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People on the other thread are very sure about what we should not be doing but not so quick to say what we should. As I believe doing nothing is not an option and I have made my views clear which led to me being called a warmonger and my dear old mother silly.
So tell me what do we do about IS?
Doesn't the other thread already contain a few options?
Schoolboy error, how did I post this in the wrong forum, people might think I actually ride my bike.
Mods Please move this to the chat forum.
Why do people think they can solve problems like IS? It's not like sorting out getting a project back on track.
But if we need suggestions I'd say follow something that worked well
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan#Western_influence
Flat mount?
Doesn't the other thread already contain a few options?
Not many no.
The overriding consensus is no we should not bomb but not many alternatives were given.
No pudding till they start playing nicely with the infidels
No, I want to know if someone had a better idea on what to do not just what not to do.
Offer them nectar points?
Dont chop anyones head off for a week and they get double bubble?
Chip, they don't have a real alternative except hope the problem goes away. Belgium had nothing to do with Iraq etc but they have a hotbed of Islamist extremists in their midst.
My 2 cents is you eradicate IS militarily, the most expedient way is to do that by supporting (indirectly) Assad, Iran and Russia. Stop funding the FSA to allow Assad to focus on IS. Support Kurds and Iraqis to drive IS out of Mosul and surrounding area.
It's my view the splinter groups in Siani, Libya and Tunisia will be significantly weakened and more easily defeated without the "control centre" in Syria/Iraq.
The other significant problem is dealing with the significant minority of Muslims living liberal western countries who reject our way of life and values but are well aware than the alternative life in the countries of their ethnicity is far worse.
Been going on for hundreds of years already. Just the latest chapter and better weapons.
Will probably only end when one of the many groups/ countries involved goes nuclear so everyone else does too.
Not pessimism, a possible reality in the medium term.
Or go post mount.
Just turn the other cheek, they'll get tired eventually then bugger off & annoy someone else.
I think you should get Andrew Lloyd Webber in ....after all he sorted out
How do we solve a problem like Maria ...didn't he?? 😀
Send in The A-Team.
30 kiloton should do it ?'!
chip - Member
No, I want to know if someone had a better idea on what to do not just what not to do.
OK but your premise is that there is a solution, if you cling to the idea it can be fixed then it probably won't end well.
Laying it out we have several groups out there, ranked from people you would cross the street to avoid to potentially want to shoot on site, picking the least worst to support isn't that good and political suicide once you get some bad publicity ie UK Guns kill babies.
Even if you could get rid of IS how do you know you have? If it's an idea it can grow and come back/resurface.
If you do get rid of one the civil war that follows would probably be another bloodbath, basically wiping out the 3rd party so we can get the original one on one fight back on.
We could invade and take control, that would be a bloodbath.
I cant begin to think of an answer.
The reality is a democratic and "civilized" world will not pay the price it would take to solve the fundamental problems which lead to IS and will no doubt lead to what follows. Any western involvement in the area is inherently toxic at this point. Hell, even non-involvment is!
In that vein, I don't think there is an answer either to be honest.
I like the way that you've already specified that doing nothing is not an option, when it clearly is. The odd terrorist attack is always going to happen. We live with it like we do with all the people who die in car accidents or commit suicide. Or.....
We go at the heart of the problem and bomb Saudi instead. Leave ISIS to Putin.
We live with it like we do with all the people who die in car accidents or commit suicide. Or.....
Haaaa..... hate to say it, but until militants get hold of dirty bombs/ nukes etc. I think the best we can hope for is small numbers getting killed in at least limited attacks each year. As previous post alludes to.
I really cant believe Ive just typed that. I really do think that is the climate we have entered though.
We can just attempt to stop most attacks and just hope to be somewhere else for the rest. The West just hasn't got the stomach for true Total War. Don't think I have either.
Halt supply of weapons and ammunition to the area, strangle them economically.
That's the most efficient solution to any conflict, however, due to the real drivers of government foreign policy (the arms industry plays a big part, as does long term strategy for corporate and geopolitical concerns) it is not one that is likely to be be broadcast prominently through the state media or indeed become a reality any time soon.
On top of that, sanctioning Saudi Arabia and preventing promotion of Wahhabism would go a long way to curbing the spread of extremism...
