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this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2024
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No Stupid Questions
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Yeah - it’s about regional control, and defensive positions.
This comment is sort of a continuation of this one, but not exactly. (Sorry about the link to my instance, I’m new and don’t know how to do the thing.)
The U.S. has long needed a bully in the area to prevent the Middle East from being too unified, so the west can get relatively inexpensive access to its oil.
The state of play right now is that the U.S. actually produces enough petroleum for its own needs, but our western allies do not, and supplying them with enough oil will raise the cost to an unacceptable level/a level where they’ll have to channel money to the Middle East (which hates the U.S. for its meddling, or to Russia, which also hates the U.S.)
In about 10-15 years, technology and renewables will advance to a point where oil demand is going to have decreased to the point where the U.S. can supply all of its needs and those of its western allies without jacking the price up.
That means the U.S. won’t need a bully. But it will mean that the U.S. will cut funding to Israel, and more or less stop coming to their defense. Israel’s plan is to push out every non-Jew, using Zionism as an excuse for awful statecraft, and they’re going to push their borders to easily defensible geographic areas.
Once they do that, they’re going to basically become North Korea of the Middle East - armed to the teeth and hard to get into. Because if they don’t, everyone they’ve been bullying for the past hundred years (yes, this started before the declaration of statehood), is going to wipe them from the map - potentially leading to them launching the nukes they keep pretending they don’t have, so they don’t have to undergo international monitoring.
Assuming, of course, the plot by other countries to destabilize the U.S. fails and U.S. is still major player by the time Israel’s plan is accomplished. If the destabilization effort succeeds, we may see a full scale war against Israel before their aims are achieved.
That’s my take on it, anyway. They won’t stop because they don’t think they can stop, due to how horrible they’ve been. (At the behest of the U.S., who will begin dropping them once their usefulness has ended.)
Reminds of the accounts of people who owned enslaved people being afraid to let them go because of how they thought once freed they would turn around and slaughter their former "masters" because how could they not.
Except that didn't happen.
A bunch of folks without many rights, property, education, or jobs in a country where they are basically hostages is quite different than Iran.
It is, you're right. It's kind of a poor comparaison now that I see it spelled out
That would actually be good, so EV and plastic alternatives get better chances.
I don’t deny that. I really can’t wait for the transition away from petroleum.
But … power, and the economy is power. Sigh. The U.S. gets billions for its oil.
Your take makes a lot of sense but I do wonder how advantageous israel really is anymore. In the past it was an easy base, but we control Saudi, UAE etc now.
It feels like people downplay how much our policitians are in israels pocket. AIPAC is flaunting publicly that they practically own all American politicians.
Even when being utterly worthless israel might be able to keep American taxpayer dollars flowing to them by bribing politicians.
That’s also highly valid, and not something I factor heavily into my thoughts about the future of U.S. support.
Shit. Huh. I gotta rethink that.
I find it wild that people say this so openly now, when before Oct 7 saying something like this would get you branded as a neo-Nazi. AIPAC being a massively powerful lobby is nothing new, it's just socially acceptable to oppose them now.
I'm just gonna comment here because most of my comments from my main aren’t getting federated in this thread. Not sure if I'm being censored or just janky federation, but its frustrating to be silenced in this situation. I'll delete this if my actual comments ever show up.
history lesson
Why don't you try answering his questions? He just demonstrated how the assertions you made in your original post don't make any sense. And your response is a list of random historical generalities without any attempt to dispute the factual and logical inconsistencies of your argument. Oy veyYou're advancing a thesis that the US has been intentionally destabilizing the Middle East for the past 70 years, when the truth is the complete opposite. Destabilizing the region is what causes the price of oil to rise, the best interest of the US is for the region to be more stable so they can sell us more oil for cheaper prices.
You're so massively, incalculably confused and yet you believe yourself to be not only knowledgeable, but capable of explaining the situation to others. Remarkable.
[Comment 2]
This sequence of words is utterly meaningless. "You think I meant the US is destabilizing the Middle East, but actually I meant that the US uses Israel in limited contexts in order to destabilize the Middle East".
Huh? You're saying the US destabilizes countries opposed to the west in the Middle East, using Israel as a projection of power. So, you're saying that the US is destabilizing the Middle East. My reading comprehension is just fine, but you just have absolutely no clue what point you're even trying to make. Your position is completely incoherent and paradoxical.
No, it hasn't. The Middle East has never been even remotely unified, why would the US be concerned about that?
