Trump Doctrine: World better with Saddam, Gaddafi in power

[Ganos Lao]

Seems more like just politicians being politicians to me.

But I'm a bit curious as to what Kuwait did that puts them on par with the Khmer Rouge. What made them "brutal"?

http://www.prwatch.org/books/tsigfy10.html

Viewed in strictly moral terms, Kuwait hardly looked like the sort of country that deserved defending, even from a monster like Hussein. The tiny but super-rich state had been an independent nation for just a quarter century when in 1986 the ruling al-Sabah family tightened its dictatorial grip over the "black gold" fiefdom by disbanding the token National Assembly and firmly establishing all power in the be-jeweled hands of the ruling Emir. Then, as now, Kuwait's ruling oligarchy brutally suppressed the country's small democracy movement, intimidated and censored journalists, and hired desperate foreigners to supply most of the nation's physical labor under conditions of indentured servitude and near-slavery.

Kuwait therefore is not unlike Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar and to a lesser degree the United Arab Emirates.

Figures you post this right as I'm about to edit my post accordingly (at the time I had a proverbial brainfart).

But yeah, just goes to show you that politicians are politicians. Ain't anything surprising to me.

On a side note, the mentioning of the "desperate foreigners" makes me wonder why the source countries of these desperate workers don't just put a full scale ban on working in the region.

[Pope Joan]

If he means that our State Department made a major error by deposing these leaders, he is entirely correct. We destroyed Iraq's infrastructure, electric generation, water, roads, hospitals, schools, museums. Some "liberation"! We also provide fertile ground for the rise of Al Qaeda and ISIS there, which Saddam had suppressed.

Likewise, oil money created the base for ample social services in Libya, including health care, education, water, power and transportation. Remember that we were being fed slanted information and even outright lies by the governments of the US and UK. One UK reporter had irrefutable evidence that Gaddafi was an evil man: He had used government money to create a four star hotel in Nairobi, Kenya, and the place did not even have a bar! The horror! Gaddafi was a devout Muslim, who did not drink; the hotel was for those who did not wish to be around drinkers. The profits all went to the people, not to him. But we never heard those details.

Gaddafi, too, was a mortal enemy of Al Qaeda.

So the US demonized these two, made them into caricatures of evil, and seriously degraded their countries. For nothing (except oil).

[The Lone Alliance]

I do agree with him on one thing.

Libya was better under Gaddafi.

Literacy was around 95%

There was enough food and water.

Education was free.

So?
That free education was absolutely useless in Libya because there literally were no jobs, kind of the same problem in the western world except even more extreme. You had hundreds of college educated men and women in their 20s and 30s with absolutely nothing to do with their lives.

Sure they weren't starving because the Libyan government provided but still, that's a lot of bored and annoyed people. And then do you know who Gaddafi hires to build his infrastructure? Mirgants from Central Africa.

Then there is the fact that despite no one going hungry, the amount of wealth the Gaddafi government used was not the same for all regions, Western and Central Libya got most of the oil wealth, Western because it had the most cities including Tripoli, and Central because it had Sirte and Gaddafi's home tribe.

Eastern Libya got the short end of the stick despite the fact that Eastern Libya had most of the oil, that's why the revolt started there.

Sadly all of this could have been prevented and even in the early time Gaddafi could have headed it off at the pass by agreeing to give more money to Eastern Libya, but instead he snapped.

Cutting the internet off also was a stupid idea because it just made those bored people even angrier.

Now Libya is a war torn nation because those "moderate rebels" that show up in almost every conflict turn out to be puppet organizations of muslim extremists.

Libya isn't as cut and dried, there's several sides not counting IS, there's the "Moderate" western Government which is mostly secular and has the majority of the Libyan military and half the militias on their side, then there's the Islamist government which has the other half of the militias, there are the guys who did the Embassy attack\Al Qaeda who are literally ex-Iraqi Insurgents, and then there are the various tribal and 'city' Militias who are just in it for themselves.

It'll be another 5 years till Libya stabilizes at this rate, least it's not as bad as Somalia.
Then again it took the US a decade to get it's act together after they revolted.

If Russia doesn't go in for the clutch the same is going to happen in Syria.

It's a little too late there, Syria isn't going to be alright for another decade at least.

With Soviet backing.

That's not exactly true Gauthier.

Yugoslavia was never a member of the Warsaw pact and in the early years of the cold war Tito openly defied the USSR because he didn't want to put Yugoslavia under Stalin's fist. He even went to the West and requested Marshall Plan money after earlier rejecting it and US actually gave it to him.

Yugoslavia pretty much played off both sides of the cold war by claiming neutrality it's why he created the Non-aligned Movement.

[Tevehas]

some stuff

I know the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd world country designation arised from the cold war, but Libya's pre-revolution situation reminded me of the Dilbert comic where Elbonia got upgraded from a 3rd World Country to a 2nd World country with Dogbert saying "They have enough to eat, it's just that they don't like it" and it going to a picture of an Elbonian going "Airline food, again?" or something like that.

It's a really bad example. But I mean, Libya for all its faults under Gadaffi was better off than it was now. Had NATO done the responsible thing and facilitated a regime change instead of just bombing and pulling out like some kid with cold feet during prom night, things might be different. But that's all hypothetical. People in Libya are starving now as opposed to no more than 5-6 years ago.

If Assad wins, it will at least ensure that cleanup and re-building will go at least somewhat smoothly. The problem is, what's more than likely going to happen is that Turkey is going to do some stupid shit and fuck over the Assad Government ensuring that Syria becomes just a 3 way competition between the Kurds, IS, and Al-Nursa. (And afterwards Israel will still complain).

I'm not saying Assad is a saint, but he's been holding the country together.

[Ganos Lao]

The problem is, what's more than likely going to happen is that Turkey is going to do some stupid shit and fuck over the Assad Government ensuring that Syria becomes just a 3 way competition between the Kurds, IS, and Al-Nursa. (And afterwards Israel will still complain).

I'm not saying Assad is a saint, but he's been holding the country together.

Syria will join Iraq in that regard then, because as soon as the last ISIS militant is dropped, the Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites are all going to have fun blowing each other to bits. And you just know Uncle Sam, Erdogan, Assad, Putin, and Iran will all leap into the fray respectively.

I know I keep stressing the inevitable bloodbath to come, but I really can't see this getting any better. Too many people have too many interests to just forsake for some lofty notion of peace.

[Justin States 3]

Altogether, I think Trump is a nutjob.
The world would not be better with Saddam and Gaddafi.

[Pope Joan]

Altogether, I think Trump is a nutjob.
The world would not be better with Saddam and Gaddafi.

A knowledgeable commentator even says that the US took a secular Iraq and turned it into a sectarian state. Why? Who knows.

http://billmoyers.com/2014/06/20/an-ira ... ays-chaos/

The citizens of Iraq and Libya certainly would be.

http://thinkprogress.org/security/2011/ ... -war-iran/

[Kauthar]

To be fair he is right.
Libya would be stable if Gaddafi was still in power as would be Iraq.

[FutureAmerica]

It sounds crazy, but he's right. The Iraq, Libyan and Syrian wars have created havoc on the middle east and a huge refugee crisis.

[The Qeiiam Star Cluster]

To be fair he is right.
Libya would be stable if Gaddafi was still in power as would be Iraq.

Or they would be exactly like Syria now.