Related sifts

Iraq is in chaos, with sectarian violence, any force increase will only increase the exposure of US forces to enemy action.
Iraq - The Hidden Story

Russia has been conducting it's own form of energy supply assurances by holding Chechnya under the banner of fight the war on Terror. Which gives them the carte blanche on action as long as they give the Americans the same at the moment.
Dispatches - The Dirty War in Chechnya

The reason the American Energy companies, Oil lobby groups and their contacts (Cheney) in the US goverment would want to flood the market with cheap Iraqi oil is because they are afraid of recent steps in Venezuela, discussions in OPEC towards putting crude oil off the US dollar due to it's military incursions and foreign policy actions. Which would threaten the US current account which relied on the printing of US dollars for oil trade to stabilize the debt. China has the largest US reserves in the world, the US owes them billions. We have become complicit in supporting a communist regime that still oppresses it's population. Even large corporations such as Google that *ahem DO NO EVIL are involved in the Chinese economy.

The Chinese Communist goverment of course finds this a perfect position, they have the US politically by the pursue because at any moment they can pressure OPEC to stay on the US dollar or not, since they are quickly foreshadowing the US in terms of energy usage. If however OPEC would switch to the Euro if say the US continues on it's war path, the US economy will crash rapidly far worse then the great depression.

If we continue to push for war and lack of diplomatic action our position only gets worse, if albeit OK for the short-term. Leading us to only one path and one solution a war for energy supplies, until the lights go out... and there is no Oil left for fight for, and just when we need international cooperation it will be marred by previous hostile actions.
China has US by the purse.

The threat of energy depletion in the long run is more important issue then global warming, and in many ways totally related. As it is better to tackle it when Oil supplies are high and related R&D would be easier compared to when the lights go out and we're fighting wars of dwindling energy domination.
Robert Newman's - A History of Oil

RE: Related sifts, I mean seriously I understand Lara Logan. But Chris Rock + Senator Boxer?

Guys, this is not about a war on terror. This war was raging long before there were any such war on terror. In the 1830s the Autonomous Soviet Republic of Chechnya began seeking independence. You have to understand that Russia is Huge compared to a place the size of Chechnya. Ill equate it size to Russia is to Chechnya as Texas is to Rhode Island. I wrote a paper on Russian historical time line, and i found many disturbing things. Chechens actually won independence for a while in which the name of the capital changed to Djohar. I have a power point presentation on a bit of this. I could branch off into this subject, but my teacher insisted i did not.

You must understand the region, Northern Caucus Mountains, there is oil there but that doesnt matter. The truth of the matter is Chechnya wants independence, and Russia does not want to give it. Whether or not there is oil, gold, nothing there Russia does not what to give independence. These guys have been at it for so long they probably do not no the truth of why they are fighting, but they do no that the enemy they face now are the same ones that our United States Military is fighting in Iraq now. I saw a recent documentary, i believe on the sift, that showed majority of the Zealots they are fighting over there are tried and true Chechen warriors.

So we went from a soviet war, to a Russian federation war, to a joint war on terrorism. Either way there is nothing that we the Americans can do, because those poor civilians think that the Round Eyed, big nose English speaking American will come and help them, and yes some of us will. But no national movement can be done because we wage our own stupid war that mirrors the Chechen war, only ours is in Iraq. We could come help them yes, but as soon as we do the Zealots will begin to kill us the same way they are in Iraq.


The only way for any thing to happen is to for the masses to stand!- choggie.

Cheers on your response, your arguement certainly makes sense. However I believe that the US can ill afford another combat operation failure on the scale of Iraq, even a shift to plan B, not because of the implications in political shift but towards the American image over the last 60 years on the world stage. This would just deepen the US position in Iraq to one of long term occupation, already the military has plans for 11 or so permanent bases across the country with the Baghdad green zone being the heaviest developed.

It's interesting that you mentioned Battle of Algiers, yes the fact is the the French forces managed to stop the terrorist activities, however you fail to mention that through out that same time a political shift was taking place that ultimately countered the military successes achieved. This is the same thing that is happening right now at Congress, House and Senate.

The fact is yes, force deployment will end this situation because US forces are the best trained, the best equipped and are actively seeking new ways of countering the insurgency. But this is only the response now, there was no solid plan post capture of Baghdad because the administration in same ways probably hoped for a stand off with a limited Iraqi army not expecting the force collapse that occurred, a replay of Gulf War 1. There was no plan, well there was one but it got thrown out by the politicians.

However this would come at a severe political cost, the entire shift will change, the political process will paralyzed to use the same force responses if another event on 9/11 occurs because you will have those who will recall Iraq and Vietnam in the same breath, we cannot afford such a position with the American people who might not understand the wider implication of keeping a stabilized American presence in the Gulf.

