( Follow up read of three minutes to the last Post)
Humanity has achieved its current level of freedom following centuries of sacrifices and struggles, which we are now wittingly or unwittingly transferring to Artificial Intelligence.
For obvious reasons it will not be us that ventures out into the Universe, but a self-sustaining machine equipped with all human knowledge, that may decide not to return as it acquires more knowledge beyond our comprehension.
No matter: We stand on the brink of a technological revolution that will fundamentally alter the way we live, work, and relate to one another. In its scale, scope, and complexity, the transformation will be unlike anything humankind has experienced before. It is characterized by a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spheres.
We do not yet know just how it will unfold, but one thing is clear: the digital revolution that has been occurring since the middle of the last century. It is already changing our health and leading to a “quantified” self, and sooner than we think it may lead to human augmentation.
The possibilities of billions of people connected by mobile devices, with unprecedented processing power, storage capacity, and access to knowledge, are unlimited. And these possibilities will be multiplied by emerging technology breakthroughs in fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, the Internet of Things, autonomous vehicles, 3-D printing, nanotechnology, biotechnology, materials science, energy storage, and quantum computing.
It’s time to let go of the United Nations declaration of Human Rights and to redefine them, effectively addressing people’s needs, not ideology, should dictate the new definition.
Centuries ago human knowledge increased slowly, so politics and economics changed at a leisurely pace too. Today our knowledge is increasing a breakneck speed, and theoretically we should understand the world better and better. But the very opposite happening.
Our new-found knowledge leads to faster economic, social and political changes; in an attempt to understand what is happening, we accelerate the accumulation of knowledge, which leads to faster and greater upheavals.
Consequently we are less and less able to make sense of the present or forecast the future. While the outside world is changing, the humanitarian sector has simply not been able to adapt to new challenges.
Digital fabrication technologies, meanwhile, are interacting with the biological world on a daily basis. Engineers, designers, and architects are combining computational design, additive manufacturing, materials engineering, and synthetic biology to pioneer a symbiosis between microorganisms, our bodies, the products we consume, and even the buildings we inhabit.
Change has a way of scaring people—scaring them into inaction.
I am a great enthusiast and early adopter of technology, but sometimes I wonder whether the inexorable integration of technology in our lives could diminish some of our quintessential human capacities, such as compassion and cooperation. Our relationship with our smartphones is a case in point. Constant connection may deprive us of one of life’s most important assets: the time to pause, reflect, and engage in meaningful conversation.
Neither technology nor the disruption that comes with it is an exogenous force over which humans have no control.
All of us are responsible for guiding its evolution, in the decisions we make on a daily basis as citizens, consumers, and investors. We should thus grasp the opportunity and power we have to shape the Fourth Industrial Revolution and direct it toward a future that reflects our common. objectives and values.
We therefore must redefine what it is to be human.
Should we view prosperity in a society as the accumulation of solutions to human problems. Instead of measuring growth through GDP.
Perhaps growth should be measured by the rate at which new solutions to human problems become available and the degree to which we make those solutions broadly accessible.
The alternative is to watch as animals and plants go extinct, water becomes scarce, weather hits more extremes, conflicts over land and resources increase, and life becomes more difficult for people everywhere.
We need to shape a future that works for all of us by putting people first and empowering them not just to control Artificial Intelligence., but all technology that is designed for Profit sake only.
If we connect the dots it is certain that “People, Planet, Profit” will be the new tomorrow.
Now that everything is digital Data Privacy is abstract, There’s an air of resignation around the concept of privacy these days.
It’s about the ones and zeros, the metadata underlying our everyday digital lives.
As the physical, digital, and biological worlds continue to converge, new technologies and platforms will increasingly enable citizens to engage with governments, voice their opinions, coordinate their efforts, and even circumvent the supervision of public authorities.
As the human population continues to increase, animal numbers are falling it’s about protecting what is yours, by creating digital spaces where you have control.
There’s a strong correlation.
A new definition of Human/ Technological rights will lift humanity into a new collective and moral consciousness based on a shared sense of destiny.
It is incumbent on us all to make sure the latter prevails.
Meanwhile, changes in the tools of war – including drones and automated weapons – point to a more remote and anonymous form of warfare. Continued civilian suffering in conflicts in Syria, South Sudan and Yemen is a sobering reminder of the international community’s continued failure.
Piecemeal reformsamount to tinkering around the edges.
Only when we realize that we are for the moment all on the same planet can all enjoy the many gifts Earth provides.
Syria has become the Middle East’s biggest humanitarian disaster in decades.
For most of the last 40 years, Syria’s leaders imposed stability on the country’s mix of religious and ethnic groups. Then civil war erupted, drawing in an array of outsiders.
Secular Syrians, homegrown Islamist radicals and foreign Sunni jihadists battle forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, Lebanon’s Shiite Hezbollah militia, and — at times — each other.
After more than four years of violence that has killed more than 250,000 people and led to the rise of Islamic State, the effects of the conflict are being felt ever further afield.
Russia and a U.S.-organized coalition are both fighting Islamic State inside Syria, with Russia supporting Assad and the U.S. on the side of the Syrian rebels.
There’s concern that Assad’s defeat could leave a vacuum that radical Islamic groups would rush to fill.
The war-weary U.S. is taking a cautious approach that minimizes harm to its forces.
There are worries that if foreign governments supply more-advanced weapons to the opposition, they might fall into the hands of the Islamic State or other al-Qaeda-inspired groups, which could turn them against the U.S. and its allies.
Russia, for its part, says its goal is to keep Syria secular, independent and, most important, intact. Russia has used its UN Security Council veto repeatedly to protect the regime and maintains its only military base outside the former Soviet Union at Syria’s Mediterranean port of Tartus.
THIS WAR NOW IS A WAR of identity—those in which populations are mobilised by grievances that have ripened over decades or centuries.
THE QUESTION IS HOW ARE WE TO GET THE GUNS TO FALL SILENT EARLIER THAN LATER.
At the risk of stating the obvious.
We all know, that bombing is not the final solution.
We all know, that in the Western Powers, there is no stomach for an overt armed intervention. (Putting boots on the ground especially now that Russia is involved.)
We all know, that war is good for business.
We all know, that the war will spread.
We all know, that our current ideologies about war (random episodes of senseless violence- Paris) makes it hard to understand why we still have wars.
We all know, that Sects and tribes are rarely neatly divided, waiting for a line to be drawn between them. Separating them, if need be by force, will make some safer, but it will cause others great misery and may well spark new conflicts.
We all know, that both sides in a civil war often feel they must carry on fighting if they are to escape slaughter. (As those fighting in Syria know, defeat often looks like death, rather than retreat.)
We all know, that only when the fighters have been disillusioned, can mediators get to work—and then only for a limited period.
We all know, that Power-sharing creates weak governments; nobody trusts anyone else enough to grant them real power. Poor administration hobbles business. Ethnic mafias become entrenched. Integration is postponed indefinitely. Lacking genuine political competition, with no possibility of decisive electoral victories, public administration in newly pacified nations is often a mess.
We all know, that Warlords who start conflicts are rarely prepared to admit that they cannot win, and their charisma can be central to the cause.
We all know, that not only does war have a special political and economic interest for many it can be addictive in nature even seeming fun and exciting.
We all know, that the best predictor of a civil war is having a war next door.
We all know, that military victories tend to provide more stable outcomes than negotiated settlements.
We all know, that the prospect of an ending can quite often intensify the fighting.
We all know, that Angola, Chad, Sri Lanka and other places long known for bloodletting are now at peace, though hardly democratic.
We all know, that killing innocent people seems to have a common theme in religion. It gets us accustomed and hypnotized into subservience once our brains enter the alpha state of conditioning.
We all know, that Civil wars unresolved for more than a decade seem to drag on for ever, with both sides resigned to perpetual fighting, too disgusted or exhausted to face their enemies across the negotiating table.
We all know, that one reason for backsliding is that peace often fails to bring the prosperity that might give it lasting value to all sides.
We all know, that from birth, virtually all of us have been brainwashed through various outlets that encourage materialism, ego, subservience, control and conformity.
We all know, that myths are created to drive war and how those myths differ so enormously from the reality.
We all know, that our children are not learning the true history of our origin while being forced to learn a propaganda filled view of what history looks like through biased.
We all know, that there can be no peace in the middle east till Israel takes down its Sectarian Wall and offers a one state Solution. There is little point in clinging to their original dreams long after all possibility of attaining them has faded.
We all know, that civil wars do end.
We all know, there are worries that if foreign governments supply more-advanced weapons to the opposition, they might fall into the hands of the Islamic State or other al-Qaeda-inspired groups, which could turn them against the U.S. and its allies.
We all know, that Russia, for its part, says its goal is to keep Syria secular, independent and, most important, intact. Russia has used its UN Security Council veto repeatedly to protect the regime and maintains its only military base outside the former Soviet Union at Syria’s Mediterranean port of Tartus.
We all know, that if the war continues untreated that there will be millions of more refugees.
We all know, that the world organisations
We all know, that there are casualties on both sides of the conflict.
We all don’t know the Human Toll.
The United Nations estimated in July that more than 100,000 people have been killed in the conflict in Syria. About 2 million Syrians have registered as refugees or are pending registration, with an average of almost 5,000 people fleeing into neighboring countries each day, the office of the UN High Commission on Refugees said Sept. 3. At the end of August, there were 110,000 refugees in Egypt, 168,000 in Iraq, 515,000 in Jordan, 716,000 in Lebanon and 460,000 in Turkey, it said. Inside Syria, a further 4.25 million people are displaced, according to data from the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
We all don’t know, that Leadership changes are a factor in the termination of between 25% and 40% of civil wars.
We all don’tknow, that the majority of victories come in the first year of a civil war.
We all don’tknow, that the war has pitted the U.S. and its Sunni-Muslim Gulf allies, who want to see Assad removed from power, against Russia and Shiite-Muslim Iran.
We all don’tknow, that there are about 10,000 jihadists — who include foreign fighters — fighting for factions linked to al-Qaeda. Another 30,000 to 35,000 are Islamists who share much of the outlook of the jihadists, but are focused purely on the Syrian war rather than a wider international struggle.
We all don’tknow, that Fighters from the rebel group are financed and armed in part by some Gulf Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia and Qatar. They have struggled to hold territory. They have also battled Islamists, who see the Syrian conflict as a religious war.
We all don’tknow, that the Syrian National Council: The council of opposition groups has its main offices in Istanbul and Cairo, and was formed in 2011. It falls under the umbrella of the Syrian National Coalition. The group seeks a civil and democratic state in Syria after the toppling of Assad. It has a president, a prime minister and about 114 members. It’s an umbrella group of opposition blocs whose main goal is toppling Assad’s government. The group has sought international recognition and the formation of a transitional government, according to its website. It has pledged to guarantee the “rights, interests and the participation of all components of Syria.
