Al Jazeera has a fascinating interview posted with a German journalist, Jurgen Todenhofer, who embedded with ISIS fighters for 10 days and lived to tell the tale. He built a relationship online with an ISIS fighter from Germany to get assurances (as far as that was possible) that they wouldn’t lop his head off before traveling there to interview fighters.
He had some discouraging / chilling / sensible insights into the current status of ISIS, their ultimate objectives and the ineffectiveness of present efforts to counter them by Western powers:
I had three strong impressions of ISIL. The first one was that ISIL is much stronger than we think. They have conquered an area which is bigger than Great Britain. Every day, hundreds of new enthusiastic fighters are arriving. There is an incredible enthusiasm that I have never seen in any other war zones that I have been to.
Secondly, the brutality of their intended religious cleansing is on another level. And thirdly, I think the strategy of the western countries regarding the Muslim world is completely wrong. With our bombardment, we have never been successful. We have not been successful in Afghanistan; we have not been successful in Iraq. The bombardments are a terror-breeding programme. We had much fewer terrorists before 2001 and these bombardments, which killed hundreds of thousands of people have created terrorists and increased terrorism.
Todenhofer implies that Western countries should butt out and asserts that only Iraqi Sunnis can defeat ISIS. He further says that Iraqi Sunnis will only undertake that once they’ve been reintegrated into Iraqi society.
Sounds about right. I wonder how that Sunni Reawakening project is coming along? Maybe PBO will give us an update in the SOTU.
OzarkHillbilly
We can not defeat “terrorism” with bullets and bombs, that way we only feed it.
schrodinger's cat
ISIL and ISIS just goes on to prove that the “surge” was as big a failure as anything else the Bushies attempted.
JPL
Now I’m confused because McCain light, said on Sunday that if we only invaded more countries, terrorism wouldn’t be a problem.
Joe Shabadoo
@JPL: When we invade the countries we are fighting with insurgents not terrorists. McCain solves the terrorist problem.
Amir Khalid
I agree with Todenhofer about the futility of intervening in other people’s fights. But too many among America’s power elite and its armchair critics think that staying out of other people’s fights is a sign of weakness.
Keith G
Hee hee.*
*Theoretically such interests need to be mentioned. I do not think many sentences will be expended.
dedc79
I agree of course that bombing has only made things worse. The tougher question is how we extricate ourselves (assuming we still have a govt interested in doing so) without just handing the whole region over to ISIL.
gussie
As always with ’embedded’ journalists, probably wise to read with large dollops of doubt. If he’d gotten the impression that they were weaker than we imagined, and less enthusiastic, I wonder how those ‘assurances’ would’ve worked out.
C.V. Danes
I think it is plain to anyone not paid to think otherwise that the bombing strategy is only making things worse. I think the real question is when do we officially make “real” war against ISIS/ISIL.
If we go all in now, we’re going to be stomping all over the sovereign rights of any country from which we attempt to extricate ISIS, and probably further inflame anti-US sentiment. If we wait until ISIS has conquered the Middle East, which I’m sure is their wont, then we’ll have to deal with them once they try to end Israel. Either way, I think we headed for a clash of epic proportions.
C.V. Danes
@dedc79:
I don’t think that’s possible. I think the question is do we wait until they’ve conquered the region before we go all in.
Belafon
Actually, if we’d just left Hussein in power, they probably wouldn’t have gained a hold in Iraq, specifically because he favored the Sunni’s and was absolutely brutal to everyone else.
schrodinger's cat
Deleted
schrodinger's cat
So is leaving the populace, not to speak of the oil reserves to the tender mercies of ISIS/ISIL, a good idea?
@gussie: I agree.
Cacti
We’re on our 25th year and 4th Presidency of “helping” Iraq.
If we “help” them much more, there won’t be anyone left.
catclub
Of course, it is a mostly unoccupied desert, but still, bigger than a breadbox.
As to the ‘they will only be defeated by the Sunni’. What if they are not defeated, but no longer expanding? Would I care? I see than as having less global reach than Osama Bin Laden. Why should I care if they control a desert ‘larger than Great Britain’? Penguins control Antarctica.
Va Highlander
@gussie:
This, without doubt.
The reality is more like IS is much weaker than we imagine. These creeps are pretty good at propaganda and good at expanding into Sunni-dominated territory with little or no resistance. They’re fairly useless against anyone likely to shoot back.
Mandalay
@Belafon:
Right, and this is precisely why the US generally favors existing dictatorships (or at least turns a blind eye towards them) over democratic alternatives. Dictatorships may not be good for human rights, but they provide stability.