If anything, the existence of Israel is the most unifying force for many Middle Eastern countries who can barely agree on anything except hating Israel.
FOH with this bullshit, quote the relevant passage that you claim contradicts me. You constantly dodge and run away from any points made against you and try to move the goalposts to distract from your glaring ignorance and wrongness.
[Comment 3 (this one went through on at least one server)]
You need to cite sources. This means nothing without a specific source. The US previously had war plans to invade Canada in the event of war with the British Empire. Does that indicate the US is currently trying to destabilize Canada? Such is the nature of geopolitics.
First of all, the French, British and US never colonized the middle east. They did engage in imperialism in order to control the geopolitical situation from distance after the demise of a previous colonial empire (the Ottomans), but there wasn't any concerted effort to permanently settle or develop colonies in the region. The Middle East has historically been a colonizing region, not a colonized region.
Seriously try to answer your own question. Why would the US be interested in destabilizing the region? So they can deal with more terrorist attacks until the end of time? The success of Middle Eastern countries is not a threat to US hegemony. They are on the payroll just like everyone else, they take US money for their oil and then they turn around and spend that money on manufactured goods and advanced services provided by US corporations. The US always wins as long as there is peace and economic activity is maximized. The US loses when economic activity is reduced, which is why you have the constant interventions in response to political and religious violence and extremism.
The US military is a generally a peacekeeping force, because the US economy is a much more powerful tool for dominating other countries. A military victory only lasts as long as you have troops on the ground, but an economic victory can effectively assimilate an entire society, leaving no trace. The more money that Middle Eastern countries make, the more dependent they become on American goods and services. That's the larger trajectory of the American geopolitical aim, not some childish strategy of "destabilizing" foreign regimes just to get embroiled in hugely expensive wars.
comment was too long
[Comment 4]You are completely and utterly confused and mistaken about everything that you just said. I wish I could help you, but the best I can offer is to stop offering opinions on topics that you know nothing about.
How is it so impossible for you to respond to the words I have already written down?
You have repeatedly stated that the US has been intentionally destabilizing the Middle East.
Now you state that:
I know, I literally just explained that fact to you. How is Middle East oil going to keep flowing cheaply if the US destabilizes the region and causes wars and conflict? Please explain how that makes sense to you. You think that oil becomes cheaper when the country is at war? Wtf are you smoking?
Please, for the love of God, respond to my argument instead of going on some tangent about how the Hebrews were enslaved in the Old Testament or some shit. Confront your own ignorance.
Lmfao this would be funny if it weren't so worrying for the future of humanity. The US had to bail Israel out? My man, the USSR had to threaten nuclear war in order to bail out Syria and Egypt (from a war they started) and get the US to force Israel to agree to a ceasefire before they overran Cairo and Damascus.
The Yom Kippur war began when Egypt and Syria, supported by auxiliary forces from Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Iraq, Algeria, Libya, Kuwait, Tunisia, Morocco, Cuba, and North Korea, launched a surprise attack on Israel on the Holy day of Yom Kippur, October 6th, 1973. The Arabic forces were supplied with weapons by their Soviet allies, and Israel was supplied by their American allies. Just in case you can't count, that's 12 Arabic and communist states versus Israel alone, with the advantage of surprise. Israel proceeded to absolutely rout the opposing forces in a matter of weeks.
Your argument is that the US provided significant help to Israel and they wouldn't have been able to win without the US. It was a fucking surprise attack and they were able to turn the tide within three days. That not even enough time for supplies to get shipped into Israel from the States. Guess what else? The Soviet Union provided more help to Syria and Egypt than the US did to Israel, as it stated in the Wikipedia article which you linked, but apparently didn't take the time to read.
66,00 tons of material from the Soviets versus 55,000 tons from the USA. Please stop spreading propaganda; you're just a happy idiot, but bad actors move people like you around like pawns on a chessboard. Hamas is playing you like a fiddle and you don't even realize.
I don't know how to explain this to you, but the fact that they didn't know it was coming in 73, or many times since then, is exactly why they have some moral ground to stand on. Invading another nation without declaring war in advance is barbaric and cowardly. Regardless of any other opinions that you hold, surely we can agree that any military action should be announced in advance and directed towards military targets? I don't believe that any civilized person can fail to understand that principle. If armed conflict is inevitable, at least give forewarning and let the defenseless women, children, and elderly get to safety.