We all don’t know, that the Assad’s family has ruled the country for 40 years, and has been backed by the Alawite community and other minorities. Assad’s father left behind an authoritarian government that’s been led by the socialist Baath Party since 1963. Under Hafez al-Assad, Syria allied itself with Shiite Muslim-led Iran. Lebanon’s Shiite-Muslim Hezbollah has aligned with the Syrian government and fought with them to take the strategic city of al-Qusair in June.
We all don’t know that General Salim Idris:
He became the head of the rebel Free Syrian Army’s Supreme Military Command in December. The East Germany-trained electronics professor was a general in the Syrian army when he defected in July 2012. He has been vocal in trying to persuade the U.S. to intervene militarily against Assad after the use of chemicals weapons in August. Idris has tried to convince the U.S. that the FSA isn’t an Islamist or radical group as portrayed by the Assad government.
We all don’tknow that George Sabra:
He was elected in April as the acting president of the coalition, and held the post until July. He’s still head of the Syrian National Council after being appointed in November 2012. During his role leading the opposition bloc he stirred controversy by refusing to rule out talks with Assad’s government. He speaks about Syria without any religious or sectarian bias and supports the formation of a secular government after the ouster of Assad.
We all don’t know Ahmad al-Jarba:
He became the opposition coalition’s new president in July. As a leader of the Shammar tribe, one of the largest in the region and from which the mother of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia also hailed, Al-Jarba is viewed as someone the leadership in Riyadh can work with. Al-Jarba was born in 1969 in the north-eastern Syrian city of Qameshli.
We all don’t know Ghassan Hitto:
Hitto stepped down as opposition prime minister in July. He was given the responsibility of administering areas inside Syria held by the rebels. He pledged to enforce laws and provide logistical support for opposition forces. The communications executive was born in Damascus and has a bachelor’s degree from Indiana’s Purdue University and an MBA from Indiana Wesleyan University.
We all don’t know Ahmad Tomeh:
Syria’s opposition National Coalition elected Tomeh as prime minister this month and tasked him with forming a transitional government. The 48-year-old is thought to be have been a consensus candidate accepted by secular members in the coalition and moderate Islamist groups fighting to oust Assad. He replaced Ghassan Hitto, a Syrian American businessman. Tomeh is from the country’s oil producing east.
We all don’tknow that Syria’s conflict began with peaceful anti-government protests in March 2011, part of a wave of popular opposition to authoritarian regimes across the Arab world. It evolved into a sectarian war after President Bashar al-Assad’s troops fired on demonstrators.
What about the sham Peace conference in Vienna misleads the world about the lack of any realistic solution to the war.is a sham conference that is not capable of delivering any peace negotiations, and that the Obama administration knew that perfectly well from the start.
None of the Syrian parties to the war were invited. The obvious implication of that decision is that the external patrons of the Syrian parties – especially Russia, Iran and Saudi Arabia – are expected to move toward the outline of a settlement and then use their clout with the clients to force the acceptance of the deal. The idea of leaping over the Syrian parties to the conflict by having an outside power negotiate a peace agreement on behalf of it clients is perfectly logical in the abstract.
Iran, on the other hand, is fighting a war in Syria that it regards a vital to its security. And Russia’s political and security interests in Syria may be less clear-cut, but it also has no incentive to agree to a settlement that would risk a victory for terrorism in Syria.
All the conference achieved it to mislead the rest of the world about the lack of any realistic solution to the war.
The way to end the war is to get Russia to ask Mr Assad to help with a transition into a new government.
It must create a Mutually hurting stalemates. Governments often need less pressure, since they find stalemates painful in themselves. Without full control of their territory, legitimacy seeps away. This weakens them and encourages others who have grievances to make a stand, adding to the problems.
Separate measures are needed for the Rebels. They will require extra pressure, since they are less likely to find a stalemate intrinsically painful.
Fighting becomes their raison d’être; keeping the ability to fight on is all they need. “The guerrilla wins if he does not lose,”
The trickiest part is getting both sides into painful positions at the same time. Knowing that the enemy is under the cosh can tempt embattled combatants to hold out.
The Assad regime obviously has no incentive to make peace the least bad option.
What is essential in peace negotiations is combatants’ acceptance, at least privately, that the hope of winning has died away.
They then can turn their attention to those that blindly believe anything they are told in the name of “faith”.
Civil wars tend to end as messily as they are fought. Negotiations often take place in parallel with combat.
There may well be some conflicts better fought to their conclusion than left unresolved. This is not one of them. The violence needed for a military victory has already destroy the state institutions required to stabilise a country in the long-term. The announcement by David Cameron that the UK is now engaged in drone strikes and bombing against targets in Syria is just what the wars needs. Britain will be at the mercy of events which are being shaped by the numerous other players in the conflict, all of whom have their own highly contradictory agendas.
Yesterday the UK government spent 10 hours debating whether to expand its Bombing on ISIS/Daesh into Syria.
During the debate there was hardly a mention of Arms Sales other than,
“Isis didn’t come from nowhere, its weapons don’t come from nowhere. We sell vast amounts of weapons to Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, and a number of other places” Mr Corbett.
When it comes to how arms sales are perceive – whether they are British or US or whatever – it tends to be seen as a domestic economic issue.
The Middle East has now descended into proxy wars, sectarian conflicts and battles against terrorist networks. Countries in the region that have stockpiled American military hardware are now actually using them and wanting more.
Adding to the concern is the fact that the spending spree on arms comes against the background of a marked increase in military interventions by countries in the region since the Arab spring in 2011. Saudi Arabia has intervened in Bahrain (at the request of that kingdom’s ruler during the so-called Pearl revolution), in Yemen in 2009 and again in Yemen this year.
$18bn expected to be spent on weapons this year.
War is good for business.
In March 2015, the Syrian civil war, rightly declared by the United Nations as the “worst humanitarian disaster since the Cold War,” entered its fifth year.
Today, a number of factors make the conflict intractable.
The revolution began around issues of social inequality and the desire for freedom from fear and repression.
The Syrian civil war was never just about Syria. From the beginning, regional and international powers intervened in the conflict by supporting the different warring parties.
The rise of mainly foreign jihadist groups like the “Islamic State” (ISIS) have exacerbated the situation by both wrestling further decision-making power away from Syrian actors and by establishing itself as a radical “spoiling” force that would hinder any negotiated political agreement.
As more actors become involved, one constant factor remains: no single group or faction has the military strength to be able to simultaneously defeat all its adversaries and declare military victory.
Russia:
Russia has continued to supply the Syrian military with weapons and equipment throughout the conflict. Moscow insists it is only fulfilling pre-existing contracts and that it is not violating any international sanctions.
The S-300 surface-to-air missile defence systems recently delivered to Syria.
Despite Western pressure, Moscow insisted earlier this year that it would be honouring its previously agreed contract with Damascus for supplying sophisticated S-300 surface-to-air missile defense systems.
Given the unprecedented levels of weapon sales by the west (including the US, Canada and the UK) to the mainly Sunni Gulf states, Vladimir Putin’s decision last week to allow the controversial delivery of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to Iran – voluntarily blocked by Russia since 2010 – seems likely to accelerate the proliferation.
Russia has already reportedly sent advanced Yakhont anti-ship cruise missiles, SA-17 surface-to-air missiles, and short-range Pantsyr-S missile systems.
Iran:
Tehran is believed to have become a key supplier of rockets, anti-tank missiles, rocket-propelled grenades and mortars. Iran has stepped up its military support of Syrian government forces since the end of 2012.
However, Iranian officials deny breaking the UN sanctions imposed on its arms exports.
To evade the sanctions, Tehran has allegedly been transporting most of the weapons through Iraqi airspace on commercial planes and, more recently, overland through Iraq by lorry, something the Iraqi government denies.
Photographs and videos published online appear to provide evidence of recent Iranian arms shipments.
One purportedly shows an Iranian-made rocket, on which the date of manufacture is listed as 2012; another an ammunition crate containing mortar shells made by a Iranian defense ministry subsidiary in 2012.
Syria:
The Free Syrian Army (FSA), have said that the vast majority of its weaponry has been bought on the black market or seized from government facilities.
European Union: May 2011, it imposed an arms embargo on Syria.
As the uprising entered its third year, several member states – led by the UK and France – lobbied to be able to supply arms to “moderate” forces in the opposition.
Despite deep rifts, foreign ministers agreed to let the embargo lapse in May 2013.
Though EU member states do not appear to have already sent arms directly to the rebels, another European country has been linked to a secret, large-scale airlift.
In January 2013, a British blogger began to notice weapons made in the former Yugoslavia were appearing in videos and images posted online by rebels fighting in southern Syria.
The recoilless guns, assault rifles, grenade launchers and shoulder-fired rockets appeared to be from an undeclared surplus from the 1990s Balkan wars stockpiled by Croatia.
Western officials told the New York Times that the weaponry had been sold to Saudi Arabia, and that multiple plane loads had left Croatia since December 2012, bound for Turkey and Jordan.
They were reportedly then given to several Western-aligned FSA groups. Croatia’s foreign ministry and arms-export agency have denied any such shipments occurred.
US:
The US has repeatedly said it is reluctant to supply arms directly to rebel groups because it is concerned that weapons might end up in the possession of militant jihadist groups.
But on 14 June 2013 Washington said it would give the rebels “direct military aid”after concluding Syrian troops had used chemical weapons.
The CIA is reported to have played an important role behind the scenes since 2012, coordinating arms shipments to the rebels by US allies.
In June 2012, US officials said CIA officers were operating in Turkey, helping decide which groups would receive weapons.
The CIA is also reported to have been instrumental in setting up the alleged secret airlift of weapons from Croatia.
Turkey:
The Turkish government is a firm supporter of the rebels, but has not officially approved the sending of military aid.
However, reports suggest it has played a pivotal role in sharp acceleration of arms shipments to the rebels since late 2012.
The Turkish authorities had oversight over much of the airlift of weapons from Croatia, “down to affixing transponders to trucks ferrying the military goods through Turkey so it might monitor shipments as they move by land into Syria”, according to the New York Times.
Jordan:
The Yugoslav-made weapons first seen in the hands of FSA units in southern Syria in early 2013 are believed to have been smuggled over the border with Jordan.
The Jordanian government has denied any role and said it was trying to prevent smuggling.
However, the New York Times found evidence to suggest Royal Jordanian Air Force transport planes and Jordanian commercial aircraft had been involved in the alleged airlift of arms from Croatia.
Iraq:
Syria’s rebels, who are drawn mostly from the country’s majority Sunni community, are said to have acquired weapons, ammunition and explosives from Sunni tribesmen and militants in neighbouring Iraq.
Arms are reportedly smuggled over the long, porous border and sold or given to the rebels. Al-Qaeda in Iraq played an active role in founding the al-Nusra Front and provides it with money, expertise and fighters.
Lebanon:
As with Iraq, Lebanon’s Sunni community is reported to have helped supply Syrian rebel fighters with small arms purchased on the black market or shipped from other countries in the region, including Libya.
The Lebanese authorities have seized unmarked shipments of ammunition, including rocket-propelled grenades.