C.V. Danes
@catclub:
I guess the deciding point will be when/if they start knocking on Turkey’s door. Or Iran. Or Saudi Arabia. Or Israel at some point.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Belafon: pretty much. I gave up on Tweety a couple weeks before the election and haven’t watched since, but he did say a few times, after he stopped shrieking about beheadings, that ISIS/IL was a direct result of the invasion of Iraq. I haven’t heard anyone else say it because the right would start screaming “You’re blaming American for terrorism!”
McCain, and I assume also Graham and Ayotte, likes to bleat about how Obama abandoned the gains made by “THE SURGE!”. I wonder if he acknowledges in his own mind that the part of the “surge” that had the greatest effect was not 100,000 Bradley Coopers marching nobly off to war, but the bribing of bribable Sunnis. Maliki cut off the money, and those Sunnis have, as I understand it, been killed off or otherwise marginalized.
GregB
Do we know if a Daesh/ISIS flack had any editorial control over this embed?
If “please don’t cut off my head” is part of the pre-interview/embed negotiations, I have to say that much of this information is fruit from a poisonous tree.
C.V. Danes
@Mandalay: There is some truth to that, because you never know what you’re going to get in replace. But siding with brutal dictatorships merely to maintain stability pretty much grantees that whatever does replace it will not be particularly favorable to us.
Tractarian
WHAT? You’re telling me ISIS controls a large geographical area and engages in extremely violent “religious cleansing”?
I don’t think Todenhofer needed to risk his life by “embedding” himself in ISIS in order to discover these amazing facts. All he had to do was read any news website any day in the past 8 months.
Va Highlander
I’m also shocked, SHOCKED, to find a Qatari asset like al Jazeera trying to convince us that bombing IS is counter-productive.
Cervantes
@Cacti:
Not to mention the two Reagan Administrations, co-terminous with the Iran-Iraq War, in which we actually helped (rather than “‘helped'”) Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Amir Khalid
@schrodinger’s cat:
In an ideal world, of course, the Crusades would never have happened; nor would the centuries since of Western conquest and colonialism. But it’s a bit late to wish for that.
In the present day, the West has less positive influence over the Middle East in general than it realises; all that history has given Middle Easterners good reason to distrust both the West’s intentions and its judgement. Western blundering has itself had a hand in the rise of IS, let’s not forget that. A period of neglect might not do as much harm as you fear.
Cervantes
@catclub:
If only.
catclub
@Va Highlander:
They (ISIL) have only been trying to take Kobane for 16 (18? 19?) months now, and the (mostly) abandoned Kurdish fighters have still held them off.
Primary asset – western PR.
catclub
@C.V. Danes:
I am willing to wait. Did you know that Saudi Arabia is building a wall? of those three, I am guessing Saudi Arabia is the most vulnerable.
Mandalay
@gussie:
This. From his web site:
ISIS has tenuous control over a chunk of desert in Syria and Iraq. That doesn’t make them “the largest threat to world peace since the Cold War”.
The man got a scoop, and good for him, but he badly needs to get a grip.
Cervantes
@Va Highlander:
Cynicism is fine and all but do you have a critique of the argument that is based on something more?
After all, it wasn’t “a Qatari asset like al Jazeera” that helped lie this country into war in 2003 — it was our very own media assets, all rock-ribbed and entirely non-Qatari.
Mike in NC
It’s only appropriate that somebody should form “ISIT” or the Islamic State in Texas. Rooting for casualties, including the entire Bush family.
OzarkHillbilly
@C.V. Danes: I wouldn’t worry about Turkey or Iran or Saudi Arabia or Israel. ISIL can’t even take Kobane from a ragtag band of under armed Kurds.
boatboy_srq
@Amir Khalid: Two centuries of history where the US BLEEPed up every international involvement they tangled with has not been enough to convince the VSPs that interventionism is a bad idea. The SINGLE time US engagement produced the intended results was WW2 – and WW2 was arguably an artifact of US demands for immediate repayment of war debts from WW1. “Butting out”, however, seems impossible for the Most Exceptionally Exceptional Nation In Human History™.
Culture of Truth
It seems like his basic point is that given the geography and numbers the “west” is never going to defeat ISIS by bombing it, and may only make it stronger. That may seem obvious, and yet that is the current plan. My opinion is that since the US broke Iraq, we do have some obligation to strongly encourage functional government there, including both Sunni and Shia, and offer an alternative to bombings and beheadings, which I doubt the majority really wants.
