My boy’s fall soccer season starts this morning. And I am a co-coach, so I gotta go get the uniforms and whatnot. Maybe you can talk about John Kerry’s effort to get a cease fire in Syria.
And don’t shoot anyone in the face.
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BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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Horrible story about the despicable people who inhabit the US military. They are mostly psychopaths or naive these days.
Poor bastard this kid… What made him think he had any place in the marines?
http://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/wayne/2016/09/08/marines-discipline-raheel-siddiqui/9
0066786/
Even worse… This drill sergeant allegedly put another kid in a dryer and turned it on. Psychopaths.
https:/www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/09/09/ohio-city-shares-shocking-photos-of-adults-wh
o-overdosed-with-a-small-child-in-their-car
I’m not sure why we other to save people like that. I know… I’m a horrible person now too.
I hope it’s a great game for your son and the other players.
Here’s what The Guardian has to say today about the Kerry/Lavrov talks:
LINK
The US and Russia have agreed a tentative ceasefire deal for Syria, intended to lead the way to a joint US-Russian air campaign against Islamic State and other extremist groups and new negotiations on the country’s political future.
The deal was announced by John Kerry, the US secretary of state, and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, on Friday night after 13 hours of talks in Geneva and a tense wait while Kerry consulted others in his administration with a phone call to Washington.
Both were cautious in describing the deal but said it was a possible “turning point” after more than five years of a brutal war that has killed more than 400,000 people.
“No one is building this based on trust,” Kerry said. “It is based on oversight, compliance, mutual interest. This is an opportunity, and not more than that until it becomes a reality.”
Lavrov described the situation in Syria as a “quagmire” of multiple warring parties, some of whom would seek to undermine the US-Russian deal. For that reason, he said, much of the deal would remain secret to prevent efforts at sabotage. But the foreign minister said Russia had secured the agreement of Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Damascus.
Russia will do “what depends on us”, Lavrov promised, but noted “not everything does”.
Syria’s mainstream opposition welcomed the proposed deal on Saturday, saying the ceasefire could eventually end the suffering of civilians.
Bassma Kodmani, a spokeswoman for the opposition High Negotiations Committee (HNC), said the body welcomed the deal “if it is going to be enforced”.
In a statement she said the onus was on Russia because its influence “was the only way to get the regime to comply”.
As part of the complex agreement, a seven-day pause in the fighting would begin on Monday evening, the beginning of the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha. During that time, the Syrian army would relax its stranglehold on rebel-held areas of Aleppo, allowing humanitarian aid to be delivered to the starving city, while rebels would stop fighting around government areas.
The Syrian regime would suspend airstrikes, the main cause of civilian deaths, on rebel-held areas around the country.
If the ceasefire holds, the Russian and US military would start planning joint air operations against extremist groups, including Isis and al-Nusra Front (also referred to as the Front for the Conquest of Syria). The Syrian air force would stay out of zones being targeted by the US and Russia. The US is also aiming to convince other rebel groups to separate themselves from al-Nusra Front where they have been fighting the regime together.
“Today the United States and Russia are announcing a plan which we hope will reduce violence, reduce suffering and resume movement toward a negotiated peace and a transition in Syria … that, if followed, has the ability to provide a turning point, a moment of change,” Kerry said.
Lavrov said he hoped the ceasefire would lead to the prompt resumption of negotiations over Syria’s political future. Kerry said he had been in contact with the opposition groups in the HNC during the week and they were prepared to take part in such talks if the ceasefire held and humanitarian aid was delivered to besieged civilians.
Staffan de Mistura, the UN’s special envoy for Syria, called the agreement a window of opportunity and said he would consult the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, on the timing of new political negotiations.
Delineating the zones deemed to be controlled by al-Nusra Front was one of the thorniest issues in the negotiations, as the extremist group has fought with a range of other rebel organisations on different fronts in western Syria. Disentangling them from their allies on the ground will be one of the biggest challenges of maintaining the ceasefire deal.
Barrel bombs. Chlorine gas attacks. Beheadings. Half the population displaced. I read elsewhere how some general with the Assad forces was blithely remarking that well, Lebanon’s civil war dragged on for 16 years, so perhaps we have another 10 years of war here in Syria.
Ah, yes, barrel bombs in Syria, bad. Barrel bombs in Yemen, good. Esp since it is our ordnance.
It is curious that they single out JaN (along with IS) for exclusion from the approved militia list, when JaN is ideologically identical to Ahrar al Sham and Jaysh al Islam, Turkey/Saudi’s little pets?
If Ergodan is happy, Kurds will be crying, probably. Did they tell him he can keep his tanks in Syria?