The Syrian town of Qusair, which was recaptured by government forces in June 2013, was a transit point for weapons smuggled from north-eastern Lebanon.
Libya:
The North African state has been a key source of weapons for the rebels.
The UN Security Council’s Group of Experts, which monitors the arms embargo imposed on Libya during the 2011 uprising, said in April 2013 that there had been illicit transfers of “heavy and light weapons, including man-portable air defence systems, small arms and related ammunition and explosives and mines”.
“The significant size of some shipments”, it said, “and the logistics involved suggest that representatives of the Libyan local authorities might have at least been aware of the transfers, if not actually directly involved.”
Saudi Arabia:
Saudi Arabia is reported recently to have taken the lead in channelling financial and military support to the rebels.
Unlike Qatar, the Gulf kingdom is believed to be suspicious of the Islamist rebel groups, and has focused on supporting nationalist and secular factions of the FSA.
In late 2012, Riyadh is said to have financed the purchase of “thousands of rifles and hundreds of machine guns”, rocket and grenade launchers and ammunition for the FSA from a Croatian-controlled stockpile of Yugoslav weapons.
These were reportedly flown – including by Royal Saudi Air Force C-130 transporters – to Jordan and Turkey and smuggled into Syria.
Qatar:
Until now, Qatar is widely believed to have been the main supplier of weapons to the rebels.
The Gulf emirate has denied providing any arms, although it has promised to support the opposition “with whatever it needs”.
Most of the weapons are thought to have been given to hard-line Islamist rebel groups, particularly those aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood, which has acted as an intermediary.
This has reportedly drawn criticism from Western officials who say many of the groups are extremist.
Qatar Emiri Air Force transporter planes flew to Turkey with supplies for the Syrian rebels as early as January 2012, according to the New York Times
By autumn 2012, Qatari aircraft were landing at Esenboga airport, near Ankara, every two days.
Qatari officials insisted they were carrying non-lethal aid.
A complete and detailed picture of the arms race in the Middle East is impossible to construct.
But the availability of weapons in the region, from which British firms make billions of pounds a year, was a “contributory factor” in the ongoing conflict.
In 2013 the Independent reported that the UK made £12.bn from arms sales to repressive regimes around the world, most of which are in the Middle East and Africa.
Over the last decade, the Middle East has become a focal point of the world arms buildup. Each year, the regional arsenal grows, as the United States, the Soviet Union, France, Britain and others ship billions of dollars worth of weapons to the countries there.
Today, the region receives over half of all arms deliveries to the Third World, and more than a quarter of all world arms shipments.
In less than 20 years, these have grown tenfold in value — from $4.7 billion in 1962 to $46.7 billion in 1980, nearly nine times the world average.
When the states of the world are ranked by military spending per capita, six of the top seven are in the Middle East.
Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Israel, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Brunei, Kuwait, United States, Soviet Union and France.
By the end of the 1970s, the region was spending between 13 and 15 percent of its gross national product for the military, compared with 8.3 percent for the Warsaw Pact countries, the next highest.
If Israel’s battle-ready reserves of some 300,000 are included, the Middle East now has almost twice the total military manpower of the US, and is approaching the 4.7 million total for the US and all NATO countries except Turkey.
During the same period, operational combat aircraft in the region grew by more than 50 percent, from 2,900 to 4,400, surpassing the size of the combined European NATO air forces.
The one Canadian deal alone – to supply Saudi Arabia with light armoured vehicles – will account for 20% of the military vehicles sold globally in years covered by the contract.
With conflicts raging in Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen, this is just the thin edge of the wedge. Saudi has booked enough arms imports in 24 months for them to be worth $10bn a year.
Arms sales to the top five purchasers in the region – Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Algeria, Egypt and Iraq – surge this year to more than $18bn, up from $12bn last year.
Abu Dhabi staged the 13th edition of the International Defence Exhibition and Conference in 2015 it attracted 1,200 exhibiting companies and over 100’000 visitors.
According to the New York Times, defense industry officials have notified Congress that they are expecting additional requests from Arab states fighting Isis – Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Jordan and Egypt – for thousands of new US-made weapons, including missiles and bombs, to rebuild depleted arms stockpiles.
Haider al-Abadi, disclosed that he was seeking arms worth billions of dollars from Washington – with payment deferred – for the battle against Daesh/Islamic State (Isis).
Ironically, among the key weapons suppliers in the arms race are permanent members of the UN security council who have been at the center of two unconventional arms control initiatives – disarming the Syrian government’s stockpiles of chemical weapons and negotiating for a deal on Iran’s nuclear programme.
They showed how Saudi Arabia had become the world’s largest importer of weapons and fourth largest military spender and that other Middle East states were sharply increasing their arms purchases.
Last week France’s foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, disclosed progress in talks to sell Rafale fighter jets to the UAE, one of the Middle East’s biggest and most aggressive arms buyers.
CHINA could be on the verge of teaming up with Russia to unleash its military might in Syria and destroy Islamic State (ISIS).
For perspective:
During the first year of the war on terror, approximately 72 million rounds were expended in Iraq and another 21 million in Afghanistan — about 2,000 rounds per war fighter.
There are over 80 million gun owners in the U.S. If every single one went out and bought just 100 rounds – barely enough for one afternoon on the range – it would require 8 billion rounds of ammo.
If you look at the number of Americans killed since 9/11 by terrorism, it’s less than 100. If you look at the number that have been killed by gun violence, it’s in the tens of thousands.
So how do we reverse the trend?
To do this,
Our approach needs to go well beyond the current focus on militarily downgrading and defeating ISIS and keeping the conflict from spreading to Syria’s neighboring countries — a strategy that has arguably already failed.
Syria is now functions as a war economy, and fighting is seen as one of the few options available to generate income.
Within the country, there are over 7 million people who have been internally displaced and over 12 million people who need basic humanitarian aid to survive.
Current international funding and resources fall short of covering Syria’s enormous humanitarian needs — including basic food assistance — and it must be increased.
What’s more, the international community’s priority needs to be to work on ensuring access for humanitarian aid workers, as they cannot reach parts of the Syrian population, whether due to the Syrian regime’s obstruction or ISIS’s extensive control.
With no clear military victory in sight, a political arrangement is still the best — albeit extremely complex — bet to see an end to the war.
Only a stronger, non-jihadist Syrian opposition can ultimately wrestle control and support away from radical groups like ISIS/Daesh and al-Nusra and sit at the negotiating table.
Something’s got to give.
And when it does, these are some possible scenarios:
If Assad is killed, the regime will likely fall and the rebels could claim victory. That would lead to an attempt at a transitional government, likely composed of members from the newly formed Syrian National Council, despite its immediate problems and the fact that jihadists have been the most organized rebel force up to this point.
A truly dangerous scenario would be if it went from the proxy war which it now is to a full-blown world war with Iran-Syria-Russia on side against the West and its Gulf allies.
The destabilization of the entire region. Syria would then turn into a free-for-all.
President Bashar al-Assad is given a safe passage out of Syria to end the nation’s bloodshed. This great compromise is not likely since Assad vowed he would never leave Syria alive. France is good at giving Mass killers a home.
With the amount of arms sales there is every likely hood that the Arab forces could become the Middle East’s newest source of Anti- democratic, sectarian- based, instability, potentially intensifying the Sunni-Shia conflict.
While most of the warring parties are exhausted, they also believe they have no alternative to war, that the only possible conclusion is either victory or death.
As with all paintings it’s beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the artist uses of the colors he sees.
In part one we have applied a wash of Money with a ramble application of religion.
Now its time to dip our brush into more intense colors and forms. Let’s have a dart of “gun culture,” the Gun.
At the risk of turning our picture into naive art as citizens of the world, perhaps we should demand an end to the unimaginable suffering of victims and their families – the maiming and killing by guns of our fellow human beings.
The annual toll from firearms in the US is running at 32,000 deaths and climbing and this is a country at peace.
To absorb the scale of the mayhem, it’s worth trying to guess the death toll of all the wars in American history since the War of Independence began in 1775. The staggering fact, is that 212,994 more Americans lost their lives from firearms in the last 45 years than in all wars involving the US.
In the past decade in which the fear of terror has cost the USA hundreds of billions of dollars in wars, surveillance and intelligence programmes and homeland security. Ten years after 9/11, homeland security spending doubled to $69bn. The total bill since the attacks is more than $649bn.
One more figure.
There have been fewer than 20 terror-related deaths on American soil since 9/11 and about 364,000 deaths caused by privately owned firearms.
If any European nation had such a record and persisted in addressing only the first figure, while ignoring the second, you can bet your last pound that the United States would be warning against travel to that country and no American would set foot in it without body armour.
The historic lunacy of this position in the USA springs from the second amendment right to keep and bear arms, and is derived from English common law and our 1689 Bill of Rights.
The gun lobby is too powerful to challenge and that nothing will ever change. It’s no wonder that it is mostly seen as a matter of personal safety. The AR 15, the gun that Adam Lanza used to murder 20 children in Newtown, is now the most popular rifle in America.
International pressure may be one way of reducing the slaughter over the next generation. This has reached the point where it has ceased to be a domestic issue. The world cannot stand idly by.
You might ask why we did not use Gun as the wash to our painting. The reason is you have to buy a gun.
Our perception of danger is easily distorted by rare events like the Recent Killings in Paris.
You also might say that Guns don’t attack children; psychopaths and sadists and terrorists do.
Weapons may have saved the planet from a future too terrible to imagine.
The one that has and is changing the future is the Kalashnikov AK – 47. The 47 refers to the year of its commission 1947.
Invented by a gifted tank mechanic to save Russia’s Mikhail Kalashnikov, who died in Russia on 23 Dec 2023 aged 94.Russia not only distributes the Kalashnikov rifles all over the world, but also licensed its production in over 30 other countries, including China, Israel, India, Egypt and Nigeria.
It’s the most effective killing machine in human history– a gun that, on its 62nd birthday, is still killing as many as a quarter of a million people every year, in every corner of the globe.
It is believed that AK-47s have caused more deaths than artillery fire, airstrikes and rocket attacks combined. Responsible for more deaths than any other individual model of weapon in human history.
It has truly changed the course of human history in so many different conflicts that we hardly have time to discuss them.
It’s the tool that lets “freedom fighter” groups – or “terrorist” groups, depending on whose politics you follow – hold off entire armies of well-trained soldiers packing million-dollar weapons systems.
The average global price of the assault rifle was estimated at $534 in 2005, according to Oxford University economist Phillip Killicoat. Though in African countries the price of AK-47 is on average $200 cheaper.
In the U.S. it has jump from $600 to $1,500, as gun owners rush to buy genuine Russian weapons before they disappear from store shelves.
It was the US, which gave the Al Qaeda founder his first AK-47 to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan.
The image of AK-47 appears on the flag of Mozambique as well as coats of arms of Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso (1984-97) and East Timor. The Kalashnikov rifle is also present on the flag of Lebanese militant organization, Hezbollah.
Coins dedicated to Mikhail Kalashnikov and his creation were issued not only in Russia, but also in such a peaceful place as New Zealand, which marked the rifle’s 60th birthday with special two-dollar pieces.
