Minor factual correction: The students were protesting (white people said “rioting”) because the minority white government had decided that they suddenly would have to study not in English but in Afrikaans, a form of Dutch
From wiki: Black high school students in Soweto protested against the Afrikaans Medium Decree of 1974, which forced all black schools to use Afrikaans and English in a 50–50 mix as languages of instruction
The U.S. is not some omnipotent god ...
I said "actively trying", which does not imply omnipotence obviously.
do you think we can control Saudi Arabia’s policy?
The US may not control the Saudis but there is an incestuous relationship.
Saudi Arabia is the US "biggest ally" in the middle east, and Saudi Arabia has the 4th largest military budget and US and Europe supplies most of its weapons.
Because direct military action in Syria is problematic the CIA with collaboration from allies like Turkey, Jordan and Saudi Arabia has been training and supplying Syrian rebels for a few years now. (You probably know about the CIA and Saudi collaboration in Afghanistan during the 1980s')
But the notion that the U.S. actively preferred fundamentalists to Assad is unsupportable.
Probably and such a policy does not make any sense to me.
However, the active policy to overthrow the secular Syrian regime while making use of allies like Saudi Arabia to support the rebels may very well put fundamentalists in power.
Any objective middle eastern expert would have known that such an outcome is highly probable.
The risks in destabilizing Syria\Lebanon was and is enormousness.
Neither Iran nor ISIS are interested to harm USA
So it follows that because they are not a US threat you can just use them as you wish, does not matter that countries and people (non-americans) are destroyed it the process?
Both Iran and ISIS want to subjugate the locals and obtain resources
Could this apply to countries like the US, Russia and China as well?
I thought that you, of all people, understood that…Otherwise, a huge fan.
My sentiments exactly.
I wonder if all Americans including Mr Cole suffers from the american exceptionalism meme.
I have watched some bloggingheads conversations by very well educated and informed professionals and as a
non-american I sometimes shake my head in astonishment that they just assume that america is a loving benevolent head master and all its actions are well intended.
Dear Mr Cole.
I enjoy your blog and respect your opinion but I do not think you address the fundamentals of this conflict.
In Syria, the US is attempting to undermine the Baath government of Bashar al-Assad, a regime guilty of crimes against humanity.
"Undermine" is a bit of an understatement.
The US has been actively trying to overthrow the Syrian regime by allowing Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to support Sunni radicals.
Anyone with half a brain could have predicted that this would destabilize Iraq further, empower Sunni radicals and risk a serious regional and sectarian war that might involve both Saudi Arabia and Iran.
We know from history that the State department does not care about human rights violations and the US has supported many dictatorships in the past and has itself killed millions of civilians from Vietnam to Iraq.
Therefore I do not think the Syrian regimes human rights violations has much relevance to understand/explain the US policy.
(And it does not make any sense to me)
The 9/11 attack and other bombings in Europe have been perpetrated by radical Sunnis, not by Baathists or Shia muslims.
Thus my question is:
Why did the US decide to overthrow secular (Baath) regimes like Iraq and Syria while siding with Sunni fundamentalist regimes like Saudi Arabia that has been responsible for supporting radical sunni groups and terrorists for more than a decade operating in countries from Libya, Yemen to Syria and Iran.
Another factor (besides what you have mentioned) will be that the New York Times readers are more intelligent than Fox News viewers and will thus be more knowledgeable and discerning.
That will of course not be because the New York Times somehow increase the intelligence of their readers!
Less intelligent/sophisticated people are naturally drawn to media that take advantage of that and Fox News caters for its viewers sensibilities.
Besides traditional media like Fox News you have today thousands of websites that targets specific groups of people which will increase peoples insular beliefs and world view.
To solve the problem you will need to legislate against news media of a sub-par or exploitative nature but doing so is of course extremely dangerous.
It looks like Americans are stuck with people who think that people like Herman Cain are presidential material and media who play along.
