- cross-posted to:
- worldnews@lemmy.ml
- cross-posted to:
- worldnews@lemmy.ml
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Finally, they removed the middleman - Saudi Arabia - and started dropping their bombs on the Houthis directly.
At least it’s less hypocrite than what was going on before.
Can’t but wonder if the Houthis aren’t used to US and UK bombs being dropped on them by now and if thus this will make that much of a difference (weren’t the Houthis mountain people, same as the Afghans?).
Don’t fuck with global trade. Your cause can be a shining beacon of righteousness, but take out trading routes you get the big boy stick. Always has been like that.
Whilst I agree with your point on why this is happenning, after what happenned in Afghanistan, I’m not quite sure of the effectiveness of what you named “big boy stick” against people who have little to lose and have spent over a decade being hit by such a “stick” only yielded by a mate if said “big boy”.
A lot of what I’m reading here is the same “America, yeah!” stuff as before the invasion of Afghanistan - nationalistic enthusiasm rather than anything thought through.
Looking at the hostorical track record, it’s a little premature to celebrate the effectiveness of this.
The Huthis have been launching ballistic missiles across country lines and target (among other things) international shipping lanes somewhat recently. They’re not soldering up IEDs in caves to fend of a US invasion force, so I’m not sure how apt the comparison with Afghanistan is.
All indications are that they’re getting their Tech from Iran.
So ultimatelly to stop this you have to stop that Tech coming from Iran. Also we don’t know how deep their current stockpiles are so even if the former is achieved and sustained without boots on the ground, how long does it have to be kept.
All this has a lot broader implications than the kind of talk I’m seeing around the whole situation: I mean US and UK politicians are treating this as almost One Bombing = Mission Accomplished.
My point is that the stated objectives aren’t likelly to be achieved by just this one military action (as it’s hardly the first time the Houthis get hit by British and American bombs so they’re hardly going to “see the error of their ways” on just this) and as of now it’s unclear how far things will have to go and if and how far will it spread.
I mean, I don’t even see a contradiction with OP there. The big boy stick comes out, Western politicians are seen doing something and don’t get blamed for the higher prices on “TIEMAM banana-shaped egg holder for children yellow plastic food container”, a few of the non-Western brown guys die, but not most of them, and history continues. I don’t think that there’s a good reason was implied.
No one is invading their territory, attempting to force peace or human rights. They’re free to go back to terrorizing the population. This is to stop them from shooting missiles at cargo ships or Israel, and that seems much more doable - it’s not like they have their own military industry capable of reducing these missiles. It’s not like they have many. It’s not like they are wealthy and can buy as many as they need
Two points:
- Reread my post, specifically the very first line were I couldn’t be clearer about agreeing with the reasons the previous poster gave for this.
- That post of yours has a whole lot of absolute certainties about the region, the local actors involved, their weapons stockpiles, how the weapons move between local actors and pretty much everything else as well as the behaviours of the foreign actors involved: with so many absolute statements about that region and situation, all of which are spinning a pro-US position, you’re providing a wonderful example for my point about the overabundance of “America, hell yeah!” simplistic nationalistic takes on the whole thing at the moment.
If there is one thing History has shown us in abundance is that the bollocks about “limited intervention” and the “explanations” spun for it by the US and UK politicians and their local Press is almost never the whole truth (often, none of it is true: remember Iraq?!) and their assessments of the impact of those actions and predictions what follows are usually wrong.
Changing the mind of what is already a veteran guerrilla movement with support from a well armed large local actor isn’t quite the same as bombing the Presidential Palace in some peaceful nation were the nation itself and the local power elites have a lot to lose, to “convince” them of the dangers of nationalizing some mineral concessions in the hands of US companies.
We’ll have to wait and see what the Houthis do on this, which in turn is also dependent on their weapon stockpiles, the continued support of Iran and even just how much the Houthis listen to Iran or not - considering that they haven’t just rolled-over and played dead in the face of Saudi Arabia’s bombing campaign, plus they have a lot or reasons to want to screw as much as possible the interests of both the US and UK (whose bombs were the ones being dropped by SA), plus there seems to be a lot of popular support in the region for anybody who screws those nations (on account of both supporting the ongowing genocide in Israel) it seems a little premature to expect the Houthis to stop after on single instance of getting from the US and UK that same as what they’ve already been getting from SA.
What are you going on about? No one thinks that suddenly everything is going to stop because of a bombing run and there’s nothing in the works on invading Yemen. You typed a lot of words to say nothing.
Can’t but wonder if the Houthis aren’t used to US and UK bombs being dropped on them by now and if thus this will make that much of a difference (weren’t the Houthis mountain people, same as the Afghans?).
