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Technician

Boko Haram 2014!!!!

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So Obama is sending eighty troops to Chad to assist in the search and rescue of the missing girls kidnapped by Islamic extremest group (who else) Boko Haram. Obama seems to be jumping in without the UN, African Union or, seemingly, congress.

So what's everyone's views on this?

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I'm trying to stay neutral on this position, but I'm still a bit nervous. I hope Obama knows what he is doing, this might be yet another conflict we are getting involved in at tax payers expense. Let's just hope for the best.

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On the surface, this does seem to be a good intervention with a real terrorist problem, and not something with an ulterior motive. Of course, there's probably some ulterior motive in there somewhere. I just hope that they snuff the extremists out and rescue the kidnapped girls and pull out without wasting any extra time there. Still, more consulting with the relevant parties should've been conducted before just jumping in.

It bothers me that they seem more quick to consider investigative journalists to be aiding terrorism, if not outright terrorists themselves, but were holding off on classifying Boko Haram as such to be "polite" to a foreign government that's not taking the just course of action on such a poison to society.

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I suppose it beats going in the with the express purpose of destroying the group.

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Keeping Boko Haram and, in general, the more backwards and anti-Western part of Nigerian society confined in the poor North, while securing the -mostly Christian and Animist- South (which also where Nigeria's oil fields and foreign oil companies' interests are...) sounds like a plan.

In addition, the -further- waves of immigrants will put some more pressure on old dirty Pinko Europe. Yup, it's definitively a plan. And a good one at that. Good old divide & conquer with some "let others pick the trash" and "NIMBY" thrown in.

BTW, I find it funny that everybody and the cat now "blacklists" and "imposes sanctions" on Boko Haram, as if they were e.g. Russian oligarchs that travel frequently and whose assets can be frozen. Like they would fucking care...they are a rag-tag bunch of terrorists, ffs. Might as well "disapprove", "impose sanctions" and "isolate from the international community" Somali pirates, as well....

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I think it's an appropriate action considering the troops being put on the ground are strictly noncombatants. From what I have read, local inhabitants are greatly upset by Boko Haram and do not support their fundamentalist positions, but they are even more outraged by the impotence of Nigeria's public servants and brutality of the "official" Nigerian paramilitary forces tasked with keeping the country safe. As to which group is overall more dangerous to the region's wellbeing, I don't know; but Boko Haram is considered more dangerous to foreigners' and western interests, meaning the US is not going to have a lot of qualms about going after Islamic fundamentalist cells in the region and generally trying to keep itself removed from cleaning up the regional government.

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Maes said:

BTW, I find it funny that everybody and the cat now "blacklists" and "imposes sanctions" on Boko Haram, as if they were e.g. Russian oligarchs that travel frequently and whose assets can be frozen. Like they would fucking care...they are a rag-tag bunch of terrorists, ffs. Might as well "disapprove", "impose sanctions" and "isolate from the international community" Somali pirates, as well....

If you want to put sanctions on terrorist groups you have to sanction off the Arab nations. You know, the ones actually funding Sunni extremist groups. Boko Haram are al-Qaeda supported and they're funded by Arab nations like Saudi Arabia.

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It is just a failed popularity stunt...

And saving 30 or so girls on a continent where daily thousands die because of hunger, disease, exploitation...
Yes, the nobles of the earth have a profound plan. It is a nesting ground plan for hypocrites.

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welcome FireFish to the sad reality of politics. This is why I usually try to avoid politics. It turns me into a cynical, apathetic, misanthrope.

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yukib1t said:

Maybe there's oil over there, or the girls are carrying oil with them.

There is a relatively large supply of both oil ans gas in central Africa but most important is the many rare earth metals crucial to our modern computer technology.

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It's funny to watch all the contortions that our Fearless Western Leaders go through to avoid incriminating their Dear and Trusted Allies and Friends like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, etc. when everybody knows that they are the financier of Islamic terrorism and exporting wahhabism everywhere they can.

But look at how evil Iran is! Boo, Iran! Boo!

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Gez said:

It's funny to watch all the contortions that our Fearless Western Leaders go through to avoid incriminating their Dear and Trusted Allies and Friends like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, etc. when everybody knows that they are the financier of Islamic terrorism and exporting wahhabism everywhere they can.

But look at how evil Iran is! Boo, Iran! Boo!

