Iran

[Collymore]

12 minutes ago, The Syrup said:

There were a few reputable airlines taking off from Tehran on their normal schedule around this time, the likes of Qatar, Lufthansa, Aeroflot, Turkish airlines. This Ukrainian flight was delayed by an hour though. Maybe the Iranian military saw the plane, they weren't expecting it and got itchy trigger fingers whilst expecting a US retaliation. I wouldn't get on a plane in that situation tbf

I just don't see how this mistake can be made. The plane will have had its transponder on, it's obviously come from the airport as it's right by it and climbing.

 

Not only that.....  as if the US would send a plane at 8000ft over Tehran! That makes absolutely no tactical sense. If the US had responded it would have been through a volley of cruise missiles from a far surely?

 

 

 

 

[The Syrup]

4 minutes ago, Collymore said:

I just don't see how this mistake can be made. The plane will have had its transponder on, it's obviously come from the airport as it's right by it and climbing.

 

Not only that as if the US would send a plane at 8000ft over Tehran! That makes absolutely no tactical sense. If the US had responded it would have been through a volley of cruise missiles from afar surely?

 

 

 

 

Agreed. I read it was a lot lower than 8000ft as well. It was 8000ft above sea level, but Tehran is about 3000 ft above sea level so the plane was at about 5000 ft off the ground and only a few minutes after taking off. Trump would have bombarded Iran with cruise missiles if he was to retaliate.

 

imagine if Iran had shot down a Russian or Chinese plane instead

[LiberalFox]

I feel like we won't ever find out exactly what happened. The US downed an Iranian airliner many years ago in a similar **** up, not to mention the time a US missile battery took out an RAF plane returning to base in the Iraq war. End of the day these people get a few seconds to make a decision, for whatever reason the operators thought they were engaging a hostile target. (assuming it's what happened but I find it hard to consider an alternative)

[Guesty]

19 minutes ago, Collymore said:

I just don't see how this mistake can be made. The plane will have had its transponder on, it's obviously come from the airport as it's right by it and climbing.

 

Not only that.....  as if the US would send a plane at 8000ft over Tehran! That makes absolutely no tactical sense. If the US had responded it would have been through a volley of cruise missiles from a far surely?

 

 

 

 

Sometimes things like this can just be human error. There was plane shot down over Ukraine. The last time it kicked off between Iran and the USA the USA shot down a passenger plane.

 

All it needs is for some trigger happy inexperienced person to panic and make a mistake.

 

Makes no sense for Iran to shoot down a passenger jet either. But who knows...

[The Syrup]

1 minute ago, Guesty said:

 

Makes no sense for Iran to shoot down a passenger jet either. But who knows...

Especially one with mostly Iranians or Iranian / Canadian dual citizenship on board

[leicsmac]

7 hours ago, MattP said:

My opinions on Trump are here to see and are written down, go back to 2016 and I wrote that I wouldn't vote for him.

 

Would I vote for him this year? Likely I would. Almost certainly if the modern woke left is representative of what will replace it.

 

I think you might be in for some disappointment later this year, the Dems seem to think bringing more BAME voters will win it for them, dont be surprised if you get a similar cultural shock to what Labour got last month.

Off-topic here, but I think a lot of it comes down to who gets the Dem nomination and what exactly happens in the next 10 months...it's a long time in politics, after all. I guess we'll see - I'm not putting money down either way.

 

 

6 hours ago, SO1 said:

I live on the planet Earth. I want the world to be a better place for all. Thanks for trying to understand the larger picture.

That's pretty much where I am at, too. Not out of any noble spiritual sense, but out of practical thought that knows what the Earth can do with or without our help and that eventually it will be one world or no world, so humans had better be ready for that choice when it comes.

 

 

6 hours ago, Kopfkino said:

Ah yes 'better' a wonderful word in the unsubstantiated facile abstract but utterly meaningless in the concrete. 

 

We can all do, want, and be better it doesn't require the weird pathological self-loathing of the significant portion of people I was referring. I wish US MENA policy to be 'better', e.g actually have a strategy, but I don't have to just slag the US off to make that point. Tbh I think its all just some odd form of chauvinism where people think the US can operate in a vacuum, just doing and being 'good', completely immune to the sequence of trade-offs that is the functioning of the world. 

It is rather unquantifiable, true (though I'm not going to take all the blame for seeking it - it's the flag-wavers who insist on this great "doing the best" moral standard for the US, too, only they think it's obviously being met).

