How much longer?

[Aggers]

How much longer are civilised nations going to allow this sort of barbaric crime to continue?....

http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/mi ... -1.2499801

Islamic State militants have killed 300 people in an “appalling massacre” in eastern Syria, according to the Syrian government.
A further 400 civilians were said to have been kidnapped by Isis, monitors said on Sunday, with the families of pro-government fighters were among those targeted.


Don't we have a United Nations who should take appropriate action?

For God's sake, this is the 21st century - not the Dark Ages.

[Kaz]

I think the UN should be acting too, otherwise what is the point of it?

[Suff]

Well we do have the UN but very few want to set a precedent that the UN can just march in and take over if they kill a few hundred of their own citizens...

Also the problem is that if we do step in and try to winkle IS out of there we will eventually kill more people than IS are currently. So the action on humanitarian lines alone is a bit dodgy.

Blair and Bush poisoned the water with Iraq where they lied their way into a conflict very few wanted and the lies were exposed. It cased civil war, internecine strife and, essentially, is responsible for IS too.

So the UN is not keen to just go barrelling in there. Especially as there are ongoing multinational operations ongoing there. Russia, in it's bombing campaign, have already killed more that that in terms of "innocent" civilians...

I'm sure it will eventually be done on the grounds of the immoral theft of women for sex slaves rather than for grounds of common decency or to stop people being killed wholesale...

[Workingman]

I am not sure that in a religious conflict there is much the UN can do.

The UN does not have an army and although IS is carrying out war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide whose troops could it send in? For all sorts of complicated political and religious reasons it is unlikely to get one from the Moslem nations.

Those very same nations are also unlikely to back a sectarian/Christian force under the UN banner. That could look to be too much like another crusade and would cause more trouble than it was worth.

Unfortunately the UN is caught between the Devil and the deep blue sea.

[Aggers]

Unfortunately the UN is caught between the Devil and the deep blue sea.

Aren't we all.

I can see this ending up in a repeat of the Crusades. With atomic trimmings ?

[Workingman]

I can see this ending up in a repeat of the Crusades. With atomic trimmings ?

Not by state owned weapons, though, hopefully.

There has long been a fear that the Soviet Union was dismantling weapons when it collapsed and that there was no real record of where the fissile material went or how much.

Now the fear is that some of that material could fall into the hands of terrorists and be used to create 'dirty bombs' based on conventional explosives. Such a bomb, with only a few kilograms of uranium or plutonium, set off over a large urban area would kill tens of thousands of people and render the area uninhabitable. Apparently that is unthinkable, for now, but not for the future.

It is worth noting that drones are available, off-the-shelf, capable of carrying such weights. There are also hobbyists making rockets reaching heights of thousands of metres. It would not take much to make one able to take off form A and descend on B.

[cromwell]

I have to say, there is something deeply bogus about the current trouble in the middle east. The USA is the most powerful nation on earth. They have total domination of the skies over there - ISIS don't have an air force.

And they can't find ISIS and bomb them to bits? I find this very hard to believe.

So why aren't they?

[Aggers]

I have to say, there is something deeply bogus about the current trouble in the middle east. The USA is the most powerful nation on earth. They have total domination of the skies over there - ISIS don't have an air force.
And they can't find ISIS and bomb them to bits? I find this very hard to believe. So why aren't they?

That's a good point, Cromwell. Perhaps they are waiting for valid provocation.

[Workingman]

Cromwell, you are not the only one asking such awkward questions.

The Americans can take out an individual in a pick-up truck due to electronic intercepts, yet they cannot stop IS making $340m a month in oil sales. News outlets have been into Raqqa and shown buildings known to be used by IS, even its HQ, yet those buildings still stand.

All is not as it seems.