It's been discussed all over the place on this board. No one has changed their mind on it from whichever side they were initially. I'll see if I can dig up all the old posts about it but I'm not going to derail this thread with it. I'm sure all the posts can be found.
I just think that it was a deal that where we will never truly punish them (not militarily, I'm not about another war) for any breaks in it. Plus as much as people want to say that Iran is moderate, while their younger population is, the hard liners still run everything about that country.
So some Syrian rebels(Nour al-Din al-Zinki Movement) beheaded a 12 year old boy.... http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-36843990 SAA successfully defended the Mallah farms in Aleppo yet again Ivan Sidorenko @IvanSidorenko1 #Syria #Aleppo #NorthernAleppo Post from #Tiger_Forces Soldier #Mallah #Mallah_Farms 4 BMP, 1 T55, 1 72 seized 2day
And then came out and thought they could whitewash it by calling it an "individual mistake." Absolute savages. Yet these lovely neocons want to bomb Assad so we can let these democracy and human rights loving people in charge.
Follow BM-21 GRAD @bm21_grad I don't know who mined this road but they did a horrible job (Ithriya-Raqqa)
SAA has completely surrounded rebels in East Aleppo Ivan Sidorenko Retweeted GlobalEventMaps @GlobalEventMap 6h6 hours ago Northern Aleppo map: Handarat camp offensives repelled, E. Aleppo almost physically besieged and offensive ongoing.
Good episode of Arms Control Wonk talking about how much shit went wrong in the chemical weapons search in Iraq http://www.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/4961/screwing-up-in-iraq/
Syria's economy has collapsed by 75% since 2010 The collapse of the Syrian economy is worse than Germany after World War II http://qz.com/741432/the-collapse-of-the-syrian-economy-is-worse-than-germany-after-world-war-ii/ Spoiler Economics is rightly an afterthought compared to the scope of suffering that has accompanied the war in Syria. Some 250,000 dead are dead. Roughly 5 million people have fled the country. Some 6.5 million others have been displaced within Syria’s borders, according to the UN. But it’s also worth noting the almost utter economic devastation. The IMF estimates (pdf) more than 75% of the Syrian economy has been destroyed between 2010 and 2015. GDP fell from roughly $60 billion in 2010 to an estimated $14 billion in 2015. The IMF cautions that its estimates of Syria’s GDP are based on “very limited data and conjecture” due to the fact that Syria’s Central Bureau of Statistics stopped publishing most important data over the last few years. For the record, the five year destruction of three-quarters of an economy would rank among one of the steeper economic collapses ever recorded, outpacing the catastrophic economic declines of Germany and Japan after their defeat in World War II, according to analysis from economists at the British bank RBS. RBS analysts pegged the decline of German and Japanese GDP at the end of the fighting in 1945 at -66% and -52%, respectively. “If we hypothetically assume that for Syria the post-conflict rebuilding period will begin in 2018,” IMF analysts wrote, “and the economy grows at its trend rate of about 4½ percent, it would take the country about 20 years to reach its pre-war real GDP level.”
Leading of Nusra Front separating the group from Al-Qaeda and forming a new group Jabhat Fath Al-Sham. Charles Lister @Charles_Lister BREAKING: 1st ever picture of Jabhat al-Nusra leader Abu Mohammed al-Jolani, just released. #Syria #جبهة_النصرة#
Richard Engel @RichardEngel 49m49 minutes ago US Special Ops, Afghan troops on a major offensive against ISIS in Afghanistan “hundreds of ISIS killed” so far, US officials tell @nbcnews US Ranger Regiment troops in direct combat, shouldering rifles, with Afghan forces against ISIS in eastern Afghanistan, US officials One US military official said the offensive against ISIS has the potential of “rendering ISIS useless” in Afghanistan. ISIS gets lots of attention for attacks, or inspired attacks, but US officals tell @nbcnews the group taking heavy losses in Afghanistan now
Leader of probably the second most powerful rebel group in Syria. He decided to stay with Al Qaeda years ago when Baghdadi broke away. Like Baghdadi we held him in Camp Bucca in Iraq and he was released in 2008.