It would also be nice if they didn’t end up with a brutal inhumane dictatorship under our tutelage, but give our Saudi BFFs, that may be too much to ask.
Cervantes
@boatboy_srq:
If by “seems impossible” you mean “does not profit the owners nearly as well.”
catclub
@OzarkHillbilly: Great minds, etc.
gene108
From Todenhofer:
I do not know how to beat up ISIL or get them to go away, but they are not good guys or even misunderstood people, with legitimate grievances, who went overboard in getting their problems redressed; they are evil people.
Right now we are bombing them at the request of the Iraqi government.
I do not know how exactly to deal with them, but ignoring them will not make them go away.
I disagree.
Western Europe did not have problems with Islamic terrorism, though they had different kinds of terrorist issues, such as the IRA, communists, etc., but other countries had problems for several years.
Also, I believe Western Europe is struggling with the fact the locals have declining birthrates and thus they are importing labor and are struggling to integrate foreigners into their society.
I think the issues behind ISIL are deeper than just a reaction to bombings. ISIL is not attacking America or focusing on American targets. Their main focus seems to be fighting other Muslims and Arabs, at the moment.
Keith G
@Mandalay:
I think you are wrong, and I think all of the Obama administration thinks so too.
It is not what ISIS controls, but what they are able to, and will be able to, influence. They are a super nova of instability both through direct geographic contact and the exporting of battle-trained extremists across the globe.
It is not that they are a very serious danger that is in disagreement, but how to confront that danger.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@gene108:
I think I pretty much agree with you here. Al-Qaeda was much more outwardly directed and interested in doing terrorist strikes outside of the Middle East. ISIL seems much more inner-directed and trying to coalesce Muslims into a single group that will have a single country, and if they have to kill everyone who stands in their way, oh well. that makes them a lot harder to fight.
MattF
One must bear in mind that endless war is what the neocons want. Now, go back and re-read the previous sentence as many times as necessary.
gene108
@Va Highlander:
Al Jazeera is an independent media voice in a part of the world, where state controlled media is very common. They are the sort of thing we want to take hold to promote our values of free speech, fee press, etc.
They do a good job reporting.
I wish the U.S. media would be as thorough and objective.
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: The legacy of colonialism has been toxic. However, blaming all the woes of the Arab Middle East solely on the West lets off regimes like the current Saudi royals off the hook.
OzarkHillbilly
@catclub: Yeah, after I posted I saw you beat me to it.
Joel
@Keith G: ISIS/L is only minimally dangerous to the US as a sovereign nation. They are dangerous to US assets in some parts abroad, certainly. But so are plenty of other folks.
GregB
I am afraid the whole region is heading towards a significant meltdown.
The latest Jenga block to get pulled was the Israeli strike in Syria that killed several high level Hezbollah commanders and an Iranian General.
The Israelis are now saying that he was not an intended target.
gene108
@Mnemosyne (iPad Mini):
What doesn’t get reported in the U.S. – we suck at geography – is that most Muslims are Asians, whether South Asians from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh or South East Asian, such as Malaysia and Indonesia.
There’s no way ISIL is going to march across the Persian Gulf, through Iran, into Pakistan and then through India, Bangladesh and island hop through Indonesia to create this caliphate.
I find it hard to figure out where the PR hype begins and the actual threat to us ends.
@Amir Khalid:
I think Middle Eastern states use Western countries, as much as Western countries use Middle Eastern states.
In short there’s a lot of bad governments in that part of the world, who do not act in good faith for the betterment of their people.
Amir Khalid
@schrodinger’s cat:
I wasn’t suggesting that the West is to blame for everything that’s wrong with the Middle East. Only that it has done plenty on its own to help fuck the place up. And that it has less direct power to change things there for the better than it likes to think. Leaving bad enough alone may be the best thing it can do for the Middle East.
C.V. Danes
@catclub: @OzarkHillbilly: Yeah. I’m thinking wait-and-see is the strategy to go with. If they peter out, then nothing lost. If they start to be a real danger to Iran or Saudi Arabia then we can offer help as needed. If Iran or Saudi Arabia looks like they’re going to fall, then all bets are off.
The Ancient Randonneur
I know this guy is from Germany but the US corporate media regularly latches onto this sort of propaganda. Bring back the draft with no student deferments so we can find out how many of these neocons are willing to go to war when they have skin in the game. Chickenhawk Nation is easily stirred up.
leeleeFL
@Cacti: Feature, not a bug! Works great if there is any oil left.
raven
Now you know how much I dislike Pat Lang’s domestic positions but his middle east stuff is worth a look. Actually this is Adam Silverman on Lang’s blog:
ISIS has three strategic objectives that have to be achieved in Saudi Arabia: 1) take the oil fields, 2) seize Mecca, and 3) weaken or overthrow the monarchy.