The French newspaper, Liberation, named AK-47 the most important invention of the XX century.
Colombian artist, Cesar Lopez, has transformed a dozen of AK-47s into guitars, with then UN General Secretary, Kofi Annan, getting one of the musical instruments as a gift in 2007.
There are more than a thousand types of dangerous guns in the world.
Our brush is now dripping in violence. However every man has the right to risk his life in order to save it.
Our next color should recognize this fact.
However to turn our painting of the future away from destruction and war to the possibilities of living together in peace we need to find a color that is common to all to wipe the earth terrorists of the face of the planet.
In light of the recent events in Paris this post is sure to touch on some
very raw nerves but if we are to honor those who lost their lives
we must come to some understanding of the horrification or
glorification of killing other than the frenzy of fear now being created
by the media.
Television is an energy drain and a large source of fear and negativity for many. Watching violence, diminishes the harshness and reality of these acts, by gradually numbing us. Along with Social media it is one of the fastest ways to disconnect yourself from the world.
Most people just want to live their lives in peace.
however this is completely undermined by modern day, which would make you think that most people are violent and destructive.
Violence on television is however part of our societal experience.
The number of murders seen on TV by the time an average child finishes elementary school: 8,000. The number of violent acts seen on TV by age 18: 200,000
Most of us will never engage in an act of extreme brutality.
We will never shoot, stab, or beat someone to death. We will never rape another human being or set them on fire. We will never strap a bomb to our chests and detonate ourselves in a crowded café.
And so, when faced with these seemingly senseless acts, we find ourselves at a loss.
At the same time for most of us in the world we have become so use to killing it means little or nothing to us unless it directly affects us.
If you stop and ask yourself why are we so prone to kill this is a subject that has been intensely debated for centuries, probably because it says so much about who we are and whether we can justify war and other collective violence.
If we really want to solve the problem of violence, there is nothing for it but to risk a kind of understanding that threatens our own values, our own way of life. We have to gaze into an abyss.
People are violent because they feel they must be; because they feel that their violence is obligatory.
Usually when someone is murdered, people expect the murderer to feel culpable. This though, is not the case in war. When in war, a soldier is taught that the enemy deserves to die, for no other reason than that they are the nation’s enemy. They know that they are harming fully human beings. Nonetheless, they believe they should.
Has warfare been handed down to us through millions of years of evolution?
Is it part of who we are as a species?
Is warfare is rooted in evolution?
At the heart of these question is whether humans have a natural capacity to kill other humans. Some social scientists have concluded that evolution has in fact left us with this unfortunate ability.
Luckily there is within most men an intense resistance to killing their fellow-man.
Violence does not stem from a psychopathic lack of morality. Quite the reverse: it comes from the exercise of perceived moral rights and obligations.
Many people assume that soldiers in a firefight instinctively respond to enemy fire by shooting back, and that soldiers in a kill-or-be-killed situation will choose to kill. But informal interviews conducted with thousands of American combat soldiers during World War II by army historian S.L.A. Marshall revealed that as many as 75% of soldiers never fired their weapons during combat.
Very few people would seek out an opportunity to kill others.
At the same time, you may find it hard to believe that it is sometimes impossible for soldiers to kill others even when their own lives are at risk.
Throughout history and around the world people have come up with ways to overcome an aversion to killing, such as dehumanizing the victim, placing distance between the killer and the victim, and using drugs or loud music to induce a trance-like state in a killer. This trait would have been amplified and passed down through the generations until it was eventually inherited by modern humans, who presumably took this predisposition and ran with it, inventing more and more efficient ways to kill each other.
Aftermath of World War II, the U.S. military embarked on a campaign to more effectively prepare soldiers for combat by employing realistic training exercises. New recruits began to practice shooting at pop-up, human-shaped targets rather than the traditional, stationary bull’s-eyes. More and more elaborate and realistic combat simulation exercises and ’war games’ were implemented.
The point of this new training was to make killing an automatic response under combat conditions. And it worked. Combatants in institutional wars do not fight primarily because they are aggressive. Humans excel at overcoming our biological limitations using technological innovation.
All terrorism and war co-evolved, promoting conflict between groups and greater harmony within them.
There is no morality in war.
The original founders of the religions were the human incarnations of the same God like Krishna, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha etc.
Every religion says that their God only created this entire earth or this entire humanity. Unfortunately, there is only one earth and this proves that there is only one God mentioned by all the religions.
Along came those religions about 4000 years ago and endless war! in the name of religion (so they can not be religions or spiritual they can not be So new armies formed called Religion?.
Since God is one and the same, there cannot be contradicting concepts between the religions. But we find some contradictions and people are divided based on these contradictions. This division is leading to quarrels and finally killing each other. These contradictions cannot be from God because there is only one God as said above.
The Q`ran says that you should protect even the follower of other religion and convey the message of Allah to him. It is left to him to follow or not.
The same God exists in different forms in different religions.
Unfortunately we are the only living species that can reason and as a result, we realized that the only way to have things your way is by domination therefore, we divide and conquer. And as we become more powerful, we distort things. We twist the truth to fit our ulterior motive. And to convince the mass to adopt your belief in the name of God.
Unfortunately, it does not follow that every problem comes with its own prepackaged solution.
War is vague and illogical because it forces humans into extreme situations that have no obvious solutions. In a war, you kill someone and even if you win, you lose. The parts that are left out are the tragedies, and the permanent scars the war left.
And yet despite this apparent aversion to killing, we still manage to kill each other with alarming frequency.
Fortuitously this aversion to killing exists, and it reassures us that warfare is not an inescapable part of human life, and gives us hope that one day we might stop fighting wars.
Killing isn’t something that comes naturally to people.
Funny that people decry killing when it is because of their own demands that make it happen.
How can this be?“
Is that we’re simply too smart for our own good with propaganda to brainwash the masses into accepting this bloodshed day after day.
I’m interested how this applies to terrorists.
So would it be social engineering like “dehumanizing America, Israel, the West” or the cult of violence in many of those societies, plus enticements of financial rewards for the family of the suicide bombers in question that would help over come terrorists from their natural inclination not to kill. Most terrorists are paid mercenaries.
It isn’t easy to change a culture of violence.
You have to give people the structural, economic, technological and political means to regulate their relationships peacefully.
Legal sanctions are insufficient on their own.
Critically, the message has to come from respected people within the killer’s own community. Their own ideas about right and wrong matter most;
The ideas of those they care about and respect matter more.
Only when violence in any relationship is seen as a violation of every relationship will war diminish. Once everyone, everywhere, truly believes that violence is wrong, it will end.
The danger for Europe as a result of the horrific loss of life in Paris is not declaring war on terrorism but shutting down its borders. Open Borders is a declaration of intent that countries share goods and wealth and if they don’t they should. If all countries helped each other I think there would be no need for war.
This would separate out those who wish for war due to some perversion. If dangerous people can be motivated by genuine moral beliefs, we face a troubling dimension to morality.
If Paris is to teach us anything it is that there is a cost to modern-day warfare, that people will kill each other quite deliberately not just with particularly technologically advanced, like drones.
Our ancestors would have carried out deadly attacks only when they severely outnumbered their victims and not with low-cost attacks on unsuspecting neighbors.
When you declare war like Mr Holland and before him Mr Bush with Mr Blair you create fear which leads to killing and loss of the very liberties that so many died for.
France’s military efforts against ISIS have developed gradually over the course of the last 15 months. France began airstrikes against the Islamic State in Iraq in September of 2014 so Mr Hollands declaration of war is somewhat retrospective.
Prior to the American invasion in 2003, which France pointedly refused to join. Hollande insisted that France’s involvement would be strictly limited. “We will only intervene in Iraq,” he said.
Now he declaring a war ( rightly so) that France can not win it on its own. Nor will NATO who will have to get its arch-enemy Mr Putin on its side.
Unlike the wars created by 9/11 this time the drum beat is not a war against civilization as you could not describe ISIS as Civilized.
These days we have portable power.
This is a war to protect the West concept of Liberty which we will win by turning every Smart Phone into the eyes and ears of Freedom.
My message to ISIS is.
You may not tell us to kill. The society that you insist on – Killing is living. This is not a society anyone other than a barbarian would want to live in.
This lesson has being with us from the creation of man. The danger is that we forget it.
Whatever drove the Paris attackers to commit their horrific acts is certainly more complex and varied than the French government’s conduct in the world. It is no secret that the world’s attention can only be split so many ways.
The lessons of Paris today provide our best chance to get to the bottom of the ‘peace versus justice’ debate, expose its fallacies, and move beyond it.
We must focused on the “big picture” exploring all avenues for influencing humans everywhere.
How societies have developed through all of human history – from Neanderthals to i Phones.
At the rate things are going, the Earth in the coming decades could cease to be a “safe operating space” for human beings.
The question is why a pretty small group of nations around the shores of the North Atlantic had come to dominate the planet in the last 200 years in a way that the world’s never really seen before is now rapidly becoming irrelevant.
Since no CLARITY is being provided by any of our World Organisations or Political leaders regarding a solution I will offer in this post the reasons why this is true and a solution that is achievable in our life time.
We have four primary issues that must be addressed for us to live in harmony with nature: Overpopulation, Over consumption, dependence on fossil fuels and our harmful and wasteful typical western consumerism.
We have already crossed four “planetary boundaries.”
They are the extinction rate; deforestation; the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere; and the flow of nitrogen and phosphorous (used on land as fertilizer) into the ocean.
The urgency now is driven by the fact that we simply don’t have the necessary time to address the first three. They will take many decades (if not centuries) to resolve and we may be down to just a few years as the experts agree that we’re rapidly approaching or passing certain tipping points, beyond which there is no possibility of avoiding the worst effects of crossing all these planetary boundaries.
In the end of all of this mess amounts to simple massive transfers of wealth from the middle classes and the poor to the rich.
Because whatever you’re fighting for: Racism, Poverty, Feminism, Gay Rights, or any type of Equality. It won’t matter in the least, because if we don’t all work together to save the environment, we will be equally extinct.
It has brought us to a situation of the greatest schism between rich and poor in history. The utter breakdown of democratic government in favour of the new technological driven Feudalism.
As our social development continues to accelerate, we continue to change the meaning of the word poor.
We are not apart from nature, we are a part of nature.
I’m sorry that we paid so much attention to ISIS, and very little how fast the ice is melting in the arctic.
It is imperative now than ever that France in honor its recent unnecessary lost of innocent lives insures that the Climate Change Conference is not effected.
Unfortunately we must tried to see beyond the horrific events in Paris – into the misery beyond.
If we cannot see something, it is difficult to know how we can possibly begin to devise ways to avoid it.
It is time to attend to this generation’s apocalypse, and to do so we must recover both the fear and the hope of early ’80s politics.
There has to be another way, and this time it must include all of humanity, and all of our planet.
