That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons bring us some web forums whereupon we can gather
http://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/
I agree - I thought we might go in a positive way under the new government - I guess not.GreenGoo wrote:Don't worry, we'll pick up the tab for a bunch of refugees.
For the record, meeting our international obligations have been at an all time low during the last ten years.
THAT has been embarrassing.
I'll just be happy if we're not blamed for the next drowned child that washes ashore.deucalion wrote:I agree - I thought we might go in a positive way under the new government - I guess not.GreenGoo wrote:Don't worry, we'll pick up the tab for a bunch of refugees.
For the record, meeting our international obligations have been at an all time low during the last ten years.
THAT has been embarrassing.
You know what's an embarrassment? Ignorant chickenhawks that don't bother with things like learning the facts before blathering on about being embarrassed by their country. At this point, all we know is that Canada will be withdrawing the 6 CF-18s that have been participating in air strikes against IS. However, other elements contributing to the effort will be remaining, such as the advisors we have on the ground in Iraq. Try showing a little fucking pride in what they are doing for the world, and the sacrifices they make on your behalf -- even though you can't be bothered to notice that they even exist.deucalion wrote:I am not sure what the correct path to dealing with a threat like ISIS but I sure wish that Canada would not pull out of the area and abrogate it's international responsibilities in this situation. I think it is kind of embarrassing that (as a Canadian) we are walking away from helping the US try and contain the situation in a combat role. Not that we were a big contributor but I think it is a good idea to support the US and international community in efforts like this as much as we can.
Anyway thanks to the US OO members that pay taxes and / or contribute otherwise to combating / addressing this terrible situation. Hope we contribute more again someday ourselves.
Wow... sorry didn't mean to bring out such a spirited reaction.Max Peck wrote:deucalion wrote: If you really give a shit what the Canadian Forces have actually been doing, you can start reading here.
Lol. Who knew calling the actions of the new liberal government an embarrassment approx. 1 week after it came into power would cause an emotional response? Actions that were part of it's campaign platform of promises. A campaign that resulted in a significant portion of the population voting for said party.deucalion wrote:Wow... sorry didn't mean to bring out such a spirited reaction.Max Peck wrote:deucalion wrote: If you really give a shit what the Canadian Forces have actually been doing, you can start reading here.
Well yes but a majority of Canadian's do support extending the military action against ISIS - so it is not like you should be surprised at our reaction - yet apparently you are shockedGreenGoo wrote:Lol. Who knew calling the actions of the new liberal government an embarrassment approx. 1 week after it came into power would cause an emotional response? Actions that were part of it's campaign platform of promises. A campaign that resulted in a significant portion of the population voting for said party.deucalion wrote:Wow... sorry didn't mean to bring out such a spirited reaction.Max Peck wrote:deucalion wrote: If you really give a shit what the Canadian Forces have actually been doing, you can start reading here.
Shocked. I'm shocked that anyone would take umbrage at such reasoned criticism.
. And if you think that withdrawing active military support against ISIS is one of the main reasons that the Liberals got elected well I guess I would beg to differ.If it's any consolation, I thought your post was fairly innocuous.deucalion wrote:Wow... sorry didn't mean to bring out such a spirited reaction.Max Peck wrote:deucalion wrote: If you really give a shit what the Canadian Forces have actually been doing, you can start reading here.
If you read more closely, you'll see that I was shocked in the same way that you were surprised that anyone would take umbrage to your fact based criticism of the actions of our week old government. My reference to the campaign promise was to illustrate that this shouldn't be news to anyone as concerned about Syria as you seem to be, and given your concerns, you'd probably already understand why the Liberals promised to do this, and why they did it.deucalion wrote:Well yes but a majority of Canadian's do support extending the military action against ISIS - so it is not like you should be surprised at our reaction - yet apparently you are shockedGreenGoo wrote:Lol. Who knew calling the actions of the new liberal government an embarrassment approx. 1 week after it came into power would cause an emotional response? Actions that were part of it's campaign platform of promises. A campaign that resulted in a significant portion of the population voting for said party.deucalion wrote:Wow... sorry didn't mean to bring out such a spirited reaction.Max Peck wrote:deucalion wrote: If you really give a shit what the Canadian Forces have actually been doing, you can start reading here.
Shocked. I'm shocked that anyone would take umbrage at such reasoned criticism.
As a matter of policy, I don't strongly care one way or the other about the CF-18s being withdrawn. They were deployed as a symbolic gesture by Harper so that he could play the part of being an international tough guy, not because it made any real sense from a strategic or tactical perspective. A half dozen planes conducting airstrikes without an accompanying ground force is never going to defeat IS, but it is a drain on operational resources. To the extent that I actively support the withdrawal, it would be because I approve of politicians actually doing what they said they would do when they ran for the office. The advisors on the ground are far more valuable in achieving the goal of pushing back IS than the CF-18s were ever going to be on their own, and so far as I know Trudeau has stated that the advisors will remain. What I objected to was your claim that we were completely pulling out when the truth is that we are not, we're just not going to continue pouring resources into the portion of the operation that is a token effort, for show rather than for effect.deucalion wrote:Wow... sorry didn't mean to bring out such a spirited reaction.Max Peck wrote:deucalion wrote: If you really give a shit what the Canadian Forces have actually been doing, you can start reading here.
I am actually very proud of what the Canadian Armed Forces have done with limited resources under the Harper government and I think it has been very suspect and sometimes shameful the way that the Conservatives have treated the serving military and our veterans.
I get that you think that withdrawing our CF-18's from a combat role is good thing but I am not sure why? Other than railing at me for being a redneck ignorant chickenhawk - I guess that puts me in my place and all is fine from there. Must be because I live in Saskatchewan
I believe that we should put more money in the military and expand our combat role where there is an international effort to contain bad situations like ISIS but I guess you perhaps disagree. I feel that Canada should pull its weight internationally in military situations and peace-keeping situations.
I guess I feel that that I am taking more pride in what we have done for the world historically than what you are acknowledging because I want Canada to continue playing an active military role and do it better in the future with more resources while it seems like you want to take a step back. And that is fine but there is no need for all the extreme rhetoric.
Just to touch on this a bit. Our use of CF-18's is almost always a show of solidarity and support for whatever operation they are sent on. We don't have enough of them, and few of them work any more, to make a "significant" impact on the operation. Particularly when they are rarely (ever?) used outside of joint operations with the American air force. Meaning, if the Americans need more planes in the air they'll just put more planes in the air, not rely on Canada's small cadre of modern (ish) planes. So the use of our CF-18's is almost always political. It helps that they are great planes that can do a lot, well.Max Peck wrote:
As a matter of policy, I don't strongly care one way or the other about the CF-18s being withdrawn. They were deployed as a symbolic gesture by Harper so that he could play the part of being an international tough guy, not because it made any real sense from a strategic or tactical perspective. A half dozen planes conducting airstrikes without an accompanying ground force is never going to defeat IS, but it is a drain on operational resources.
Great, leave it to Quebecer living in Saskatchewan to derail a perfectly good thread on IS with a college rape culture link...tjg_marantz wrote:American Colleges are as bad as ISIS at promoting rape culture.
Thanks MsMagazine! LOL
Douchebags.
Max Peck wrote:Great, leave it to Quebecer living in Saskatchewan to derail a perfectly good thread on IS with a college rape culture link...tjg_marantz wrote:American Colleges are as bad as ISIS at promoting rape culture.
Thanks MsMagazine! LOL
Douchebags.
Although, to be fair, Islamic State literally is a rape culture.
I love that when I googled Moosomin to see if that was an actual place or a slang term, it showed me a map of the town with four elements on it: the city name, the two major roads running through town, and the Tim Hortons location.Max Peck wrote:(Moosomin represent, yo!).
Per the RCAF page (under tech Specs), you have 77 CF-188s.GreenGoo wrote:Don't get me wrong, I love our CF-18s. I fell in love with them in the late 80's and they are a source of pride for me in our military. but they are not vital, they are expensive, they are suffering maintenance issues and for every one we can get flying the Americans can get 20+ (I don't know the exact number, it's rhetoric).
I'll also admit that the CF 18s were in far heavier use than I originally thought.As part of Joint Task Force-Iraq, Air Task Force-Iraq (ATF-I) contributes to coalition air operations against the so-called ISIS.This mission extension and expansion allows the CAF to strike the so-called ISIS targets in both Iraq and Syria. The use of air power contributes to the destruction of the so-called ISIS infrastructure and equipment, denying them the military means to attack Iraqi security forces or coalition assets.
The ATF-I includes:
six CF-18 Hornet fighter aircraft;
one CC-150T Polaris aerial refueller to support coalition air operations;
two CP-140M Aurora surveillance aircraft to contribute to coalition intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities; and
aircrew support elements.
That's a butt load of sorties considering that the CF 18s only became active in this mission during November 2014.Attention: Latest News - Air operations
As of 10 November 2015, Air Task Force-Iraq conducted 1726 sorties:
CF-188 Hornet fighters conducted 1105 sorties;
CC-150T Polaris aerial refueller conducted 301 sorties, delivering some 17,860,000 pounds of fuel to coalition aircraft; and
CP-140 Aurora aircraft conducted 320 reconnaissance missions.
Fair enough.Max Peck wrote: I didn't call you a redneck, although I do think you're ignorant -- not stupid, just not well informed on the issues you've been raising. I've been providing you with reference citations specifically so that you can acquaint yourself with some verifiable facts. When I stop doing that, you'll know that I've written you off as a troll.
I didn't find any of the questions particularly difficult, although some were asking what kind of horse I should buy before I knew what my cart was going to be and what it was going to carry.Moliere wrote:10 Questions for Clinton After the Paris Massacre
Nah, in an actual Canadian flame war everyone apologizes, shakes hands and hugs it out at the end.Kraken wrote:Canadian flame wars.
On Thursday, eight days after Justin Trudeau took office, two CF-18 fighters with laser-guided bombs screamed above the desert city of Sinjar, in northern Iraq. Below lay a crucial artery for the so-called Islamic State: Highway 47, the main east-west route between ISIS headquarters in Raqqah, Syria, and the ISIS-held city of Mosul, Iraq. On the ground, Kurdish forces were mounting an assault on the ISIS garrison at Sinjar in a bid to cut its supply line. The Canadian pilots' task was to take out an obstacle to the Kurdish advance: an Islamic State unit dug in to the east of Sinjar at Tal Afar. A second target was an ISIS ammunition store close to Sinjar itself. Both targets were hit. The counteroffensive worked. With the aid of the Canadian, as well as U.S., pilots, plus Canadian special forces trainers on the ground, the Kurdish forces drove ISIS out of Sinjar. It was hailed as a "liberation" by the remaining Yazidi community, who had been massacred and enslaved by the Islamic State.
But... what happened to Justin Trudeau's pledge to bring the CF-18s home and end their participation in the war on ISIS? And will that pledge survive the massacre in Paris?
ISIS targeted Paris because it is bombing them. If Canada withdraws, the terrorists win. At least in Canada they do.GreenGoo wrote:6 CF 18's couldn't and didn't prevent Paris and won't prevent the next one. I fail to see how Paris changes anything with regard to policy in Syria.
That would be the political spin, from some quarters at least. (For those who don't know Mr. Kenney, he's one of the likely picks as Harper's replacement.)Kraken wrote:ISIS targeted Paris because it is bombing them. If Canada withdraws, the terrorists win. At least in Canada they do.GreenGoo wrote:6 CF 18's couldn't and didn't prevent Paris and won't prevent the next one. I fail to see how Paris changes anything with regard to policy in Syria.
At least according to the CBC article that Max Peck posted, Canadian CF-18s apparently played an important role in helping the Kurds drive ISIS out of Sinjar, Iraq. The potential way in which Canadian bombers could help prevent further attacks by Paris is by helping additional anti-ISIS offensives, eventually destroying the Islamic State. That would both destroy operational bases for further attacks and destroy the underlying rationale for such attacks (because there would be no Caliphate to attack on behalf of).GreenGoo wrote:6 CF 18's couldn't and didn't prevent Paris and won't prevent the next one. I fail to see how Paris changes anything with regard to policy in Syria.
CF-18s struck 2 targets in support of the assault on Sinjar, out of possibly 250 air strikes in support of the operation. This was an example of how air strikes can be used to good effect (i.e. in support of ground forces), but Canadian air power per se was a very modest factor in the overall success of the endeavour.El Guapo wrote:At least according to the CBC article that Max Peck posted, Canadian CF-18s apparently played an important role in helping the Kurds drive ISIS out of Sinjar, Iraq. The potential way in which Canadian bombers could help prevent further attacks by Paris is by helping additional anti-ISIS offensives, eventually destroying the Islamic State. That would both destroy operational bases for further attacks and destroy the underlying rationale for such attacks (because there would be no Caliphate to attack on behalf of).GreenGoo wrote:6 CF 18's couldn't and didn't prevent Paris and won't prevent the next one. I fail to see how Paris changes anything with regard to policy in Syria.
Of course, that wouldn't end terrorism, or even Islamist terrorism, but it's a plausible way in which Canadian military action could end ISIS terrorism. With the usual caveats about the risks and unpredictability of war, naturally.
Though to be clear, continued anti-ISIS action probably increases the odds that ISIS terrorism will happen in Canada, at least in the short term.
's not enough for Muslims to condemn terrorism, such as what occurred Friday in Paris, a brutal ISIS assault that left 129 dead and many more injured.
We must build communities in which extremists cannot find a foothold, let alone a launching pad, to take their terror to the ends of the Earth. I don't mean to say Muslims are collectively or personally responsible. But I also can't tolerate the idea that we don't have a problem.
ISIS believes itself to be Islamic. The group is Muslim, after all. Members quote from our scripture. They claim to act in our name. They kill in the name of our faith. And they seek to recruit their murderers from our communities, even and perhaps especially in the West...
...The Islamic State is at war with how Muslims understand Islam.
And let me be clear here: They represent a mortal danger to Islam.
Whenever I teach on Islam, inevitably someone asks, "Well, what about such-and-such verse of the Quran?" The fact is, the people who argue about Islam using isolated verses of the Quran alone are usually Islamophobes or Islamic extremists.
I'm more concerned by the latter...
...The reason there are schools of Islamic law, no centralized authority in Islam, and so much debate and discussion between Muslims is because the premise where traditional Muslim scholars regularly begin is one that jihadists, and many Islamists, cannot abide:
The Quran contradicts itself. The Prophet Mohammed said conflicting things.
Merely citing what the Quran says, or what Mohammed taught, say doesn't mean much, since the Quran and Mohammed often appear to offer conflicting advice.
How you make sense of a vast corpus of texts -- intended for different situations and different contexts, anchored to different points in Mohammed's life, reflecting the circumstances of a small, 7th-century Arabian city -- requires years of deep learning, debate and a willingness to admit that we might be wrong.None of which ISIS is interested in...
...In ISIS' Islam, there's only black and white. Every text has just one meaning, and it's the meaning they prefer. In fact, in the terrorist group's reading, religion itself can only have one form, which is why ISIS might frequently invoke the Quran, but only the parts of it that support their extremist views.
Don't misunderstand my saying so: There's violence in the Quran, in the Islamic tradition, and in Islamic history. To deny that would be ridiculous.
But there are many more passages in the Quran that condemn violence, that note that God gives people the freedom to choose their faith, that it is not our job to impose religion on others, that killing a single innocent person is the same as killing every person. These verses are, however, nowhere to be found in ISIS propaganda. The group reads Islam selectively...
...Mohammed warned his followers that a people would arise "who read Quran," who would be more religiously observant than any around, but that "nothing of Islam would go past their throats" -- that is, they would talk the talk, but never walk the walk. In fact Mohammed described them not only as "the worst of all people, but the worst of all creation."
Russia's security chief says an act of terror brought down the Russian A321 airliner in Egypt last month, killing all 224 people on board. "Traces of foreign explosives" were found on debris from the Airbus plane, FSB chief Alexander Bortnikov told Russian President Vladimir Putin. Mr Putin vowed to "find and punish" those behind the attack over the Sinai peninsula. A branch of so-called Islamic State said it downed the plane. Nearly all the dead were Russians.
Mr Bortnikov said a bomb had been planted on board the Metrojet plane, equivalent to up to 1kg of TNT. The Kremlin website carried a transcript of the meeting. The bomb shattered the plane mid-air on 31 October, he said, "which explains the wide dispersal of fuselage pieces".
ISIS is on the rise in Afghanistan -- and they say they're getting young kids to join the jihad. In a special report, FRONTLINE correspondent Najibullah Quraishi reveals on film the degree to which ISIS is gaining a foothold in the country, and how they're focusing their efforts on training a new generation of jihadists. Then in Pt. 2, how one police unit in Pakistan is fighting the Taliban.
You might want to add Egypt and Libya to the mix too.GreenGoo wrote:I was just thinking this morning that we've been talking about Syria and Iraq but not Afghanistan.
Spoke Thought too soon.
It shows their total disconnect from reality. On the one hand they seem to be astute in terms of recruitment/PR and to some degree tactical operations. But on the other, they are a disparate collection of various sects living in a fantasyland.Moliere wrote:Islamic State Says It Has Executed Chinese and Norwegian Hostages
Uniting the world against a common enemy? It's like ISIS is secretly out to create world peace.