Keith G
@Joel: The question was about world peace not danger specific to the US. The continued conflict of which ISIS a an important part has the ability to bring into play random and unforeseen events that can lead a very destabilized part of the world to even more dreadful conflict and aggression.
MattF
@GregB: There’s a dynamic in the ME that’s reminiscent of the situation in pre-WWI Germany– there was, in that case, a prevailing fear that Germany’s power was only going to decline relative to the other Great Powers. Similarly, Israelis don’t see any peaceful hope for their future. Not good. Not good for anyone.
GregB
I really think we need to hand it to the neo-cons.
Going in to the Middle East and throwing a little country up against the wall has really drained the swamp of terrorists and fanatics.
Linnaeus
This reminds me of a New York Times Magazine article I read a few years back in which the author argued, as best as I can recall, that it’s ultimately futile for Western nations to try to bring about secular (but religiously tolerant) governments in the Middle East on the West’s timetable. Not because such governments can’t be established, but because elements within the Muslim community are best able to do so. The West, according to the author, has forgotten how religion can animate people to do what they do and so does not really understand Muslims. So it’s Muslims who need to take the lead, because they will be able to articulate such a vision in terms that their fellow Muslims can identify with and support.
Mandalay
@Keith G:
I see no evidence for your claim, and our inaction suggests the exact opposite. We have been like Bambi caught in the headlights for months, and ISIS is a big fish in a small pond.
ISIS is importing extremists, not exporting them. Al Qaeda is a far bigger threat than ISIS “across the globe”.
And as far as “world peace” goes, the threat of ISIS is dwarfed by the consequences of further instability in Pakistan, and the possibility of Iran becoming a nuclear power.
leeleeFL
@GregB: No doubt that will make it all better. No?
Pogonip
@Amir Khalid: I agree. There’s a bewildering array of religious and tribal entanglements out there that our leaders can’t begin to understand. Even I can’t begin to understand it and, unlike our glorious leaders, I am not foxed by the concept of people taking a religion seriously.
C.V. Danes
@gene108:
If they’re “evil” it’s only in the sense that any theocratic autocracy is “evil,” namely to those who are not a part of their theocracy. Indeed, they may very well appear to NOT be evil to those who live within their sphere if they bring a sense of stability.
Are they evil with respect to common morality, such as it exists? Probably, once you subtract the Christian-Islam Hatfield vs. McCoy propaganda. If so, is that reason enough to go to war over?
And before Mnemosyne accuses me of supporting genocide or whatever, I believe that ISIS does represent a dangerous ideology that we’re going to have to deal with sooner or later.
C.V. Danes
@Linnaeus:
Indeed, especially because we have such a hard time maintaining our own secularism. After all, America is a country that prides itself on being a Christian nation, right?
Mandalay
Uh-oh….
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2015/01/20/national/islamic-state-threatens-kill-two-japanese-hostages/
PIGL
@Tractarian: yes, because I totally believe it when the western press tells me that their official devil of the week is Beelzebub himself, fresh from the very uttermost pit of hell, and fit only for righteous slaughter and bombing. What other evidence could anyone possibly want?
catclub
@raven: I think Saudi Arabia is a much bigger nut to crack than Kobane. Let me know when ISIL can handle that.
Keith G
@Mandalay: So…we are fighting a direct and proxy war (including the reintroduction of troops into Iraq).
ISIS is not fixing to land in Peoria, but it is a big issue in the most unstable part of the world. The continuing conflict that ISIS is helping to feed is a challenge to friendly states. Some fighters who have traveled to that war zone have since left to go back home. This second order effect of ISIS’ activities is considered by anti-terrorism officials both in the US and Europe as a huge concern with the strong potential for nightmarish results.
schrodinger's cat
I have been watching Simon Schama’s History of Britain on DVD recently and it really feels like the Middle East is going through what Europe went through during the Middle ages, i.e. internecine religious conflict between the two versions of the same faith.
Paul in KY
@catclub: Antarctica, as far as we know, is not floating on a sea of oil. Plus, I feel so sorry for the kids stuck in this brutal crackpot regime. Especially the female children.
schrodinger's cat
Also too, from my limited knowledge of the Middle East. Iran seems more sensible and less of a basket case than the Arab Middle East.
schrodinger's cat
@Paul in KY: BBC’s reporting on the plight of their female captives has been both excellent and heart rending.
