Foreign policy and terrorism in UK - any connection?
Discussion
Puggit said:
Just look at the target in Manchester. Young girls and women attending a pop concert, by a young woman. Sadly this way of life is totally abhorrent to the stone age beliefs of the Islamic fundamentalists living in our country.
Sure, foreign policy doesn't help, but as Sweden proves, they're coming for us anyway.
What happened in Sweden is surely a consequence of our foreign policy too.Sure, foreign policy doesn't help, but as Sweden proves, they're coming for us anyway.
A conversation between a leftist and ISIS, via Brendan O'Neill...
Leftist: ISIS attacks in the West are fuelled by anger at Western foreign policy.
ISIS: Nah, we're sectarians who hate you for refusing to bow before our religious diktats.
Leftist: Come now, you're better than that.
ISIS: We really aren't.
Leftist: It's political anger you're feeling. At some level. You're kind of anti-war!
ISIS: I'm pretty sure we love war.
Leftist: But if our nations didn't attack your nations, you wouldn't attack ours.
ISIS: We would. We have. Sweden. Belgium. They didn't attack us and they still got it.
Leftist: But Trump. And Bush. And Blair. Such awful people! They made you like this, they made you do this.
ISIS: I'm pretty sure it was Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi giving me orders, not Tony Blair.
Leftist: But we are so Islamophobic and you hate us for that. We should respect Islam more.
ISIS: We don't want you to respect Islam, we want you to convert to it. Have you read anything we've written?
Leftist: Look, once we leave your lands, you will leave us alone, I just know it!
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: Okay, we will. *quiet maniacal laugh*
Leftist: ISIS attacks in the West are fuelled by anger at Western foreign policy.
ISIS: Nah, we're sectarians who hate you for refusing to bow before our religious diktats.
Leftist: Come now, you're better than that.
ISIS: We really aren't.
Leftist: It's political anger you're feeling. At some level. You're kind of anti-war!
ISIS: I'm pretty sure we love war.
Leftist: But if our nations didn't attack your nations, you wouldn't attack ours.
ISIS: We would. We have. Sweden. Belgium. They didn't attack us and they still got it.
Leftist: But Trump. And Bush. And Blair. Such awful people! They made you like this, they made you do this.
ISIS: I'm pretty sure it was Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi giving me orders, not Tony Blair.
Leftist: But we are so Islamophobic and you hate us for that. We should respect Islam more.
ISIS: We don't want you to respect Islam, we want you to convert to it. Have you read anything we've written?
Leftist: Look, once we leave your lands, you will leave us alone, I just know it!
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: Okay, we will. *quiet maniacal laugh*
Andy Burnham quoted in the Guardian disagreeing with Corbyn -
he told TalkRadio. “9/11 happened before any interventions overseas, and the ideology was in existence before that … The people who committed this appalling act are responsible for it, 100%.”
I had to go away and check the history books - I'm sure Britain had foreign policy pre 9/11 and oh, wasn't there an invasion of Iraq before the Iraq war... Gulf War maybe... it's all so long ago it must be before young Andy Burnham started thinking about these things - which makes it all okay.
he told TalkRadio. “9/11 happened before any interventions overseas, and the ideology was in existence before that … The people who committed this appalling act are responsible for it, 100%.”
I had to go away and check the history books - I'm sure Britain had foreign policy pre 9/11 and oh, wasn't there an invasion of Iraq before the Iraq war... Gulf War maybe... it's all so long ago it must be before young Andy Burnham started thinking about these things - which makes it all okay.
we need to be asking some of the right questions...
Has UK foreign policy caused our current situation? No. No question at all.
Has it helped or exacerbated our current situation? Well I suspect we can all agree on the answer to that one.
With regards to foreign policy though IIRC (and I am happy to stand corrected) Spain, Germany, Sweden, Belgium don't meddle in the ME and yet there are issues there WRT terror attacks.
Let's be simplistic here - substitute Iraq for Nazi Germany... the difference is that the allies had a post war plan, for Iraq we didn't. I suspect that is a the single worst mistake we have made.
We helped out the Muslims in Yugoslavia and that is ignored. We were chided by many Muslims for not 'taking care of' Saddam when he was murdering his own people, ditto Qaddafi... we do take care of them and we get thanked by a kick in the balls. These cowards hide in hospitals etc knowing that when they get killed by a strike there's a lot of innocent lives also potentially lost - they don't care, they revel in it and yet they are still seen as heroes.
Truly this really is a difference of mindset.