So far, few works have managed to put the unthinkable in front of our eyes –
The Internet, is the public face of globalization. Corruption is not only thriving online, but winning. The digital revolution has degenerated into an underworld of organized crime, dirty tactics, black ops and terrorism.
There is no such thing as “national cyberspace.” International cooperation will be needed, but be warned that the Internet will not go away in any place it touches.
“Lets just say that today’s Internet is a dirty mess waiting to be cleaned up.”
I am sure that there is no need to give a history lesson but here is one that tells the truth and which I admire.
Written by Roberto Savio.
It out lines why we are in the current mess and if you want to understand why it is so it is compulsory reading.
Roberto Savio, founder and president emeritus of the Inter Press Service (IPS) news agency and publisher of Other News, offers ten explanations of how the current mess in which the world finds itself came about.
1) ” The world, as it now exists, was largely shaped by the colonial powers, which divided the world among themselves, carving out states without any consideration for existing ethnic, religious or cultural realities. This was especially true of Africa and the Arab world, where the concept of state was imposed on systems of tribes and clans.
2) After the end of the colonial era, it was inevitable that to keep these artificial countries alive, and avoid their disintegration, strong men would be needed to cover the void left by the colonial powers. The rules of democracy were used only to reach power, with very few exceptions. The Arab Spring did indeed get rid of dictators and autocrats, just to replace them with chaos and warring factions (as in Libya) or with a new autocrat, as in Egypt.
The case of Yugoslavia is instructive. After the Second World War, Marshal Tito dismantled the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and created the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. But we all know that Yugoslavia did not survive the death of its strongman.
The lesson is that without creating a really participatory and unifying process of citizens, with a strong civil society, local identities will always play the most decisive role. So it will take some before many of the new countries will be considered real countries devoid of internal conflicts.
3) Since the Second World War, the meddling of the colonial and super powers in the process of consolidation of new countries has been a very good example of man-made disaster.
Take the case of Iraq. When the United States took over administration of the country in 2003 after its invasion, General Jay Garner was appointed and lasted just a month, because he was considered too open to local views.
Garner was replaced by a diplomat, Jan Bremmer, who took up his post after a two-hour briefing by the then Secretary of State, Condolezza Rice. Bremmer immediately proceeded to dissolve the army (creating 250,000 unemployed) and firing anyone in the administration who was a member of the Ba’ath party, the party of Saddam Hussein. This destabilised the country, and today’s mess is a direct result of this decision.
The current Iraqi Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, whom Washington is trying to remove as the cause of polarisation between Shiites and Sunnis, was the preferred American candidate. So was the President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, who is now virulently anti-American. This is a tradition that goes back to the first U.S. intervention in Vietnam, where Washington put in place Ngo Dihn Dien, who turned against its views, until he was assassinated.
There is no space here to give example of similar mistakes (albeit less important) by other Western powers. The point is that all leaders installed from outside do not last long and bring instability.
4) We are all witnessing religious fighting and Islam extremism as a growing and disturbing threat. Few make any effort to understand why thousands of young people are willing to blow themselves up. There is a striking correlation between lack of development/employment and religious unrest. In the Muslim countries of Asia (Arab Muslims account for less than 20 percent of the world’s Muslim populations), extremism hardly exists.
And few realise that the fight between Shiites and Sunnis is funded by countries like Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Iran.
Those religions have been living side by side for centuries, and now they are fighting a proxy war, for example in Syria. Saudi Arabia has been funding Salafists (the puritan form of Islam) everywhere, and it has provided nearly two billion dollars to the new Egyptian autocrat, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, because he is fighting the Muslim Brotherhood, which predicates the end of kings and sheiks and power for the people. Iraq is also becoming a proxy war between Saudi Arabia, defender of the Sunnis, and Iran, defender of the Shiites.
So, when looking at these wars of religion, always look at who is behind them. Religions usually become belligerent only if they are used. Just look at European history, where wars of religion were invented by kings and fought by people. Of course, once the genie is out of the bottle, it will take a long time to put it back. So this issue will be with us for quite some time.
5) The end of the Cold War unfroze the world, which had been kept in stability by the balance between the two superpowers.
Attempts to create regional or international alliances to bring stability have always been stymied by national interests. The best example is Europe. While everybody was talking about Crimea, Ukraine and Vladimir Putin (who had been made paranoiac about Western encirclement, from the George Bush Jr. administration onwards) and how to bring him to listen to the United States and Europe, European companies continued trade in spite of a much talked about embargo. And now, Austria has quietly signed an agreement with Russia to join the South Stream, a pipeline that will bring Russian gas to Europe – so much for the unity of a Europe which has been clamouring about the need to reduce its energy dependence on Russia.
A multipolar world is in the making, but it has to be seen how stable it will be.
In Asia, China and Japan are increasing their military investments, as are surrounding countries. And while local conflicts, like Syria, Iraq and Sudan, are not going to escalate into a larger conflict, this would certainly be the case in Asia.
6) In a world more and more divided by a resurgence of national interests, the very idea of shared governance is losing its strength, and not only in Europe.
The United Nations has lost its significance as the arena in which to reach consensus and legitimacy. The two engines of globalisation – trade and finance – are not part of the United Nations, which is stuck with the themes of development, peace, human rights, environment, education and so on. While these issues are crucial for a viable world, they are not seen as such by those in power. Conclusion: the United Nations is sliding into irrelevance.
7) At the same time, values and ideas which were considered universal, such as cooperation, mutual aid, international social justice and peace as an encompassing paradigm are also becoming irrelevant.
French President Francois Hollande meets U.S. President Barack Obama, not to discuss how to stop the genocide in Sudan, or the kidnapping of children in Nigeria, but to ask him to intervene with his Minister of Justice to reduce a giant fine on a French bank, the BNP-Parisbas, for fraudulent activities. The outstanding problem of climate control was largely absent in the last G7 meeting, not to talk of nuclear disarmament … and yet these are the two main threats to the planet!
8) After colonialism and totalitarian regimes, the key phrase after the Second World War was “implementation of democracy”. But after the end of the Cold War, democracy was taken for granted. In fact, in the last twenty years, the formula of representative democracy has been losing its glamour. Pragmatism has led to the loss of long-term vision, and politics have become more and more mere administration.
Citizens feel less and less related to parties, which have basically become self-centred and self-reliant. International affairs are not considered tools of power by parties, and decisions are taken without participation. This leads to choices which often do not represent the feelings and priorities of citizens.
The way in which the bailout of Cyprus from its financial crisis a few years ago was treated in the European Commission was widely recognised as a blatant example of lack of transparency. Few people certainly make more mistakes than many …
9) A very important element of the mess has been the growth of what its proponents, especially in the financial world, call the “new economy” – an economy that contemplates permanent unemployment, lack of social investments, reduced taxation for large capital, the marginalisation of trade unions, and a reduction of the role of the State as the regulator and guarantor of social justice.
Inequalities are reaching unprecedented levels. The world’s 85 richest individuals possess the same wealth as 2.5 billion people.
10) All this brings its corollary. It is not by chance that all mainstream media worldwide have the same reading of the world.
Information today has basically eliminated analysis and process, to concentrate on events. Their ability to follow the world mess is minimal, and they just repeat what those in power say. It is very instructive to see media which are very analytical about national affairs and very superficial about international issues. The media depend largely on three international news agencies, which represent the Western world and its interests. Have you read anywhere about the gas agreement between Austria and Russia?
So, a final point: never be satisfied with what you read in the newspapers, always try to get additional and opposite viewpoints through the net. This will help you to look at the world with your eyes, and not with the eyes of somebody else who is probably part of the system which has created this mess. Do not go with the tide … search for the other face of the moon. And if they tell you that they know, well, just look at the results. So, be yourself and, if you make a mistake, at least it will be your mistake. “
I thank him and I could not agree more with his advise in his summing up. He states what I have being advocating in post after post.
Many factors influenced the civil war in Syria, including long-standing political, religious, and ideological disputes; economic dislocations from both global and regional factors; and the consequences of water shortages influenced by drought, ineffective watershed management, and the growing influence of climate variability and change.
Here is my solution.
Greed is the real terrorist operating under the banner of Profit for Profit sake.
Make Profit for Profit Sake Pay;
By placing a World Aid Commission of 0.05% on all High Frequency Trading, on all Foreign Exchange Transactions (over $20,000) on all Sovereign Wealth Funds Acquisitions, on all new drilling and mining Licences.
A commission rate ranging from 0.005 to 0.25 percent would generate between $15 and $300 billion per year, of which a substantial amount could be allocated to promote international peace and development and resolving Climate Change.
This would create a perpetual Funded Fund to contributed to rectifying the very thing that caused the problems in the first place.Greed.
And as we look forward into a world increasingly dominated by technology, what will geography mean in the 21st century?
A new report claiming the numbers killed by ‘the war on terror’ globally may be as high as 2 million has been met with almost total silence.
What will all the deaths achieve? Every death is a tragedy.
This is a good starting point for a wider debate about the justifications and rationalisations for the great swathe of global violence unleashed in response to the 9/11 attacks.
The under reporting by the media of this human toll attributable to ongoing Western interventions, whether deliberate, or through self-censorship, has been key to removing the “fingerprints” of responsibility.’
The new age of humanitarian war which suggests that war is not as bad as it used to be, or at least that it’s not so bad that the costs outweigh the gains. Is totally naive.
High-tech precision weapons, precision targeting enabled by lawyers, new ethical norms, population-centric counterinsurgency – all this has made it possible to vaporise the bad guys is not true as we all saw up close yesterday in Paris.
Mr Hollands declaration of war is understandable, as was Americas after 9/11. But it should not be the first choice rather than a last resort.
The first choice should be to convince their populations that war will not only be cost-free for them, but that its effects on the countries on the receiving end of it will also be minimal and ultimately beneficial.
This is what we have been told ever since the US invasion of Panama and the first Gulf War and throughout the last fourteen years of the ‘war on terror,’ whenever the US and its allies are considering who next to bomb or hit with a drone.
War used to be a way to learn Geography – Fool me once.
In the past 60 plus years, many changes have taken place with society, technology and governments but world peace is for the most part pie in the sky.
It is true that their have been no major global conflicts in the latter half of the twentieth century and into the twenty-first.
So is Nato still relevant? Or is it just a pension club for the military old boys.
Since 1999 Nato has struggled in performing ever mission it has launched- Bosnia, Kosova, Afghanistan.
When Estonians pulled the Nato emergency chain on a cyber attack it was left with a lukewarm response raising the question what constitutes an attack on a country that Nato will react to.
What would happen if a war started, or the market crashed? I don’t think that NATO would fight a war together ( Including USA and Canada there are currently 28 member states) to be honest.
The conflicting priorities of Europe and the USA and the absence of a common foe all point to the need for Nato to be refilled into either a new European defense force or into the United Nations as a total peaceful organisation. Since the end of the cold war, NATO and the UN have become nearly interchangeable.
However some still say that the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) is more relevant than it has been for years even if many of its members are moving further away from meeting their defense spending obligations.