Linnaeus
@C.V. Danes:
It’s funny, that’s very similar to a thought I had while reading that article.
PurpleGirl
@boatboy_srq:
and WW2 was arguably an artifact of US demands for immediate repayment of war debts from WW1
Yes, World War II was caused by the results of World War I. But the US wasn’t the only country who demanded reparations of Germany for World War I. Great Britain and France, and probably the rest of Europe, were in on the demands. There were many resentments on the part of Germans to what happened. It’s a complicated thing.
Just Some Fuckhead
Aha, so Great Britain does have no go zones!
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: India and Pakistan had the same legacy of colonialism, in fact India even has more Muslims than Pakistan. But look at the difference between the two countries, especially since President Zia’s time.
ETA: My point is religion and politics make a toxic brew. Any religion. Its what many dysfunctional regimes resort to.
Villago Delenda Est
Fat chance of that happening. The Shiites are in control, and they’re not going to even entertain the notion of letting the Sunni back in.
Also, too, the utter scum that is the bandit House of Saud is trying to build a wall across their northern frontier to keep ISIL out. That worked really well for the DDR in the final analysis….
Jim, Foolish Literalist
well, Madame Tussaud’s is a huge fucking rip off
MattF
@PurpleGirl: Note “The Deluge” a new history book by Adam Tooze, has a lot of info about the US role in the immediate aftermath of WWI.
srv
No doubt whatever platitudes PBO spouts tonight will be embraced and fellated by the loyal here, and there will be zero accountability, just like the last parrot at the podium.
samiam
This post is so naive I didn’t even want to respond. Usually only fell like it when wr0ng way Cole does one of his “war is bad because Griftwa1d says so” posts.
As if Paris wasn’t enough to convince you that sometimes the only response is violence. Yea, there needs to be a lot of other things done to address the underlying problems that cause these people to be radicalized in the first place. However, to just say war is bad so don’t bomb them and just let them grow like weeds is just so fucking dumb it doesn’t deserve a response.
catclub
@Keith G:
This is where ‘intelligence failure’ might be the best description. The War Nerd recommends getting a copy of the passports of those volunteers when they leave, giving them a first class ticket, and not letting them come back. I know it is not that simple, but I agree.
Mandalay
@Keith G: In the scheme of things, ISIS is not that big a deal. If it was then President Obama would have put boots on the ground months ago. And to quote from your link: “Obama has stressed repeatedly that the new conflict will be limited, and the U.S. would not be “dragged back” into another quagmire in the Middle East”.
All of that strongly suggests to me that the Administration have precisely calibrated the threat ISIS that presents, which is local to Syria and Iraq. Todenhöfer’s claim that they are the biggest threat to world peace is absurd.
Amir Khalid
@samiam:
You would have done well to follow your first instinct.
boatboy_srq
@PurpleGirl: IIRC, the UK and France demanded reparations only because their debts to the US had to be paid, in full, immediately on receipt of demand. Clemenceau in particular argued loudly for clemency for Germany, and for understanding on the Allies’ debts, but those demands fell on deaf ears among the US delegation. Germany was the only source available for the funds the US required (Austria-Hungary had devolved into the constituent nations, and the Ottoman Empire was succumbing to revolution) – so Reparations were assessed. Let’s not forget also that the League of Nations – Wilson’s principal suggestion for preventing future conflicts – was immediately stripped of influence by the US’ own refusal to join that body. The UK and France have a share of blame here to be sure, but the root of all that bad accounting and vindictive stripping of vanquished foes is in Washington, not Paris.
Mandalay
@Villago Delenda Est:
Exactly. Meeting with ISIS clearly hasn’t given Todenhöfer any special insight into how to resolve the issue. His notion of Sunnis being “allowed to completely re-integrate into Iraqi society” is laughable.
On a practical level he’s completely clueless.
boatboy_srq
@Mandalay: The more I see of IS behavior, the more I’m reminded of the Barbary Pirates of 1800.
srv
After ratfucking a policy of absolute failure for years, He Who Cannot Fail blinks.
Good luck putting humpty dumpty back together again, worked out great for the last guy. I’m sure Hillary will appreciate the mess you left.
C.V. Danes
@PurpleGirl: @boatboy_srq:
I’ve recently been reading The Nuremberg Interviews, and it’s interesting as to how most of those interviewed at one point or another identified the Treaty of Versailles and the economic damage and misery it created for Germany as the fertile ground that allowed Nazism to flourish.
Paul in KY
@Villago Delenda Est: Also the French with the Maginot Line.
