So what happened to Turkey?

Gilligan

#*! boat!
PREMO Member
141639
 

SamSpade

Well-Known Member
I do think one thing is clear, and until recently, it's something I've always agreed with the DEMOCRATS on - the U.S. cannot be the world's policeman. We have a responsibility for protecting freedom and rights across the globe - but it is absurd that we do it alone. In that respect, our allies, the members of NATO and so on - they have to pull their weight.

So there's a big part of me when I see Americans going into the Middle East that says "Eff this! Why does it have to be US? Let 'em pour into Europe and let them deal with it".
 
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Kyle

ULTRA-F###ING-MAGA!
PREMO Member
So there's a big part of me when I see Americans going into the Middle East that says "Eff this! Why does it have to be US? Let 'em pour into Europe and let them deal with it".

Something tells me the Europeans won't manage to push them out again like they did in the 10th and 11th centuries.
 

Hijinx

Well-Known Member
I do think one thing is clear, and until recently, it's something I've always agreed with the DEMOCRATS on - the U.S. cannot be the world's policeman. We have a responsibility for protecting freedom and rights across the globe - but it is absurd that we do it alone. In that respect, our allies, the members of NATO and so on - they have to pull their weight.

So there's a big part of me when I see Americans going into the Middle East that says "Eff this! Why does it have to be US? Let 'em pour into Europe and let them deal with it".


They are pouring into Europe and Europe has no idea what to do with them.

Trump has the right idea what to do with them but for some reason the Democrats seem to be in denial or something.
We don't need them here, and we certainly do not need them in our Government.
Obama was trying to bring enough in to destroy us and perhaps he did.
 

BOP

Well-Known Member
Nary a peep out of anyone, save the occasional rehash of the initial faux outrage.


President Trump has played this out perfectly. By isolating Turkish President Recep Erdogan, and effectively leaving him naked to an alliance of his enemies, Erdogan is now urgently asking for the U.S. to mediate peace negotiations with Kurdish forces.
This request happens immediately after President Trump signed an executive order [See Here] triggering the sanction authority of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. Erdogan called the White House requesting an urgent phone call with President Trump.
 

Hijinx

Well-Known Member
Nary a peep out of anyone, save the occasional rehash of the initial faux outrage.


President Trump has played this out perfectly. By isolating Turkish President Recep Erdogan, and effectively leaving him naked to an alliance of his enemies, Erdogan is now urgently asking for the U.S. to mediate peace negotiations with Kurdish forces.
This request happens immediately after President Trump signed an executive order [See Here] triggering the sanction authority of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. Erdogan called the White House requesting an urgent phone call with President Trump.

Schiff probably wants a transcript of that call too.
Why doesn't Trump just put Schiff and Nadler on a party line so they can listen in.
Just like the Whistleblowers do.
 
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BernieP

Resident PIA
Given how Eurocrats ****ed over the Middle East partitioning the Ottoman Empire after WW I
Exactly
The vast majority of the people who make up these countries don't really give a crap about "the country", their order of allegiance is Family, extended Family (aka Tribe) and religion -those are the ties that bind, not a national flag.

BTW, did folks notice that the fighting stopped when the Kurds negotiated a pull back from the border with Turkey?
And who facilitated that negotiation?
Two sides to every story, just maybe the Kurds were using US arms and counting on the US soldiers to protect them from the Turks even if they were crossing into Turkey?
 

GURPS

INGSOC
PREMO Member
The vast majority of the people who make up these countries don't really give a crap about "the country", their order of allegiance is Family, extended Family (aka Tribe) and religion -those are the ties that bind, not a national flag.



like in Africa - Eurocrats put tribes of people together who hated each other to keep them fighting and ignoring the Colonialists
 

BernieP

Resident PIA
like in Africa - Eurocrats put tribes of people together who hated each other to keep them fighting and ignoring the Colonialists
I don't think they were that clever, they drew boundaries like they had in Europe, tried to form nation/states they could negotiate treaties with, like they did in Europe. They tried to make countries that looked like the mother land. Problem is, that's not the mindset of the people who lived there.
Pretty much what Britain, France, and Spain did in the Americas. Look where the native North American people.
I know the latest left wingnut fantasy is to portray Columbus as a murdering villain. The real truth is that he came to the Americas to find commerce, not to subjugate the people. His business was in trade, commerce. He also wanted to "educate" them on Christianity, the Holy Roman Catholic Doctrine, that's what good Catholics were supposed to do. (we can debate the methods later)