The end of the Cold War and, consequently, the absence of the Soviet threat, did not render NATO ( The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) obsolete. There is no Warsaw Pact anymore, so why is there NATO?
The Alliance is now expanding like crazy. Faster than EU itself.
This means they either feel their power is crumbling and need more power, more allies, or the simple fact NATO has no more meaning.
It is the last surviving relic of the Cold War and is now the centerpiece of US-European relations. It has served as an integrating mechanism for Europe for more than sixty-five years.
Here what it cost to-day.
Nato 2014 Actual 2014 2015 2015
Member State Expenditure % of GDP Project Exp % of GDP
Bulgaria $604 million 1.3 $565 million 1.16
Canada $14.3 billion 1 $12.2 billion null
Estonia $430 million 2 $461 million 2.05
France $40.90 billion 1.5 $41.2 billion 1.5
Germany $44.3 billion 1.14 $41.72 billion 1.09
Hungary $1.03 billion 0.79 $0.79 billion 0.75
Italy $17.3 billion 1.2 $16.3 billion null
Latvia $252 million 0.9 $283 million 1
Lithuania $359 million 0.78 $474 million 1.11
Netherlands $8.7 billion 1 $9 billion null
Norway $5.8 billion 1.58 $6.8 billion 1.6
Poland $10.4 billion 1.9 $10.4 billion 1.95
Romania $2 billion 1.4 Not yet announced 1.7
UK $55 billion 2.07 $54 billion 1.88
US $582.4 billion 3.6 $585 billion 3.1
Turkey Not known
Albania “
Czech Rep “
Denmark “
Greece “
Iceland “
Luxembourg “
Poland “
Slovakia “
Slovenia “
Portugal “
Spain “
Belgium “
Unfortunately the US funding of Nato has it wrapped around its finger. It funds between one-fifth and one-quarter of Nato’s budget.
The civil budget for 2015 is € 200 million. The civil budget provides funds for personnel expenses, operating costs, and capital and programme expenditure of the International Staff at NATO Headquarters.
The military budget for 2015 is €1.2 billion. This budget covers the operating and maintenance costs of the NATO Command Structure. It is composed of over 50 separate budgets, which are financed with contributions from Allies’ national defence budgets (in most countries) according to agreed cost-shares.
While there is stagnation in military expenditure from the larger military powers in NATO — the UK, France, Germany, and Canada — that has led to several smaller NATO states to increase their funding. Not coincidentally, some of them would be front line states in a future military conflict between Russia and the NATO alliance.
NATO was founded to promote democratic values and encourage cooperation on defense and security issues. What started as a good idea that was backed by powerful nations, now is not the case.
With Russia involvement in Syria not to mention the Ukraine the real question is: Do we need what I see as a duplication Organisation that appears determined, for the first time in its history, to intervene beyond its borders.
Operational partnerships, such as the one Nato established with Australia in Afghanistan, are an additional source of personnel and resources for Nato-led operations.
Even militarily it does not make sense to have an European Union relining on an Organisation that has as its linchpin of the alliance Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty, which states that “an armed attack against one or more of them [NATO members] in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all” and that all members are obliged to assist the state(s) under attack.
Article 5 has been invoked only once in NATO’s history, after the terrorist attacks against the US homeland on September 11, 2001.
It says it committed to the peaceful resolution of disputes.
NATO provides security to the world because of their rules and regulations that prevent war. Considering those FACTS it is foolish to say that NATO is not relevant.
No wars have taken place in any country that is part of NATO after they joined.
It is supposed to act under resolutions that are carried out under Article 5 of the Washington Treaty – NATO’s founding treaty – or under a UN mandate, alone or in cooperation with other countries and international organizations.
So tell me what irresolution was passed about ring fencing Russia with rockets.
NATO’s incessant push to the east is an attempt to reinstate a Berlin Wall that spans the entire western border of Russia. This has no place in a peaceful world.
It’s no wonder that Russia is worries about that, as well as the new identity and tasks that NATO has awarded itself.
Russia opposes expansion mainly because she fears that the West is trying to isolate her in the corner of Europe, deprive her of her privileged relationship with her former satellites and undermine her national interests. This is why she is so fiercely opposing enlargement to include the Baltic States and Ukraine. NATO is viewed by Russia as nothing more than the club wielded by capitalist sharks.
Without a unified military force Europe (an area of the world that for many centuries was the most warlike on the globe) relies on the Nato. The dissolution of which without a replacement would leave the Continent without the existence of a military option to ensure stability within in its borders.
There is one thing for sure in light of NATO’s character as a political forum of democratic nations, expansion to incorporate those states that had authoritatively been excluded from it and pushed into the arms of the Soviet Union seems a logical consequence.
It can no longer be seen merely as a military Alliance with a defensive character, but as a political one as well, gathering the nations that share common democratic values and respect for human rights and the rule of law. However this is a new world where NATO seems confrontational and counter productive with limited capability to undertake even crisis management operations.
One of the major problems with the preceding league of nations, was the lack of ‘teeth’.
Instead of focusing on the rapidly declining interstate conflicts (as a result of interdependence), maybe Nato should be focusing more on threats such as cyber warfare, terrorism, and piracy, and vetting refugees.
It would be impossible to think a couple of decades ago that the Americans and the Russians might sit at the same table and plan common military operations.
You would think that Nato which is deeply involved in the Syrian war and the United Nations would be encouraging such a move to avoid Turkey being dragged into the War.
Instead Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato secretary-general, said that the organisation intended to “send a clear message” to show that the world’s most powerful military alliance was prepared to act in defence of its citizens. “Nato will defend you, Nato is on the ground, Nato is ready,” he said.
Nato says it is prepared to send troops to Turkey to defend its ally after violations of Turkish airspace by Russian jets,
Then all hell breaks loose as if this was the ultimate pretext for a NATO-Russia war.
But wait; NATO is actually too busy to go to war. The priority, until at least November, is the epic Trident Juncture 2015; 36,000 troops from 30 states, more than 60 warships, around 200 aircraft, all are seriously practicing how to defend from the proverbial “The Russians are Coming!”
Russia’s spectacular entry into the war theater threw all these elaborate plans into disarray.
Surely, there are differences between the US and Russia, but these can be overcome step by step with constructive dialogue and mutual understanding. They are no longer afraid of each other. They do have their differences, as it is natural that they should.
As events in the Ukraine, Syria and now Turkey are tragically demonstrating Nato could become a source of potential danger for the entire world.
The World has enough problems this is not a time for Nato saber-rattling.
Finally it is otter stupidity to think that if a nuclear device designed to emit an EMP (Electro Magnetic Pulse) were detonated about 300 miles over EUROPE ( most of Europe as we now know it would be gone) that Nato or the USA would do anything other than issue wet wipes.
Also one may wonder why Turkey — a country that is about 2,000 miles to the east of the Atlantic Ocean — finds itself in an entity called the “North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The answer is the roots of accepting non-North Atlantic nations into NATO, mainly Greece and Turkey lies at the heart of the Truman Doctrine — extending military and economic aid to states vulnerable to Soviet threat / expansion. NATO membership should guarantee, in essence, that Turkey would not become a Soviet ally.
Moving forward means dissolving what does not work and finding what will work.
The next two decades will make or break humanity.
Perhaps Nato should stand down as a military force and take up the mantel of fighting Climate Change.
Finally how can we have an ordered world where Russia and China are excluded from the police force?
If Nato is to be relevant it could start by building a world environmental police force.
What began as another Arab Spring uprising against an autocratic ruler has mushroomed into a brutal proxy war that has drawn in regional and world powers.
How’s this all going to end?
No one knows, really. While plenty of countries (including Germany, the U.K., Iran, Russia, France and the U.S.) have tried to offer support to one side or the other to try to end the conflict, there’s been little success.
What ever happens this war is developing into a war that is going to have far reaching unseen effects not only on the Middle East but on the World. (Not to mention the balance of world power.)
So it important that we see it as such.
To the victor go the spoils:
That might be true for most other wars, but the Syrian conflict has proven to be far outside the established norms and conventions governing the conduct of battle . (That is if you are of the opinion that such things exist in a modern warfare.)
In Syria the spoils are going to whoever has a gun, and there are plenty of those about.
How did it all Start?
In March 2011 in the southern city of Deraa some teenagers painted revolutionary slogans on a school wall. THEY WERE ARRESTED AND TORTURED which lead to Pro-democracy protests which were fired on by security forces killing several demonstrators leading to more demonstrations triggering nationwide protests demanding President Assad’s resignation.
By July 2011, hundreds of thousands were taking to the streets across the country.
Violence escalated and the country descended into civil war as rebel brigades were formed to battle government forces for control of cities, towns and the countryside. Fighting reached the capital Damascus and second city of Aleppo in 2012.
Hundreds of people were killed in August 2013 after rockets filled with the nerve agent sarin were fired at several agricultural districts around Damascus. Western powers, outraged by the attack, said it could only have been carried out by Syria’s government.
The regime and its ally Russia blamed rebels.
Facing the prospect of US military intervention, President Assad agreed to the complete removal or destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal as part of a joint mission led by the UN and the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
The destruction of chemical agents and munitions was completed a year later.
By June 2013, the UN said 90,000 people had been killed in the conflict.
However, by August 2014 that figure had more than doubled to 191,000 – and continued to climb to 220,000 by March 2015, according to activists and the UN. Despite the operation, the OPCW has since documented the use of toxic chemicals, such as chlorine and ammonia, by the government in attacks on rebel-held northern villages between April and July 2014 that resulted in the deaths of at least 13 people.
The conflict has now acquired sectarian overtones, pitching the country’s Sunni majority against the president’s Shia Alawite sect, and drawn in neighboring countries and world powers.
The rise of the jihadist groups, including Islamic State, has added a further dimension.
Both sides of the conflict have committed war crimes – including murder, torture, rape and enforced disappearances.
The so-called Islamic State has also been accused by the UN of waging a campaign of terror in northern and eastern Syria.
It has inflicted severe punishments on those who transgress or refuse to accept its rule, including hundreds of public executions and amputations. Its fighters have also carried out mass killings of rival armed groups, members of the security forces and religious minorities, and beheaded hostages, including several Westerners.
Almost 4 million people have fled Syria since the start of the conflict, most of them women and children.
It is one of the largest refugee exodus in recent history.
Neighboring countries have borne the brunt of the refugee crisis, with Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey struggling to accommodate the flood of new arrivals.
A further 7.6 million Syrians have been internally displaced within the country, bringing the total number forced to flee their homes to more than 11 million – half the country’s pre-crisis population.
Overall, an estimated 12.2 million are in need of humanitarian assistance inside Syria, including 5.6 million children, the UN says.
In December 2014, the UN launched an appeal for $8.4bn (£5.6bn) to provide help to 18 million Syrians, after only securing about half the funding it asked for in 2014.
Four in every five Syrians were now living in poverty – 30% of them in abject poverty. Syria’s education, health and social welfare systems are also in a state of collapse.
The armed rebellion has evolved significantly since its inception. Secular moderates are now outnumbered by Islamists and jihadists, whose brutal tactics have caused widespread concern and triggered rebel infighting.