Before you even try to solve a problem like ISIS you have to stop creating the conditions for ISIS to thrive in. So no to bombing them it just creates a sense of grievance, martyrs and ultimately recruits for ISIS. Then you stop funding them. When you have done both of these then you might have a chance of sorting out ISIS
You don't have to have an alternative to know a proposed course of action is wrong.
Also 'doing nothing' can also be 'thinking about alternatives' or 'not knee jerking'.
For the region, The issues we have here are nothing new. It's been beset with tribal conflict for thousands of years and every so often, people from western Europe have, for various reasons, religion, territory, oil etc, gone in to 'sort' what they perceived to be the problem. Except how does a historically cultural problem get sorted?
Ultimately, fighters gonna fight.
As it stands, it's a far cry to see a peaceful outcome. The real danger will be, although IMHO unlikely, that IS manage to unite the Arab states against the rest of the non Muslim world.
I've tried to think of a solution, but we're talking ideology here and we all know how difficult it can be to persuade someone otherwise.
Most of the brake manufacturers do IS to post mount adopters. It is getting more unusual to see IS now
A simple case of doing the exact opposite of what's already been done.
But it's not going to happen is it? JC is on his hind legs with this one - how do you get behind a man who has been crafted to look like a loon? Well the truth is, his approach is exactly what we need. To go in the opposite direction.
I don't think it's a conspiracy to say our leaders seem to like kicking up a war for some obscenely tangled-up logic and they don't have the capacity to handle what they've created. The west created the conditions for a cancer to thrive.
JC is on his hind legs with this one - how do you get behind a man who has been crafted to look like a loon?
That's not his biggest problem here, he has set out his stall before questions were asked and his answer regardless will be no.
It's all about material values. I like IS for steel frames or forks.
Start by stop buying their oil and selling them guns and Toyotas.
Take a long term view to build stable democracies with functioning economies. I don't believe that the solution to this is to kill all the existing members in a Bbattle but to starve them of new recruits. It seems, Jordan being relatively stable and prosperous has far fewer issues than its neighbours.
There would need to be some peacekeeping security to enable investment and aid. We've got money to blow shut up, we have money to build.
That's not his biggest problem here, he has set out his stall before questions were asked and his answer regardless will be no.
I think the questions and answers have been fairly evident for a long time now. How much longer do you need to draw on history for your answer?
A bit less me culture and human solidarity.
The real danger will be, although IMHO unlikely, that IS manage to unite the Arab states against the rest of the non Muslim world.
Sunni uniting with Shias is most unlikely. It wont ever happen just like we wont stop a percentage of our population being willing to bomb anyone for anything even if it wont make us safer. Also other states would need to cede power to ISis leaders so wont happen on that level.
No 2 countries with a Maccy D's have ever gone to war with each other. FACT! What Syria needs is...
[img] 
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Job jobbed!
Failing that....
Halt supply of weapons and ammunition to the area, strangle them economically.That's the most efficient solution to any conflict, however, due to the real drivers of government foreign policy (the arms industry plays a big part, as does long term strategy for corporate and geopolitical concerns) it is not one that is likely to be be broadcast prominently through the state media or indeed become a reality any time soon.
On top of that, sanctioning Saudi Arabia and preventing promotion of Wahhabism would go a long way to curbing the spread of extremism...
Very difficult to argue with any of that. JHJ's most rational post ever. 🙂
Eliminate as much as possible of IS high command militarily, then negotiations with all the various regional/ethnic groups, may have to redraw a few borders. Then implement local democratic governments, but keep some control and provide peacekeeping troops throughout the region for at least a generation. Trillions of pounds/dollars of Western aid and investment, a lot of it aimed at education, infrastructure, building a whole new economy. Commit to it for two generations at least. That, if all done well, could have a chance of fixing some of the issues.
I have no idea, but it strikes me the last time a large amount of people were radicalised to commit murder on a massive scale by a fascist death cult was in WW2.
So ,whatever the Germans did ,postWW2 ,to end the Nazi belief system ,a lot of their population supported ,could be worth thinking about maybe?
@pleader, many Middle Eastern countries don't want democracy. Also they have more than enough oil and gas wealth to pay for education, infrastructure etc, why should we ?
@senor, they where pursueded by a second crushing military defeat
Very difficult to argue with any of that. JHJ's most rational post ever.
Oi cheeky chops, all of my posts are rational, I'm just too ahead of my time for most of you to realize it...