Pretty much what the news analysts are saying, even. I’m unsure why Biden and Sunak felt like this was a good idea. I really can’t see any possible upside. Now they look even more crooked in the region than before, because the only thing they acted on are the cargo ships loaded with dumb crap for the West, and the Houthis look cool and relevant directly fighting them. The threat to shipping is even higher than before if anything, and the whole place is even closer to going WWI.
They could have just parked their warships there and kept eating drones. It would have costed a lot in interceptors, but you’d think even a few more weeks of situation normal would have been worth it.
No. They were firing at anything with a Western financial interest backing out too. So these were ships that never touched a Western shore but just had a part US owner.
That doesn’t actually undercut my point. Yes, they carry important crap for the West too, and some amount amount of crap not ultimately for the West. It would still get there going via the Cape, and either way, the stakes are way higher for the Arabs than “more expensive stuff” and everyone knows it.
So the entire middle east should just be a no go zone for shipping? I’m pretty sure the entire MENA area would blow up if we did that. It would ensure the SA/Iran war we’ve been avoiding for decades. Or, less worse case, Iran cuts the Houthis free and watches the rest of the region obliterate their former clients. Because the oil producing countries are absolutely not going to just stop exporting oil. The tourist countries are not going to accept a halt in cruise ships. And nobody wants to deal with bulk food import via land only.
The Houthis fucked with the entire world. This is not just about going around or sticking it to some distant government without a local impact.
Lol, you really don’t like the Houthis. Why do you care? It’s a little ethnic paramilitary, like a bajillion others all across the MENA area and other unstable regions.
No, I’d say they should keep parking warships in the area and eating all the missiles. It’s expensive as all get out, but said Gulf contries would be obliterated by mass bombardment on the first day if the region really goes boom, and a few more weeks to let things settle and ship Anthony Blinken around would have been great.
I don’t give a fuck about pirates. I care about disingenuous arguments. Including that them shooting at international ships is an effective or moral way to protest Israeli actions.
Well you’re in luck then, because I don’t think it is either. Maybe they’d have a leg to stand on if they were actually Israeli ships, but it sounds like they’ve been attacking random ones and then declaring them Israeli. It’s a stunt, and now the West is making it look even better.
There’s a really interesting (but quite long) YouTube deep dive into history about how there has been a struggle between city builders who farm and nomads/‘barbarians’ who herd for all of our history.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://www.piped.video/watch?v=IrqkwG7Nqj8
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
That’s very interesting, thank you!
You’re welcome. It’s a really good channel if you like history deep dives.
And Iran just seized a US oil tanker in the strait of hormuz today.
In fairness, its one the US seized from Iran some time back.
But geez, CENTCOM has too many problems today.
So not a US oil tanker then?
Americans please remember vote blue no matter who! ❤️
I wouldn’t miss this election for the world! ^(because the consequences of fucking this up would echo far, far beyond the US…)
I’m voting green and red (Greens, socialists and communists)
As shitty as it is, when it comes to the actual presidential election, that’s basically a vote in trump’s pocket if he’s the candidate. Trump’s base is already solidified. They’re voting for him no matter what. He could get on live tv and say he’ll have everyone who voted for him executed after becoming dictator, and they’d cheer louder. For Biden, he’s going to struggle to get votes beyond “always vote blue” so any vote not for him is going to weaken his position against Trump. There’s no scenario where a third party wins.
It’s not how it should be, but in this election, it’s what’s going to matter.
These aren’t lost votes for Biden. Most of these people straight up would never vote for him to begin with. You neolibs need to accept that the world doesn’t revolve around you.
lol
looks at buttons
button 1 is a fascist dictatorship
button 2 staves off the dictatorship
button 3 does nothing
Yes, my super neoliberal alignment is where my decisions are based. I would love for another candidate to get the presidency, but the 70k or so active users on Lemmy voting for so won’t matter.
Ok so then what? Biden wins another election term, continues committing genocide in Gaza, and after 4 years we’re still stuck in the same place we started?
Vote for Democrats again so Arabs in the middle east are murdered and Nazisrael expands their Lebensraum to include Lebanon and Jordan?
If Biden wins while committing genocide it’s signaling that Democrat voters are just as fine with genocide as Republicans are, giving the Democratic party no reason to stop doing it.
Genocide Joe must be replaced by a different candidate without a funny nickname, because voting for Biden now means you directly endorse genocide.
