Syria

[willedoo]

This is a rather lengthy interview of U.S. Senator Richard Black on his views and experiences of the Syrian conflict.

 

Staged Gas Attacks & US Shortcomings: US Senator Tells Sputnik About Syria Trip

 

 

[Phil Perry]

U.S. Ambassador Bolt said ( At a WH Press briefing ) that a 'Lot' of US 'Advisers' AND troops will be sent to Syria.

 

Why I wonder ? this conflict is all but done. Assad has most of his country back, courtesy of the Russians and a disparate number of Iranian backed militias. What the feck is trump up to now. . .( Rhetorical )

 

 

[willedoo]

Hard to say, Phil. Maybe they'll all be going to the Kurdish area. There was some talk a day or two ago about joint Turkish / US peacekeeping type actions there. In my opinion, the fact that the Turks have been sitting on both sides of the fence for a while possibly has a bit of a stabilizing influence.

 

This delivery of S-300 systems to the Syrian military might make Israel think a bit harder about crossing the border in future. Their plan is to integrate with the Russian systems there with about three months training time for Syrian crews. The US is not impressed.

 

 

[Phil Perry]

That is another Oxymoron, ie, Turks in a Kurdish area 'Peacekeeping' . . .Erdogan has vowed to wipe out every last Kurd on the planet and would fight any attempt to allow them their own bit of land. . . .curiouser and curiouser ( said Alice )

 

 

[willedoo]

So Trump has announced a pull out from Syria after talking to the Turkish President on the phone. It's looking like he's prepared to hang the Kurds out to dry to prevent any fighting between NATO allies.

 

I was reading an article today by an American analyst who thinks Trump will back down on the decision.

 

 

[facthunter]

He might, IF he listens to anyone. (But He doesn't, EVER). Nev

 

 

[Marty_d]

If Fox News thought it was a good idea, he would.

 

 

[willedoo]

It gets curiouser and curiouser.

 

It's been reported that the Syrian Arab Army has entered Manbij for the first time since the war began, and hoisted the Syrian flag. Supposedly, it was requested by the Kurdish fighters who are bugging out. I guess they thought Syrian control was preferable to Turkish control over the city. The Turks said they were coming to get the Kurds but after the phone call with the orange haired comedian, delayed it until the Americans were withdrawn from the area.

 

At the moment, a Turkish military convoy has crossed the border on the way to Manbij and American helicopters are buzzing around the sky above town. Possibly they're covering retreating Kurds. Turkish President Erdogan has said that if no Kurdish forces are there, their job will be done. By that he probably means they will go back home if Syria and Russia can guarantee the Kurdish forces do not return to the area.

 

Meanwhile, in the big cities, life is starting to return to normal:

 

 

[facthunter]

The Kurds never get a fair go from anybody. Their country was just carved up arbitrarily by Europeans. Nev

 

 

[willedoo]

The Kurds have said they're vacating and going somewhere else to fight IS. Probably away from the Turks and where they can get a bit of U.S. air cover. It will be interesting to see what sort of deal they get when the war's finally over.

 

 

[willedoo]

This week someone posted some video of an American APC pushing a Russian jeep off the road in northern Syria. It looks like the two convoys got tangled up. You'd think that childish behaviour from either or both sides could easily escalate.

 

 

 

 

[onetrack]

Road rage at its finest level. Sometimes I wish I drove an armoured vehicle in traffic, I could have a great time putting a stop to traffic shenanigans by smart-arses in BMW's. 

 

 

[Yenn]

The Kurds. The people the world has to hate, along with the Arabs. Neither of them could ever feel safe with the governments we have around the world now. They got shafted at every opportunity, especially if the believed what they were told by the major world powers.

 

 

[willedoo]

Assad is back for another term with 95% of the vote. Full credit to Australia for allowing expat and refugee Syrians to vote, especially considering many of our powerful friends banned the vote in their countries. Voting was banned in the U.S., U.K., France, Canada, Germany, The Netherlands, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Question is, by banning voting, was it a genuine principled stance or a thinly disguised attempt to stifle an uncomfortable truth.

 

Opponents of Syria claim that the elections are neither free nor fair. So their solution is to ban Syrians from voting. That doesn't sound very fair to my way of thinking. One thing to bear in mind is that in global politics, opponents of a particular regime will always claim the vote was rigged and often without hard evidence. Even in the Land of the Free almost half the population thought their election was a fraud. Those in glass houses.

[Yenn]

Why should Australians vote in Syrian or any other countries elections? Why would Australia have any say in how Syrians vote in Syrian elections, even if the live in Australia?

The real question is why are Australians allowed to retain the citizenship of their country of origin? If they come here and become Aussies I cannot see why they should be allowed to retain their original citizenship. When they are allowed to do that they scream for help when they are in their home state and something bad happens. This is apparent when there was a massive explosion in Lebanon and Australia had to evacuate so called Aussies. The same is happening with Indians now. I could be completely wrong but I am guessing that 99% of the Indian descent Aussies in India, wanting to come home are also Indian citizens.

If I had been in Britain when the pandemic was at its worse I would not have had the cheek to call for Australia to repatriate me as I have not renounced my British citizenship.

[willedoo]

On 01/06/2021 at 12:18 PM, Yenn said:

Why should Australians vote in Syrian or any other countries elections? Why would Australia have any say in how Syrians vote in Syrian elections, even if the live in Australia?