 

I think there is a pretty fine line between self-examination and self-loathing, and while the latter is unhealthy the former is pretty much necessary IMO - I wish there was more of it because there isn't really enough. WRT the last sentence, I'd agree with the idea that political decisions are never made in a vacuum and there will always be trade-offs...but again, my post (as well as the original point directed at Matt) wasn't really aimed at folks that use some nuance to examine the situation, rather those who insist on dividing international relations into straight black/white, good/evil dichotomies and so believe that most anything their "side" does is justified because if they're on it, it must be the right side, by definition. And that isn't a strawman - those people exist both on here and out in the wider world and possess considerable political power.

[leicsmac]

On the above, Marjane Satrapi summing things up better than I ever could:

 

[WigstonWanderer]

This will probably quite rightly be viewed as a conspiracy theory, and I am loathe to even hint that Trump may know what he’s doing, but I’ve been wondering if the assassination of the General was agreed beforehand with sections of the Iranian government.

 

It could suit some more moderate sections of the government to remove someone who was an obstacle to better relations with the US, particularly when the country is suffering economically from US sanctions. The whole thing could’ve been choreographed and would explain why there were no casualties in the Iranian attack, other than the air liner that surely has to be a mistake anyway.

 

Just a thought.

[Jattdogg]

3 hours ago, WigstonWanderer said:

This will probably quite rightly be viewed as a conspiracy theory, and I am loathe to even hint that Trump may know what he’s doing, but I’ve been wondering if the assassination of the General was agreed beforehand with sections of the Iranian government.

 

It could suit some more moderate sections of the government to remove someone who was an obstacle to better relations with the US, particularly when the country is suffering economically from US sanctions. The whole thing could’ve been choreographed and would explain why there were no casualties in the Iranian attack, other than the air liner that surely has to be a mistake anyway.

 

Just a thought.

Could be....and given how trudeau has said it could have been accidental so soon with 0 evidence (unless he knows something). Who knows. All i know is that governments and religios regimes are the real problem. Bet you anyone of us could have a coffee with a regular dude from Iran and end up being good mates.

 

Take religion and government away and we are more alike.

[Izzy]

On 08/01/2020 at 13:31, Costock_Fox said:

Shock, it’s clearly been hit by a missile.

They should just make planes out of the same material those black boxes are made of then they'd be indestructible 

 

[Jon the Hat]

3 hours ago, Izzy said:

They should just make planes out of the same material those black boxes are made of then they'd be indestructible 

 

We could just go everywhere by tank.  Sorted!!

[VLC86]

1 hour ago, Jon the Hat said:

We could just go everywhere by tank.  Sorted!!

Flying tanks invented. Be right back, just off to count my billions.

[Izzy]

At least they've admitted it now

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-51073621

 

Iran has admitted "unintentionally" shooting down a Ukrainian passenger jet, killing all 176 people on board.

 

[leicsmac]

Well, that adds to the USSR "unintentionally" shooting two different Korean airliners, the US "unintentionally" shooting down an Iranian airliner, and the Russian separatists "unintentionally" shooting down a Malaysian airliner (though there's still all denial going on there).

 

Amazing how all of these "unintentional" events add up.

[WigstonWanderer]

20 minutes ago, Izzy said:

At least they've admitted it now

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-51073621

 

Iran has admitted "unintentionally" shooting down a Ukrainian passenger jet, killing all 176 people on board.

 

Tragic

[st albans fox]

41 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Well, that adds to the USSR "unintentionally" shooting two different Korean airliners, the US "unintentionally" shooting down an Iranian airliner, and the Russian separatists "unintentionally" shooting down a Malaysian airliner (though there's still all denial going on there).

 

Amazing how all of these "unintentional" events add up.

Adds up to thousands of innocent deaths .........

 

the point on this particular tragedy is that Iran were at heightened alert in that specific time period and it’s unforgivable that they were allowing civilian flights to be taking off if they knew they could be sanctioning the launch of any missiles to intercept potential hostile actions  from the USA 

 

I think this is also another illustration of the value of ‘ordinary’ human life in this part of the world ........... I guarantee that no senior iranian govt officials at would be flying anywhere that night 

[Guest MattP]

How long before Trump gets the blame?

[Collymore]

Hopefully a reality check for the region and just emphasises the point that it's the innocent that suffer in these wars. 

[leicsmac]

21 minutes ago, st albans fox said:

Adds up to thousands of innocent deaths .........

 

the point on this particular tragedy is that Iran were at heightened alert in that specific time period and it’s unforgivable that they were allowing civilian flights to be taking off if they knew they could be sanctioning the launch of any missiles to intercept potential hostile actions  from the USA 

 

I think this is also another illustration of the value of ‘ordinary’ human life in this part of the world ........... I guarantee that no senior iranian govt officials at would be flying anywhere that night 

And in many or even most other parts of the world, mores the pity.

