# Yay! The UK joined in the bombing of ISIS / Deash **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [December 3, 2015, 10:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302 "2015-12-03T10:20:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/121 "2015-12-05T16:30:37Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > You think Zawahiri today is as dangerous as Bin Laden in 2001? No. But al Qaeda is more than Zawahiri. Just because operations have moved from Afghanistan and Pakistan to places like Yemen doesn’t mean that al Qaeda has been defeated. And AQAP, operating out of Yemen, looks eerily similar to ObL’s operation in Afghanistan prior to 2001. Whether it’s “as dangerous” as ObL was is not really the issue. The issue is whether in your words, they can plan more than Birthday Party. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/122 "2015-12-05T17:33:41Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > 😕 Did the Anglo-American alliance seek permission from a French government for the 1944 invasion of Normandy? Actually, they did. The invasion was conducted with approval and cooperation of de Gaulle and the Free French government (and IIRC _L’Armée française de la Liberation_ formed the van of the push into Paris). ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/123 "2015-12-05T17:35:35Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > I think you’re being glib here What gave it away? 😉 But thanks for a thoughtful and thorough post in response. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/124 "2015-12-05T17:46:07Z")
> [@andros](#): > > Actually, they did. The invasion was conducted with approval and cooperation of de Gaulle and the Free French government (and IIRC _L’Armée française de la Liberation_ formed the van of the push into Paris). It wasn’t a govenment, it was a bunch of guys who went to London. FFS 😃 You might as well say Luke Skywalker was a Prime Minister. Any chance of staying on subject … ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/125 "2015-12-05T17:51:13Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > I think you’re being glib here, but what you’re saying is in fact a good point. Anyone that thinks we can simply kill our way to solving terrorism is incorrect. There’s a new documentary out you can view on Showtime On Demand called “Spymasters” that features interviews from several of the recent CIA Directors. One issue on which they all agree is that there is “no killing our way” out of the problem. Well I wish someone would show it to\*\* Ravenman\*\* cos he’s driving people nuts with his simplistic ‘blast em into the Stone Age’ gibberish. Anyone would think he’s standing as a GOP candidate. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/126 "2015-12-05T18:39:42Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Well I wish someone would show it to\*\* Ravenman\*\* cos he’s driving people nuts with his simplistic ‘blast em into the Stone Age’ gibberish. > > Anyone would think he’s standing as a GOP candidate. Following this logic, the next time you get the flu, or a cold, don’t bother taking aspirin because it’s not going to “cure” the problem. Relieving some of the symptoms is always a good idea. Once Ahmed is dead, it’s very unlikely he’ll harm anyone again. Once 1000 Ahmeds are dead, it’s even better. The math goes on… ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/127 "2015-12-05T18:53:28Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > Well I wish someone would show it to\*\* Ravenman\*\* cos he’s driving people nuts with his simplistic ‘blast em into the Stone Age’ gibberish. > > Anyone would think he’s standing as a GOP candidate. Pardon me, but I specifically never said that all we need to do is bomb them and everything will be fine. You’re making shit up and inserting it in my mouth. What has happened is that you and others have claimed, in varying words, that bombing ISIL will make them grow stronger. That is bullshit and you can’t back it up. So you’re quite obviously trying to pull the classic politician “I can’t defend what I said so I’ll change the subject by trying to attack the guy who is calling me on my nonsense.” That, you cowardly little intellectual dust mite, is the Donald’s bread and butter tactic. I’m saying that you can’t back up what you’ve argued, so you are despate to change the subject to me. You can’t explain why Al Qaeda, as lead by UBL and Zawarihi, is probably the most heavily bombed terrorist group in history, and yet it hasn’t grown stronger because of the bombings. Until you can back up your theory that “bombing them makes them stronger” you have nothing of value to add to your pathetic, whining thread. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/128 "2015-12-05T19:06:18Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > Did the UN Security Council exist in 1944? But even if we ignore that, I just don’t get this idea that we’re in some situation analogous to WWII. We’re not. This is Civl War within sovereign countries. However… if you really think the analogy is useful, let me know, and I’ll be happy to open a GD thread to hash that out. Islamic Jihadism is more than just a problem in Syria and Iraq, it may not be “truly global” but it’s pretty damn close to it. > [@](#): > > Well, I’m not really seeing anything I disagree with there. The only question is who and how. Da-esh is primarily a regional problem, and when the regional powers show little or no interest in degrading them, I’m not seeing why it’s our responsibility to do so-- especially when our track record in the region is what it is. > > I’m with Bernie Sanders on this issue. It’s one thing for the US to play a supporting role to help the regional powers deal with this issue, but we shouldn’t be the ones leading the effort. It’s a regional problem and we shouldn’t be trying to impose a solution from the outside. One of the big issues is the fundamental unwillingness of countries in Europe to engage in any meaningful military activity at all. I made mention in another thread awhile back about Trudeau withdrawing Canada from airstrikes against ISIS. The number I had on NPR was that there were four Canadian planes involved in bombing ISIS (a poster here objected to that number with a different one–but it was still a number less than ten planes and I suspect some of them are support-only planes that do not drop bombs.) I think France has maybe a dozen or so involved there now. I don’t know how many Britain was using to bomb ISIS in Iraq. We can get rough ideas by searching, but either way–the U.S. has hundreds of planes involved. Thousands of drones. It is largely our European allies who are applying the greatest international pressure on us to lead the effort against ISIS while their own military contributions (and their military spending in general) is almost criminally low. I’m super on board with a long term, deliberate, and persistent pressure being applied to NATO allies to either step up or shut up, with an understanding if they don’t step up they don’t get to complain when we decide “maybe this isn’t for us” on issues like Libya (another campaign we were largely pressured to get involved in and then ended up carrying most of the burden.) However in the short term I can’t get behind reducing the number of airstrikes on ISIS by 90% (which is about what would happen if we backed off.) I agree with you in the long term we need to quit being the only country doing heavy lifting in situations like this, and that we need to push regional allies to take the lead on issues within their region as much as possible. But in the short term I don’t believe that’s possible. The world has largely been spoiled by us being the super power on call, and it will take time to adjust to a new reality. We may or may not be moving into a multipolar world, but we certainly need to move to a world in which the United States isn’t the “military of first resort” for everything the “West” deems necessary of military attention. That shouldn’t be the job of one country, not when entities like America’s NATO allies in Europe have a GDP and population larger than America’s own. (NATO’s European membership has a combined GDP of $18.2T vs America’s $17.4T, and a population of 572m vs America’s 320m or so–these numbers include Turkey.) It’s quite shocking given the size of the block of countries involved how minimally involved in military affairs the majority of them are, and how most of them expect (to the point of leaders like Hollande reaching out to make demands of Obama) America to conduct their overseas military policy for them. But again–my only problem with this position is I don’t believe it appropriate to reduce by 90% the number of airstrikes against ISIS in the immediate term, which is the only thing a policy of American non-intervention would do. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/129 "2015-12-05T19:08:53Z")
> [@Morgenstern](#): > > Following this logic, the next time you get the flu, or a cold, don’t bother taking aspirin because it’s not going to “cure” the problem. > > Relieving some of the symptoms is always a good idea. Once Ahmed is dead, it’s very unlikely he’ll harm anyone again. Once 1000 Ahmeds are dead, it’s even better. The math goes on… And you believe this right? How old were you when the Vietcong body count was announced daily on the nightly news? That was a classic exemplar for your policy, except they were called ‘gooks’ or something then rather than ‘Ahmed’. Just keep mowing them down and blowing them to shit, what could possibly go wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/130 "2015-12-05T19:09:57Z")
People are just repeating the common trope from mid-20th century counterinsurgency that harsh tactics just create more and more support for the insurgents. Modern day drone bombing is relatively mild in harshness, and is probably not creating all that many ISIS supporters. It’s not like it’s a mystery where ISIS recruits are coming from and why, they are broadly in two categories: 1. True believers 2. Opportunists The true believers are coming from all over the world, often places that have never suffered a U.S. drone strike. The opportunists tend to be coming from the MENA area, and often are deserters of other terrorist groups who have joined ISIS specifically for better pay and because ISIS is the “dream team” so to speak, in this day and age. I just don’t see any significant evidence ISIS is swelling its ranks due to U.S. bombing, in fact every news article released about ISIS in the past month has painted a grim picture of ISIS’s position now versus before the airstrikes began. Outlets like the New York Times are simply not normally where you’d look for jingoistic war propaganda, these are papers that spent eight years bashing Bush’s running of the War on Terror. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/131 "2015-12-05T19:11:57Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > And you believe this right? > > How old were you when the Vietcong body count was announced daily on the nightly news? Please stop referencing mid-20th century counterinsurgency efforts, they bear no resemblance to the war on ISIS. The Internet, cell phones and Twitter aren’t the only things that have changed since 1965/1970 or so. Military technology and doctrine are rapidly advancing and changing in line with technology and society in general, the battle against the Viet Cong has about as much relevance to the discussion about ISIS as the First Battle of Bull Run did to the Battle of the Bulge. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/132 "2015-12-05T19:16:04Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Please stop referencing mid-20th century counterinsurgency efforts, they bear no resemblance to the war on ISIS. > > The Internet, cell phones and Twitter aren’t the only things that have changed since 1965/1970 or so. Military technology and doctrine are rapidly advancing and changing in line with technology and society in general, the battle against the Viet Cong has about as much relevance to the discussion about ISIS as the First Battle of Bull Run did to the Battle of the Bulge. It’s not my fucking policy you twat. The policy remains you bomb the shit out of them because you bomb the shit out f them: some bogus law of attrition. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/133 "2015-12-05T19:29:25Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > It’s one thing for the US to play a supporting role to help the regional powers deal with this issue, but we shouldn’t be the ones leading the effort. It’s a regional problem and we shouldn’t be trying to impose a solution from the outside. I agree with this. The U.S. and the NATO powers have a great deal of military force and surveillance that can help, but what are other countries doing? Is there a website that gives a good overview of what countries are helping, who’s got boots on the ground? Saudi Arabia and some of its neighbors have huge military budgets; they’re helping but is Saudi willing to commit any of its several combat brigades? Turkey? Russia is more interested in propping up Assad than fighting Daesh, right? Is Iran a positive help? How big of an Iraqi Army is fighting Daesh in Iraq? Wikipedia has a discussion but I’ve not read it beyond noting > [@](#): > > As of 2015, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey are openly backing the Army of Conquest, an umbrella rebel group that reportedly includes an al-Qaeda linked al-Nusra Front and another Salafi coalition known as Ahrar ash-Sham, and Faylaq Al-Sham, a coalition of Muslim Brotherhood-linked rebel groups > > … > > French television France 24 reported that the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, with perhaps 3,000 foreign jihadists among its ranks, “receives private donations from the Gulf states.” What a mess! Unless one of the regional powers cares enough to mount a massive land-war, I wonder what civilization is supposed to do about this. :dubious: ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/134 "2015-12-05T19:43:15Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > It’s not my fucking policy you twat. > > The policy remains you bomb the shit out of them because you bomb the shit out f them: some bogus law of attrition. You’re displaying ignorance of the efforts against ISIS and the VC, or you’d understand they aren’t being fought in the same way at all. Honestly you’re sort of coming off too stupid now to be given much further notice on this topic. ---
**Author:** ![Morgenstern](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Morgenstern](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgenstern)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/135 "2015-12-05T20:36:52Z")
> [@up\_the\_junction](#): > > And you believe this right? > > How old were you when the Vietcong body count was announced daily on the nightly news? > > That was a classic exemplar for your policy, except they were called ‘gooks’ or something then rather than ‘Ahmed’. > > Just keep mowing them down and blowing them to shit, what could possibly go wrong. What you clearly missed in your point is that is that, for political reasons, we were not allowed to bomb the NV/VC/enemy where it hurt. I wonder how differently that would have been if we had bombed Haiphong harbor from day one? Yes, you bomb the shit out of them over a long enough period, and pretty soon the lose their resolve if not their life. That’s a pretty fundamental principle of modern warfare. It’s game over for a dead enemy combatant. ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2015, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302/136 "2015-12-05T21:29:17Z")
You’ll have to run those examples past me because I see two discrete invasions slowly morphing into a huge region of rage stretching from Pakistan and Afghanistan to Syria, through Iraq to the Gulf. And every single bomb and drone attack makes that amorphous whole more certain. The USA is not even in charge of a coherent, applicable policy. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/yay-the-uk-joined-in-the-bombing-of-isis-deash/739302.md?page=6)