Vanya
I’ve been reading Richard Overy’s book about bombing in the Second World War. For the most part bombing is counterproductive because it tends to drive the civilian populations into the hands of your enemy. An ordinary German in Hannover couldn’t see the faces of the English pilots dropping bombs on her city, but she could hear the reassuring words of the local civil defense authorities, even if they were wearing swastika armbands. Even if she hated the Nazis before the bombings, most people had nowhere to turn for help but to the state once heavy explosives started falling from the sky. I doubt it is much different in ISIS held territory.
Paul in KY
@C.V. Danes: That it did. Also has to be noted that average non-in-the-military Germans had no idea they were losing WW I, until the armistice was signed (due to heavy censorship). Thus, they were also susceptible to Nazi propaganda about the Jews stabbing Germany in the back, etc. Even tough nothing of the sort occurred & many Jewish Germans fought & died for the Kaiser.
boatboy_srq
@Cervantes: It’s not as if Wall Street and Houston invaded Iraq all by themselves, nor as if Dole and Hearst assembled the armies and fleets to defeat Spain and acquire Cuba, nor those principled Boston and New York merchants who purchased the ships to subdue the Barbary Pirates. Regardless of the interest served, the US acts on behalf of all its citizens, and all its citizens share in the consequences. If we don’t like what The Owners™ are doing with the country, then we can jolly well get to the polls and put people in power who won’t dance to their tune: otherwise by our ballots or lack thereof we’re selecting the option The Owners™ prefer, and are as liable as those mysterious Illuminati.
boatboy_srq
@C.V. Danes: Indeed. Lloyd-George and Clemenceau both wanted a low bill for German reparations: the idea was that enough damage had been done. Wilson, however, arrived in Paris with inflexible demands for immediate payment of war debts (that none of the Allies were in a position to pay) – and with Germany the only source of funds available, that’s where the Allies went for resources to pay their debts. Nazism owes a great debt to the Ruhr occupation and the inflation that Weimar experienced resisting the French land grab – but the occupation would not have occurred were it not for the war debt payment France owed for which Germany was the only practical funding source. Similarly, the Washington Treaty of 1922, while it did slow (not halt) the arms buildup postwar, required the UK to terminate the defensive agreement with Japan – sowing the first seeds of the Pacific conflict as well: by cancelling that arrangement, the US isolated Japan and deprived it of an ally, and Japanese planning post-1922 factored in the UK as a potential enemy, and the US as a growing rival, as a consequence.
Tree With Water
Jurgen Todenhofer is out of his mind. And even hundreds of riflemen who daily rally to the ISIS standard are a cipher if push comes to shove (militarily speaking).
boatboy_srq
@Paul in KY: The last few months of the war, with US intervention barely offsetting the end of the Eastern Front campaigns, were decided less by German defeats than by the Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman implosions: Germany was losing but the other Central Powers were falling apart far more thoroughly far more rapidly. With their Southern flank collapsing, the Germans had few choices. The Germans were arguably not defeated so much as let down by their dissolving allies. It’s not surprising that German popular opinion would be so out of step.
Joel
@Keith G: Still really a regional issue. However, I could see Iran getting an itchy trigger finger if this gets out of hand.
Cervantes
@boatboy_srq:
What odd notions these are.
That’s the way the system’s supposed to work, sure.
Other than that last incomprehensible bit about the “Illuminati,” of course.
Betty Cracker
@Tree With Water: 19 men with box-cutters managed to incite the warmongering idiots in this country to unleash military action that has killed well over a hundred thousand people (maybe as many as 300K; we just don’t know) and pour a trillion dollars and counting down the Middle East rat hole. I don’t know if Todenhofer is right, but you don’t have to be out of your mind to imagine the current Middle East shit-show spinning out of control.
Heliopause
Forget it, Betty, it’s hopeless. The national security consensus, which even our socialist President buys into, will never, ever, ever admit that they’ve had it wrong all along and change course. They will sooner see the collapse of Western, Eastern, and every civilization in between. They’re too inert.
Even the lowest-grade, drool-cup-equipped knuckle-dragger can plainly see that Western policy toward the Islamic world is not just a failure, but actively counterproductive. Lucky for me, I’m coming up on old age and a merciful deity may take me into Its bosom before the worst of it comes down. As for the rest of you, I feel sorry.
C.V. Danes
@Heliopause: Ain’t that the God’s truth.
Chris
@Mandalay:
Fixed that for you.