The real question is why are Australians allowed to retain the citizenship of their country of origin? If they come here and become Aussies I cannot see why they should be allowed to retain their original citizenship. When they are allowed to do that they scream for help when they are in their home state and something bad happens. This is apparent when there was a massive explosion in Lebanon and Australia had to evacuate so called Aussies. The same is happening with Indians now. I could be completely wrong but I am guessing that 99% of the Indian descent Aussies in India, wanting to come home are also Indian citizens.

If I had been in Britain when the pandemic was at its worse I would not have had the cheek to call for Australia to repatriate me as I have not renounced my British citizenship.

As far as I can remember, for most foreigners to become an Australian citizen, they had to give up their former citizenship. Then they changed the rules to allow dual citizenship a while back. I'm not sure how it works, but they vote at their country of origin's embassy in their host country. but I don't think it's a simple matter of the embassy taking the votes back to the country of origin in a diplomatic bag. I would guess it would have to be overseen by the foreign affairs department and approval for a vote given, hence the host countries ability to prevent an embassy vote for dual citizens or allow it.

[Jerry_Atrick]

John Howard introduced dual citizenship under the premise of stopping the brain drain (or at least, being able to allow the drained brains back in). I am a dual citizen, born in Aus and by the end of 2025, will have spent near enough to exactly 1/2 my life in both countries (if I am still here, which is unlikely).

 

I agree with Yenn's premise about playing arbitrage with consular services. When I have lived in the UK, I haven't voted in Aus (I can't at the moment, anyway).. with one exception - the republic referendum - but wasn't out of Aus for too long at that stage, and was intending to be 2 years in the US then return to Aus.

 

I think if you are dual citizen, you should be accorded the "citizenship" of the country you currently live in (assuming you aren't in a third country as an ex-pat - in which case, it would be the country you last lived in). So, I want to return to Aus at the moment (from pre-pandemic days); but at the moment, I should be able to.. but under my own steam and not as any repatriation exercise of the government. If I was in a third country, I would not expect Australia to jump in and help (there's a question of whether they ever would anyway, but let's leave that out of the equation).

[Yenn]

When I became an Australian I never had to renounce my British citizenship and i assume that if I wanted to become a federal polly I would have to do so.

There was a possibility that if I had travelled overseas on an English passport, I would not have been allowed back into Australia if I was not an Australian citizen. That was probably to make sure people who lived here were Australians. Now it seems our government is hell bent on getting as many citizens without worrying about what really happens. I have met obvious foreigners who say they are living here to get Aussie citizenship and then going home.

[Jerry_Atrick]

I only applied for my UK citizenship after JH allowed dual/multi citizenship. I had already been a permanent resident of the UK (indefinite leave to remain is the official term) and the citizenship wasn't a big deal for me, except that I would still be compelled to pay national insurance but wouldn't be eligible for a state pension (I think). For me, it was more of a convenience of getting through Heathrow and European immigration without needing visas/passports being checked and waiting too long in line. Now, we are out of Europe, that convenience is a bit less. Now we are in a pandemic, that convenience is almost gone. If dual citizenship wasn't allowed in Aus or it costs as much as it does today (something like £4k for the leave to remain and another £1200 for citizenship if my memory serves me ), I would not have applied for my UK citizenship.

[willedoo]

There's a little bit of the usual dick swinging going on in northern Syria at present. Turkey's Erdogan has got the sh*ts with both Russia and the U.S.. Between them, they were supposed to make sure the Kurds pulled back 30klm from the Turkish/Syrian border and haven't done so. Erdogan has reportedly run out of patience and is massing troops to invade four Kurd held towns. The Turks have shot down a Russian reconnaissance drone in the Turkish militant area, so the Russians have buzzed them with a few Ka-52 Alligators doing carousels over their positions just to let them know who's who.

 

There's also reports that U.S. forces have expressed intention to occupy some country, supposedly to prevent a Turkish invasion. At this stage, the Russian air forces are not letting them into the area.

 

 

[facthunter]

I think Trump has put  the final knife into US concepts of democracy.  He's demolished the republicans although much more than 50% of them would rather he went somewhere else out of politics. .Nev

[Bruce Tuncks]

Jerry, you are welcome anytime. You speak the same language. Not to mention a million other things....

I do not understand why we give citizenship so easily to people who are clearly hostile to our way of life, in particular to our language and our culture.

One of the things the Japanese do is to insist that new citizens speak Japanese...  they have few problems with terrorists as you can imagine.

If we at least did this! Not Japanese, of course, although you would get no argument from me if you did the application in Japanese, well Jerry excepted.

 

I reckon we have given control to real-estate interests and the bleeding-hearts, who are their unwitting supporters.

[onetrack]

I have the ability to acquire a British passport, thanks to English and Scottish parents. I did actually acquire about 10 years ago, to facilitate travel into the U.K. and Europe. But I found so little benefit in having one, I never renewed it.

[facthunter]

There's good and bad in all races. There's a few crazy rightwing Nut Jobs in the US I wouldn't want a lot of. ASIO says they are more of a risk at the present time, but Morrison is deaf to that. So is Pauleen. THEY tried to get money from the NRA.  THAT should have disbarred them from being a political Party here..Nev

[old man emu]

20 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

I do not understand why we give citizenship so easily to people who are clearly hostile to our way of life, in particular to our language and our culture.

The perfect reason to ban Yanks from settling here. Who wants to live with illiterate warmongers?