Interestingly IIRC Japan has not had one single Islamic terrorist outrage, why?
Has UK foreign policy caused our current situation? No. No question at all.
Has it helped or exacerbated our current situation? Well I suspect we can all agree on the answer to that one.
With regards to foreign policy though IIRC (and I am happy to stand corrected) Spain, Germany, Sweden, Belgium don't meddle in the ME and yet there are issues there WRT terror attacks.
Let's be simplistic here - substitute Iraq for Nazi Germany... the difference is that the allies had a post war plan, for Iraq we didn't. I suspect that is a the single worst mistake we have made.
We helped out the Muslims in Yugoslavia and that is ignored. We were chided by many Muslims for not 'taking care of' Saddam when he was murdering his own people, ditto Qaddafi... we do take care of them and we get thanked by a kick in the balls. These cowards hide in hospitals etc knowing that when they get killed by a strike there's a lot of innocent lives also potentially lost - they don't care, they revel in it and yet they are still seen as heroes.
Truly this really is a difference of mindset.
Interestingly IIRC Japan has not had one single Islamic terrorist outrage, why?
footnote said:
Andy Burnham quoted in the Guardian disagreeing with Corbyn -
he told TalkRadio. “9/11 happened before any interventions overseas, and the ideology was in existence before that … The people who committed this appalling act are responsible for it, 100%.”
I had to go away and check the history books - I'm sure Britain had foreign policy pre 9/11 and oh, wasn't there an invasion of Iraq before the Iraq war... Gulf War maybe... it's all so long ago it must be before young Andy Burnham started thinking about these things - which makes it all okay.
Iraq itself wasn't invaded we kicked them out of Kuwait which they had invaded.he told TalkRadio. “9/11 happened before any interventions overseas, and the ideology was in existence before that … The people who committed this appalling act are responsible for it, 100%.”
I had to go away and check the history books - I'm sure Britain had foreign policy pre 9/11 and oh, wasn't there an invasion of Iraq before the Iraq war... Gulf War maybe... it's all so long ago it must be before young Andy Burnham started thinking about these things - which makes it all okay.
We need to separate out what actually motivates organisations like ISIS with the propaganda they put out.
American foreign policy acts in the decade before 9/11
Intervene to protect one Muslim state from another (Kuwait invaded by Iraq)
Intervene in Bosnia to protect Muslims against Serbs.
Intervene in Kosovo to protect Muslims against Serbs.
Result passenger planes being flown into their cities.
I'm sure if we stopped interfering our inaction in various conflicts involving Muslims would be used as justification instead, just as even now they are using the slaughter in Syria for that end.
That is not to say I believe in western military intervention. I do not and the limit of our involvement in any Muslim conflict should be providing aid.
We should however recognise there is no quick fix, no appeasement, that will make the fanatics vanish.
The problem with threads like this is there are no answers that are 100% correct, and any answers given are open to easy contradiction and being refuted.
Saying yes to the forign policy position is easily argued against by people that point out that Sweden isn't dropping bombs on Muslims, whether Isis terrorists or innocent civilians.
One of the reasons is because I think we in western countries identify ourselves more on geographical references, whereas the 'enemy' that attacks us doesn't think of themselves in a geographical boundaries sense. They don't identify as being "British/Swedish/French" etc. And they don't identify us as being that either. We are westerners and infidels, they are Islamic fighters/defenders (terrorists that utilise terrorism as a tool).
We need to stop thinking about "British forign policy" as being the contributing cause. If America drops bombs on an Islamic country target, then attacking their western soft target allies by association is seen as a legitimate tactic. Terrorists generally attack the softest of targets which are unprotected, the authorities then react with new measures after the fact and the terrorist develops a new target or tactic.
The perpetrators of these attacks carry many different nationalistic identities. But they see themselves in a identity based on their religious indoctrination. I don't see myself in this way and I don't think most others do.
I'm British above European, above western, above Christian, above catholic.
The enemy in this case doesn't see themselves in this way. Pointing at the guy that did this and saying "but he's Libyan and we helped them" is a stupid error of massive understanding.
Obviously the main issue is that when we call the enemy 'Islamic' or 'muslim' then we create a far larger target for blame than can possibly be justified.
However just calling them terrorists undersells their commitment and belief. Which is dangerous. And I think they have more support and are far more widespread now than they did on 10th September 2001 so we must be doing things wrong.
Saying yes to the forign policy position is easily argued against by people that point out that Sweden isn't dropping bombs on Muslims, whether Isis terrorists or innocent civilians.