 

 

20 minutes ago, MattP said:

How long before Trump gets the blame?

No-one light a match, awful lot of straw around here.

[Charl91]

On 09/01/2020 at 17:32, MattP said:

 

 

Would I vote for him this year? Likely I would. Almost certainly if the modern woke left is representative of what will replace it.

 

You sure like to whip yourself into a bit of a frenzy about this imaginary threat of the "woke left".

 

It reminds me of a conversation I had with my father the other day, when he was talking about how ridiculous it is that people identify as 50+ different genders. So I asked him how many people he'd met that identify as one of these "strange" genders - the answer was of course, zero. And that sums it up really. There's a lot of, dare I say, "project fear" in the media about 'woke' people, and people love to share outrageous things they've read on twitter. But the reality of it is, how many of these people do you actually meet in real life? For most people, I imagine the answer is 'very few'. 

 

I mean, Jesus Christ, imagine wanting to vote for Trump because the media has you worried about "woke people". The right wing media has done it's job well - people are genuinely worried about things that have literally 0 impact on their day to day life (and often things that don't reflect reality). However I am starting to come to the conclusion that most right-wing people already know this; they just don't try too hard to see past the misinformation, as it's an easy strawman to justify supporting someone who's clearly morally bankrupt. "Haha, stupid left-wing people wanting the right to marry trees. Trump wouldn't stand for it". In reality, most people who oppose Trump don't define themselves as "woke", they're just normal people with a conscience, but of course, they're a bit more difficult to attack, so let's just focus on the Loony 0.1%.

 

After everything that's gone on, and everything we know about him, anyone who would still willingly vote for Trump, is either someone with very low intelligence (which is somewhat forgivable - I'm not exactly the brightest button myself), or an intelligent person with 0 mortal fortitude (which is not). And I'm not saying that the American left-wing candidates are good, and I could certainly understand not voting for them. But actually voting for 'The Donald' of your own volition? At least in Russia you have the excuse of being shot for not voting the right way.

 

And before people say "ItS LanGuage LiKe ThAt ThAt MEaNs PeOpLe VoTeD for TrUmP", I don't care. Clearly if you're still inclined to support Trump, you are not persuaded by reason, logic or just basic human decency. You're already a lost cause, so it doesn't really matter.

 

/Rant

 

TL:DR - Trump Sucks. Voting for him is bad. 

[Guest MattP]

21 hours ago, Charl91 said:

You sure like to whip yourself into a bit of a frenzy about this imaginary threat of the "woke left".

 

It reminds me of a conversation I had with my father the other day, when he was talking about how ridiculous it is that people identify as 50+ different genders. So I asked him how many people he'd met that identify as one of these "strange" genders - the answer was of course, zero. And that sums it up really. There's a lot of, dare I say, "project fear" in the media about 'woke' people, and people love to share outrageous things they've read on twitter. But the reality of it is, how many of these people do you actually meet in real life? For most people, I imagine the answer is 'very few'. 

 

I mean, Jesus Christ, imagine wanting to vote for Trump because the media has you worried about "woke people". The right wing media has done it's job well - people are genuinely worried about things that have literally 0 impact on their day to day life (and often things that don't reflect reality). However I am starting to come to the conclusion that most right-wing people already know this; they just don't try too hard to see past the misinformation, as it's an easy strawman to justify supporting someone who's clearly morally bankrupt. "Haha, stupid left-wing people wanting the right to marry trees. Trump wouldn't stand for it". In reality, most people who oppose Trump don't define themselves as "woke", they're just normal people with a conscience, but of course, they're a bit more difficult to attack, so let's just focus on the Loony 0.1%.

 

After everything that's gone on, and everything we know about him, anyone who would still willingly vote for Trump, is either someone with very low intelligence (which is somewhat forgivable - I'm not exactly the brightest button myself), or an intelligent person with 0 mortal fortitude (which is not). And I'm not saying that the American left-wing candidates are good, and I could certainly understand not voting for them. But actually voting for 'The Donald' of your own volition? At least in Russia you have the excuse of being shot for not voting the right way.

 

And before people say "ItS LanGuage LiKe ThAt ThAt MEaNs PeOpLe VoTeD for TrUmP", I don't care. Clearly if you're still inclined to support Trump, you are not persuaded by reason, logic or just basic human decency. You're already a lost cause, so it doesn't really matter.

 

/Rant

 

TL:DR - Trump Sucks. Voting for him is bad. 

But it's not imagerinery, it's only that if you aren't paying attention.

 

We live in a country now where people like Julie Bindell and Germaine Greer are "no platformed" from academic institutions because of that woke left, ignoring that could have appalling ramifications long term for free speech.

