Syria under Bashir Assad (closed end 2014)

[Tukhachevskii]

Easy solutions? I don't think so. Binary logic is a poor basis for foreign policy; i.e Syria is part of the axis of evil, therefore anyone that fights them is ipso facto on the side of good, therefore the US (as the self-appointed Universal good guy) will support them...er, even if "they" quite like beheading people in the name of Allah (who else?)

From:http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...OBCYAAAph6.jpg

[Tukhachevskii]

Support Assad

Interesting stuff from Daniel Pipes thinking along similar lines to myself. Although, as a conservative (of the old fashioned European variety rather than the loony-toons in the US) I view Assads regime as the legitimate (de jure) government fighting exactly the same kind of fools we've been fighting in Afghanistan. The US sees only permanent enemies. I use a TEA model (came up with that myself, we Brits love our tea); threats, enemies, allies. Your threats determine your enemies and your enemies determine your allies. During the nineteenth century the French castigated the UK as perfidious Albion. We were not perfidious, we merely took each case on its merits. Today's enemies are tomorrow's allies, it's the threats that need addressing. Once the threats are dealt with we resume business as normal. The liberal universal perspective is prone to crusades against universal enemies who must either submit to the enlightened (the US) or be exterminated (a curious mirror image of Islamic universalist thought!).

Or, here

[omarali50]

The sage of London has spoken: http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2013/08/28...ning-in-syria/

I think my version of his analysis was better: http://www.brownpundits.com/2013/04/...i-on-pakistan/