UniversalRinging wrote:Alex66: I just read about that this morning. I recently read a bit of analysis (can't remember where, otherwise I'd link) which compared the current geopolitical situation to the one just before WWI and Jesus f**king Christ does that seem apt today.
Markfiend: Lol. I think you give him too much credit. Doesn't seem like this narcissistic amoral jackass actually makes decisions based on strategy, actions, consequences or anything else that would normally enter into a world leader's mind. I can't think of any motivation besides the attitude of: f**k it, let's show the world how tough I am. And the rest of the ghouls in positions of power are just letting it happen because the side-effects of instability line up with their private interests. Aka war is profitable.
This is just my muddled, sleep deprived take. Honestly can someone explain this s**t? Like, WHY?
Why? Because there's nothing like a good war to stiffen the sinews and summon up the blood. Thatcher knew it in 82, GWBush in 2002 - Trump needs a nice fat war to guarantee his win in 2020. He needs to side with the Israelis who guarantee nice fat dividends to the arms companies in the US (you want perverse? how's this: under the Camp David Peace Accord the US gives Israel north of $3bn a year. Almost every penny of this comes back to the US in the form of military contracts, in effect subsidising the US armaments industry (which includes Boeing. And yet the US has the gall to cry foul about the subsidies that the EU grants to Airbus). And getting up the noses of the Iranians suits him well, since as far as he's concerned all Muslims are terrorists (neatly ignoring the fact that Iran is Shi'a and pretty much every fundamentalist terror group is Sunni, and that they're largely funded by Saudi Arabia, but we can't p*ss off the Saudis for fear that they turn the taps off and cause a spike in oil prices).
The short answer to why? Well, because why not? And because not going to war is way more effort than going to war. You go to war over the Who and the What - it takes way more effort to understand the Why. And yet, when you understand the Why, you realise that the case for war is weak and untenable. The difference is between Information and Intelligence. I'll tell you a little story:
Many many years ago, when I was a mere stripling of an Evil Bastard, my godfather was an officer in the Royal Artillery. We used to go and visit him and his family when they were stationed at SHAPE in Belgium. His C/O was a guy called Frank Kitson. Kitson wrote the book (quite literally - his stuff is still used to teach courses at Sandhurst and West Point) on counter-terror - he'd served in Northern Ireland, Kenya during the Mau Mau uprising, and sundry other commands. In his view every non-regular fighting force (i.e. paramilitaries) could be dealt with in the same manner as a street gang, because they had similar command and cell structures.
Anyway, I remember being in Kitson's office - I was maybe 6 or 7 years old, probably playing with cars on his rug - he was babysitting for my sister and me. He was working on something, and he said, "Do you know the difference between information and intelligence?" I said I didn't. He sent his AdC down to the mess, and he came back with a tomato and a slice of melon. "Ok," he said, "you know what these are, right?" Yes, it's a tomato and a slice of melon. "Well done, we'll make an officer of you yet. Now, here's some information you didn't know: a tomato is a fruit, not a vegetable." Err...ok? "Right, now I want you to imagine that you're helping your mum to make a fruit salad. So, here's my question: which of these things are you going to put in it? You can choose either the tomato, or the melon. Which is it going to be?"
"Well duh - the melon, obvy."
"OK - but why not the tomato? That's a fruit too."
"Yeah, but...well, a tomato doesn't belong in a fruit salad."
"And there, young Bastard, is the difference between information and intelligence. You have the information - a tomato is a fruit - but you also have the intelligence to know that it doesn't belong in a fruit salad. If you're going to make good decisions then you need to have both of those things."
That conversation happened 40 years ago, but Uncle Frank's "Tomato Analogy" has stayed with me - and any time I hear a politician promote something misguided and ill-informed I wonder whether he would benefit from the same lesson.