 

As for the old "thick" argument - different people have different personal circumstance, I wouldn't blame anyone on the rust belt for voting for Trump, let alone call them thick. Those who wanted a immediately short term boom economically got it right as well. Maybe people just aren't as concerned about process and statesmanlike behaviour as you are?

 

I mean in my own head there can be no one thicker than the people who voted to make Jeremy Corbyn the Prime Minister last month, but if you look long and hard you'll eventually find out why. Many of them aren't actually thick, they just either realised that was the only way to reverse Brexit or they hate the Tories so much they'll literally vote for any opposition that can dislodge them.

 

Weirdly a lot of those who did that for that precise reason are often the ones who criticise Americans for doing exactly the same thing in reverse. Then somehow they dont realise they are doing it.

[leicsmac]

31 minutes ago, MattP said:

But it's not imagerinery, it's only that if you aren't paying attention.

 

We live in a country now where people like Julie Bindell and Germaine Greer are "no platformed" from academic institutions because of that woke left, ignoring that could have appalling ramifications long term for free speech.

 

As for the old "thick" argument - different people have different personal circumstance, I wouldn't blame anyone on the rust belt for voting for Trump, let alone call them thick. Those who wanted a immediately short term boom economically got it right as well. Maybe people just aren't as concerned about process and statesmanlike behaviour as you are?

 

I mean in my own head there can be no one thicker than the people who voted to make Jeremy Corbyn the Prime Minister last month, but if you look long and hard you'll eventually find out why. Many of them aren't actually thick, they just either realised that was the only way to reverse Brexit or they hate the Tories so much they'll literally vote for any opposition that can dislodge them.

 

Weirdly a lot of those who did that for that precise reason are often the ones who criticise Americans for doing exactly the same thing in reverse. Then somehow they dont realise they are doing it.

TBH I wouldn't call them "thick", either.

 

Afraid for themselves and those around them, and driven by that fear to make decisions that might seem reasonable in the short term but may well be terrible for them in the long run...I think that is more accurate. Fear makes people make questionable decisions. Of course, a lot of those same decisions end up not just affecting them, which is where the problem lies.

[leicsmac]

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-51077897

 

Diplomatic immunity is sometimes abused, but the UK ambassador hasn't done anything wrong here, much less something that would lead to a violation of that aforementioned diplomatic immunity. Stupid from the Iranian government.

[Guest MattP]

12 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

TBH I wouldn't call them "thick", either.

 

Afraid for themselves and those around them, and driven by that fear to make decisions that might seem reasonable in the short term but may well be terrible for them in the long run...I think that is more accurate. Fear makes people make questionable decisions. Of course, a lot of those same decisions end up not just affecting them, which is where the problem lies.

A lot of people have been completely right to have been voting in fear of what governments would do to their industry and what mass immigration would do to their wages and the almost sudden changes they saw in their communities.

 

Just because something is good for someone in London, Cambridge, New York or California doesn't mean it's also good in Bishop Auckland, Bolsover, Michigan or Wisconsin.

 

Doesn't mean they were wrong to vote that way either.

 

One of the reasons it's so important now that the Tories rebalance our economy and send so much money to the midlands and the north is to show those people who voted to leave the EU were correct to do so after consecutive governments of all colours ignored them (same goes for the EU as well)  - sometimes the only way to get noticed is at the ballot box, no matter how stupid the well off and "educated" think you are.

[leicsmac]

1 minute ago, MattP said:

A lot of people have been completely right to have been voting in fear of what governments would do to their industry and what mass immigration would do to their wages and the almost sudden changes they saw in their communities.

 

Just because something is good for someone in London, Cambridge, New York or California doesn't mean it's also good in Bishop Auckland, Bolsover, Michigan or Wisconsin.

 

Doesn't mean they were wrong to vote that way either.

 

One of the reasons it's so important now that the Tories rebalance our economy and send so much money to the midlands and the north is to show those people who voted to leave the EU were correct to do so after consecutive governments of all colours ignored them (same goes for the EU as well)  - sometimes the only way to get noticed is at the ballot box, no matter how stupid the well off and "educated" think you are.

I think the idea of whether someone is "right" or not based on their thoughts and subsequent voting record wrt industry changes, immigration etc is pretty subjective (barring cases where such thought is very clearly based on outright discrimination or hatred). There definitely does need to be more localised oversight when it comes to such decision-making because you're right in saying that people are different and have different priorities and different needs. Time will tell if the Tories will hold their end of the bargain when it comes to attending to the most needy in the North and Midlands.

 

However, there are some votes based on fear that result in politicians being elected that then make decisions that are bad long term for everyone. Not so much in the UK (right now anyway), but elsewhere. And you know what I am getting at here.