Or, vote for a third party candidate. Trump wins. He guts the checks and balances of the US government, a civil war erupts, the “little” insurrection we saw becomes very real. All the proud boys sitting home with their rifles scrolling truth social start to walk outside and shoot people they don’t like because Trump said it’s ok. Half the police are trying to quell the violence, half of them are siding with the insurrection.
Foreign policy doesn’t matter at this point, it’s a matter of who survives the internal struggle. The EU and other nations ban travel to and from the US while they decide whether or not to intervene. Our NATO treaties are about protection from other nations, not from ourselves. The fascist uprising in the US gives strength to other international fascist uprisings that are currently rearing their heads across the world. Israel does whatever the fuck it wants, and the weapon dealers of the US, no longer bound by international treaty are happy to fill those weapon orders.
Either a stronger section of what remains of the US government defeats the insurrection, and begins to pull apart the rubble for survivors, or what has won becomes the new “America,” no longer United States, but one “strong nation” so on and so forth.
This isn’t a standard election, it’s literally deciding whether to vote in someone who has actively claimed they will become a dictator once in power. And it has very broad global implications beyond Israel’s imperialist invasion of Gaza.
We heard the that dictatorship argument in 2016. Trump removed Roe v Wade (which the democrats refused to encode while they held full power even though everyone and their moms asked them to do it), had a small army of looneys achieving nothing on jan 6, and now Genocide Joe is president.
If the Dems don’t change Biden, Trump will do 4 more years of stupid shit and then they’ll have another shot.
The world stage was not nearly as volatile in 2016 as it is now, and Trump, who did manage to gut much of the US government legally at the time (Supreme Court, EPA, FCC, Education, Labor, Agriculture, Transportation, etc), was not at that point declaring he would go full dictator like he is now. He wasn’t on trial for being a literal insurrectionist and traitor against our democracy at that point. Like I said, it’s a very different election. I don’t like Biden, but I do like the idea that Biden can be legally voted out of power, and then the next president can also, legally be voted out of power. Trump’s goal is that he cannot be legally voted out of power, to the point that his militia will try to murder anyone that makes an effort to remove him from unlawful power.
Here’s the big problem: Democrats have refused to fix it even when they were in power. Because it benefits them. The Democrats with Obama had full control of everything before 2016. Obama and Biden could have prevented this but they didn’t.
Democrats purposely didn’t encode any rights such as abortion. All so they can keep saying “Oohhh look at the other scary side, keep voting for us Democrats! You can’t vote third party this time they will take your abortions away!”.
Unless Americans start waking up to these extremely obvious forced scare tactics that the Democrats themselves hold in stand, nothing will ever change. And Genocide has to be the line at which you say “holy shit this is too far”. The end do not justify the means anymore if the means include genocide.
Problem. Biden is the only candidate with a chance of winning and plans to let people vote again in 2028. Protest voting or staying at home means we’re stuck with a genocidal idiot for the rest of his life. And God help us when he’s replaced by the genocidal smart guy with no checks against his power.
At some point you have to vote in your own interest.
Or you could:
- look at the overall picture instead of voting one issue
- consider the alternative
- stop being unrealistic that anything will change
We can all agree with wanting the suffering of civilians to end but random countries in civil wars taking potshots at merchant ships passing by or throwing missiles in the general direction of hostilities, seems more like an attention getting tactic
What bigger picture? It’s fucking genocide dude. Holy shit this is not just a small issue you can ignore.
It’s like saying "Vote for Hitler, he’s better than the other guy and it’s just the Jews that are going to get kiled.
What israel is doing is blockading food and water from entering into Gaza which is an actual Nazi style war crime straight from the concentration camps.
This is what shipping through the red sea looks like right now in 1000’s ships:
The Houthis are most definitely making an enormous global impact. Since the West is not standing up for humanitarian rights it seems like the only thing that will stop this genocide them is losing money.
Biden is not running for President of Israel
So the Houthis are coming off a civil war resulting in 300,000 deaths, yet now we’re getting worked up about less than a tenth that. Houthis are pirating or taking potshots at random merchant ships passing by, yet this is Israel’s fault?
Last time I checked there were 2.3 million people in Gaza. You know why the Houthis do this? Because israel is still committing genocide in Gaza.
All that will still happen under trump, plus the Ukrainians will lose their lifeline and be conquered by Russians, and we’ll likely have purges in America or a civil war as trump tries to end America’s run as a democracy.
Maybe ask Biden to bypass congress for Ukraine, instead of using them to give israel more bombs to kill children with then
Unless you live in one of the handful of close states, your vote red or blue makes no difference to the electoral college. Why give either of these your symbolic popular vote.
No 3rd party will win, but a rising 3rd party is competition that may at least raise an issue’s prominence or worry the main parties enough to pull their finger out and run better candidates.