Capitalising on the chaos in the region, IS or ISIS or ISIL – the extremist group that grew out of al-Qaeda in Iraq – has taken control of huge swathes of territory across northern and eastern Syria, as well as neighboring Iraq.
Its many foreign fighters in Syria are now involved in a “war within a war”, battling rebels and jihadists from the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front, who object to their tactics, as well as Kurdish and government forces.
In September 2014, a US-led coalition launched air strikes inside Syria in an effort to “degrade and ultimately destroy” IS, ultimately helping the Kurds repel a major assault on the northern town of Kobane. However, the coalition has little influence on the ground in Syria and its primacy is rejected by other groups, leaving the country without a convincing alternative to the Assad government.
In January 2014, the US, Russia and UN convened a conference in Switzerland to implement the 2012 Geneva Communique, an internationally-backed agreement that called for the establishment of a transitional governing body in Syria formed on the basis of mutual consent. The talks, which became known as Geneva II, broke down in February after only two rounds.
So who is backing who?
Iran and Russia have propped up the Alawite-led government of President Assad and gradually increased their support, providing it with an edge that has helped it make significant gains against the rebels. The government has also enjoyed the support of Lebanon’s Shia Islamist Hezbollah movement, whose fighters have provided important battlefield support since 2013.
The Sunni-dominated opposition has, meanwhile, attracted varying degrees of support from its main backers – Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Arab states along with the US, UK and France. However, the rise of hard-line Islamist rebels and the arrival of jihadists from across the world has led to a marked cooling of international and regional backing.
The US is now supposed to be arming a 5,000-strong force of “moderate” rebels to take the fight to IS on the ground in Syria, and its aircraft provide significant support to Kurdish militia seeking to defend three autonomous enclaves in the country’s north.
September 2015 Russia openly (in the United Nations) declares its supports for President Assad under the umbrella of tackling ISIS. On 30 September, Russia’s parliament approved a request by President Vladimir Putin to launch air strikes in Syria. Within hours, the country’s first intervention in the Middle East in decades began. The following day, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov clarified that the air campaign was targeting “all terrorists” in Syria, and not just IS.
But the US and its allies noted that the strikes took place where IS had little or no presence. They instead appeared to be aimed at rebels backed by Gulf Arab and Western states who are advancing on Latakia province – the coastal heartland of Mr Assad’s Alawite sect. At least one group that has been armed and trained by the CIA was hit. Says the Americans.
Russia has made clear that its intervention was approved by Mr Assad, who sent a letter to Mr Putin requesting military assistance. “By supporting Assad and seemingly taking on everyone who is fighting Assad, you’re taking on the whole rest of the country of Syria.”
The Russian president is one of Mr Assad’s most important international backers.
Ties between their countries go back four decades and the Syrian port of Tartous is the location of the last Russian naval base in the Middle East.
Russia has blocked several resolutions critical of Mr Assad at the UN Security Council and supplied weapons to the Syrian military, saying it is violating no international laws.
We are now facing new kind of mentality that rules those people doing the fighting in Syria, a complete disregard for the lives and property of ordinary civilians. This goes for both sides in the war.
The fortunes of some are fast accumulating, while the rest of the nation languishes in dreary poverty and destitution, waiting for an end to the greed and hatred that fuels this seemingly never-ending nightmare.
There’s also tons of conflict among European countries about what their responsibilities are and whether anything could’ve been done to prevent the Civil War and the massive loss of life. There are understandable hesitations, strategic rivalries and unwillingness to take on financial commitment, making it impossible to pursue potential solutions.
There is one thing for sure we would be better off legalizing the migration process in order to leave the slave traders of the 21st century empty-handed.
Why?, because there is growing major culture of fear and suspicion when it comes to Muslim refugees.
The struggle in Syria could be ended in one way only.
And that is when the US and Russia with Europe countries agree and support one man to take Bashar Alassad place.
But unfortunately this won’t happen because the U.S government believes that he is the best person to keep Israel safe from Syria. While Russia (which has been crippled by sanctions due to Ukraine ) see it as an opportunity to unshackle itself for isolation and a opportunity to boost its economy.
This was once just a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis in the wider Arab world, especially in Syria and Iraq. Now it is turning into a free for all. The consequences of which will be only seen by those left alive.
Meanwhile, the failure to understand the ‘Arab Spring’ for what it was facilitated the destruction of Syria’s delicate balance such that the Islamic State represents the first real challenge to the Middle East which emerged from the Sykes-Picot Agreement of 1916, under which the British and French empires secretly agreed to divide the Middle East domains of the dying Ottoman Empire between them.
As for the military route, proposed by several Conservative political leaders, masking as armchair generals, air raids are clearly insufficient yet no government wants to send ground troops.
Syria could remain at war for years.
There remains one more danger to the Free World ( for lack of a better noun) and that is the pressing of a nuclear button which will resolve the war leaving nothing to fight about.
Right I am no military general or foreign policy guru but Russia recent backing of Assad to tackle extremists and terrorists and the so-called Islamic State militants ( IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) is a recipe for a war that is going to expand and last for some considerable time.However when you look on at the inability of the free world to resolve the Middle East problems now it is not an option to turn our backs on Mr Putin latest offer because there has being a cultural shift in the Middle East sparked by West and Smart phones.
There is no doubt that Mr Putin geo-political announcements at the United Nations emphasizes the problems of a joint international coalition to confront IS. ( The reporting of which by RT.Com keeps crashing on Flip Board Cover Stories. I wonder why? http://on.rt.com/6sg4 )
Perhaps his offer should be TAKEN SERIOUSLY.
”There is a belief that “creative destruction and chaos” in the Middle East are beneficial assets to reshaping the Middle East, creating the “New Middle East,” and furthering the Anglo-American road map in the Middle East and Central Asia:
There is no denying that now more than ever we are achieved this with a new road map by Mr Putin.
The United Nations as usual is a lame duck, (with 7.5 million children displaced and over 16 million people homes and livelihoods destroyed) all it can do is pass resolution’s that are vetoed.
WE NEED TO SCRAP THE UN TO BE REPLACED it with A NEW PROTECTION WORLD ORGANISATION THAT REPRESENTS THE WORLD – FULLY FINANCED. ( SEE PREVIOUS POSTS)
While the two world powers will now be at logger heads and the small players like France and the UK play Ludo with the situation. ISIS continues to extend the group’s self-styled caliphate, which now stretches from Turkey’s border with Syria to south of Fallujah in Iraq, an area roughly the size of Indiana.
For nearly 70 years, Lebanon was a proxy battleground for the conflict between Israel and Palestine.
As Paul Rodriguez said ” Sometimes I think war is God’s way of teaching us geography.”
If you ask yourself how did it all get into such a hell hole you can come up with reasons that cover every aspect of Power, Greed, Religion, History, Oil,etc.
The answer however to a great part is a lot more simple.
NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS. Climate change and the issue of whether there will be enough water for a future global population double its present size is controversial and the answer to this question is of particular importance to the people’s and political leaders of the Middle East and North Africa.
It requires an inhuman level of political courage for a political leader of any country which for five thousand years has enjoyed water security to announce that water resources are no longer adequate.
To make the announcement would be political suicide.
SO BACK TO TODAY.
It has been nearly impossible for two U.S. presidents — Bush, a conservative evangelical; and Obama, a progressive liberal — to address the plight of Christians explicitly for fear of appearing to play into the crusader and ‘‘clash of civilizations’’ narratives the West is accused of embracing.
The above does not apply to Mr Putin, but there are limits to what the international community and Russia can do.’’
For instance the fate of Christians in the Middle East isn’t simply a matter of religion; it is also integral to what kinds of societies will flourish as the region’s map fractures.
No matter what solution’s presents itself there will be a requirement for a buffer between Sunni and Shia.
Across the region, that conflict is now secondary to the shifting tectonic plates of the Sunni-Shia divide, which threatens terrible bloodshed. Everyone has seen the ISIS forced conversions, crucifixions and beheadings that is displacing millions.
Even if ISIS is defeated, the fate of religious minorities in Syria and Iraq remains bleak because Iraq is devolving into three regions — Sunnis, Shia and Kurds — as it is obvious that there will be a need for a fourth region for minorities. Iraq is a forced marriage between Sunni, Shia, Kurds and Christians, and it has failed with the resulting wasted lives lost.
The term “New Middle East” was introduced to the world in June 2006 in Tel Aviv by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
International borders are never completely just. But the degree of injustice they inflict upon those whom frontiers force together or separate makes an enormous difference — often the difference between freedom and oppression, tolerance and atrocity, the rule of law and terrorism, or even peace and war.
Our continuing failure to candidly depict the roots of the problems and conflicts in the contemporary Middle East has now being exposed by Mr Putin – POINTING A FINGER AT THE WEST FAILURE AND SECRETIVE TRADE DEALS.
His good news is complicated and indigestible as well as unsensational – throwing stones in a glass house is never a good idea.
The truth is that the Middle East has been conditioned by outside forces into a powder keg that is ready to explode with the right trigger, possibly the launching of Anglo-American and/or Israeli air raids against Iran and Syria. A wider war in the Middle East could result in redrawn borders that are strategically advantageous to Anglo-American interests and Israel.
We must think creatively about how to act on Mr Putin address to the United Nations.
What the media does not acknowledge or inform us about is the fact that almost all major conflicts afflicting the Middle East are the consequence of overlapping Anglo-American-Israeli agendas.
Many of the other problems affecting the contemporary Middle East are the result of the deliberate aggravation of pre-existing regional tensions.
Among the problems in the contemporary Middle East is the lack of genuine democracy which U.S. and British foreign policy has actually been deliberately obstructing.
The United States has deliberately blocked or displaced genuine democratic movements in the Middle East from Iran in 1953 (where a U.S./U.K. sponsored coup was staged against the democratic government of Prime Minister Mossadegh) to Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, the Arab Sheikdoms, and Jordan where the Anglo-American alliance supports military control, absolutists, and dictators in one form or another. The latest example of this is Palestine.
Attempts at intentionally creating animosity between the different ethno-cultural and religious groups of the Middle East have been systematic.
Even more ominous, many Middle Eastern governments, such as that of Saudi Arabia, are assisting Washington in fomenting divisions between Middle Eastern populations. The ultimate objective is to weaken the resistance movement against foreign occupation through a “divide and conquer strategy” which serves Anglo-American and Israeli interests in the broader region.
Where might one find a useful analysis of what is happening today in the market democracies of the West?
How about this: “The executive of the modern State is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the bourgeoisie.” Or this: “Modern bourgeois society…is like the sorcerer, who is no longer able to control the power of the nether world which he has called up by his spells.” Or this: “The productive forces no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property: on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions…[and] they bring disorder into the whole of bourgeois society, endanger the existence of bourgeois property.”