It makes my eyes almost roll out of my head at how transparent it all is. But they have America over a barrel. If the Arab nations had the gall to unanimously change their petrol currency, America would sink (along with the west in general). It could never possibly invade them all and topple the leaders to change it back to USD like they did with Iraq and Libya.

Now Europe is just afraid of being called racists.

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Bunch of islam extremists gone next from being haywire, really. But what else you can do, when you live in total poverty with no future? And to add that, roots of that movement originate from time of colonization, so there's decades of mistrust to be straightened out. Good thing there are some islamic folks that condemn such thoughts, not just westerners, but local imams too.

Also, Slavers should be summarily sentenced to death, no judge, no jury and all execution.

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CorSair said:

Also, Slavers should be summarily sentenced to death, no judge, no jury and all execution.


That is exactly what is happening in those countries. Governments, freedom fighters, and rebels against the two aforementioned just kill without a judge or jury. AKA : this is what the world is attempting to stop. although i do not agree with save every human possible, and everywhere...

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CorSair said:

Also, Slavers should be summarily sentenced to death, no judge, no jury and all execution.


Ok, I agree with that they should be put to death part. I Highly disagree with the no judge, no jury part and all execution part. that would be easily abused.

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CorSair said:

Slavers should be summarily sentenced to death, no judge, no jury and all execution.

reality 2.0 said:

Ok, I agree with that they should be put to death part.


In this cases, it's unlikely it will have any significant effect. Let's not forget that these groups view their fallen members as martyrs. I say life sentence.

EDIT: Orthography.

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Seems to me it's kind of a risky move, one that could end up bolstering support for the terrorists if it goes wrong. I realize great care is being taken to avoid that, but all the same, it'd be easy through the use of fear and propaganda to turn this into anti-western sentiment.

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I would scrape the Anti-western part and replace it with anti American.
If the U.S. invades yet another country, the us has to take the blame, fall, praise (by ass kissers), and hate by a quarter of the world.

I detest the generalization ;'the U.S. is the west', to try and shove the blame onto half the globe while they are doing it.

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This is just like this Kony 2012 crap. What ever happened to that, oh right it fell off the radar.

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FireFish said:

If the U.S. invades yet another country, the us has to take the blame, fall, praise (by ass kissers), and hate by a quarter of the world.

I detest the generalization ;'the U.S. is the west', to try and shove the blame onto half the globe while they are doing it.


But the West is the US. Canada, the EU, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan all politically, economically, and militarily depend on the US.

Look at the US war in Iraq. France had the gall to say it was a stupid idea, immediately leading to the US media starting a campaign of hysterical francophobia (none of them cared that Germany opposed too, the orders from Ms. Rice were to punish France and ignore Germany after all, and they were dutifully followed by the supposedly independent media); but if you counted the number of EU nations that took part in the Coalition of the Billing, you'd get a majority (14 out of 28 current members, plus 6 current candidates). Norway, Australia, NZ, Japan were there too.

Claiming that other western nations shouldn't be lumped with the US when they overwhelmingly follow the US everywhere is betraying ignorance of blatant geopolitical facts.

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Gez said:

Claiming that other western nations shouldn't be lumped with the US when they overwhelmingly follow the US everywhere is betraying ignorance of blatant geopolitical facts.


I totally agree. In the case of my dear country (Mexico, for those who don't know), it's almost a commandment. When the U.S. says "jump", the government here says "how high?". Embarrasing, humiliating and stupid, yes. Can we, the normal citizens, do something about it? No.

Double Edit, sorry, I'm an idiot.

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Gez said:

Claiming that other western nations shouldn't be lumped with the US when they overwhelmingly follow the US everywhere is betraying ignorance of blatant geopolitical facts.


To use the simplism of a previous poster because of point B :
not one European country simply 'jumps' when the US says jump. If they get nothing in return, they do nothing. (btw. japan is east, not west.)

B :
For the rest i have seen the age old 'ignorance' card which has no insulting or cultural impact here so that fails. i even learned not to debate with anyone using that word.

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FireFish said:

To use the words of the previous poster because of point B :
not one European country simply 'jumps' when the US says jump. If they get nothing in return, they do nothing.

Getting something in return can be as simple as being spared punishment. Remember that these countries all depend on the USA politically, economically, and militarily? Preserving the status quo is something that can be worth it enough for the leader of a small, vulnerable nation.

FireFish said:

(btw. japan is east, not west.)