One of the reasons is because I think we in western countries identify ourselves more on geographical references, whereas the 'enemy' that attacks us doesn't think of themselves in a geographical boundaries sense. They don't identify as being "British/Swedish/French" etc. And they don't identify us as being that either. We are westerners and infidels, they are Islamic fighters/defenders (terrorists that utilise terrorism as a tool).
We need to stop thinking about "British forign policy" as being the contributing cause. If America drops bombs on an Islamic country target, then attacking their western soft target allies by association is seen as a legitimate tactic. Terrorists generally attack the softest of targets which are unprotected, the authorities then react with new measures after the fact and the terrorist develops a new target or tactic.
The perpetrators of these attacks carry many different nationalistic identities. But they see themselves in a identity based on their religious indoctrination. I don't see myself in this way and I don't think most others do.
I'm British above European, above western, above Christian, above catholic.
The enemy in this case doesn't see themselves in this way. Pointing at the guy that did this and saying "but he's Libyan and we helped them" is a stupid error of massive understanding.
Obviously the main issue is that when we call the enemy 'Islamic' or 'muslim' then we create a far larger target for blame than can possibly be justified.
However just calling them terrorists undersells their commitment and belief. Which is dangerous. And I think they have more support and are far more widespread now than they did on 10th September 2001 so we must be doing things wrong.
Jazzy Jag said:
A conversation between a leftist and ISIS, via Brendan O'Neill...
Leftist: ISIS attacks in the West are fuelled by anger at Western foreign policy.
ISIS: Nah, we're sectarians who hate you for refusing to bow before our religious diktats.
Leftist: Come now, you're better than that.
ISIS: We really aren't.
Leftist: It's political anger you're feeling. At some level. You're kind of anti-war!
ISIS: I'm pretty sure we love war.
Leftist: But if our nations didn't attack your nations, you wouldn't attack ours.
ISIS: We would. We have. Sweden. Belgium. They didn't attack us and they still got it.
Leftist: But Trump. And Bush. And Blair. Such awful people! They made you like this, they made you do this.
ISIS: I'm pretty sure it was Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi giving me orders, not Tony Blair.
Leftist: But we are so Islamophobic and you hate us for that. We should respect Islam more.
ISIS: We don't want you to respect Islam, we want you to convert to it. Have you read anything we've written?
Leftist: Look, once we leave your lands, you will leave us alone, I just know it!
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: Okay, we will. *quiet maniacal laugh*
This completely ignores everything ISIS have actually said for the sake of making a dumb political point.Leftist: ISIS attacks in the West are fuelled by anger at Western foreign policy.
ISIS: Nah, we're sectarians who hate you for refusing to bow before our religious diktats.
Leftist: Come now, you're better than that.
ISIS: We really aren't.
Leftist: It's political anger you're feeling. At some level. You're kind of anti-war!
ISIS: I'm pretty sure we love war.
Leftist: But if our nations didn't attack your nations, you wouldn't attack ours.
ISIS: We would. We have. Sweden. Belgium. They didn't attack us and they still got it.
Leftist: But Trump. And Bush. And Blair. Such awful people! They made you like this, they made you do this.
ISIS: I'm pretty sure it was Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi giving me orders, not Tony Blair.
Leftist: But we are so Islamophobic and you hate us for that. We should respect Islam more.
ISIS: We don't want you to respect Islam, we want you to convert to it. Have you read anything we've written?
Leftist: Look, once we leave your lands, you will leave us alone, I just know it!
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: We won't.
Leftist: You will.
ISIS: Okay, we will. *quiet maniacal laugh*
skyrover said:
durbster said:
This completely ignores everything ISIS have actually said for the sake of making a dumb political point.
Go on then...what motivates ISIS? You are disbelievers
You are liberal
Some of you are disbelievers
Crimes against Islam
Crimes against Muslims
Invasion of lands
A mix of foreign policy and religious beliefs.
One should also consider the reasons that the terrorists themselves give (separate to the ISIS ideology), and that's invariably foreign policy.
TonyToniTone said:
JagLover said:
Iraq itself wasn't invaded we kicked them out of Kuwait which they had invaded.
So you are saying Iraq wasn't invaded, at least twice? 
Without doubt the "war on terror" that saw the attack on Afghan based seat of terrorism was allowed to spread into a region wide assault on Iraq and Saddam by Bush enabled by Blair.
Without this massive and let's face it unjustifiable scope creep from war on terror to regime change ISIS just wouldn't exist.