I do not believe in pursuing a war that was put in motion by people who do not understand the local play out of the area. Bush Senior knew the country was too unstable to go into outright, his failure was not keeping up US force support in the same way that the Taliban goverment was toppled by support of the Northern Alliance.

In the mind set of the Arab people they draw parallels between this war and the Russian Chechen occupation that follows the exactly the same steps. There is a continuous force deployment by Russia, still peace and stability eludes them... they also occupy Chechnya because of it's importance to the oil supply.

http://www.videosift.com/video/Dispatches-The-Dirty-War-in-Chechnya

Great post!

One of the appalling consequences of this bullshit war on 'terror' is the way that Bush and Blair have given their full support to Putin to inflict terror and genocide on the people of Chechnya. The UN Charter, and Article 1 in both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), guarantee the right of self-determination to ALL peoples.

"This is how a war for independence can get called 'terrorist' activity" - just like in Palestine!

http://www.freechechnya.org/

Video about Chechen - Russian war

With the impending collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990, an independence movement, initially known as the Chechen National Congress was formed. This movement was ultimately opposed by Boris Yeltsin's Russian Federation, which argued:

(1) Chechnya had not been an independent entity within the Soviet Union – as the Baltic, Central Asian, and other Caucasian States had – but was a part of the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic and hence did not have a right under the Soviet constitution to secede;

(2) Other ethnic groups inside Russia, such as the Tatars, would join the Chechens and secede from the Russian Federation if they were granted that right; and

(3) Chechnya was at a major chokepoint in the oil-infrastructure of the country and hence would hurt the country's economy and control of oil resources.

In the ensuing decade, the territory has been locked in an ongoing struggle between various factions, usually fighting unconventionally and the forgoing position as held by the several successive Russian governments through the current administration. Various demographic factors including religious factors with charges and actions characteristic of Islamic terrorism have continued to keep the area in a near constant state of war.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chechnya#Russia.27s_recent_role_in_Chechnya

This film explores motivations, attitudes, and challenges faced by Brett Davis and Mary Ann Hopkins who have joined Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in order to assist people in such disaster-ridden areas as Darfur, Sri Lanka, Burundi, and DRC.

Médecins Sans Frontières is a secular humanitarian-aid non-governmental organization best known for its projects in war-torn regions and developing countries facing endemic disease.

Médecins Sans Frontières was created in 1971 by a small group of French doctors, as an aftermath of the Biafra secession. The organisation is known in most of the world by its French name or simply as MSF, but in the United States the name Doctors Without Borders is often used instead.

MSF is governed by an International Board of Directors located in Geneva, Switzerland, and organised into 20 sections. Annually, about 3,000 doctors, nurses, midwives and logisticians are recruited to run projects, but 1,000 permanently employed staff work to recruit volunteers and handle finances and media relations. Private donors provide about 80% of the organisation's funding, while governmental and corporate donations provide the rest, giving MSF an annual budget of approximately USD 400 million.

The organisation actively provides health care and medical training to populations in more than 70 countries, and frequently insists on political responsibility in conflict zones such as Chechnya and Kosovo. Only once in its history, during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, has the organisation called for a military intervention.

MSF received the 1999 Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of its members' continuous effort to provide medical care in acute crises, as well as raising international awareness of potential humanitarian disasters. Dr. James Orbinski, who was the president of the organisation at the time, accepted the prize on behalf of MSF. Prior to this, MSF also received the 1996 Seoul Peace Prize.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%A9decins_sans_Fronti%C3%A8res

"Serious miss allocation of military resources."-Saving Private Ryan Us military occupation force, i think not our military is trained to kill, let the UN occupy land. Wait!! We went to war with out the UN's consent feeding them false information about Weapons of Mass Destruction. That is why Colin Powell quit his post, if you still believe we need to be there then we should at least give the troops the proper equipment. Still riding in half ass vehicles (Marine First Recon rode in the vehicles with no doors, and plywood for armor, the same shit that the rangers had to deal with in Somalia) Ive heard horror stories about army occupation forces not getting their proper flak vests, most are buying theirs from soldier of fortune magazine advertisements.

On another note, any one here know about that 80% of the forces over there in Iraq are private military operators (Mercenaries) they are mostly called "Shadow." They are hired by our government, and most of them are so well equipped that our uniformed troops sometimes mistake them for the enemy.

The majority of the opposition that our occupying force is fighting are Chechen Muslim Zealots, and they are much better trained than the average middle eastern Zealot. They fought the soviets, and the Union of Russia since the 1800, the capital of Chechnya has changed its name at three times.

In short should have never been there, although Saddam is gone thats great, but get them out. Bring em home, next time just send an assassin because i don't see a difference here.

I hope that the next president has enough testicular fortitude to do stand up to "them" our government doesn't seem to be running its checks and balances very well. I cant see how many Americans would love to send their children, husbands, brothers, sisters, and best friends off to a desert to fight some one else's war. I hope that congress has enough gall to act before we get into a sh*t storm, this is way to late.