Inside ISIS Inc

edinburgher

A fascinating series in general (reading more than I should as work IT is playing silly beggars bar the internet)! Now I have no more free FT articles for the month

PasturesNew

They just kidnapped themselves some Royals. That'll bring them in some cash. Or somebody did.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3362669/Qatari-royals-26-hunters-kidnapped-gunmen-Iraq.html

Generali

edinburgher wrote: »

A fascinating series in general (reading more than I should as work IT is playing silly beggars bar the internet)! Now I have no more free FT articles for the month

Since the FT started the current fremium scheme I've collected a new login at each job. I get 40 free articles a month as a result

zagubov

Reminds me of all those radio documentaries about Al-Quaeda back in the day, and how it was all run on the same model as a business organisation, with forms for this and that.

It's like the James Bond movies where the biggest enemies of Western civilisation turn out to be fascistic millonaires hiding in underground complexes conspiring to overthrow governments.

It's interesting how these "businesses" compete and have fortunes that rise and fall. Let's hope that ISIS goes the way of woolworths.

vivatifosi

The book I mentioned above says that the,area under ISIS control is four or five times the size of the UK. However more scarily, the population under their control has risen from 8 million to 12 million. Clearly part of this is down to territory gains, but part of it is also down to inward migration.

When we think here of people moving to Syria or Iraq we think of jihadis. However there are people who move to IS controlled areas because it offers them a better standard of living. Apparently, it is less lawless and you are less likely to get blown up than in, e.g., the remaining state controlled parts of Iraq.

People know about the violence and the hard line view of Islam, but pragmatically accept that if they think their families will be safer, the hospitals are still open, the bins collected and electricity still works, then it is a better place than where they are leaving. I find this chilling, and shows what an appalling job of statecraft the UK and US have delivered in the aftermath of two Gulf Wars.

zagubov

vivatifosi wrote: »

The book I mentioned above says that the,area under ISIS control is four or five times the size of the UK. However more scarily, the population under their control has risen from 8 million to 12 million. Clearly part of this is down to territory gains, but part of it is also down to inward migration.

When we think here of people moving to Syria or Iraq we think of jihadis. However there are people who move to IS controlled areas because it offers them a better standard of living. Apparently, it is less lawless and you are less likely to get blown up than in, e.g., the remaining state controlled parts of Iraq.

People know about the violence and the hard line view of Islam, but pragmatically accept that if they think their families will be safer, the hospitals are still open, the bins collected and electricity still works, then it is a better place than where they are leaving. I find this chilling, and shows what an appalling job of statecraft the UK and US have delivered in the aftermath of two Gulf Wars.

How did we make such a great job in post WWII West Germany, such a mediocre job of rebuilding our own country and a catastrophic car crash of the middle eastern states we've meddled in in modern times.

It's a regrettable and grim indictment of our foreign policies, that when we overthrow dictatorships, they can turn out to have been safer than the anarchy we left behind.

CLAPTON

zagubov wrote: »

How did we make such a great job in post WWII West Germany, such a mediocre job of rebuilding our own country and a catastrophic car crash of the middle eastern states we've meddled in in modern times.

It's a regrettable and grim indictment of our foreign policies, that when we overthrow dictatorships, they can turn out to have been safer than the anarchy we left behind.

Maybe because the problems of post war Germany were easy to solve, those of the UK were more difficult and those of the middle east are massively more intractable.

Actually I quite like the UK and consider it a very successful country : you however have abandoned yours and feel somewhat differently

CKhalvashi

CLAPTON wrote: »

it took the soviet empire about 70 years for disenchantment :

However ultimately, there was nothing wrong with the USSR. (See my sig)

It was a lot better than the majority of the post-Soviet nations are now, despite what a lot of people will say.

Comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges.

zagubov

CLAPTON wrote: »

Actually I quite like the UK and consider it a very successful country : you however have abandoned yours and feel somewhat differently

I also like the UK and have explicitly enumerated the reasons many times, although I am ambitious for it and would wish it was better still. The last two clauses of your final sentence puzzle me. But so it goes.

vivatifosi

CKhalvashi wrote: »

However ultimately, there was nothing wrong with the USSR. (See my sig)

It was a lot better than the majority of the post-Soviet nations are now, despite what a lot of people will say.

Comparing the two is like comparing apples and oranges.

Nothing wrong? What about, e.g. Stalin and the Gulags?