East vs. West is like North vs. South; it's an oversimplification. East vs. West is American influence vs Russian/Chinese influence. For instance, North Korea is East but South Korea is West.

Likewise, North vs. South is industrialized countries vs. third world. So a country like Australia, in the South-East geographically, is a Northern, Western country politically.

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Gez said:

US media starting a campaign of hysterical francophobia (none of them cared that Germany opposed too, the orders from Ms. Rice were to punish France and ignore Germany after all


I hope you realize that not one pixel of francophobic propaganda ever touched a television in Europa during that era. This is so alien and special that nobody would ever know that happened unless somebody like you makes a forum post about it. There is no anti-this-country or anti-that-country propaganda in existence in the EU. France never received any punishment or counter-blow for that matter in total.

I know out of experience it is impossible to debate with people rooted into the US television and media because they believe every word spoken on there. so this will be the actual last post on this in a thread about Boko Haram.

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FireFish said:

I hope you realize that not one pixel of francophobic propaganda ever touched a television in Europa during that era... There is no anti-this-country or anti-that-country propaganda in existence in the EU.


Well, that's bullshit. We in the UK saw all the American fuss about "freedom fries" (because to call them French was unpatriotic) and the media uproar, all reported as a kind of "Those wacky Yanks" story. It got prominent coverage on Have I Got News For You. As for the latter - most right wing media goes against every foreign country at the sign of immigration or international incident. Get the world cup or European football tournaments going and the papers go into a frenzy. Meanwhile the "impartial" left wing BBC vilifies Russia constantly for every action. This is just one country. I know places like Greece are becoming quite anti-Germany (or just Merkel) as the economic hardship wears on too. Nationalism is alive and thriving in Europe.

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I will re-phrase 'most of the EU countries.'
There is a big difference between an election stunt of left wings vs actual propaganda made to influence an entire nation. The UK itself claims via politics and people (in interviews) they feel left out of the EU and do not know one bit of what is going on in the EU. according to the media coverage here (which i take with a big grain of salt) many in the UK severely want out of the EU because of the aforementioned.

This seems interesting to debate, maybe i might fire up a separated thread, to save this thread. (only if i notice troll nor wise-guy)

*after edits are made to remove typos and restore sentence structures.
I have broken it two times.. so i hope i wont post here anymore.

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Freedom Fries made news in the Czech Republic as well, might further rephrase your claims.

Also EU campaigns brutally against select targets. Remember Kosovo? Serbia got villified, condemned and bombed because of falsified propaganda supported heavily by American pro-Kosovian and German Catholic pro-Croatian cliques. Belarus is ostracized heavily despite being a "light dictatorship" compared to our esteemed allies from Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan or even the awesomely "democratic" Gruzia.

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I suspect a number, if not most, of these girls are already dead or lost to some prostitution rings and that they'll never be seen again by someone who didn't pay money to fuck them. If that's what they were kidnapped for. I don't really know, and am just throwing out random slooge into the conversation.

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French Vanilla ice cream offends me. We should rename it to Freedom Vanilla.

Zed said:

In the case of my dear country (Mexico, for those who don't know), it's almost a commandment. When the U.S. says "jump", the government here says "how high?". Embarrasing, humiliating and stupid, yes. Can we, the normal citizens, do something about it? No.

I'm sad to say, it's almost the same situation here in AU. The current government is basically trying to clone/shadow America's every move, no matter how blatantly terrible the effects are.

The citizens here are protesting a current (awful) financial shift Tony Abott has planned wherein the citizens under 30 are charged exponentially more for higher education, and those seeking jobs will not receive any assistance either. It's awful.

geekmarine said:

Seems to me it's kind of a risky move, one that could end up bolstering support for the terrorists if it goes wrong. I realize great care is being taken to avoid that, but all the same, it'd be easy through the use of fear and propaganda to turn this into anti-western sentiment.

This is definitely my biggest worry about the whole situation. It could essentially become a self-defeating cause..

FireFish said:

saving 30 or so girls on a continent where daily thousands die because of hunger, disease, exploitation...
Yes, the nobles of the earth have a profound plan. It is a nesting ground plan for hypocrites.

Yeah, America's "high and mighty" bullshit just needs to stop. I don't think anyone who lives outside of the US (and indeed, most thinking people IN the US) are buying it at this point.

BUT YEAH AMERICA IS AWESOME, BOO IRAN!

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