that are a lot more simplistic that the US it's a little easier.

The Russians main goal in Syria is to prop up Assad and his regime. They don't care if the people they bomb are ISIS or any other rebel group. They also don't seem to mind going after ISIS targets when those barbaric scumbags are using caged prisoners as human shields. It's an old style war to the Russians and they aren't as averse to collateral damage as the US is.

The US tried and is still trying to thread a needle that attacks ISIS without going after the non-ISIS rebel groups. Personally I think it's a mistake, I'd rather have Assad in power and ISIS dead.

Pretending any one side is
morally superior is willful ignorance.

The atrocities since the invasion
of the middle east are vast and
incalculable, on all sides.

Save the *exceptionalism* rhetoric

There is no moral superiority, the only reason the American forces are doing it the way they are is because of media coverage. If they could get away with bombing the hell out of ISIS and taking out a group of human shields without anyone hearing about it they'd do it in a heartbeat.

The US still wants to oust Assad and a massive bombing campaign helps Assad and reduces that option. I don't think it's going to work, Assad is in and the Russians are going to keep him there. I say we let him stay, it's not worth the effort to get rid of him.

the media is firmly controlled
by the intelligence establishment.

We get daily feedings of fact free
propaganda fostering an us vs them mentality.

We never see the true atrocities,
the horrors of regime change.

The premise that *we* can't beat back
ISIS because of *media coverage* is laughable.

It is what it is.

A lot of it is being sold to the Assad regime or smuggled across the border into turkey.

Plus nobody wants to destroy the wells (like we did in 1991 during Desert Storm) in the hopes that they can be used after ISIS is defeated.

Here's an article that sheds some light:

http://www.businessinsider.com/r-islamic-state-keeps-up-syrian-oil-flow-despite-us-led-strikes-2014-10

It looked like a child's conception of hell.

But I suspect that a lot of that oil changes hands several times before it reaches its ultimate destination.

14 years and their control over the region has never been greater.

"Whatever it takes to make friends and influence people,"


Yeah we did a great job of that in Iraq!

as experience in the Americas has shown.

What on earth can your line of thought be for that?

"It would cost less to pay off opium farmers to NOT grow than try to eradicate the crops."
You're assuming that once you've paid someone, they don't grow the crops anyway. Yes, follow the money - but when it comes down to it, stopping an entire country growing a crop means you need complete control of it, and occupying a country in that way is difficult, costly, and frequently ends up in a large loss of life for all sides.

looks like the opium warlords have won...can we leave now?

and seems very off-topic.

Basically we have left Afghanistan.

to these old fucking warlords given a new lease on rape ......... wouldn't you say? I hope you don't ever call yourself a feminist, or even someone who cares about women and girls living lives more horrific than you could ever imagine in your wildest dreams.

Not off topic at all ........ if you care about human beings and our actions in Afghanistan and so many other sovereign nations the west has it's eyes on - PNAC, perpetual war for billion dollar profits for the MIC, contractors, weapons makers ..... create terrorists like ISIS to help destroy leaders long on the list. It's disgusting .......... every bit of it. As we all know, women and children end up suffering the most. Migrants trying to leave the horror we've created drowning at sea, being treated like hated vermin in many places they've been allowed to land. But it's all good ....... we have an ocean to protect us, why bother ourselves when 'Afghanistan is over' and we've moved on to help destroy yet another nation?

A question though ....... if we've left, why are drones still killing civilians, including small children? What are we doing about the tens of thousands of children with PTSD and 6 psychiatrists able to treat them in the whole country? Children there and in Pakistan and Yemen who fear even going outside to play? "Be good, or i will call the drones"! At least we've given them a new tool to discipline these little horrors, eh?

Such 'concern', I hope you're happy with dismissing them as 'over, done with'. Beautiful minds, and all .....

Fucking pathetic.

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Pay no mind the little one on the beach with no life ahead of him ...... he's 'just collateral damage', war/regime change is hell!

All it, and the Washington Post article it's taken from, say is about wives that are younger than the 60 year old warlord. So it's about polygamy, but not about children. No, I don't like polygamy, but I don't know that those wives' lives are 'horrific' either.

We don't know that warlord makes his money from opium, either. Perhaps he does, but is that our prime concern, or is it the violence? The idea is that he was on our side - ie not the Taliban - and so he is not the equivalent of ISIS, either. If you want to stop ISIS, or Assad - ie the causes of the refugees - you need local cooperation; or a massive invasion and occupying force to take control of all the opium fields and oil wells, which screws things up after that, as we saw in Iraq. So the 'local cooperation' route looks better.

So, no, giving Viagra to a Afghani warlord really doesn't end in the body of a child on a beach. It's not a lethal drone, is it?

If the oil was flowing through a fixed pipeline, you are correct but Daesh and AQ are trucking the oil to brokers and oil tends to be very fungible. There is a black market for the product

It is my understanding that the Warthots (A-10s) are being deployed for this mission

They don't sell through the normal markets.

They buy the oil from ISIS. At cheap prices.

Do you want to make them angry?

If you mean that people should stop buying ISIS oil, that's largely outside of our control. From what I understand, their oil enterprise is mostly black market.

If you mean destroy their oil infrastructure with targeted attacks, the concern is that rebuilding oil extraction facilities post-conflict will be very expensive and damaging the communities that thrive upon them for economic survival. This objection isn't without merit, as to whether it outweighs the imperative to deprive ISIS of funding... that's a trick argument, in my opinion.

One needs enemies or MIC profits will fall.