Syria watch...

[emordnilap]

My guess, with a general election looming, that if ISIS beheads this British hostage that we are heading towards direct British military action against ISIS. I think Cameron will calculate that the engagement of British forces, at least in the air, will be an election-winner in those circumstances.

WWIII

[biffvernon]

Follow the Money; Follow the Oil
How the West Created the Islamic State
by NAFEEZ AHMED

http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/09/12/ ... mic-state/

[Mr. Fox]

Great article, Biff.

And in the same month that al-Qaeda’s control of Syria’s main oil regions in Deir al-Zour and Hasaka was confirmed, the EU voted to ease an oil embargo on Syria to allow oil to be sold on international markets from these very al-Qaeda controlled oil fields. European companies would be permitted to buy crude oil and petroleum products from these areas

---8<---

Early last month, a tanker carrying over a million barrels in crude oil from northern Iraq’s Kurdish region arrived at the Texas Gulf of Mexico. The oil had been refined in the Iraqi Kurdish region before being pumped through a new pipeline from the KRG area ending up at Ceyhan, Turkey, where it was then loaded onto the tanker for shipping to the US. Baghdad’s efforts to stop the oil sale on the basis of its having national jurisdiction were rebuffed by American courts.

---8<---

Among the many oil and gas firms active in the KRG capital, Erbil, are ExxonMobil and Chevron. They are drilling in the region for oil under KRG contracts, though operations have been halted due to the crisis. No wonder Steve Coll writes in the New Yorker that Obama’s air strikes and arms supplies to the Kurds – notably not to Baghdad – effectively amount to “the defense of an undeclared Kurdish oil state whose sources of geopolitical appeal – as a long-term, non-Russian supplier of oil and gas to Europe, for example – are best not spoken of in polite or naïve company.” The Kurds are now busy working to “quadruple” their export capacity, while US policy has increasingly shifted toward permitting Kurdish exports – a development that would have major ramifications for Iraq’s national territorial integrity.

*sigh*

[biffvernon]

Non-eco Sunday musing...
So Obama/Cameron are declaring war on the "barbaric" ISIL ?
Like everybody else I recognise and am horrified by the nightmarish inhumanity unleashed by these religious extremists.
BUT...
It seems after they beheaded 3 westerners, we are now seeking to enter into an unholy alliance with another fundamentalist Islamic dictatorship which has beheaded "only" 22 people in the last 3 months ie Saudi Arabia. Hmmmm... I struggle to find the logic in this.
Meanwhile US/UK drones have been carrying out barbaric extrajudicial murders for years via their drone bombers in numerous Islamic countries (Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq), which not only behead their victims but often disembowel, blind, dismember and burn horrifically the skin of their sometimes conscious victims, not to mention the crimes carried out with US/UK weapons on innocent Palestinians.
And this horrific barbarism that is carried out in our name is also not just inflicted on those our masters have decided to murder without trial but also on their innocent wives, children, wedding parties, friends and elderly pensionsers.
When Joe Biden invoked the ridiculous religious imagery of these ISIL barbarians burning in Hell, maybe he might pause before using such inflammatory imagery and place himself in the minds of some of the 30,000 volunteers who have flocked to ISIL and ask himself what has created the conditions for such enthusiastic support for this barbarism?
And finally let us not forget that our own Prime Minister holds direct blood responsibility for the creation of ISIL, through his enthusiastic support for Blair's illegal disastrous invasion. They were warned by our own secret service that such a blood thirsty shock and awe invasion would lead to the creation of thousands of militant Islamic youths - just as the bloody acts by the British Army did on Bloody Sunday did for the IRA.
And many of those pontificating this weekend on Scotland (Blair/Brown/Reid/Prescott) defending the "wonders" of what we can do together in the UK, used the armed forces of Scotland to carry out these vile invasions which led directly to the creation of ISIL.
So maybe on this Sunday, we should decide that massacring the volunteers that we recuited for ISIL, may not be the best way to try and close the nightmarish Pandora's Box opened by Blair/Cameron/Bush?
We might use the benefit of hindsight and decide that killing more Muslims might not be the best way to halt the fire of religious extremism set on light by our murderous invasions?
And maybe we might on this Sunday think that acts of contritution and restitution might be more appropriate response to the consequences that our barbarism has left as a legacy to humanity?
Create a peaceful Sunday my friends.
Donnachadh x

[biffvernon]

And from Nafeez Ahmed: https://medium.com/@NafeezAhmed/how-the ... fa6f83bc1f

[3rdRock]

David Cameron has said Britain is ready to "play its part" in fighting Islamic State, which he called an "evil against which the whole world must unite".

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29357116

There'll be no boots on the ground this time.

Yeh, right.

[PS_RalphW]

The US is now bombing oil refineries under the control of the IS. How long before they bomb the wells also?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%E1%BA%BFn_Tre

[fuzzy]

The US is now bombing oil refineries under the control of the IS. How long before they bomb the wells also?

seems pretty strong evidence that the Saudi princes need oil at $100+
to balance the books

[Little John]

We really are now unmistakably in the early skirmishes of WW3 between East and West.

[Mr. Fox]

The US is now bombing oil refineries under the control of the IS. How long before they bomb the wells also?

seems pretty strong evidence that the Saudi princes need oil at $100+ to balance the books

Bit of a dilemma, then, for anyone seeking to destroy the Russian economy.

[3rdRock]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-29370515

The Iraqi government's request for support in its fight with Islamic State means UK air strikes in the country would be legal, Number 10 has said.

A summary of the government's position said the call "provides a clear and unequivocal legal basis for deployment of UK forces".

It's because I is IS, init?

[RenewableCandy]

That's a French journalist.

[3rdRock]

Je suis vraiment désolé.

[biffvernon]

I've not always agreed with everything Simon Jenkins has written but he's spot on with this article.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... en-gesture

[biffvernon]

And a further aid to understanding what's going on:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/09/26/ ... cupy-iraq/

As the US, Britain and France are maneuvering to escalate military action in Iraq and Syria against the ‘Islamic State’ in an operation slated to last “years,” authorities are simultaneously calling for new measures to tighten security at home to fend off the danger of jihadists targeting western homelands. Intervention abroad, policymakers are arguing, must be tied to increased domestic surveillance and vigilance. But US and British military experts warn that officials have overlooked the extent to which western policies in the region have not just stoked the rise of IS, but will continue to inflame the current crisis. The consequences could be dire – while governments exploit the turmoil in the Middle East to justify an effective re-invasion of Iraq along with intensified powers of surveillance and control – the end result could well be accelerated regional violence and increasing criminalization of Muslims and activists.