I just keep thinking all bombs are bad, but so many want to draw a distinction… What’s up with that?
Mino: If you somehow inferred that I think barrel bombs are OK in Yemen, then you have a very odd way of reasoning.
I thought you were being a morality-based differentiator. My mistake.
you do seem convinced that barrel bombs in Syria are justification for the U.S. overthrowing their government. Do you feel the same way about Yemen, where the U.S. is supporting their government?
WTF? Where did I express any support for the US government overthrowing the Syrian government? I copied verbatim an article from The Guardian. I expressed dismay about what has happened to the people of Syria. That’s it.
I understand the game being played here: You insinuate that if I don’t express outrage about some event, then I must be in favor of it. Fascinating logic. I also didn’t express my outrage about poisoned water in Flint, or rising sea level, or sexual violence, or tooth decay, or about 99.999999999% of all events going on in the world today. Why don’t you go ahead and condemn me for that, too.
War is politics by other means (Clausewitz). When those other means disappear and politics return, the war ends. That is more significant for the long term than recriminations.
At this point, the coverage of the Syrian conflict is so rife with propaganda about facts on the ground and journalists are attacked, detained, or killed, especially those who might offer and independent view, that the information about atrocities tend to look like incitement of US intervention.
No doubt all military men and militias have some vested interest in prolonging war as was done in Lebanon. And the sponsors of proxy wars tend also to like to keep them going. For the US and Russia to be agreeing runs counter to that.
The US clearly has recognized that the chaos in Syria and Iraq spawns terrorism that can blow back in the US, and Russia understands that many of the rebels against Assad and fighters for Daesh are in fact Russian nationals from muslim areas of Russia. Cooperation with the US is necessary to prevent their slipping back through Turkey to Russia.
Same concerns that China is showing. http://english.alarabiya.net/en/perspective/analysis/2016/03/02/China-s-proxy-war-in-Syria-Revealing
-the-role-of-Uighur-fighters-.html
Damn, I did not know about the involvement of Uighurs in Syria. Fascinating. Thank you for the link.
Except it (Syria civil war) really hasn’t bothered anyone in the USA. France and Belgium and Maybe Germany. Not the USA.
It is surely true that our general foreign policy spawned 9/11 and a few other attacks… But so have gang warfare and crazy people and guns galore been responsible for violence and injury here. If I were going to address the threats to American’s well being, I wouldn’t even think about Syria.
thanks for posting this.
Anyone else think the biggest part of this announcement is what isn’t in it?
I don’t think anything positive can be achieved in Syria without the cooperation of Turkey, and I don’t see much evidence of that.
Well, govt forces had recaptured lost ground and re-established the siege. I even saw mention of Iranian military making an appearance in Aleppo.
So will this be like the last one–which rebels used to resupply? I only saw that Erdogan was pleased with it…probably means everyone will continue to ignore his tanks inside Syria shooting at Kurds.
Is supposedly five papers to be announced.
Am reading that the ceasefire did not include Aleppo, but that a humanitarian corridor was being opened in Syrian’s lines.
Anyone know more?
My sense was that Turkey didn’t really give a damn about Syria except insofar as the “threat” posed by Kurds is concerned.
It’s truly a sad situation. The Turkish government flushed a nascent peace deal with Kurds in Turkey because it allowed Erdogan to stir up nationalist sentiment and win a majority in the last election (after the previous one had led to a stalemate). Turkey could have set an example by guaranteeing minority rights and integrating the Kurds. But Erdogan, like many of his predecessors, defaulted to repression.
two thoughts 1- they tell us they haven’t said what’s in it; we don’t know what the Turkish component is
2- thought 1 with respect to pressure on Turkey,
i.e. we don’t know
This radio story is inspirational:
http://www.npr.org/2016/09/10/493399783/in-wake-of-international-tragedy-rerouted-passengers-find-re
silience-in-gander-o
Peace and love to all.
Events have revealed that these two are not strange bedfellows at all:
Julian Assange is not an honest actor, does not stand for the issues he claims to stand for, and he is attempting to manipulate the American electorate so they will elect Donald Trump President. It’s the issue that animates him this year.
The guy has been hiding out for several years to avoid facing rape charges. RAPE CHARGES. He can sling all the bullshit he wants about being kidnapped by the United States, or about Sweden sending him to the United States, but the fact remains that he is sheltering from accusations of a violent crime.
Took Finn about 45 seconds to score the first goal of the season, then added two more and a beautiful assist off a corner kick. He came to play.
Chip off the old block?
I feel good for your whole family.
Wow…Proud Papa