Abu Muhammad al-Jolani is his name. They're still AQ in all but name, al-Zawahiri gave them explicit permission to split if they thought it was advantageous. It's going to be interesting to see what AaS and the other Islamic Front groups do.
I thought this post was the beginning of a rhyme until the 2nd half of the second sentence. Sounded good even though name was a repeat word.
The video claims to be of a Palestinian guy trying to get Israeli soldiers to kill his son, so it can be used as anti-Israeli propaganda footage.
Wonder if there was a threat of a suicide device or did he really expect the IDF to kill his son because he was in their way with a Palestinian flag. I guess maybe if it was a little jew with an isreali flag in his neighborhood it could have gone differently.
Yeah the best part of the video, if you can say something is good about a video like this, is the soldier just giving the kid a high five like "sorry about your Dad breh"
Do you guys think now that the Iraqi military has grinded their teeth against ISIS for a few years, they're functional enough to maintain their own territory by themselves after everyone is done helping remove ISIS from Iraq?
Huge counter offensive by rebels in Aleppo trying to break the siege. If this doesn't work could be a huge turning point for the SAA
Most of what I've ever read about Iraqi "national identity" (or lack thereof) makes me think they probably won't.
Hopefully it's not like afghanistant where we stay for 15 years supporting them, and then when we finally pull out they immediately start losing territory.
Some of their forces are good like the Golden Division featured in Vice a few months ago. Other than that no, they've gotta rely on Shite militias organized by Iran's Quds force.
I didn't even realize this dynamic. That's a pretty enormous reversal from when Iraq was an actual power in the area.
N: IS calls for members to carry out jihad on Russia http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-russia-idUSKCN10B0WI V: Well, it was a nice run you had going, IS.
Russian helicopter shot down by Syrian rebels. Some pretty gruesome pictures out there of them dragging the bodies.
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/is...-against-isis-targets-libya-n620906?cid=sm_tw U.S. Begins New Airstrike Campaign Against ISIS Targets in Libya The U.S. began a new campaign of airstrikes Monday in Libya, four defense officials told NBC News. The strikes will target ISIS in and around Sirte, a city halfway between Tripoli and Benghazi that has become an ISIS stronghold in the country, the officials said. The officials described the pending strikes as targeted and well-planned. The head of the United States Africa Command said this past spring that ISIS had about 5,000 fighters in Sirte. But the military loyal to the new Libyan government, alongside various militias, have been pounding the city for the past few months — and the U.S. military now believes there are only a few hundred to as many as 2,000 fighters left there. The officials all explained that this will not be shock and awe — but they concede that it could be a sustained, offensive air campaign. The U.S. aircraft will not base in Libya for the operation.
somewhere in eurpoe per http://www.militarytimes.com/story/...ibya-us-opens-fourth-front-war-isis/80620174/ used F-15s so wherever we keep those
SAA held off the rebels today but they're fully committed to this offensive Yusha Yuseef @MIG29_ #Breaking :#SAA Tiger forces recapture all 1070 Area south Aleppo city after the order from The Tiger . Ivan Sidorenko @IvanSidorenko1 56m56 minutes ago Ivan Sidorenko Retweeted M_Zakaria #Syria Terrorist leader about campaign in #Aleppo: we are using 4x the number of men and equipment for this campaign
WASHINGTON—The Obama administration secretly organized an airlift of $400 million worth of cash to Iran that coincided with the January release of four Americans detained in Tehran, according to U.S. and European officials and congressional staff briefed on the operation afterward. Wooden pallets stacked with euros, Swiss francs and other currencies were flown into Iran on an unmarked cargo plane, according to these officials. The U.S. procured the money from the central banks of the Netherlands and Switzerland, they said. The money represented the first installment of a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a decades-old dispute over a failed arms deal signed just before the 1979 fall of Iran’s last monarch, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.