The fall of the regime in Iraq led to the 'Arab spring' of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya etc, which led to Syria. And frankly I'd go right back to the status of the Middle East pre 2001 and say that was far more stable and less threatening.
Yes there were Islamic based terrorist attacks before 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq, but they weren't blowing up children in Manchester or driving lorries into crowds in France. It's been massively escalated by our actions in the Arab countries.
And then there's the massive elephant in the room that is the fact that the money and lives spent in Afghan is for nowt. It's decesnding back into taliban rule.
Imposing change is a recipe for disaster. It's got to come from within.
Without this massive and let's face it unjustifiable scope creep from war on terror to regime change ISIS just wouldn't exist.
The fall of the regime in Iraq led to the 'Arab spring' of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya etc, which led to Syria. And frankly I'd go right back to the status of the Middle East pre 2001 and say that was far more stable and less threatening.
Yes there were Islamic based terrorist attacks before 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq, but they weren't blowing up children in Manchester or driving lorries into crowds in France. It's been massively escalated by our actions in the Arab countries.
And then there's the massive elephant in the room that is the fact that the money and lives spent in Afghan is for nowt. It's decesnding back into taliban rule.
Imposing change is a recipe for disaster. It's got to come from within.
TTmonkey said:
Iraq wasn't invaded with ground troops in GW1 but we destroyed much of their infrastructure and pressed home the attack hard against fleeing troops using air attacks right back up the country. Justifiable in the circumstances too.
Pretty sure the US launched ground assaults into Iraq in the first Gulf War. Supported by various other NATO forces, including the UK.skyrover said:
Evanivitch said:
skyrover said:
Travel to Pakistan and draw a picture of Muhammed... See how long you survive
Given that Muhammed, and variations of, account for a large number of the Pakistani population, I think you're trying to make a crass point from a position of ignorance.The point being... we could have locked ourselves away for millennia and still been a target.
Our beliefs and freedoms are completely incompatible and this alone makes us fair game. The fact we are nothing more than infidel makes us a target.
How many successful Democracies exist in the middle east? I count one... and it isn't Islamic,
Millions of Muslims fit quite well into western cultures, and yet because of a tiny minority you believe they are incompatible with our society? The reality is all religions have been leveraged towards violence at some point in history and to this day. Heck, 30 years ago you could argue Catholicism was incompatible with British values.
I think it's incredibly difficult to criticize the democracy of middle eastern states when for over a hundred years there has been huge interference from external forces, both political and military. Britain, America and Russia have all be influential in overthrowing government and stoking civil unress. And let's not forget how quickly a country like Spain went from dictatorship to democracy when actually given a real chance to do so.
Even now in Iraq and Afghanistan governments are chosen (or atleast preferred) by the western forces instead of by internal political movements.
irocfan said:
we need to be asking some of the right questions...
Has UK foreign policy caused our current situation? No. No question at all.
I think that's highly debatable.Has UK foreign policy caused our current situation? No. No question at all.
There are centuries of history wrapped up in all of this. Even if you break it into periods after each significant point of conflict over the last 150 years, there are various where the west's actions change the course of history either by proxy or direct action.
Certainly, the foreign policy has given opportunities to those who would seek to exploit it for their own agenda. The ISIS movement needed a spark and a catalyst and the west provided it.
Look at things that have happened and rationally consider whether they would bother you if you were on the receiving end of it. The US killed 100 innocent people in Syria in one airstrike a few weeks ago. How can you rationally justify that and not expect it to trigger some kind of reaction in the same way that a gas attack is met with an instantaneous missile strike response from the USA.
Context is important but Corbyn isn't wrong.
Evanivitch said:
Even now in Iraq and Afghanistan governments are chosen (or atleast preferred) by the western forces instead of by internal political movements.
Not true.i.e. Afghanistan's government was elected by the population. The integrity of those elections is highly dubious but that's how it is. The current leadership is not the choice of the west. The democratic process is a mess and the corrupt leadership remains a significant root cause of their issues.
Afghanistan is a horrible mess of corruption, violence and opium traders. The west's simplistic approach to intervention didn't work and we've given up and left them to it.
ferrisbueller said:
TTmonkey said:
Iraq wasn't invaded with ground troops in GW1 but we destroyed much of their infrastructure and pressed home the attack hard against fleeing troops using air attacks right back up the country. Justifiable in the circumstances too.
Pretty sure the US launched ground assaults into Iraq in the first Gulf War. Supported by various other NATO forces, including the UK.Gassing Station | News, Politics & Economics | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff