http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-28191181

Artefacts and some of the world's best preserved and interesting historical monuments are being systematically obliterated in Syria during the on-going civil war.

Ancient buildings being targeted by air strikes whilst ISIS fighters destroy anything they find heretical (such as Roman and Assyrian architecture and statues).

A sad end to some buildings and statues that have been standing for over two millenniums, destroyed in seconds.

There was a time when I thought that some artifacts removed from the Middle East should be returned. No more. These ignorant thugs have no appreciation for history or culture.

Any museum which returns anything to these barbarians should be indicted for crimes against humanity.

All this is made possible by our initial acquiesence to, and moral sympathy with, efforts to topple Assad in favor of "democracy", actively champion for as long as she was in the state department, by Hilary Clinton. What a know-nothing ideologue she proved to have been as a secretary of state overseeing middle east turmoil.

Are you suggesting we should have intervened on Assad's side?

He's as bad as the rebels. There are no good guys over there.

(July 10, 2014 at 12:24 pm)Minimalist Wrote: Are you suggesting we should have intervened on Assad's side?

He's as bad as the rebels. There are no good guys over there.

No, he would not have been as bad as the rebels had the rebels not been encouraged to grow by us. It's relative social stability under an authoritarian, but not yet brutal regime, vs all out, no holds barred civil war of regime survival against a jihadist enemy.

Hilary Clinton saw the authoritarian part, and decided on a course to a no holds barred civil with possibility of victory by a fundamentalist Jihadist movement.

Yeah, she was a real Bismarck statesman in skirts there.

I think the world is at the moment undergoing fundamentalpolitical and economic transformation that is every bid as profound as the end of cold war, and with potential for deeper impact on the lives of more people in more places in the world than any other single event in human history. Foreign policy guided by simple minded rights and wrongs stemming from student movements of 1960s slightly modified by the intoxication from the heady days of surplus military strength in the 1990s will not stand us in good stead to come out even in this transformation.

Couldn't find a reference, but a Fundy Pastor smashed a Hindu (IIRC) statute in Texas back in the 80s.

If he hadn't made a media spectacle of it, he might have continued with his campaign against idolatry.

Surprised I didn't find anything on a quick Google search, but all the Islamic atrocities must have pushed the Texas one down too far in the pile.

Remember the buddhas in Iran? They might be a religious icon, but they were old and a testimony of human history. Shot down with missiles because some fucktards think their fantasy god doesn't like to be threathened by other fantasy gods.

I just don't buy the idea that somehow the US is responsible for every fucking thing that happens in the world, Chuck.

The Alawites are a distinct minority in Syria...just as the Sunni's were a minority in Iraq. Yet they controlled majority populations. We took the cork out of the bottle in Iraq and there probably was some sort of spillover effect in neighboring Syria.

But I rather doubt that someone was sitting in a mud hut in Aleppo waiting for encouragement from Hillary Clinton.

(July 10, 2014 at 1:58 pm)LastPoet Wrote: Remember the buddhas in Iran? They might be a religious icon, but they were old and a testimony of human history. Shot down with missiles because some fucktards think their fantasy god doesn't like to be threathened by other fantasy gods.

That was in Afghanistan. It was the Bamiyan Buddhas which the Taliban blew up.

Iran is the country where there are as many women as men who attend Universities, and the majority of those who study engineering in the Universities are female, albeit wearing mendatory head scarf.

Afghanistan is the country where it is often considered a kindness to cut of off a woman's nose if she had the temerity to try to learn to read from behind her burqa.

Because we have an vendetta against Iran stemming from the hostage crisis, we protray Iran in the most blood curdling light possible at every opportunity up to this present day. In reality for a Muslim country, Iran is near the top of approximate democracy, somewhat real progress and not a discreditable amount of enlightenment, especially compared to our Sunni friends and allied in the Gulf kingdoms and Shiekdoms, and to say nothing of the Talibans, with whom we are being driven ever closer to direct negotiation, on the other side of Iran.

Not having restored good relationships with Iran after 9-11, especially after 2005, is another sign of the lamentable paralysis of American foreign policy.

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(July 10, 2014 at 2:00 pm)Minimalist Wrote: I just don't buy the idea that somehow the US is responsible for every fucking thing that happens in the world, Chuck.

The Alawites are a distinct minority in Syria...just as the Sunni's were a minority in Iraq. Yet they controlled majority populations. We took the cork out of the bottle in Iraq and there probably was some sort of spillover effect in neighboring Syria.

But I rather doubt that someone was sitting in a mud hut in Aleppo waiting for encouragement from Hillary Clinton.

Hillary Clinton was leading the at the charge to intervene, while actively hampering Assad through escalating, and at the time credible, threats with every appearence of atrocity even when who exactly was responsible was far from clear.

There is little doubt given a free hand in the beginning, Assad would have crushed the revolt in 2 weeks. But that would be contrary to "democratic" "Arab Spring" which is no doubt dear to Hilary's heart.