Supporting the Shah instead of democracy in Iran guaranteed we’d have to deal with the revolution a quarter century down the line. Supporting all these thugocracies in Central America ensured that we had to spend decades pouring money and weapons to keep them on life support, because the nature of the regimes pretty well guaranteed that popular rebellion against them would continue. Then there’s Vietnam.
Chris
@Linnaeus:
Whoever that was, completely true.
Paul in KY
@boatboy_srq: They definitely had serious setbacks on the Western Front in the last few months, yet the Germans back at home generally thought everything was going pretty well. Good points about their allies imploding.
Paul in KY
@Heliopause: Hopefully, you’ll still be alive to turn into soylent green :-)
Tree With Water
@Betty Cracker: True. But a person to be out of their mind to hook up with ISIS and place themselves at their mercy- because they ain’t got none. I’ll go even further, and say I doubt that any information was gleaned by Todenhofer that was not already understood by outsiders.
boatboy_srq
@Cervantes:
I cannot help you if you obtusely refuse to connect the dots between the terms each of us uses to describe the shadow government you insist exists.
Do we translate that as “what the US does, has no impact on me because I didn’t vote for those S0Bs”, or “I’m a sovereign citizen and disavow any association with the US federal government”? Because unless you’re one of BJs international commentariat, that’s your WH and Congress too; you may not like what they do, but you can’t disavow all ownership.
boatboy_srq
@Paul in KY: It’s interesting that very few historians make mention of the affect Wilson’s stroke had on the negotiations. The Wilson that ended the war and who proposed the League of Nations, and the Wilson who played hardball at the negotiating table, were measurably different. One more reason Saint Ronnie is such a suspicious figure: with Alzheimer’s clearly evident in his final years in the WH the risk of similar behavior was extremely high, and while none of us should be especially happy with his two terms we can at least be relieved he didn’t land the US in similar territory as a consequence of his ill-health.
Chris
@boatboy_srq:
Interestingly, I had never heard this. And it really does put a whole different spin on responsibility for Versailles, the bad peace that followed, the rise of fascism, and ultimately World War Two.
Paul in KY
@boatboy_srq: I had thought the negotiations (end of WW I ones) were mostly over before Pres. Wilson had his stroke. I do know his stroke adversely affected his campaign to get us into the League of Nations.
Tree With Water
@Betty Cracker: One last nitpick.. by my lights, it wasn’t the hijackers but our fellow Americans- the ones who plotted war in the mideast long before 9/11- who shoulder the lions share of responsibility for that war and its attendant carnage. That was treason.
A gratuitous shot: a treason wholeheartedly supported and defended by (among others) Hillary Clinton.
Vanya
@Amir Khalid: In an ideal world, of course, the Crusades would never have happened;
From the Greek point of view, sure. The Crusades did far more damage to the Byzantine/Orthodox Christian part of the Middle East than they did to the Arab world. For most of the Islamic world the Crusades were a minor incompetent annoyance that were largely forgotten until the 19th century when their memory was resurrected for propaganda value (by both Western Christians and Muslims). The invasions that really devastated the Arab and Persian worlds, and arguably set them on the course to becoming Turkish ruled cultural backwaters, were those of Genghis Khan and then his sons, yet oddly we don’t hear a lot of complaining about “Mongolian colonialism”.
Roger Moore
@Paul in KY:
I think this point is greatly exaggerated. The average German civilian during WWI had a pretty good idea about how many young men from his town had died, and after the war had a good chance to talk to the ones who survived about how the war had been going at the end. Plenty of ordinary soldiers, like Erich Maria Remarque, were willing to write honestly about the war afterward. Also, and not to be ignored, is that the average German civilian was on a starvation diet by 1918 because of the blockade, which made the extent of Germany’s problems manifest with every meal. If people were easily convinced about the dolchstoss, it was because they wanted to believe, not because they lacked the facts and evidence to understand otherwise.
JMV Pyro
@Chris:
It’s certainly an interesting take compared to the normal historiography. Where did you find this argument boat?
Mandalay
@Chris:
Meh – you’re proving my point: dictatorships provide stability, albeit of the pressure cooker variety sometimes.
But dictatorships aren’t necessarily short term, they aren’t automatically doomed in the face of rebellion, and democracy won’t automatically follow a deposed dictator. The House of Saud is a dictatorship which has been ticking over nicely (nastily?) for hundreds of years. And in Egypt there was a change from Mubarak’s dictatorship to a military dictatorship with the intervening “democratic” rule of the Muslim Brotherhood lasting less than a year.