And take someone with you!
What’s the model of your axolotl?
As someone in a solid blue state, my vote won’t help decide our future, but we’re going for biggest percentage win.
deleted by creator
Yeah because no republican has ever started a war in the middle east before.
Oh wait, was OP being ironic?
Americans are so close minded they only think in Democrat and Republican, open your eyes. That’s not a democracy.
I mean, the rest of us do too. That’s just how the American system is set up.
Yeah no shit sherlok, you have 2 choices. Shitty neoliberal capitalist or actual fascist. Neither are good choices, but one is obvious choice.
Come lead our Constitutional Convention then. Or persuade 38 states to vote for an election amendment. It’s easy to criticize, come actually do something.
Meanwhile in britian vote anything but fucking blue
I guess we’ve arrived at the part where a bunch of low-information lemmings come to say that Biden is bad for striking Houti terrorists who have been attacking and hijacking international shipping lanes, after being warned multiple times over the last weeks to stop. Boo fucking hoo.
Pro tip: when the US military gives you a “final warning” to knock off your shit, maybe listen.
The country supplying arms for genocide is bombing the only country that is trying to put an end to it. Yemen is imposing sanctions on Israel because it is committing genocide. Israel should be sanctioned by the entire world. The united states imposes debilitating deadly sanctions on countries for decades simply because they are not under its boot. The United States is evil and no amount of propaganda is going to change that.
The terrorist Houthis in Yemen, like Hamas, are backed by Iran–all three of which have individually called for the genocide and annihilation of Israel.
Last week America gave the Houthis one final warning (after multiple others) to knock off their piracy and hijacking of international trade routes.
Instead of widely heeding that warning, they made the very stupid decision to call America’s bluff. As the saying goes “fuck around, find out.”
By the way, Iran is also an authoritarian Islamic theocracy in which women are subjugated, homosexuality is subject to persecution, and freedom of expression is nonexistent. They represent the model of a Muslim State under Sharia religious law, back Islamic terrorist groups in various parts of the world, are creating instability in the region (like the Oct 7 attacks and these trade route hijackings), and are generally not your friend no matter how much koolaid you drink or what medal you pick up in the mental gymnastics Olympics.
I guess Iran is just really committed to ending genocide then, huh?
Well, if the shoe fits…
The Houthis are attacking random ships, not Israeli ships. They were warned to cease attacking civilian ships on one of the largest trading routes in the world, and they didn’t. They fucked around and now they’re finding out.
First of all they’re not attacking ships. They are first warning them to reroute and not dock at Israel. When these ships refuse these orders they are boarding the ships and rerouting then without injuring anyone. Their operations are entirely reasonable.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houthi_involvement_in_the_Israel%E2%80%93Hamas_war
They have fired on civilian vessels without provocation, attempted to violently board other vessels and have attacked ships that were not going to Israel. They are treating any ship as a target (a war crime, by the way).
Ansarallah has been very clear on the degree of association with Israel they consider sufficient for enforcement of the blockade.
Again, COSCO is literally sailing ships through the Suez Canal.
Yemen is perfectly within the provisions of international law in blocking Israeli boats from transiting. The only violation of international law is if you claim that Ansar Allah is not the rightful and legitimate government of Yemen.
I can only imagine being so brainwashed to believe that the Houthis harassing, threatening and attacking one of the biggest international trade routes on Earth, while indiscriminately targeting ships from various countries and ignoring multiple warnings from the UN, Britain and the US, is in any way legitimate.
They attacked civilian ships, they were warned not to, they didn’t stop attacking civilian ships, and now they’ve been retaliated against as promised. Let’s see if they’re smart enough to finally stop fucking with international civilian trade ships.
But when americans use naval ships to stop civilian ships from getting to Cuba is that them threatening and attacking civilians?
ignoring multiple warnings from the UN, Britain and the US
So everyone needs to follow Americas orders without question?
They attacked civilian ships
Thats how a blockade works, yes.
Thanks for this response, I didn’t have the mental capacity to frame it this well.
Cuba
You gotta vote for the blue orphan-crushing machine!
Option 1: the racist orphan-crushing machine.
Option 2: the orphan-crushing machine
Another war omg
Seems there is always at least one. Daddy Warbucks has to get his piece
Nothing compared to living in mideval or ancient times. Literally brutal wars everywhere all of the time. I’d actually say we live in relatively peaceful times.
GiddyGap says:
Nothing compared to living in mideval or ancient times. Literally brutal wars everywhere all of the time. I’d actually say we live in relatively peaceful times.
Yes…?