Israel does that. Hamas does the exact opposite. They go out of their way to attack defenseless Israeli civilians and they actively put their own civilians in harms way so that they can use their preventable deaths for political maneuvering. Absolutely disgusting, indefensible behavior.
Is there any evidence to directly prove this claim? This sounds like a made up justification to validate your own opinions. The Middle East isn't divided by the US, it's divided by its own history of imperialism, colonization, oppression and violence based on religious and ethnic lines accross the centuries. There's really no incentive for the US keep the Middle East divided, not to mention that oil producing countries are already united through OPEC.
Besides, why would the US need a bully when it's directly allied with Gulf states? Not only that but those states are also allied with Israel. Who exactly is bullying who? The only agreed upon bully in the region is Iran, it's actually the uniting factor between the Gulf states and the Israelis. Not to mention that the US doesn't need a bully because it's more than capable of doing what it wants.
You understand that it's not only American allies that rely on Middle Eastern oil, right? China, India, Southeast Asia, and so on all rely on Middle Eastern oil and they all have a vested interest in keeping it flowing. If anything, the US is incentivized to sell its own oil since it's a net exporter.
Again, is there any source that backs up this prediction?
This idea that Israel only exists due to US funding is a myth. Israel won all its major wars by itself and it has one of the world's largest and most resilient economies. US aid, which is almost entirely in the form of loans or weapons contracts, account for less than 1% of Israel's GDP.
20% of Israel's citizens aren't Jewish. Also do you even know what Zionism is?
This is historically illiterate point of view. First of all, Israel isn't the bully in this conflict, especially before statehood. If you look at the actual history, you'll how muslims in the region collaborated with the Nazis to help eradicate the Jews during WWII or how the Arab world rejected the 1947 UN peace plan and invaded Israel with the intention to destroy it or again in 1967 during the six day war or again in 1973 Yom Kippur war or the 1920 Nebi Musa riots against Jews in Jerusalem or the 1921 Jaffa riots or the Jaffa deportations by the Ottomans in 1917 or the 1929 riots and massacres (including the Hebron Massacre which destroyed the ancient community there) or the insane number of Palestinian terrorist groups and their attacks on civilians. The number is comically large that there are entire databases dedicated just recording all of them:
https://www.johnstonsarchive.net/terrorism/terrisraelsum.html
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/comprehensive-listing-of-terrorism-victims-in-israel
Hell, even Wikipedia can't fit all of them in a single article:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Terrorist_incidents_in_Israel_by_year
Ffs, the Palestinian leadership at the time, which is arguably the foundation of the modern Palestinian national identity, literally cooperated with the Nazis to a comical degree. The leader at the time, Amin al-Husseini, and his administration literally flew out to Germany and personally met with Hitler. There they both expressed praise and support for each other, and declared desire for cooperation to reach their mutual goals of defeating the British and genociding the Jews. Amin al-Husseini directly told Hitler that Jews shouldn't get a national home, that they were natural allies in their fight against the Jews, and that Fascism is a righteous ideology. Hitler was so impressed that he called him the most important leader in the Middle East and an Aryan because he was white, blone, and had blue eyes. The thing is that muslims at home celebrated the new ties with the axis powers and cooperation between went through the roof. The Palestinian identity was quite literally founded on antisemitism.
Do I need to keep going? I hope not. Keep in mind, this is all history. You can look all of this up yourself to verify.
We have already seen this play out at least three times. All of these wars were coalition wars provoked by the muslim Arabs seeking the full destruction of Israel, and every time Israel won.
What a bad take. The reason they're still fighting is because they're still being attacked.
Oooh. I attracted a 1-day old account that conveniently doesn’t know about U.S. statecraft toward the Middle East for the last 70 years, doesn’t know about the long history of arms transfers to Israel, doesn’t know about the Balfour Declaration, the Jewish terrorism against Britain and Palestine until Britain left the area, or the genocides that happened as soon as Britain stopped offering protection to the Palestinians. You conveniently seem to fail to understand geopolitics in any meaningful contexts.
And then you “Source?” my (very well informed) opinions.
lol. No. Don’t waste my time.