Let's be clear, the modern revision of history is that all colonists, all explorers were intent on doing evil.
They were neither saints or sinners, just humans, somewhere in between.
At one time they were held up as flawless, now we judge them in terms of our current knowledge and standards.
They didn't understand how disease spread, inoculation, etc. They didn't realize that they had built up an immunity to something that they could still carry and infect others with.
They looked at people and judged them by the European culture they came from.
 

gemma_rae

Well-Known Member
Trump did something that on the surface looks stupid, hideous, and is being used to stir up problems with even his most loyal supporters.
But it's far more complicated.

Turkey is and has had it's problems, but has tried to stay a democratic nation and is a member of NATO. While the country is predominately Muslim, they have for the most part tried to stay a secular state. That is until recently when there has been a push from radicals to become more "Islamic".
If you studied biblical history you know that what is modern day Turkey is home to some of the earliest Christian settlements. Jews had spread from Israel up along the Mediterranean coast into modern day Greece (all part of the Roman Empire at the time).

Syria is another mixed bag of nuts. Various ethnic groups and religions. The majority is Sunni Muslim. Pardon my spelling, but the country is ruled by the Baath party. They believe in an Arab Renaissances, socialism and one party rule. They are predominately Shia Muslim.

The Kurds are a part of the non-Arab Sunni group. They have been sniping at Turkey for decades as well as Iraq and Syria. They are aligned with nobody but themselves, and just to be clear, not all Kurds agree even on the time of day. They want a homeland, their own country, which they intend to carve out of the countries that surround them, Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran (minor). The US first started to arm the Kurds when they were fighting Saddam. All well and good until they took those weapons and turned them on a NATO Ally, Turkey. The Kurds had no time for Saddam and no time for ISIS, they don't want to be subjugated by anyone. Therefore the US was their friend in the sense that the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

The Syrian war refugees and the terrorist attacks from the Kurds have put a serious strain on Turkey. Turkey is a NATO ally and has long been a base of operations to spy on the former Soviet Union and Iran. I can tell you from work with NATO in the 80's and 90's that the Turks did not want to visit air defense radar sites in the border region with Syria and Iraq for fear of being grabbed by Kurdish fighters. The feeling was if you got pulled over and had an American passport you were safe - safer, than if you were Turkish.

It's a shithole, always has been a shithole, and will probably continue to be a shithole until they kill every last one of themselves, it;s tribal / ethnic and religious warfare, they all claim the same land, they all want the same thing, which is the land and the other guy gone.

That's just as simple a summary as I could come up with. 10,000 years of history in 1000 characters :)

Thank you BernieP. I learned something today!
 
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BernieP

Resident PIA
NATO has had to play referee between Turkey & Greece for decades. Fighting over some islands. At least the Turks attempt to act like a democracy. Sad part is that Afghanistan and Iran use to be just like Turkey with women freely going about their business on a daily basis.
Turkey started down hill in the 90's. They had runaway inflation and then the Islamic uprising started. They were more or less a secular nation, they were courteous to their connection to Islam but not religious fanatics. For example, Islam does not allow the consumption of alcohol. The bars are inside western hotels, it's well know and accepted. Or was, my connections to the country were lost in 95.
At that time there were not government imposed religious requirements and the major cities were westernized. But I do know there was a push to move to Islamic law. I think part of the problem has come from the government crack down on those clerics that were promoting Islamic law. Those clerics probably had the support of the poor and more rural people.
Yes, there is a class system in Turkey. It's played out in military service. Males are required to serve, there is a age range in which they must go to training and serve (like 18 to 28). But you could buy down your service time. The more intelligent earned scholarships to prestigious US colleges, got degrees and even jobs in the US. They saved their money, bought down their service to some cushy desk job for 6 weeks and were done.
Then they came back to work and became US citizens. The poor, well they had to do much longer tours and they became infantry, not office workers.
 
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