Fuck around and find out
but if Palestinians do it, then it is resistance and they are the victims… even if they started it
Started what? Building a concentration camp and starving two million people?
The UN built that concentration camp in 1947. We’re just dealing with the consequences.
Your comment reads as if Israel continuing to starve Palestinians was absolutely unavoidable since 1947.
The UN literally created a state inside another state that ideologically and religiously despises the surrounding state. It has always been a time bomb.
Israel became a state one year later. They could have integrated their society then and there.
They weren’t working off a UN charter?
Most Palestinians didn’t do anything. Most Yemeni didn’t do anything.
Precision strikes against terrorists vs. effectively turning a country/region into a gravel pit are not quite the same thing. Israel has been leading attacks against Hamas teams for decades without much of an outcry from the international community, only once they’ve decided to level the entirely of Gaza.
Iran probably wants this, because they can say “look, the West cares more about money from shipping, than it does about the lives of human beings in Gaza”.
Horton Hears a Houthi
WTF, the Middle East is a powder keg right now, and they’re, like, setting off a pinwheel on top of it.
The US side ignored dozens of attacks. The history calculus shows at some point the houthis will figure they’re untouchable and escalate and whose fault will that be then?
Sometimes there are no good choices, only more shitty and regular shitty
Escalate to what? They’re already doing all kinds of pirate stuff, and I don’t think they’re strong enough to threaten anything else the West cares about on their own. What seems like the obvious Western play would be to keep intercepting attacks from warships for at least a few weeks. It’s more expensive, but would give critical time to deal with all the other, bigger issues in the Middle East.
The US not content with spending 2.3 trillion dollars and 20 years to replace the Taliban with the Taliban in Afghanistan, seeks to repeat the same in Yemen.
My bets that in 2044 we’ll still have Ansar Allah and maybe even a Yemeni supercar.
Ansar Allah has survived for this long under constant bombardment by Western weapons. What’s another few bombs?
Gangrene got your limb? Just take a painkiller!
JFC. It’s almost like Biden is trying really hard to lose the election.
It’s actually super based to blow up terrorists attacking container vessels.
You can either shut the fuck and bitch about inflation (which is driven up by Houthi attacks) or you can go on a weird demand for a ceasefire but acknowledge paying higher prices for goods is a necessary side effect of allowing Houthis to terrorize shipping lanes.
It’s actually super based to blow up terrorists attacking container vessels.
It is if you swallow the US imperialist propaganda happily and greedily.
Anyone that’s not a useful idiot, sees it a bit different.
Yes, I’m aware they see it the wrong way
So your entire argument is founded on the assumption that Ansar Allah is not the legitimate government of Yemen. That, just because they have de jure independence over a territory, they lack de facto independence because the territory is still contested by a government-in-exile.
Turn Palestinian kids into dust…to keep prices down. Got it.
Congratulations on bringing up a subject we weren’t talking about to say something the comment author clearly wasn’t saying.
Go you.
Because letting shitheads affect a major shipping route and cause another supply shortage and more inflation will surely win him it!
You do realize that there’s another way to make them stop doing it, don’t you?. That other way also has the side effect of murdering significantly fewer innocent Palestinians. It would also act to prevent the conflict from spreading regionally.
I realize that retraining Israel would deny us Americans our dead brown people high, but come on, think of all the inflation we could prevent by not killing them.
That’s a mighty huge brush you’re painting 300+ million with, skippy.
Unfortunately, those types of people never stop. They would immediately see that as a major sign of weakness and would expand on the attacks, targeting more ships over a larger area. Any hoo, those ass hats are now toast, so any sympathy you have for them might as well be vaporized with them.
It worked so well in Afghanistan, might as well repeat it in Yemen
Unfortunately, those types of people never stop.
And we’ll never stop as long as you are all the way over here. As if attacking us would do anything except motivate us to resist. What a racist and chauvinist world view.
The US aids Israel in its genocide, and our resistance is the problem. What a lopsided logic but whatever. Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of the people who were oppressing them.
Your “resistance” consists of kidnapping Filipino crewmen. Truly a bastion against US tyranny
And your western world “defense” consists of years of continuing crimes against humanity and genocide. Truly the leaders of human rights and freedom
You must’ve responded to the wrong comment, I never said anything about defence.
They were given warnings beforehand and they are free to sail around Africa. Ansar Allah are very clear about who and why they are targeting.
They’re not clear at all lmao. They attack whatever vessel they want and then find a flimsy connection to Israel after the fact.
The Houthis, on the other hand, were very clearly warned. They are free not to attack and kidnap cargo ships, otherwise they are free to get bombed. They have chosen the latter option.