Lol imagine feeling so attacked by someone calling out and criticizing your blatantly made up and ignorant claims that you actually resort to a toddler level insult where you call me stupid, call yourself "well informed" (lmao), and then put yourself on the back for it as if you actually did anything more than clown yourself. I was right on the money, you don't actually have any idea what you're talking about. You just regurgitate the propaganda you consume on echo chambers like Lemmy, and then make up stuff to fill the gaps. But I agree, I won't waste your time because that would mean I would be wasting my time on somebody who doesn't actually bring anything of value. Now scurry back to your echo chamber before the big scary knowledge comes and destroys your ignorant worldviews. Shoo, go on then
Support your claims.
Edit: With like, actual sources.
And I didn’t call you stupid. I insinuated that your motives were suspect and that you are dishonest. But I am beginning to think you lack the ability to actually make supportable claims or debate people - which would probably mean … eh. *shrug*
8 hour old account with 42 comments...
I really hope it's a hasbara account working hard and not someone with such an unbelievable capacity for missing the point.
Name the claim and I'll provide you with a source.
Ahh yes. The Middle Easts own history. Clearly has nothing to do with French, British or US being the colonizing entities... And after all why would the US be interested in dividing a region that is connecting 3 continents and has the mos accessible of the main strategic ressources of the past two centuries.
And of course all the plans of the US that specifically talked about destroying nations like Iraq and Syria and the invasion of Iraq to do exactly that... All coincidences! Who would be so mean to assume this to be part of larger strategies?
This is such a brainless and oversimplified ideological point of view. If you actually bothered to look into the region, you would clearly see that there's a lot more going on. For example:
The list goes on and on. No matter how recent or how far back you go, this region has ALWAYS been unstable, violent, and tyrannical. This because it's in the crossroads of 3 continents like you said, but also because of geography and culture that reinforces the same cycles. Western powers did play a role, but trying to blame all the division, violence, and hatred in that region on the West is just ignorant.
And Israel and the EU help Azerbaijan to continue ethnic cleansing of Armenians, in particular Israel by sending drones in exchange for Azerbaijani oil
The Kurdish identity was deliberately squashed by the Western imperialists France and UK when they drew the borders after the fall of the Ottoman empire
Turkey went into Cyprus when a western aided fascist Greek military junta government tried to take over Cyprus and make it part of Greece with ethnic cleansing against the Turks in Cyprus. Calling it an illegal occupation is again a western imperialist narrative ignoring the complicity in attempted ethnic cleansing or worse genocide by the Greek fascist military junta government of the time. In fact Turkey stepping in was pivotal to the fascist military junta falling apart and Greece returning to Democracy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_invasion_of_Cyprus
So already in your first three points you are showing either a lack of understanding, or deliberately downplaying the effects of western imperialist rule and its continuation into today. Armenians are allies of Palestine as they understand that they are victim of the same forces. In particular the Israel-Azerbaijan axis shows that it is not about religion, but about classic imperialist motives of ressources, power and money.
This is blatantly false. France and Greece, for example, explicitly supported Armenia and the rest of the EU and NATO was largely neutral except for Turkey because they were dealing with Covid lockdowns.
This is true but the squashing of the Kurds didn't start with the West nor did end there, they merely continued something that already existed. The Ottoman Empire and the Arab empires before it were all explicitly suppressed the Kurds.
Such embarrassing ignorance. This is from the very wiki article that you linked:
The international community condemns Turkey's illegal occupation of Cyprus. There is a reason why no country on earth except for the occupier, Turkey, recognizes this fake puppet state as a country. Even Turkey's other puppet, Azerbaijan, which is the most loyal of Turkey's allies doesn't recognize it.
Not only is the international community unanimously against Turkey, but they also violated the Treaty of Guaranteed of 1960. This was a joint agreement between Turkey, Cyprus, Greece, and the UK regarding the protection and territorial integrity of Cyprus. Turkey was one four principal signatories and one of the three supposed protectorates of Cyprus, and they only signed the treaty a few years before their occupation.
This is taken directly from the Treaty of Guarantee of 1960:
You can read the full treaty right here: https://peacemaker.un.org/sites/peacemaker.un.org/files/CY%20GR%20TR_600816_Treaty%20of%20Guarantee.pdf
As you can see Turkey is in clear violation of this treaty. It is refusing to cooperate with the other protectorates of this treaty and it is directly violating Cyprus' sovereignty and territorial integrity.