Minor factual correction:
The students were protesting (white people said “rioting”) because the minority white government had decided that they suddenly would have to study not in English but in Afrikaans, a form of Dutch
From wiki:
Black high school students in Soweto protested against the Afrikaans Medium Decree of 1974, which forced all black schools to use Afrikaans and English in a 50–50 mix as languages of instruction
Regards
Eric
The U.S. is not some omnipotent god ...
I said "actively trying", which does not imply omnipotence obviously.
do you think we can control Saudi Arabia’s policy?
The US may not control the Saudis but there is an incestuous relationship.
Saudi Arabia is the US "biggest ally" in the middle east, and Saudi Arabia has the 4th largest military budget and US and Europe supplies most of its weapons.
Because direct military action in Syria is problematic the CIA with collaboration from allies like Turkey, Jordan and Saudi Arabia has been training and supplying Syrian rebels for a few years now. (You probably know about the CIA and Saudi collaboration in Afghanistan during the 1980s')
But the notion that the U.S. actively preferred fundamentalists to Assad is unsupportable.
Probably and such a policy does not make any sense to me.
However, the active policy to overthrow the secular Syrian regime while making use of allies like Saudi Arabia to support the rebels may very well put fundamentalists in power.
Any objective middle eastern expert would have known that such an outcome is highly probable.
The risks in destabilizing Syria\Lebanon was and is enormousness.
Neither Iran nor ISIS are interested to harm USA
So it follows that because they are not a US threat you can just use them as you wish, does not matter that countries and people (non-americans) are destroyed it the process?
Both Iran and ISIS want to subjugate the locals and obtain resources
Could this apply to countries like the US, Russia and China as well?
I thought that you, of all people, understood that…Otherwise, a huge fan.
My sentiments exactly.
I wonder if all Americans including Mr Cole suffers from the american exceptionalism meme.
I have watched some bloggingheads conversations by very well educated and informed professionals and as a
non-american I sometimes shake my head in astonishment that they just assume that america is a loving benevolent head master and all its actions are well intended.
Dear Mr Cole.
I enjoy your blog and respect your opinion but I do not think you address the fundamentals of this conflict.
In Syria, the US is attempting to undermine the Baath government of Bashar al-Assad, a regime guilty of crimes against humanity.
"Undermine" is a bit of an understatement.
The US has been actively trying to overthrow the Syrian regime by allowing Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey to support Sunni radicals.
Anyone with half a brain could have predicted that this would destabilize Iraq further, empower Sunni radicals and risk a serious regional and sectarian war that might involve both Saudi Arabia and Iran.
We know from history that the State department does not care about human rights violations and the US has supported many dictatorships in the past and has itself killed millions of civilians from Vietnam to Iraq.
Therefore I do not think the Syrian regimes human rights violations has much relevance to understand/explain the US policy.
(And it does not make any sense to me)
The 9/11 attack and other bombings in Europe have been perpetrated by radical Sunnis, not by Baathists or Shia muslims.
Thus my question is:
Why did the US decide to overthrow secular (Baath) regimes like Iraq and Syria while siding with Sunni fundamentalist regimes like Saudi Arabia that has been responsible for supporting radical sunni groups and terrorists for more than a decade operating in countries from Libya, Yemen to Syria and Iran.
Another factor (besides what you have mentioned) will be that the New York Times readers are more intelligent than Fox News viewers and will thus be more knowledgeable and discerning.
That will of course not be because the New York Times somehow increase the intelligence of their readers!
Less intelligent/sophisticated people are naturally drawn to media that take advantage of that and Fox News caters for its viewers sensibilities.
Besides traditional media like Fox News you have today thousands of websites that targets specific groups of people which will increase peoples insular beliefs and world view.
To solve the problem you will need to legislate against news media of a sub-par or exploitative nature but doing so is of course extremely dangerous.
It looks like Americans are stuck with people who think that people like Herman Cain are presidential material and media who play along.