Regardless, despite their blather, US Administrations aren’t genuinely concerned about the long term stability and democracy of other nations with complex problems. They mostly just don’t want stuff hitting the fan while they are in office. Hence our largely hands off approach towards Syria, Palestine and Ukraine.
Betty Cracker
@Tree With Water: Hence my phrasing, “incite the warmongering idiots in this country…” I’m not claiming, and I don’t think Todenhofer is claiming, that ISIS is a threat all by itself. Rather it’s a hornets’ nest we would do well to stop kicking.
Paul in KY
@Roger Moore: They knew they were taking heavy casualties, but thought the allies were getting it worse (due to the censored/lying stories in the papers).
I’m sure the most savvy knew how bad things were.
boatboy_srq
@Paul in KY: The ARMISTICE was concluded. The peace negotiations, not so much. Not to mention the rest of the US delegation was collectively victimized by the 1918 version of “Ahmurrca won the war for you” attitudes, which didn’t win many friends among the British, French or Italians. None of the European negotiators wanted to burden Germany with all that debt (some, sure; ALL of it, no way) because they all knew the Germans were as exhausted as they were and had no means to pay it; but if the US insisted that their loans had to be paid back first, then Germany was the only place the Allies were going to get the funds. Hence Reparations being so onerous: the funds were used to repay the war debts of the other Allies back to the US. Clemenceau’s memoirs go into this in some detail.
boatboy_srq
@JMV Pyro: Clemenceau wrote fairly extensively about the negotiations. Had he succeeded with his vision, it’s arguable we’d have talked of a Clemenceau Plan rather than a Marshall Plan, and the National Socialists would be about as dangerous as LePen’s National Front. There would probably have been a Pacific war in the late 30s (the US stepped in that one fairly thoroughly all by itself beginning with the Washington Treaty in ’22), but it might not have included Europe (unless Japan could have persuaded Mussolini to distract Britain and the Netherlands while Japan swiped their Far East colonies).
Tree With Water
@Betty Cracker: I agree, of course. But I also take your scattershot denunciation of warmongering idiots a step further, using Hillary as my example. By your definition, she is a idiot warmonger. Either that, or she is credulous to a degree that renders her unfit for the office of the presidency. Refraining from “kicking a hornets nest” is a start, to be sure, but it’s a feeble one. The democratic rank and file will prove itself worthy of political power when it renounces its own political creations- such as Clinton- and assumes responsibility for their consequences of their own warmongering. Anything short of that merely serves to perpetuate the status quo.
Mandalay
On his web site Todenhöfer has an amazing interview with a white Protestant German who converted to Islam and joined ISIS. The interview is in German, but has English subtitles: http://juergentodenhoefer.de/islamischer-staat-das-interview/
He views the Shia as even lower than Jews or Christians, and his lust for killing is incredible. A psychiatrist would have a field day with him.
Betty Cracker
@Tree With Water: You won’t shock or upset me by teeing off on Hillary — she’s not my political brass ring. If she’s the nominee, I’ll vote for her because I’m not an idiot. But I’m under no illusion that ANYONE whose political views mirror my own would get anywhere near the nomination. I expect HRC would pursue a path in the Middle East similar to PBO’s, or maybe veer off in a more hawkish direction, neither of which would make me happy.
And if you’re waiting for a truth and reconciliation committee in which Democrats denounce their own warmongers, I’ll check back after my dinner date with Mr. Godot.* In the meantime, yeah, let’s stop kicking that damn hornets’ nest. It’s a start.
*Shamelessly stolen from another commenter.
Cervantes
@boatboy_srq:
The odd notions are these:
1. That “regardless of the interest served, the US acts on behalf of all its citizens”: This is odd because it’s incoherent. If I’m serving someone else’s interest then I’m not acting on your behalf or in your interest. I may be acting in your name — but that’s another matter altogether.
2. That “the US acts on behalf of all its citizens”: This is odd because it’s simply not true. In fact, it’s pretty much a truism that the US government acts on behalf of those who pay for it to be elected — a small minority of “all its citizens.”
3. That “all US citizens share in the consequences” of the government’s actions: This is also odd because it’s simply not true. The point of much (if not most) lobbying is to make sure that positive consequences accrue to lobbyists’ clients and negative consequences are, ideally, borne by the rest of us.
So to answer your question (“Do we translate that as … ?”), the answer is no.
Still incomprehensible — sorry.
Tragically, however, you may be right that you can’t help me.
Cervantes
@Tree With Water:
You may be right. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure you can imagine things worse than the status quo.
Paul in KY
@boatboy_srq: Very interesting. Thank you for the info.