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
The celebrated bearded communists had argued that capitalism would reduce all of society to only two classes: the prosperous bourgeoisie, who owned the capital, and the impoverished proletariat, who contributed their labor. Modern industrial production would inevitably depress the living standards of the proletariat, they believed, but also, in the end, increase their power. Having created a form of slavery, capitalism would be overthrown by its slaves. The proletarian masses would become the dictators.
This did not happen.
But now the West see itself as prisoners of the system that they helped to create.
I am no alarmist, and no one should worry that I have become a late convert to Marxism. Marx’s prescriptions were mostly wrong, and his spirit was intolerant and coercive. He did not understand markets or respect political institutions, and he thought liberty was a sham.
However, Sectarian division, ethnic tension and internal violence have been traditionally exploited by the United States and Britain in various parts of the globe including Africa, Latin America, the Balkans, and the Middle East. Iraq is just one of many examples of the Anglo-American strategy of “divide and conquer.” Other examples are Rwanda, Yugoslavia, the Caucasus, and Afghanistan.
Besides believing that there is “cultural stagnation” in the Middle East Western-style “Democracy” has been a requirement only for those Middle Eastern states which do not conform to Washington’s political demands.
Invariably, it constitutes a pretext for confrontation. Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Jordan are examples of undemocratic states that the United States has no problems with because they are firmly alligned within the Anglo-American orbit or sphere.
Also we need to support Iran as a bulwark against Sunni extremism.
Additionally,
Turkey and Iran, the two most powerful states of the “Eurasian Balkans,” located on its southern tier, are “potentially vulnerable to internal ethnic conflicts [balkanization],” and that, “If either or both of them were to be destabilized, the internal problems of the region would become unmanageable.
In the end it all comes down who is willing to receive body bags.
Rest assured that the striking images of body bags depict the physical residue of war and time. Yet even more horrific than the physical scars of the war is the sense of sorrow and loss, floating in their expressions like ghosts.
The other day I came across the term Fourth Generation Warfare. A term used by military thinkers to describe conflict at the end of the 20th century.
Now I am no General but my first reaction to the term was ” Fourth Generation – Kill everyone up to and including Great Grand Dad.”
The problem is that our traditional definition of “war” is outdated, and so is our imagination of what war means.
How many wars have you witnessed since World war Two.
So how many the easy answer might just be: too many.
I was lucky like most of us these days as I was not around for either of the World Wars.
Some time ago I wrote a post ” We watch as a civilization thousands of years old goes to rack and ruin Nov 2014.
With 20 million soldiers worldwide and every conceivable weapon it’s no wonder we have a world that is incapable of living in respect of each other.
Right now in 2015, it’s hard not to get desensitized to death and violence.
The Syrian war is now in its fifth year.
Anyway back to the term Fourth Generation Warfare.
This term is used to describe the current growing inferno that is currently wreaking havoc in Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen which will engulf the whole region and beyond and has the potential to push it over the threshold into a third world war.
What is needed is a concept which explains to blinkered military and political leaders why *they cannot win* unless they change what they are doing in *truly radical* ways. Why? Because what has changed is the near instantaneous nature of the cognitive and moral aspects of war, empowered through information technology.
What we are really seeing is that the increased “dispersion and democratization of technology, information, and finance” brought about by globalization has given terrorist groups greater mobility and access worldwide.
Isis ,Hamas and Hezbollah ( If you consider the latter two terrorist organisations) ,especially, have established themselves as organizations capable of addressing the everyday problems of their constituencies. They are integrating themselves into the social and political fabric of Muslim societies worldwide.
While we watch they are turning their constituencies into effective weapons by creating strong social, political, and religious ties with them; in short, they have become communal activists for their constituencies, which have, in turn, facilitated the construction and maintenance of substantial financial and logistical networks and safe houses. This support then aids in the regeneration of the terrorist groups.
We see that even in the so-called information age, the use of brute force remains an effective tactic in many parts of the world.
Terrorists, guerrillas, and similar actors generally aimed at eroding an opponent’s will to fight rather than destroying his means.
“Maybe those gangs of Islamist terrorists and Jihadists are doing a hell of a job destabilizing and fragmenting the Arab world. And surely the US/EU will continue to look from on high and make-believe they see no terrorism and hear no terrorism until the whole region is set for a greater Israel scenario.” To Quote (Hillary Clinton.) The next President more than likely of the USA.
No boots and uniforms on the ground has turn ISIS, contrary to Al Qaeda hoax, into the most dangerous international terrorist organization the world has ever come to witness.
If ISIS is allowed to grow bigger in the hope of fragmenting the Arab world and giving more space and influence for the Zionist entity then this whole thing will turn into an imminent world menace.
Unfortunately or perhaps fortuitously there is no stomach in the west to tackle ISIS head on. That option has long gone.
The main target behind ISIS is to ignite a Shiite/Sunni inferno that is drag Saudi Arabia and Iran into a dreadful conflict that will destabilize and weaken both states.
ISIS is already issuing passports and promotional publications for the new Caliphate and is now presenting itself as an ideologically a superior alternative to al-Qaida.
All three groups – Jabhat al-Nusra and Zawahiri’s al-Qaida on the one hand, and Isis on the other – share the same goals: the creation of an Islamic state in Syria (and Iraq.) Iraq is already a country of two distinct halves.
Everybody now seems to have some kind of involvement in this fight, which may have killed more than 200,000 people, and no one has a realistic idea of how to end it or for that matter to navigate the chaotic seeming tempest of our modern world.
One way other the other history never begins with a sudden event.
No matter what terminology we use ISIS definitely has its origins in the USA invasion of Iraq after 9/11. It is now shaped by the nature of conflict which is taking on an increasingly sectarian characteristic. As a Jihadist organization claiming to represent the true Islamic Khilafat, its project( for the lack of a better word) will not stop at the current borders and it will continue seeking to expand its territory. Building its own state and consolidating its power in the areas it manages to control.
So where do we stand to-day?
As the attention of the world focused on Ukraine and Gaza, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (Isis) captured a third of Syria in addition to the quarter of Iraq it had seized in June.
The frontiers of the new Caliphate declared by Isis on 29 June are expanding by the day and now cover an area larger than Great Britain and inhabited by at least six million people, a population larger than that of Denmark, Finland or Ireland.
It is believed to have some 30,000 fighters in its ranks, with about 10% of them from the West. ( 3,000 Westerners)
In a few weeks of fighting in Syria Isis established itself as the dominant force in the Syrian opposition, routing the official al-Qaida affiliate, Jabhat al-Nusra, in the oil-rich province of Deir Ezzor and executing its local commander as he tried to flee.
In northern Syria some five thousand Isis fighters are using tanks and artillery captured from the Iraqi army in Mosul to besiege half a million Kurds in their enclave at Kobani on the Turkish border.
In central Syria, near Palmyra, Isis fought the Syrian army as it overran the al-Shaer gas field, one of the largest in the country, in a surprise assault that left an estimated three hundred soldiers and civilians dead. Repeated government counter-attacks finally retook the gas field but Isis still controls most of Syria’s oil and gas production.
Branches of ISIS have sprung up in Egypt and Libya, and in March 2015, the Nigerian-based Islamist sect Boko Haram pledged allegiance to ISIS.
ISIS is definitely not Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda distanced itself from ISIS as it grew increasingly violent and intolerant, even of Muslims.
It has no boundaries in regard to its savagery.
This inferno will not be controllable, and nobody will be immune from it, most of all the Jewish state of Israel (maybe only then the US/EU will regain some of their lost senses and start to see and hear the evil of their own doing.)
Our reluctance to act promptly and decisively with the present and imminent danger of ISIS might seems contradictory to their holy Gospel of war on terrorism, but a closer look will reveal the perfect harmony of the western passive stand with their newly adopted trend of 4th generation asymmetrical warfare.
What is the beauty of this new 4th generation warfare?
In brief, the theory holds that warfare has evolved through four generations:
1) The use of massed manpower, 2) firepower, 3) maneuver, and now 4) An evolved form of insurgency that employs all available networks—political, economic, social, military—to convince an opponent’s decision makers that their strategic goals are either unachievable or too costly.
This is laughable : The Caliphate may be poor and isolated but its oil wells and control of crucial roads provide a steady income in addition to the plunder of war.
When it comes to ISIS is a different story; it’s an obviously more organized, highly militarily trained to use US sophisticated weaponry and attracting evermore young recruits from the west. Who by the way through the Media are its biggest propaganda arm with on average 25 articles per day.
The group uses social media outlets such as Twitter, Whats App, and Facebook to promise new recruits material rewards, such as free housing and a steady salary.
Egypt
The most virulent militant organization in Egypt, pledged allegiance to ISIS.
Libya
At least three militant groups, one in each of Libya’s three regions, pledged allegiance to ISIS.
The group has also reportedly received funding from wealthy individuals in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Turkey, and Qatar and then used the money to buy arms on the black market. These nations support ISIS because both consider Iran and Syria a threat, share anti-Shiite sentiment, and want to protect fellow Sunnis from violence sanctioned by Assad and Maliki.
Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Qatar have passed legislation banning such aid, but the governments have done little to enforce the laws.
As we are unwilling to cut the head of the serpent we can only hope that ISIS might have its own internal disagreements about the future. (A slow burn, rather than complete eradication, may be the best possible outcome).
First, a dispute with local populations and the more indigenous groups that have their distinct concerns and priorities other than the strict interpretation of Sharia law, and this dispute is already in place in Syria and some parts of Iraq.
The second. A conflict within the organization between its Iraqi wing that might prioritize the “sectarian conflict” with Shias and issues related to communal identity, and the global wing that adopts the ideology of jihad and looks beyond Iraq.
So we are left with: Why do it yourself when your own enemies (infiltrated by covert operatives) could do it, even better, and change their own sovereign country into a failed state ready to be controlled and subjugated.
The price we might pay in a future conflict could be high indeed.
Life is not a solo act. It’s a huge collaboration.
So where does 4th Generation War come into the picture. War is war no matter what term you give.
It is a loose collection of ideas that does not hold up to close scrutiny.
4GW has reinvented itself several times, taking advantage of the latest developments in technology or tactics, and whatever ideas or theories happened to be in vogue is not working.
Victory in 4GW warfare is won in the moral sphere. The aim of 4GW is to destroy the moral bonds that allows the organic whole to exist — cohesion.
There does not seem to be anything Moral about ISIS or Drones.
Through the haze of horror and grief we all witness this war is becoming internationalized and we are running out of time to do anything about it.
Mr Bush wanted to leave Iraq divided up into three separate states along sectarian lines, Sunni, Shia, and Kurdish. He got his wish.
Russia not only distributes the Kalashnikov rifles all over the world, but also licensed its production in over 30 other countries, including China, Israel, India, Egypt and Nigeria.
Most of us will never engage in an act of extreme brutality.
This was once just a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis in the wider Arab world, especially in Syria and Iraq. Now it is turning into a free for all. The consequences of which will be only seen by those left alive.
However when you look on at the inability of the free world to resolve the Middle East problems now it is not an option to turn our backs on Mr Putin latest offer because there has being a cultural shift in the Middle East sparked by West and Smart phones.
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