But actually gets even worse because the Turkish speaking Cypriots want to reunite with their Greek neighbors and unify the island, and there are have been ongoing demonstrations by the native people there for DECADES against Turkish occupation:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Turkish_Cypriot_protests (50,000 to 80,000 people turned out, that's about 1/3 of the 170,000 native Turkish speaking Cypriots) https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jan/09/rising-anger-with-turkey-drives-calls-for-reunification-in-crisis-hit-northern-cyprus https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/nov/15/erdogan-met-by-protests-from-turkish-cypriots-during-visit-northern-cyprus https://cyprus-mail.com/2024/04/26/hundreds-of-turkish-cypriots-protest-against-govt/ https://apnews.com/article/europe-middle-east-government-and-politics-united-nations-suburbs-235658ac64b564902747dc2225933899 https://apnews.com/ea58f13ac33a49479048df04357d78c7/Turkish-Cypriots-protest-Turkey's-'unwanted'-meddling
What does Turkey do in response to this very clear opposition from the native Turkish speaking Cypriots who want them to leave, respect the treaties they've signed, and want to unite with the rest of the island? That's right Turkey sends in over 100,000 non native Turkish residents to occupy the island: https://assembly.coe.int/nw/xml/XRef/X2H-Xref-ViewHTML.asp?FileID=10153&lang=EN#:~:text=According%20to%20reliable%20estimates%2C%20their,way%20from%20those%20in%20Cyprus. http://www.mfa.gov.cy/mfa/Embassies/Embassy_Vienna/vienna.nsf/page74_en/page74_en?OpenDocument
Which by the way is a clear violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention's Article 49 which includes:
https://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/documents/atrocity-crimes/Doc.33_GC-IV-EN.pdf
Calling Turkey's illegal occupation of Northern Cyprus anything but that shows that you're either a historically ignorant, a bootlicker, or an authoritarian extremist like a Marxist or Fascist. Though in your case, it's probably all 3.
I wonder how it feels to be confidentially incorrect. I can't really tell if this a projection or just a lack of self awareness.
Actually this isn't true. Israel and Armenia are pretty neutral towards each other. Armenia was the only country in West Asia, other than Israel, to not recognize Palestine as a country. Actually they only did so yesterday, and everybody sees this as a tit for tat for Israel signing that arms contract with Azerbaijan back in 2012 where they gave them drones and other military equipment (which the Azeri dictator Aliyev used against them in 2020) over the next few years in exchange for their oil (which makes up 40-60% of their oil imports) and having Azerbaijan and Turkey remain allies against Iran... but despite this there's calls in Israel to recognize the Armenian genocide and talks in Armenia to buy Israeli weapons: https://en.globes.co.il/en/article-armenia-mulls-procuring-iai-missiles-report-1001482068 https://www.thejc.com/lets-talk/why-israel-must-now-recognise-the-armenian-genocide-jvxgn8k7
Armenia used to be a strong Russian ally in hopes of having Russia protect it from Azerbaijan, and it's big ally Turkey, a NATO member. However, when Azerbaijan attacked and Armenia invoked it's defense clause, Russia refused to help. Not only that but it's puppet Belarus, publicly came out in support Azerbaijan. Because of this Armenia has publicly announced it's intent to withdraw from the CSTO and draw closer to the West, especially after France, Greece, and even the US (remember that Nancy Pelosi trip?) all showed support to Armenia over Azerbaijan. Which leaves Armenia in a very weird and complicated geopolitical situation. Trying to oversimplify their geopolitical situation is just stupid.
I've been reading your posts. You make excellent points very often, clearly drawing from a deep knowledge of the region.
However continually calling people names and insulting their intelligence will tend to stop them from really hearing your message and just inflame the situation. You could just not type that stuff and then everything else you type would have more impact. It'd be a pity to waste all that effort.
I sometimes get frustrated with the people I argue with and these stuff slip out. However, what you're saying is a true and your criticism is valid. I'll definitely keep this in mind. I appreciate your comment.
Yes your frustration is totally understandable. It is a very heated topic and a lot of bad faith arguments are thrown around.
Sometimes I remind myself not to hope that the person I'm replying to will understand my reply or acknowledge that I'm right - instead I post my reply for the lurkers to read, who are far more numerous. The lurker has not publicly said anything so their ego is not fixed on defending their position and they are more likely to receive what I contribute with an open mind.
With this wider context, the goal changes. When the target audience shifts to the readers then there is no longer a need to continue a long back and forth discussion (the person replying to me will never change their mind anyway!) once I have made my point clearly. It's ok if the other person has the last word if by having it they discredit themselves by demonstrating a closed mind - the lurkers will see it.
I hope this helps.
That's actually a very interesting perspective. Thanks for sharing