such fun to make you mad, CS, like AL, like gaz….because demographics is destiny.
bi lal kayfah
Corner Stone
@samara morgan: get off my nuggies old timer. less be realz. your a gray. ;0
If you’re a day under 35 I’ll donate to any charity you want. Because you’re not.
And your conclusions are shit.
;)
;)
hahahaha
so sad to make choo mad old timer
;)
THE
And this one is pretty good too.
THE
My current favorite love song:
Tim Minchin — Inflatable you. NSFW
The piano rif is awesome.
samara morgan
@Corner Stone: again.
my conclusion is that the US is chained to the ME because of Israel.
not just because of oil.
Ben Franklin
@THE:
Where is the Justice for the North American Indian
Indian Casinos dispense justice to the White Man, every day.,
Ben Franklin
@THE:
Where is the Justice for the North American Indian
Indian Casin0s dispense justice to the White Man, every day.,
THE
@Ben Franklin: But the continent is lost forever Ben. And the Buffalo are gone.
Ben Franklin
@THE:
Sorry for the tongue-in-cheek, but Justice has a strange way of emerging, given time.
THE
@Ben Franklin: I don’t believe that Ben. I believe the winners win and the losers lose. The game is for real and forever.
If Homo Sapiens killed off the Neanderthals they will not return to claim compensation. Neither will the Tasmanian aborigines.
Ben Franklin
@THE:
I don’t believe that Ben
The Cosmos is a big place, and all action has an opposite and equal reaction.
That same Cosmos has little concept of human time, but holds it’s Laws in a balance. I know I’m going around the bend on this, but I believe Karma can be an ally or a Bitch. It’s our choice. Cheers.