@pleader, many Middle Eastern countries don't want democracy. Also they have more than enough oil and gas wealth to pay for education, infrastructure etc, why should we ?
That's why we need at least two generations of education, so they do want democracy, democracy and more stuff. The thread is a hypothetical, what would we need to do to 'solve the problem' of IS, I believe the only way to eliminate it entirely is to turn them into good little western capitalists, and if, as currently, they have no interest in doing it themselves, then if we want to 'solve the problem', we will have to do it ourselves. Rich, well educated (in a western/secular tradition) people with good jobs have much less desire to blow themselves up.
It is pretty much what happened in Germany after WW2, we took full control, gradually ceding political power back to the locals while maintaining military control for a long time. Along with massive investment via the Marshall Plan.
simples...round them all up and cut their nuts off...so the 72 virgins will be very disappointed...then cut off their beards and call them Daesh!
What we need to do is install a few hardline dictators in the region . People a bit like Saddam Hussein and Gadaffi who will commit a few minor atrocities in their own countries but will be able to keep the various factions under control . Oh wait a minute we got rid of them . Then all we have to do is sort out the Israel/Palestine problem and the job's a good un . You can't force democracy on a country or it isn't democracy .
Continue the carnage until me and my pet tortoise, Garald, are the only ones left alive.
Continue the carnage until me and my pet tortoise, Garald, are the only ones left alive.
Garald will outlive you...so you might as well perish with the rest of us....saves him the heartache... 😛
I think you should get Andrew Lloyd Webber in ....after all he sorted out
How do we solve a problem like Maria ...didn't he??
Er no. That would be Rogers and Hammerstein.
the best approach to eradicating something is to create as many threads about it as possible on STW.
if you look closely we are half way to the end of BlackFriday.
The incessant what tyre threads eventually sounded the bell for 26" wheels.
Iv'e got a feeling the trouble will end when the Qatar oil pipeline to the EU is complete!
I've long considered this and there are two basic issues, the first is to stop intefering in their environment, and the second is to put our own house in order locally.
The thing we have more to fear is the home grown disaffected, now we either have to review our own moral compasses and not provide examples of why we are the devils spawn, with our open drunken immorality spewing out onto the streets night after night. Why would any group of religious types like their young to adopt our ways? Lots of them are offended by open homo and heterosexual promiscuity and all those other new benefits of having dumped our religious beliefs, easy to point at and sway young minds in an environment like Islam with the promise of a new idealistic state worth fighting and dying for. Face it only a generation ago the then youth fought for God Country and a better tomorrow.
So if you have decided to accept multi cultures, then you have not to encourage opposites nor discourage the religious beliefs of one group whilst pandering to those of another. Or provide a level playing field and ban all religion, fundamentally it is the root cause of the problem.
As to the current situation with ISIS, they are genuinely awaiting the armies of Rome and an apocalypse, if you study their teachings, which means boots on the ground, nothing will stop until they are beaten militarily.
That's it really, now we as a society are not going to tolerate a return to puritanism or sharia so that needs explaining hard and fast and the secular nature of our situation reinforced hard. That means fewer mosques and fewer clerics, be firm, but fair, their teachings are contrary to this nations evolved state, take them elsewhere.
Or adopt and reinforce Christian puritanism and a return to victorian ideals, a little truth, honesty, prayer, and ethical conduct wouldn't go amiss particularly amongst our ruling caste, that way no one side has to endure a different set of ideals to the other and the seeds of radicalisation cannot be planted. You can't have it both ways or you get what we have now.
I voted "No" in the other thread, but that however does not mean i also think we should do nothing, in my opinion what we can add to the current situation by carrying out air strikes can be summed up as nothing positive.
Oddly there is very few posts on either this thread or that other one that i disagree with, they all (mostly) have their merits and make some good points. However before IS can be defeated all of these need to happen in my opinion:
Stop Turkey bombing the Kurds
Stop Russia bombing the FSA
Negotiate a cease fire between the FSA and Assad's forces
Once the above are achieved then there will be sufficient ground forces to confront IS on numerous fronts with sufficient air power used to support them to defeat them militarily. Then we can move onto the longer term problem of a long term cease fire between the FSA and Assad and the ending of hostilities between Shia and Sunni.
The first part of this is feasible but alas i fear unlikely, and considering that the second part is going to be much harder, maybe even impossible at the moment.
And it's for those reasons that i'm out.